Hi everybody,

I weighed myself last night before bed and I was 21st 1lb and then I thought I would try it again now and I am back to 20st 12lbs, so I’ve lost 3lbs in the last 18 hours. I’ve ordered some new scales today as the one I am using now has a wonky foot and won’t sit right on the floor.

I’ve developed a really bad pain in my hip that stops me sleeping on my right side and it seems to have travelled down to my knee. I think is due to my having to roll off the sofa onto the floor and then stand up from there, because the sofa is too low to stand up from. I have therefore ordered on of those high seat wing chairs which I think will make standing up easier. Just have to get rid of the sofa now.

Hi Ginette,

Yes, fasting again today. Been on decaff coffee since getting up and I’m looking forward to my tea at around 7pm. In the last two weeks I’ve not been eating anything on fast days and I wonder if that has caused me to unconsciously eat more on ‘feast days’, like extra calories from olive oil to cook with and the odd packet of crisps or a couple of mint humbugs I’ve maybe not wrote in my calorie count book and then forgotten about.

The scales are some I found on Amazon which had really good reviews for being totally accurate. They weigh in pounds to one decimal place and after it has told you what you weigh now, it also reminds you what you weighed last time you used them. I’m not that bothered about fat percentage, I can see it in the mirror and I don’t need a machine to tell me I’ve got too much of it, just need my weight.

The ‘old’ sofa is only a couple of years old and has sprung seats, so it was designed to be low and that is what I bought it for. It is lovely to lie on and go to sleep. I just can’t stand up from it. I just think the new orthopaedic chair will be better for me. Alternatively I could keep the sofa and get rid of the exercise bike (which I only use when my hips ache), but not enough room for both though. Perhaps I can sit on the chair when I want to read and use the sofa for watching TV or having a nap.

Fast day for me today, probably only 2 this week with the upcoming travel. Nursing the back still….

Hi all

daily mail has a piece on fast dieting being anti-aging, which means I’llbe here a while, I hope to be 29 again and 8st 10!

Got thru my fasting day, but boy am I in a bad mood. Not sure why…probably hormonal. Dang menopause! Watching the weather forecast doesn’t help as the week looks blah. I’m beginning to think it’ll never warm up.

Good luck with another fast day tomorrow salma!

Hope everyone has a good night!

Hi Graham. Sounds like you have hip bursitis which I now have. I got some really good stretchs & exercises to do for mine from my doctor.Mine is only painful when lying in bed.

Hi Graham

Glad you have sorted your room out. Also nice to hear you are not on any medication. I would like to stop some of mine when my blood pressure is lower. Will do so will full consultation with my doctor. Others I can’t stop, I have taken them for years and will need to continue. I was diagnosed with epilepsy at 6. It was much worse as a child and always ended in hospital admission. I am now completely under control. It doesn’t interfere with my life unless I get stressed. They only happen when I am falling asleep so that is good too. I do suffer from holding excess water as a result, but as I said I am one of the lucky ones.

I’m glad you had something to eat today. Hopefully tomorrow you will find you don’t feel hungry and overeat.

I am doing some exercise to tone up, start moving and generally get that heart going. It it helps me lose weight even better. I don’t go mad I only did 30 mins a day but I like the challenge of it and it makes me eat more healthily. Win win for me.

Milena

I saw that article in the Daily Mail. Interesting if you take vitamins it doesn’t have the same effect. I will be really interested to get my bloods taken at the doctors as I then have a starting point, even if this will be some time after I have started the diet.

Lori and Salma

You are probably asleep by now and when you wake up it will be an eating day how nice I can’t wait for my granary bread sandwich with vine tomatoes, watercress and ham. I try not to eat until after 2 therefore going into repair mode before eating.

What time difference is there between England and where you are Salma? Lori are you in England I am not sure why I am assuming that. It is a shame that where we come from isn’t visible. The country would do.

Ginette

Hi Lori

That is why you are still awake then. Clocks changed here yesterday they went forward an hour. My body clock hasn’t realised it yet though.

What time is it where you are?

It is 8:20PM

Hi Milena

You are right about the time. They haven’t caught up yet a bit like my body clock.

I know that ketones are produced when on the Atkins diet. I haven’t done it but I know people who have. I only have granary bread 5 times a week, so days when I am not fasting. I consider this to be a relatively healthy bread. Much better than white which I don’t like. I think and I need to check this, that it is when our bodies don’t get carbohydrate in food (only protein and fat), it needs to use from our fat stores. Protein takes much longer to break down into energy. This is why the Atkins diet works. I am not sure about a lot so saturated fats though. I know research is proving certain theories wrong all of the time. Hence eggs OK now. It is difficult to keep up. I know the Atkins diet makes the body go into Ketosis mode. Look it up and hopefully you will understand more.

I read a couple of recipe books but I am happy with what I am eating now. Much healthier food than before I started. Very little fast food. The occasional fish and chips but with reduced chips. I have much more fruit and vegetables. I was having very little before. Having such a long journey ahead I have to enjoy myself. I have the odd meal out about once a month. I don’t drink, that is just habit from parents who hardly ever drank. I had a glass of wine last year…..yes just the one. If people enjoy it that is fine by me. I am usually driving.

At least I am only thinking how nice Granary bread would be and not a big bar of chocolate.

Enjoy your fast free day tomorrow. I am going to. I laughed at someone who said they thought of lining food up for the morning after fast day. It’s nice to know I don’t need to do that. They found they didn’t either.

I’m off to bed now to try to sleep. Not at all tired at the moment. Horrible wind outside, I imagine there might be some damage tomorrow.

Ginette

Hi Salma:

“I read the thread you referred to. I am not sure that an experiment with such a small sample size is reliable,”

The data from the experiment was quite reliable. But you don’t have to worry about the sample size. It was small, but has been confirmed by data from tens of thousands of fasters.

People that water fast for two weeks or longer lose, on average, about a pound a day. If there was such a thing as ‘starvation mode’, you would expect that people not eating any food at all would quickly shift into the ‘mode’ and their weight loss would be minimal – or even stop. However, the data show that the fastest way to lose weight is to not eat anything at all.

Just try to imagine what would happen if you, under your doctor’s supervision, of course, stopped eating for the next three weeks. Do you think your current rate of weight loss would slow, stay the same or increase? If there was a starvation mode, your rate of weight loss should decrease, or, at worst, remain the same.

But I think you, and anyone else that thinks about it for a minute, know the answer. You would lose weight much more quickly than you are now. And the study’s results show you would continue losing until you literally started dying from starvation (no body fat left for the body to eat, so it has to start eating muscle), at which point the ‘starvation mode’ would kick in (about a 40% reduction in the metabolic rate). However, you would still continue to lose weight as the body ate up its muscles until you died (usually from a heart attack resulting from a weakened heart muscle).

Short plateaus (a month or less) are caused by things other than a slowing metabolism – usually by water weight fluctuations and ‘food in transit’ fluctuations combined with the timing of weigh in. Plateaus longer than a month are usually caused by overeating. Of course, we are not talking about weight losses/gains that arise from taking drugs, insulin or other hormone level changes.

If you are interested in learning more about fasting, this article from Harper’s magazine is very informative: http://charleycropley.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/FASTING-ART-Harpers.pdf

Good luck on your continued weight loss journey!

Hi All

Article in the Mail about fasting. The Mail is available as an app. They often have things about 5:2 in there. You don’t have to pay anything to download news, it is completely free. Really useful.

Link below:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-3018207/How-5-2-diet-makes-body-resilient-stress-Fasting-makes-cells-work-harder-study-reveals.html

I am in the UK. I am doing well on fast days. Feast days are difficult although my mantra is tomorrow is another day. How is everyone going to cope with Easter and all those lovely goodies that are everywhere?

Hi tofi:

This article contains an illustration of your comment: http://charleycropley.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2013/04/FASTING-ART-Harpers.pdf

Hi, I’m 57 and just starting, again, today. It is such a surprise to see that people are going through the same stuff as me. My husband and 2 sons are the lucky ones. They eat what they like and stay thin. Over the years I have struggled with my weight, tried lots of different diets and have ended up here at 86 kilos. I am hoping, with support, that this time will be different. I have tried the fast diet before, with great success, but when people told me how good I was looking I thought I could start eating whatever I liked. Sigh! I delude myself so often. So now I’m older and wiser, im hoping this time will be different. My niece is getting married in 2017, so I have given myself plenty of time to lose all my excess weight before the big family get together.

In the UK there is an Internet catalogue called Fifty Plus which concentrates mostly on women’s clothing up to and including size 36 plus lingerie from 36 to 56, cup sizes A – K (don’t ask me, I’m a man).

There is a men’s version from the same company called Premier Man which I have been using for years, sizes up to 66″ chest & 64″ waist.

Both charge interest, but you can order and pay at the same time. Prices seem to be a lot lower that other catalogues.

Hi Salma

I agree slowly and surely. Losing weight too quickly doesn’t allow our skin to catch up. Also we don’t want to get that gaunt look.

I don’t like the heat but I also don’t like severe cold weather either.

Three fast days together that is some going. I hope it pays dividends!

Lori

It will soon pick up again. I had five weeks where I only lost 4 lb in total and now it has picked up.

Salma

Have a nice holiday. We are only at the end of the Internet ha ha…..

Graham

You are full of surprises. I think that is quite a good site.

Welcome Auroras end

We are a friendly bunch here. You will be able to have a fantastic loss by 2017. We will be with you step by step. You might face a few blips as we all do.

Ginette

36″ Milena? Hips 48″ & waist 52″ at the moment, so I’ve got a bit of fasting to do to get rid of 125lbs! Still, January is 9 months away so I’ll give it a go.

Actually Milena I started yesterday with my first fast day, 0.4 of a pound lost = 6 1/2 oz (which sounds a bit pathetic really, it’s most likely just water and I’ve probably put it back on today). 11lbs total for April, doable?

If I can get to 20st 0lbs I will be a very happy bunny and it will give me the incentive to keep going. I’ve already bought some size 46″ waist trousers, so I’ve got something to aim for.

My scales are new and weigh in stones and pounds, tell me what I weigh now and what I weighed last time I used it, so I’ll be weighing myself before breakfast on the day after my fast days and I’ll post it straight after.

Also, I’m going to combine the 5:2 with the ‘2 day diet’, which is 2 fast days back to back with a protein only 1000 calories per fast day, then keep under the TDEE for the other 5 days. Dr M mentioned it in one of his threads so it must be okay. The book arrives tomorrow and my first 2 day fast will be Thursday/Friday.

Milena

Are we starting the challenge this week as it is April?

Graham

Good luck doing the mixture of diets. Don’t let it confuse you in a rush to lose weight. We all took a long time to put it on and we shouldn’t set ourselves unrealistic target. Me I am happy with 5 lb a month. Thrilled if it is 6 lb and ecstatic if it is 7. I am also satisfied if it is 4.

This way I hope to be I between satisfied and ecstatic every month…….so easy to please.

I think we all need to commend Milena for her enthusiasm. Whatever the result we are not competing only with ourselves. It will be a good month if we are all happy with our losses. Set a realistic target anything else is a bonus.

Good luck all.

Ginette

Ditching wine??!!! Sorry milena that is too much of an ask. You have no idea how much I am looking forward to my Pata Negra tonight after my B2B fasts. We are celebrating the anniversary of finding this house 3 years ago, so it’s steak and chips for tea.

All this talk of snow makes me realise just how fortunate we are to live here. I just couldn’t bear it again.

Loved the article in the link from simocoeluv. Very, very interesting. I find with the one day total fasts that I do, it is the mealtimes I miss, not the food. Mind you, I think if I were diagnosed with some awful disease I would try to help myself be fasting longer. It seems to work.

Welcome Auroras, I am 59, so a little older than you. We can do this! My OH is driving me bonkers. He has been a little too successful on the 5:2. He wanted to join me for health reasons, but ended up losing too much weight. He is now constantly asking me what he can eat to gain weight, not helpful when I am trying to lose it.

Happy fasting everyone!

Sorry Milena, was watching ‘It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World’ on DVD last night and didn’t go to bed until about 3am, so therefore missed the 9am pep talk.

Checking calories this morning. Usual breakfast of 1 tin grapefruit, 2 Weetabix, 2 Shredded Wheat, 50g Rice Krispies and 450ml soya milk = 850 calories. New breakfast as from today is 1 tin of grapefruit, 100g porridge oats, 300ml soya milk and a generous squeeze of honey = 435 calories. So saving already.

There is a farm in Ripon, North Yorkshire, where I buy all my grass fed meat from. I’ve put an order in today for steaks and bacon so I will have enough for the protein only fast days from Thursday. There are a couple of houses in the village that have their own hens and they have a box at the gate with eggs in and a box for the money, so it’s quite easy to pop along there every few of days to get 12 eggs for my breakfasts. No more black pudding though, boo.

Off for a walk soon before the rain comes again, forecast says I have about two hours so I’d better take my poncho just in case.

Graham.

Now where is that short skirt and my pom poms? Scary thought!

Just measured out 100 ml of semi-skimmed and 3 tea spoons of sugar. That’s a hundred calories, I’m checking to see if I go over or under this in my tea?

Enjoy your cruise, Lori – hope that there is lots to do on the ship, quite fancy the waterboard myself – only seen it on TV, do they have pools and things on all ships? And enjoy the food!!!

Hope you have a great walk Graham, windy but sunny here, walking myself this afternoon – pleased weather has improved as I didn’t fancy walking in snow and sleet. I’m off to the farmer’s market at the weekend, and I’ve a voucher for £6 off £40 at waitrose, so if I can’t get fish elsewhere, will buy from waitrose. To think Scotland has 6,000 miles of coastline, but its hard to find decent fish supplies.

travel hopefully