How do I do this?

[steppemum]

I want to loose weight and thought I woudl try either 16:8 or 5:2.
I have no idea where to start. What do I need to know?
What is the difference between the two?

can I drink tea when fasting? What are the rule for it all?

Thanks

I did 16:8 as for the most part I was asleep during the 16 hours 😂

16 hours fasting: 8 hours eating

Or

5 days eating normally: 2 days eating a significantly reduced amount

You can eat and drink whatever you want during those eating times (obviously being sensible though).

During the fasting time I'd suggest sticking to green tea or water as they are significantly lower in calories. As long as you stay below 60 calories, you should still get the same effect.

You'd have to really calorie count with 5:2 which is why I would never pick it. I like my food and I don't want to be tracking calories all day so I went with 16:8.

I'd have my last meal of the day at say 6pm. Sleep from about 11pm until 7am. Then have breakfast at 10am.

14:10 worked equally well for me too.

Thanks,
So if I do 16:8, I need to stick to less than 60 calories for the 16?
I don't want to stop drinking tea, as I wouldn't keep it up. So I need to work out how many cups of tea make up 60 calories?

For the 5:2, you should pick 2 days for your fast , and you are supposed to stick to under 500 calories on those days. You can eat what you want on the other days but need to stick to a calorie level that won’t cause weight gain. If you go on my fitness pal they will recommend a calorie intake . Mine was around 1300 calories.
I did it for 3 months and slowly lost over a stone which has stayed off. I very seldom stayed under 500 calories on my fast days — it was usually nearer or just over 600 , and at the weekends I had over 1300 calories quite a few times - but I still lost.
The fast days on the first 2 weeks were very difficult but I got mor3 used to it after that. I got myself through the fast days by thinking of all the things I could eat the next day - but when the next day came I didn’t want to ruin the effort I’d made by eating too much

@steppemum I do 16:8, its just plain water, black tea or black coffee in the 16 hours.
No calories and no insulin spikes
Then 8 hours you can eat "anything" but obviously if you want to lose weight you should have a healthy balanced diet

Green tea is about 2 calories

Tea is normally about 30 to 40 calories, I think, depending on how much milk you use.

As a PP has said, you might want to consider black coffee and black tea. Zero to very little calories.

is the idea zero calories for the 16 hours?
So I've just googled and it is 26 calories for tea with semi skimmed milk

I will struggle with black tea/no tea, but can easily fast until lunch time if I can drink tea.
But I don't want to do that if that will scupper the way it works

With the 5:2 you can have the 500 calories however you want - so you can drink as much tea as you can as long as you take the calories off. I have just started doing this and the first few weeks were hard but now much easier. your non fasting days you need to check your TDEE to find out how many calories you can have - I have a lot of weight to lose so mine is around 2000. I tend not to eat that much but useful to know I can

I couldn't stomach black tea, so I thought I'd try green tea in my fasting window- total convert! Just don't leave it to brew for more than 2 mins max as it starts to get bitter.

I would strongly urge you to read the obesity code and/or delay dont deny before or as you start. Both of which you can get on Amazon or do what I did .... Google search them with pdf in the search box and get them for free 😳

Obesity Code is very much about the science of it and as I was reading it, it was like oh yeah that make sense, why has no-one told me this before. Delay don't deny is a more personable approach, with a bit of the science ce but a lot of anecdotes. I liked the both for different reasons.

FYI I've been doing 16:8 for 30 days now and have lost 12lbs (although I have a lot to lose so if you don't, it won't be a there near as fast for you).

I have a lot to lose

I do a kids' camp every year. this year was on-line, and we prerecorded some stuff.

Seeing myself doing the actions to kids songs on a video was mortifying. I am like a beached whale.

My goal is that by next year's club, I will be half the size!

I do know that I will need real tea first thing every day though. I have tried all the others and when I am up at 6, I need my tea. But I can probably get down to just one, with minimal milk.

I don't actually want my family to know I am doing it, I just want to do it for myself. Dh is skinny and doesn't get it. I've done 5:2 before and found it worked, but I think 16;8 is going to be more sustainable for me.

@steppemum If you need tea in the morning you could just do an earlier eating window. So have your eating window from 7am-3pm? That was you are still fasting 16 hours from 3pm-7am

[quote Sissy31]@steppemum If you need tea in the morning you could just do an earlier eating window. So have your eating window from 7am-3pm? That was you are still fasting 16 hours from 3pm-7am [/quote]
no, because I have to cook and feed the family at 6-7 pm, so any eating window must keep going til then!
Apart from the hassle, I would constantly forget and taste the cooking/lick my finger and blow it.
But family meal time is pretty central to our life, so I need to work round that.

I'll try and wean myself off the milk.