Hi, I’ve struggled with my weight for a long time. I am 5’1”. This time last year I was successfully losing weight and was down to 127 pounds. Then I caught covid and dealt with long covid, as well as pretty severe depressive episodes and new psych meds, and gained back all the way to 146lbs. Anyway! Feeling a lot better mentally and my long covid fatigue is finally gone. I’m ready to lose this weight! I am currently down to 140 just by trying to be more mindful when I eat and watching my sweet tooth but I want to try 5:2. What is something I should know going into this? Is it true that on fast days I should eat 500 cals? As of right now I do not exercise outside of walking, I want to take this one step at a time and get a hold on my diet and nutrition before I add in exercise so I don’t overwhelm myself.
Personally, I don’t think you should consume any calories when fasting. Otherwise your really just living at a very low calorie deficit which is gonna f your metabolism and general health. When you water fast w zero calories your actually letting your body enter ketosis and autophagy and reaping true biological benefits which is the whole point of fasting.
I would start w 8 hour eating windows. If your patient, you’ll prob see the weight loss you want w that regimen. If you want quicker results you’ll have to go longer but would still recommend building up to that slowly rather than jumping straight into 48 hour fasts.
Can only speak for myself, of course, but my first effort at fasting (for weight reduction, I;e., this was my newest diet) was 5:2 and I found it miserably complicated and difficult to keep my days straight around my schedule/social life.], I hated calorie counting but preferred them to be carbo calories at least. And finally, and probably due to finding it miserably complicated to work and that thing about carbs, I didn’t lose any weight. Boo hiss. I went to IF with an 18 hour fast, 6 hour eating window, no carbs or sugar, and within two weeks lost seven pounds. I am shorter than you (4’10” if I stand up really straight) and we KNOW how hard weight loss is when you’re smaller! I feel good and have tons of energy and it’s just not really hard. Yes, you get hungry, but the hard part is getting over things like: “breakfast is the most important meal of the day” (put out by the breakfast cereal/morning candy folks) and “I need my coffee and I need it with stuff in it” (half the new people posting here, I feel for the anguish, but black coffee becomes a food in itself when there’s nothing else to eat, and a very fine one at that).
PERHAPS IMPORTANT CAVEAT- I am that person who, if she cannot have five jelly donuts in one sitting, would rather have no jelly donuts at all. This is a temperament that is really suitable for intermittent fasting daily.
you can do it any way. I think of it as Calories per week and I try to keep a slight deficit overall. I was doing 5:2 with two 36 hour fasts and maybe a 5000 calorie a week deficit, but that was starting to have an impact on my energy and really straining me for workouts and recovery, so now I am doing closer to 2 days of 800 or so cals (high protein), and a totally weekly deficit usually less than 2000 calories (VERY SLOW WEIGHTLOSS but increased strength). I may dial back to full fasts more soon, but the bit of calories definitely helps my performance on “fast (not really a fast)” days, and I may do a bit more of a traditional consistent deficit with monthly deficit breaks