Can anyone please advise, make suggestions, help anything? I am feeling frustrated, losing will power and upset.
I have several chronic health conditions, so experience chronic back, hip, rib and leg pain with flare ups in most other joints as well, i experience chronic fatigue amongst other symptoms also. The conditions affect my mobility and day to day functioning. It is important to keep my weight down as weight gain increases pain, which decreases mobility, which increases weight and so the cycle goes.
I am 43 and my TDEE is between 1600 and 1700. I started my new way of life 8 weeks ago to lose weight and to hopefully have a positive impact on my pain and energy levels. My life since then has been as so:-

Fast 2 days per week consuming less thsn 500 cals and having a period of at least 12 hours of no cals or very little ( 5 cals in morning coffee with almond milk), now stopped that and have green tea instead, no other cals til meal at about 6pm. Meal is under 500 cals.

3 days of eating less than 1300 cals of healthy well thought out food. I weigh my food and record it on fitness planner to ensure i stick to limits and don’t inadvertently go over, do this on fast days too.

On a weekend i don’t restrict myself as much but don’t have a free for all either. I still eat healthy food but allow myself occasional treats or glasses of wine or lager. I still record what i consume so know it is between 1600 and 2000cals on a weekend or sometimes it’s only one of the days I consume that much.

I carry out yoga almost everyday and have only missed about 7 days since started. I do between 30 mins to two hours, averaging about one hour per day. I chose yoga as after much reading i ascertained that it will be good for conditions i have, be part of pain/fatigue management plan, build strength and tone muscles. I know it does not burn that many calories but can have the benefits already mentioned. The work outs i have done have been mainly for abdomen/core and weight loss.

This week i have started 5 mins a day of HIIT. I have tried a few different exercises and have not settled on one thing. It is difficult to find something because of pain and mobility issues but i have worked to my absolute hardest for 1 minute, then slower for 30 secs and repeated this til i have done 5 separate mins of hard/fast exercise.

I drink at least two litres of water per day, more on fast days.

In 8 weeks of this wol/routine i have lost 1 pound and even that is debatable as my weight fluctuates between start weight and 2 pounds lighter, so I’m averaging it to 1 lb. My neck and bust don’t need to lose anything but my waist and hips do. I have not lost one cm from either! I have not noticed any change in my clothes and my tummy still has and looks fat.

I am at my wits end, where am i going wrong? Why am i not seeing or having any changes?
I am prescribed medication which usually prevents going lower than a certain weight but at the moment i am half a stone heavier than that and not moving, which is unusual for me. I had routine blood tests in January and all came back within normal range so don’t have any underlying medical condition such as hypothyroidism. Do i need to increase my cals to my TDEE on non fast days, I’ve been reluctant to do that in case i started to gain weight and cm’s but would be more than willing as I’d love to eat more nuts, seeds and home made popcorn!
I am feeling very frustrated and losing motivation especially when i read how well other people are doing in a shorter period of time than me. Please can anyone help/advise me?

I am taking meds that hinder weight loss but I normally maintain my weight by about half a stone lighter than i am now without exercise or watching what i eat. I crept up half a stone and want to get back to my usual weight as even a slight increase in weight increases pain. I was prescribed something which made me gain 14lbs in 6 weeks, i stopped taking it and lost 10lbs in a week without changing anything in my diet, which i didn’t consider to be that healthy. I got back to my pre med weight within 2 weeks after that without changing a thing. I’ve been taking the other meds for years and although not gone below a certain weight have not had an issue getting any gain off.
Over a period of a week I am consuming about 1000 cals less than my TDEE so even with the increase at the weekend i am still under and that’s without taking into account any exercise i do. I am concerned if i ate less cals on nfd’s I’d be really struggling to meet my nutrtional needs.

Thanks for the advice and suggestions. @fitnfast thanks for the calculation, I’m not sure i have set myself the right TDEE as I worked it out based on level of activity before I started exercising everyday and in the winter when I’m a lot more exhausted and in more pain, so less active. Also the calculator said to go under on activity levels as people tend to over estimate. I am 5feet four and half inches, I said I was lightly active for reasons above which brought me out at between 1600 and 1700, can’t remember exact figure but i work to 1600 anyway. I exercise on average one hour everyday since end of february, some days i do more than 100 crunches to strengthen my core and tone my abs. Even before starting 5:2 I very rarely ate bread, pasta or yoghurt and only ever had a small amount of semi skimmed milk in my one cup of coffee per day (I’ve never liked milk, butter, gravy and now i use almond milk on non fast days and drink green tea on fast days), I’ve not eaten much at all with added sugar, have changed and reduced the amount of fruit i eat. I have actually gone about 95% gluten free so not having pasta or bread at all, when i cook pasta meals for my family I have a small portion of basmati brown rice or quinoa instead. I’ve rarely eaten cheese and when I have it’s been small portion of real feta. I’ve dramatically reduced the amount of nuts, seeds, dry fruit, olive oil i used to eat and measure it all out exactly so i can’t overeat them e.g. 10g walnuts and 5 almonds on nfd’s, none on fast days.
I do now eat about 100g of Total fat free Greek Yoghurt, which is 57 calories per day and sometimes on a fast day if after my one meal if i have calories left.
Thanks @lichtle i will stick with 5:2 as want the internal health benefits as well as weight loss of about 8lbs in total. I agree that having a day off full on calorie counting and eating a lot less is psychologically helpful, if i didn’t give myself time off, i think i would have been completely demoralised and cracked weeks ago. Maybe it will just take me a bit more time, i used to walk a lot but as my health has detetiorated i am hardly able to walk far at all and somedays walking only the few feet from lounge to kitchen is too much/hard. This is why i do yoga. I have thought about that, maybe i would have gained weight if i hadn’t ate like this but not sure as have generally been underweight until last few years when I’ve been less active and took these meds, until recently i was classed as ideal.
Thanks @amazon, just need to be more patient with myself i think. I am going to try to reduce the meds which cause weight gain and see if this helps and doesn’t impact on pain management or sleep. My pain is not well controlled by my meds anyway, my Dr’s keep trying to increase the one that causes weight gain but i refuse to take more because of possible weight gain so ultimately would increase pain!
I’d been fine with lack of progress and feeling positive that it would come in cm’s lost if not weight soon but i felt so positive that progress would be made this week, when it wasn’t i was upset and frustrated. Suppose i set myself up for a fall.
Thank you, I’ll keep on keeping on – i have to!

My difficulty with carbs is fruit, but I’ve stopped eating bananas and started eating blueberries and strawberries. I try not to eat fruit on a fast day. I haven’t and don’t think i could cut out sugar completely and have allowed myself the odd treat or wine or beer on a weekend which i know is high in calories, but if i didn’t do this I’d find things so boring and lose heart. I eat very little potato or eat sweet potato instead, brown rice and quinoa. I’m unsure what to do regards carbs and whole grains due to guidance that has come out this week. I definitely do not eat enough whole grain but the downside is the calorie content. Brown rice, quinoa and popcorn are comparitively lower than pasta or bread but still add a fair amount to daily intake. I used to eat oat cakes instead of bread and bought gluten free 9 weeks ago, i have not had one of them!
I generally eat fat free greek yoghurt with the blueberries, strawberries, nuts, seeds, dry fruit or scrambled eggs with spinach/ mushroom or sometimes a slice of bacon for breakfast.
For lunch i might have prawn, avocado with salad, tomato, basil, manchego, mozzarella or feta cheese salad, if not had for breakfast, the yoghurt mix or home made veg soups. I make batches of different veg soups which work out about 120 cals for 300mls and i freeze them in little bags so i can just get out and eat them whenever i want. My favourite is what i call souper soup, that is kale, broccoli, spinach and garlic with fat free quark or yoghurt!
For dinner i have mainly low fat protein such as quorn, chicken, turkey, kangaroo,prawns, white fish or egg dish with either large salad or large portions of a variety of veg.
My treat snacks are either 9bar seed bar which is packed with nutrients from 9 different seeds but is 244 cals or small packs of sesame seed bars which are about 150 cals for the three little bars. I only have these during week if my calorie intake allows.
I also make sure i have at least one meal per week with oily fish, again within calorie limit. I weigh and log everything so i know exactly how many cals i am consuming.
I am enjoying learning about new healthy recipes and trying them out and all of these are on nfd’s of course. On fast days i just have the evening meal.
I have checked my TDEE and it is 1691, using the caculation above i have worked out my daily calorie allowance on non fast days to be 1467 or total for week to be 9269, so even though i consume more on a weekend i am still between 1100 and at worst 369 cals under my weekly recommendations to lose 1lb per week. My target was 8lbs in 8 weeks. I’ll just kerp trying and hope for best.