How do you deal with mind-crippling hunger?

[deadduck]

Just that really. It's my first day, I've just had my lunch (first meal of the day), a bowl of carrot soup. Another one tonight, with a boiled egg, and that's my 500 calories blown...
Any advise how to stay focussed at work and manage to sleep?

Coffee, pepsi Max or diet coke

Probably not ideal but that's how I do it!

It goes away, and you get used to it. It's your first day, so this is the worst, it gets a lot easier I promise.

Somebody said to me that you have to get your head round hunger. It doesn't build and build and carry on building. It does go away even if you don't eat.
So distract yourself and you'll notice it less or drink water to feel fuller.
I'm not fasting/5:2 ing but am eating v little due to a gallbladder problem. I can honestly say that my appetite has shrunk, i don't feel as hungry and I'm satisfied on smaller portions, but it has taken 3 weeks to feel like this!

I find some days worse than others. I thought I might fast today but really needed a bowl of porridge when I got back wet and cold from my dog walk (I like to save all my calories for dinner) so I won't do it today.

Fasting on a busy day is easier for me, Wednesdays are always a FD because I leave home at 7:30 and don't get back until 5 and I only have an hour before I volunteer at a children's group. By the time I am home it is almost 9pm and I tend to have an early night.

If it all goes horribly wrong and I can't manage not to eat I just do it the next day, I do manage 2 x a week, had hoped to do three some weeks but I haven't been able to do that.

I feel great though when I have fasted and am generally no longer able to eat things like bread which just makes me feel very full and lethargic so something has changed.

Thanks all , I've made it through my first day. Full of soup (and one egg), and the hunger wasn't that bad in the end after all!

Yay, well done! In a few weeks it'll be easy peasy. x

I find that drinking different flavours of tea helps as it tricks my mind somehow. We normally only have an evening meal on a fast day, and using up to approx 100 cals through the day to still hunger (coffee with milk, a handful of berries, that sort of stuff). All I can say is: It gets easier with time!

Well done on finishing the first day. I agree that the hunger doesn't build relentlessly. It ebbs and flows. I also find busy work days best for fasting - weekends are far more difficult. And I also think of hunger like an alarm clock but I have a snooze button. I mentally hit snooze and think "I'll come back to this later" and then I do forget to think about it. Until the next pang an hour or so later and I hit snooze again.