Angela – I feel for you and your family, and can only imagine how dreadful this is for you all.

You said that your husband tends to ‘over focus on health and fitness’ and ‘I am so saddened that so many absent minded health professionals are pushing this fasting and not understanding the serve side effects it can have on people with additive personalities and people who have a tendency towards eating disorders’ Are you saying this as a generalisation or are you saying that your husband’s doctor advised him to do this?

I cannot imagine any doctor advising a healthy, fit person – who was probably not overweight, to follow this way of eating. Especially if that doctor was aware of any obsessive tendencies in his patient.

The Fast Diet information does warn against people with eating disorders using this diet.

I agree with fastinginberlin that it is not the Fast Diet solely to blame but your husband’s underlying problem. I appreciate that you feel that if the Fast Diet hadn’t been there this wouldn’t have happened but I think he might just have found another way, equally damaging to your family.

Please don’t blame the tool. If I shoot someone, it isn’t the fault of the gun for being available. It’s my decision whether or not using it is the right thing to do.

Speaking to your family doctor is the first step as your husband needs professional help and you and your family need support too.

I hope you can resolve this and that you all get the help and support you need.

Hi

I would like to add my condolences for the awful situation you and your family find yourselves in.

There are a few folk on this forum who have said they are not aiming to lose weight but fast for health. They therefore do the maintenance version of the diet which involves fasting for only one day and eating a week’s worth of the full normal calorie requirement over the remaining six days.

Did your husband mistakenly believe he was overweight when he began? You also speak of trying to eat his calories in half a day, so it sounds like he was doing a different version of fasting called 16:8. There must be a maintenance version of this too but I don’t know enough about it.

Anyway as others have said, it has reached the stage of an eating disorder so medical involvement is required. I don’t think this situation is common, the Dr Mosley book says that people with a history of eating disorders must not fast. Some fasters hate the actual fasting, and those of us who do get to like it still love eating very much.

All the best

Barbara

Angela, like other posters who have replied I would like to say how sorry I am for the suffering your family is going through with your husbands apparent addictive behaviour towards fasting. As a layman with no medical training I would like to offer some thoughts on your situation which may help focus your mind towards the issues. You seem to suggest your husband has some form of addictive personality coupled with a tendency towards eating disorders. In your opinion the 5:2 “Fast Diet” is in some way responsible for your husbands present destructive behaviour as he now “Fasts” and as a result has developed a destructive eating disorder.
You do not say what type of fasting your husband is following or for how long he has been fasting. It seems to me that in addition to voicing your critisism about the 5:2 Diet yours is akin to a cry for help. You recognise several important factors here. Your husbands mental, and physical approach to health and diet. That his trigger for his present condition was the “Fast Diet”. Your own recognition of all of the circumstances surrounding his behaviour prior to and including his present behaviour. Finally, your love and concern for your husband and family shines through your post.
You will see from the posters comments we all recognise your concerns and in our own way offer some sort of help and direction for you. For my part I urge you to seek urgent medical help firstly for your husband, both physical and mental health, and some form of help and support for yourself and your family.
You do not say which country you are in so I cannot, and would not make suggestions as to which organisation you should approach. You need to be careful in this instance. It may be that your husband may have private health cover through work or through a Union that may assist. Remember you and your family are suffering from your husbands present behaviour and you need as much help and support that he needs.
If you feel able to, or want to, or feel the need please post again in the future to keep us concerned posters informed.
Good luck.

Hi! My first post! Hopefully it will go through. Sadly, the internet has its
share of “invisible” hecklers, scammers, and folks who find this method of communication suitable to their strange ways. I would venture that the poster here may be a dissatified or a failed “5:2er” who may be immature enough to communicate this unlikely story. Or worst, just someone jealous of her mate’s
accomplishments. Apologies if this is not so, just hard to believe this is a real life scenario. Our amazing technology doesn’t provide for in person, real life, proof…we’re not always able to tell fiction from non-fiction! Don’t like being a “doubting-Thomas”….just saying………………….

I smell a troll.

“atoms” has NOT posted anything but this post, and has never responded to anyone’s post. Huge red flags.

Any healthy person would have to STOP eating to look grey and gaunt. So has your husband stopped eating. If mine did I would find him help immediately, not post about it online to stir up trouble.

So if this story is true, her hubby has a serious (mental) issue and needs some serious help. Fasting 1 or 2 days a week will NOT have this effect on anyone who is healthy.

Stop posting and get your husband some help.

I’m sorry guys but there is no reason not to take the OP on face value.
I know that if I was in that position that I could very easily make one post and one post only.

You know that you are entering enemy territory and quite likely not to be received in a positive mannner – so say what you want to say and don’t come back to be attacked.

A troll would come back and try to stir the pot a lot more. That is the nature of a troll.

The fast diet does come with the warning that it is not a diet to be recommended to people with eating disorder tendencies. Reading some of the posts in some threads there have been a couple of posters that have made me wonder if they are following the correct diet for them because what they have posted has sounded like someone tending to extreams. I know that I don’t have enough information to say anything to them so keep my mouth shut.

I am five weeks into the diet and loving the results I am getting.
I can see how easily this type of diet could be become addictive and then misused, but I don’t personally think it would ever be a problem for me – I love my food too much and don’t have enough self discipline. 🙂

Angela – if you do come back to these forums – I wish you and your family all the best. Hopefully your husband will get better soon.

As a recovering anorexic my self, I totally 100% agree with the danger of the 5:2 diet.

Yes, you all say that it warns that nobody with an eating disorder should fast! But that is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard, somebody with an eating disorder is desperate, and there is now access to hundreds and hundreds of 500 calorie meal plans all over the internet, creating more ideas and advice for all anorexia suffers to cling to! Telling them not to fast is like telling them to just eat and get over it, if they can see 5:2 fasts as a advertised weight loss remedy, then it is highly likely with such an addictive and controlling mental disorder they are going to use the so called ‘healthy fasts’ to cator to their anorexic voices.

I have myself been in recovery for 5 years and still see a counsellor to this day, and i can quite positively say that i find this VERY VERY triggering, and have spent a lot of time accessing 500 calorie meal plans myself. I know for sure that if this had been introduced all over the media a couple of years ago, my turn out may have been very different to where i am now!

I think people need to think about the dangers of such diets when advertising them all over the media. If a person seriously needs to loose weight, then it is up to them, their doctors and private support from medical professionals to work on that, people need to consider the rising occurrence of eating disorders and have a good think about why this may be!

Sorry to rant, but anorexia ruined my life completely 5 years ago, and i nearly died and i would not wish this on anyone else!

I am sorry atoms and rtowlson that you are caught up in the despair of addictions, it is painful and can be life destroying, however the cold hard fact for anyone with addictions is that food and alcohol are both part of normal living, so are eating plans and exercise programmes, both of which are good for most people. It is the addiction that is the problem not sensible food or exercise regimes.
In fact this fast diet plan would be the healthiest one ever–if it is followed correctly and with common sense. I believe this way of eating is a way to resolve the unhealthy cycle that other diets can cause. The 500 calorie plan is only for one or two days a week the rest of the time you eat to your TDEE–it has never been advertised as a continuous 500–so if you are ignoring that you are not doing 5:2 or 6:1.
Again I say I am sorry that you have both experienced the plight of addictions but don’t blame the fast diet blame the addiction.