Time restricted eating involves only consuming food for a certain number of hours per day; usually less than 12 hours. This means that if you eat your last bite at 8 pm you do not eat anything again until 8 am. When you are practicing a fasting diet or implementing long term changes to your eating behaviours the use of time restricted eating is beneficial and easier to implement than you think. I will use myself as an example, because I have managed to achieve this many days of the week without even knowing what is it….
Monday
Monday mornings are chaotic, everyone is rushing around trying to get their gear together for school and I am frantically preparing for the work week – I haven’t eaten breakfast on a Monday for years. This doesn’t bother me anymore. At 7 am I make myself a skinny piccolo (26 calories) to get my brain started and I don’t eat anything until I have a break in my schedule at 11:30. 15 hours fast achieved without really noticing because I am too busy.
Tuesday/Thursday
These are my 2 big workout days. I do high intensity exercise at 6pm for an hour. The intensity of this workout means that I do not eat anything after 3 pm, otherwise I will feel nauseous (this is serious exercise people). 3 pm is therefore the start time of the fast. On these 2 days I make sure I have breakfast in the morning, and then I have a late lunch. Breakfast time is generally 7:30 am, that’s 16 1/2 hours of fasting. The intensity of the workouts are high enough that appetite is effectively shut down – I drink a post workout muscle recovery formula to assist in recovery and reduce muscle pain the next day (20 calories).
Saturday
On Saturday I will either be at a beautiful farmers market somewhere selling my wares or at Saturday sport for the kids – frantic getting ready is generally involved in both of these so just like Monday, I usually will only have my tiny little coffees until lunch.
4 days of the week I manage to do time restricted eating without really trying, or even noticing that I did it. I will admit that on Wednesday and Friday mornings I am generally very hungry, as my body cries out for nourishment after those workouts (hello berry bowls!).
There is considerable evidence emerging that having only 2 meals a day with one or two 100 calorie snacks in between provides optimal health outcomes, which ties in perfectly with the proponents of time restricted eating. It’s worth looking at your weekly schedule to see how you can incorporate this into your life – 4 days of the week is a pretty good start!
