When you began your journey with fasting did you eat your regular diet, just only during the time alloted or did you eat healthier? What about exercise? Did you try and bump up what you had been doing?
When I started I didn’t make any major dietary changes. I was mindful of portions, tried to eat a little better food choices overall, but more or less ate the same meals of the same food of similar quantities. I just cut out a meal, a bunch of snacking, and tried to not eat those back during my eating window. That was my deficit.
Eventually I did start making changes to my diet and food choices. Pushing all my nutrition into fewer food choices sort of naturally made me favor better choices most of the time, though I still had some treats.
These days I favor setting a protein goal and a calorie goal for myself, and then I just keep an eye on not undereating on essential levels of fats for my size. And again, these goals kind of feedback on themselves. I can’t hit where I want to be if I’m eating a bunch of foods that don’t keep with those goals, but there is room life and foods I enjoy.
I started day one of IF with strength training. Part of focusing on IF and strength training was to do something different than where I had lost/regained with more traditional CICO and tons of cardio.
i think that would depend on many factors like your age and how much you weigh. But typically people try and increase exercise to lose weigh especially when they are younger. It is what I did until I hit my late 30s and the exercise wasn’t enough anymore. Weight loss happens with proper diet though. You can accelerate calorie burn by working out but you can also make it so you are even more hungry. In my case I focused on the consumption first and then added in exercise as I lost weight. I didn’t really change what I was eating just the IF. I was very strictly with it when I was losing weight though and never deviated from what I was doing. And now in actual time done I work out less now then I did when I was at my heaviest. So by getting your diet in order it makes for a way easier time with the fitness.
My regular diet is quite good (a little high carb for most) but I do really well with it. As I reduced calories significantly I set a protein and a fiber goal (fasting can mess with digestion) and I try my best to reach it. And I do have a goal for calories burnt but how I reach it doesn’t matter to me. I also always work with weekly values (calories, protein, fiber) because no one is perfect every day