As the obesity rate still climbing, people are looking for a ways to get their health and physique back on track. However, just like fashion trends diet or nutrition plan also go through similar trends.
Currently, people are searching more information about Ketogenic Diet, Paleo Diet and Intermittent Fasting. Perhaps the biggest reason is people are seeing some results.
But which would work for you? Let's look at the focus of each diet.
Paleo Diet
Although this diet may seem to be new, concept was created in 1975 and been modified since then. Main concept is to eat like caveman from Paleolithic time.
What is that like?
Obviously, there were no process food nor they were capable baking cake or deep frying chicken. Cavemen ate whole and natural food. So what does Paleo diet follow? Eating whole and natural food with minimal processing like cutting, cooking and seasoning.
This diet has been favored by athletes especially Crossfitters. Main reason is to give the body clean and as much natural food as possible so that trained body will get more stronger and healthier, which makes perfect since. Therefore, the meal mainly consists of meats and vegetables.
Ketogenic Diet
Like Paleo Diet, Ketogenic or high fat low carb diet has been around for more than 60 years. The concept of high fat low carb got popular when Dr. Robert Atkins created the diet called Atkins Diet.
Main objective was to controlling the blood sugar level, which has potential of lowering the elevated blood sugar level. Initially, though, Atkins diet was viewed as false nutrition plan because of what people believed about consuming fat. Bad right? Consuming fat was thought to lead to clogging of arteries, elevation of blood pressure, and eventually lead to heart diseases, which none of them were proven to be true.
Now the nutrition plan got well known by the name Ketogenic Diet. Reason for the name is secretion of ketones while metabolizing fat as energy source. So many who follows Ketogenic diet check their ketone level with blood test or urine test to make sure they are in ketotic state.
Ketogenic diet also educated people on how important for us to be consuming fat.
Intermittent Fasting
Concept of fasting has been around for centuries mostly from religious purpose. However, the concept of intermittent fasting got popular in UK in 2012.
Duration of intermittent fasting varies. Initially, it was 2 days of fasting and 5 days of eating. Currently, some of the popular duration is 12 hours, 16 hours, and alternate days.
Although there are so many advantage to the intermittent fasting, main focus is to control the insulin level and recovery of the digestive system. When insulin level is elevated for extended period of time, the body has tendency to store fat instead of using fat.
According to studies, even longer intermittent fasting, like alternate day fasting, does not influence in lean muscle loss. So weight lifters, particularly figure athletes, started to implement this concept and there are so many books and articles illustrates how this works.
Which one is best?
Now the question of which one works best comes in. To be honest, the answer is depends. It is depending on what you are lacking. As you can see from simple explanation from above that each diet has it's own advantage and you may also can see why they work.
However, this is my personal and professional opinion by why not do all of them at once? Majority of my clients, without them knowing, are following a blended nutrition plan.
Why? How?
Well, like Paleo diet, you should be consuming whole and natural food source and should be eliminating processed food. Like Ketogenic Diet, you should be managing your blood sugar level by manipulating carb and fat intake. And just like intermittent fasting, you should give your digestive system a break and manage insulin level. Make sense right?
So here are some nutritional habits that I teach to my clients.
12 hour fasting - Allow the digestive track to finish digesting and time to rest for 12 hours. When last meal finished at 7pm then the next meal can start at 7am.
Eat whole and natural food - No boxed or food from frozen section allowed. This also means that you will need to learn how to cook. However, this is not gourmet cooking. This is more simple cooking like grilling chicken, making hard boiled eggs and roasting vegetables.
Cut down carbs and sugar - Even if you are working on gaining muscle mass, you should manage the blood sugar level which lead to managing insulin. If you are struggling to lose body fat, then work on eliminating carbohydrate and sugar. Only time you should consume carbs are after the workout.
Do these 3 habits sound familiar to you? It is nothing new right? If you have been following nutrition trends, you've seen this all the time.
Here is the issue. Majority of people are looking for instant results. From my training and coaching experience, people start seeing weight loss or fat loss results depending on the duration of their being obese. It does take some time for your hormonal imbalance, due to your fat gain, to balance out. It is not that diet or nutrition plan does not work. You are not allowing the plan to work for you.
If you are serious about losing weight and regaining your health, give yourself at least a year. Yes, you may start seeing results in about 12 weeks but your nutritional habit will not stick. This is why many are experiencing major rebound.
Kota Shimada
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