An intermittent fasting diet is a diet method where the eating pattern is divided into eating and fasting periods. There are many types of eating-fasting patterns that you can choose from, such as the 16:8 and 5:2 methods.
In addition to helping you lose weight, this diet also has many health benefits. Such as reducing inflammation, and increasing the process of repairing cells in the body.
Various Benefits of Intermittent Fasting Diet
Intermittent fasting requires you to not eat for a certain period of time each day or week. Some fasting patterns you can try are:
- Alternate Fasting. Eat a normal diet one day and completely fast or eat one small meal (less than 500 calories) the next day.
- 5:2 Fasting. Eat normal food five days a week and fast two days a week.
- Time-Restricted Daily Fasting. Eating normally but only within an eight-hour window each day. For example, skipping breakfast but eating lunch around noon and dinner before 8 p.m.
Apart from losing weight, there are many benefits of this diet for the body, namely:
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Altering Hormone, Cell, and Gene Function
When you don’t eat for a while, several things happen to your body. Here are some of the changes that occur to your body during fasting:
- Insulin Levels. Insulin levels in the blood drop significantly, which facilitates fat burning.
- Human Growth Hormone (HGH) Levels. HGH levels can be increased, which supports fat burning and muscle gain, as well as providing many other benefits.
- Cell Repair. The body induces important cell repair processes, such as removing waste materials from cells.
- Gene Expression. There were improvements in several genes and molecules associated with longevity and protection against disease.
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Helps Lose Weight and Visceral Fat
Intermittent fasting will make you eat less. Unless you compensate by eating more during other meals, you will end up consuming fewer calories.
In addition, this diet also improves hormone function to promote weight loss. Lower insulin levels, higher HGH levels, can increase the breakdown of body fat and support its use for energy.
For this reason, short-term fasting actually increases your metabolic rate and helps you burn more calories. In addition, intermittent fasting can also help you lose a lot of visceral fat or dangerous fat in the abdominal cavity.
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Lowering the Risk of Type 2 Diabetes
Because intermittent fasting can benefit insulin resistance, it may help lower the risk of type 2 diabetes. In a 2014 study in the journal Translational Research, fasting blood sugar was reduced by 3 to 6 percent over 8 to 12 weeks in people with prediabetes who followed an intermittent fasting diet.
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Reduces Oxidative Stress and Inflammation in the Body
Oxidative stress is one of the causes of aging and many chronic diseases. It involves unstable molecules called free radicals. These molecules react with other important molecules in the body, such as proteins and DNA, and damage them.
Well, an intermittent fasting diet can increase the body’s resistance to oxidative stress. It also helps fight inflammation, another major driver of many diseases in the body.
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Beneficial for Brain Health
What’s good for the body is often good for the brain. Intermittent fasting can improve a variety of metabolic features that are important for brain health.
This diet helps reduce oxidative stress, inflammation, blood sugar levels, and insulin resistance. It can promote the growth of new cells, which could potentially benefit brain function.
In addition, fasting also increases the level of a brain hormone called brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF). A deficiency of BDNF can increase the risk of depression and various other brain problems.
That’s the discussion about the benefits of an intermittent fasting diet for the body. If you want to try this diet, make sure to do it correctly and safely.
