Time Restricted Eating - Blog Post by WholeSoMe Nutrition

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Time restricted eating - your body's daily reset button

June 5, 2025

brain health, diet, fasting, hormones, weight loss

Evolutionally, your body operates in a mode where supermarkets and refrigerators didn’t exist, and food was not available all the time. Your metabolism is designed to recover at times when food isn’t available. It’s a bit like pressing the reset button.

Not providing this opportunity for your body means that your system haven’t had the chance to fix the normal, operational wear-and-tear of the day, which starts accumulating, and, soon enough, it causes a decrease in function and efficiency.

This concerns all of your organs. Your gut, your liver, your heart, your brain, your metabolism, your mood…. directly or indirectly, literally all of your bodily functions.

Let’s finally clarify the time restricted eating vs. intermittent fasting definition debate…

Time restricted eating is a daily routine, where you only eat over shorter period of time every day. The length of your eating window may vary, and your calorie intake is not necessarily restricted (but you can add that on and still call it time restricted eating). This is one type of intermittent fasting.

Intermittent fasting however has endless number of other versions, too. This includes alternate day fasting, the 5:2 diet, one meal a day, etc. These different versions may involve periods of significant calorie restriction, and should only be done under a health professional’s supervision.

This post is about time restricted eating. If you would like to know more about other intermittent fasting methods, let me know!

Why the increasing popularity?

There are plenty of scientific proof, that fasting routines are more effective than calorie restriction on its own, when it comes weight loss. While often times it is a desirable outcome, I encourage you to consider it a side effect. The reasons why weight loss happens are much more important than weight loss itself.

Benefits of fasting routines include:

Improved insulin sensitivity and glucose metabolism
– your process your food more effectively, your energy levels increase
Improved heart health
– better circulation, reduced risk of disease
Improved liver health
– more efficient detoxification
Improved vascular health
– lower cholesterol levels, reduced risk of disease, improved blood pressure
Improved brain function
– better cognition and memory, better mood, improved mental health
Improved hormone balance
– less cravings, better appetite regulation, improved fertility, better sleep
Lowers inflammation levels
– more efficient nutrient absorption, increased immune function, reduced risk of disease, increased energy levels

Another reason why I want you to focus on these heath benefits is, that weight loss doesn’t necessarily happen. While for the majority of people it will, it is possible to eat enough calories within a shorter eating window, to maintain, or even increase your weight. But by all means, with an improved overall health, your weight loss goals become much more accessible to you.

What does time restricted eating look like

Time restricted eating means that you reduce your eating window (the time frame within which you are eating food during the day) to a certain number of hours, and do not take any food or calorie containing drinks during the remaining time.

In fasting state your body starts using up its energy stores: first the glucose stores, then the fat stores. While this is also influenced by several other factors, generally, the longer you stay in fasting state, the higher the rate of “fat burning”. Fasting state starts after about 8-12 hours of food (and caloric beverage)-free time, depending on your own individual markers.

Where in your day you should place your eating window and how long it should be, depends on your individual metabolic pattern, your lifestyle, your current metabolic health, and where you are in your monthly cycle. Some people function better if the majority of their fasting window is at the end of the day, some prefer to fast in the morning.

If you stop taking in calories let’s say at 8pm and you don’t eat until 8am the next morning, then you fasted for 12 hours, and your eating window was 12 hours. If you don’t eat until 12pm that morning, then you fasted for 16 hours and you restricted your eating window to 8 hours. To keep an 8 hour eating window you can also stop eating at 5pm, and have your first meal at 9am the next morning.

8 steps before you can introduce time restricted eating

If you are new to fasting there are several things you should consider before you throw yourself right in.

Make sure your overall health allows you to fast safely
Clean up your diet
Balance out your macronutrient (carbohydrate, protein and fat) intake
Ensure that your vitamin and mineral stores / levels are topped up
Make sure you are eating the right types and proportions of fibre
Balance out your fatty acid intake (saturated/unsaturated)
Drink sufficient amounts of water routinely
Set up your exercise routine

At WholeSoMe Nutrition I guide all my clients through these 8 steps, making sure that their individual needs are met and that their new routine agrees with their current responsibilities and circumstances. We break down all changes to bite-size projects, and tweak them until they feel easy.

Why is this important?

Establishing healthful habits and start fasting with these in the background, ensures that fasting is safe, effortless and you feel great every day.

Fasting without taking these steps first, may result in decreasing nutrient levels, less efficient detoxification processes, headaches, fatigue. You might find yourself less productive, more irritable, you sleep might be disturbed, and a whole range of other implications can make fasting a very unpleasant experience, which makes it unsafe and not sustainable.

Fasting is not for everybody

Nothing is for everybody. Under certain circumstances you should not fast. These are

If you have a history of eating disorder
If you have type 1 diabetes
If you are pregnant or breastfeeding
If you are on a prescribed medication that needs to be taken with food
If you are over 75 and have certain health conditions (only supervised fasting is recommended over the age of 60)
If you are malnourished or underweight
During puberty

Your takeaway

When you stay away from food for a certain amount of time, you are eating more “in tune” with your genetically coded circadian rhythm. Making time restricted eating a part of your daily routine will help your body to reset and recover, and start fresh every day and improve your overall health. Good nutrition, exercise and drinking enough water should remain in your focus, but time restricted eating can play an important supportive role in achieving your health goals.

Northumberland, UK

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