The FastDay Forum

@Peebles, @lovemyparrot, and anyone else with similar over-eating issues on non-fast days - how do we best support each other and find workable solutions to our problems? We do have the thread that Tracieknits started for non-fast days, but I have found that does not seem to work for me in the same way that the fasting today thread does.

Lovemyparrot, what are your particular challenges for maintenance?

Peebles, keep us informed how you go with keeping to TDEE and avoiding carbs, and what seems to work for you and what doesn't. What is your plan for the carbs? (And accepting being a bit heavier is one thing, continuing to put in weight is another!)

While I am away from home it is hard to monitor the results of my eating behaviour, as I do not have access to scales - which, despite all the known issues with them, I still find are the best measure. Keeping tabs on my calorie intake does help to some extent - well, it seems to stop me eating double my TDEE, which I can easily do, but doesn't stop me going over by a few hundred.

All suggestions for support welcome!

[carorees]

@peebles @lovemyparrot @sassy1
I'm sorry you are all finding things have suddenly got tough (and am hoping it doesn't happen to me ). I have recently been reading a book by Gillian Riley "Ditching Diets" that was very interesting and had some good ideas about how to stop overeating. I think that the book by Amanda Salis "Don't go hungry diet" may also have some useful insights.

I believe that, if you are suffering from the famine reaction, Amanda Salis suggests not dieting for rather longer than 2 weeks before trying again.

The key premise of Gillian Riley's book is to move the focus away from weight, and instead to focus on the eating habits that you can sustain for their health benefits (especially the health benefits that you can really feel, such as more energy due to lower carbs, rather than the putative health benefits that you can't actually feel but just hope are happening), even though not using weight as a goal might result in you stabilising at a higher weight than you would like, as peebles has speculated.

Here are some key passages from Gillian's book:

1. AM I CHOOSING? Most people deny choice in an attempt to cut back on their eating, whether or not they are actually managing to cut back. If you keep procrastinating, putting off making good changes or if you feel deprived when you don’t eat something yummy, this is the theme for you. When you eliminate these problems, then you take control. You take control by developing a deep sense of free choice. Only then can you make genuine choices that work for you, choices you really do want to live with.

Most people try to control their eating by thinking in terms of prohibition: commands, restrictions and maybe even threats. They think like an authority figure, a stern parent inside their own heads, shouting out orders. The harder they try, the more urgently this voice shouts at them, judges them and tries to bully them into submission.

The sense that eating less means you are ‘depriving yourself’ is nothing but an attitude, a way of thinking. All that difficulty and negativity is created when you deny your freedom of choice, and you do that by thinking in terms of commands, threats, rules, restrictions and prohibition.

This fear is that if you really let yourself believe you’re completely free to overeat – you will! That’s why you deny choice in the first place, because you hope that if you give yourself rules you might obey them, at least for a while. It can take time to overcome this fear, to throw out the rules and let in a stronger sense of freedom around food. It will take developing trust in yourself to make the choices you really do want to live with. That’s something that can take time,

Setting out ‘to eat what you want in moderation’ is all very well unless eating in moderation leaves you feeling deprived! After all, it is the immoderate amount you eat that you’re trying to control in the first place, isn’t it? The problem is that eating enough to never feel deprived means overeating, and especially it means overeating things that are aren’t so good for your health.

There’s absolutely no need to go ahead and overeat in order to prove that you’re free to. In fact, trying to gain a sense of freedom around food by overeating can be completely counterproductive. This is because you can become even more fearful of acknowledging free choice, and so end up denying it even more strongly. What I’m suggesting is something else completely: that the difference is in whether or not you genuinely believe you’ve got real, open, free choices about what and how much you eat. The difference is in your attitude. It has nothing at all to do with what and how much you are eating. It’s entirely possible not to eat for long periods of time and not feel deprived. It’s entirely possible to feel tempted by food but not eat it and still not feel at all deprived. The reason is because you’re remembering that it’s your own free choice; that nothing about this is being done to you against your will.

Make complete choices by acknowledging the outcome you would expect, based on your experience. For example, ‘I’m choosing to eat this tub of ice cream and to feel nauseous and guilty afterwards’. You are free to eat anything, but different choices produce different outcomes. What you don’t have much of a choice about is what outcomes follow from particular choices.

When you ask yourself: ‘Am I choosing?’ see if you feel and believe that you are totally free to overeat - especially when you’re not eating something that looks good to you.

2. WHY DOES IT MATTER TO ME? Here we look at why you might make one choice over any other. For example, you might ask yourself, ‘Why don’t I eat some more cake?’ Or, ‘Why am I snacking on an apple instead of a bar of chocolate?’ We always have reasons for the things we do but often we lose sight of what they are, and this is important when it comes to making lasting changes.

When you eat the food that your body was designed for, in time, the weight evaporates and the weight loss is fairly easy to maintain. Do you think you’ve been trying to do this already? Maybe, but it’s also likely that your weight has been all that matters. Isn’t that what’s motivating you? Weight loss? Wanting to lose weight is very likely to be the reason you’re reading this book. Assuming you are overweight, that’s a good reason, but no matter how much you want it, it is a weak motivation. It’s weak because it keeps you locked into the effect of the problem.

It’s a very good idea to lose weight, assuming of course that you are overweight to start with. It’s when you can put that to one side and discover other reasons to take control of your overeating that things really start to change. You lose weight too, but it’s a side effect rather than the focus of everything. Then, your weight loss is much more likely to last.

It’s about eating in a way that supports and enhances your emotional and your physical wellbeing. It’s about correcting the balance from a situation where losing weight is everything to just having it be one factor. It’s fine to have both kinds of motivation. Most of us do. We will always want to look as good as we can, and I do too.

When you draw the focus of your attention away from your weight and towards looking after your health, you immediately start to boost your self-esteem. This is because you are affirming that you value yourself enough to give your body what’s best for it. You motivate yourself towards having a healthy relationship with food rather than looking a certain way. You can have both. You can have the best of health and look great too, but if you prioritise your health and self-esteem you will connect with a considerably more powerful and enduring source of motivation. Then, the weight loss pretty much takes care of itself.

3. HOW AM I DEALING WITH TEMPTATION? This theme addresses your desire to overeat; the urge, impulse and attraction towards all that food you don’t really need. In the past you may have tried to control this by avoiding temptation or distracting yourself. But it’s impossible to keep that up forever, so your success gets compromised. You can begin to think differently about feeling tempted and about feeling satisfied. When you do, things really start to change.

We are rewarded with endogenous opioids when we eat, because our survival system assumes we’re doing something that will keep us alive. Food that contains sugar, most other carbohydrates such as wheat, and fat activate these rewards much more powerfully, which is what makes them more attractive - and potentially more addictive.

It’s important to be able to identify even those brief thoughts of desire [for treat foods] because a great deal of overeating can get done in a fairly unconscious way. You may not be aware you are feeding an addictive desire, and maybe not too aware of what and how much you’re eating either. It’s impossible to control something you aren’t aware of, so noticing your desire to eat is a crucial first step. If you just think in terms of ‘craving’ you might miss a lot of it.

Becoming aware of addictive desire is, of course, just the first step. It’s a hugely significant step, but even when you’ve identified it, you’re still feeling a desire to overeat. When you learn how to manage this experience, you’ve got the option not to satisfy your desire, or at least not to satisfy it quite so often.

If you eat every time you feel upset, then every time you feel upset you’ll want to eat something. If you buy a chocolate bar every time you pay for petrol when you fill your car, you will inevitably desire your treat every time you’re there. You either reinforce this memory [pathway] by overeating once again, or you start to let it go by leaving it unsatisfied. If you leave the addictive desire unsatisfied, you get to be in control of your overeating, and it fades because you are no longer feeding and reinforcing it.

When, in the past, you avoided temptation and any feeling of desire, you never learned how to work through this trance state, so you are going to be controlled by it when it’s there. Far more powerful is to develop the skill of talking yourself through it, by turning around to face it and deal with it. At first, though, even when you do face it, you may still fight it and struggle with it, simply because you hate it and really you just wish it would go away. This actually makes things worse because the more you fight something like this the more it is going to fight back. You stop fighting your addictive desire by accepting it, so that, without any opposition, it simply flows through you. You let yourself relax, breathe into the feeling and allow your addictive desire to eat be there. You choose. The way you choose is either to satisfy your addictive desire or to accept it by being willing to feel it by leaving it unsatisfied. Fundamentally, those are the choices that are open to you and by far the best way to think about them. Of course you aren’t going to stop eating entirely, so one of the challenges you face is in knowing the difference between an addictive desire and a genuine need to eat.

You take control of your overeating by allowing yourself to feel your unsatisfied addictive desire - but don’t expect to do that every time. Sometimes you might not even notice the desire, and sometimes you might not be willing to accept it. This is a process, and you will be on a learning curve. Stay with it and you will get where you want to go, but don’t ever expect your eating to be perfect from now on.

Let go of black-and-white, all-or-none thinking, thinking instead in terms of shades of grey or percentages. Aim for 80 per cent, or whatever seems to work for you. If that’s too high, aim for 50 per cent and keep looking for ways to improve on that. What percentage of success did you have with your eating today? Acknowledge one thing you did or didn’t eat that you are pleased about.

It makes such a big difference to let go of any assumptions about your excess, addictive eating. You simply don’t know if you will, in the future, eat considerably more food than you need. And the wonderful thing is, you don’t need to know. To start with, this can seem frightening because it’s likely you’ll lack confidence in this method. You’ll understandably want to feel comforted by a guarantee of success. But it’s recognizing real freedom of choice whenever you experience your addictive desire that is so liberating because it eliminates any sense of deprivation. If you let yourself know that certain food or quantities of food will always be available to you - tomorrow, next week, whenever - it will be much, much easier to pass on them today.

Thanks @carorees

I have been planning to read Amanda Salis' book - Sallyo, among others, speaks highly of it too. I have read the chapter available on the Internet a number of times, but I think reading the whole book would be useful.

The other reference looks very interesting too. I quickly read through the extracts you provided, and will need to read again to digest properly! Not focusing on weight seems totally appropriate for maintenance, and her suggestions for reframing how I look at eating may hopefully lead to some solutions for my overeating.

The overeating is of course almost a lifetime problem for me, and quite independent of 5:2.

Will report back on any insights! Thanks again

Lovemyparrot, what are your particular challenges for maintenance?

I'm afraid its alcohol - I am really able to eat at or below my TDEE with food - I have so much control, but with alcohol (and when OH is drinking and I'm thinking of NOT having a drink), it is SO difficult for me. We did well for sober January (as OH decided to join me) but now he is having his usual drink (or two, or more) - it is SO hard for me. I don't really expect you all to understand (altho' I did see something similar that @Tracieknits recently posted) - anyway, that is my main challenge.

@Lovemyparrot, is the problem that when you have alcohol, you also eat? Or is it just the cals in the alcohol itself? No suggestions, apart from the obvious one, which you no doubt try, of only having one glass most days, then one day of fasting a week could counterbalance that...

And I don't think you are alone in enjoying alcohol!

@peebles @lovemyparrot @sassy1
I'm sorry you are all finding things have suddenly got tough (and am hoping it doesn't happen to me ). I have recently been reading a book by Gillian Riley "Ditching Diets" that was very interesting and had some good ideas about how to stop overeating.]

I am fascinated by Riley's emphasis on the underlying issue typically being the addictive desire to over-eat rather than the 'comfort eating' etc. I think experience here and elsewhere also indicates that there can be strong hormonal drives to eat and I was interested to see that there are hints to Riley allowing for this in her most recent blog posts altho' she'd previously seemed to discount it.

I'm always aware that I have a sense of cognitive dissonance that I'm OK with, when I read writers such as Riley. She'd possibly argue that fasting is restriction. However, for me, it's a contract with myself about how I organise my week in an efficient manner whilst supporting several goals and I know that I'm free to change my mind and not fast on a scheduled day - it's just that since 2011, this hasn't happened.

As ever, I am attracted to the reminder that we accept that we are works in progress and we don't expect perfection just because we read about something and try it out a few times.

Thanks @carorees

Thanks @carorees from me too - now I have digested your long helpful post and quotes, I think most of the ideas apply equally to food and drink and I have to re-read and concentrate on many of the points mentioned in the Gillian Riley book.

Thanks again

It's my 66th birthday today and I am pleased to say that I am still within my target range - 147.8 pounds, almost identical to my weight on last year's birthday and that is something that I have never achieved before! There have been ups and downs during the year but as long as I keep returning to my 'magic' 147 pounds, then I feel justified in calling myself a maintainer!
I did have a blip on my Progress Tracker this week because on my 'official' weigh -in day, last Sunday, my weight had jumped to 151.8 pounds! I have only myself to blame for this - too many 'treats'! However, it prompted some drastic action so I fasted on Monday, ate sensibly yesterday and those four extra pounds have now gone! I love this WOL!

Happy Birthday@StowgateResident
I hope I can say the same when my birthday comes around!

Hello everyone,

I haven't posted here for ages as l have not been fasting or maintaining, I read the Amanda Salis book in early Feb and have been trying to eat 'normally' since, but am planning on going back to fasting soon as I am doing much better with eating 'normally' now.

Anyway, as I see that some of you are looking for ways to control eating on non-fast days, I'll briefly share my experience. I kept a food diary as she suggests, and noted hunger and satisfaction levels, and found 2 problem areas, 1 was obvious but the other was not. I only kept the food diary for 2 weeks on and off, weighed myself after the first week and had gained a kilo, then after second week and weight was decreasing. Now, after about 6 weeks weight is lower than it has been since September but best of all i don't think about food all the time or limit anything, i naturally seem to be eating well and stopping or not eating when not hungry, and I feel so much better. I am still loosing weight, progress is slow but i really am eating what i want so this is totally sustainable. I am planning on reintroducing 1 fast day a week soon because I do like fasting so I hope that I will be able to find a balance.

So anyway I would totally recommended the book (I got the 2nd one as someone said it was better than the first) and am going to look for the other book now, and would also be interested in a maintenance support group!

[carorees]

That's very interesting and reassuring @Nicky_94. I must get her book for homework!

It is interesting about finding habits and problem areas. I thought I had a problem with over-eating eating salted nuts before dinner in that it had become an "addictive desire" as Gillian Riley calls it. OH and I would pour a glass of wine and open some nuts while we waited for dinner to cook and we would both trough so many nuts that we were not that hungry for dinner . We have both been being good about eating a lightish lunch and not eating between meals but yesterday we had a scone with butter and jam at around 4.30pm in a departure from routine. When dinnertime came I was not in the slightest tempted by the nuts and glass of wine!!! I now am thinking that rather than being non-hunger eating, the nuts issue was simply a case of releasing the hunger monster early! Or maybe yesterday was a one off!

Perhaps an afternoon snack (of something healthier than a scone) would not be so bad after all. It is within my eating window so probably I should not be being so strict about eating between meals when my window is only around 6-7 hours long anyway. I shall continue to observe with interest!

And while I'm here I might as well submit my maintenance report for the last 7 days: max 64.2, min 63.5, trend 64.0; maintenance range 63-65kg.

My high this week was on Monday and Tuesday at 137.5--2.5 lbs over the goal of 135. But this morning after fasting yesterday, I'm down to 134 for the first time since November I'd like to stay here, below the goal, rather than consistently over.

Hope the rest of you are doing well, also

I fell off my roll today. After 10 consecutive days at goal, I was a pound up this morning. Let's see what tomorrow brings.

There are always going to be ups and downs, @barbarita, one pound is nothing - see my post earlier this week about my four pound up! As long as we don't let it stay for too long, or allow it to be joined by other pesky pounds, then we just have to learn to live with it!
Congratulations, by the the way, on your immense dedication to your walking/running routine - I wish I were so motivated!

Today I felt that I had a bit of a win. I went out for lunch with a friend and - for the first time ever in my life- chose to have a salad! It was followed by a waffle and ice cream, with caramel sauce but, even so, me and salad -voluntarily - who ever would have thought it!

@stowgateresident I admire the calm confidence you have when faced with your gains. You have faith that you will soon get rid of the blips - and you do! Of course I am not freaked out by the odd pound or two, although I can't blame mine on lovely holidays!. All part of the mysteries of life, but if I carry on eventually things will come right again. Well done on actually wanting the salad - salad is often my preferred choice because the alternatives are often too high in carbs, but I have nothing against fish and chips once in a while.

PS Back at goal again today.