Asides from drinking plain water, eating or drinking any other thing would break your fast. The reason is that every other food contains calories. This is regardless of how much or less it is. So, drinking or eating anything that contains as little as one calorie or even less; breaks your fast.
Be that as it may, people can still go ahead to enjoy intermittent fasting advantages even if they consume something during their intermittent fasting window. This is provided that what they eat or drink is low-calorie. This article will touch on this subject. So, read on to find out how many calories are enough to break your fasted state.
Summary
How Many Calories Help You Retain Intermittent Fasting Benefits?
This IST Health weight loss study has gathered that you can still very much retain the advantages of intermittent fasting if you take something that contains between 30 – 50 calories during your fasting time. You can safely stay within this limit with foods and drinks like – herbal tea, bone broth, coffee, and tea bag. The rule of thumb is that it is best if the calories you consume something with very few amount of calories.
Especially if the aim of the fast is to lose weight, the goal is to cause a calorie deficit. In other words, it is about making sure your body’s metabolism has fewer calories than it needs. To make up for the deficit in your diet, your body will be forced to start burning your accumulated body fat (that you want to lose) for fuel. So, it ends up being a win-win.
Advantages of Intermittent Fasting
Although the weight and fat reduction benefits of intermittent fasting are largely publicized, there is more. Some of them include the:
- Regulation of insulin levels to prevent or manage certain diseases – This also impacts positively on blood sugar and how it permeates body cells
- Regulation of blood sugar levels – This is one of the effects of insulin level regulation
- Possibility of decreased inflammation – This helps people recover better and easily from injuries
So, intermittent fasting is not about starvation. It actually supports healthy living, especially in the long run. However, your decision to engage in intermittent fasting must be well-guided. It might even help to seek the professional service of a nutrition expert.
One of the important decisions that have to be made is choosing the best intermittent fasting method for you. For example, fasting repeatedly for very long hours, a day, or even days may slow down your body’s metabolism. This is not good for weight and fat reduction purposes.
So, a nutrition expert can help you fast the proper way. Besides this, this professional’s services can come in handy in recommending supplements that can help. For example, some supplements ensure that energy levels are within safe levels and that inappropriate food craving is not a problem.
Basic Rules of Eating During Intermittent Fasting
Even if you have to consume anything during your fasting time, here are some basic rules to follow:
Take a While before You Consume Anything
For starters, don’t abuse the possibility of eating during intermittent fasting. You will not see optimal results if you do this. You should only eat or drink if there is an absolute need to do this. This might be to boost energy levels or to use medication, among other reasons.
But besides this, you should take a while fasting even before you have anything (if you must). If the goal is to fast for 8 hours, don’t eat within or right after the first hour, simply because you can during your fasting window. Allow some more hours to pass before you do this.
The Food Class Also Matters
You should not only be concerned about eating low-calorie food. You should also be concerned about the food class. Protein is one that you should consider even for its muscle-building benefits.
We have other information on our website that you will find helpful. For example, you can read this article about how you can lose weight even while you are on beta blockers.