4-week fasting countdown to February 2024!

[Peae]

Welcome all, this a thread for Intermittent Fasters who want a weekly check-in on Fridays. Chat between the check-ins are welcome too, share as little or as much as you like. Each Friday, log your weight, fast, whatever metrics help you.

Check-in 0 Friday 5 January.
Check-in 1 Friday 12 January.
Check-in 2 Friday 19 January.
Check-in 3 Friday 26 January.
Check-in 4 Friday 2 February.

well done @StealthLaSilkySightHound that’s fantastic to keep going past your goal! You are so right about the boredom issue. My struggles today were more mental than anything. However I put a tiny amount of ginger spice in my water today and it really helped satisfy some need for flavour I guess. I think the cold today is also creating an extra challenge.

Interesting about the differences between how slim colleagues eat. I have noticed when I am sharing tapas with friends that I somehow I am always the one still idly taking nibbles from the dishes sitting in front of us when everyone else has stopped eating.

@GildedAge apparently a good choice is tomato, cucumber and parsley. The parsley apparently helps with the diarrhoea. My longest fast is 42 hours I broke it with cucumber, parsley and olives but then ate whatever I wanted.

CHECK-IN WEEK TWO FRIDAY 19 JANUARY

MMm..... thank you @Peae

And wondered if you all might like to add one thing you're going to do to add a bit of extra joy in the coming week?

“MMm..... thank you @Peae”

?

G'day everyone!
CW: 64.7kg
Last week: 65.2kg
Happy with half kilo off. Hope everyone else is doing well post Xmas.

For extra joy this week, I have been having ice lollies every evening! Because 1. It's 🥵 and 2. The tropical ones are delish and make me very happy 😆

Happy Friday everyone!

CW: 9st 13lb
Last week: 10st
SW: 10st 4lb

Another pound off this week which I'm happy with as had a few drinks at the weekend and a few treats in the week.

This week for extra joy I might see if I can find some cute summer clothes in the end of the sales as I get paid this week after a long ass January and I'm aiming for my target for my holiday in May. Some nice new clothes will bring me extra joy!

Morning all.

80.4kg, same as I was 04 January.

This is absolutely fine: I'm not adjusting to going back to work very well, eating my way through feelings connected with that.

I'm aware of it and started fasting around 4pm a couple of days when my stomach had had enough.

Joy: camaraderie at work - big deadline today.

Walk with a friend tomorrow.

Empty Sunday with lots of potential.

Morning

Sw 14 stone 7
lw 12 11.5
cw 12. 9.5.

happy with that although it’s likely to come up a bit before my next fast.

I have done pretty well with goals and logged 30 plants in my notes (tiny portions of some though!)

Joy - wow I really don’t know why this is so hard! I usually get some joy when it’s a sunny cold day and I get a good bit of park with no people around -,trees, pond ducks and sun! Doing something fun with my dds (or ds if he’s around!) usually brings joy so might try and find something for us to do but it’s easier said than done! To be honest coffee in a cosy chair with a book brings me joy - it probably shouldn’t!

good luck with deadline @HarpQuartet sounds like you probably have an interesting job and good teammates are possibly the most important bit.

Morning all,

Starting to see some slow movement on the scales; I've weighed daily and then took my average for today's check-in.
SW: 201.8
NYD: 195.2
LW: 194.4
CW:193.9

I've been mainly doing 18:6 this week so I'm on track with increasing my fasting period. Reading a chapter of FFR every night and dipping in to the podcast when I can so I'm staying motivated. Some things from the book are really starting to resonate with me, so I like that I'm slowly changing my mindset for the better ☺️

Morning everyone! Really enjoying hearing your "joys" and positive comments.

SW: 2nd Jan 14 stone 6
CW: 19th Jan 13 stone 11
9lbs loss this month

Very happy to have broken that stone-age barrier. Have averaged 11k steps a day, one meal a day, and fasting from 6:30pm to 3;00PM

My joys this week will be doing week 4 of C25K and seeing that personal accomplishment. Some lazy mornings with a coffee then WFH in the warm (I never stop appreciating this luxury!)

Morning all,

Happy Friday! Here are my stats

05/01/24 66.1 kg
12/01/24 63.1 kg (post 72 hour fast)
19/01/24 64.3 kg

I gained back just over a kilo this past week but it was to be expected, you normally gain back around that after a long fast. Happy it's not more than that because it means still on the right track to my goal of 60 kg.
Not feeling the best today with period cramps but heading out for a nice walk and then swim and sauna.

Hope you all have a fab weekend!

hello! This is the end of my first week returning to 16/8 after several years. It has gone really well, managed 30 plants, daily exercise, prioritizing sleep, no wine.

DH has got excited about healthy eating & exercise too and got to say Zoe podcasts are a revelatio. Now even DS age 13 is getting into it and eating probiotic yogurt with cinnamon and fruit “to feed the microbes”.

First week moved my BMI from obese to overweight which is great.

joys to look forward to are watching Traitors as a family, seeing a friend today, treating myself to deli roast shrimp instead of pizza with the family tonight

START 88kg/194lb
CW 85.3kg/188lb so down 6lb. It will slow but it’s a great start.
goal - 150lb.

Have a great week everyone and thank you for sharing your stories, it’s very inspiring

13st 6lb which is a pound on, but actually only about half a pound due to rounding. It's not unexpected. Anyway, my goals:

• at least 14-hour fasts every day. Yes! One 14-hour fast and up to 22 on the other days.
• at least a Zoe score of 50 per day (this means basically low UPF and high in plant-based foods). No, this has been a disaster due to meals out and an increase in Diet Coke consumption :(
• at least 10k steps a day on my sedentary drive-to-work days days. Another fail, I have had 19k steps a day, but a couple sub-10k. This is mainly due to me feeling that I really need to take rest seriously, especially upping the exercise significantly.
• get to the gym and lift x6 and swim x3. So far I have lifted x5 and swum x2.5. So this is great progress, and I'm really enjoying how I feel.

@Peae I'd like to nominate your recognition wrt rest as a win, as well as lots of other things in your post.

I really enjoy everyone's input here, thank you. I wish I could have weighed myself just before lunch. I did some HUGE wees this morning, feel like I easily lost half a stone 😀

My loss this week: 0lbs - I am very surprised as I had expected to lose 2lbs, especially as I'm still holding onto 1lb of Xmas weight
SW: 14.2
CW: 12.1
TW: 11.2
Approach last week: four OMAD days in 1-3 hour window incd a 25h fast, lowish carb, high protein, lots of veggies and some dark chocolate. 500-1000 cals.
Approach taking next 7 days: similar, majority 800/1000 days in 1-6h window with one at 500, and increasing exercise gently.

Gentle reminder to self – I lost 40lbs in 2021 to reach my 11.2 target and kept it off for 14 months: I can do it again
IF is how I look after my body for the rest of my life

I cannot tell you how much I'm longing to get into the 11's again - it feels hugely symbolic. I know it is just a number but it's a number that will give me a boost reminding me I'm in reach of my goal.

I'm loving reading of so many successes this week, including Zoe and masses of plants, and so many of you seeming to have moved a symbolic level down whether in weight or BMI. Huge huge congrats to all

And my joy in coming days? Getting outside every day and consciously drinking in the beauty of nature, what it smells like and looks like... some days just in my garden but more often I hope walking in a park or by the sea.

@Peae i think if you are doing some 19k day it is ok, if not necessarily to have some rest days. I’m not counting steps at the moment as I have plantar fasciitis, but when I did I always aimed for a total for the week rather than worrying about each individual day.

I have lost 8llbs so far this year. I’ve been eating in a 5 hour window and counting calories but eating around 1800. For this week;

Minimum 18 hours fasting each day
Calories around the 1800 mark on average
4 lots of exercise, walks, swimming etc
Daily yoga with adrenaline
Cooking from scratch and low processed for at least 5 days per week.

Wow @GildedAge that's a fabulous loss for 1800 calaories - your body is obviously liking losing the weight

@StealthLaSilkySightHound my dh (in his 50s) is recovering from a heart attack - it has influenced my desire to lose weight to an extent, but in all honesty I am probably not taking it on board as much as I should. Maybe it’s because my dh was already a healthy weight and exercised etc. on the flip side it is thought this is why his recovery has been extremely good. I did start cutting out upf for us all immediately after but have severely backslided on that.

well done everyone - and I hate it when the scale doesn’t play ball but it makes me wonder if it’s things like bones getting stronger, less muscle being lost alongside the fat etc which makes the scale results not drop as fast?

urgh talking of scales I have undone last weeks loss with my Friday abandon which will make this week harder. Unfortunately in my case the weight was exactly as I expected. I like a relaxed Friday but took it too far!

@StealthLaSilkySightHound i suspect palm oil is as bad as rape oil and is also in so many things. I find cooking main meals from scratch is cheaper than the ready meal alternatives. Treat food is more expensive to cook at home though and difficult to avoid emulsifiers altogether. Good luck in improving your health in general, I suspect those of us with similar conditions have more to gain with fasting and clean eating.

Congratulations to everyone who checked-in and congratulations on your success @pottypotamus, @Saraswati, @HarpQuartet, @Clearingaspace, @Catherhino, @StealthLaSilkySightHound, @FastingPhilly, @Fullsteamahead, @loveyouradvice, @PartridgeInAPearShape, @GildedAge,

@StealthLaSilkySightHound everything you wrote about the lack of leeway at our age struck a chord with me. It really does seem to be (strictly) consistency, consistency, consistency! I was thinking about colleague's cousin too, and how often I think about "I'll take this seriously tomorrow".

@HarpQuartet glad you're still here x

@GildedAge I take your point about averaging steps, but I do worry about my very sedentary days and I don't think 10k will be too much of an ask. However, perhaps I need to be gentler with myself during these difficult winter days!

Another run in the bag 😀relieved it isn't as cold today!

Today I have had 2 baby bels - 100 cals
280 grams of prawns - about 300
Konjac noodles - 52
Carrot and onions - 40
2 choc protein bars - 300
Splash of skimmed milk - 10

About 800 today, feel full. Needed that choc hit (again) and it hit the spot