Comments on: Real Life Extension: Caloric Restriction or Intermittent Fasting? (Part 2)

By: mary titus

mary titus — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 19:32:22 +0000

Hi David Majercin,
Yes , I agree,you must make certain that your diet supports your fasting regime. If you are taking in proper nutrients, you should not need medication. Your body is perfectly capable of running itself quite well in nutrition is optimal.

By: David Majercin

David Majercin — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 18:46:08 +0000

Low calorie diets and fasting have interested me for many years. There is a lot of studies that correlate longevity with low cal diets. One of the main researchers I have found to be helpful was Edward Howell M.D. and his work on enzymes.

Some of the studies on animals show that the ones who eat raw food diets versus completely cooked or enzymes-less foods have longer lives and less disease. Animals on the all cooked food diets had more pathology in various organs like their pancreas.

Dr Howell hypothesized that when a diet that included a large percentage of raw food, the naturally occurring food enzymes would break down a lot of the food eaten, so that the pancreas would not have to work as hard to produce enzymes to digest food. Dr. Howell thought that the digestive system may be over worked from having to digest such a large percentage of our total calories. It was thought that the digestive system might rob nutrients from other systems just to keep up with the over worked system.

Our eating habits have radically changed with modern food processing were enzymes are taken out of food to give longer self life. Dr Howell thought that it was impractical for the average person to eat a raw food diet, so he created the 1st digestive enzyme supplement to digest the food before it reaches the small intestine to signal pancreatic enzymes.

After studying Howell`s work and others and seeing my own blood under a microscope before and after eating meals with and without enzymes (not pretty), I have been a big believer in daily enzyme usage.

I also think the total caloric load, quality of the nutrients, and health of the persons digestive system influences the amount of free radical chemicals created from food that potentially creates disease in the body and possibly shortens life span.

By: David Majercin

David Majercin — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 18:05:34 +0000

It used to be a very popular part of detoxifying and health regimes to incorporate fasting. However the newer approach is to have adequate amounts of amino acids, minerals, and essential fatty acids to drive the natural detoxification mechanisms in the body.

With a lack of essential nutrients, more toxins like various heavy metals are retained versus being shed. In addition to ensuring that patients have adequate nutritional intake, it also can be very important to use natural medicines to facilitate detoxification pathways from the liver, intestines, or lymphatic system.

By: mary titus

mary titus — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 23:13:51 +0000

I eat a high fat diet. I was already doing low carb. I increased my fat intake. If I had my druthers, I druther eat one meal a day all the time but right now, I will throw in a couple of days a week where I do eat one meal. By far, keeping your diet rich in fat and protein and all the nutrients that comes with that is ideal. This is just my opinion but fasting is ketogenic so why not fire the ketogenic fires with ketogenic fuels namely fats. I know you are speculating that I eat a vat of fat which is untrue. I just make sure that I have some form of fat ( butter, cream, coconut oil,omega 3s, MCT oil ) throughout my day, even while I am fasting.

By: Kenn Hallstensen

Kenn Hallstensen — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 15:19:35 +0000

I think a modify version of IF works – and perhaps is the best way of eating. If you look at for example Hurtado and Hill, two anthropologists who have lived among the Ache people in Paraguay, they find that they ate ca. 95 percent of the food in evening. The women maybe a bit less. The same have been reported by Krogh and Krogh 100 years ago. I have been well trained my whole life, doing competition both in bodybuilding and powerlifting, but two years ago I decided to get mye daily, off-season fat percent down from 12 to 9. The only thing I did, was to start eat 60-75 percent between 18-21 (although just one meal), and the rest in two small meals – 08:00 and 13:00-14:00. Just in 2-3 months I reach my goal.

If we look at the studies from Mattson et al and Varady et al, it’s perhaps better to eat something every day on IF, and a high fat diet is better than a low fat diet.