Update: Intermittent Fasting, 5:2 Style

Isn’t it a bit fucking awful, that I live somewhere we play with starvation? Those who resist abundance shall be Queen! (Or King, should you be appropriately equipped). Nevertheless, intermittent fasting via the 5:2 diet, which I kind of accidentally fell into, is not going too badly. I quite like how it makes me feel: empty, clean. Here’s an update.

Week 1
I lost 4 ½ lbs over the two days. Inevitably I put back on 2 of those pounds across the week. I did feel woozy at the end of day two but that’s because I ran the previous day and didn’t have much in reserve as a result. Next week I ran on day 2 instead and felt better. Also I concentrated on soup and veggies and didn’t include any protein so that might have contributed to how shitty I felt.

Week 2
I did it a little differently this week: still did the 500 calorie restriction two consecutive days (it’s 600 if you’re a man), but as mentioned, I saved my cardio for Day 2 so I wouldn’t feel so depleted by the end of it, and I parsed out my meagre calories a little differently, taking a more considered, proteinated approach. I did not feel too shitty at all.

I never thought I could eke so much out of so few calories. It kind of makes my usual free ways with a pound of butter seem licentious. But butter is my homie. We are never breaking up. This week I lost another 3 ½ lbs. It’s a bit up and down which is novel to say the least. I found myself only slightly inclined to binge eat and it didn’t seem to impact the weight loss too much. I had presumed my body would somehow find ways to make up the calories. It did not.

Week 3
It’s day 1 and I have a rotten headcold so no exercise for the last five days which is driving me crazy. I ate rather a lot over the preceding weekend or at least more than usual because it’s fucking freezing here and I’m always hungrier when it’s cold, but I still only put back a pound of the weight from last week’s loss. So that’s a total of four pounds I lost really quite easily. We’ll see how much at the end of week 3 that I lost again. I really don’t want to go down too much more. I’m coping much better with the hunger now, it isn’t bothering me much at all.

What did I eat?
Here are some photos of how to make a lot of food with the least calorie allowance. Each bowl of soup has approximately 70 calories, and each meal has 100 cals of protein and 100 cals in veggies.

Example: Day #1 –
Breakfast: 100g plain yoghurt, blueberries, squirt of honey;
Lunch: small bowl of homemade veggie broth;
Dinner: 100 cals of steamed white fish with vegetables and way too much sriracha.

Steamed whitefish on a bed of braised leeks, carrots and mushrooms in a mustard sauce. Steamed the fish in the microwave, and braised the veggies in a pot with some chicken stock, a little skim milk, minced garlic and a tablespoon of grain mustard. Tasted nice.

Stir-fried shrimp with Asian style veggies (lots of spice, oyster and soy sauce, squirt of honey, garlic, ginger)

A big pot of cauliflower and vegetable soup: just added stock, garlic, seasoning and plenty of veggies. Then attack with a hand blender. I added some chopped parsley. Quite nice tasting.

I bounce out of bed in the morning. I am charged full of energy. I am all slinky of body. But in the evenings I want to crawl into bed and watch toddler beauty pageants and food shows and plan what I’ll eat the next day. That’s the low after the high. But then you get to eat some serious food the rest of the week after! The day after Week 2′s effort, I ate this: it’s the best burger in the whole world. Two inches thick of ground beef and onion, a slice of melted cheese and a fried egg on top. And fries and mayo. I ate it all. I swear, you could hear it evaporate the second it hit my stomach. Food has never tasted so good. Plus, I found I wasn’t hungry the whole rest of the day after this and hadn’t put on any weight the following morning either, despite inhaling this greasy grub.

The monster burger. Heaven on a plate.

I’ll do a final post once I complete week six as planned, but overall I’m pleased with this. Previously when I’ve been packing e.g. some holiday chubs it has taken me a few weeks to pare it off, and this is way faster and seems to stay off. So I’d recommend it for ‘summer body’ purposes. Once I get over this cold I’m going to do some long runs, god I hate being sick.