The FastDay Forum

Sorry if this has been asked before but after reading another article that says this is not a sustainable diet it made me wonder.
How long does someone have to do this for it to been seen as a sustainable way of life.
I've been fasting for 7 months now, no problems so far. Will be tested soon when I go on holidays for 2 weeks. I'm not fasting on holidays and I wonder if I will find it hard to start again.
So is 7 months long enough, 1 year, 2? What do you all think?

I don't know, I think it has to do with keeping the weight off. That's where most diets fail.

I recently came back from holiday, and I also didn't fast while I was away. It was very easy to get back on the 5:2 plan. My body looked forward to it!

Ncync I hope my body looks forward to fasting but I doubt it

Sorry if this has been asked before but after reading another article that says this is not a sustainable diet it made me wonder.
How long does someone have to do this for it to been seen as a sustainable way of life.
I've been fasting for 7 months now, no problems so far.... What do you all think?

I think that a far better question might be to ask who's opinion of success is more important? Theirs or yours?

The very fact that you're 5.4kg down, and "7 months now, no problems so far.." seems an undeniable clue of sustainability.

HTH

Haven't several big losers switched to maintenance recently? I reckon if they keep it off 6-12 months we have some evidence for the naysayers.

If people who lost weight using 5:2 have kept it off for 5 years, I'd say it's sustainable.

[carorees]

The scientific evidence is that if you can keep the weight off for 5 years, it's likely to stay off. On the other hand, people who have had weightloss surgery are considered for skin reduction surgery after 2 years of maintaining. So, probably we have to wait at least 2 years after reaching target to decide if it is sustainable!

I guess I chose a shorter time frame because in my personal experience, I gained all the weight back in the first year after the diet. I have heard the five-year figure before. I don't want to have to wait that long to tell the naysayers they are wrong though!!!

Well, it is coming up to 16 months since I decided to lose weight, almost 12 months since starting 5:2 and nearly 6 months on maintenance and I am still happily trundling along. I said, to myself, that If I get to Christmas and I'm still living this way and with no weight gain then I would consider this is sustainable and I should manage to continue indefinitely. This is the first time I've ever done 'maintenance' as I've never been able to stick to any diet for any length of time so for me this is VERY successful AND sustainable.

Ballerina x

[carorees]

I found this article about weight regain after dieting. The introductory paragraph is interesting:

in the united states, over 60% of adults and close to 20% of children are overweight or obese (35, 174). A number of effective weight loss strategies are available, but most are only transiently effective over a period of 3 to 6 mo. Less than 20% of individuals that have attempted to lose weight are able to achieve and maintain a 10% reduction over a year (128). Over one-third of lost weight tends to return within the first year, and the majority is gained back within 3 to 5 years (3, 246). A number of reasons have been proposed for the high incidence of weight regain (69, 246), and several point to the biological response to weight loss.

I think we can assess the effectiveness of 5:2 after a year. However, it is hard to gauge from the forum how many people drop out so we won't know easily if we are beating the 20% mark mentioned above.

It's going to be interesting to see how everyone goes. Hopefully there will be enough of us still here in another 12 months to really get a gauge of how successful this is.

There is another side to sustainability - in maintenance, with exercise, I am struggling not to keep losing despite not having done a strict fast for three months (I have been 16:8ing 2 days a week). I cannot bring myself to eat junk/sugary stuff any more and have reduced wine intake as well - but still enjoy having a big plateful when I do eat.
Not worried just yet, a month of not biking/climbing due to my broken wrist has probably meant losing some muscle tissue, but if things don't turn around starting next week I will start getting concerned...

Surely the sustainability of any particular eating plan is at least as much down to the individual as anything else - particularly how ingrained their previous eating choices and exercise habits were. A bit like Pete, for me the success of sustainablility comes down to being weaned off the junk and really enjoying exercise.
Sorry to hear about your wrist Pete. Hope it heals up soon.

So far after 6 months of 5:2 I find its the most sustainable diet so far as I'm still on it and still going downward in weight.
It will be a couple of years before I am at maintenance, by then I should think that 5:2 will be so ingrained that it will have become my 'normal' way of living.
With other diets maintenance is strict control of how much 'nice' stuff you can re-introduce back into the diet without starting to put on weight. As 5:2 er's have been eating what they like anyway there isn't the need for any strict control, just having one fast day instead of two and thats maintenance.

Julieathome, I agree with you completely.

I think when a diet, be it 5:2 or any other, feels like a normal way of eating, and not a diet, i.e you eat this way comfortably and without undue effort, sustainability has been achieved.

And I think many on here, are already living proof of that