Why I don’t eat on Friday nights

Hi love

I got back from our holiday in the Lake District recently. It was gorgeous, a lush, tropical paradise compared to the yellow wasteland that is London at the moment! In spite of all the hiking and climbing I managed to put on a few extra pounds - it was still a holiday after all ☺️

No need for an expensive health club, my go to when I’ve put on weight is intermittent fasting (IF). I do this anyway a couple of times a week as part of my normal routine for overall health and weight maintenance in addition to my seasonal liver detox, and if I splurged a bit I get back to my normal routine and maybe add an extra day of IF to come back into balance.

I find IF the easiest way to manage my weight in a healthy way so this week I thought I’d tell you about why I like it and then next week I'll tell you specifically how I incorporate it into my routine to give you some ideas if you want to give it a go

Fasting - an ancient healing practice

Fasting and IF might seem like the newest fad because it’s so popular at the moment but fasting is part of almost every natural and indigenous healing modality.

It has become really popular recently because all the extensive health benefits are now backed by science. So why all the hype? Well, there are three main benefits of allowing your body to go for longer periods without calories

1. Autophagy - this is when your body recycles it's own cells. When you fast for around 16 hours or longer your body starts to heal itself by removing and replacing damaged cell components. This is instead cultivates a kind of master cleanse
2. Digestive rest - our Western culture of eating, drinking and grazing pretty much around the clock is really bad for our health because every time we eat our body has to produce insulin to process the food. This sets us up for blood sugar issues and diabetes long term. Even if you don’t feel drawn to an intense fast, just making sure there is at least 12 hours between your last and first meal of the day and not snacking in between meals is itself a detox and can actually do wonders for your health by stabilising your blood sugar
3. Ketosis after around 12 hours of not eating the metabolic process of ketosis is triggered. This essentially means fat burning, once your body has run out of glucose it goes into ketosis which means it starts burning stored fat. 

Just because something is helpful it doesn’t mean we should go to an extreme. Women especially need to be careful not to fast too long or too regularly as it will disrupt our hormones and eventually cause our periods to stop, so taking a balanced approach is important. Next week I’ll let you know about my routine to give you some ideas, and some tips I've learnt along the way, to detoxify and for maximising the benefits.