Fast-5

[slightlysoreboobs]

Has anyone read/tried Dr Bert Herring’s Fast-5 book? It’s a free download.

I've been trying it out for a few days after seeing holiday photos where I barely recognise myself. My tummy wobbles when I walk and I’m not having it! Yesterday was day 3 and I found it really really easy to not eat until 2pm. I had lovely food, ate with the kids and stopped when I was full. I ate lunch and tea and nothing in between which is revolutionary- I’m a bit of a permasnacker usually!

My plan today is to do what I did yesterday: eat between 2 and 7 and have a small lunch and a normal sized tea with nothing in between.

Day 4 today (started on Thursday while we were away on holiday - those photos were awful) and it’s been fine. I ate lunch at 1 and then dinner at 5 so I’d be all finished by 6. I was ready to eat at lunchtime but not starving, and I wasn’t that hungry at dinner time but thought I’d best eat so I can get through tomorrow until 1pm.

Dr Bert wrote another book called Appetite Correction which I downloaded and have read this weekend. He says it takes 3 weeks for the body to adjust and then after that you can expect to lose 1lb a week. I haven’t found the past few days difficult at all so I’m hopeful I’ve found the method for me.

I was back at work yesterday after the holidays and just because of the team and our work I had to have lunch at 12.15. I was really pleased with myself when I didn’t eat again until tea time but because I was late leaving work and then had to cook when I got in, we didn’t eat until about 6.30 so a much longer window than I wanted, but it couldn’t be helped. I like the analogy from the book where he talks about slipping as you climb up the mountain: you’d expect to slip, it’d be unreasonable to anticipate that you wouldn’t slip, so if you slip, you just get back up and keep going.

I've got another busy work day today but even if I can’t eat 1-6 or 2-7 I’ll just do the best I can.

Interesting - thanks for the tip.

Are you able to have tea/coffee in the fasting time or is it water only?

(coffee addict here)

I haven't tried this, but am currently doing a OMAD (one meal a day)/VFast800 fusion, which is 800 calories only in one meal per day with extended fasting in between. This sounds similar with a longer eating window and less/no (?) calorie & carb counting?

Not read it. I already do 16:8 (still have about 2000 cals a day in that window!) and it's worked well for me. I also have a milky coffee after 12 hours fasting. Will have a look!

@anotherbrewplease black tea, black coffee, water, anything calorie free is allowed!

@strawberrybarn he talks about appetite correction: no need to count calories, if you eat on a 19/5 schedule apparently your appetite naturally reduces and after a three week adaptation period, as long as you stick to the 19 hour fast you should lose about one pound of fat a week. I’m dubious about the natural reduction of appetite… I can eat a lot of crap (sweets, crisps etc) without really being hungry but I’m just going to try it and see!

@wordlewordle do you mind me asking if you’ve lost weight on 16:8?

Today I have really pushed the eat-to-your-appetite thing: I permasnacked all afternoon from lunch until home time. There’s such an abundance of snacky crap food at work it’s hard to say no!

I started eating at 12.30, and finished tea by 6.30 so not a 5 hour window and not the snack and meal that Dr Bert recommends but it’s progress.

Ooo that looks like an interesting diet, I’m going to give it a go!

Yes I did, I wasn't overweight. 5'5" and was 8.10, dropped to 8.2 at one point but hover around 8.6 now.

I do love healthy foods but also have a lot of peanut butter, bagels, choc/ice cream and protein shakes! Always a veg-based dinner. Tend to have a bagel for first meal, coffee protein smoothie with banana mid afternoon and more wholesome dinner (usually followed by ice cream!)

@namechangeforthisQ2022 that’s interesting to know thanks - did you do this for reasons other than weight loss?

I’ve had a couple more slippy days - yesterday was strange, but good strange. I had decided to just eat some fruit at lunchtime and then have a main meal with the kids at 5 but a variety of events over the morning caused me to think “fuck it” at 12.45 and I went and got a meal deal…. I was super full from that and didn’t feel hungry when tea was ready so I didn’t eat anything! This is completely new and has never happened before. I would usually always eat tea with the kids regardless of hunger!

I felt a bit unnerved though and peckish at 9pm so I made a wrap with loads of salad and had that, but I’d done an 18 hour fast till 12.45, then about 7 hours from meal deal to wrap… Assuming I get through to 1pm today that’s going to be another 16 hours. This feels very positive. I weighed myself this morning and I haven’t lost anything, my tummy is still very wobbly… but so far Fast 5 seems like progress in the right direction.

Not really, I just realised I was pretty much doing it already due to lifestyle (I exercise before eating, and have dinner at 5:30 with young DC but was then having a dessert about 8pm) when some weight fell off ("those last 5lbs" sort of thing) and then I decided to do it more properly. So I eat between 11-6.30 or sometimes 12/12:30-6.30 depending on what I'm doing that day. I usually finish dinner by 7 but will have a solero or something about 6:30. What's really good about it is that I've stopped mindlessly snacking at night.

I do have an oat milk coffee around 7/8am though. Realised it wouldn't be sustainable if I didn't! Tried black coffee but I just can't.

Have you considered starting on 16:8? It sounds less intense (so more sustainable?) than fast 5. Build to that gradually?

If you are restricting for long periods of time from waking your body may go into starvation mode so more likely to lead to non-stop eating/bingeing when you do start to eat. I feel 16:8 works as I'll eat within 4/5 hours of waking.

Sorry meant to say I usually finish dinner by 5:30pm, latest 6pm

Just a little progress report: the end of the week was really busy work wise so I had some 7 or 8 hour windows but yesterday I just wasn’t hungry until 5pm and was content and satisfied by 8pm so my window was only 3 hours!

I think that having a flexible approach is really helping me: if I don’t hit 5 hours, it’s ok, I can try again tomorrow. I really like how I feel doing this. Usually I get really sleepy in the afternoons, but I’ve noticed if I don’t eat lunch, or only eat something small I just don’t get tired. It’s brilliant! And my hunger has not been an issue at all in the way I thought it would.

Checking in with another progress report, I’ve had my period for the last week which totally arsed things up but back on it today. I downloaded a fasting app that just keeps track of how long your fasting/eating windows are and even with feeling hormonally vile, I was keeping 17-18 hour fasting windows which is great. Still not lost any weight though….