10 Common Side Effects of Intermittent Fasting
In our previous videos we talked about how intermittent fasting can be used
to help you lose weight by tapping into your fat reserves for energy,
And how it improves your mental focus, memory, and ability to think clearly,
Stabilises your blood sugars and blood pressure, sleeping patterns
And lowers inflammation for healing throughout the body.
Intermittent fasting simply means that you eat all of your daily calories,
in a shorter window of time during the day.
Allowing your body to fast for the remaining hours.
Some people eat 2 meals within a 5 hour window and fast for the remaining 19 hours. (19:5)
Others choose to follow the OMAD diet,
which is eating one meal a day (23:1) for fast weight loss results.
However its common to experience some side effects when you start
intermittent fasting, especially if you have been eating poorly for many years.
In today's video we will highlight the top 8 most
common side effects of intermittent fasting and how to overcome them.
Please tap the thumbs up icon below the video.
Likes help us to reach more people with life changing health tips and remedies.
Side Effects of Intermittent Fasting
1. Cravings For Sugar When you have just
started intermittent fasting, it's very common to get cravings for sugar between your meals.
This is because your body is used to eating more frequently, so your blood sugars start
to crash. This is a temporary problem and will go away the more your body adapts to fasting.
Add a little more protein and healthy fats to your meal
until you get used to this new way of eating, for these will help keep your blood sugars stable.
2. Cold Hand & Feet As you start fasting, hormonal
and chemical changes start to happen in your body. This can cause your thyroid to slow down slightly,
which makes you feel a little cold. This is temporary and will subside when regular
fasting for 1-2 weeks. It's actually a good sign that your body is making the necessary changes.
3. Heavy Legs When fasting your body
uses more B vitamins and electrolyte minerals to burn body fat to turn it into fuel. This can
sometimes make you a little deficient, which makes the legs and buttocks feel tired, heavy and weak.
Take a supplement that contains Vitamin B1 such as nutritional yeast, and electrolytes from
bone broth or pickle juice to overcome this. Over time, however your body will adapt.
4. Uric Acid Your body produces
more uric acid when you are fasting, because it's part of the antioxidant network.
However some people get the side effects of uric acid stones in the kidney
or a flare up of gout in the big toe.
To prevent this, it's important to eat lots of leafy green vegetables
and salads to provide alkaline minerals. These reduce the acidity of uric acid
and prevent the formation of crystals in the joints or the kidney.
5. Moodiness As your blood
sugars drop between meals, initially you may feel moody, grouchy and emotional.
This is absolutely normal. Your body needs time to adjust to its new eating pattern.
Be patient, over time your blood sugars will normalise and you will
experience much more stable moods than you did even before you started this eating pattern.
6. Headache Headache 2.fw As you fast, your body adapts to
running on fat as a source of fuel instead of glucose. This can trigger a headache
or light-headedness in the first few days of fasting. This is perfectly normal and
is a type of withdrawal happening causing your blood sugars to dip.
After 3 days, your cells start using fat as a fuel source and your blood sugars normalise,
getting rid of any headaches or problems. Then you start to experience better mental focus,
clarity and cognition because fat is a cleaner fuel source for the brain than sugar.
7. Nausea Nausea.fw Some people feel
nauseous when they eat, after they have completed their fast for the day.
This is caused by a sluggish gallbladder or low stomach acid,
but usually subsides after 2-4 weeks.
To overcome this faster,
simply take some digestive enzyme supplements before you eat, which contain bile salts.
Alternatively you can take 1 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar mixed in a glass
of water before your meal to support your digestion.
If your nausea happens when you are fasting however,
a ginger capsule usually settles this problem.
8. Hair Loss If you eat lots of junk foods such as sugar,
refined flour and soda drinks in your fasting window, you may be robbing your body of nutrients.
Refined foods deplete your minerals and nutrients, which can cause hair loss,
especially if you were already deficient before you started intermittent fasting.
Load up on high quality vegetables, fish,
meats, eggs, olive oil and shellfish in your fasting window to keep your nutrient stores high.
Extra Tips
If you follow an intermittent fasting plan,
you will find that you are less hungry because your body uses your fat stores for fuel.
For this reason it's very important that when you do eat, you eat very nutritious foods
with lots of healthy fats, high quality meat and fish, along with lots of vegetables.
You want to load up your body with nutrition, because nutrients give
your body the raw materials it needs to fix any problem, and trigger healing processes.
When fasting, there are some supplements that you can to help you along.
You can learn more about these in our previous video.
Summary
Intermittent fasting has many tremendous health benefits but can also have side effects,
especially in the early stages.
By learning about what causes these side effects, you can quickly overcome them
by using today's video as a reference. The human body will need time to adapt
to your new eating pattern, so be patient with it and give it some time.
To learn more about natural remedies and nutrition, please see our other videos.
Thank you very much for listening, a like is always appreciated and remember to subscribe
and tap the bell for more healthy videos. I wish you great health, wealth and happiness.