This topic contains 7,289 replies, has 660 voices, and was last updated by Opal Shine 2 months, 1 week ago.
Hey Smiffy, well done, congratulations, brilliant! How good must you be feeling! Do you have a particular secret for success? Enjoy your meal, you deserve it, I shall raise a glass to you this evening – non FD today.
And Femme Anglaise too, despite Italian delights! You are la femme de disparaître! (I hope Google Translate got that right ☺️
For myself the Trousers Of Truth are keeping me on the right track even if the Scales Of Deceit sometimes say otherwise!
Xx
Hello BooBoo and LOACA
A very hot afternoon in Rome. Most people are having a siesta, including our new baby who is now two weeks old.
I have started reading the posts from N°1- a source of inspiration!
Thanks, Booboo.
Welcome to those just starting. This is definitely a YES WE CAN diet
I have been doing the 4:3 diet with my husband for a month now.
Why the 4:3 rather than the 5:2? We are starting strict and will change over to 5:2 when we have lost a certain amount. I don’t see the 4:3 as a lifetime diet, but certainly the 5:2 fast diet will be.
I want to lose 25kg and my husband wants a BMI of 24. He is just about there.
My news is that I have lost over 4kilos in a month. I am so happy.
I am a bit worried about loose skin. My daughter suggests buying 2kg weights and using those to tone arms.
Is there an answer to that problem? If not the saggy baggy elephant in the Just So Stories will have nothing to complain about, if he looks at me in 6 months.
We are leaving for France again tomorrow.
I am feeling pleased with myself as the other day, I drove the Amalfi Coast road, south of Naples. If you know it, you will know why I am pleased with myself.
You really feel like a rally driver. I am sure this experience lost me some weight through nervous tension. This would be a great experience in a sportscar.
Maybe you know the film, Under the Tuscan sun. The Amalfi coast road is the road where the beautiful Italian boyfriend took the heroine(Diane Lane).
I think I still prefer George Clooney.
I visited Lake Como with my daughter a couple of years ago in the hope of meeting George there. You had the advantage, Femme anglaise, of knowing where he lives.
Well as from tomorrow, a French fast diet instead of Italian one. The fresh produce in Italy is so wonderful.
Pour le mmoment.
Caio
Kiwi Wiwi
Hi Kiwi Wiwi
Congratulations on the birth of your bambino, I think it’s amazing that you are managing to do any diet regime at all at this time – and brilliant that you have lost 4kg.
I have been along that road – amazing scenery if you can bear to tear your eyes away from the road – I did it a few years ago with a lunatic bus driver – that was scary too!
Thank you all for the warm welcome! I did get the book and the cookbook from the library as well watched the documentary. Very very good stuff! I had never heard of Dr. Mosley before since I’m on the other side of the pond but he seems to be so down to earth, you can’t help but like him! Today is another day eating at TDEE and I’m all ready for Monday with my handy can of soup, lots of bottles of water and some veggies (I’m a planning freak!)
Kiwi wiwi congrats on the birth of your grand baby! My first grandchild arrived 6 weeks ago…he is so cute and such a good baby. I could just eat him up LOL!
Hope everyone is having a great day!!
Good morning LOACAs everywhere from the frosty south.
Smiffy, so well done. Enjoy your celebration.
Tangatawiwi, also well done with weight loss and congrats on beautiful grand-bambino.
Newme@50, welcome and congratulations on your new grandy. Wonderful news and you’re right, they’re so gorgeous you called almost eat them up.
After 2 FDs this week I put on 800g! Couldn’t understand and sadly, reverted somewhat to my old comfort eating ways yesterday. Haven’t had a migraine in years but when I woke up this morning with a ripper, I remembered all the old symptoms – weight gain, uncontrollable craving for sweet carbs, especially chocolate biscuits, and heightened sense of smell, especially for smoke which, being winter here, is all around from neighbours’ slow combustion heaters. Anyway, rummaged in my ‘potions’ drawer and took a blast of migraine med and feel much better now. Expect to see big improvement in the scales next week with Monday-Tuesday fasting and fluid loss post migraine. Pre-meno I had a monthly migraine so maybe not all hormones settled down yet, even after 18 years.
Enjoy the remainder of the weekend all and happy fasting next week.
HI Nicky
I sympathise…I also had a roaring headache this week, and resorted to drugs. Also used to get migraines monthly between late thirties and when periods stopped. I also turned to bread and honey this week. Haven’t eaten any in ages. Mmmm…
Also cold here. 4.9 deg at 7am this morning, which is bl*****y cold for here. Hope you feel better this week. OW & DW P
Thanks P. At least after I worked out what was wrong I felt less down about the weight gain.
Wow! 4.9 is damn cold for Sydney. At 8am here our verandah temp was 3.8, roof temp 0.6 and only 9.8 inside. No wonder my MS Surface wouldn’t start until I warmed it up. At least the sun’s shining, although of course that and cold mornings are a necessary co-occurrence.
Bread and honey …. mmm!
Ow & dW for me and Sw for you. Have a good week. n
PS: you have previously mentioned your OH’s science background – physical or biological? My OH is an earth scientist – with my biol sc. it makes for interesting dinner table discussions. Also our disciplines overlap with fossil plants so we still learn from each other.
PreciousBooBoo – many thanks for your congratulations on my weightloss – I am utterly amazed by it; but time will tell if I continue at the same rate. I am hoping to lose overall 3 stones, which I realise the more I lose the harder it will get, and the less TDEE I will have!
My comment about ‘no excuses’ referred to ‘no excuse’ for not giving the FD a go.
I note you suffer with an under-active thyroid and am staggered that you are not being treated. My lack of thyroid function was picked up as part of a full blood count, sugar levels, cholesterol, vitamin D, etc. and I thought my GP would just prescribe me tablets, but she actually sent me to have a scan of my thyroid (which picked up a benign nodule) and then I was referred to an Endocrinologist who prescribed the widely used drug, Levothyroxine. I tried various dosages and after a year am now on a steady level of 150 ug/125 ug, on alternate days. I have a three-monthly blood test to check the levels. Looking at my last result (it is called ‘TSH ultra sensible’) it shows a level of 0.32 (the range being from 0.35 to 4.00) – I’m slightly below but better than being up to 28.0 when I was first tested. I hope next time you see your GP they are more proactive for you.
On a lighter note I have just come across an American author Tish Jett, a lady of our age, who has been a journalist on mostly women’s issues for many years. She married a frenchman and lives permanently in France. As well as being concerned with how trim we LOACA are she is keen for us to ‘keep up appearances’, be confident and worldly, etc. She has a blog ‘afemmeduncertainage.blogspot.fr’ – I’ve only had a quick look but thought some LOACA might be interested.
FA x
Hi all LOACA. Thought it time I put in an update. I’ve been pretty busy the past week with preparations for my Wedding Anniversary party, which was yesterday. 34years!!!! We were only going to have the family around for lunch but it grew as we heard ourselves saying to various friends” OH do pop by”, like you do!!!!! Anyway 20 people later…… I arranged a catering supermarket delivery for fresh salads, puds, and things like bread and cream(!!?) and used some large joints from the freezer. (My OH is a sucker for a bargain and will come home with huge bits of meat way too big for the two of us!! Anyway they came in useful for yesterday!!) The worst thing was that I ended up roasting them on a fast day… but I managed. We wanted to slice them cold as it’s summer and I knew it would take ages to chill them. (I do sympathize with those who live in the Southern Hemisphere who are suffering cold temperatures at the moment, but it’ll be our turn soon!!)
Anyway on Friday we weighed and measured. My OH has lost a stone and I’ve lost 11 lb, in 7 weeks. Also losing inches. 1inch off bust,2.5 off waist and 1 off hips!!! Feeling great. We had a smashing day yesterday, food was good and we didn’t go too mad. Had several celebration glasses though!!
Never mind, don’t feel guilty. Had complements on my new (smaller) dress too. So all in all we’ve had a great weekend!! Fast day tomorrow, that should get us back to normal. Hope other LOACAs had a good one. Good fasting. WN
Hello BooBoo and all LOACA, I am still doing my 5-2 B2B Sunday and Monday as usual.
LUVTCOOK. Thank you for your kind words regarding my 3 years at goal, you are right it is easy to lose than maintain the weight, I will keep at it. I love the way slim feels.
How are the (over the pond ladies) hope you are all well.
I have not had time to read back the posts for a couple of days. My mind is not in a good place and I am going to give these threads a few days or more rest. I wish all of you happy fasting or feasting. OW’s and DW’s JIP.
Congratulations, Wilbersnanna. Isn’t it fun to be smaller! Well done!
Hi JIP, May your spirits rise up after a good nights sleep. You are a role model for all of us. 🙂
For me, maintaining is far harder than losing the initial 16 kg. 5:2 really is a way of life that I have embraced with gusto. I do love the food choices. B 🙂
Ladies and, well, ladies. It gives me great pleasure to accept the STAR LOACA AWARD. I am so overwhelmed!! I apologise for the delay in my speech but I had to wait for Kylie to finish at the closing ceremony at the CommonweaLth Games..! I would like to thank Precious Boo boo for handing the award to me, and ,of course, my dog for allowing me to take him for lots of long walks. Also my grandchildren for allowing me to chase them to get exercise, the grocer for selling me loads of vegetables, and my mother,who’s 87, for having me, and for her saying “that’s nice dear”, when I told her about it!! My OH is dusting the mantlepiece ready for it as I speak. Again, THANK YOU ALL. Wilbersnanna.
Hi BooBoo & everyone
Well, what can I say? Thank you, thank you, thank you! Through Paltrow-esque tears I am (sniff sniff) so happy to (sniff sniff) accept this beautiful award. I would like to thank all the Ladies Of A Certain Age for their consistent support, encouragement and wonderful humour (sniff), my OH for being with me all the way on this journey (sniff) and BooBoo for starting this thread a year ago and being there for all of us (sniff sniff). Thank you all (sniff).
Seriously BooBoo, many thanks and I do feel rather guilty at having lost the weight in a relatively short time, when you, poor thing, have had such a struggle. Thanks everyone else for your kind words. No, Cheese, there is no secret – I just follow Michael’s guidelines. I am careful to keep to the 500 cals on FDs, and try not to have too much wine on the other days. I don’t have any strict exercise regime but I do take long walks with the dogs every day and am a very active gardener. The one problem is that I know I don’t drink enough water.
Falling asleep doing this, goodnight all and G’day Down Under.
Smiffy x
PreciousBooBoo – I’ve just read your post and immediately looked out my results –
as well as the TSH test they did these others:
T4 Libre – 9.85 (9.00-19.00)
T3 Libre – 3.57 (2.60-5.70)
Anticorps anti-thyroperoxydase – >1000.00 (<5.60)
Anticorps anti-thyroglobuline – 89.7 (<4.1)
As I understand it the combination of a HIGH TSH (mine was 28.0) and a LOW T4 (as mine was initially 9.85 it was considered to be LOW) shows someone having PRIMARY HYPOTHYROIDISM.
When I was initially diagnosed I did lots of research and came across the American Thyroid Association website – I searched for Thyroid Function Test and up came lots of very informative facts.
Part of which was information on testing for antibodies. The following I have copied from that site:
Two common antibodies that cause thyroid problems are directed against thyroid cell proteins: thyroid peroxidase and thyroglobulin. Measuring levels of thyroid antibodies may help diagnose the cause of the thyroid problems. For example, positive anti-thyroid peroxidase and/or anti-thyroglobulin antibodies in a patient with hypothyroidism make a diagnosis of Hashimoto’s thyroiditis.
I hope the above helps you as I can understand your frustration at it not being looked into further. I know when I was diagnosed as having hypothyroidism I felt relieved – at last there was a reason for my two stone weight gain over two years. Over that period I had dieted continuously and not lost a lb. Now I knew why.
Femme x
Hello Boo. Thanks for your thanks! (This could go on a bit!!!!) Yes, a bit like you we hadn’t intended to watch the ceremony but got hooked! Kylie was excellent, I wish I could be like her. I’ve always envied petite people having, it seems, always towered over friends and work colleague’s.And I am not particularly tall at 5ft 5ins,used to be 6ins but I seem to have shrunk a bit! Reckon I’ll have to start Pilates, if I can find a class.
Oh dear! Now I’m rambling!! Just looking at this while I wait for the kitchen floor to dry, must be by now! See ya!!
Wilbersnanna. X
Happy Monday everyone – I know for most of you the day is almost over but it’s only beginning for me 🙂 Today is fast day and I’m all filled up with coffee with a splash of milk and now onto my water for the day. I weighed in on Friday and I’m determined not to weigh in again until this coming Friday. I want to truly see what is happening! August 25th is my yearly physical so I want some sort of improvement..I’ve gained weight since my last physical and I don’t want the lecture (hehe)
I can’t believe the commonwealth games are over all ready. I wasn’t really following it that much as I’m crazy busy these days but I think we won a few medals but nothing spectacular!
Here’s to a successful week for all of us!!
Oh BooBoo I do wish I could send you some of whatever it is that is helping me lose the weight. It must be pretty galling, having started the thread and given everyone so much encouragement along the way. I’m fairly sure I will reach a plateau before too long, so you may have the last laugh!
JIP – so sorry to hear you are not feeling on top form – don’t stay away too long.
Wilbersnanna – your anniversary bash sounds great and how fantastic to be so much slimmer for the occasion. Glad you got lots of compliments – you must have been on cloud 9. Like you, I’m 5’5″ and have always longed to be petite. I’ve also got broad shoulders, which I have always been conscious of. My (ex!) husband used to call me ‘Prop Forward’, which, being in my late teens/early twenties gave me a huge complex. You can imagine how I was in the 80s – I took the shoulder pads out of everything otherwise I looked like the Honey Monster!
Hi Newme@50 – hope today’s fast has gone well. Lots of us fasting today I suspect. I managed to skip lunch and looking forward to a prawn stirfy when I finish this. It’s my favourite FD standby, especially since I discovered the Zero Noodles.
Hi to everyone else. Hope it’s all going well for you.
Smiffy x
JIP. sorry to hear you have hit a rough patch. Offering you a soft shoulder (emphasis on the soft I am afraid) to lean on. It is tough to be feeling low when there is so much celebrating on the thread. Hope you have a nice old pair of “fat pants” to pull out of the closet and try on. You can do one of those commercials for yourself where you stand in the mirror and show how 3 of you could now fit in those big wide pants that you used to wear.
Ladies: ALWAYS keep a pair of fat pants just to remind yourself when you are low and maintenance is a struggle of ALL THE WEIGHT YOU LOST TO GET THERE. I almost donated by “Biggie” to the Salvation Army bin, and thought …oops. Almost lost a teachable moment there. I don’t think the tape measure ever does as good a job as the feeling of wallowing in clothes that are now way too big.
JIP: hope you feel the love coming your way of many LOACA that care about you.
Nicky: hoping your migraines are settling down. I have never had one but know several strong folks who are brought to their knees by them. I will save the other shoulder for you if you need one.
Best to the Rest. OW & DW
Purple: your fish parcels sound devine. I have tried and tried to find fresh kafir lime leaves around DC and that is the one ingredient I always come up short on…must make another go of it because this sounds like something I would really enjoy.
Boo: the yogurt chicken would be a winner for me too, because those are two ingredients my frig is never without. So nice to have something that you can go to in a pinch. So many recipes call for marinating chicken in yogurt for extra jucieness. I could throw this together the night before and toss in the oven ready to go when I get home from work. Sounds like a plan!
Hi Luvtocook.
Thanks for the prod re Big clothes. I had a fun time trying on all my clothes today. End result. Loads of clothes gone to charity. Because of your post, I saved a pair of tailored shorts that I was most proud of a year ago. Now they drop to the floor fully zipped and buttoned.
I cleaned out the wardrobe shelves and found clothes that now fit me. 🙂 I am having my second fast day today and am keeping myself busy. Hope everyone is having a lovely day. Sunshine here. B 🙂
Dear LOACA
I have read all of your posts from the beginning, and your advice and support encouraged me to start the 5:2 WOL. I completed my fifth fast day yesterday.
To date I have lost 7lbs proper and to my surprise several inches, although none off my somewhat substantial bust unfortunately, but no surprises there.
I am however looking for some advice from you all. Despite what the scale and tape measure say, I am still feeling very bloated and uncomfortable. I have cut out most of my carbs (bread, pasta DO affect me). I had only 400 cals of mainly veg for yesterdays “fast” meal and woke up this morning with a bloated, achy belly. Which I did not expect.
This hot/humid weather does not agree with me, I am drinking as much as I can but cannot get rid of this achy belly feeling. HELP! Please. DDx
Good morning everyone! Fast day is over and back to normal (that is TDEE) eating today. It’s so refreshing to wake up in the morning and know I can have something yummy but healthy! I am trying to limit sugar today as an experiment. It really does throw me for a loop – have a little crave a lot. Stupid sugar, stupid companies for adding so much sugar to foods! And I resisted the scale this morning, I’ll fast again tomorrow (super busy day at work) and hop on the scale on Friday morning. I’m tired of being obsessed about the scale!
Welcome Dottie…I’m new here too! I’ve played around with fasting for the last couple of weeks and now I’m committed to it. I wonder if your tummy issue is due to too much veggies too fast. When adding in more fibre you need to go slow and build up. Just a thought anyhow!
Bayleaf – great job donating your “fat” clothes! It’s good to get them out but the idea of keeping one pair of your fat pants is also a great idea. You can see how far you’ve come!
I hope all those who are fasting today have a great day!!
Thank you for the warm welcome…
I am in sunny Suffolk, finding the weather a little unsettling – my body really doesn’t like it, bra, shoes, stomach all seem tight, even though everything else says I am getting smaller..!
It would seem that so much changes when you get older… and I am only 50! But have been through menopause now for about 7 years. HRT helps most things but not the weight. Always had big boobs/hips but hips seem to be less so and stomach is horrible (once upon a time it was flat!).
Will check out the enzyme issue, but also wonder if I overdid the veg. Cabbage could be the culprit. So many things don’t agree with me anymore.
Thanks for the prompt response ladies, its appreciated. DDx
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