Feeling sceptical!

This topic contains 17 replies, has 7 voices, and was last updated by TishTash2 7 years, 2 months ago.

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TishTash2

11:46 am
20 Jun 16
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I’ve been on 5:2 for about 8 weeks and my tot weight loss is a miserable 2kg. I just seem to fluctuate up and down all the time and at one point on the scales I’d lost 4kg but it just went up again after a couple of non fast days. I’m feeling discouraged as from what im reading I’m not sure 5:2 really works – as in eat 500 cals two days and don’t think about it the rest of the time. Actually what seems to be the case is people are also dieting or calorie counting the rest of the time. Please tell me I’m wrong!!

Amazon

12:05 pm
20 Jun 16
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TishTash

First of all well done on losing 2kg. The average weight loss for women on 5:2 is 0.5 kg per week so as you are losing less than that you need to look at what you are eating on non fast days. It is imperative that you don’t overeat and you must have been doing that before or you wouldn’t need to lose weight, so unless you are making an effort to eat less on non fast days it makes sense that your progress is so slow. You can eat what you like on non fast days but not as much as you like but within your TDEE.

The best thing to do is calculate your TDEE if you haven’t done so already, and you can do that by clicking on the how it works tab at the top of the page. Most people overestimate the amount of exercise they do so unless you are an athlete I suggest you opt for sedentary.
For the next two weeks you should count calories on non fast days and my guess is that you’ll discover you’ve been overeating. One you’ve done that you’ll have an idea of how much you can eat on non fast days.

There has to be a calorie deficit in order to lose weight and to lose 1kg that needs to be around 7,000 calories so cutting out approximately 1500 twice a week isn’t going to do it, especially if you are eating too much on the other five days.

The scales will fluctuate up and down all the time and that is normal regardless of whether you are calorie restricting or not. It depends on many things, how much you’ve eaten, medication, constipation, fluid retention which are all part and parcel of human physiology.

5:2 works if you do it properly and I can say that because I’ve lost over 30 kgs.

Good luck.

bigbooty

2:16 pm
20 Jun 16
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I hope Im not confusing you with another person, but we appear to be going over old ground. If you eat without being mindful then 5:2 can sort of work or at least stop you from gaining even more. That is the case for you at the moment. 5:2 is not a green light to eat whatever and how much you want. It is not a magical bullet. Eating up to your TDEE on non fast days is not dieting!! It is eating THE appropriate amount. You must at some stage go into caloric deficit to lose weight. Otherwise you are attempting to disprove the laws of physics.

On the assumption that you are eating up to TDEE on non fast days, then eating 500 cal on two days (assuming your TDEE is 2000 cal) means that you are 3000 cal down for that week. That means you will lose about 0.7 pounds plus some water, so say 1 pound per week or 0.5 kgs.

If you want to accelerate the process then you need to choose your foods carefully. You need to eliminate sugar, and restrict simple carbs like bread, rice, pasta, potatoes. If you are not prepared to do these things then you are chasing a panacea that doesn’t exist.

Be honest, please describe a typical eating day. What do you have for breakfast, lunch and dinner? How many snacks to you have?

It works as I have lost 20 kgs and I do not count calories at all. I do eat mindfully though. I severely limit breads, pasta, do not have rice. Never have biscuits, cake, chocolate, sugar. The majority of my carbs come from vegetables. I eat some meat/fish. Love cheese, walnuts and almonds which are a good source of protein and fats. Eat some fruit, NEVER fruit juice.

NothingToLoseButMyFat

3:20 pm
20 Jun 16
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Hi TishTash, I see you live in Malta. Lucky you!
One of the few criticisms I would have of the excellent Fast Diet book is it doesn’t make enough of the need to be mindful on NFDs. There are a couple of warnings here and there but the phrase “you can have it tomorrow” pops up occasionally and for those of us who got into this mess (e.g. me) by long term over eating it may not be quite firm enough. This website, however, is very clear on that point if you go through the “get started” pages.
As Bigbooty says if you eat to your TDEE you will lose no more than the calorie deficit of your fast days permits. I see nothing wrong in this as the slow process is sustainable and I am in this for the long haul.
If you want more rapid weight loss, you will need to be more restrictive (not for me, but your choice). Also I find the fasts are slowly reducing my appetite. For instance I am now looking at an unfinished plate on an NFD that would have easily disappeared before.
You may be over doing your TDEE on your NFDs (definitely worth checking) or you may not be and are just one of those people who take a while to get started. It’s a bore but maybe calorie count for the next couple of weeks on all days and see where you are.
Good luck

HappyNow

3:22 pm
20 Jun 16
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Bigbooty,

If you click on someone’s name you can see what other threads they’ve started/ contributed to.

In this case, you have spoken to Tish previously.

Tish,

I have to agree with everyone else who’s responded to you so far. On non-fast days you need to be eating a ‘normal’ amount of food (for the average person). This is not the same as calorie counting/ restriction/ deprivation, it’s just not being greedy and eating more than your body needs. It almost sounds as though you want to be able to keep overeating?

Bigbooty has asked you to describe a normal eating day. I see from another thread that on your non-fast days you eat chips, bread and cake every day, and chocolate most days. That suggests that even if you aren’t massively over consuming calories you may be eating too much refined carbohydrate and sugar, keeping your insulin levels high and hindering fat loss.

Personally, I largely cut out bread, pasta and added sugar when I started 5:2 as I recognised that those poor food choices were responsible for driving my weight gain. I didn’t want to carry on making the same mistakes, I wanted to change my habits and adopt a healthier way of life. Now I am able to appreciate that cakes/ biscuits/ chocolates are not daily staples, they are occasional treats. I’ve been slim for over two years now (I lost 30lbs in 2014 and have not gained any of it back), and I’m happy that I’m no longer addicted to refined carbohydrate and sugar. I’ve taken back control from food 😀

I have never dieted nor have I ever calorie counted, but I have accepted that I can’t eat bread and added sugar every day and expect not to gain weight.

5:2 really does work. If it isn’t working it’s usually because it’s not being done correctly.

It sounds as though you need to give some serious thought to what you want. Make a few small sacrifices (and let’s be honest, sugar is pretty toxic so your body would thank you!) and lose weight, or carry on as you are and maintain and possibly even gain weight as you get older?

TishTash2

9:33 pm
20 Jun 16
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Hey! Thanks for your responses and thanks to those who responded to me previously. I actually didn’t see those replies as didn’t get alerts about them and new to understanding how the forum works. Anyway, yes I suppose I did buy into the sales pitch of the book and believed that I can eat whatever I like on the non-fast days as that’s the whole selling point of the diet. And I’m a bit disappointed to find it is definitely not the case and yes there does need to be restriction and calorie counting and it should be clearer in the book in my opinion! On a”feed” day I find it extremely difficult to count calories exactly as I eat out in restaurants a lot. So it’s hard to know exactly what is going into the food – for example yesterday was a feed day and a special celebration so we went out for lunch with friends, it was four courses and I’m sure over TDEE. I am pretty sure I’ll be going over my TDEE most feed days I haven’t wanted to restrict food groups such as sugar or calorie count. As per my other comment I do have bread every feed day (toast) as well as some kind of sweet treat (a piece of cake when meeting friends or an ice cream etc). Not chips as well but I wouldn’t rule it out if they were in front of me!!! I am fairly active I suppose, not an athlete but I am a stay at home mum so either up and down all day caring for my baby or out and about walking around for probably at least two hours daily if not more. I guess I’m waking up to the reality that you DO have to be very careful and diet the feed days as well as fasting so it doesn’t quite live up to the hype.

TishTash2

9:35 pm
20 Jun 16
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And HappyNow – your story is very inspiring. I do need to take back control over food as I’ve put on weight over years and years. Need a life change like you.

MmeMonkey

10:32 pm
20 Jun 16
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I would agree that the book is a bit vague about eating days but you do have to be mindful and I definitely watch what I eat most days. But I have to remember I had a distorted view of normal before and have had to relearn some more moderate habits.

I haven’t given anything up. Still eat bread and rice and pasta although not in the quantities or frequency I did. Cut right down on alcohol, and cakes, desserts etc are only occasional treats, like once every couple of weeks occasional, not every other day occasional.

I don’t feel deprived though and have managed to enjoy meals out and takeaways (again, everything in moderation).

And it works! I’m down almost 3 stone since January.

bigbooty

10:50 pm
20 Jun 16
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OK you keep referring back to the book as “your get out of jail free card”. But it said I could eat anything….. It really is up to you whether you want to lose weight or not, no one can do it for you. Im going to assume youre over weight and from what you’ve said you eat, Im pretty sure your insulin levels would be constantly high. That means you will always be storing ALL your sugary treats as fat. So after you’ve sat down and eaten your meal at a restaurant (which I suspect will be WAY over your TDEE just in the one sitting), I get the impression you need to have a treat as well. A piece of cake, an ice cream etc. That sugary treat is going DIRECTLY to fat storage. It has NO OTHER option. A piece of cake or an ice cream is probably a 200g serve. About 60 g of that goes straight to fat storage. Think about it, every time you have a treat a quarter of the weight goes to fat storage.

It really is up to you. Get rid of that mindset that is currently blaming the book. How’s that saying go, Madness is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome.

Success doesn’t chase you, you have to chase success.

Good luck.

TishTash2

8:26 am
21 Jun 16
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Hey yes I get what you say BigBooty and I’m starting to count calories as from today as I do want to shed my excess weight in the region of 15kgs and am really determined to do so now. My point is just that unless you read this forum / website and like me just bought the book, you wouldn’t know about TDEE and like me may try the “diet” – and it’s not without considerable effort to fast two days per week – and be frustrated at your results or give up easily. So I guess I hope others looking for an “easy” fix also read this and take note about the TDEE as the concept of 5:2 as in fast two days and eat whatever you want / do not calorie count the rest of the time simply does not work!!

HappyNow

9:02 am
21 Jun 16
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Tish,

I didn’t start reading the forum until I’d reached my goal weight.

I saw the Horizon programme and read the book before I started 5:2. It seemed fairly intuitive to me and I certainly wasn’t misled. I understood that eating whatever I wanted referred to food types and not quantities.

I suspect there must be a large element of wishful thinking for those people who thought they could carry on eating too much and still lose weight?

Anyway, good luck. It really is easy, works, and becomes quite addictive!

bigbooty

11:46 am
21 Jun 16
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Whats that movie with Tom Cruise and Jack Nicholson….A few good men. You want the truth? You cant handle the truth. I suspect that MM’s publisher had a lot to do with how the book was promoted. Publisher to Michael: You tell the punters that they have to make a genuine effort and you’re not going to sell any books.

Get rid of the sugary treats and it will become a lot easier for you to be successful. Its not easy giving up sugar. Sugar is addictive, just like cigarettes. You will go through withdrawal pains. Probably takes the best part of a month to detox from sugar.

Good luck, it works if you give it a genuine go. I lost 20kg over the course of 2015 and have been in maintenance 6:1 since March.

TishTash2

12:09 pm
21 Jun 16
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Exactly! No easy way out. I’m doing three things – 1) incorporating more exercise 2) cutting down on sugar 3) calorie counting my feast days 4) moving to 4:3, fasting three days instead of two.

I will update!

HappyNow

12:22 pm
21 Jun 16
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Tish,

It might help to think of them not as ‘feast’ days, but just non-fast/ ‘normal’ eating days.

Amazon

12:27 pm
21 Jun 16
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Tish,

They are NOT feast days, that is IMO the wrong way to approach them, they are normal eating or non fast days.

A feast day should be viewed as a rare occasion.

NothingToLoseButMyFat

12:50 pm
21 Jun 16
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Tish, well done on your resolve. To be honest, I don’t think you need to do all 4 things straight off, but if you can manage them, then more power to you.
I’d stick with 5:2 and make sure I had the not-above-TDEE intake nailed on NFDs before going to 4:3, if required.
Some people advocate using your goal TDEE, but I am happy modifying my intake as it goes down, especially as my appetite is naturally decreasing as I progress.
All you decisions are admirable though. For exercise have you looked at HIT as described in the Fast Diet book? It fits into a busy lifestyle and I have found it effective.

fastdutchgirl

7:17 pm
21 Jun 16
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You can eat whatever you want on non fast days, but not as much as you want. That’s quite a difference.

TishTash2

11:46 am
9 Feb 17
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Hello! I remembered this post and wanted to update in case there’s anyone else reading this in the same situation. It is about 7 months since I posted this and my total weight loss is now 8kgs. I continued to fast for a few months, and was more careful about what I ate on the non-fast days (though I wasn’t too strict either and was still having carbs etc). I gradually stopped the full fasting for 24 hours and tried fasting for part of the day, which i preferred. For example – fast from 2pm to 2pm. I now no longer have specific fast days but I have cut down the quantities of food I eat each day and I am continuing to lose weight slowly over time as long as mindful about it. For example most days I have a cooked meal for lunch and I will have nothing for dinner. Trying the Fast Diet broke the habit for me of ‘having’ to eat at every meal time – it taught me to get used to being hungry and eventually feel less hungry. The weight loss hasn’t been as fast as I imagine it would be if sticking strictly to the diet of fasting entirely for 24 hours then TDEE but it has worked. I have another 2kg to lose to get to my original goaland to push that bit harder I am now incorporating gym sessions 4 mornings per week as well as trying some smoothies made from nuts and chia seeds to replace my usual carby breakfast. Let’s see!