Intermittent fasting, anyone want to join me?

[achillea]

Anyone watch Horizon last night want to try fasting for weight loss and general health?

www.bbc.co.uk/mobile/iplayer/episode/b01lxyzc

I might try 6 days on and 24 hours off has anyone tried this and does it work?

I am trying to be organised and make some very low calorie soup for my 500 calorie days. Does anyone have any good recipes?

A roundup of my first week.

I have been mostly eating ;) coffee with milk, and about 400 calories in one meal. I have had four fast days so far, one day on, one day off.

I have been thick and not weighed myself when I started, but I was 12.12 this morning. The day before I was 12.9, morning after the fast day. I think what's happening is that I'm gaining four pounds and then losing three, bringing my total weight down 1lb every two days.

My attitude to food has completely changed. I am forgetting to eat and not reaching out for what's available just for the sake of eating it. Today I sat and watched the family eat cream cakes and I didn't faint. I am enjoying food more, but don't want to eat as much.

My energy levels are fine and it hasn't put me off doing anything.

The biggest mistake was to eat at lunch time and it suits me best to eat nothing at all until the evening, have a decent meal so I don't go to bed hungry.

It reminds me a little of what happened when I gave up smoking (shortly before I gained my extra 3 stone). I remember feeling relieved that it made my life easier and not harder. It's like I have let go of something.

The family routine is messed up because cooking is no longer my raison d'etre, and they are eating biscuits for lunch. Heyho.

Have you seen today's Telegraph 'Weekend' Section? A whole article on 5:2, plus some recipes. Very useful.

www.telegraph.co.uk/lifestyle/9480451/The-52-diet-can-it-help-you-lose-weight-and-live-longer.html

Here's the link. Helpful to see it written down.

I've just worked out the calorie content of the milk that I put in tea and coffee and it's higher than I thought, I'm probably drinking at least 200ml per day on diet days which is about 130cals. Time to decide whether to eat less or drink less milk.

Thanks for the link. I fasted yesterday and found it ok, though when I was not busy I was hungry at times and thought a lot about food I would eat the day after. I also went to bed at 9.30pm (an hour or two earlier than normal) as the temptation to eat chocolate was exhausting me.

Bother, I'm only allowed 500 on fasting days as I'm female, not 600. That last 100 gave me my tin of mandarins in the evening.

Today I was surprisingly not stuffing my face, had a couple of small yoghurts for breakfast, roll, chocolate and kiwi for lunch and medium dinner. Just a tiny chocolate bar tonight.

Trying to plan which day to fast on next ...

I used to fast regularly when I was younger, but I just feel faint and get hypo attacks now

The article says you should not fast on consecutive days. I wonder why not? We can only realistically do it on Monday and Tuesdays.

(marking my place to read the thread properly later....)

Starting tomorrow.
I find it so much easier to get through the day without breakfast as well.

Abra, try it for a day - I'm fasting every other day regardless of what I'm doing and I'm not feeling faint or ill even when I've got a busy day with lots of physical activity.

Today was easy until just after I had eaten my meal and I'm now starving so will have a few more cups of tea to fill me up, then bed and a look at the scales tomorrow morning.

I've done two consecutive days last week (Monday and Tuesday) and today will be the first of another two consecutive days. But my query was really about why the two days being contiguous was a problem?

Hi - am new to Mumsnet but was googling the AFDiet and found you all - great! I started my first down day last tues so today is my 4th down day. Finding it very interesting to 'observe' myself. I started it because I was talking to DH about how the pounds keep piling on even though I eat healthy, am active and take care with food intake blah blah! I notice that once I start eating that stimulates the hunger and I want more food. DH suggested this - he is not a diet man at all but had read some of the stuff about the Horizon prog. So I'm doing alternate days, he's joining me by doing 2/5.

Only lost 2 pounds so far - thought it might have been more. But I agree with those who have said they find it best not to eat at all and just have the 500 cals in the evening. Am drinking lots of fizzy water as it feels more of a treat! But have realized that a lot of eating is just habit and not connected to being hungry

Hi Abra1d - your query about 2 consecutive down days - maybe then the body might think 'oh oh, famine out there' and shut down the metabolic rate to compensate which then slows weight loss and can permanently re-set the metabolism. Just a thought....

Yes, I wonder. Though for me it is more about reducing health risks than weight. All very interesting, any way!

Bah!

Third week in, last week I did Alternate days, Tues, Thurs and Saturday. Strictly 500 calories on each of those days. Sunday & Monday went to the seaside, ate normally

Sunday - lunch 250 cals
tea - salad with chicken and bacon with half a bowl of chips.

Monday - breakfast - cereal, full english
lunch - 3 ring donuts (we were at the seaside)
tea - two slices of large pizza - 160 cals each.

So week three of 500 calories usually M,W,F and .........................

I've lost Half a Pound!!!!
Crap

I have been doing this for two weeks now - trying alternate days which has been fine. I haven't weighed myself but some clothes are slightly looser so have probably lost something. I am finding that I am really not that hungry and as I said up-thread I don't feel the need to over eat on my normal days. I do think it is psychological, the fact that I could eat chocolate, cakes and bread (my downfalls) means that when push comes to shove I haven't wanted to. I know if I am bored or stressed I will use food to blank out those feelings.

My understanding is that there is something about allowing your body to go without food for many hours that is crucial and that alternating fasting with eating normally means we don't go into starvation mode ie. store calories. Could be totally wrong as am no scientist

I did the first fasting day yesterday. had plain yogurt and sons strawberries and lots of tea.
I generaly find if easy to stick to one type of food and I tend not to eat when I'm busy.
3 pounds down.

I'm down from 13.12 to 12.8 in 3 weeks. I think I lost a stone in the first week (I was particularly bloated) and four pounds roughly in the last two weeks.

When I find it hard I just remember that it's only a few hours to go, after which I can eat whatever I like. Quite often I just don't feel like eating.

I have a hunch that this works better when you allow yourself to get properly hungry, and don't graze through the day.

I have just done this for two weeks (alternate day fasting). It was awful. I am a post-menopausal mum so that might have something to do with it re my metabolism. It also made me exhuasted in the mornings following the fasting days.

I didn't see the programme but read the blurb - apparently you are supposed to get used to it. I didn't. I could not do much on the fasting says and I would say I was painfully hungry. Even watching TV in the evening it was gnawing away at me. I just longed to go to bed so that I could get up and eat the next day.

I was only about 7 lbs overweight (for me) and within healthy BMI range. Maybe it is easier if you are very overweight?

I think I kept to about 5-600 cals - still had milk (skimmed) in tea and had low cal soup once a day, as well as mainly veg, cott cheese and the odd egg or tuna.

Certainly didn't eat to compensate the next day as I didn't need to - I was full up on very little!

I will weigh myself tomorrow but think I have lost a few pounds.

For sustained weight loss it is generally recommended to lose slowly ie at 1-2 pounds per week. Yes starvation mode can kick in if you consistently have less than 15% (or thereabouts) of your normal calorific intake - which means you put on weight more easily when you go off the diet.

I like the idea of 5/2 - on two separate days and will have a go - maybe I won't feel so bad if i don't do it every other day.

One good thing - my blood sugar levels were regulated - I no longer got the shakes when hungry - but as I said painfully hungry - hungrier than I have ever been - and I have strong will-power normally.

I have tried this and it really isn't going well. On the fast days I'm agitated, can't concentrate and found myself pacing round and round the kitchen. I was obsessing about food in a way that I just don't, normally.

No noticeable fatigue, but the agitation and distraction really makes it unmanageable. I couldn't work effectively at all.

Am not post-menopausal, but like the previous poster I only have a few pounds to lose.

dh and I are thinking about trying the 2/5 version....but I have to admit, I'm worried about losing weight. I don't want, or need, to.

Is it possible to do the 2/5 for health and energy, without losing weight?

Might have to try and find out, I suppose. Also suffer from heartburn (hiatus hernia) and concerned that fizzy drinks, teas, and fruit are not going to be good - but that might be total rubbish!

Hi, may I join you? I am reading with great interest as to how you're getting on as I have started the 5 2 diet myself this week; mostly inspired after seeing the Horizon programme and wanting to lose some weight and improve my health prospects - the info was really interesting.

Biggest difficulty is working out exactly what this diet is; the programme had some info but once you start googling online : it's s minefield!!

So, this week, I restricted myself to 500 cals Wed and Thurs (won't do consecutive again - it just suits my week this week). I drank gallons of coffee (with milk) to get me through the day (and er, some water), two apricots at 3pm when i seriously flagged, and then had veg soup, veg and a bit of fruit totalling 400 cals for dinner.

Has anyone adopted the 16 hour window between food approach on their fast days? I have read something about this.

Also, anyone know about the need to restrict protein on fast days in order to gain the benefits? Think he may have referred to this in the Horizon programme?

Bit confused, and there doesn't appear to be a definitive book to follow - which would really help! :-)

Another 2lb lost this week.

Pinkchilla, I too think the 16 hour window is important in terms of getting the cells to go into repair mode, but the research is quite confusing.

I don't think this is a good diet for those who have less than 7lbs to lose, that amount of weight is negligible anyway, this diet is more about health and normal weight is a very wide range, around two stone for most people.

I have another two stone to lose to get to the mid-higher range of 'normal'. I am currently in the 'overweight' range and was bordering on obese, but not quite there yet. If I lose a stone I will get down to the highest range of normal, and another stone I will be in the middle.

I did lose over a stone in 3 weeks, but it has naturally steadied now, so I am hoping to continue, losing around 2lb a week, this will get a stone off me by Christmas.

I am finding the hunger a little more gnawing now, must try to remember that it comes in waves. I don't start to get hungry until about midday and then just drink more coffee. So even if I eat at midnight I can then eat at 4pm the next day which isn't too hard.

Family meal planning is tricky and I find it hard to cook and not eat, so I try to restrict this to 400cals allowing the last 100 for milk through the day. I'm restricting milk intake a little as that could add up to 200 calories in a day if I don't watch out. This diet works for me because I can't slip into denial or conveniently forget that I'm on a diet. I intend to make sure there are no grey areas.