Hi! I’m Donna Reish, IF teacher, weight loss coach, blogger, and half of “The Minus 220 Pound Pair” as my husband and I have lost over 220 pounds together (160 of that in the past couple of years through the Weight Loss Lifestyle habits and strategies I teach!).
In this episode, I present some much-needed information on what “breaks the fast”—from eight fasting experts I studied, watched, and listened to.
In lieu of an outline for this episode, I have created a chart that shows what the eight fasting experts that I have studied say about breaking the fast. This is a special episode that I did for my free private FB group and decided it was so needed that I put it into my Think-Feel-Eat episodes for you!
The chart is extremely helpful and thorough (I hope you will print it and study it and follow along with the episode!). But here are some super important points about this topic:
1) All 8 experts say that at the very least an oil (even if it is just CBD oil, which has calories and is a fat) can be consumed, at least in small quantities, during the fasting time. (One says only CBD oil—no other oils?)
2) The research for “breaking the fast” is sketch at best. I have taught about this many places. (Here is one: https://donnareish.com/logical-fallacies-broadcast-54/ ) As a teacher and former high school debate coach, I can’t let this go unmentioned. We have to learn how to discern small, self-reported, short studies from more reliable and robust research! A study that says when sucralose is injected into a mouse’s stomach, this happens, can’t automatically be applied to a person drinking a sweetened drink. (And I do fast pretty clean myself!)
3) The best experts to listen to in this episode are the ones who tell what results you are after through fasting. Period. If you are after weight loss, different things interrupt the fast than if you are after cell rejuvenation/autophagy. It really isn’t accurate to even say “this breaks the fast” without saying “when you are going for…..”
I want so many good things for you! Intermittent fasting has changed our lives. I can’t imagine my husband 120 pounds bigger than he is today (how much he has lost) if I had told him that he couldn’t lose weight or wasn’t really fasting if he continued to drink a non-caloric, sweet-tasting drink during his fast. It breaks my heart that people are giving up on fasting because zealots in FB groups tell them they aren’t really fasting if they have this or that in their coffee! (This all has no bearing on me—diet drinks make me want to eat, and I don’t like coffee!) There are very few fasting experts who say black coffee, plain tea, and water only in the fasting window—surprisingly enough!
So listen and learn what different experts say about consuming drinks during the fast. Very eye opening!
(Don’t forget to get your chart here!)
Blessings!
Donna
P.S. Take my incremental, month-long fasting course to get your fasting on strong! We’ve been at it for 18 and 12 months each—and have lost a LOT of weight and feel great! Intermittentfastingcourse.com
Find all of my episodes, outlines, and articles for my two weekly broadcasts:
(1) Weight Loss Lifestyle broadcast (formerly Donna’s Intermittent Fasting Broadcast)
(2) Think-Feel-Eat broadcast at
Sign up for my free webinar: https://intermittentfastingwebinar.com
