"The CR Way" vs "The Longevity Diet" tips

[FrederickSebastian]

So--

I recently got copies of "The CR Way" and "The Longevity Diet" as birthday presents... In "The CR Way" it says to eat a large breakfast and a small lunch with no dinner for optimum health and I think the reasoning has something to do with glucose levels. "The Longevity Diet", on the other hand, says quite adimately that it DOES NOT MATTER when you eat so long as you are cutting calories. Which one should I believe? Is it really worth it to cut dinner and part of lunch off? I've heard so many good things about intermittent fasting. Any help would be appreciated!

[Dean Pomerleau]

Dr. Greger recently did a nice video on the benefits of time-restricted feeding with eating concentrated early in the day:

https://nutritionfacts.org/video/the-benefits-of-early-time-restricted-eating/

--Dean

[Sibiriak]

Frederick, I presume you are referring to Brian Delaney and Lisa Walford's "The Longevity Diet" book,  not Valter Longo's book by the same name.

Longo  advocates time-restricted eating:

 

Quote

6. Eat twice a day plus a snack: Unless your waist circumference and body weight are in the normal or low range, it is best to eat breakfast plus one other meal a day and one low-calorie, low-sugar, nourishing snack. If your weight or muscle mass is too low, then eat three meals a day plus a snack.

7. Time-restricted eating: Restrict your eating to eleven to twelve hours or less per day. For example, if you eat breakfast after 8 a.m., finish dinner before 8 p.m. Shorter periods of feeding (ten hours or less) have been shown to be even more effective in promoting health, but they are much more difficult to comply with and may increase the risk of side effects, such as the formation of gallstones.

8. Periodic prolonged fasting-mimicking diets: People who are under seventy years of age, not frail or malnourished, and free of certain diseases should undergo five-day periods during which they consume a relatively high-calorie fasting-mimicking diet (see chapter 6). An FMD may also be appropriate for older people, but only if needed and if a medical doctor recommends it.     (The Longevity Diet,   pp. 215-216)

 

Edited December 21, 2019 by Sibiriak

[mccoy]

My personal and obviously widely discussable reply is that the context governs and benefits are dependent upon individuals.

Context or goal: you want to lose weight, to control weight, to gain weight, to optimize digestive effort together with bodyweight optimization ?  Besides, There is always an optimization at play, based upon individual genetic traits, habits and body responses. 

I try not to rely too much upon scientific literature. Of course, I'll read that, critically examine that applying discrimination and decide whether in my own case it is going to provide benefits, and sometimes experimentation is needed. Even very reputable authors who synthesize scientific literature sometimes will offer a general rigid proposal without considering too much the individual response and habits. Valter Longo is an example of that.

For example, I already know that I cannot follow the one meal a day regime. My digestive power is not such to afford that. My heart rate increases too much, I'll feel extremely bloated and miserable, lethargic, with a horrible neurological response. The overall response is such that I undoubtedly know that in normal conditions that is something actually deleterious to me.

I also think that we should be flexible and do what our body requires sometimes.

Eating a large breakfast or no breakfast depends on people and even on age. When young, I never ate breakfast, I simply had no hunger at all. The hunger erupted at one o clock and then I ate hugely without problems. And at dinner, I ate a little less. 2 meals a day, almost invariably.

Presently that's all changed, I have breakfast and usually I'm good with 3 smaller meals a day.

 

 

 

Edited December 21, 2019 by mccoy

[Sibiriak]

Speaking of context:

Nearly half US residents to be 'obese' in 2030, 1 in 4 to have 'severe obesity,' study says

 

 

Quote

 

In 10 years, 29 states are projected to have majority populations that are obese, the study says, and all states will have populations that are at least 35% obese.

"Obesity is going up in terms of the number of people who have it, and the degree or severity of obesity is going up," said Zachary Ward, a Harvard programmer and analyst who served as lead author of the report published Thursday in The New England Journal of Medicine.

 

 

[Saul]

Below is the video from Luigi Fontana.  It includes a discussion of "calorie dilution" -- which suggests strongly that "grazing" -- eating bits all day, even with reduced calories, does not result in the benefits of CR. 

Luigi suggests eating at specific times.

There is also evidence that eating early in the day is better than later.

  --  Saul

 

[Clinton]

This paper summarizes much of Luigi’s info with a nice chart depicting the different ways that CR, TRF, certain amino acid restriction (or reduction) and higher fibre intake can benefit health and lifespan.

       https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25815989/

[mccoy]

Clinton, that's a very good review of Fontana's study until 2015.

AFAIK there are some developments from recent analyses of the CR group which is part of this forum, which would be useful to have summarized as well.

In this paper general IGF-1 reduction is advocated without providing an optimum, which we've been discussing elsewhere. Too little IGF-1 is apparently pretty bad.

Also it is clearly underlined the necessity to consider individual genetic variation, which are probably hard to discern from the statistic results of smallish samples.

 

[FrederickSebastian]

OK guys... I'll keep all this in mind... Right now I'm eating once at 8:00AM and once at 8:00PM which leaves me a 12 hour fasting window twice per day. Not sure if this is a good idea as one meal is eaten close to bedtime but it is the best I can do for this year. I am thinking about doing 8:00AM and 2:00PM for next year, once I lose some weight.

[Mechanism]

Edited

Edited July 20, 2020 by Mechanism