Muslims fast in a month Ramadan Every day from dawn until sunset, they eat two meals: breakfast and the pre-dawn meal. There is scientific evidence for the positive effects of fasting on health.
In the month of Ramadan, social life is particularly active. People either receive relatives and friends or make guests to them, and they all gather around an iftar table filled with delicious food and drinks in celebration of their fasting.
However, healthy steps in nutrition and taking care of the needs of the body, and the behaviors of daily life, acquire a distinct importance in making fasting easier and less causing fatigue and physical fatigue. Here are some of them, according to Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper:
1- Avoiding exhaustion of the body
Feeling hungry and feeling thirsty are inevitable during the daytime hours when fasting. But it does not have to be severe, because the body, in those without chronic diseases, can deal with this situation according to mechanisms that are comfortable for it, and it can easily adapt to this unique circumstance.
And the British Nutrition Foundation (BNF) explains that “once the body has consumed all the calories it obtained from foods eaten during the night, the body during fasting hours uses carbohydrates (stored in the liver and muscles) and uses fats, to provide energy.” .
Thus, the body is not affected to a severe degree, and its suffering remains limited to the feeling of endurable hunger and thirst, that is, without affecting the body’s energy supply mechanisms, leading to a state of exhaustion and a severe decrease in blood sugar levels. The most important step here is to be careful not to overstress the body, and to avoid exposure to the heat of the sun and the hot outdoor environment.
2- Reducing hunger
The body has a hunger switch, by increasing or decreasing the production of hunger/satiety hormones, which we can control so as not to cause us too much discomfort.
The stomach is a source of stimulating the feeling of hunger or satiety. Ghrelin, the hunger hormone, increases its secretion when the stomach is empty, while leptin, the satiety hormone, increases its secretion when the stomach is full. Therefore, eating foods that stimulate the stomach to feel full for a long time is one of the keys to extinguishing the feeling of hunger.
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The most powerful of these foods are food products rich in proteins, and food products rich in complex carbohydrates, ie slow-digesting sugars.
By eating them, as in oatmeal soup with pieces of meat, the feeling of fullness in the stomach following a meal increases (reducing the feeling of hunger), and the body gets small amounts of glucose sugar continuously and for long hours, following eating a meal (preventing headaches, nausea and dizziness ).
3- Maintaining body fluids
The body cannot store water, but the kidneys work to reduce the amount of water the body excretes with urine. Therefore, avoiding unnecessary exposure to sunlight and hot weather contributes to reducing the amount of water lost by the body through other outlets, that is, with breathing air and with sweat secretions.
Reducing the intake of salty foods during the Suhoor meal also contributes to reducing the feeling of thirst during the day, because too much salt forces the kidneys to excrete more urine, in order to maintain the balance of salts in the body, which causes more dehydration in the body.
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However, it is worth noting that drinking a lot of fluids before dawn forces one to wake up to urinate later, which hinders comfortable sleep, if one depends in his main sleep on sleeping during the early morning hours.
4- dehydration
Depending on the number of hours of fasting during the day, the temperature of the atmosphere, the amount of physical effort that the fasting person exerts, and also according to a person’s health condition, the majority of those fasting suffer from a slight degree of dehydration, which causes dry mouth, feeling thirsty and headache, feeling a low degree of fatigue, and few difficulties. in focus. With this degree of dehydration, there is no drop in blood pressure, or an increase in the heart rate, or an increase in body temperature.
Also, this simple state of dehydration has no health damage to it as long as the health condition of the fasting person is originally good, and as long as one is keen to drink water following the time for breakfast.
5- Replace fluids at night
Starting to supply the body with fluids immediately following sunset, works quickly to restore the balance in the degree of body perfusion.
This removes the feeling of thirst and quenches the blood vessels in the body. Providing the body with fluids has different forms, such as drinking clear water, eating soup, drinking fruit juice, eating fresh fruits such as dates and others, and eating fresh vegetables as in salads.
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It should also be noted that what hinders the body’s replacement of fluids is eating fried foods or fatty pastries during the early stages of eating breakfast.
To replace the fluids lost during the day, and to start the next day of fasting well, it is worth making sure to drink water from time to time during the night, up to the Suhoor meal and constipation followingwards.
6- When to eat
During the early evening hours, it is worth taking care not to delay eating breakfast, so that the body begins to receive its needs of water and food in a healthy arrangement that benefits the body and does not overburden the digestive system.
In order to provide comfort to the body throughout the day, care must be taken to delay the Suhoor meal as much as possible, that is, to the last moments before dawn, to reduce the number of hours during the day in which the body feels hungry.
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And when the fasting person is keen to eat the Suhoor meal in a healthy way and ingredients, the body does not feel any disturbance in feeding for hours that extend to regarding midday, which is the same number of hours that separates in normal cases between the usual morning breakfast and the usual lunch.
7- Prevention of constipation
Changes in eating habits and lack of fluids during the day, may cause constipation for some fasting people. The first step to prevent this is to eat many foods rich in fiber, such as whole grains, fiber-rich cereals, bran, fruits, vegetables, beans, lentils, dried fruits and nuts, along with drinking plenty of fluids and eating foods rich in fluids and fiber together, such as fruits, vegetables, yogurt, soups and stews.
It also helps relieve constipation doing some light physical activity, such as walking following breakfast.
