Mad, our air condition actually stopped working and another guy checked it and says it leaked Freon. Because its so old it would be costly to replace the Freon and no guarantee it would not leak again. We decided to replace it but that guy never called us to schedule. I wanted to also replace the old furnace but DH didn't want to replace it for someone else, insinuating we won't be around long enough to use it. We don't know that. I don't want it to break down in the winter. So when our neighbor said he got a good deal with this guy replacing air, furnace and hot water tank he saw the benefit of replacing all now. I hope it is more efficient but our heating bills aren't real high as it is. I just want reliable for whatever time we are here.

I still don't want to get on the scale. I can't get a fast longer than 16 hours. I am not happy with my eating. Its not terrible, but I am never hungry. Getting the hunger feeling tells me I didn't overeat. I will keep trying every day and hope today is the day I get back on track. I don't think I could ever do 60+ hours, especially with DH around. He would want me to eat. But now that I've done 20-24 hours I know I could go longer if I was alone. I did 5 days twice under medical supervision in the hospital and the only thing that happened was my potassium went too low. I now know I could do it on my own.

Mad I hope you don't get issues on your way to your vacation home or anytime during your trip. That would be terrible. We just can't control such bodily functions.

Trish, I hope your issues are under control, but you are doing so well and I pray you can hold the wonderful losses. The restaurant where I liked the wings closed permanently. I tried them somewhere else and didn't like them. I don't like them with sauce. Actually, I never had them with sauce. I don't really like BBQ sauce very much. I liked the ones that came in our bucket of chicken from KFC. DH would never eat wings. He doesn't like any meat on a bone. He only likes boneless chicken, steak or pork chops. That's why I was surprised that he ate KFC but he pulled the meat off with a fork and threw the skin away. I'm just glad he said he would eat it again.

We will probably go to Rodneys today but I don't know what I will order.

Carol: one this for you is that you see results with IF of 16-20 hours, which I don't. I don't think I could do beyond alternate day fasts with DH around either. Its pretty difficult. Next week when we get back he is having dental surgery again, so I am thinking that will be a good time for another EF. He will be on a liquid diet for a few days. Even if that includes smoothies and ice cream and soup, I will likely not get so tempted as I am when he has cooked foods. You have to do you, and what works for you. One thing about all the years I have been coming here, is that different things work for different people. None of it is easy though.
Hope the replacement goes well. You will be so happy with it.

I am stuck at 182.6 so I have lost 5.4 lbs this month. YAY!!! I can remember either gaining or losing nothing in a month so this is very good. I am very happy with my progress. It has taken me a good 7 or 8 years but with all the bouncing up and down I have actually lost 62 lbs total at this point. I have always gained weight back but this time I am determined NOT to do that. DH put a thing on my new pc that measures BMI and show what your ideal weight is to be and it says I should weigh 118 lbs. It doesn't have a please for age so I have no hopes or desire to weigh 118 ever again. My goal is 150 lb and will decide then if I want to go lower. I won't be surprised if I hang at this weight for a while for my body to adjust to the loss I've had so far and then hopefully it will start going down again. I think I will finally start doing a lower carb again. In fact, I am thinking more Atkins again.

Carol Sue I think you should not worry right now about doing a 16 to 20 or 24 hr fast and not doing longer. I think there are times that I think I could do a 24 hr fast but right now I am happy with the 16 to 20 hr fasts. One of these days I am confident that I will brave it one day and try a 24 hr fast. I also think that you will ease into the plan that will work for you. It isn't easy to do at first but once we do, it seems to become second nature to us. I read the other day that the habits we change slowly last longer and I am hoping that is true.

Mad I admire you being able to do those long fasts. I remember years ago when the church we were in when I was still living at home with my parents. The church decided that we would do a one week fast. Mama and I were going to a diet doctor back then. When I told the doctor, we had just done a one week fast, he told me that we had done so many good things for our bodies and should be able to really do great on our diet afterwards. I have never done a one week fast ever again. I am not sure I could ever do it, but the one thing I do remember is how light my body felt from not having to digest food for that week. I have to say I like the way my body feels from just the OMAD and a snack.

I hope you have a good vacation trip to the cottage with no issue so you can enjoy it. Be safe and we look forward to hearing from you when you return.

We are going to meet my sisters and their hubbies for lunch today. I think I'm either going to have liver and onions or catfish although their grilled pork chop sounds good. I will eat OP veggies but no salad.

Have a nice day everybody.

Trish, 182 is a very good place to be stuck.

Its getting to the point that I don't feel right unless I fast at least 20 hours. At that point I can have a very small meal and a normal dinner. I don't like the word snack. It makes me think of junk food. This works good for me because DH is happy if I will eat dinner with him. I can lose weight at that point and just feel better all around. I have noticed my sleep results have not been as good since I stopped fasting. It was not my choice. I just couldn't do it long enough until today.

The lowest weight I can remember as an adult was 122. I would love to weigh that now but its unrealistic. I don't know what weight I want to reach but I will know it when I get there. I just never want to see 190 again. The danger is my belly fat. Belly fat indicates fat around your vital organs. That is my concern.

My phone is working fine but it is not showing up on my Tracfone account. I was on the phone with them for an hour trying to resolve this. He sees my new phone on his end but I don't on my end. He said it will take 24 hours to fix it. It doesn't affect the way the phone works but I need to be able to see my minutes and text balance. Computers are great when they work right.

Carol Sue I seem to do good with a 20 hr fast as well. Sometimes I do a 3 hr eating window and sometimes it is a 4 hr. So I guess the next day I end up with a 21 hr fast, but I don't really think about it. I agree with you that an evening meal would be better than thinking of it as a snack. There are days it is just a quick snack to eat something and then other times it can be a small meal. I think I will do like you can call it a 2MAD rather than OMAD & a snack. There is probably some wisdom in your theory.

I know when I was a teenager I mostly weighed about 120 lbs. I weighed 150 lbs when I married DH#2 and not sure what I weighed when DH and I married but do know when we came for our first trip to TX in May 18 yrs ago that I weighed 167 lbs. I gained back up to 244 at my highest after we moved to SC but not really sure how long ago that was. I found that as my highest weight on some diet site I was on. Like you I never want to see 190 or 200 again. They say only 1% of the people who lose weight keep it off and I intend to be one of those people.

I also agree that we have to get rid of belly fat because that is the most dangerous fat that we carry.

We will do this dear friend.

Trish, I've heard that 5% of people never regain their weight. The problem is, after you lose weight your body requires less food, and its less than a person who was always that weight. I have also heard that if you do a fast like we do and still eat a full meal like we do your body will not slow your metabolism. I have no way to prove that except wait and see. I can only do my best. I really don't understand how some people lose 100 lbs and some of them do it more than once. I struggle to lose 10. Even though we complain that it is so slow I think that's the answer. Slow loss is permanent. Once I finally got to onederland I never went back to 200. I bounced around in the 190s until I finally got in the 180s. Now I'm struggling to stay there.

I was 137 on my wedding day, a

nd it went up steadily from there. If I knew then what I know now that wouldn't have happened.

I feel good that I fasted for 21 1/2 hours. We went out for fish and I had to stop on the way home to go to the bathroom, so it is my opinion that refeeding caused it. I don't know what else. I'm just glad that I'm back to my long fasts. I don't even consider it a fast anymore. I just wasn't hungry.

I was on the phone twice today with Tracfone. The second lady was from Indonesia and I could not understand her. I know these people need a job but we should be able to request an English speaking rep the way they allow you to choose Spanish. It is still not straightened out but it will just have to do.

I am finished eating until tomorrow.

We had a good visit with my sisters and BILs. I did eat half order of chicken fried steak, but it was more batter than steak so ate the steak and left most of the batter and ate very little of the gravy. I had 1 roll no butter and ordered fried okra which I ate about half of it and green beans. I probably ended up with almost 22 hr fast by the time we got our food.

Carol Sue Good for you for successfully fasting today. We probably fasted the same length of time. I agree with you about the weight gain. If I had known what I know today, I would never have let myself gain this weight in the first place.

Going to bed early tonight since I have to go to the beauty shop in the morning.

Trish, I did some fasting back when I was single to control my weight, and I exercised. But I never told anyone I was fasting because it was a real No No back in the 70s. I also did carnivore sometimes. When you live alone you can eat however you want.

I forced myself to get on the scale today and I am 189.6, just barely under 190. I have to keep pushing this to continue downward. I cannot allow myself to get back to 190. I would like to fast overnight again but I can usually only do that if we go to the casino and I don't want to go on Saturday. If I can figure out something for him to eat that would work but he will want me to eat too.

I used to love country fried steak and ordered it often. I don't know when I stopped liking it but now I like my meat plain. I used to order it with white gravy and mashed potatoes. That was during my gaining period but I never ate half. I always ate every bite.

DH just made breakfast. He asked if I wanted some and I said No. When I'm fasting it doesn't bother me if he's eating. If there is something I want I can wrap it up for later and often I throw it out because I don't want it later. This might be different if I was doing extended fasting like Mad does. I think of the book Delay, Don't Deny. I never read it, but its easier for me if I think I can eat it at a later date rather than think that I can't have it at all.

I searched and found Delay Don't Deny free on PDF. I'm surprised. I'm curious about the book but not enough to pay $10 for it. I'm thinking I might already know most of what it has to say, but I'll look through it.

Right now I'm at 19+ hours and I want to eat something. I don't know what we're doing for dinner, and it depends on that. I'm not hungry. I just want to eat something. I think the reason I don't get hungry is I took Metformin but not G. I don't take it unless I'm eating, or if my blood sugar is really high. If it's just slightly high I skip it and let my blood sugar come down naturally through the fast. I am not recommending this to anyone. You should always take your meds the way the doctor prescribed them. Diabetes meds are the reason that fasting is not recommended for diabetics. I am trying to wean myself off the G because it pushes the pancreas to release more insulin, which is the fat storage hormone. I'm trying to very carefully manage my blood sugar with the G until I don't need it anymore.

This is just me talking to myself, and trying to convince myself I'm going about this the right way.

This computer is so touchy and I do not know what I hit but I just wrote a message and ended up hitting something and got into something I've never seen and had to leave it and do over.

Carol Sue I remember that book. I think I had that book but don't remember if it was a kindle book or not. I think they have a FB group but not sure about that. I like to use the delay idea myself. I did that when I wanted the potato chips and planned to get them at the store and then we got the LJS fish and make me a sandwich if I still wanted it by then. The funny thing is that when we were walking through the store and we came to the potato chip isle, I remember saying to myself, "I don't need to go down that isle because I don't need anything down there". Funny thing is that I did need something on that isle for DH and he remembered and went down it and got his Planer's salted peanuts. I'm so used to passing the chip isle it never occurred to me that I wanted chips. I didn't think of them until we drove into the LJS lane to order take out. Of course one thing that helped is that I didn't have any in the house to start with. So not sure that would have happened so well if they had been here. It is helpful that DH doesn't eat them any more either.

Felt strange to go to the to the beauty shop on Saturday. It was just for this week. Next 2 weeks we will go on Friday at regular time. She was in a different room this time since the owner was there using her room. I feel sorry for our beautician. She said she doesn't know what she will do if they don't get moved into new salon after the next 2 Fridays because she has no place else to go. I think they have the remodeling etc done, but now they are waiting for the inspection to be done. I know everybody will be glad when things get back to normal for them all.

I made yesterday my WI for this week because I never know what I actually weight when I have to weigh 2 hrs earlier. But today it showed that I am up 1 lb from yesterday. I think I said my weight yesterday was 182.6 but it was 182.4 and today after eating out I am 183.4. That could be right though since yesterday was a very carby day.

Today I am back OP and going to try doing LCMF woe. I can't say I am doing keto but I definitely want to do a low carb plan and plan to keep my carbs between 50 and 70 grams. I did drink a cup of BPC this morning using a little EVOO in it. I plan to have my salad with crackers, a veggie and we are having French Onion chicken and I always end that with my diet dessert and a cup of coffee. I might try to fast tonight as I would really like to try to go back to having a low carb breakfast and eat dinner at 3pm and then nothing except liquids afterwards until breakfast the next day. That would be more of a CAD plan with IF and LCMF. I find it very difficult to eat anything at night these days and I would like to get back to that routine since I do like having my eggs. I think I will have to not eat bacon as often as I used to but I do keep Canadian bacon on hand and can go back to eating that. I'm not big on sausage because it hurts my stomach when eaten in the mornings. But then that was turkey sausage and regular might be different.

Now I need to get busy if I'm going to get all my Saturday things I normally do before DH gets up.

Have a nice day.

Well, the furnace guy was supposed to call yesterday and we still haven't heard from him. This is the second time someone was supposed to call us back to give us a price and didn't. I know this second guy does it on the side from his real job so he's busy, but when you say you will call you should call. I can't do any laundry because DH pushed the file cabinet in front of the dryer to get it out of the guy's way and I don't want him to have to push it around so much. I hope he calls.

I hope your hair dresser gets this straightened out. Its hard not to know where you are going to work.

I just typed a whole message and lost it.

Weight stuck at 183.6 today and was 183.4 yesterday so I guess the bounce yesterday was real. I am going to switch to Brunch and early dinner everyday starting today. I plan to eat breakfast around 11:30 and of course we usually have our early dinner around 3:30. I have missed my eggs and will try my hand at making a Mug almond bread or an almond pancake. If I can do this, I will be able to have a 20 hr fast each day. I also plan to get back to my exercise tomorrow. I will do 2 days of core and stretches and 3 days on the bike. I want to get back to a routine and hopefully make this a habit until it becomes second nature to me.

Dinner today will be homemade pizza which I make mine on the Joseph's oats flax flatbread. So that will make it another high sodium day which means I need to drink a lot of water to compensate.

Carol Sue I hate it when someone tells me they are going to call or come by and never bother to call and tell me. I hope the guy calls or shows up today. Maybe he had to work or had an emergency but still no excuse for not calling.

Have a blessed day everybody.

The furnace guy called today and gave us a quote that we accepted, so he's going to put the hot water tank in today to get a start on it. Then he said he will call Tuesday to schedule the rest. I asked about an air cleaner and he recommended using the high filter furnace filters instead so that makes me trust him that he didn't take advantage of making more money.

When we went to Wal-Mart this morning DH wanted to go for breakfast so I did since we haven't gone for a long time. I really hate that because it makes me want to eat all day. DH says it fills him up and he doesn't want to eat but he had a banana and cucumber slices since we got home. LOL. He eats every 2 hours. I think your plan of brunch and dinner sounds good as long as you don't need a snack in the evening. I'm all screwed up now that I only had a 14 hour fast and who knows what well have for dinner. I would like chicken again. Or liver but DH won't eat that. We have steak for him.

Carol Sue I'm glad the man called and he seems to be trustworthy. Hope your day has gone well.

Today has been a good day. I did eat within a 4 hr window and fasted tonight. I was able to drink a lot of 0 calorie drinks. I plan to get some more of those tomorrow when we go to Sam's and Walmart. I am thankful for the way today has gone. I did make the almond mug bread which didn't turnout as good as I would have liked. Next time I will add a little more almond flour and then brown it in a skillet. I ended up cutting it in half and using a slice of Canadian bacon and a slice of Velveeta cheese and made myself a keto version of Egg McMuffin. I went on MFP and changed my settings so that it shows brunch and dinner and a snack which is really just a cup of coffee so I can take my collagen in it.

Good night.

So not a great month, I have a 1.5 lb gain. I will update my CW to show a 22.5 lb loss (was 24 lb).