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Find a diet plan that suits your lifestyle

Finding the right dietary plan doesn't have to be a difficult process. We'll assess your personal tastes and preferences while keeping your lifestyle in mind. We can assign various eating styles, including:

We'll also teach you how to track your macros.

Turn to Essential Elements for nutritional counseling services. Call 970-829-1867 today to schedule a consultation.

Intermittent Fasting

There are a few ways to do intermittent fasting, but they all involve alternating periods of fasting and eating. Some research suggests this may have benefits beyond weight loss, like improved brain and heart health.

What is Intermittent Fasting (IF)?

Intermittent fasting (IF) is an eating pattern that cycles between periods of fasting and eating. It doesn't specify which foods you should eat but rather when you should eat them. In this respect, it's not a diet in the conventional sense but more accurately described as an eating pattern. Common IF methods involve daily 16-hour fasts or fasting for 24 hours, twice per week. Fasting has been a practice throughout human evolution. Ancient hunter-gatherers didn't have supermarkets, refrigerators, or food available year-round. Sometimes they couldn't find anything to eat. As a result, humans evolved to be able to function without food for extended periods of time. In fact, fasting from time to time is more natural than always eating 3-4 meals per day.

Intermittent Fasting Methods

There are several different ways of doing IF - all of which involve splitting the day or week into eating and fasting periods. During the fasting periods, you eat either very little or nothing at all.

These are the most popular methods:

• The 16/8 method: This involves skipping breakfast and restricting your daily eating period to 8 hours, such as 12-8 p.m. Then you fast for 16 hours in between.
• East-Stop-Eat: This involves fasting for 24 hours, once or twice a week, for example by not eating from dinner one day until dinner the next day.
• The 5:2 diet: With this method, you consume only 500-600 calories on two nonconsecutive days of the week but eat normally the other 5 days.

By reducing your calorie intake, all these methods can cause weight loss if you don't compensate by eating much more during the eating periods. Many people find the 16/8 method to be the simplest, most sustainable, and easiest to stick to.

How it Affects Your Cells and Hormones

• Human Growth Hormone: The levels of growth hormone skyrocket, increasing as much as 5-fold. This has benefits for fat loss and muscle gain, to name a few.
• Insulin: Insulin sensitivity improves, and levels of insulin drop dramatically. Lower insulin levels make stored body fat more accessible.
• Cellular repair: When fasted, your cells initiate cellular repair processes. This includes autophagy, where cells digest and remove old and dysfunctional proteins that build up inside cells.
• Gene expression: There are changes in the function of genes related to longevity and protection against disease.
  

Health Benefits

Many studies have shown that IF can have powerful benefits for weight control and the health of your body and brain. It may even help you live longer.

• Weight loss: IF can help you lose weight and belly fat, without having to consciously restrict calories.
• Insulin resistance: IF can reduce insulin resistance, lowering blood sugar by 3-6% and fasting insulin levels by 20-31%, which should protect against type 2 diabetes.
• Inflammation: Some studies show reductions in markers of inflammation, a key driver of many chronic diseases.
• Cancer: Animal studies suggest that intermittent fasting may prevent cancer.
• Brain Health: IF increases the brain hormone BDNF and may aid the growth of new nerve cells. It may also protect against Alzheimer's disease.
• Anti-aging: IF can extend lifespan in rats. Studies showed that fasted rats lived 36-83% longer.
  

Frequently Asked Questions