Hiya,

I’ve been following the 5:2 diet for five weeks now, and have been checking these forums on every fast day for support and inspiration.

A year and a half ago I started my MSc. I went from working full time to working part time and studying full time. Something had to give, and for me it was exercise. It was a really tough year, and I felt worse because I wasn’t eating well and felt guilty when I took time out from studying to follow anything besides work. I berated myself a lot and fell into some really harmful thought patterns.

I made it through the year, finished my degree and started working full time again. I tried to get back to my old routine, but it was tough. I started running, but injured myself and had to stop for a while. I was really hard on myself and was feeling really negative and hopeless- as though would never start to feel like my old self again, and was spiralling into some really negative territory.

I started trying to make some positive changes. I started cbt and enrolled in swimming lessons so that I could add some low impact exercise into my routine. I wanted to make sure I was eating healthily as well, but I knew that I have problems with consistency and that depriving myself of things I liked would just make me feel miserable.

I started 5:2 with the mindset that I would be making a lifestyle change,rather than implementing some quick fix that I would abandon as soon as things got rough.

It’s been five weeks now, and so far so good. I’m finding it gets easier each week. Although losing some weight would be great, for the time being I’m trying to focus on being healthy and building routines that I can stick to, or at least pick up again and not be too hard on myself if I stray a bit.

Right now my plan is to stick to it for two months and then I might start weighing myself once a month. I don’t mind if progress is slow,because I’m hoping it’ll be sustainable. I don’t want to get too caught up in the numbers at the beginning, just focus on making a healthy change.

I will say that in this five weeks, I’m already feeling a difference, and I can feel my appetite levelling out on non fast days.Let’s hope I can keep checking in every now and then, and that we can continue to encourage each other 🙂

Hi Sweet tooth,

So far so good. I was on holiday abroad recently, so I took two weeks off. Before I went away,I had completed seven weeks. The fast days were challenging but getting easier,and I found on my non fast days I wasn’t snacking as much. Even though I’m not weighing myself at the moment, I felt like my clothes were fitting better. That might just be me feeling more confident, though. Being able to rearrange my fast days to suit my schedule, and knowing that when I do over indulge I can pick things back up again and get back on track has been really helpful in staying positive.

I was worried that I would have trouble sticking to it or getting back to it once I got back from holiday, but today is my first fast day since getting back, and it’s been fine! I gave myself a few days to get over the jet lag and get back into my routine. I’m aiming for another 4-5 weeks, see how I’m feeling, and maybe I might start tracking my progress. Or maybe I won’t, but I hope to stick with it for a while yet. How did your first fast day go?