The FastDay Forum

Every week we will have a challenge thread where you can set a challenge/goal for yourself for that week. Anyone is welcome to start the thread or join in. If someone else's challenge sounds good to you, you can do that one or create your own. It should be a habit that will help you reach your goal. (It can even be unrelated to weight loss if you want!) Then during the week and at the end of the week you can report on your progress.

My challenge this week will be to drink a glass of water first thing in the morning. I need to increase my water consumption in general, so I will start with this. (I do also drink tea and iced tea during the day.)

I will also be continuing to work towards my first 3 challenges!

Please share what you would like to work on this week. Anyone is welcome to join in!

Thanks @cblasz. An excellent challenge! I don't know if it will help, but I have found that a glass of warm water is much easier to drink. First thing in the morning I boil the kettle, make a cuppa, and then use some of the remaining hot water to add to 2/3 glass of cold water, scull that, then settle with the cuppa and the iPad to catch up on overnight messages. If you want to add to the challenge at some stage, a glass of water half an hour before a meal is supposed to be a good idea.

I also will continue with my challenge from last week, with the aim of 4 nights a week having no more than 2 squares of chocolate (2 of which are on the 2 light days). I would like to add something else to the challenge, but can't immediately think of anything that I am happy to do (!) so will see if I get inspiration from others.

Good luck to all!

Hello all!

Congrats for last week's efforts.

I've just lost a post...grrrr...that I wrote updating you on my progress with last week's challenge.

No matter - here are the edited highlights:-

A game of two halves - had some success with getting to bed before/by midnight and also some shocking absolute failures (4am one night). I think I maybe succeeded 3 times - though one of those should hardly count as it was 11.59pm!!

Anyway, I am rolling the challenge onto this week in the hope that I can do better. No point in me making any mad promises though...I'll just see how I can do. No point in working on anything else either until I've got the sleeping lark under my belt...

Good luck everyone for the week ahead!

Thanks @Sassy1! I'm definitely a cold water person. I'm not sure why I'm so bad about drinking it though. My plan will be to have my cold water while I make my tea and lunch (to bring to work) and then drink my tea after. I will be adding another glass in the evening either before or with my dinner.

@Hazelnut20 - I don't see why the 11:59 one shouldn't count if the goal was by 12! I do still wonder what you do until you go to bed. Unless it's that you fall asleep on the couch. I used to do that a lot, and now if I think that might happen I go to bed to watch TV, so I'm already in bed if I fall asleep.

[janeg]

Hello All, I'm going to formalise my challenges by writing them in here. Since the begining of the year I have been slowly adding things to get me back on track. Week one was to do 3 fasts (tick) week two was to add in exercise 3 days (tick)week three was to make sure I exercised 5-6 times (another tick).
This week is the biggy; keep up the three day's fasts and the exercise and 'cut the crap'. My fasts have been about 3/4 to 7/8 proper fasts due to having a wee something extra which usually grew to be more than my allowance. And ordinary days are quite gluttony. Now that the Christmas goodies are finished, it's time to knuckle down and cut the crap.
I'm off on holiday 24th Feb so I have something to aim for, which is unusual for me.
So, get on with it janeg and good luck to everyone with their challenges.

What a fab idea folks, let's be accountable and stick tuit!

I'm just getting through a malicious bout of heavy cold type bug.
Saturday I dozed in bed while my good biome blazed a furious war on the incoming bad warrior bugs. I felt like it could have gone either way.
I am improving as I'm up today, pottering round the house, mainly sitting reading.
Onward and healthward

How is everyone doing this week? I'm happy to say that I'm doing good with my water challenge. Today is the 3rd day I've had my glass of water in the morning. Unfortunately, I'm not doing so well with the walk or green tea. The weather has been lousy and I've been VERY tired. Last night I fell asleep without even eating dinner!! But I will try again. I've still been good about not eating sweets, except for a couple of squares of dark chocolate.

I hope everyone is having a good week!

Hello Fellow Fasters My first post!
My challenge is to do 4:3 for 6 weeks. Although with a public holiday (Australia day) it's probably going to fail this week. So far 1 week down (last week). I'm hoping it gets easier and more a way of life like other posters in this forum have been saying
Good luck with your challenges!

[Tracieknits]

Hello Fellow Fasters My first post!
My challenge is to do 4:3 for 6 weeks. Although with a public holiday (Australia day) it's probably going to fail this week. So far 1 week down (last week). I'm hoping it gets easier and more a way of life like other posters in this forum have been saying
Good luck with your challenges!

Welcome to the forums and the challenge @Wakki22 !! It *mostly* gets easier, but for varied reasons, sometimes fast days are easier than others. I have no doubt that hormones play a role, but I'm not sure what other things impact it. Some days, fasts are easy. Most days they are a bit of work, but not terrible, and sometimes, they're just miserable and I end up caving and eating more than I planned to eat -- and I have FOUR YEARS of experience with 5:2. So don't let a difficult fast day make you throw in the towel. It's a great way of eating and if you stick with it, you can have real success.

Welcome too @wakki22! There is lots to learn from this website, both from the forum discussions and the "LEARN" pages. Tracie has provided a very realistic outline of what fast days can be like, and there are lots of tips to be found for how to get through the more difficult days - tho, as Tracie says, sometimes you may need to have more cals than strictly "allowed". Good luck and best wishes!

Hi @cblasz, good for you re the water and sugary foods! Lousy weather does not help with the walking of course, not when you have work as well which limits the available time, and such short daylight hours too. Is there an alternative you can do at home - skipping?? Would only need a few minutes of that to equate to 15 mins walking!! But hard to do if you feel tired - a walk outside is best for that.

I am doing okay after a "disastrous" start on Monday!!! I made up for it with 2 light days to follow, and no choccie, so am pleased with myself. The plan is for a normal day today, a low choccie day tomorrow, another light day on Saturday (need a 3rd to make up for horror Monday) and normal day Sunday. I have been thinking what to add for next week's challenge - will see how this week shapes up first tho.

The weather was better yesterday. I got my walk in and had about 12,000 steps. I also got my green tea in last night. Still good with the water. Hopefully I can keep it all up through Sunday!

Sorry about Monday, Sassy! But we all have bad days. Not turning it into a bad week, is what matters!!

I'm still working at my challenge from last week - to minimize my weekly alcohol intake. I used to have my glass of wine (or two) or vodka or two each night, it was a habit and I felt I needed it to relax. Last week I managed to skip a night or two, but this week I decided to just plain not do it on weeknights. I made the wonderful discovery (well, I knew that, but this confirmed it) that alcohol is the reason for my wanting a snack at night! So, this week has been great so far in terms of weight loss.
I'll have a glass of wine today with lunch, since I"m lunching with an old buddy, and then probably over the weekend as well since I'm visiting out of town friends. Luckily they're aware of my new eating habits and are supportive. I'll just make sure my wine consumption does not take me over my calorie count.

I also make sure to get my steps in, I walk between 3.5 and 5 miles every day, I think the scale is gonna be very happy next week with the help of these two challenges!

[Tracieknits]

Well done Zesty and Cblasz!

Sassy - we've all had those days. I think you're plan for atonement is a good one

Thanks Tracie. I know I am not alone with "those days". Learning not to eat for any reason other than hunger (except for special occasions) is a real challenge. And learning how to correctly interpret the body's hunger signals is also difficult.

I wonder if people who have never had weight issues ever have days like "those"??