IF / ADF / 4:3 / 5:2 / 6:1 / 16:8 ~ Maintaining at a healthy weight ~ Chapter 4

[TalkinPeace]

This thread is for those of us who have been practicing IF (Intermittent Fasting) for quite a while and are now at, or nearing, their target healthy weight.
It's also for anyone who is doing it for the health benefits alone.

How do we experience fasts and balance a stable food intake while having little or no weight to lose?
How do we ensure that this WOL keeps us at the healthy weight long term rather than revert to yoyo games?
How do we ensure that we keep ourselves looking great rather than just thin?

Many of us have been maintaining at our original goal weight for many months, and others are joining all the time.
Obviously, the more the merrier!
It is also worth considering whether a second, leaner target might be achievable.

You'll find the first three maintenance threads and all the main 5:2 threads for posters practicing IF to lose weight here Fasting / 5:2 on the diet forum. We're currently on thread no. 35, but there is a new main thread every 2-3 weeks.

There are three other associated threads:
This one, which is an absolute goldmine of Tips and Links on how to practice IF, and the research behind it.

And here is a treasure trove of 5:2 recipes, mostly low calorie for fasting days, but there are also recipes for when you want to treat yourself. And, now we're maintaining, we'll need more of these!

Since I started the last Maintainers thread the importance of exercise has come to the fore, as part of our general health and to help weight loss. BigChocFrenzys thread is here

TIP at you drinking tea with Mrs Cambridge! Bet her hair was fab

I have to wait till they are 14! (Faints). Yikes. I already throw ketchup at DD. DS is an odd child who hates ketchup or any kind of sauce. Never mind. I am just going to serve up what I like and want to eat. Stuff them!

Hope you're sleeping Betsy.

thanks for congrats all - trying to keep up but can barely keep my eyes open (hugs to Betsy). So much more knackered this year, think because I really pushed myself to my physical limits every day.

I am mainlining sugar, carbs and coffee...fasting will wait!

Mrs F DH made several jokey comments about the "much photographed hair" And it was vehy shiny. But she really is scrawny. Anne looked a much healthier shape.

Another one here who needs to sort out their lack of sleep.

Where on the south bank did you go Tip? I like Giraffe next to the Royal Festival Hall.

Betsy ((((()))))) not sleeping is awful - I am a terrible sleeper and can count the number of unbroken sleeps over the last year on one hand. I think the older you get the worse it is. As my dad said the other day, it is such a shame you can't "bank" your good sleep hours to make up for the bad ones.
Mrs F I never pandered to my two (now 13 & 7) - they are being brought up French style - i.e. we eat together and they eat what I eat so 'adult' food (I tried fish fingers once but neither liked them). If they don't like it they go hungry or eat bread. I have never cooked anything special for them unless they have a real hatred of something. For school dinners they get no choice either in Primary, there is a starter, main course and dessert and if they don't eat what is offered, they go hungry too.
I'm 1kg (shock horror) over target running weight after a sociable and very stressful weekend. When I get stressed I turn to chocolate in a big way! Last half marathon of the summer coming up next Sunday then no more races 'til September.

Aw, thanks you guys. I did sleep last night. I had almost zero sleep on Saturday (which I knew would happen, and can cope with fine) but another one on Monday night was a step too far for me!

I've got a very glam, bias cut, silk scrap of a dress to wear on Saturday so the last thing I need is eating my way out of sleep deprivation! I avoided my TaeKwonDo class last night as I thought I might injure myself or some one else flailing my tired limbs around, and it's another thing that buzzes me awake and might well have led to yet another terrible sleep.

I used to feel very cross about kids being difficult with food. I think my solution has been to provide a variety of things, smogasbord-style, knowing that everyone would like something and if anyone wanted to try anything new without feeling scrutinised then they could help themselves. The days when I hear "can I try some of xx mum?" have always been music to my ears and they're both pretty good these days. But we do often have separate things to the kids as I don't wish to waste my favourite things on the ingrates and bunging some sausages in the oven while I make a fast-day friendly-thai fish curry is not a problem.

I wonder if the scrawny Kate is a post-baby thing? She was lovely in real life pre-baby.

Southeast it was indeed Giraffe.
Betsy Dunno but she looked like victoria beckham skinny
Anglaise well done you. I admit to pandering to my two a bit - but the food is HERE in the Uk

Interesting Betsy because I always thought DoC looked lovely (though erring towards too thin around time of the wedding, but to be expected I think) but yes scrawny since then - but I'm def more "scrawny" since pregnancy....I still have saddlebags but weight disappears immediately from my chest so before even getting to target weight I look a bit too thin around the face, shoulder and chest...I'm also the same age as her too and the same height so maybe there's something in that? My body shape has altered completely after two pregnancies, I used to be absolutely hourglass but now my bum has disappeared and my boobs have suffered so I swing between apple and boyish. But I'm also the thinnest I've ever been anyway. Who knows.

I try not to pander to my two, we all eat together most evenings, but if it's a FD or we're out for dinner or whatever I'll let them have just pasta and pesto...but I do alter our family meals to things I know they'll like. Once a week or so I throw a curve ball though and give them something totally new, sometimes it goes down, sometimes it doesn't, but they generally try it.

I'll be getting more ruthless as they get older but DD is only 2 so I'm still in the scared-she'll-starve-herself phase!

Betsy and TIP. Do you both know Mrs Cambridge?? I'm a bit

Yes the pandering and DC only started a few months ago. We had all been ill so I thought that was it and I offered them whatever they wanted. Sadly that coupled with their school giving them choices at lunch has meant a slide into utter rudeness about food served.

Anyway no more nice mrs F!

MrsF
Have a look at my facebook - I went to the Garden party yesterday :-)

ATB
SAdly, best laid plans of toddlerhood start to go out the window when school and such pressures hit.
Mine ate everything, then went fussy and are now getting adventurous again.
Maybe I should let them get REALLY hungry more

ugh really? both mine weaned on literally everything, DS went fussy aged 18months-3yrs old, now 5.5yrs and will at least try everything, has even started asking to try stuff he has always turned his nose up at. DD went fussy at 1yr so I'm holding out for the next 6months and hoping the same techinques we did with DS to encourage him to try more food again will work

My Mum and Dad were at one of the Garden Parties last week TiP!

TIP. I remeber a while ago you said you'd been invited. Didn't realise you would get up close and personal with the Firm

All chores completed for the day. DC fed and clean. Story read and now 5 mins of iPad time before bed. We are all sitting on our bed. Very cosy and they both look so small and cute

Tip I'm most impressed with your tea party companions.
Maybe next time you could advise the Duchess to do some Big Girl pressups, to put some muscle on her bones.

I don't envy you the food:super-sophisticated sandwiches without crusts - they are the best part. I throw away the middle of loaves
I hate butter and similar substitutes too

Actually the food was not bad at all : rather carb heavy but tasty
which considering they were catering for 8000 was impressive

Just spotted this alarming study in BMJopen showing
more than 35% of people in England are prediabetic

It was only 11% in 2003, so more than tripled in only 8 years.

Prediabetes can be reversed by diet and exercise, but otherwise proceeds to full type 2 diabetes, for up to 30% of people within 5 years.

50% of those who were overweight were pre-diabetic.
Motivation to everyone.

But we must remind folks on these threads:
focus on body fat and waist, the weight will adjust

Big numbers bigchoc

Increasingly, people will have older family members who have type 2 diabetes so it will hopefully become a real motivator for those in the overweight camp to get healthy. (It was certainly mine.)

People eat such a lot of crap, I wish they would know how great they could feel if they gave some of it up.

It depresses me how normalised it all is.

But, smoking has become vastly reduced and less acceptable so maybe junk food will go the same way. Too late for many.

Well, great fast day yesterday which seems to have done the trick and I'm back at 9.4 just need to keep on track for the next 10 days so that I look super well at the upcoming big family party :-) got a visiting teenage boy next week who should oblige by eating up anything tempting that might be lying around. I did make the mistake of buying a fantastic loaf of bread as the dcs are home from Uni .... I think one of them had the odd slice . It was rather wonderful with the butter and marmite

Thanks for that link Bigchoc. How alarming to see those figures. According to one of the reports authors in this BBC article the level of increased diabetes risk is going up more quickly here in the U.K than in America!

catsrus
But good bread is wonderful.
Sometimes on a Saturday evening DH makes home made garlic bread - nom nom
and Friday night pizza with no sugar no salt crust is yummy

Mmmm, good bread with lashings of butter and marmite

About to head to the airport for our summer trip to the motherland and all notions of veganism will be out of the window as I am greeted by proper bread and proper butter!!

WI today and nice surprise seeing as on last years ride I put on 4lbs, this yet I lost 3 (though started the ride 3lbs heavier than last year) so I'm back to my top end of maintenance weight of 133lbs, yay! Would like to lose the extra 3lbs remaining from ideal weight before being a bridesmaid in 3 weeks, but will have a lot of temptation to avoid!!

I heard the report on pre-diabetes increase on the Today programme. I couldn't believe the figures. But then when I visited the UK in March I was struck by the number of overweight people I saw. And the constant food availability, and portion size, so maybe it shouldn't be such a shock!

Whether it's cheap white rolls from Sainsbo's or expensive sourdough from posh London shops, I eat all kinds of bread. I've recently started getting into rye bread which is low G.I and is very fibrous. I love that I can eat one of my favourite foods on NFD's and still maintain my weight loss quite easily.

Anglaise The French seem to have a better relationship with food, don't they? As in they love eating it (and drinking wine) but just nowhere near the crazy amounts most Brits do.

South there is a growing obesity problem in France too - in the rural areas you notice it! But the tendency here is to eat at mealtimes and not snack. Where I work, for example, there is no vending machine with food in it, in fact, with the exception of bakeries and McDo it is difficult to buy food outside of regular meal times.