One year ago today I started on my 5:2 Way of Eating (I don’t call it the D word) and today I’m around 15kg lighter and a whole lot healthier. I’ve written about how I’ve done it and what it is here.
When I started, I was on cholesterol medication (my whole family is on it as we have a genetic predisposition to high cholesterol) and my weight was the same as when I gave birth to my son 12 years earlier (that’s full term pregnancy!).
I’ve always had a bit of an issue with feeling deprived (regular diets are all about deprivation), and I do love chocolate and champagne, butter and cheese, and most diets make you give them all up, and all that does is make me want to eat them more.
So a year on I’m still eating those yummy foods, when I really want to, and I fast most weeks one day a week, sometimes two, if I’ve really overindulged that past week. I keep alcohol consumption to weekends and special occassions too.
I’ve not fasted on holidays but start again as soon as I return and it immediately gets my appetite under control again. I think that is what has been so great about the 5:2 way of life, is that just those two fasts per week (or one on maintenance) changed my whole mindset to food, and as long as I stick with it, that mindset stays with me.
These days I’m much more aware of how I feel after eating, and my ability to stop eating when I’m full has improved out of sight (I belong to that clean plate club because of all those starving children in China/Africa). I love that I can eat a mainly healthy diet, but still enjoy the fun things in life. I love that not only do I now have a healthy BMI, I also feel much healthier (and blood tests have shown that my body is also heaps healthier than it was).
As Count Rugen in my favorite movie, The Princess Bride says “If you haven’t got your health, then you haven’t got anything.” and as I’m now even closer to 50 than 40 it’s something I realize that health is incredibly important to quality of life (as well as longevity).
These days I don’t eat til dinnertime, then eat a high protein and lots of vegetables dinner for my 500 calories (lots of recipes on the post mentioned in the link at the top of this page). As long as I drink lots of water and other no-calorie drinks, I can get by. I know that hunger pangs come and go and I just remind myself that being hungry means that my body is about to start burning my fat as fuel and I’m not going to die!
