Intermittent Fasting: Tips for Success in Blackburn

Many folks in Blackburn have tried intermittent fasting as a way to manage their weight or support healthy insulin and cholesterol levels. But truth be told, most don’t stick with it long enough to see real benefits.

The good news is that there’s more than one way to succeed at intermittent fasting—and the efforts are truly worth it. Keep these do’s and don’ts in mind as you incorporate intermittent fasting into your Blackburn lifestyle.

What is Intermittent Fasting?

First off, let’s make sure we understand what intermittent fasting is. Put simply, intermittent fasting is an eating pattern that cycles between periods of eating and fasting each day. The idea is to go longer stretches of time (say, 16 hours, a lot of which take place while you’re sleeping) without eating. This allows your body to tap into stored fat for energy and supports healthy blood sugar levels.

With that in mind, let’s start with tips that will help you get the best results from intermittent fasting.

Do:

Start slow. You wouldn’t go from being a couch potato to a marathon runner overnight, right? The same principle applies to intermittent fasting. While some folks can go full cold turkey, it’s often easier to start with small, more achievable goals like not snacking after dinner or eating breakfast an hour later. Gradually work toward a longer fasting period as your body adjusts.

Pick the intermittent fasting schedule that works for you. Many find great results with the 16:8 method, meaning you fast for 16 hours between dinner and your first meal the next day. For instance, you might eat all your meals between noon and 8 p.m., and then fast until noon the next day.

Feel free to adjust your start and end times to fit your Blackburn lifestyle. If you need to eat earlier, try starting your fast at 5 or 6 p.m. If a 16-hour fast isn’t feasible, cut back to 12 or 14 hours. The key is to find a fasting length that works for you in the long run. Experiment with different schedules to find the one that you’ll be able to maintain.

Drink lots of water. It’s good to give our bodies breaks from food, but not water. Staying hydrated helps our bodies function better overall and can help stave off cravings by making us feel fuller.

Eat wholesome meals. No matter the length of your eating window, make sure to fill it with fruits, vegetables, healthy fats, lean proteins, and fiber. Wholesome foods provide the nutrients you need daily and make it easier to fast. Foods high in sugar and simple carbohydrates often leave you feeling hungry sooner, leading to cravings.

Keep an IF journal. When first starting intermittent fasting, keep track of what you eat, the various schedules you try, and how you feel each day. This helps you tailor a long-term plan suited to your needs.

Don’t:

Binge during your eating window. Just because you’ve fasted for 16 hours doesn’t give you a free pass to eat everything in sight for the next eight hours. The quality of the food you eat still matters. Focus on wholesome foods and avoid high-calorie items that aren’t filling.

Also, avoid swinging to the opposite extreme: not eating enough. Intermittent fasting isn’t about restricting calories but rather about timing your meals to allow your body to tap into stored fat for energy.

Give up too soon. To start seeing the benefits of intermittent fasting—and there are many!—you’ll need to stick with it for at least 30 days. Once your body adapts to the new eating schedule, that’s when you’ll really see results.

If you find intermittent fasting too challenging, try a shorter fasting period rather than giving up altogether. Once you’re comfortable with 12 or 14 hours a day, you might find it easier to extend that window to 16 hours, maximizing the benefits of intermittent fasting.

Expect perfection. You don’t have to be perfect at intermittent fasting to succeed. A bad day won’t erase your progress. A late-night dinner with friends won’t set you back indefinitely. Life happens, and the key is to aim for consistency over perfection. As long as you stick to intermittent fasting correctly most of the time, you’ll be on the right track.

When Willpower Isn’t Enough

When it comes down to it, willpower alone may not be enough to succeed at intermittent fasting long-term. Luckily, with a little help, intermittent fasting becomes much more manageable.

Two Unicity products—Unimate and Balance—can aid in extending the time between dinner and your first meal the next day. Unimate, a yerba mate drink, contains up to 10 times the amount of chlorogenic acid (the feel-good, “get-up-and-go” component) found in premium coffee. It helps boost mood, supports mental stamina, focus, and motivation, and helps fend off cravings between meals.

Balance is a pre-meal drink with a patented fiber matrix that includes bioactive plant compounds, polysaccharides, and micronutrients. The fiber matrix is designed to mitigate the impact of excess carbohydrates and cholesterol, and the soluble fibers help curb your appetite.

We call these two products + intermittent fasting the Feel Great program because, well, people feel great when they stick to this method. Learn more about the Feel Great program and see how it can help you get the most out of intermittent fasting in Blackburn, without making you work harder for it.