The FastDay Forum

Totally agree with @FatDog if you are stuck on a plateau for a while it does mean you are effectively maintaining, seems like a oxymoron, but it is what I have been keeping me from being totally frustrated. So there is an upside to it.

@Debs I found the more I fasted, the more stuck I was, so for me that's why I eventually had to consider something was going on as I could fast effectively and at low cals too. Famine effect or set point seemed to be words flashing at me. I have had a break from fasting for a couple of reasons. Not even to rethink but rest, relax and today is my first day back to IF.

Not sure what form my fasting will take will just see how the day unfolds. What is weird is that I haven't really strayed from the weight I have been bouncing around though I did try on one pair of my newish skinny leg trousers and decided nah not comfy.

My original goal was to lose 10kg, I have done that, anything from now on in is a bonus.

I posted a link to an article on plateaus, it was quite interesting and if you are currently suffering a plateau evidently it's a good thing.....for a while!
resources-links-f3/how-to-break-through-a-plateau-t11124.html

That article led me to this fantastic blog.

well worth following

i guess she is doing 19:5

http://19hours-freedom.blogspot.com.au/

going since 2010


this then led me to
http://www.theiflife.com/

which is also good

Thanks for the links @Juliana.Rivers it's amazing where they lead to and such interesting reading! I liked it when Jenna (the first link) said, "Go and find the answers yourself and learn from experience. What works for one person may not work for you, so customize your weight loss journey to fit YOUR needs."

[Moogie]

Thanks @Juliana.Rivers for tagging me on the issue of 3 day B2B fasts. While it's not something I'd like to encourage in the long term, it's a bit of a grey area as there are plenty of folks who do their 5:2 days back to back and I guess why not for 4:3 as long as it's not doing physical harm to you. Yes, it's more the near-zero calorie fasts (ala MM in the Horizon doc, with his tiny cup of soup and nothing else) which I wouldn't like encouraged here.

Once my anxiety issues are resolved somewhat and my body is less prone to going awry I'll be back on the fasting train and perhaps in a couple of months I'll try the 3 days back to back to kick start things as suggested by Dr Varady.

I've tried the 3 days back to back and only managed 2 days so that didn't work. I had also put on 1 pound at the end of 2 days fasting. It must have been water, but why?. So I then stopped fasting for 2 weeks, I have put on 8lbs. I am now in panic mode and back to fasting. 4:3 from now until my surgery. I really, really want to lose another 30lbs at least before then (estimated surgery date should be June). For now its going to be M-W-F fasts. If that doesn't kick me off this plateau, then I will try for the 3 day boost.

I keep alternating between 70.2 and 70.6, the former if its a fast day. Now that is weird.

Not that frustrated ... yet. im still have time till Easter for the challenge. forget that i actually had a trend weight on 69.9 as my christmas challenge. did have a mini party when i say 69.9 a few times on the scale but it just didnt keep.

my renewed use of myfitnesspal should help

[Debs]

Just caught up with this thread and @moogie being tagged due to the 3 day fast thing that I did last shift. Just to alay fears, it is NOT a regular occurrence and the only reaso I did it was to see if it would shift anything along. It did slightly but not enough to want to repeat the exercise regularly. I think if you are comfortable with what you are doing, know how your body is responding, then all well and good. The other point to make is that it is being openly discussed as I did rather than sneaking off to your own little tent and fasting alone for days on end

I've been wanting to increase from 5:2 to 4:3 as I have been maintaining (totally agree with @fatdog and @gillymary that maintaining sounds much better than plateau when it goes on for so long LOL) for months now and I'm getting a little frustrated. Life keeps getting in the way though and the only way I'll get three fasts in this week is to do today and tomorrow back to back as well as Saturday. I'm seriously considering it, depending on how I feel in the morning x

Yesterdays fast went reasonably well. I caved in on my liquid fast and had some cheese, ham, brocolli and pasta bake, less than a cup full, I'm not sure of the calories, but I don't think it would have been too far over my allowance if at all.

As of today I've 2 or 3 pounds in weight from my up of 8lbs (I had forgotten if it was 2 or 3 pounds between the time I had weighed myself and managed to get to my PC).

What I am really stressing about is if, as usual, I had lost a lot of water weight over the fast, then surely I should have lost more weight. Or have I really put on 6lb of fat in only 2 weeks? I didn't go over by 10's of thousands of calories in the two weeks. I was eating a high carb diet for the two weeks, will that have had a longer term effect on water weight, if so, how long? Am I talking the end of the week, or a few weeks?

That's a tricky one Julie. I had a 10 day blow out on holiday in Italy last year, I lived on carbs and booze the whole time. Came home 6lbs heavier but lost 4lbs of that after the first fast or two but the rest took ages to come back off. I imagine most of it is water but some may be fat too. I'm sure it won't take too long to get back on track though, good luck x

Yesterdays fast went reasonably well. I caved in on my liquid fast and had some cheese, ham, brocolli and pasta bake, less than a cup full, I'm not sure of the calories, but I don't think it would have been too far over my allowance if at all.

As of today I've 2 or 3 pounds in weight from my up of 8lbs (I had forgotten if it was 2 or 3 pounds between the time I had weighed myself and managed to get to my PC).

What I am really stressing about is if, as usual, I had lost a lot of water weight over the fast, then surely I should have lost more weight. Or have I really put on 6lb of fat in only 2 weeks? I didn't go over by 10's of thousands of calories in the two weeks. I was eating a high carb diet for the two weeks, will that have had a longer term effect on water weight, if so, how long? Am I talking the end of the week, or a few weeks?

Odd you should ask that @Julieathome as I've just been pondering that on my yet-to-be-posted-log. I'm no expert but, from the bits that I've read, methinks that, if one has shifted to high carb, one might expect to gain up to 8 pounds, and for this to come back off within a week, with the last couple of pounds taking perhaps a little longer to shift. IIRC, @carorees hit this after a Chinese meal some months ago, and I regularly hit it (see my tracker for spikes...) and there's times I've thought it would never come back down...

Carbs, exercise, all sorts of things will increase water weight, and that weight can stay for much longer than seems reasonable. Essentially, unless you've eaten 3500 x the pounds suddenly gained, it's water and (as long you stop doing whatever caused its accrual in the first place) it'll mostly have gone by the end of next week. xxx FatDog