I’m enby, 5’3, SW: 220 GW: 140
I’m currently in grad school and in a fantastic long distance relationship. My partner and I planned to see each other next year in March for the spring break. It was then I began to evaluate my current state mentally and physically.
Grad school is no joke, and I tend to be an emotional eater. Something that I’ve been addressing lately through therapy and medication. Somehow, the door dashing, late night snacking, and multiple meals after the next caught up to me and I packed on quite a lot of weight within a short amount of time. Though I may not reach my goal by March, realistically I’m hoping to at least get out of the 200s and into the 180s by then. Heck maybe the 170s.
With that being said, I’m familiar with IF and have successfully done it before, but I’m ready to take it to the next level.
How much weight can you lose through the OMAD diet in the span of 5 months? With or without exercising?
All feedback and constructive criticism are appreciated. Thank you!
It all depends on your current size, how active you are, and how many calories you eat. OMAD doesn’t cause fat loss on its own. You stil have to eat at a deficit to lose fat. The size of that deficit will determine the total amount lost.
Without counting calories, I lost 25 pounds in my first 5 months of OMAD. I’m 40F, 5’4”, SW 180 lbs and pretty much sedentary. (I lost weight more slowly after those first few months.)
I’d strongly suggest not trying to rush or sprint to lose weight as fast as possible. That way leads to burnout, quitting, and regaining anything you lost. Better to do something you can sustain every day for the long term, even if that means losing weight more slowly. Grad school is enough pressure; don’t make yourself miserable pushing too hard with IF, or you will burn out and quit. I know you want to look good when you see your partner again — but your long-term health is the bigger issue, and I bet your partner would agree.
For me, OMAD is sustainable; my body happens to like it. If your body likes another IF schedule better, then work with that. (For example, my husband tried to join me in OMAD, but found that he gets far too hangry in the afternoon. But 16:8 feels easy and natural for him. So he does 16:8 and I do OMAD.)
I will say that IF has been very helpful for me with emotional eating. When I’m stressed and feel the urge to snack about it, the momentary pause of “Oh, but it’s still my fasting window” is enough to break the automatic reaction to grab a snack. Instead, it gives me a chance to stop; mindfully recognize without judgment my thoughts, emotions, and physical sensations; and then practice a coping/self-soothing strategy that is more effective than food. It’s exactly the kind of thing I learned to do in therapy, but IF gives me that extra push to put it into practice each day.
My advice is to ease into the IF lifestyle. If you restrict your diet and add exercise you may burn out and give up quickly. Plus if you are going from eating throughout the day to OMAD or even 16:8, it takes time to adjust.
The first week my goal was to just make it to 16 hours without food then eat whatever I wanted..and let me tell you I went carb heavy and felt terrible. So the next step I made better food choices and was able to make it to 18:6, then I began to meal prep and finally added exercise. I was able to lose 15 pounds in 2 months without starving myself or hitting the gym everyday.
You can totally do this!!!
You can do any eating schedule you want to get results now and it’ll probably work. The question is, once you get to your goal, then what? Are you going to stay omad or whatever forever? Because if you don’t then the weight will probably just come back up. Why? Because of what you’re eating, far more than when.
The only reason you weigh what you do now is because you’ve been eating too much sugar and starch. Because of emotional reasons or whatever else. That is the actual root cause of your problem, and if you don’t get off sugar and starch then you’ll probably just yo-yo up and down the scale as your motivation and stress comes and goes throughout life.
In addition to all the great advice in this thread, I’d recommend getting excited about educating yourself on what high volume low calorie foods you like, and generally on the calories of the foods you’re eating.
There are many apps that make this easy. This will help you to be very satisfied when you do eat and to help your choices because you may look at some foods and determine it’s not “worth it” because instead you could have a huge plate of the [low cal high volume] thing.
When I break my fast it’s usually with a huge salad that has a cashew based creamy dressing, lots of add-ins for texture and flavour, and things like lentils for protein and fibre. I might also have something like a white sweet potato cut and roasted in the oven. After that meal I am sooo satisfied and all in all it’s very low cal for how satisfied I am for a long time afterwards. Good luck to you!!