What Diet Fads On The Internet Don’t Tell You | Could Fasting Be Harmful For You?

Are you dieting right now?

Is it keto, Mediterranean, Atkins or is it the internet’s favourite intermittent fasting? Well whatever you’re doing, I can say you’re not alone. We are all victims of diet fads, we see videos about them, we get all inspired, we google them, we jump into a diet and soon enough we are ready to give up. Only to pick up the next one. Diet fads keep changing but very few are as divisive as this one, intermittent fasting, the internet’s favourite diet trend.

But what exactly is intermittent fasting?

Does fasting really work?

Is it good for everyone and why should you care?

If you open YouTube and type intermittent fasting you’ll see thousands of videos pop up.

Is it good? Is it bad?

What is the right way to do it?

Before and after transformation videos, intermittent fasting is an internet phenomenon. It is taking over social media one real at a time. So what exactly does it mean? Well simply put, intermittent fasting is a time restricted diet. You eat for a particular period of time and for the rest of the day you fast. Sounds simple right? Well that’s part of its appeal. Intermittent fasting has no complicated charts or list of things that you can or cannot eat. It has only one rule, eat within the given time frame. The most common one is the 16 to 8 method. So you fast for 16 hours and try to eat only within an 8 hour window but this is not the only type. There’s also the 5 to 2 diet. In this you eat normally for 5 days a week and the last 2 days you cut out most of your food intake. So you consume just 25% of your daily calories for these 2 days. That’s how intermittent fasting works.

But have you ever wondered about the science behind this? What does it do to your body and to your mind?

Let’s try to understand that. When you eat you get energy some of it is stored in your liver. This is in the form of something called glycogen. So what happens when you don’t eat for more than 10 hours? These glycogen reserves fall low. As a result you feel hungry and sometimes even angry, aka hungry, hungry plus angry. But being hungry could do more good than bad. In some cases at least when you have very little glycogen left your body goes into alert mode. It starts burning fat. That stage is called ketosis. Basically you end up burning fat for energy. That’s how intermittent fasting works. It forces your body to burn fat. And maybe that’s why so many people want to follow it. In 2019 it was the most googled food related topic. On Instagram there are more than 7 million posts related to intermittent fasting. A 2022 global survey even asked people about this. 80% of them had heard about intermittent fasting. 36% believed that it could be good.

Is it really fail proof?

Well there’s a lot of debate about that. Some studies call it a good thing. They say it leads to the lowering of insulin levels, release of the growth hormone and of course some good old weight loss. But some other studies don’t really agree. One particular study, tracked portion sizes of 547 people. This was done over a course of 6 years and what did it find? There was no link between eating times and weight loss. And even if there was weight loss it was minimal. Most of it was muscle loss. So you’re not really losing fat. You’re losing muscle instead. But the biggest problem with intermittent fasting is the food that you eat. The flexibility may appeal to people but it’s not necessarily a good thing. You cannot eat pizzas and burgers in that 8 hour window and then starve for the next 16 hours. That is going to be counterproductive. The food you eat during the 8 hours is also crucial. The kind of food you eat. And intermittent fasting barely talks about it. Which brings us to the problem with diet fats. They’re often half baked. The internet convinces you to start a diet but it barely ever talks about the consequences. And don’t get me wrong, fasting itself as a concept is age old. It can be traced to the 5th century. Ancient Greece is believed to be the birthplace of fasting and who pioneered it. The father of medicine, Hippocrates himself. He is said to have recommended it to people for certain medical conditions. In ancient India fasting was a prominent practice. Hindu still fast on auspicious days. It’s a spiritual exercise to practice self-control. The idea is to give your body a break, to recover and heal. And not just Hinduism, religions across the world practice fasting. Christians fast during Lent, Muslims during Ramazan and Jews during Yom Kippur. So there’s religious significance perhaps rooted in science but fasting is also linked to politics. It’s often used to make a political statement.

Remember Mahatma Gandhi?

He went on 18 fasts during India’s freedom movement. Hunger strikes are still used today as a political weapon. So clearly fasting has been going on for ages. But in the 1900s researchers started taking note of it. They tried to figure it out to understand how it works. In 1945, intermittent fasting entered the picture. Scientists found that it made mice live longer. Fast forward to today and intermittent fasting is everywhere. Celebrities are promoting it. Beyonce loves it. So does Hugh Jackman.

Do you know what Beyonce and Hugh Jackman have?

Nutritionists and personal trainers giving them sound advice. They aren’t depending on New Age apps or random reels. The problem with any new diet fad is that it’s half paid research. Intermittent fasting does not tell you what to eat. So many end up binge eating in the AITA window. They’re also hunger pangs, mood swings and low energy levels in general. All of that could affect your daily productivity.

The other problem is that it could even be dangerous for some people. Fasting is often not suited for certain medical conditions. In some cases it can be harmful in some others even life threatening. And this stands true for any diet. So the next time you want to try intermittent fasting, pause for a second. It could be trendy, but it may not work for you. There is no one diet fits all formulas.

So before you starve yourself for 16 hours, listen to your body and maybe to your doctor. And no one thing. There is no replacement to healthy balanced lifestyle. Eat healthy, eat clean and try to be active. This may come and go, but a healthy lifestyle is forever.