The FastDay Forum

I have been lurking this forum for several months. I love this place. I read the threads every day.

English is not my mother language and I apologize in advance for my mistakes.

I´m 52 years old, overweight (at the moment I still have another 31 kilos to lose). I have been doing the 5:2 since January. I moved to 4:3 in March. I tend to alternate the days every week so the body does not "get used" to it. I can honestly say I have never felt so well in my life.

I track all my meals on FitDay and I weight most of my protein intake when I am preparing my meals - I like the nerdness of doing this )

I lost 6,5 kilos since January and am, of course, very pleased.

My body has changed too. I weight and measure myself once a month. The most drastic change was my waist. I lost 10 cm! Hips and tights: lost 2,5 cm in each. My body fat looks different too, it is softer, feels like I am "melting".

In short, I am quite pleased with this WOE and have no complaints whatsoever. I’m sticking with the 5:2 for the foreseeable future and beyond.

This June I began doing 45 minutes of deep water running (Mon to Sun) and I plan to add some weight training in July. A week ago I began to follow a paleo menu and have adapted very well. I am keeping the carbs consumption between 5-10%.

It would be really nice to be able to speed up the weight loss a bit and I do need some guidance regarding the TDEE.

Reading the forum threads there seems to be a relation between eating less than the recommended TDEE and a slow weight loss. I used this TDEE calculator (http://iifym.com/iifym-calculator/) and my TDEE is 1270. The problem is that it is too much food. My biggest meal so far was around 800 cal and my stomach bloated up and ached and I felt awful all day.

Is there anything I can or should do? Do I have to eat more? Maybe I am losing weight at a normal speed, I am not sure.

Any advice/comments will be very welcomed.

Thanks in advance and sorry for the long post/broken English.

Francesca

[Moogie]

Hi Francesca & welcome to the forum
Please forgive this brief reply, I need to go to bed soon!

Sounds like you're trying all sorts of diets combined here so I can't really advise about all that, it sounds quite complicated compared with basic 5:2, but if it's working for you and you like it, that's great.

Considering you have quite a lot to lose, I'm surprised you haven't lost more so far as the average rate of loss is around half a kilo per week, and if you've been doing this almost 6 months I would think you could have lost about double that. But of course, any loss is good, especially if you still get to enjoy your food (do you enjoy Paleo and low carb?)


Please don't take this the wrong way but I'm very concerned that you say you're only eating around 800 calories most days, when your TDEE is nearer 1300 (this also seems very low considering the weight you have to lose, normally when we are larger we have higher TDEEs!). 800 calories a day plus 3 fasting days of only 500 calories I'm sure cannot be good for you, this is far too little. This is only around 8000 calories a week, the 'average' for a woman would be around 14,000. You're only eating about half of what your body needs (and that's not even accounting for the exercise you do!), perhaps your body is resisting losing weight because of this? With your current deficit of calories over the week you should be losing around 1kg a week, which would put you at close to your goal by now after 6 months.

This sort of eating is bordering on a disorder and I'd strongly suggest you start eating a more normal amount on your feed days and consult your doctor.

How did you calculate your TDEE to be so low? I put in some figures - age 52, female, guessed your height at around 165cm and weight of 100kg (since you had around 38kg to lose and a weight around 62kg would put you in the mid healthy BMI range) and exercise 4 times a week puts you at a TDEE of 2500 for maintenance. Even with a shorter height and 10kg less it's still over 2000! With no exercise it's not far below 2000.

Remember, you should be eating around your maintenance TDEE on feed days, your calorie deficit comes from your two fasting days! So, don't calculate a TDEE for weight loss, calculate for maintenance.

Please be careful eating so little

Hi Francesca,

I'll second Moogie, that TDEE seems dreadfully low.

I just had a swift try with your TDEE calculator and with my figures (age 51, 4'11, 135lbs, and little exercise) it comes up with 1560 (rather too generous) for maintenance, I'd think yours would be much higher. Are you reading off the figure for 'fat loss' rather than the maintenance one? It is the maintenance one that you should be using.

Better still, have you signed up to the Progress Tracker on here yet (on the banner at the top of the page) - that will give you a sensible TDEE to start working from.

Hope you can get this sorted, as 5:2 really is a good way of slowly but surely losing weight (as well as possibly having lots of other health benefits). All the best, FatDog.

Hi Moogie and Fay Dog,

You were spot on, I was indeed using the "fat loss" figure, not the maintenance one. The Progress Tracker of the site says 2442 calories on feed days.

I am 52, 1,57m and weight 102 kg. The paleo is something I have been doing for a week and I cannot say much about it yet. The low carb part of it is definitely a challenge.

I usually eat a large salad with lots of greens, tomatoes, olives, boiled eggs (seasoned with 2 tbspoon of olive oil and lemon), one vegetable side like creamed spinach and a portion of 250/300 gr of protein (salmon, chicken, etc) and a meal like that leaves me absolutely full.

I will definitely concentrate on increasing the amount of calories of my meals and will get back to report.

Thanks for the help.

Warm regards,

Francesca

Hi Francessa and welcome from the lurker status!! I also thought it was low but most people's do compared to mine which is high because I'm in the M/obese category but this Friday I aim to get into just obese group.
Glad yours was sorted, for me + others on forum would have no difficulty with the extra calories you've just gained so good luck Sue

Hi monteverano. I would recommend you eat more than one meal a day.

I know many paleo people advocate a single meal, but it's very difficult getting enough calories due to the sheer volume of all the good vegetables you eat, and how filling the high protein and fat content is.

I see that you already eat a lot of good fat, with olives, olive oil, salmon and egg. You might be able to get more calories from fat by also eating nuts, seeds, avocado and a larger serving of oil than 2 tablespoons, and that might make three meal of 800 kcal = 2400 kcal more doable for you?

Hi glassmarble,

I only eat one meal once a week (sometimes twice) when I do the 24 hours window. The other days I have two meals (I really don´t do breakfasts, but I will try to overcome that).

You mentioned something I can do easily: a larger serving of olive oil. I live in Spain so I have plenty of good olive oil around I will add an avocado and some nuts to the salad as well.

Thanks!

That's good news Francesca.

I'm trying a low-carb vegetarian addition to 5:2 just now and journaling it here viewtopic.php?f=4&t=6427 - you might find some help in there.

I also tried working with a single meal but it really isn't do-able: and there are suggestions out there that more than 12g of carbs at a single sitting isn't a good idea (anecdote, I know, but it sort of makes sense).

So I ended up with my 'breakfast' (chai yoghurt and nuts) which comes in around 380 calories and a mid evening snack (more nuts and a little cheese, around 400 calories) - both very easily eaten - making a big evening meal with the rest of your calories much more feasible.

Agree the olive oil, butter, cheese, nuts, avocado (though the latter is a little high carb) and eggs are essential : they are certainly my main source of low-carb calories just now! I've not used soy/tofu much yet but that is also meant to be a good source of low-carb calories.

All the best, FatDog.

and a portion of 250/300 gr of protein (salmon, chicken, etc) and a meal like that leaves me absolutely full.

I would think it does - that's at least two portions with 500-600 calories of salmon alone.

Now I am confused. The software I use (FitDay) tells me 250gr of cooked salmon are 348 calories. So I have been eating more calories than I think?

Can someone recommend a good nutritional data source I could consult?

[carorees]

It may depend on whether it is wild or farmed salmon. According to the calorie count app, farmed salmon is 206 cals/100g while the wild salmon is 182 cal/100g. But it seems either way you have been eating more than you think!

Haha I am glad I misunderstood you! I thought "that poor woman, trying to cram a whole feed day's calories in in one meal, her stomach must hurt". I know some paleo dieters do eat like that, but they eat bone marrow and seal blubber and pemmican, right?

I am definitely not eating bone marrow, seal blubber and pemmican. The truth is I really don´t know much about the lifestyle of paleo dieters.

A friend suggested I should follow paleo dietary guidelines for a month to see if that would speed up my weight loss a bit.