If you don’t like weighing yourself, you might try this trick to measure your progress

I’ve been doing intermittent fasting for a little over 2 weeks now, and it’s been cool. I don’t weigh myself, but I decided that I should probably measure my progress SOMEHOW (aside from photos and the way that my clothes fit). So I took some string and used it to measure my waist, and then I cut the string to that exact size.

So now I just wrap that string around my waist and measure how much smaller my midsection has gotten compared to the size of the string. Just something tangible that I can wrap my head around, since I don’t do scales.

Anyway, my waist size has decreased by a little over 1 inch in about 2 weeks.

About 7 months ago, I started exercising at least 1 hr every day so that I could get back into shape after gaining weight during the pandemic. The workouts are intense, so I’ve built up a decent amount of muscle, and I’m finally in some of the best shape of my life. But I want to lose a tiny bit more fat for vanity reasons, so I’ve decided to finally focus on cutting calories via IF. So far, it’s working! Usually I can’t stand dieting, and I dislike counting calories. But now I’ve trained myself to eat within a 4 hour window, and it’s going okay now (although I had to learn how to pace myself).

Also, I often no longer have the energy to do 60+ min HIIT workouts while I’m doing such an intense fast (20:4)… except for some days (today was a rare day that I had enough energy for the full workout). I’ve decided that’s okay because I just want to focus on cutting fat for now. Most days, I just do a bit of strength training with my dumbbells and light cardio instead of the full routine. Definitely not the type of fast that I want to do forever (this ain’t easy). But hey, maybe I’ll switch back to 16:8 if it ends up working okay for when I’m in maintenance mode.

So far, this has been an effective method for me to cut calories without having to feel like I’m depriving myself too much.