Hello all!

I’m new to the 5:2 lifestyle and hoping to share experiences with other people on here who are living the 5:2 life.

After spending last year doing a lot of psychological work on myself I’ve now decided to tackle my weight and relationship with food as the next step on my personal journey.

Although I’m extremely informed when it comes to what I should and shouldn’t eat (I live in Helsinki in Finland which is a very health-conscious city), I keep straying from it enough to slowly put on weight or at least stay where I am. I’m lazy by nature, but I bike a lot in the summers. However at the moment there’s too much snow to bike, so I’m even more stationary than during the summer months.

I did my first fast last Saturday (10th January) and found it much easier than I thought. As long as I drank a lot of water and green tea I was able to stave off any hunger pangs that came along. I didn’t experience a headache or any kind of bad mood. In fact, I felt much better than normal and more energized!

My second fast day was on Monday and my third yesterday (after forgetting my lunch at home and deciding to switch my fast day from Thursday to Wednesday – I love how flexible 5:2 is!). I already feel like my thoughts about food have changed a bit and I think 5:2 is perfect for people like me whose weight and health issues relating to food are psychological.

As I didn’t have a working set of scales when I started out, I only weighed myself today after buying smart scales so I can also find out my fat percentage and muscle mass.

MY STATS:

AGE: 30
GENDER: female
HEIGHT 176 cm (5’9″)

STARTING WEIGHT: 89,7 kg (14 st)/(197 lbs) – this is actually down 2 kg from when I weighed myself last and most of that is probably fluids I’ve lost during the previous week.
GOAL WEIGHT: 70 kg (11 st)/154 lbs)

STARTING FAT%: 33,3 % (ugh, that’s bad!!)
GOAL FAT%: 18% (optimistic and ambitious, I know)

STARTING MUSCLE%: 34% (not as bad as I thought – it’s actually in the normal range)
GOAL MUSCLE%: 39%

STARTING BMI: 29
GOAL BMI: 22,6 (which I’d reach if I got to my goal weight of 70 kg)

SIDE-GOAL: to get my mom inspired to try 5:2 as well

I’m not looking for a quick fix here. I want to change my entire lifestyle for good and if it takes a year to reach my goals then so be it. I feel like with 5:2 it could actually be possible.

I’d love to hear some thoughts and experiences and encouragement from those of you who have done this for a while as well as those who are only just starting out like me!

-Penguin