The Fasting Plan That Helped Me Lose 186 Pounds
The one habit that changed everything.
Every effort feels difficult, Anna Smith thought, setting down her paintbrush, fearing for the future. The artist’s hands were numb from carpal tunnel syndrome, and her body ached under her excess weight — weight that had started to pile on at the age of 3.
“My life had taught me that this body was defective and broken,” Anna reveals. “Freedom from pain and ease of living was something I saw as a reality only for others, not myself.” Though she managed to lose some weight over the years, Anna continued to yo-yo. “I was an adult who really didn’t know how to feed myself. The carb monster was always hungry.”
As her weight continued to climb, Anna heard people talking about losing weight with keto. She recalls thinking, I need to get myself some keto. “I didn’t realize keto wasn’t something I would ‘get,’ but something I would ‘do.’”
Using Jimmy Moore’s book Keto Clarity ($21.07, Amazon), Anna learned to adopt the lifestyle. Two weeks in, she compared selfie photos and was amazed at how much inflammation had disappeared from her face. She’d also lost 12 pounds. Soon, Anna added intermittent fasting to her routine. She enjoyed coffee made with canned coconut milk after waking up, ate lunch and dinner, then fasted until morning.
“Once I began to eat fewer, more substantial meals, I started seeing greater weight-loss success,” she says. “I found it very freeing not to be tied to food. I had unlocked the key to utilizing the stored fat on my body.”
After two months, Anna’s carpal tunnel disappeared. She also noticed beauty benefits: “Intermittent fasting helped me turn back the clock and look younger. My skin responded by tightening and glowing. Win!”
Along the way, Anna loved experimenting with keto recipes. Her favorite “fat bomb” snack became chef Carrie Brown’s Coconut Lime Jellies. “It made me feel like I was eating candy, but instead of hurting my health, I was actually caring for my body!”
Today, Anna is wearing clothing 11 sizes smaller. “I’m a Texas girl and I was able to buy real cowboy boots. That’s a big deal!” More important, she adds, “I had no idea that changing my food choices would help heal the numerous ailments I just thought. were part of aging!” Now Anna runs the “Keto San Antonio” Facebook group as well as the website KetoSanAntonio.com to help other people heal. Plus, painting is a joy for her again. “Being able to create without pain and fear of losing the use of my hands is like breathing freely!”
How Mini Fasts Speed Slimming
When it comes to weight loss, when you eat may be as important as what you eat! So say researchers reporting in the journal Obesity. In their study, when a small group of volunteers ate three meals over a six-hour period (between 8 AM and 2 PM), they had 23 percent lower levels of the hunger hormone ghrelin and increased their fat burn throughout the day, compared to those who ate the same amount of food during a 12-hour period (between 8 AM and 8 PM).
According to the investigators, a six-hour eating window followed by an 18-hour fast syncs meal times with the body’s circadian rhythm, improving its ability to burn fat (rather than carbohydrates) for energy.
This article originally appeared in our print magazine, Keto Over 50.
