Intermittent Fasting Lingo
Intermittent fasting is simple, but if you’re a newcomer, you might be confused by some of the terminology people throw around. Here’s a list to get you started:
2MAD: 2 Meals A Day
ADF: abbreviation for alternate day fasting
alternate day fasting: the practice of fasting on certain days and eating normally on the others
autophagy: literally “self-eating”; definition from Wikipedia: a natural, regulated mechanism of the cell that removes unnecessary or dysfunctional components. For more information written by a doctor, check out this article.
CICO: abbreviation for calories in, calories out; some people choose to track calories and limit them in conjunction with intermittent fasting.
eating window: the period of time you eat
extended fasting: fasting for longer than 24 hours
fasting window: the period of time you don’t eat
intermittent fasting: the practice of splitting each 24 hour period into an eating window and a fasting window
IF: abbreviation for intermittent fasting
OMAD: Abbreviation that stands for one meal a day.
window: a period of time. You might hear the question: what’s your window? Someone might respond, “I do a 16:8.” That means the person fasts for 16 hours, then eats during the next 8 hour period. The window can be any combination of numbers that adds up to 24. Other common windows are 14:10, 18:6, 20:4, and 22:2.