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Fasting / 5:2 diet

Talk about intermittent fasting and 5:2, including what’s worked for others. Mumsnet hasn't checked the qualifications of anyone posting here. You may wish to speak to a medical professional before starting any diet.

blood sugar diet thread 5

999 replies

yumyumpoppycat · 15/10/2016 17:12

Continuing thread for Blood Sugar Dieters:
Phase 1 lasts 2 - 8 weeks and involves restricting calories to 800 a day. Eating healthy fats is encouraged as is limiting carby foods (no specific guideline on this but some people aim for under 50g), small amounts of complex carbs are allowed but should be balanced ideally with green veg, protein and fat to lower the glycemic load and reduce the effect on blood sugar.

Tips
You may get headaches at first so drink lots of water, possibly try mixing a teaspoon of marmite into boiled water and having that to replenish salts etc
Exercise: aim for 10,000 steps a day and ideally consider adding in resistance training and some HIIT workouts.
Fasting some people find it helpful to have an eating window e.g 14:10 – 14 hours fasting and 10 hours to fit in the 800 cals. Avoid snacking and grazing - split your calories into 2 or 3 meals for potentially better weightloss.
Use the menu plans in the book or plan ahead on My fitness pal app

Foods to avoid
Sugar, sweets, milk chocolate, biscuits, cake
White bread, pasta, rice, chips etc
Processed Junky food with added sugar
Alcohol, fizzy drinks, juice etc
Diet foods, artificially low fat foods
High sugar fruit

Foods to eat
Full fat Natural/ Greek yoghurt
Fish in particular oily fish, Meat, eggs, nuts seeds
Non starchy veg, cauliflower, leafy greens, avocados, peppers, tomatoes, broccoli etc
Olive oil, coconut oil, rapseed oil

Berries and low sugar fruit (2 portions or less)
Lentils, beans etc

Foods to include in small amounts and be careful of
Full fat dairy is fine but some people do better with less of this
Starch veg such as sweet potatoes and squash
Wholegrains (quinoa, buckwheat etc) limit to 2 tablespoons
Low carb crackers and breads made with coconut flour, almond flour etc

Phase 2/ 3
for more sustainable continued weight loss and then maintenance add in some days with higher calories but still lower carbs, and have 2 – 5 days at 800 calories. Continue to avoid processed simple carbs like white bread, chocolate etc but possibly add in small amounts of dark chocolate and red wine or less sugary alcohol if you wish to.

Useful links:
My fitness pal
[[https://www.amazon.co.uk/8-Week-Blood-Sugar-Diet-Recipe/dp/1780722931/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1476547726&sr=1-1&keywords=blood+sugar+diet Bloodsugar diet recipe book
BigChocs Fasting exercise thread]]

For full recommendations and lists of those who should avoid this diet please see the BSD forum

OP posts:
Thread gallery
40
BeyondTheStarryNight · 08/01/2017 19:44

So, dinner came in at (rough guesses as didn't weigh stuff) 1000 cals!!!

I think I'm gonna aim to do 2:5 at worst, with an aim to do all seven at 800cal ideally, but not kicking myself if I have two higher days.

Just having an options hot chocolate (praline - it's not half bad) before going up to bed :)

alleypalley · 08/01/2017 20:03

Day 6, pretty happy with how the week has gone so far. Preparation has been lacking though so tonight will be spent meal planning for next week.

Thanks for the advice on running poppycat, I can run for an hour quite easily so I think I'll stick to that for now for a longer weekend run and see how I get on, as well as a couple of shorter ones during the week. I have a half marathon in about 6 weeks so hopefully if I can stick to this and lose 7-14lbs by then that will be a lot less weight to be carrying around with me when I run which will help a lot.

Can I also ask, when looking on packaging for carb levels do you look at total carbs, or 'of which sugars' or whatever it says?

thenewaveragebear1983 · 08/01/2017 20:56

Relatively successful day for me- no breakfast because I thought we had eggs but actually just had an empty box! Lunch was homemade chicken soup, and a bread roll. Few slivers of cheese throughout the day. Went to IKEA along with the entire population of Birmingham so it seems, so avoided the cafe as it was manic. Went for coffee with my dsis and her husband and they all had coffee and cake and I didn't- I had tea and no cake. Literally the first time ever.
Roast pork for tea, but I was too excited to build my IKEA stuff so had another bowl of soup and have just had a slice of pork and a piece of delicious hot crackling.
So prob not 800 calories or anywhere near, but pretty low carb and I'm happy with that for a weekend.

yumyumpoppycat · 08/01/2017 21:34

Alley carbs for counting are the total carbs (higher number) although its good to be aware of the sugars. If you want to you could subtract fibre as an incentive to search out carbs higher in fibre so if a serving of lentils had 20g of carbs and 8gs of fibre it would be 11g of carbs to log. V impressed that you can run for an hour. Not sure I have had an 800 cal day yet this week but hearing you plan to run for an hour makes me think I will aim for 800 tomorrow as it is a cardio day. I am doing a weights beachbody dvd program called hammer and chisel but seems like the workouts are all about half an hour so not as hardcore as all that Grin

Seriously impressed by your ikea cafe avoidance newaverage!

Praline hot choc sounds yum Beyond.

Really good day lookingforhope, eggs are such a good option for this, but yes it does get easier and actually some days are just randomly easier or harder than others.

Well done Ragz.

OP posts:
yumyumpoppycat · 08/01/2017 21:35

I am shit at maths btw but you get the idea ;) Blush

OP posts:
AccioNameChange · 08/01/2017 21:50

I had a question about fats - I've been tracking everything on MFP, when I look at the nutrition the fats on some days look quite high, e.g.

Protein 69, Carbs 58 (oops, high day!), Fat 61
Protein 39, Carbs 49, Fat 68
Protein 57, Carbs 53, Fat 45

Looking at those I need to work on keeping my carbs down a bit. But is it a problem if fat is quite high?

alleypalley · 08/01/2017 23:02

Thanks poppycat, that makes sense. I'm pretty good at running, but a bit of a weakling when it comes to weights although I do like to throw a kettlebell around sometimes.

Lovetunnocks · 08/01/2017 23:47

Hi Accio - someone more knowledgeable will be along to help out but those ratios look quite similar to mine. For comparison the last few days I've had ..
Carbs 64, Protein 57, Fat 41,
Carbs 44, Protein 82, Fat 47
Carbs 48, Protein 52 Fat 66

My understanding of low cal/high fat diets is that you can eat way more fat than we've been putting away. I struggle a bit with the carbs - I aim for under 50 but sometimes slip over.

yumyumpoppycat · 09/01/2017 00:05

This is not a low fat diet so you don't need to worry about counting fat grams, eating more healthy fats is encouraged. If you are having 800 calories then the actual quantity of fat you are eating isnt going to be that much anyway even if it looks high as a percentage.

OP posts:
diamantegal · 09/01/2017 11:09

Day one of doing it properly for me - starting weight 10st 10lbs. I've got ham and feta salad for lunch, and then tea will be sausage and butter bean casserole. Which in theory is fine, except that the recipe serves 4 and DH and I normally make it do 2/3 portions Blush. So I really need to control portion size tonight, and avoid snacking when I get in - if I can do that everything will be more or less on target.

And hope - agreed on the eggs. Frittatas are a good option if you get bored of scrambling!

Lndnmummy · 09/01/2017 12:12

Day one for me too, weighed in at 69kg this morning so not great at all. No problems slipping back in though, no hunger, no head aches so far. Went to the gym this morning as well (nothing to hard though) so I am feeling really positive.

Oblomov16 · 09/01/2017 13:32

I don't seem to be doing quite so well. Not badly, but not great. Can't quite seem to get back into it.

Oblomov16 · 09/01/2017 15:56

Welcome all newbies and welcome back all old timers!!

Re hope having work do's. agree with bear and yummy that if you want to 5:2 that's fine, but I think the best way to view it is just not to think of anything as 'catastrophic', if you have a couple of glasses of wine too many, oh well, if you scoff the roast potatoes, never mind.

You are doing better than you were previously/last month or year/ three months ago and also you probably have eaten less that day - for breakfast and lunch, than you used to, by the time you get to this work dinner.

so try and get into perspective.

and also and by the time you get to these dinners your palate may have acclimatised, you might surprise yourself and eat the good bits, not really want those high carbs.

so if someone dishes up on those potatoes you know just maybe eat one or two rather than all of them and just leave something on your plate ? and then remember that you've done well during the whole day.

I find that if I don't give myself too much of a hard time, but 'get back on it' the next day, Rather than seeing it as a disaster, and then proceeding to sabotage it further, by eating a whole packet of biscuits, then it's fine.

Oblomov16 · 09/01/2017 16:09

Is now the time to tell you all that on Friday, I went to posh restaurant in Piccadilly Circus, for my 2 school friends - all our birthdays around this time. I broke my dry January, IN STYLE, with 4 cocktails, 3 bottles of wine, prawns, steak, cheesecake. I consumed 5000 calories.

CakeWineCakeWineCakeWineCakeWine
Not good. Blush
Today I've been better. Roast chicken leftovers, is all I've eaten.
I'm going to really try and go for it this week.

AccioNameChange · 09/01/2017 16:12

Thank you for clarification about fat, the eating less overall so even if fat seems a high percentage makes sense.

Tried to start a week ago, think I was kidding myself. Been around 900 cals per day since Thursday. So five days done.

Finding it hard today. Work is dull and I'm a boredom / comfort eater!

APlaceOnTheCouch · 09/01/2017 19:44

Oblomov I'm in awe of your 5000 calories - they sound amazing! I don't usually drink much at all but over the holidays because of various events, I had cocktails, wine, gin or champagne almost every day. Today I am convincing myself that hot water is just as good Hmm

ragz134 · 10/01/2017 07:48

Week 1 down, 7 to go! 8.6lb off for the first week which is a great start.
Week 2 day 1 today.
Meals not really planned but dinner will involve chicken and my sister is here so we're going shopping so lunch will be something light from m&s probably!

LookingforHope · 10/01/2017 09:20

Hi Oblomov. Remember you from last time I was on here. Cheers for the advice, that is what I am hoping for too - a gradual erosion of my old habits so that roast meat and 3 veg with one tiny potato seems as good as a dinner with mash AND roasties in abundance Grin Your Piccadilly Circus blowout sounds marvellous by the way! Sure it was worth it Grin

Having said that, it's a week in today and weighed myself and have only lost 2lb so am rather despondent. Sad I KNOW it is still a loss, but other people seem to lose tons in the first week (Ragz!!!!) and according to the book big losses in week 1 are to be expected as normal. If I am losing this slowly on the first week with no major slip ups and no social events how am I going to lose ANYTHING in other weeks?

Need to up the exercise maybe, but so busy at work at the moment it is a struggle. Pah!

I think my metabolism must be so wrecked that I need about 200 calories a day - gastric band time or sewing my mouth closed maybe?

Lovetunnocks · 10/01/2017 09:31

Oblamov - that sounds like a great party!

Just had breakfast - chia and flax seeds soaked overnight in greek yoghurt with a plum and some berries chopped in. It was very nice but I'm very nervous chia seeds. I read something about someone eating them from the packet and washing them down with water then they expanded in his throat and it was all a bit unpleasant! So I'm paranoid about them and soaking them religiously. Does anyone know if the soaking is necessary?

Usually have eggs for breakfast and they easily see me through to lunchtime so hoping a yoghurt breakfast will do the same. Time will tell!

Lovetunnocks · 10/01/2017 09:36

LookingforHope - if you're following everything correctly then I wouldn't worry about not having a massive loss in week one. Your whoosh will come! Are you getting loads of water and plenty of sleep? I need to have eight hours or NOTHING shifts.

LookingforHope · 10/01/2017 11:21

Thanks Lovetunnocks. Yep, loads of water and sleep - even have a hypnosis app to send me off to sleep as otherwise end up messing about on my phone until the early hours. Have had greek yoghurt with strawberries and a spoon of no sugar granola today and starving already (no time to make eggs when in the office) but lunch in 45 mins - having a huge chicken salad and then home made tomato soup tonight with a couple of slices of roast beef to add protein. Probably need to keep the carbs down more as averaging around 65g, but all my carbs are from fruit (berries and apples only and no more than once a day), vegetables, or occasionally a handful of lentils in a soup to bulk it up.

I just think sometimes I am destined to be short and fat Sad

LookingforHope · 10/01/2017 11:23

(when I say all carbs, I know the granola has some but it is mostly nuts and one tiny dessert spoon full, just so I don't gnaw my own leg off by lunchtime!) Blush

ragz134 · 10/01/2017 12:05

Lookingforhope - I've been having 20-40g carbs most days according to myfitnesspal. I don't have breakfast, so I'm also doing intermittent fasting as well, which may be why my first week loss was so high. Also, I gained a lot over Christmas so a lot of mine was probably bloating! Don't be disheartened, keep it up and it will work.
I am actually feeling a little fuzzy today, so maybe I need to eat a bit more today. I've had Mexican chicken strips (m&s) for brunch and double cream in my coffee. Maybe chicken korma for dinner with stir fried greens.

LookingforHope · 10/01/2017 13:19

Yum, Korma sounds fab. Do you have a recipe? The one I use for the family is not very low calorie!

thenewaveragebear1983 · 10/01/2017 15:03

Remember as well that dairy has carbs- I find too much yogurt on an empty stomach does crazy things to my sugar cravings all day.

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