First Fast

Day one of the 5-2 diet and my first day of fasting. On a fast day I am restricted to 500 calories.

I have only ever fasted once when I was about 10 for charity. We were allowed only water and milk and it was from sundown to sundown in the summer. I remember eating a massive dinner the night before then enjoying a mass of barbeque meat as soon as the sun went down the following day! I also remember it wasn’t too bad but the consumption of milk helped.

The reason for this diet is partly for dieting reasons but also for the health benefits. As I mentioned in my previous post, Fast is Exciting, I’m not a fan of fad diets, preferring to exercise & eat a controlled balanced diet instead. But this diet is meant to repair your body & make you healthy (reducing the risk of such serious illnesses as some cancers) so I thought it was worth a try. But, I do hope to lose weight too so here are my vitals:

Height: 5;6” (obviously I’m not expecting this to change, I have just added it for reference)
Weight: 12st 12.2lb
Body fat: 16.6%
BMI: 24.4
Chest: 35”; Waist: 37”; Hips: 42”; and Thigh: 23”

Its now 10am and not going too bad. The main cause for my snacking during the day is due to boredom so the plan is to try to keep busy.

I know from experience that I can go a lot longer without food if I don’t have breakfast, I plan to have a poached egg on a slice of toast without butter for lunch then Stuart and I will have mixed vegetables in a curry sauce for dinner.

I did start to get hungry around 8.30am so I had a cup of tea (with SS milk) which was very welcomed for the caffeine after a bad night’s sleep.

In addition, I intend to guzzle water!

I’ll report back again at the end of the day.

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So, its now 8.30pm. I’ve just had a massive portion of cauliflower & courgette in a jar of tikka masala source for 300 calories. It should’ve filled me up but I actually feel hungrier after eating it.

The rest of the day hasn’t been too bad. The hardest points were at 8.30am and then after lunchtime, about 2pm, after having some stress over a hire car. I am an emotional/comfort eater – as well as eating when bored. Eating makes me feel happy so I turn to it in times of stress.

I also had to remember not to ‘taste’ Callum’s dinner – I was making him cheesey pasta with home made cheese sauce, and you know there’s always a knob of cheese left at the end of grating? I had to sacrifice the whole chunk of cheese to Callum *sob*.

We were warned the hunger comes in waves, and I think that’s fair to say. Overall, it really wasn’t that bad and I think it is sometimes good to feel hunger as it makes you appreciate your next meal a little bit more. There are also many people in the world (the UK included) where what I’ve eaten today would be a feast. Its humbling to remember that!

Tomorrow is a normal day – I can go back to eating whatever I want. I plan to exercise tomorrow too (not recommended on the Fast days).