Hi Betty,

Welcome and good luck to you.

I would recommend reading these two links to begin with:
https://thefastdiet.co.uk/forums/topic/warnings-to-newbies/
https://thefastdiet.co.uk/forums/topic/the-basics-for-newbies-your-questions-answered/

Everyone has a slightly different approach so it is important to find a method which suits you and you feel you can realistically sustain. I’ve been doing this now for over 10 years and compared to my original weight I am 17 kg lighter – initially lost in the first 6 months of doing 5:2, then maintained, up and down a bit, ever since.

I can share my approach but it certainly will not suit everyone as I have never been a big foodie.

1) Keep it simple. I figured out two slightly different fast day menus and have pretty much stuck with them, until the last 6 months, ever since. (I only changed recently because the Zoe App I used revealed some of my original choices weren’t great for my gut biome, and so I changed them.)

2) Don’t fast on consecutive days. Don’t fast from Friday to Sunday. Don’t fast on holidays – enjoy yourself. In non-holiday weeks do a 6:1 instead if life simply gets in the way of doing 5:2. Go back to 5:2 immediately that you can after a 6:1 or after a holiday.

3) Keep busy on fast days, drink plenty of water or black coffee/tea. Hunger pangs WILL pass and tomorrow you can eat whatever you like.

4) Never count calories on non fast days – only the “2” part of 5:2 is supposed to require conscious effort.

5) I weigh myself every day and I am used to constant fluctuations from day-day, even seeing weight go up after a fast day. This works for me but most people only weigh once a week. The long term trend is what is crucial, not what happens day-day or week -week. Decide what you want to do.

6) Remember this is a marathon, NOT a sprint. Don’t expect huge losses in a short space of time, which would be unhealthy anyway. I lost about 0.6kg per week in my first 6 months ON AVERAGE. By that time the weight it had taken me 10 years to put on had all gone.

7) Don’t worry when (not if) you plateau and possibly even put some weight back on. That seems to happen to most people but the overall process will work so keep faith with it and persevere. It happened to me 3 times in my first 6 months.

8) Don’t be afraid to tweak your approach if and when you need to in order to keep it sustainable.

9) Don’t stop and start 5:2. A lot of people did it for a while then stopped, gradually let their weight creep back up, decided to do it again and found a lot less success the second time around. Once you get the weight off, keep it off by maintaining the same way of life. Some people can go to 6:1 but I gained weight doing that so just keep doing 5:2, probably by now less strictly than originally, but still aiming to fast twice a week whenever I can.

A key thing I found in the first 6 weeks was that my portion control improved dramatically – so on non fast days I naturally started eating less anyway, without counting calories, because I got used to seeing less in my plate and I was happy to maintain that.

Hope this helps.