The FastDay Forum

Ah, that makes more sense .... so the low calorie intake is week days offset by wine at weekends (me too!)
but it would would be worth you recording everything for a couple of weeks to work out your average and total calories over a week

Yeah, I could never eat that little on the weekends - that's when all the chocolate and wine come out to play ok thank you, just scared me a little reading the above posts, don't want to end up going backwards. Just averaged out what I think my weekly intake would be and it would be around 9200. That's with 2000 sat & sunday. 1400 3 days and 500 the other two.

Thank you for all your responses but I am rather confused. I have just checked my TDEE & it is 1686 so do I eat that on eating days & fast on 1/4 of that ie 442 cals on fasting days & adjust down as I hopefully decrease in size?

Hi Isis,

I've went ahead and did the calculations for you based on the information you provided through this website. Since you didn't mention if you currently do any form of exercise I assumed you were sedentary the site stated that you need around 1782 to maintain. So that's an extra 100 from what you originally calculated.

So your TDEE is 1782- Consume at or below this amount of feed days
On fast days you should consume roughly 450

you can play with your numbers on this site for calorie needs: http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm

Hope that helps!

you can play with your numbers on this site for calorie needs: http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm

Hope that helps!

Thanks for that link. I just used this and mine came out as 1914 to Maintain or 1531 for weight loss. Am I right in thinking that we are using the higher amount (as we are reducing with the fast days anyway)

So, I should aim for ..

2x 478 kcal max
2x 1729 kcal (ish) ie 10% less
2x 1914 kcal (ish) ie my 'magic number'
1x feast day /don't worry about it

The thing is (and I know this sounds very lazy of me)one of the main draws of this way of eating, for me, was that I don't need to count cals apart from on fast days. I do want to get lean though. I suppose I'll have to get my most usual meals calorie counted then.

Hi Lucky7!

No problem. The numbers are just an average but it does give you a sense of what is needed for your height and build. And if you did choose the right activity level, the higher number is what you keep to on feed days

It looks like you have your numbers figured out. I might add if you kept your feast day to 2500kcal you would end up averaging the weight-loss calorie number recommended on the site lol. It seems like a better version though!

If your not keen on calorie counting just keep to an average of 1700-1900 for most days with an occasional blow out day (every other week). You can still fit treats with that amount or increase your activity level and easily take in a bit more calories to balance it out.

Sincere24
Thank you very much for working out my figures for TDEE. I had taken the fat loss figure so I will now work with the higher figure but reduce my fast day to 450. I have always worked with BMR before as a base line but of course I had not taken into account the reduction in calories on my fast day. I guess I thought of it as a weight loss boost on fast days but I do want to safely lose weight until I reach 10 stone & then I will re-evaluate. I probably won't get there until the end of the year so I needed to start off correctly. I hope my mistake has helped others re-evaluate where they are starting from & I feel much happier & reassured now.
Thank you everyone for your advice
Isis

[Moogie]

No BBT053 I feel fine. At the moment a bit rumbly but I have planned a more calorific supper of Chicken Kiev, mashed potato & veg & low fat rice pudding with some fruit. So not fast again this week?

Just wanted to say that low fat isn't actually very good for us and can in fact contribute to making us gain weight. Have a look at 'The Men Who Made Us Fat' on YouTube, brilliant documentary series which aired last year.

My hairdresser is also a qualified fitness instructor & knows a fair bit about diet now. She's known quite a few overweight ladies who do Slimming World or similar, sticking to low fat food. She had quite a few of them swap from low fat to real, natural fat and found that with this change alone they have lost weight! Strange but true!

Thank you Moogie I will look at it. My low fat rice pudding was in my larder but I am still adapting my mental programming. I do prefer "normal" unadulterated food & I have eaten mainly organic meat & vegetables for years because I prefer the flavour & provenance but I guess for many people that would open yet another whole can of worms! I will ditch the flora for butter & then I can make a Victoria sponge because I was given Mary Berry's Baking Bible for Christmas & haven't dared make cakes yet. Too calorific but now I have extra calories to play with yippee

Wow, the more I read the more scared I am! Apart from when I'm eating out, EVERYTHING I buy/eat is low fat and sugar free, from cheese, to ready meals, yoghurts, I even found myself buying weight watchers cake on Tuesday, when I really wanted a full fat cup cake! Maybe that's where I am going wrong as I don't really eat loads, but maybe just eating the wrong thing!

It's going to take a huge shift in my mindset to think that it's actually OK to eat 'full fat' stuff :-0

But it does seem as though many of these big diet clubs are responsible for this mindset - I was a member of Slimming World, on and off for years....

Too true! I think I have been brainwashed by my yo yo dieting to only think low fat & low cal & I will have to break myself of that habit.

[Moogie]

Here's the link to the documentary, a real eye opener about low fat & diet foods!

viewtopic.php?f=3&t=15

If you really look at what is in low-fat foods, it's scary. I'd much rather have the actual fat in it's natural form.

Have just looked at the first episode of The men who made us fat. What an eye opener I think everyone on this forum should see it!
I am going to email my family about it because they are all trying to lose pounds gained over Christmas even though a couple of them are super fit cyclists & doing triathlons. I will also look at the other two episodes.
This certainly answers the question of why so many people have gained weight since the 1970s & hidden fructose is largely to blame. What we unwittingly put into our bodies eh!!

We have been brainwashed over many years into thinking that fat is bad. Good fats like butter and olive oil are brilliant for you! eating good fats will have a great impact on your hair and skin and nails. I cringe whenever I see that advert for flora liquid - that stuff will be so far removed from natural food!! The less your food has been touched before you eat it the better it is for you - thats the biggest thing to get into your head. and by that I mean not processed mainly. Things like butter are a million times better for you than things like utterly butterly which have been processed to within an inch of their lives. Most low fat foods are high in sugar as they have to get some taste back in somehow. We had ready meals in the office the other day - I had a diet one and my colleague had a regular one, Mine had twice the sugar ! Hers had more fat but when the fat is from cheese (it was spinach & ricotta canneloni) then its good natural fat. Its not easy and I'm not able to always eat well but pure foods are def the way forward.Sugar is the biggest enemy without a shadow of a doubt.
*steps down off soapbox*