I find counting calories very boring and completely unsustainable, but is there any point if not all calories are equal? I lost weight and inches when I started the 5:2 by simply following 500 calories for 2 days a week. It was a huge step for me to ditch breakfast for 2 days and count down the hours until a rather miserable tin of soup without a large hunk of bread to dip into it.
Fasting has changed what I eat and how much I eat. I had to find something else to make up the 500 calories on a FD as I was so bored of soup and then started investigating what else I liked and wanted to eat.
I have found that counting how much sugar(both hidden and visible) in a day has been a very effective way of limiting how much of the sweet stuff that I can scoff. By keeping to no more than 6 tsp of sugar or 25gms has changed what I choose to eat. I am also sure that the consumption of processed or other sugary foods drives the desire to eat more and more-just as Robert Lustig-Paeditric Endocrinologist found.
I don’t eat bread/rice/pasta/potatoes very often anymore. I thought it was completely bonkers to avoid them but thought that I would eliminate them all and then try one for a week and see how I felt. The conclusion is that rice and pasta make me feel rubbish and very very sleepy so must send my insulin levels sky high and then into a sugar crash, so I avoid them. I have bread occasionally and potatoes too. There is nothing that is banned but I try to avoid anything processed/out of a box as I know that I feel rubbish afterwards.
Scales lie. Look to the tape measure if you want to see progress.

@simcoeluv – People practicing calorie restriction for life extension are not trying to lose weight or even build lean body mass. While their blood tests are good they often have issues with being too frail. Additionally their diets are very complex because it is extremely difficult for them to meet their daily nutritional needs with the long term calorie restriction. I suspect they would have difficultly with weight if they ever went back to eating normal amounts of food.

As I’ve pointed out numerous times, fasting is really about improving health. Even the shorter fasts that people often follow in 5:2 have multiple impacts on hormones that aid in consuming stored fat. There is likely even enhanced autophagy, although mostly that has been studied in longer fasts or animals. The point is that there are many things occurring that are far beyond calorie restriction.

While it is possible to push 5:2 more towards calorie restriction which you constantly do, it is just one aspect of fasting. I spent years practicing calorie restriction. It actually worked fairly well in my 30’s and even 40’s. However in my early 50’s I reached a point that it no longer worked. Anyway, since almost all diets used are based on calorie restriction, we know it almost has an unblemished record of long term failure. If it is long term successful with 5:2 then it is because of the fasting element, at least for many people.

With calorie restriction I reached a point where 94kg was a plateau I couldn’t get through. Sure my weight would drop for a few weeks but then it would slowly climb back and I had to cut more to drop it again. I was constantly hungry and miserable, worst I was losing lean body mass and gaining fat. After I started changing the food I ate and fasting I actually increased by around 3000 calories how much food I was eating a week. That is actually a lot when you consider I don’t eat for two days a week, yet now my weight is around 80kg and I’ve been building muscle mass. That is why I don’t believe it is just about calorie restriction.

While I’ve read Dr. Fung and Dr. Longo and many others. I’m not following anyone in particular. That doesn’t mean I don’t respect their work.

Fasting is the core of 5:2. The calories allowed on fast days are just to allow more people to partake in it. Maybe they only end up fasting 20h before eating too much, still it is better than nothing. Fasting is very powerful and profoundly impacts on our bodies. Coupled with good nutrition the body can greatly improve. The calories are a factor but they are only part of the story.

The biggest problem with CICO is that it is a concept firmly embraced and pushed by companies like Coke Cola Inc. Those companies producing the processed foods are the biggest reason for the obesity epidemic over the last few decades.

Now the reason I can eat more food is simple. Not all calories are equal and by fasting, good nutrition and exercise I’ve improved my bodies energy demands. Even so I don’t think 15000+ calories a week is a crazy amount of food. Much of my diet is lower calorie density food that offers good nutrition. The exception is probably nuts which simple don’t seem impact my weight at the levels I eat. Maybe if I doubled or tripled the amounts it would but frankly I couldn’t really do that. TDEE from a calculator is just a guess based on population averages, not really something to hang your hat on.

Hi Sim,

I really think you are distorting what Dy and myself are saying. Im not sure if this is deliberate or just a misinterpretation? You seem to have distorted the concept of not having to count calories with “you can eat all you want” if you eat healthily. No that’s not it. If you eat a healthy diet and this in no way diminishes 5:2, the need to count calories become redundant (for a lot of people). Your body will self regulate. Of course Im excluding situations where there are biological reasons at play or psychological reasons.

With regards to what I was saying about what you eat affecting your BMR here’s one paper. Im sure there are others.

Tapsell et al. The effect of a calorie controlled diet containing walnuts on substrate oxidation during 8 hours in a room calorimeter. Journal of the American college of nutrition 2009.

Dr Gregor covers it pretty well in this clip.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5-82Ya0J_4

Dr Peter Attia has a pretty good blog on the subject of CICO but he doesn’t cater for the layperson so its a hard slog following his blogs.

I think it is naïve to believe that you TDEE, actually it should really be BMR, does not vary but is fixed in stone based on your current weight, height, age and sex. It varies based on many other more nebulous factors like, mood, stress, ambient temperature, whether you are fasting or not, and the types of foods you eat. Im sure there are other factors as well. So while using the TDEE calculator, as provided on this site is helpful, to rely on it as being the be all and end all is naïve.

So am I saying that you can eat over your TDEE and not gain weight? No. But you have to realise that your TDEE (BMR) is not a fixed quantity. It varies greatly based on many factors, with food being one of them.

To the best of my knowledge the human body has no inbuilt calorimeter that produces a signal either chemically or electrically that says we have hit our TDEE for the day, stop eating. Hence the explosive use of CICO and apps counting calories etc. Our body does however have a regulatory system that responds to other queues. Modern foods have compromised that regulatory system. Our system responds differently to fats, protein and carbs. It responds to soluble and insoluble fibre. Fructose intake inhibits lepton signalling (and historically there was a very good reason for this). Vinegar (acetic acid) inhibits carb uptake in the small intestines. Our gut flora releases a plethora of signalling chemicals that is only just starting to be scientifically explored. So our bodies do regulate, its just not based on calorific intake.

Here is a nice snapshot of nut studies with regards weight gain/loss. Feel free to get any of the papers he cites. He is an eccentric character and he is a vegan but I don’t hold that against him.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRxMhqdmb2Y

Way to go Annette. Maybe for some weighing out your food and counting calories for the rest of your life is a sustainable way of eating. Im happy not counting and choosing my foods carefully. For me this is sustainable.

Thank you bigbooty-you inspired me to ditch the pasta/rice/bread/pasta and eventually I did and it is 1 of the best things that I have done. I feel better without them in my life and only have them occasionally now as opposed to all of them in a week. One of my best achievements has been to ditch the sugar in my tea after 40+ years.
I encouraged my rather overweight son who has Aspergers(he has rigid food choices)to ditch the orange juice, eat whole fruit and veg, and avoid those carbs. He takes a packed lunch to work so still eats bread but he has ditched the breakfast cereal to an omelette when he is working and a bacon sandwich when he isn’t. He refuses point blank to stand on the scales or allow me to put a tape measure around his waist but I would guess that he has lost around 3 stone. He no longer snores, now sleeps with the window closed because he feels the cold and has gone from an XXL to medium/large. This as happened over 2 years and he continues to shrink. He fasts as in doesn’t eat if he isn’t hungry.

I have managed several 24 hour fasts but I am not sure that I could go any longer. Perhaps I need more practice? I can do 16 hours when I am at work.

we have to deal with the cause and not the effects of over eating and eating the wrong things. until we do that we are only wasting time, the comfort foods have to go peace out

jrmelmer when I started the 5:2 the only calories that I counted were 500 on a FD. To celebrate each FD complete, I would celebrate with an almond croissant. I know, quite bonkers. I had thought that comfort foods would make me feel better and I suppose for about 5 minutes they do, until the sugar crash and then I can barely keep my eyes open. I can’t tell you how many times I have turned to them in times of stress, distress or when I am tired, bored or lonely and sometimes I still do. However, I do feel so much better without them, so I am not sure why I turn to them.
The consumption of the sweet stuff has decreased as I have felt better about myself and the changes to my body have shown that I can change from being a round blob to a person with a waist. The numbers on the scales have never moved downwards either regularly but I have noticed that my body has changed shape when often the scales show no change. Scales lie all of the time. I weighed myself every day for 7 days just to see what the daily difference was and found that I could gain and lose 10lb so I take it all with a pinch of salt now. One of the most powerful posts on here when I first started this was from a woman who had dropped 3 dress sizes but the scales hadn’t moved. It kept me going and gave me faith that even though I couldn’t see internal fat was shrinking, my clothes were becoming looser and the rolls of fat becoming less.
I am so much happier being 3 stone lighter, and fasting has helped me make positive changes to what I eat as well as the confidence to know that being hungry is fine-it will pass.

jrmelmer-changing habits can be a challenge and being kind to yourself when you are not well is an excellent way to prevent self-sabotage. For me there have been lots of little changes that all add up to some rather big changes.

Try whole foods and see if you feel better. Protein is filling. Avoid the sweet stuff. Get out for a walk.

Hi dy,
The protein doesn’t have to be meat based. I eat some meat but not a lot. Most of my protein comes from nuts and cheeses and beans. Heres a simple take on the three macros. You need a certain amount of protein, same with fats. Carbs are not essential but are required to make up the calorific total needed for biological function. The trick is to get carbs bound up in lots of fibre. So if you need to top up your calorific intake make sure its with veggies, fruits, legumes. Foods with lots of fibre. Essentially you need to eat whole foods. Personally I think its such a simple concept and a no-brainer. Why is it such a hard sell?

Regards workouts my bike riding is about the only real exercise I do. Its usually a 50km ride at about a 30km/h average. Not super fast but by no means a doddle. I usually try and empty the tank for the last 1km and I really don’t have anything left afterwards. Sometimes Im close to being ill as I get off the bike. A bit of pain is good for the soul. Yeah Im with you the last thing on my mind is to eat protein after a ride. Actually eating anything doesn’t cross my mind. Sometimes I’ll later crave protein and sometimes that craving is not there. I let my body signal what I need.

Don’t get me wrong I eat a lot of carbs, but theyre all tied up with fibre. I look at all these different diets and what I eat doesn’t fit any of them.

Here is another clip by Gregor on brown adipose tissue BAT and capsicum. Now Im a little extreme (wife thinks Im crazy) and I have cold showers, been doing it for 3 years. Easy in summer, bloody hard to do in winter. I cant do it for 30 minutes as suggested, that’s just too much. But 1-2 minutes I can tolerate that. The good news is that having hot peppers also activates BAT and increases your BMR. Which adds to the concept that CICO is really a very truncated truth of what is happening.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GmAiOsZWP5E

Adelaide doesn’t get that cold. In summer cold showers are easy, winter does take some will power. My son just got back from Japan recently for a science conference he attended and he looked like the Michelin man all dressed up in his puffer jacket. Now that’s cold.

A lot of the micronutrients are bound to fibre, so yes its important to have “carbs” in that sense. Im not really low carb, just that most of my carbs are fibre rich. Ive got really simple tastes when it comes to foods. I just try and buy a selection of different fruit and veg every time I shop. My hope is that by randomly eating a rotation of different foods Im hopefully covering all the bases. Having said that I do take vit D supplement being essentially an office worker.

I just upgraded to a Giant Advanced Pro carbon fibre job. Had my other bike for 30 plus years. Im no faster with the new bike but Ive entered the 21st century regards gear changes. So nice changing gears now. I had the last of the old friction shifters. It was a state of the art bike back in 1986.

I can appreciate that if you have limited income buying fresh produce may be difficult. My wife started going to local farmers markets about a year ago. Ive just started doing it as well. We try and get most of our fruit and veg there rather than at the big supermarket chains. Its almost nice seeing fruit and veg with blemishes on them rather than the aesthetically perfect stuff you get in the supermarkets.

He visited earlier in the year so it would have been your winter. I’ll have to ask him were it was again. He’s doing his PhD in atomic physics and went over for a conference and workshop. The bike I bought was about AUD3800 but the seat was killing me. I replaced it with a $15 cheapy off ebay and its a perfect fit. Go figure.

Tsukuba is a pretty large University. While it is hot now the winter here was pretty cold and long this year. Then in one week it seems it went from freezing to baking!

@rahul. I know that you addressed this to Dy and hopefully he will chime in. You say youre a vegetarian but really struggle with vegetables. So what do you eat that is non meat?

I highly recommend prayer and the avoidance of refined carbohydrates