Bella Adams
Intermittent fasting allows you to lose weight quickly and yet sustainably – that’s the promise. But be careful! These five common mistakes prevent weight loss.
Intermittent fasting has several advantages: The dietary method helps to lose weight, lifts the mood and, according to studies, can have a positive effect on blood pressure.
The principle is very simple: Depending on the variant, you fast at least 16 hours a day, the remaining hours you may eat as usual.
Intermittent fasting, however, is not a free pass to eat fast food or unhealthy foods. Plus, the weight loss trend isn’t for everyone.
Here are some common mistakes to avoid.
Set goals that are too high
Many diets fail because they require extreme readjustment. If you completely change your diet from one day to the next, your body will be overwhelmed.
Therefore, you should not set your personal goals too high from the beginning, even with interval fasting, but increase them slowly.
It is best to start with a fasting interval of twelve hours and extend it according to your personal well-being.
The interval fasting plan does not fit the lifestyle
Which fasting variant one chooses should be well considered.
If you don’t like breakfast anyway, the 16:8 rhythm is ideal. For example, you can eat from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. or 1 p.m. to 9 p.m.
Night owls who don’t want to give up their midnight snack, on the other hand, often find this option difficult.
Even whole fasting days, as with the 5:2 variant, are not suitable for everyone – those who have a stressful workday, for example, need regular meals to recharge their batteries.
Eating too much or too little
The fasting phase is finally over, so you can really eat again? Not quite: If you eat too much, you gain weight.
The energy balance also applies to intermittent fasting – if it is positive, i.e. if you eat more than you consume, you gain weight.
But eating too little is also dangerous: the metabolism slows down, and the body reduces muscle mass. However, muscles are important for losing weight, because the more muscles you have, the higher your calorie consumption – even at rest.
Therefore, you should counteract with strength training.
Reach for unhealthy foods
Intermittent fasting is not a free pass for fast food, chocolate, and other high-calorie foods.
Of course, you can and should allow yourself minor sins now and then, but unhealthy snacks should not become a habit.
Those who do not adhere to this rule should not be surprised about extra kilos. Because only in combination with a healthy diet does Intermittent Fasting lead to the desired success.
Drinking too little
Drink, drink, drink – THE standard rule for all weight loss methods. The recommendation of the German Nutrition Society is two to three liters per day.
And this does not mean cola, juice, and beer, but water and unsweetened herbal teas. Because drinking enough is healthy and helps get rid of excess pounds.
