Did 5:2 work for you? If not post here and tell me why...

[BetsyBell]

I'm a huge advocate for 5:2 but I often wonder about the people who drift away from the main threads and if it's because in the long run they didn't get on with it.

I understand all the positives about intermittent fasting but in the interest of balance I'd like to know why it doesn't work out for some people.

If you didn't get on with 5:2 for whatever reason I'd love to hear from you, mainly so I can dish out better advice to people on the main threads!

Thanks for the reminder - I had blood tests done (incl cholesterol) when I started 5:2 last January, so now would be a good time to redo them and see what has changed.

re. Cholesterol reduction: Varady's studies showed reduced cholesterol in her ADF work. Mosley did too and lots of anecdotal evidence for it on these threads.

That's good, thank you.

I had a cholesterol test that showed a bit of a reduction, too, but as I had been taking plant stenol thingies I couldn't be sure whether 5:2 was helping. You'd think it would do, as the overall level of fatty food should surely be reduced in a week.

I am doing this and find the 5:2 works where no other plan has worked as it tackles the emotional reason I have an issue with food.

Like mintyy i did for about 8 months and lost about 4lb. I stopped because I seemed to always be suffering with a cold, headache or dizziness. My iron levels dropped and periods were terrible. I wish I could have kept going despite not losing weight because I felt it took all the worrying about food away and even now I skip brekkie and start eating later in the day. The real reason I stopped though was that found it impacted massively on my mood and my depression started resurfacing. Also on fast days I struggled to sleep despite not really being hungry. Overall my health felt shakey.

I am thinking of restarting 5:2 as although I didn't lose much I found I did t gain and I actually enjoyed the fast days of feeling lighter.

I was doing 4:3 and the weight was hardly shifting. I did it for a while, about a month and a half and I only lost a kilo.
I think it didn't work because I don't have a lot to lose. I'm about 5 feet, and weigh 56 kilos which on my frame is overweight. I wanted to lose about 6 kilos.
I'm starting the low carb boot camp on the 13th on the Biwi thread, hoping that will work for me.

I have also had my appetite much reduced and I just can't eat to excess any more. That is really good, obviously but I do sometimes miss my Saturday night crisps. I just don't want them when I have had my dinner.

I've only been doing it for three weeks so really it's too early to say whether or not it's definitely going to work for me.

What I like:

• Knowing that I can eat chocolate/crisps/whatever tomorrow, as long as I count them
• Feeling in control of food, rather than the other way around
• It [cautious emoticon] seems to be working, and at a rate I'm comfortable with (3-4lbs so far).

What I don't like:

• I only managed to fast one day between Xmas and new year as we had days out etc and (for me) it doesn't fit v well with social activities, eg eating lunch out
• It is hard.

And I haven't been regularly posting on the fred because it moves so fast I can't keep up! Then it would seem like I'm only posting to go 'me me me' which seems rude…

One of the really important differences between Michael Mosely and the vast majority of people of MN weight loss threads is
he was never overweight.
He was looking at the whole thing analytically and from the medical aspect of reducing his risk of heart disease
( a known side effect of intermittent fasting going back to the initial research in the 1930's )

Also he has a GP wife and grown up children.

Not at all the same as Mums of toddlers who have eaten in a disordered way most of their adult lives.

Therefore the simple version of 5:2 works fine for people who are already active and have a BMI under 25

Unfortunately for those who are larger, do not exercise and may never have eaten healthily since they were children and do not have families who eat healthily
there are many more hoops to jump through.

BUT
For those of us now maintaining at a lower weight than we had ever managed before, 5:2 is a very simple way to do it that allows good meals on the other days.

Sheila Hancock was quoted recently as saying that if she has a big meal booked she skips one before and an unexpected big meal results in a skipped one after.
I suspect many, many other slim people do exactly the same, they just never shouted about it.

I think talkin makes an important point. Wasn't there also some talk of it being less effective for younger women with monthly cycles? I'm not sure if the research was credible, but there's certainly some truth to the idea that it does not work uniformly for everyone.

Talkin just to be clear I've never tried restrictive diets before and am a low BMI. The "thin on the outside fat on inside" part of Moseley's programme chimed and I am beginning to carry a little bit of fat around the middle. I walk plenty however and eat fairly healthily.

Quite why I felt so angry when doing a low calorie day I don't know! I naturally eat light after a "feast" but not down to so few calories.

Fairisle
I wonder if it comes down to dehydration.
Various studies have shown that many people are permanently dehydrated and on a fasting day, if you are not in the habit of drinking plenty of water, it would be easy to become severely dehydrated.
I aim for four huge mugs of tea and four pint glasses of water during a fast.
Its good for my skin too!

Talkin I was virtually mainlining herbal tea!

No it was a feeling I remembered from when I was a disorganised young adult , not having eaten for quite a while, no handy food outlets (those were the days!) then feeling quite raging..

fairisle
Interesting. And proves Betsy's point that not all diets and ways of eating suit all people.

I've just had supper (550 calories) having not eaten since yesterday lunch and I now won't eat till tomorrow lunch. I find it easy. DH still doesn't. We've been fasting the same number of months.

Lasted 12 weeks, lost 5lbs, didn't seem to be sufficient weight loss to justify the pain of it.

Should also say I have lost more weight in the same period of time by simply eating more healthily. Given that my goal was weight loss rather than focusing on the other apparent benefits of fasting it just didn't seem to suit me.

How you cope with fasting may be dependent on how insulin-sensitive you are, i.e. how well your body regulates its sugar levels.
Also, some nutritionists, e.g. Dr Schwarzbein, stress the importance of adrenal sensitivity.
Naturally, social commitments are also a big factor.

You don't have to be just mildly overweight to do well on 5:2. Some quite desperate folk have lost many stone on 5:2 or ADF; it just suited their metabolism, lifestyle etc.

Talky, but why haven't you eaten since "yesterday lunch"?

Presumably today is your fast day?

So why did you not eat anything after lunchtime yesterday?

Mintyy
That comes down to the size of the lunch!
My normal routine is a big Sunday breakfast and a massive Sunday lunch (totalling well over my TDEE including the wine)
and then no food till 500 calorie supper on a Monday and then through till Tuesday lunch.
My TDEE is low enough that one small and one decent sized meal a day is all I need.

Sunday lunch is often a main meal minty. Monday fast day is brilliant because if you eat a Sunday big roast early then you can clock up the fasting hours with no effort!

5:2 works for me because it's flexible enough to allow me to eat more or less what I want when I want, without gaining weight (have maintained loss over Christmas, with just 2 FDs) and to lose weight by sticking to TDEE on NFDs and

I found it really hard to fast on my days off from work and would get really grumpy. Before Christmas I started fasting on work days and because I'm normally really busy at work I was much less conscious of being hungry. In fact, I would say I actually feel less hungry if I don't eat at all at work than if I do!

Clock up the fasting hours??

I had a big Sunday lunch yesterday at about 3pm and nothing else, not even wine after that (quite normal for me on a Sunday or any large lunch day).

Not sure I could have waited until this evening before eating again though.

The 16:8, is that every day?

Me and DH did 5:2, started last March. By August he had lost 60lb, I'd lost 6. So unbelievably disheartening. He's back on it to shift the weight he gained over Christmas while i'm trying to find something more suitable for me.

A mum of a toddler who has always had disordered eating is an accurate description of me and so a diet like this couldn't work for my lifestyle and wellbeing. Like fairisle fasting gives me terrible rage and I drink three litres of water a day (except when pregnant - my bladder could not withstand that right now!). I used to get incredibly irritable as a child if hungry, my parents still talk about the grump I would get into before going out to restaurants etc when dinner would be later than usual. I think low blood sugar has that effect on some people.