... to tell you that diets don't work for everyone

[Wroxie]

Today is my 9 month anniversary of tracking every bite of food that's gone into my mouth, with the exception noted below:

My birthday (one day in which I had, as I remember, pancakes with maple syrup for breakfast, no lunch, and fish and chips + a couple of donuts for dinner).

And that's it. I don't drink alcohol. No takeaways. No restaurants. Nothing that I didn't weigh, portion, and track faithfully. Even when I bake or make something from a recipe, every ingredient is weighed and the calories per serving calculated. I skip breakfast during the week and have normal, healthy food and smallish portions for lunch and dinner.

I eat, on average, 1,100 calories per day. I have a desk job but I walk for 30 minutes to an hour nearly every day.

Before this, my diet was pretty bad - takeaways 3-4 times per week, pastries for breakfast, sandwich with crisps and chocolate at lunch, biscuits whenever I felt like it- probably more than 2,500 calories most days (I'm 5'3" so that is A LOT).

And now, nine months later, I have gone from 13 stone to 12.3 stone. That's a grand total of ten pounds lost on an extremely restricted diet- and it was all within the first two months.

Please don't give me diet advice - no, I'm not in 'starvation mode' (because that's a complete myth). No, I don't need to 'cut carbs'. Seriously, I do not want your advice. What I want is to point out that, the next time you're tempted to say something asinine like 'it's just about calories in vs calories out' or to dismiss or vilify or judge someone based on their weight, to realise that the human body is not a two-stroke lawnmower engine and weight, food, activity, hormones, age, genes, and a million other factors are at play. Losing weight isn't simple and even with all the willpower in the world - which I have demonstrated - it isn't always possible.

I'm not giving up. I have gotten used to eating this way and I actually feel like my blood sugar is more regulated (no 'sinking feeling' a few hours after eating a big lunch, for example) and I know that as I get older, it will be better to, at the very least, not get any fatter. That, at least, I can probably do. But nothing short of eating less than 1000 calories per day or surgery or medication are going to get me to a 'normal' BMI.

@PurpleDaisies thanks for the radio 4 link, listening now and very interesting

lots of research into Parkinson and particularly cycling, again exercise and nourishment

I’m glad you’re enjoying it @ivykaty44. I listened to all of it on a long lockdown walk and found it fascinating. It’s not an area of medicine I know a lot about.

Just skimming this thread and saw a bit of talk about fasted exercise. Brought this to mind, which I thought I'd share. Studies are often done on men and reported as if they apply to both sexes. Not sure if it's all that relevant but thought I'd pass it on:

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4glyLcrhgqQtPGQYM11l1YJ/the-big-experiment-how-can-i-get-my-body-to-burn-more-fat-without-doing-more-exercise

OunceOfFlounce, interesting. I do both. Exercise fasted and none fasted. I usually run abut a couple of hours after breakfast. The breakfast won't fuel the entire run nearly enough, though (236 cal breakfast over 700 burnt cals by the run). I just like eating breakfast. I can run fasted with no real ill effects apart from getting up early! I like it at the peak of summer, however, when the weather gets hot but mornings are cool enough to be bearable.

I've not noticed an awful lot of difference regarding fat loss. But then my calories are in deficit for a lot of the day. I have successfully been losing weight for the past couple of years.

I wonder whether this is linked at women being good at endurance sports...🤔

I always thought fasted exercise was the best. Interesting to read the results from that study.

I can only follow these debates so far because I have no kind of grounding in science. I lose track of all the important points so quickly because I barely understand them in the first place!

I just remembered this because I saw the programme when I was starting to get into fasted exercise. I was in a funny place at the time, my bmi was very low, and I'm glad it stopped me in my tracks as I shouldn't have been considering it in the first place.

Interesting point about women and endurance sports!

I have never been able to do fasted exercise. I just feel dizzy and weak. Carby meal a couple of hours before is my best plan.

Is that because you're addicted to carbs though, purpledaisies? Sorry, I might have missed your PPs but 'dizzy and weak' is how I used to feel trying to do fasted exercise before I started messing about with my carb intake/doing more prolonged fasts.

It's still weird now that I can get up and run for miles without breakfast, and still not really feel like I want to eat until lunchtime.

I think there is a place for fasted exercise and fasting generally, though OunceOfFlounce. Intensity of exercise might make a difference, however. The exercise the subjects in that particular study was the sort designed to be high intensity. MAF training, is comparatively lower intensity and designed to train the body to become better at utilising fat for energy. I think having available carbohydrate might generally be less important in these circumstances.

OunceOfFlounce but it sounds like you made the correct decision. With a very low BMI it sounds like you ought to be prioritising building muscle rather than losing more fat. I I remember correctly carbohydrate can give you the energy and power to do more muscle building exercise. Sprinters build up incredibly big muscles versus long distance runners, for example.

I don't eat breakfast until 10.30am , this is a habit I got into as I was always peckish at break but didn't need to have breakfast on waking - so I moved breakfast to break time.. roll on a few years and I have to take a tablet well before eating so it works well

I can do spin before work and then wait to eat at 10.30 all fine I can't eat before jogging so again all fine

but there is no way I can go out for a 2.30 hour bike ride on a Sunday club run without eating breakfast, I'd bonk. I eat before the ride and take a banana with me or a naked bar to keep me going - I can feel my stomach becoming hollow. I can't drink milk either, it gives me stomach ache...had this a couple of times and one of the lads suggested it was milk, haven't had this since changing that aspect of my breakfast

I wouldn’t say I’m addicted to carbs @Eckhart. I’m vegan so I eat a lot of them and I really like them. Even when I ate meat and much less carbs I still struggled without eating breakfast. Fasting just isn’t for me.

But you do fast. I suspect you don't eat constantly, PurpleDaisies. You fast overnight too. I suspect you mean you are not used to fasting longer than what you are used too. You could try eating dinner earlier and breakfast later to get used to fasting.

Regarding carbohydrates, if you are effectively carb loading they could be fueling your fast through the glycogen they cause the body to store. When this store runs out you will feel the effects unless your body becomes fat adapted, that is, efficient at burning fat for energy. To develop that skill you need to exercise it by doing light exercise or even just go about your daily business in a fasted state. It does get better and you can ease yourself into this. But, of course, I don't know whether you are interested in burning your fat stores.

But I think it's a useful capacity to be able to burn fat stores for endurance and glycogen stores for quicker bouts of extra power.

I wonder what Vikings ate before raids? They would need endurance for rowing and running but power for fighting,,,,

Did they eat other, smaller Vikings?

That would be low carb. That would be keto actually.

Thanks for your thoughts, namochangoro. Yeah, the difference intensity could make is definitely something to consider. It's all academic to me still, as I'm still underweight and not looking to burn fat, but I do find the topic interesting to (try to) follow.

Glad the link was useful to some of you!

But, of course, I don't know whether you are interested in burning your fat stores.

Not really! I just lost the last of my lockdown 1.0 weight and I’m back to where I’m happy.

To be honest, getting away from carbs isn’t something I’m interested in. I measure my pasta and rice, and that works for me. I’m not sure how long a gap counts for a fast. I eat supper at 1030pm and breakfast around 7am. Then it’s mid morning and mid afternoon snacks. Fasting would make me miserable and I don’t need to lose weight but I know it’s a very successful way for many people to eat.

Eckhart

Although, I think they ate a lot of blood pudding, fish and grains from what I know, but it would have been a pretty strenuous lifestyle!

I’m not sure how long a gap counts for a fast

PurpleDaisies, I think at a very basic level fasting is just not eating constantly. Our bodies need to be able to store energy otherwise we would have to constantly eat. The thing is a lot of people never get to the point of utilising their fat stores and rely too heavily on stored glycogen and replenish it with carbs as soon as it runs out. So stored fat builds and builds.

'm still underweight and not looking to burn fat,

OunceOfFlounce, best exercise for you then would be the sort that builds strength and muscle. Carbs and protein I think may well play an important part in that. It's something I think I might have to tackle, although to a lesser degree as I am not underweight. However, I can see me getting to the lowest of my BMI and still wanting to lose fat so I do need to build muscle to stop me from being underweight.

Sorry, a few bold fails in my last post.

Apparently they had bread in their diet too. Viking on toast?

A fast is 16 hours or more without eating, so dinner at 6pm, then no more food until counting on fingers 10am. But then, you'd count as fasting for a second or something. The time after 10am is fasted.

Eckhart, well yes, fasted but obviously to a lesser degree. I did a veg broth (cooking water) fast for 4 days once, years ago. Extremely boring but I was trying to rule out an allergy. Felt fine but very bored supping scummy cabbage water while DH ate nice food. The veg broth was to enable I still had an intake of potassium.