Great idea for topic!

LOL! I need to build higher level of my rewards. I am more like – I can eat that bag of chips when I be 145 lb.

Hot lingerie….Now you got me thinking… 😀

I love the ideas above – especially the lingerie. Having the cookware ordered and shipped someplace is an excellent idea.

My rewards:
10 pounds loss – tattoo, lux in tenebris (Latin for light in darkness)
20 pounds loss – start training to RUN a 5k

I know we’re all different, but I must admit I’m struggling here.

I was overweight. I wasn’t happy or healthy in my skin.

I lost weight. I became happy and healthy in my skin.

It’s now been two years since I reached my goal weight.

I still wake up every morning and put my hand on my belly. My hip bones and rib cage are more prominent than my belly.

I get up and get dressed. It doesn’t matter what I choose, everything fits, I look slim in everything. No more trying to hide lumps and bumps. Shopping is easy: I like it, it’s available in my size, I buy it.

I go out for a run. I’m no longer wearing a fat suit that moves independently of me or putting excessive pressure on my joints. I enjoy feeling my body working as nature intended.

My ‘reward’ for losing weight is not being fat any more, and hopefully looking forward to a healthy long life.

If the goal is weight loss, then why is not losing weight reward enough in itself?

Hi Fast,

I’d never been on a ‘diet’ before 5:2, and to be honest I didn’t really believe it was going to work and had no idea what to expect! So although I had an idea of what I hoped to achieve, setting any time-limited (or even interim weight-related) goals might have been dooming me to failure?

Indeed, a lot of people do turn up here with completely unrealistic expectations, fail to meet them, blame the diet and bail out…

Also I knew that diets mostly don’t work for long-term weight loss (hence why I hadn’t dieted before, and was just helplessly watching myself get fatter!). Starting 5:2 wasn’t a ‘diet’ for me, it was committing to a lifestyle change for health and weight loss: intermittent fasting but also addressing bad eating habits on non-fast days (severely reducing bread, pasta and added sugar – turns out even homemade biscuits are fattening 🙂 ). I didn’t want to fast so I could carry on stuffing down ‘cr*p’, I wanted to address the root cause of the problem.

So I guess I just embraced intermittent fasting, and healthier eating, as a way of life and was just happy to see where it took me.

There were plenty of incidental rewards along the way though to motivate me! Like digging out an old pair of jeans which had been too tight only to find they were too loose! And breaking into a run and not having to hold my chest in place (yes, I’m happy to have gone from a bulging 36C to a 34A/B). And finding my balance improved in the absence of my fat suit (which had its own momentum and the stopping distance of a small family car 🙂 ). And PMT symptoms gone…etc

And yes, I have bought new clothes since I’ve lost weight! But to be honest, I was reluctant to buy smaller clothes (and get rid of the old ones) until I was really really sure I wasn’t going to put the weight back on (I don’t like spending money, and I really don’t like wasting it!).

Good luck on your journey!

@happynow I too hope to stick with this plan for life. I feel better on my fasting days, it is more than just about weight loss for me. I am really looking forward to getting to where you are at – I think your name says it all. 🙂

@mylast10 – agree with you too, small goals will help me personally achieve my bigger goals. I want to be fit. I want to enjoy life for a very long time. I’m 14 pounds from my overall goal weight. I like that you are setting smaller and achievable goals to lose your 10 – I think I should rethink mine. 🙂

Excuse me LA Chubster,

Hot lingerie is your reward for 110 lb. There are hardly “tens of pounds” left to lose. No cheating with rewards!!! 😛

Speaking of falling off the wagon – I tried and failed yesterday (which was supposed to be my FD).. when my hubby started cooking dinner, which doesn’t happen often. I gave in and ate way over my 500 cals. SO – today I’m back. Any encouragement out there?? I did SO well back in October/November/December and got nearly to my goal – and then one simple day, I chose to forego the FD and BAM – it was all over. It’s like I have to be so committed or forget it. Today, I want to be committed again! I definitely need encouragement. We all do.

The one piece of encouragement I do have is that you truly only need to fast twice a week, and the weight truly does come off! (Maybe I just need to repeat this to myself! ha)

I think you have a smart method. Back in October, I was limiting myself to 600 calories – and it was working, but now I find that if I eat something after a few hours (even within 500 cals) I immediately get hungrier. I will try drinking water only for a fast day so I don’t rev up my hunger. Thanks!!

I find that if I spread my calories throughout the day, I want to keep eating and seem to be hungry all day. Waiting until dinner time to eat 1 500 cal meal seems to work well with me.

What an amazing lifestyle change. I used to be the person that had to eat by a certain time or I’d turn into a hangry (hungry + angry) monster! I cannot believe how easy this transition was, I haven’t had blood work done in years so I cannot confirm but I feel like my blood sugar levels have stabilized whereas before they would drop if I didn’t eat – I would get clammy and have a terrible headache and would slightly “shake”.

The weight loss is why I started but feeling good is why I’m sticking with it!

Interesting article…

Should we start a new thread “What will I lose if I don’t lose weight” instead of reward? 🙂

I realize that I kind of doing it. I still have all of my old skinny clothes, that I am going to give up if not losing weight this year. But it seems so far away still, so I don’t think it motivates me a lot.
Maybe I should chose a specific piece of clothing for each month, and if I am not able to wear it to give it away… Still a very scary thought… :-O

Hi HappyNow,

WAY TO GO. Love your attitude. You should be the Nike poster girl. Just do it! I read lots of posts on here and get the feeling that some people are looking for a magic bullet solution. An unrealistic expectation that the 5:2 diet will either do it for them or the 5:2 diet is to blame. The diet works only if youre honest and give it a genuine try. It took me 52 weeks to lose 44 pounds, so a little under 1 pound per week. I suspect the diet industry has a lot to answer for. Follow this new fad diet and lose an amazing 20 pounds in one week…etc etc. Some simple physics will tell you that even if you eat nothing for the week you’ll be hard pressed to lose more than 3-4 (real fat loss) pounds per week.

My reward? I can get on my bike and ride as well as I could when I was in my early 20s and that was 30 plus years ago. As I tell my wife, I’ll eventually die a very healthy person.