Comment by dipro | Hacker News Reader

Comment by dipro | Hacker News Reader

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Wow - I (male; 45 y.o.) have done virtually the same (2 days/week fast, Tue and Fri, no food intake, only drinks - mostly water, sometimes coffee, rarely some orange juice; on non-fast days ate without restriction) for one year now.

The curve looks quite similar: https://imgur.com/a/H4pKkNv

What I find interesting is your mention of a metabolic set point. Wanted to lose a bit more weight (since I still have visceral fat), but couldn't manage to do so. It seems I hit a hard barrier - any caloric deficit during fasting days was magically compensated exactly on non-fasting days; I tried to reduce caloric intake on non-fasting days, but while fasting a whole day isn't that difficult for me, restricting calories while eating seems to only work when my body has met a magical internal quota.

It seems indeed to be a set point. The small uptick beginning of June was when I skipped a fast day once. I'm a bit scared what would happen if I stopped fasting altogether now.

Would be interesting to understand more about the set point - however, some research on the net didn't yield much substantial info. It seems it exists, but how it works exactly and how it can be moved is unclear. And even if trying to move it makes sense. Maybe the set point is ideal health-wise, and is overridden on unhealthy caloric surplus diets...?

> while fasting a whole day isn't that difficult for me, restricting calories while eating seems to only work when my body has met a magical internal quota.

One dirty trick to try is, just after eating, to drink about two tablespoons of staight "extra-light" olive oil. It's a bit foul, but makes for a effective way of ruining your appetite. Other "bland food diet" tricks might also work.

(I'd like to mention that I do not support healthy diets, but my design to work against anything nature intends takes priority.)

Edit: two tablespoons, not eight, and apparently they make low-fat olive oil now.

> drink about half a cup of staight olive oil. It's a bit foul, but makes for a effective way of ruining your appetite

It's also a very effective way of getting 1000 kcal.

I tracked down the original suggestion to here[0], and I was off by a factor of four. Mea culpa, especially since I've actually used the 2 tbsp version a couple of times.

0: http://slatestarcodex.com/2017/04/25/book-review-the-hungry-... # middle of section IV

That's much more reasonable, but it's still around a candy bar's worth of calories. You may want to find a different method, depending on how much you want to cut.

I find brushing my teeth helps.

This is effectively like keto, which is a kind of fast in that you're fasting off carbs. you're not really getting protein or carbs at all, but I guess you're giving your body some fat for calories rather than just stored fat.

I accidentally discovered that a couple bites of sauerkraut instantly kill any residual appetite after a meal - which is a different version of your "bland food" assertion. I'll try olive oil next time.

Have you tried or considered a low-carb high-fat diet in the non fasting days?

Maybe keeping your insulin levels relatively low, you can reduce the effect of the insulin cycle on your appetite

Perhaps this will help https://idmprogram.com/tag/body-set-weight/

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