In this video, I'll uncover the most effective strategy for using one meal a day for weight loss.
It's that time of year where a lot of people are trying to lose weight and get the body
of their dreams.
Now here's the thing.
A lot of people, this isn't your first go at it.
You've been trying to do this for many years and you've come across so much misinformation.
You've come across so much contradicting information.
And then of course you've come across so many different plans and programs that cost fortunes.
And so, in this video I'm going to lay it all out for you.
And at the end of this video I'm going to tell you the most important thing that you
have to do in order to see results with one meal a day.
So, stick around to the end, but before we get started, I'm Dr. Zyrowski and welcome
to the channel.
If you're new to the channel, it's a pleasure to have you here.
Be sure to subscribe, hit the notification bell, and join the notification community.
And I'm going to help you excel your health and your life.
So, this is an exciting topic.
I really like this one because it is such an effective strategy when done correctly.
So, let's go ahead and break down one meal a day and the most impactful way that you
can use it for weight loss.
Now let's go ahead and first look at some of the fasting hours here, because a lot of
people say, well, do you actually have to do one meal a day for weight loss.
Is it necessary?
Let's talk about the hours as to what you need to know.
Now this is a graph right here that indicates your blood glycogen right here.
This is your stored sugar within your body - this black line.
Now your blood glycogen essentially is going to start to be tapped into as you are fasting.
Everybody's going to be a little bit different.
If you're a regular faster, if you're a healthy eater, you're going to have less blood glycogen.
If you are someone who is going to eat a really unhealthy diet and you don't fast very often,
you're going to have a lot more store glycogen.
So, when you look at glycogen levels, essentially you start fasting.
It's a stored sugar.
Your body turns to it when the fast starts and it starts to plummet in the body.
So, this is just like I said, this is going to be more of the person who is on a healthy
diet, the person who fasts regularly.
The person who is not eating healthy, your blood glycogen could hold you over until the
20 plus hour mark.
So that's something that you have to understand there depending on how much you have of it.
And so, this glycogen store is going to plummet here and then this red line indicates your
fatty acids starting to mobilize.
We can see right about between the 12- and 14-hour mark, you get those fatty acids that
start to mobilize, and when they start to mobilize, that's when you're really just getting
that fat, your body in that fat burning state.
And then from there, this blue dotted line indicates ketones.
Your ketones start to skyrocket.
You get that benefit to the brain and all the benefits that the ketones have to offer.
So that's important to realize.
So, if you want to fast and you want to get results, if you're not hitting that 12, 13-hour
mark, then you're not going to get any benefits of fasting for the most part.
You'll get some benefits, but when it comes to the topic of weight loss is not going to
be real beneficial.
You want to get to that 13, 14 plus hour mark.
It's going to be a little bit different for everybody.
Now, ideally, like I said, you follow a healthy diet and you make sure that you're fasting
on a regular basis and that's going allow you to get better results.
And when I say better results, that just means that it's going to allow you to get into the
fat burning state much quicker.
And so, this is something we want to take into consideration.
So, this is when it starts and then if we're doing one meal a day and we hold off all the
way to let's say that 22-hour mark, we really put ourselves into that fat burning state
for a long period of time.
And that's a great way to lose weight when you're really focusing on mobilizing the fat
around your belly, on your arms, everywhere, on your face.
When you mobilize that fat and your body starts actually burning it for energy, that's how
you're going to lose weight.
Let's talk about some strategies that I use to effectively stay into that fasted state
for that period of time.
So, let's say in the morning, one of the first things I like to do is wake up and then I
will drink sparkling water for most of the morning.
Now the reason I like sparkling water is because you've probably heard me say this before,
it's kind of satiating.
It holds you over.
It's a little bit of a twist from regular water, and so this is something that I like
to do right here.
Now the other thing that I'll often do as well is I'll also have a glass of apple cider
vinegar.
I'll just take plain old apple cider vinegar, ice water, about two tablespoons and I'll
drink that.
That does not break your fast.
So, I'll do that sometime in the morning as well.
It’s very beneficial for your overall gut health.
It’s got some good probiotics in it.
It's good putting that acidity in there because it helps make your stomach more acidic, which
is a good thing.
Many people have the opposite problem where their stomach's too alkaline, so I use that
right in there.
Lots of digestive benefits, but it also is going to do this for you.
It's going to really help just get your blood sugar low as possible.
It's going to help you get into that fasted state much quicker because that's what apple
cider vinegar and the acidic acid in it does for you.
So, I'd like to do an apple cider vinegar drink right in here.
Like I said, I keep it simple.
A lot of times it's just plain old apple cider vinegar with ice water.
Now that's right here and then around noon.
I like to have a coffee at some point.
I do enjoy my coffee.
The problem for me having coffee first thing in the morning is I don't necessarily need
it.
Sometime in the afternoon when I'm getting a little bit fatigued, I like to use my coffee
around that point in time.
So, that's noon.
And then we go further into the afternoon.
At some point I'll typically do some electrolytes.
It may be a little bit of salt in my water.
The reason for this is because I just feel so much better during the day.
If I'm adding in electrolytes at some point.
We've got to be careful.
Some people get into these electrolyte drinks that have sugar and different things in it.
We want to stay away from that, so adding a little bit of sea salt in your water is
a great way to go about doing this right here.
Now, after adding some electrolytes into my water, one of the things I will do is just
kind of keep going into that fast.
It's important to remember that while you're in this fasted state, you continue to drink
lots of water.
A lot of people become dehydrated when they're doing one meal a day because they're not eating,
they forget to go and drink adequate amounts of water.
It's not good for your gallbladder.
It's not good for your whole bodily health.
So, we have to be careful with that.
And so anyway, from here I go into my exercise.
This is in the ideal, and I'm speaking ideal scenario.
A lot of times my exercises up here and so it'll move from before dinner to in this area
right around noon.
One of the troubles for me personally is if I put that exercise right around noon, it's
hard to stay in that fasted state all day long after I've exercised because I’ve burnt
so many calories that it's a grueling thing and it's very difficult to do.
And if you're trying to gain muscle, it can be very difficult as well.
So, in the ideal scenario, you put your exercise right around here.
And I have essential amino acids with my exercise.
Now, the reason for this is because first of all, it gives you a good source of clean
energy.
It also gives you the proper building blocks to build muscle.
So, I'll do like a half a scoop of a single essential amino acids prior to my workout
and a half after.
Some people will ask, well, does the essential amino acids actually break your fast?
It is a protein.
So yes, it will break it.
However, for me, with my goals and what I'm trying to accomplish, I'm okay with that because
here's the deal, you're talking about five calories right here.
It's a protein and you're going to utilize it.
Your body's going to utilize that very quickly if you're working out and exercising at a
high level.
So, I add in essential amino acids because I always want to make sure that I'm promoting
the muscle building and not just breaking down muscle and then not making sure that
I get the proper nutrients in the protein in order to rebuild it.
And so essential amino acids, I'll do this and then dinner after that.
With dinner, it's something that is very important to realize.
There's kind of just some things that come up that you really want to understand if you
want to get good results with one meal a day.
So, let's go ahead and talk about that.
I like to do my dinner between one to two hours if I'm going to do one meal a day.
The reason for that is because I do not feel comfortable packing all of my food in within
like a 30 minute to one-hour period.
I just don't feel well that way.
Now, some people do and they can manage it and that's fine, but it's important to understand
that in order to have sustainability with any fasting practice, it's all about you and
what you're comfortable with.
And so, for me, it's one to two hours.
For people that I do one meal a day with, like when they're a patient of mine or whatever,
I still recommend one to two hours because I feel it's the better way.
It's not so stressful on your stomach.
A lot of people who pack all that food and they don't feel well.
And so some people will be fine with it, some won't.
It's okay.
You got to do is right for you.
So, I like to do one to two hours there.
The next question becomes every day.
Do I need to do one meal a day every single day if I want to lose weight?
And the answer is no.
What I like to do is I like to switch it up.
I'll go from one meal a day to 16 and 8.
I'll go back and forth.
The reason that this works well for me is because if I'm doing one meal a day too often,
what happens is it just puts a lot of stress on my body between work and being very physically
active and just throughout the day when I'm working, I'm very active, and so if I'm doing
one meal a day every single day, it doesn't do good things for me.
As a matter of fact, I start to notice I can't sleep well at night, I start to go into this
really bad pattern.
So, I recommend doing like one meal a day every other day or maybe just a couple of
times a week.
And so, one meal a day is very beneficial for weight loss, but it's not necessarily
important to do every single day for results.
Because remember as we mentioned here, your fasting is going to start at 13 hours basically
- that fat burning zone is kicking in, those fatty acids are mobilizing, and then from
there, that's where you'll start losing weight.
So, if you can kick in that fat burning here and then you can basically hold out all the
way to that one meal, then you're just in that fat burning state for a long period of
time.
Now here's something that's incredibly important to understand.
One meal a day right here is highly beneficial when it comes to losing weight.
There's just so much benefit to mobilizing those fats in your body, sparing that muscle.
It's really great for people who are trying to really look good.
They're trying to be ripped.
They're trying to just look really tone, fit, male, female, whatever.
But here's one of the key factors that nobody hardly ever talks about, is you can do one
meal a day, you can do 16 and 8, you can do all these different fasting methods, but if
you're not doing this right here, then you're wasting your time.
Most important thing is make sure that you're watching your calories.
It's very important to make sure you're doing that.
If you are kind of coming into a huge calorie surplus, even with one meal a day, you can't
lose weight.
If you're doing the ketogenic diet in one meal a day and you're coming in this huge
calorie surplus, you still can't lose weight.
And so, we have to make sure that we understand our calories and what we need.
To give you an example, for myself, I come in at about 2,700 calories if I'm working
out, if I'm doing like a good workout every single day, that's where I fall.
Now, if I'm not doing a heavy workout, and let's say that I would get busy at work and
I skip my workout altogether, I'd come in at about 2000 calories roughly.
Now, if I didn't do any workout and I wanted to lose some weight, I would want to come
in at a deficit from that 2000 calories.
And so, if I wanted to come in at a deficit with this, I would go and take about 300 calories
off it and that would help me lose about a half a pound a week.
But let's kind of back up a little bit.
So, let's just say that I am doing a heavy workout and I do want to come in at a deficit.
And then what I'm going to want to do is I want to take about 300 calories off of that,
and that will put me at about 0.5 pounds a week.
Now, if I wanted to come in at about maybe like one pound a week as far as weight loss,
then I'm going to want to hit about a 500-calorie deficit.
And that'll give me about one pound of weight loss per week.
It's important to understand that.
That's a very, very simple concept, but it's the one that many people miss because you
hear all the time, well, if you just fasting, then weight loss.
Well the reason that many people lose weight while fasting is because it's a good natural
way to help you fall into a calorie deficit, but it's not necessarily like that for everybody.
Some people fast and they still can't lose weight simply because they're not hitting
a deficit.
They're still able to eat just as much food.
And so if we want to make sure that we're losing weight effectively and doing one meal
a day, we just want to make sure that we understand our calories and it's okay to be able to enjoy
your food and eat food that you really like all as long as you're making sure that you're
not coming into a huge calorie surplus.
So, understand your calories because it's a key component of this whole thing.
Now, one of the glories of fasting is because you're able to not go in and you don't eat
all day.
Even if you're doing 16 and 8, you don't eat all morning.
And let's say you're doing 16 and 8 you have a small lunch right in here maybe about, you
know, let's say that you have a small lunch of about 600 calories.
If you're someone who can have 2000 calories in a day, then at night you get to have a
1400-calorie dinner and you can still maintain proper weight.
And if you're somebody who is trying to lose weight, then you just cut that back a little
bit.
But the truth is, is that that is one of the massive benefits that fasting has to offer
- mobilizes those fatty acids, it goes in, it spares muscle, but also one of the massive
benefits is that it pushes your eating back.
So, you have a nice lunch, you feel satiated here, and then you don't eat between this
period of time.
You don't snack.
And then you go in and you have a huge dinner.
If you're somebody who is doing one meal a day, then you get to eat this whole 2,700
calories for dinner or whatever your calories are.
Your calories aren't 2,700, those are mine if I'm exercising at a pretty high level.
Now it's important to understand that if you figure out your calories and you really dial
those in, you're going to get some phenomenal results.
So, it all comes down to strategy.
First, one meal a day is a great strategy.
You don't have to do it every single day.
16 and 8 is a great strategy.
You can bounce back and forth between 16 and 8, one meal a day, but if you really want
to get results, you want to make sure that you dial those calories in.
I'm talking to people who are getting really good results.
They got the abs, they look really tone, really fit.
You could lose weight, you can lose a lot of weight by just doing it and not counting
your calories at all, but if you want to really dial it in and really have an excellent looking
physique, then you want to dial it in watching your calories.
And so, give this video a thumbs up, put in the comments section your experience with
this.
Let me know what you think of this topic, and then finally, go ahead and check out this
video over here if you want to learn more about fasting.
If our feeding window is restricted too much to the point where we are restricting our
calories that we open our feeding window back up.
Here's the deal.
You will create a problem with un-satiable hunger and you’ll also have serious binge
eating issues.