The FastDay Forum

I was equally discouraged when I stepped on the scale this morning. My weight seems to have gone up again. I think it is water weight. Last time I weighed myself was the morning after a fast, so it appeared as though I'd lost more than I thought. Anyhow, it looks like I need to limit my calories on feast days if I want to continue losing. I have to eat more sensibly. Losing weight is really tough when you are older. Frustrating. Once I reach my goal, I will work very hard to maintain it because losing is too much work!!!

Stay positive! And I'm sure that with the 5:2 mentality it will be fairly easy to maintain your weight!

[carorees]

It seems that feasting boosts your metabolism, restricting calories slows it. So constantly restricting is counter productive, but you need an overall calorie deficit to lose weight. That's where fasting helps, but if you can actually over eat on a few non-fast days and under eat on others you get a bit of a boost. Or at least that's how it has worked for me. Exercising on fast days helps too as it forces your body to use fat as an energy source.

[wildmissus]

Take the opportunity to look at peoples progress charts. Yes, there are few that have that downward diagonal line but many are like mine up and down all over the place. I've almost done 3 months and still get disheartened when the weight goes on but in the end the overall is down. I've started doing what carorees suggests and I eat big at the weekend, less during the week and 2 fast days. Don't give up.

Hmmmmmm perhaps I shall try the overeat/undereat regime when I get the chance to overeat. I'm thinking either a meal out or order pizza next weekend.

Thanks for all the support. Have eaten slightly over today (not really planned) as I've just added up the cals. Discovered there are 438 cals in a naan bread!!!!!

Fast day tomorrow starting with a run with my dogs

I agree, it's so hard when you don't lose weight. I thought it might be because I was already dieting, restricting calories to 1250, before I started 5:2 - I was losing approx 1-2 lbs weekly, now only about 2 lbs in 3 /4 weeks. But am impressed with the health benefits as well as weight loss possibilities so intend to continue for a while anyway. Am going to the gym Mon, Wed Fri, seeing a personal trainer weekly - what else can I do!!!

It can also help if occasionally you can find somewhere that does weighing with body fat measurements too. sometimes weight can stay the same but body fat can go down.
take my weight this week is week 3 the first week I only lost 1lb of weight but 4lb of body fat. week 2 1lb off in weight and 2lb of body fat off week 3 stayed the same in weight due to TOTM and I usually fast on Sunday and weigh on Monday but yesterday started out as a fast day but someone brought pizza into work and got home to find my mum had come round and ordered a chinese banquet for our dinners. but another 4lb of body fat off making total losses in 3 weeks of 3lb in weight but 11lb in body fat.

Thanks for posting your graph Madge. It looks just like mine! Made me feel tons better. I've noticed a definite 'crocodile teeth' look to my weigh-ins. My chart does include a trend line and seeing that keep pointing downwards does help to off-set the panic a bit but I was a bit disconsolate this morning as I appeared to have gained about 3lbs! Now my commonsense tells me that is just the fact that my intake has been much more carby on my feast days and that it will all level out but you do get that sinking feeling at the time don't you?

Lets face it, the sheer fact that I keep having to pull my knickers up should be telling me something but it often takes someone else to help you see reason doesn't it?

Lets face it, the sheer fact that I keep having to pull my knickers up should be telling me something

I'm not sure I read that quite how you meant it!

I never knew until recently why lowering your salt intake is good for your BP. If you take in more salt, the body retains more water to lower the concentration in the body and your bodily pressure goes up.

This would make a difference as you have a huge amount of water in the body and water weighs lots.

Slightly OT but one of the reasons weight fluctuates.

Lets face it, the sheer fact that I keep having to pull my knickers up should be telling me something

I'm not sure I read that quite how you meant it!

Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!

I never knew until recently why lowering your salt intake is good for your BP. If you take in more salt, the body retains more water to lower the concentration in the body and your bodily pressure goes up.

This would make a difference as you have a huge amount of water in the body and water weighs lots.

Slightly OT but one of the reasons weight fluctuates.

One of the tricks that bars do is offer salty/spicy snacks such as crisps, nuts etc. They cause the body to ask for water (aka we get thirsty) but instead of water we have a drink in front of us, a drink that we sip faster and then we'll order a second, third and so on.

Lol Miffy49! I don't think I've got to the stage where me undies are falling down yet but the jeans feel a bit looser. I'm glad you find the graph useful, I thought it would offer some hope and encouragement to those of us in the 'slow lane' to prove that we are moving in the right direction but it will just take time. I started weighing daily in the beginning really just to work out what was the most appropriate day to record an 'official' weekly weight, but to be honest I'm non the wiser after 10 weeks as it doesn't always follow an exact pattern from one week to another. Anyway, I've had a break over Easter. Haven't weighed since Saturday and not fasted since last Monday. It will be interesting to see what happens when I hop on the scales tomorrow morning!

Must confess to not fasting today. Did my usual 3 mile run with dogs but when I came home I really wanted eggs on toast so I had it. Now having salmon and veggies for tea.

Think I need to re read MM's book and maybe watch the tv prog again to remind myself. Really not sure what to do next

My progress chart is steadily down but that's because I weigh myself the day after a fast day, first thing in the morning after going to the toilet each time, which serves to minimise the fluctuations. Even taking that into account, the amount I lose each week varies. I measured myself daily for one week just for fun and my weight varied by about a kilo and a half across the week!