Hi. My advice would be to choose a plan and stick to it for a month or two (if it is tolerable). Two fast per week combined with a healthy attitude to food and exercise should do the trick.

You lost 2 kg from 2 fasting days and gained it all again over the weekend. This indicates that it was not all fat you lost and not all fat you gained (2kg of fat is a lot of calories!) and shows how unreliable weight is.

You need to look at the long trend in weight (over a month or two) and long trend in e.g. waist measure. Be patient; if you stick to your plan and is otherwise healthy your weight will go down.

Keep us posted

I was wondering what HIIT was as well. Thanks DrLL for the explanation.

The way I track my weight is to weigh once a week, on the same day each week, before breakfast, in the same PJs. Weight fluctuates and weighing in more often can lead to confusion. What we need is a long-term trend, although I admit to being thrilled that I’ve lost 3 lbs. in the first 2 weeks.

I’m confused about your description of the length of time you’re fasting. The way Michael Mosley describes the 5:2 system, you would eat dinner the evening before a fast day but have nothing after that; when you wake up the next morning, you have 500 calories to distribute throughout the day in whatever way works best for you; then no more calories until you normally break your fast again the following day. So that actually makes a 36-hour period with a 500-calorie allotment, which most people seem to divide between breakfast and dinner (making 3 12-hours fasts) or save up for dinner (making a 24-hour fast followed by a 12-hour fast), with some people needing a small mid-day snack (a 12-hour fast, 2 6-hour fasts, and a 12-hour fast). If you do shift work you may want to shift it around to work with your work/sleep schedule. As far as I know there is no research showing that one of these patterns works better than the others for weight loss. And I’m sure other lengths of time fasting have their benefits, it’s just that this is how the 5:2 system is described.

Took me about three weeks to find what suits me and works. Definitely need to try things out. I dont eat breakfast, keep my lunch to under 110 cals and the rest goes on dinner. Some weeks I dont even reach 500 cals (doesnt happen alot) I also weight lift and do cardio on the actual fast days.

Trial and error, dont give up keep trying diffrent things.

It says in the book you can pick and choose what ever day you want to fast. Im one for routine. However I have changed the days a few times with work things come up unexpectantly

Great to read this advice dlroseberry. In the first 3 weeks I lost 3 kg, but in the last 3 weeks nothing. But I don’t have a lot to loose, so feel pretty good already. I have an exercise program (which I have done for years)that I’m happy with, so eating less on the fast days may suit me. I had just decided to try eating less on non fast days during the week, then just having what I want in the weekends. But your suggestion is more “cut and dried” Thanks. I find drinking lots of water helps and after 6 weeks, find the fast days OK.

hi clare – i just started this week myself – welcome aboard.

since this is new for me, i decided to track my food and do my meal planning on Fitday.com. i also calculated my TDEE to give me an idea of my boundaries. yes, you can eat what you want on feed days, but it’s good to track how you’re doing to see where you need to tweak.

i have never been fond of logging my food, believe me, but whenever i need to follow a particular eating plan or gauge how much i’m eating, i’ll log into fitday.com. others use other sites/apps for food logging.

bottom line is, make sure you’re eating 1/4 of what you normally eat on fast days, and on feed days, stay near your TDEE.