The FastDay Forum

Extra hungry today maybe as i went swimming

Had to give in and have an apple! My tummy now making lots of noise
Lentil and Tom soup for later. My fav and a normal day tomz. 5 hrs till bed

My fifth fast today (presumably there will come a point when I stop counting them), I didn't wake up properly until about 3:30pm... On the plus side, less hours to be hungry, on the down side, probably will have difficulty getting to sleep tonight. Still, no eating until at least 7:30/8:00pm. Hope your days are going well.

I know it's really hard to get back to excercising, but you are doing rally well with the fast and all that walking is brilliant. I have put on a stone and a half in the last two years and feeling a bit c**p about my self at the minute. tried to fast on Monday and caved in late afternoon. I am going to do it though as the health benefits will be worth it.

Esmecat, who said that eating normally doesn't mean to pay attention of what you're eating and how much?
Unless in your book "eating normally" means "eating whatever is in front of me" so in that case you might want to use the word "sensibly" instead of "normally".

I DO eat sensibly. That's what is starting to really hack me off, especially on days like today when I am feeling rubbish and the scales are telling me I have failed. In the book, Michael mentions going for fish and chips and similar stuff on the non-fasting days. If I did that, I would be even less successful! I count calories a lot, and I try to be very careful. I even avoid eating in situations where I cannot count what is on my plate.

I have over the years done all sorts of things that were supposed to be wonderfully healthy and help me be so thin, energetic, beautiful, etc I have reduced (now cut out) sugar in drinks, stopped drinking fruit juice because although we are essentially 98% orang-utan we allegedly cannot have the stuff without becoming obese, gone for low-fat cheese, olive spread, olive oil for cooking (and I am a stingy oil user), swapped to wholemeal instead of white bread, reduced my daily calorie allowance (pre-5:2 and now on "non-fast" days) to below my TDEE, and been swimming and attending Pilates or T'ai Chi every week, gardening, and I walk a minimum of 3 miles a day... All to no avail.

This diet promised the same in the book - you will lose weight, your clothes will hang off you, your blood chemistry will be fantastic, your skin will not break out, you will have energy you never thought possible, and so on.

I read the page about the improvement in skin condition on a fasting day with a particularly nasty break-out happening right there and then. I cannot measure my blood chemistry, so all I can go on are my physical measurements and weight. They are to all intents and purposes unchanged! I have some pretty horrible photos of me that make me look seriously pregnant, which is mostly lordosis but would be much improved if only I could find some diet/exercise combo that WORKS.

I need some sort of evidence to suggest that I have benefitted from all this stuff, at the very least to make it worth my while continuing. I really am losing heart in more than just the diet at the moment.

I think that you went to the total opposite direction. All in moderation. Perhaps there's something that's keeping you from losing weight?
Hypothyroidism? Polycystic Ovaries? When was your last check up?

OK I'm in for today, as well as tomorrow. I had an egg with spinach and peppers for breakfast. Just got home from a 4 mile walk and will try to keep myself busy (a toddler helps with that!) until a dinner of salmon and spinach. This is week 5 for me and have lost about 4 pounds. I'm frustrated with the slow progress but am trying to plug along.I have 15 pounds to go and was hopeful that I'd be there by June 1st but it's not really looking like that will happen...

Holy Moly, been a hard slog of a fast today, made it to tea-time though after a couple of hairy moments over lunchtime! phew...

I just had my last snack of the day and I'm at 481 calories. Only water and broth from now on.