Rob, You don’t sound confrontational, just frustrated. It is easily possible to overthink this – there are some very complicated theories on these sites, most of which I ignore. The only theory I really believe is the one you demonstrate – after a time at a given weight my body decides that is normal and whether I overeat or fast it will tend to stay there. It then takes a determined effort to get it to co-operate. Once it gets the idea it is relatively easy. So if I fast most weeks I lose weight, lapse for a month or so and it takes a few fasts to get going again. Fortunately my body’s current idea of normal is about 40 pounds less than it used to be. The answer is in simcoeluv’s last paragraph – stick with it and find what works for you.

Thanks a lot penguin & simcoeluv,

Simcoeluv I do appreciate your patience and I totally get your final point. I’m normally the first one to say, “Your anecdote does not trump scientific tests” 🙂 That’s at the heart of my frustration. I believe that I understand the theory, I’m absolutely confident that I’m applying it, and it’s not working. You say I am not “sure” about my calorie intake. That is only partly correct IMO. I am not sure what the numbers are. I AM sure that I am eating considerably less than before. No, I have no “proof” of that that would convince a court of law :-), but it’s true what others have said that the fasting makes me conscious of my eating habits 24/7 whereas I wasn’t before.

I have cut down – NOT cut out – on a lot of snacking that was a regular part of my diet, and reduced frequency and portions of carbs in main meals. Again I don’t have records, but when I recall I went through maybe 2x or 3x 150g bags of potato crisps a week until late February (often as snacks, between meals), and have eaten maybe 2 bags in the 2 months since, I’m not imagining that. I haven’t replaced them with other snacks, I just haven’t eaten them.

I cook for two, and if the portions had increased to the level required to stealthily replace 3600 “missing” calories (720 per day), I think my partner would have noticed! The only foodstuff I consciously eat more of than before is fresh vegetables; is there a “banana” of the vegetable patch? A stealth calorie-monster that I don’t know about? O GOD – IS IT THE COURGETTES!?!? 🙂

I may have to take you chaps’ advice and give in to strict calorie-counting, for a short period at least. As it happens, I can work out nearly exactly what I have eaten today, after my (estimated) 600 calorie fast day yesterday, because I still have identical portions left. So I just put the figures into the calorie counter on the NHS website. I had an apple (50kcal) and 50g of Halloumi cheese (200kcal) for lunch, two large pork sausages (~200g) (400kcal) and ~250g of caliuflower “cous-cous” (100kcal) for dinner. Apparently that’s ~750kcal. Add in maybe 50kcal for a couple of cups of tea with ½tsp of sugar and a large glass of “no added sugar” squash. I’m feeling peckish so I’ll probably have another 50g of that cheese before bed. Generously, that comes to 1000kcal.

Now, I’m not claiming that all or even most of my non-fast days are like today; I’m sure I do usually eat more than this. But it’s not unique either. I’ve had non-fast days where I’ve still only wanted one meal, albeit a larger one. I’m not feeling ravenous tonight; that sausage dinner was very satisfying. The notion that on other days, when I don’t have the figures to hand, I’m somehow getting through 3000+ calories seems, to say the least, fanciful. I know, I know – it has to be coming from somewhere! But unless I’m sleepwalking to the fridge and then out to the shop to replace what I eat before breakfast, I’m genuinely at a loss! 🙂

No doubt! 🙂

A bit extreme though, isn’t it? A long way from the original 5:2 instructions, which are to eat “normally” (i.e. 2400kcal) on the 5 days. 6200 calories per week begins to sound like the “starvation” diet that 5:2 is supposed to avoid. I’m not sure I’m up for that.

I think I have a plan based on everything I’ve learned so far: I’m going to carry on as before for one more month, but with much more regular weighing, to look for variations and to make sure that it’s not (particularly stubborn) inertia to blame. Then I’ll try perhaps two weeks of strict calorie-counting to 600:2400. If there’s still no significant movement, I’ll try zero-calorie fast days for maybe another two weeks, then re-assess.

Once again, thanks for the responses. I’ll no doubt be back with long-winded reports – but hopefully not for a while! 🙂

Hi Rob,

You need to change things up. Keep doing the same thing and you will get the same result. There is no magic involved. If you have genuinely reduced your caloric intake then your body has also reduced its caloric activity to match.
Or you are grossly underestimating what you are eating. I must admit that when I had just gone into maintenance I used to think that what I was eating was WAY below 2100 calories. What I was having was looked to be so little there was no way it could have been adding up to 2100 cal. So I weighed everything I ate for a few days. Sure enough I was having 2100 calories. 2100 calories is NOT a lot of food. Our sense of portion has been destroyed by modern society.

I still water fast one day a week even though Ive been at my maintenance weight for about 18 months now. I do it for health reasons and not to lose any more weight. If I find myself dipping too far below my self imposed weight 70kg (154 lbs) I will usually have one or two days where I will eat “cheap” carbs rather than more food. BANG. The next week I’ll be back up to my set weight. A calorie is a calorie is such a myth. Different foods are processed differently. 1000 calories worth of donuts is not processed the same as 1000 calories worth of broccoli.

David V have you had me under surveillance? I agree with that totally, except that I don’t recognise the concept of a small whisky.

Hi,
I do intermittent fasting but the way I do it is to consume no calories at all and only drink water for as long as I can manage (up to three days).

I congratulate those people who have intermittent calorie restriction which works and helps them to lose weight.

That diet simply doesn’t work for me because I find it easier to eat nothing than just a little. If I eat just a little I cannot completely free myself myself from the thought of having to have food and I end up clock watching more wondering when I can eat and thinking about what I’m going to have to eat.

When I eat nothing at all in my fasting periods I do still think about food, but only for short intervals. The rest of the time my mind is completely off food.

Hi bigbooty:

I understand how/why processed carbs are processed differently by the body than are fats.

But are you saying that if a person has a TDEE of 2000, and eats only donuts, which amount to a total of 1000 cal., each day, leaving a 7000 cal. deficit for the week, the person will either not lose or will gain weight over, say, a 4 to 8 week period?

Okay, well I may be a neophyte in the world of nutrition & dieting (as must be obvious by now!) but I do have scientific training, so I’m going to address bigbooty’s repeated statement that “‘a calorie is a calorie’ is a myth”.

A calorie is a scientific unit. Although it doesn’t fit into the SI system, it is metric and fully standardized. A calorie is defined as the amount of energy required to raise the temperature 1g of water by 1’C at 1 atm pressure, and what is called a “calorie” for the purposes of nutrition is actually a “kilocalorie”, which is this figure multiplied by 1000. So; a calorie IS a standard amount of energy. A calorie absolutely IS a calorie. To say otherwise is – on the face of it – the same as saying that a kilo of feathers weighs less than a kilo of lead.

However, what I think bigbooty is really talking about is the ways separate food groups release their calorific energy, which can be quite different (A kilo of feathers may WEIGH no more than a kilo of lead, but it’s a lot more awkward to carry, and almost impossible to make a drainpipe out of…) Dietary fibre, for example, contains calories but is not digested, so the amount of dietary calories actually absorbed from high-fibre food is considerably less than its total calorific content. As far as I can ascertain from reading around the issue, these differences are taken into account by applying absorption-specific correction factors when calculating energy values for commercial food labels – although the system for doing so is imperfect and contentious. So calorific values on labels should still approximate the calories made available to the body on absorption.

I guess how accurate (or otherwise) you believe these approximations to be, determines how strongly you feel the statement “a calorie is a calorie is a myth” can be justified. One thing seems unequivocally clear to me, however – if you DO believe that, then you can’t possibly use calories as a meaningful tool in weight control, AT ALL. You’d need to do your own separate calculations on every single mouthful you ate, based on (presumably) your own exhaustive scientific research of the energy absorption rates on every foodstuff you ever have, or are ever likely to, consume.

Conversely, if we are to continue to use calories to design and regulate diet plans like 5:2, then we have to be talking about the same thing, so “a calorie is a calorie” is a given, or we’re all wasting our time.

You are both technically correct. A calorie is a specific unit of energy. My intent was to point out that how that unit of energy relates to a biological system is too simplistic and people misuse the concept. I own a Ferrari and run it on 100 octane fuel. If I place “XX” calorific content into the tank the car will run for a certain amount of “XX” time depending on the output demands. If I replace it with the same “XX” calorific content but the fuel is diesel will the car run just as well? What if I chop up some wood having the same calorific content and place it in the tank? This is the concept I was trying to get across but I suspect that you knew that.

Our biological system has evolved over millions of years to run on certain fuels. Use these fuels and it runs well. Use other fuels and our bodies still run, sort of OK for a period of time and then stop. In the last 50 off years the quality and quantity of that fuel has drastically changed. I know Ive simplified the concept but at its core its correct. If you eat the wrong foods your biological response makes it VERY hard to diet.

Its very hard to just eat 2000 Cal of donuts as your TDEE, and not want to eat more. The biological response is to shuttle all the excess glucose off to fat storage via an insulin response. That insulin spike takes hours to dissipate. The 4 grams of glucose running through your blood system is consumed. However your ability to access stored fat energy reserves is severely compromised. The so called sugar crash. Realistically you have two options available. You reduce your activity or you seek more fuel even though you are carrying huge amounts of fuel on board as fat. Its very hard for you to “not eat” when your brain is responding to hormonal inputs that are screaming for you to take the action to eat more. Eat whole foods and you make the task of running your body well a lot easier. That’s my analogy behind donuts vs. broccoli.

Thanks for the clarification, bigbooty. That and the link bcjmmac sent do go a long way to explaining the theory.

What I’m still fuzzy on, though: The 5:2 diet, in all descriptions I have read, is characterized as an input-reduction diet, essentially on the “CICO” model; consume fewer calories – expend the same – lose weight. But the article above seems to suggest that it is actually the lowering of insulin that gives 5:2 its effectiveness, and the calorie input reduction per se is secondary, if relevant at all.

I haven’t seen any 5:2 instructions that require a reduction in carb intake on non-fast days. One of the main selling points of 5:2 is that you “eat normally” on the 5 days. Cutting carbs in addition is often mentioned as a good idea but NOT one essential to the scheme. Everything I read about 5:2 suggests to me that I could (if I chose) follow a high-carb diet with 2 days of fasting, and lose weight. But this LCHF/Insulin theory seems to suggest otherwise, and that a reduced carb intake is necessary to prevent insulin “spikes”. Would you say that was right? Because if so, I think it needs to be made clearer to those embarking on the diet.

In my own case, I believe I have cut down on carbs, but I also suspect I started from a position of fairly high carb intake. I’m still not sure any of this explains my reported lack of results on 5:2. However, since I started this conversation a few days ago I’ve been weighing myself every day as advised, and there is a pronounced downward trend this week – probably because I’ve been obsessing, which I promised I wouldn’t do – so, onwards and downwards! 🙂

Rob,

Michael’s 5:2 was to a large degree born out of research conducted by Valter Longo (and Krista Varady). He himself practices water only fasting 4 days straight per month. Personally I think I would struggle with that but find one day per week do-able. Michael plucked the figure of 500/600 out of thin air as that is what he thought most people could at least do. At the end of the day if you propose a regimen that is too harsh even if you know it will work 100% and no one follows it, then what good is it?

I don’t think Im a low carb person per se’, its just that my carbs are not processed. I get them from veggies, nuts and some fruit. If they are locked up in fibre and your body has to work to extract the fuel then all is working as it should be. Im of Italian heritage and I very rarely have pasta and bread any more. Now here’s a interesting story. I asked my mum what she used to eat as a child growing up in Italy. Thinking the reply would be pasta and pizza. It was mostly veggies, beans and a little bit of fish and sometimes red meat. Pasta and pizza was considered a “treat”. To be had maybe once per week. Crazy right? Now we treat those foods as staples and even processed biscuits and cakes have turned into food staples!!

If you visit the maintenance section and talk to those that have been successful there is a common thread. Most either avoid or limit processed carbs. Its not like its a secret club where the members hide their knowledge. They freely give advice, but a lot of people just dismiss it. It does agitate (probably not the right word) me that people are determined to treat 5:2 as some sort of magical bullet that will allow them to eat crap for 5 days a week as long as you then reduce the calories for 2 days. Do I miss eating all that processed crap? Not really. Am I a saint about it? No, every now and then I’ll have a piece of cake or a chocolate but its a treat not a staple.

Good luck with it.

Recent posts have been getting very technical !
Which is slightly the opposite direction that the 5:2 diet promotes.
It’s simplicity is what drew me to it.
A simple cal reduction on 2 days of the week.

But I quickly found that you don’t really eat “as normal” on the other days.
Once you gain more knowledge about the portions you eat and the cals in everything I found I was cutting much more than a few calories on those 5 days.
I was stunned when I saw the cals in carbs for example. Rice, potatoes, pasta, pizza. My staples. Bread too.
So I cut them down to a minimum. Maybe once a week and I didn’t feel tired either even when doing sports. I’m sure this was a big contribution to the weight I lost. And as I have been eating more of them recently, my weight has gone up.

Anyone tried just water on the FDs ? As said, Mosely promotes the 600 cals on those days because people can do it but if you can do just water, would you lose more weight ?

Hi David,

It got all technical because Rob was stuck and was wanting to know how to change things up. Well I think that’s how it got all technical. If it works then all is good. Its when it doesn’t work that you need to deviate from the basic 5:2. And there are enough posts on here to suggest 5:2 doesn’t work for everyone. That’s when you need to change things up.

PS: @penquin : my first car was a “previously enjoyed” 1971 MGB

Hi guys. As a mid 50’s bloke I previously lost 10kg but gradually put it back on. After weighing myself post Easter binge at 79kg, committed to getting back to at least a more healthy 72kg. While FD are not a real problem for me get these out of the way on Monday-Tuesday), it is the NFD where my will power disappears.
Hope support on this forum will keep me from straying – and provide inspiration for a thinner me. Weighed myself today and already 1.0kg less! But trying to look at what I eat over the next few days to keep it off.

Hello gents, I’m back from three weeks in France and Italy. I actually lost 1.5 lbs and weigh less than 180lbs for the first time in a year. However the way I lost it was not pleasant. I did eat and drink moderately, walk tons and did body weight exercises for the first two weeks. The last four days I was sick as a dog and ate very little. I spent my time either in bed or on the toilet. Fortunately I was able to get back home without any issues. Hit the gym today for an upper body workout and was pleased that I didn’t lose much strength. I’m very grateful that I’m recovering and able to get back to good health.

Back at 5:2 as best I can through daily diary; reality check after a full medical, not to mention summer clothes are hard to hide in! Just heard another medical study verification of the HIIT benefits for all age groups; they skip the whole ongoing motivation source need though. Best regards to all; Victoria Day long weekend here in Canada.

Hello Gents, just back from more travel to my dysfunctional sorta in-laws. Lots of stress and junk food. Gained 2.5 lbs to 180.4. No one to blame but me!

I’ve been doing quite a bit of research and I’m going to make a few changes. First I’m going to do time restricted eating to synchronize my solar and eating clocks. My first meal will be breakfast around 8:00 AM, starting a nine hour window to my last meal. I will eat healthy (moderate protein, high fiber, high fat, low carb) but I won’t be restricting calories. After that it will be water only.

Second will be a twice a week water fast instead of the 600 calorie 5:2 style 36 hour fast.

I have a blood test panel tomorrow so it will be my first attempt at a water only fast. I’m a coffee junky so it will be a big challenge for me.

How about a “no-progress” but “back at it” report? Restarts count, I am told, as we all deal with real world issues that set us back a step or two. My food and exercise diary has many recent gaps between entries. Looking today at 30-60-90 day mini goals to get back on a sustainable track.
Condolences and encouragement,again, to all in the UK as we continue to absorb the most recent insanity.

Diverdog. 2.6 lbs in a week is what the gurus consider a satisfactory and sustainable result. You are on track. I am thoroughly off that wagon. The 6 lbs I lost preparing for my colonoscopy are back on. It has been a disorganised spring/early summer and I am now 14 lbs heavier than I was at my lowest point, which puts me 21 lbs above target. However, I have my Cancer check results – still clear so no more excuses.

August, I’m with you. In the past 5:2 was too easy and I got too casual about it. A series of goals setting out achievable (but not easy) objectives is what I am currently working on. I started again on Monday/Tuesday and have made small but measurable progress. Thanks for your thoughts. The UK has been here before – thirty years ago I did morning push-ups by my car to look for IRA bombs under it. This is more difficult, the suicide aspect is new. We have our General Election today – tomorrow we will know which of the contenders will have to solve the problem.

Thanks Dog. I had the surgery a year ago; this was confirmation that it worked so I was pretty relaxed, but still good to know! The real problem the surgery left me with was the alcohol. Initially my interior would not tolerate beer or wine but was fine with whisky. I was also fine with whisky but it did get to be a habit. It is a habit with calories and it stimulates the hunger. No excuses now, so I’ll be trying to match your 2.6 lb a week.

Thanks August. Have a look at the site “No breakfast, or more like…” Diverdog has a really interesting thought on daily cycles and their possible use to us.

Gent’s, here is some great information on circadian clocks, eating patterns and fasting:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-R-eqJDQ2nU

Progress report. Week one of back on the wagon. In this order:
2 not very hard FDs,
2 NFDs ,
1 x 10 hour time restricted eating (TRE), but too much booze,
1 NFD with the family – real cider, large meal and chocolate cake,
1 extremely TRE -only a very substantial breakfast at 0930. 22 hours later, still not hungry

I ignored the restriction on types of fluid outside the TRE hours -as much tea/coffee with milk, no sugar as I wanted. Result for week: down 5 lbs. I’m not sure I believe it; it was too easy. The late breakfast was on Sunday, probably the only day that would work, but a single later meal could work during the week. 5 lbs in a week is not sustainable, but it is an encouraging start.

August, those damn salmon pies are sneaky! Thanks for keeping us posted on your progress. Good goals and they should be attainable. I’m shooting for <15% BF too.

Penguin, 5 lbs is awesome! I agree that it’s not sustainable for someone as close to goal weight as you are. If I can sustain 2 lbs a week to my goal I’ll be delighted.

I didn’t mention that I had a small glass of wine with dinner most nights. also I am exercising, 1 upper body, 1 lower body and one HIIT on the bike in a 6 day cycle. Weigh work outs are heavy and hard and I’m happy to report that I can finally do some pull ups again. 4-5 short walks a day with my GF’s dog. Well I guess he’s mine now! LOL