Love that feeling of getting to eat what I want the next day! :)

Oh man, I so know how you feel!

I had to do back-to-back fasts Monday and Tuesday, so a total of 1,000 calories for two days. Usually not a huge deal, but it totally killed my energy yesterday so I took the day off from the gym. Unfortunately, today I am ravenous! But I packed good, balanced foods and have since run out of food to stuff in my ravenous mouth, so I will just have to deal until dinnertime (unless I steal some sunflower seeds from my office mate, which sounds more and more tempting as the hours pass...). Fast #3 of the week will be Thursday or Friday. Hoping to see 178 to meet my goal by Saturday.

Finishing Week 3 of Couch to 5K tonight!

NNS, I hope you don't mind my asking, but how did you choose 500 calories for your fast days? Is there a website that gives guidelines? I know alternatedayfasting.com has a calculator of sorts, but I was thinking the other day that's just based on one particular approach.

HungerWerks - I started with 5:2, or The Fast Diet. The very basic "rules" are eat up to 500 calories (as a female, 600 for males), twice a week, and "normally" the rest of the week. They do provide a TDEE (total daily energy expenditure) calculator and if you want to get really specific you eat your TDEE 5 days a week, and 1/4 of your TDEE the other 2.

But I like to keep it simple. I don't even count calories of the food I eat on fast days anymore. I just stick to the same things and estimate. I added a third fast day because I wasn't losing anymore on just twice a week and didn't feel like restricting further on non-fast days.

Small update. I think I have been far too forgiving on fasts days, and I really want to be more diligent so I can see bigger losses again. I've always had coffee with milk and sugar in the morning on a fast day, but I think it's getting out of hand.

So, on fast days, I'm now using unsweetened soy milk instead of my usual whole milk, and honey instead of sugar (I feel I need to use less honey.) I usually bring my own coffee to work but occasionally will have another cup, so I tried Splenda for the first time. We'll see if I have a reaction - I usually get an upset stomach from aspartame, but I'm not sure how I'll react to sucralose. Also limiting myself to just one extra cup of coffee at work, no more!

Trying to be more diligent about my evening meal as well. Tonight I'll weigh and measure everything and put it into MFP. Maybe it's also time to bump my calories down from 500 to 400-450. We'll see what tomorrow's weigh-in brings, but I'm really anxious to get things rolling at a faster pace again. I suppose this counter acts my previous post :)

How is everyone else doing?

Thanks so much for the helpful info, NNS. I had to tweak my alternate day fasting quite a bit, too, as mentioned above. :)

Well, Friday's fast went really well and I saw a new low on Saturday. So, I think I just need to keep this up, a smaller meal than I have been eating on fast days and less coffee/sugar/milk etc. Today is fast 1 of 3 for the week. Monday's are always easy after eating lots on the weekend!

Congrats on the new low! :broc: And as for not being hungry on Monday because of weekend eating - definitely. I ate so much chocolate peanut butter fat bomb "batter" on Sunday that I wasn't hungry all day Monday! :T

Hello everyone! Glad I found this discussion on IF. I've been practicing IF, the 16/8 protocol, and lost 10 pounds in a month. The 5th week and the weight loss is sorts stalled. I still have quite a bit to lose.

I have 27days before a get away so I am going to jump on board with this intermittent fasting for hopefully at least 2 weeks. Any ideas on a how/where to start?

Noname, it seems that you have done very well with 5:2. I am considering trying it. I get the part about 500 cals on the 2 days. I eat a lot of veggies so they should sustain me. But what do you eat on the 5 days? Do you stick to a particular calorie limit or just eat to satisfaction? After a day of only 500 cals I don't want to ruin it by overeating. I already do low carb due to my diabetes and really have to stick with that.

Hi everyone,
NoName your doing great! Nayla are you around?

I've taken a little detour through Intuitive Eating. It has a lot of great principles, I just need more structure. It's basic principle is eat when your hungry and stop when your satisfied, (not stuffed). That is a great principle which I am still attempting to apply. I just feel a time frame like 16/8 would be helpful in getting there.

Hi everyone. I just started the ADF on Thursday. It is going well so far. Going to weight tomorrow and see what happens.

I would recommend checking out thefastdiet.co.uk and I would also discuss it with your doctor. My understanding is 5:2 is not recommended for people with diabetes, but through the Facebook group I belong to, I know many people have done it successfully.

As far as what I eat on the other 5 days, I started out not being strict at all. Fasting those 2 days will naturally change your cravings and your hunger levels on non-fasting days (surprisingly, you WON'T feel like eating anything and everything!). I think everyone should start off by just eating "normally", but if they then do not lose weight, you may want to count calories or set other limits.

I personally don't drink alcohol during the week anymore and generally eat very healthy and lower calorie during the week so I can splurge a bit on weekends.

Thanks noname. I will check out thefastdiet.co.uk. I think type 1 diabetics can definately not do the 500 cal fast, but I think it's OK for type 2 if you're not on insulin or other injectibles, which I am not. My doctor would be happy with whatever I do to get some weight off, within reason, as long as my labs were still good.