The 5:2 Thread Number 24 - Summer's still here so skip the snack and share the meal!

[BetsyBell]

The continuing thread for those of us following either the 5:2 diet or the alternate-day fasting diet.

The 5:2 diet was featured on Horizon in August 2012, and essentially requires you to fast for 2 non-consecutive days per week. The other 5 days, you can eat what you like, or approximately your TDEE (see explanation below). Alternate-day fasting is just how it sounds; you fast every other day. By "fasting", we mean that we keep our calorie consumption very low, around 500 calories on average for a woman, 600 for a man, on those days.

You'll find on these threads we use a number of acronyms. If you're new to the threads, or Mumsnet in general, they might not make much sense.

WOE/WOL = Way Of Eating/Way Of Life. We use this term instead of "diet" as many of us see this as something to do in the long term.

MFP = My Fitness Pal, a website many use for keeping track of the number of calories they're eating.

TDEE = Total Daily Energy Expenditure, quantifies the number of calories you burn in a day. This measure is best estimated by scaling your Basal Metabolic Rate to your level of activity. TDEE is critical in tailoring your nutrition plan to desired fitness goals. Here is a link to a calculator to help you figure out how many calories you should be eating in a day.

ADF = Alternate-day Fasting, as it says on the tin, fasting every other day rather than 5:2.

NFD = Non fast day

NSV = Non scale victory

Michael Mosley has a website to accompany his book on the subject. Please go check them out, as he's the whole reason most of us are here!

I know a number of people lurk on this thread, as this is currently quite popular. Please just jump in and post if you're new- you'll find a lot of support here.

Here is a list of links to get you started with this way of eating. Please let us know if you find a new article or some other information online:

All our previous threads can be found by browsing through our very own fasting section of the site.

Another thread which breadandwine has started is a good resource for some of the tips and links that get lost in these big threads. In addition to sharing links, we try to condense some of our top tips for fasting there. Keep in mind, we all do this differently, so these are just tips, not rules. This might be a good place to catch up with us if you're feeling a bit lost!

frenchfancy has a recipe thread over here, please post any low-calorie recipes there so they don't get lost in these bigger threads!

If you've been at this a while and are moving on to maintaining your goal weight, there is a thread here to discuss that.

Here is the link to the BBC article regarding Michael Mosley's findings, which was featured on Horizon.

There's a link to the aforementioned Horizon programme here.

A blog post here gives some of the scientific explanation for why this way of eating helps you to not only lose weight, but improve your all-around health.

A Telegraph article which comments on the diet and gives a brief overview by Dr Mosley himself, very informative if you're just starting. (I highly recommend this for an overview)

A study discussed here gives commentary specifically addressing the effect of this diet on obese people (both men and women), with regard to both health and weight loss. ("After 8 weeks of treatment, participants had an average 12.5 lbs reduction in body weight and a 4 cm decrease in waist circumference. Total fat mass declined by about 12 lbs while lean body mass remained relatively constant.) it also mentions "Plasma adiponectin, a protein hormone that is elevated in obesity and associated with heart disease, dropped by 30%. As did LDL cholesterol (25%) and triglycerides (32%).")

Something to consider if you are currently your ideal BMI: this appears to suggest the benefits for women at a lower BMI might not be seeing the same health benefits that are found on men at their ideal BMI.

A BIG THANK YOU to all who have been contributing. Most of us are learning this way of eating as we go along. All of the links above have been posted by others in our previous threads, and they've been very helpful.

A HUGE THANK YOU to Greeneggsandnicht for putting together all this info and resources into one concise OP text, much appreciated by so many 5:2ers!

Come join us, and tell us about your experiences with this diet!

Yes, I do 3 meals and 2 snacks a day for DS. Tbf, he has issues with food so it's important that he is offered food throughout the day. And he does eat most times.

As far as I know, little ones, especially pre-school children, have smaller tummies so need to eat more frequently. That's what my DS's dietician told me anyway.

Young kids fidget all day long and are always on the go. They need alot of calories - I read around 1800 cals for primary age children. They also have small stomachs and my 5yo DD can't physically eat loads at one sitting. Healthy snacks in addition to 3 meals a day for her. I would only worry if she was regularly snacking on junk.

Thanks for replies guys, mind at ease :-)
Off to bed after vg fd, back in the game

Hi all, just checking in, this thread moves pretty fast! Thanks for the welcome. Had a good FD on Monday and Tuesday remained healthy. Had intended to do another FD today but being at home with a toddler remains full of temptation! No problem when I'm at work but the days at home are tough. Ended up are 800 today with another FD on Friday so not going to beat myself up too much.

I have a question about TDEE - on my NFD should I be eating my current TDEE or TDEE for my target weight? Current TDEE is 2415 which obviously is way more than I want know I'm in a focused weight loss mindset. BMR is 1860 and I've been eating around 1400 on NFD. That's a lot of acronyms!

chirp
I think technically its meant to be TDEE on NFD but 1/4 on FD.

I started at around 2200 as my allowance and just stuck to 500 on FD and eating healthily on NFD. I never hit near the 2200. I was however always full and never felt too deprived. Now my TDEE is 1830, and I still don't tend to eat or drink up to it.

Just eat up to your fill, as healthy as you can is my advice. If its a fair way under then its a fair way under. If you hit it then you hit it, etc. etc.

Chirp, eat to your current TDEE, but keep readjusting it as you lose weight. However, as ERD says, don't eat past the point of fullness, so don't force yourself to eat 2400 if you're comfortable at less. 1400 does sound far too low, though, given your TDEE.

Weigh in this morning. No pounds lost after two excellent FDs. I'm blaming the imminency of TOTM.

tortoise aunt flo needs to be rounded up and beaten to a pulp in my opinion

It had better BE Aunt Flo, is all I'm saying, though, because otherwise I've been a snarling bitch all week and lost no weight for no reason at all.

Well that's me finished my second fast day, and Aunt Flo has came for a visit too so I can spend a few days munching chocolate. My fast days weren't too bad though, I was kept busy so didn't have much of a chance to give hunger much notice .

Hi everyone, been lurking off and on for the past 6 months and after falling off the wagon spectacularly thought it was time I pulled myself together and joined in.
I started this WOL on 2nd Jan after Christmas left me feeling huge and miserable, did really well and lost a stone in 10 weeks then hit plateau and bounced up and down for weeks. Reading all your posts has been so inspirational, and I think it's no coincidence that things went a bit wrong when I stopped lurking and stopped tracking my calories. I started at about 106kg (shudder) and am down to 97 now (was 93 but lost my way), and am determined to get back on track. I know with your help I can do this.
Fast day today, not been too hungry so have just had miso soup and some yoghurt, plus went to aqua running so all in all a good day. Going to delay breakfast for as long as poss tomorrow and try to eat well without snacking.
Thanks for reading, and thank so much for all your posts, I wouldn't have made it this far without you x x

Hi motivational thread contributors. Another shredder checking in, and also did 20 min swim today - fasted yesterday and will do again tomorrow. Been eating low carb every few hours as h

... Whoops, as hungry all day but came in at 1000 calories and just having small bit of tuna steak and spinach for tea.
Way to go everyone and good luck tomorrow's fasters.

JB30 et all:

I posted this on the Tips and Links thread, Jan 17th:

This 4 minute film by Dr Lustig (he of 'Sugar: The bitter truth' film and book) gives 4 tips for making your home safe for your children.

In summary, here they are:

Nr.1 ? Get rid of every sugared beverage in the house ? that includes fuit juice.
Nr.2 ? We need to keep insulin down ? by eating fibre. If you eat your carbohydrate with fibre, you will lessen the insulin response. Look at the side of the package, you need 3g of fibre or more
Nr.3 ? Wait 20 minutes for second portions. It takes that long for the body to realise it?s had enough to eat.
Nr.4 ? Buy your screen time with activity ? if you?re outside for half an hour, you can have 30 minutes of TV; if you spend an hour out on your bike, you can have an hour of video games (Good luck with that one - but it can be done!)

The film is here. Well worth watching.

Anything from Dr Lustig is well worth following up. And if anyone hasn't gone through that thread yet, well you should. It's full of good stuff!

mttum love your 'advance compensation'! It's what I do often - and I shall pinch that term!

Right, I have a question.
I don't thnk m eating enough on NFD.
My TDEE is 1880- 1950 a day.
But this last couple of NFD I've eaten 1300. Or even just over 1000 calories.

I'm eating low carb with meat, fish, eggs, lots of veg, full fat Greek yogurt, and a bit of cheddar and some occasional nuts, some berries and the odd half apple or pear. I've cut out grains, pasta, rice, potatoes and juice, anything with sugar in except fruit. I drink dry red wine, dry white wine and G&T Friday - Sunday, no booze rest of week. I do the Shred or a swim or both on non fast days and fast Tuesday and Thursday. I started first week of July and am starting to feel great, lost 4-5lbs first ten days, about a pound since and my clothes all got too big.

So all very fab but as my appetite decreases I am starting to worry that I am sabotaging this WOE by wanting to eat less than 1800 or so calories on NFD? Will I end up with 'nowhere to go' and have to stay on a low calorie baseline forever because my metabolism will get used to quite a lot less food than it was used to? Do I need to push myself to eat more? Are appetite-sating high fat/low carb ways of eating (which often end up being low calorie as there is a limit to how much protein you can actually stuff into yourself) truly compatible with fasting?

Sorry long and TIA

Hey, TAD worry ye not!

Your concerns are unfounded! You will carry on losing weight - albeit at a slower rate (1lb/week is average on this WOL, so you're doing very well!).

It may well be that you plateau for a week or two - but looking at your diet, which shows an enormous amount of will-power, I think you've got the tools to overcome anything.

I've been maintaining for the past 8 months, without any difficulty. When I was losing (10kg over 8 months) I reduced everything on my NFDs by about 20-25%, but when I decided I didn't want to lose any more, I gradually increased my portion sizes and generally ate more.

For instance, instead of 75g of rice on a NFD, I went down to 60g, whilst losing weight. Now I'll have 70 or 75g, depending on how the scales fall - I simply don't worry about it any more. If I find my belt tightening, I just eat less for a day or two - it's dead easy!

So carry on doing what you're doing and relax. But keep coming back on here and tell us how you're doing because that's a pretty inspirational post.

Cheers, B&W

Ps. I'm up ATM because I can't sleep. Happens every now and again if my mind is too active before bed. I made a bit of a discovery yesterday - well, an explanation of something that's puzzled me for a while and I blogged about it late last night.

I'm sitting here with a mug of cocoa - and I've just remembered I made a batch of chocolate biscuits using vegan chocolate and Oaties yesterday. But I'd better drink most of the mug before having one - otherwise I'll polish them all off once I start.

I am totally at my body. Weighed 12st4 on tues post fast, 12st7 yesterday am after my dinner out, and 12st9 this morning after normal tdee-ish eating day and wandering round Greenwich w kids all day. Dunno what body is up to, can only assume TOM is approaching but that's some big variation!

Will fast today and see how it goes, will be busy at work so should be ok.

BAW that's good advice on sugar, I do tend to stick to that w the children although they are too little for number 4 just yet. Will try to keep it up!

Morning! Fast day yesterday, just wondering whether to do my second today or wait until tomorrow. Not actually hungry, so may well take advantage of that and get it done.

Now, on a TMI front, I know a lot of you suffer from constipation on fast days, does anyone else get the opposite? Diarrhoea by the end of the fast day every single time! I thought it may be the flavoured sparkling water I drink, so I avoided that yesterday, same problem.

Here are my before and after photos. I'll remove them after a few days (for privacy). BMI 36 to 24 :) I'm 43 but I don't think my face looks drawn so will keep on aiming downwards for 22 or 21 BMI. I'll now also start doing physique photos to monitor weight training effects on my body.

wowzers bssh you look FANTASTIC! well done you, how long has it taken you and how much have you lost? Fast day here ( on a bit of a hangover, impromptu garden drinking) going to be hard, always want to eat when feeling a little delicate. so far so good though, 3 cups of tea and a lot of water ( plus a painkiller, awful period pains ), planning on a cup a soup before I start work at 12, then power through with fizzy water and more tea until dinner at 6, M&S veg mousaka 280 cals, plus salad. MFP tells me this will come in at 439. Good luck fasters.

Good morning! Fast day today, I've shredded and now have a delicious cup of freshly ground black coffee.

School holidays means I get to challenge myself to wait longer to break my fast - currently aiming for 4pm, and if I get that far I may as well wait till 6 .

Stick with it Thalia you are doing wonderful things for the health of your body.

If you must weigh in often I really do recommend only doing it after fast days, and then only once, first thing in the morning. It's too easy to get fixated on those numbers and so many reasons why they don't show us the result we want.

For example: hormones, stuff in bowels, water retention in muscles if you've exerted yourself more than usual, water retention due to eating salty things, water retention because you're processing carbs... you get the picture!)

After a fast day, water retention is definitely less of an issue, as is stuff hanging around in your digestive tract.

Record your post-fast day weigh ins and look at the over-all trend over time - it will be downwards. Ignore the daily & weekly fluctuations or 'bounces'. We all have them.

BB fantastic pictures and you look younger than 43!!

Wow! You look fantastic bsshbosh. Such a change. Loving the hair too

Well done Bssh you look really well. Inspiration for those of us just starting our new WOE's.

Bssh You look like a completely different person! WOW! You certainly don't look drawn at all, you look AMAZING, and really young too! Your frame is tiny.

I hope your family and (supportive) friends are suitably impressed.

betsy well done on the shredding this morning. I have shredded too. . In fact, I've shredded, vacuumed downstairs, put wash on and out to hang and currently looking around to see what else I can do! I feel so energetic!