Summary
I am no dietitian, I am a tinkerer and this is what worked for me to reduce my weight from 194 pounds to 155 pounds, Triglycerides from 430 to 82 and Cholesterol from 218 to 171. Use your own judgement.
- Two fasting ¹ days per week.
- Two cheat days of eating anything you want, preferably in social settings.
- Three keto days of low carb, high fat², high vegetables³.
- Three workout* days. Either 30 mins of Weight Training or HIIT or 60 mins of Cardio.
¹ Fasting = Go hungry for 18 hours at a stretch in a 24 hour period, if needed eat upto 500 fat** calories after 18 hours. See example week below.
² Fat Sources = Avocado, Coconut, Nuts and Seeds, Olive Oil(Raw), Eggs, Cheese.
³ Vegetables = Broccoli, Carrots, Green leafy vegetables, Bell peppers, Green Beans, Squashes, Beets. Basically any vegetables except carbohydrate heavy roots like potato.
*Workout = Workout days can be on fasting, keto or cheat days. Eat a banana (simple carbohydrate calories) 30 mins before workout and drink a protein shake after workout.
Example Week
Sunday : Cheat Day + Workout. Dinner by 8pm.
Monday : Fasting Day. Only water till 3pm. Handful nuts or cheese if needed after that. Keto Dinner at 8pm.
Tuesday: Keto Day + evening Workout. Keto Breakfast. Keto Lunch. Keto Dinner.
Wednesday: Keto Day. Keto Breakfast. Keto Lunch. Keto Dinner.
Thursday: Fasting Day + evening Workout. Only water till 2pm. Handful nuts or cheese if needed after that. Keto Dinner at 8pm.
Friday: Cheat Day.
Saturday: Keto Day. Keto Breakfast. Keto Lunch. Keto Dinner.
FAQs
Why Fasting?
Losing weight is about creating a calorie deficit so that your body will use the stored fats for energy. This means burning more calories than you eat. It takes around a 3500 calorie deficit to loose 1 pound (use this USDA tool to calculate your target). Unfortunately, it is much easier to eat extra calories than it is to burn extra calories. It takes 2 cookies to intake 300 calories extra but you will have to run around 3 miles to burn those 300 calories.
But this asymmetry also opens up an opportunity. If we can eat less, then we can create a bigger calorie deficit. However, counting calories is so tedious for most of us that we give up in a few days. People who follow regular keto have to track their macros meticulously. This is where fasting helps us by making it very easy to follow the diet.
Fasting is also probably the only proven anti-aging treatment we currently have (study), so you are getting bonus benefits(study) over and above weight loss. Many cultures have discovered and ritualized fasting for these benefits.
If you feel hungry due to the body’s natural schedule, drink water, electrolytes or eat some nuts or cheese.
Why Cheat Days?
Cheat days have psychological, social and even metabolic benefits.
Diets can be hard to follow, especially for those of us who love to eat. Also socializing is harder when one is following a diet. Both of these constantly eat away at our will power to stick to a diet. By having two cheat days one can use them as and when needed to enjoy life and rejuvenate the will power.
Your body also does not lower its base metabolic rate (energy expenditure) if you provide it with an unrestricted diet at regular intervals.
Hopefully, even if you eat anything you want you cannot overeat the entire calorie deficit of the week in two days. Though be careful of liquid calories like juices, soft drinks and alcohol. Its very easy to go overboard with them. Also, avoid eating your cheat food alone. Eat it with someone else to prevent scenarios like mindlessly eating a tub of ice-cream or chips over Netflix.
Why Fats?
Fats are higher in calories per gram than carbohydrates but they have three properties that make them useful for weight loss, subjectively they make us feel full faster, they are digested differently than carbohydrates and so do not contribute to insulin resistance and last but not the least, they make everything tastier.
If you are worried that fats are harmful, recent studies have found that dietary fats are not particularly harmful. Examples here and here.
But some fats are harmful, specifically trans-fats which are present in commercially available foods with hydrogenated oils or where oil is heated to high temperature and reused. I therefore avoided fried foods on non-cheat days
Why Vegetables?
Vegetables are high in nutrients, high in fiber and low in simple carbohydrates. You can eat a lot of vegetables, feel full for longer, get many nutrients and add hardly any calories. Do I need to say more?
You should aim for roughly half to three-fourth of your plate to be vegetables.
Why Exercise?
Exercise helps burn calories but they are not enough for weight loss. It also makes you more hungry, so normally you will compensate the burned calories. Diet regulation is must for weight loss. But exercise has many other benefits. It “tells” our bodies that we need our muscles and so the risk of muscle atrophy is reduced even if we are fasting. It also improves our mood and improves metabolism.
Why no carbohydrate? My ancestors have eaten carbohydrates for generations.
Carbohydrates are a great source of energy, if you have an active lifestyle. But for modern, sedentary lifestyles coupled with an environment of abundance of processed carbohydrates, it is easy to overeat. This causes spikes in blood glucose which has to be controlled with insulin by storing excess in fat cells.
Why no mention of protein?
Most fat sources mentioned above, cheese, yogurt, nuts, eggs etc, are also rich in protein. If you are eating a pure fat source like ghee, butter, coconut milk etc add some protein rich food. See example recipes. I did not add beans to my regular diet on fasting and keto days since they have a lot of carbohydrates too. I did drink a protein shake after my workout.
What if I want to eat Meat?
You can. Tinker and find out. You can easily add in fish as they are high in healthy fat. If you are adding in other meat use them to replace fat/protein and not the vegetables.
What about fruits?
Most fruits are high in simple carbohydrates but also high in nutrition. So it is best to eat them in moderation. Strawberry, raspberry, blackberry and blueberry give some of the highest nutritional bang for the calorie buck. You can eat them on fasting and keto days. You can also eat high calorie fruits like banana, mangoes, cherries etc right before, during or after a workout.
What workout is right for me?
This depends on your current fitness levels. Start with what is comfortable for you and slowly increase the intensity. If you have never worked out start with brisk walking + yoga. If you also have joint pain start with swimming + yoga.
I feel that weight training and especially free weight and/or body weight training is best but you will need to slowly build up to it and take help of a trainer to learn the right technique to avoid injury.
What if I just want to maintain my weight after weight loss?
In maintenance mode, you can relax the diet a little bit like fasting only 1 day a week and adding back some carbs into regular meals. I added beans to my diet since they are protein rich. But you will have to maintain the shift to eating more vegetables and fats and less carbs or increase workout frequency and intensity.