First day of March, and you would think (or hope in my case) that with the end of the past couple of months of the usual wave of new diets to embark on to get you healthier and/or lighter and/or younger looking and possibly even super human, that March would be a little bit quieter and different. Think again.
Recent news, fresh out of the oven, revealed yet another celebrity praising a new method of eating called Intuitive Fasting: an approach that combines Intuitive Eating, Intermittent Fasting and Ketotarian Foods. None of these approaches are new, and intuitive eating and intermittent fasting are as opposite as night and day. Intuitive eating promotes, as part of its core principles (10 in total), eating by adhering to your internal hunger and fullness signals, and not by ignoring them to be able to adhere to a restrictive pattern[1]. Sadly, when a celebrity of that calibre shouts about it, a lot of the population will follow the advice in a desperate attempt to get healthier, lose weight and ‘glow’ in the same way.
The truth is, that all of us should definitely be eating more mindfully and intuitively as a whole, but the question remains the same. What should you eat? What diet regime should you follow? Who should you believe on what works and what doesn’t?
Each one of us, are such unique individuals, that is very likely that something that worked for your partner or your best friend, is unlikely to work for you. You will have to tweak it to you, to your energy levels, your physiological needs, your health background, your social life and your goals. So why not adopt this tweaking approach from the start, rather than test and fail experiment?
As a strong proponent of Personalised Nutrition and Lifestyle Medicine, it is absolutely crucial, to look at what specifically works for us, as an individual, and not as an anecdote. By using individual – specific information, founded on evidence – based on science, we can promote dietary and lifestyle behaviour change that may result in a measurable health benefit. [2]
And where does Lifestyle Medicine come into this? you might be asking yourself. When we incorporate Personalised Nutrition along with the right diagnostics tools - where applicable - such as nutrigenetics, epigenetics, blood tests, and even wearables, you have more tools to make the choices that work best for you according to your needs. By applying medical, behavioural, motivational and environmental principles to the management of lifestyle – related health problems in a clinic setting[3], the power of prevention and health fulfilment are likely to bring further satisfaction to one’s life.
I invite you to be brave and be curious about finding out what works for you.
[1] Tribole E, Resh E. (2020, 4th Edition). Intuitive Eating. A Revolutionary Anti-Diet Approach. St. Martin’s Essentials. New York, USA. [2] Adams SH, Anthony JC, Carvajal R et al. (2019) Perspective: guiding principles for the implementation of personalized nutrition approaches that benefit health and function. Adv Nutr 11, 25–34. [3] Egger GA, Binns A, Rossner S. (2010) Lifestyle Medicine: Managing Diseases of Lifestyle in the 21st Century. McGraw-Hill.