Who is at their goal weight and fasts to maintain it? What type of fasts? I’m doing 16:8 to maintain my weight. Are people that do frequent (monthly/weekly) extended fasts usually trying to lose or maintain their weight? If I did extended fasts I would be losing too much weight, so I plan to stick to the 16:8. But I notice a lot of people on this forum saying they do extended fasts. I am just wondering why, especially if they are at their goal weight.
Thanks!
For me OMAD (~22:2 on average, though the ratio of individual cycles can fluctuate quite a bit) has been the battle-tested sweet spot between efficacy and sustainability. Anything laxer and I’d possibly struggle to maintain a 20-ish BMI without exercise and without explicitly minding my intake (I very much prefer just eating until I’m full, even if it means that I can’t routinely allow for heavily processed or excessively palatable foods capable of suppressing my native satiety cues). Anything more ambitious / exotic and I’d risk ending up underweight, malnourished and yet more asocial than I am already. But that’s just me.
Someone else might employ, say, rolling 48s, over the long haul, perhaps because their TDEE is on the lower end of the spectrum, or because they wish to induce peak autophagy levels or keep a propensity for hyperinsulinemia in check, or find a more “cyclical” eating pattern most appealing, be it because of social demand or innate desire to “eat like a human” even if only every other day.
I’ve been at my goal weight for a while and maintain doing OMAD with the occasional 40 or so hrs fast if i decide to have a huge feast (i absolute love food, so happens a couple times a month).I mostly do OMAD for mental health, though. Autophagy helps a ton with that. Keeping my goal weight is just an added bonus. I also like the simplicity of it. Cooking and eating only once a day is amazing. I used to do 20:4, but OMAD is so much more convenient.