Metabolic Flexibility
The human body’s metabolism has evolved to be flexible, meaning it can obtain fuel from food or from fuel already stored in your body. This is most likely the result of the feast and famine lifestyles due to the seasonal and migratory changes experienced by our pre-industrial ancestors. This has changed in the relative recent past as modern society allows for three meals a day plus the occasional snack and/or treat. That availability of the high carb, high sugar diets readily attainable to us is also a cause. Our bodies metabolisms have become inflexibility which has resulted in excess stored fat and diseases like type 2 diabetes.
Obtaining the metabolic flexibility our bodies were designed for is still possible. Two ways of accomplishing this is combining a keto diet with intermittent fasting. It is important to discuss these approaches with your doctor or nutritionist first, but by adopting a ketogenic diet, and after achieving ketosis, incorporating an intermittent fast, you can retrain your body to pull fuel from both food and fat stores.
There are vary types of keto diets to fit the varying types of people. Some of us benefit from sustaining ketosis for long periods and others prefer shorter cyclic keto style diets. Net carb daily intake is also variable. It can take multiple attempts to find a keto diet that works for you.
Intermittent fasting has various methods such as fasting for 16 hours and limiting meals to with a contiguous 8-hour period in a 24 day. Some may find that fasting for a day or two may achieve best results. It is important to find what works best for your body type, but a general rule for intermittent fasting is usually no less than 14 hours and no more than 2 days.
