Oh and the whole grazing thing doesn't work for me either.

Anonymous wrote:PP again. Sorry, OP, I didn't answer your question. I second the rec for eggs. I'd probably do a two egg omelete with lots of herbs and sauted veggies inside. And I'd snack on pickles. And I would keep the cream in the coffee, too, if you are a coffee addict like me - keeping that part of my life normal allows be to be strict about other things.

Everyone is different. Eggs don't cut it for me (eating 2 eggs is not filling at all although eating 2 egg sandwiches with mayo and bacon would cut it ). For me Greek yogurt is filling along with bread and peanut butter. I usually fast daily from 9pm-noon (so 15 hrs) which works for me well. But if I did a 5:2 plan on my 500 calorie days I would eat: coffee a/skim milk, apple (70), cheese stick (70), 2 slices of bread w/peanut butter (200) and a large salad with nuts for dinner (160).

Smoked salmon/lox with freshly squeezed lemon.

OP again

I really do appreciate all the advice and I recognize that some "diets" are better than others and lots of people lose weight on very different things. The last time I lost weight (before kids) I did weight watchers and found it very sustainable. I have now been on WW for the past year and have lost almost nothing, bc with my current lifestyle, it is harder for me to track and I forget and skip meals and then eat too much at other meals and get discouraged and binge.

I could also never do paleo. I tried low carb before my wedding and barely made it a week.

I did a month of 6 small meals daily but by the last week, I was miserable.

There are so many diets because everyone has their own issues and loses weight differently.

liamw wrote:But no the guy who's job required him to maintain a healthy life style has no idea what he's talking about lol

There hundreds of thousands healthy life "experts" out there.

liamw wrote:There was a lot of research on power carbing as well.... and many other fads.

Multiple small meals, etc are fads as well. Many animals eat once a day or even once every few days.

liamw wrote:Funny I am not the over weight one here

funny when I did gain weight after breaking my back I lost it through the multiple small meals throughout the day approach, but I haven't tried to push that on the OP.

I simply voiced concerns about the possibility of negative health issues associated with 500 cal a day

I am not overweight either. You acted as if you knew more about those effects than those following the regime while in fact it's the opposite. Intermittent fasting is healthy.

liamw wrote:The thing I am getting at as some one who has trained for combat in a ring and in war is 500 calories 1-2 days a week does more harm over time than good. It's a lot like the people who do the cleanse + sauna thing, it may be good for your waist line but it isn't good for your body.

Your body adapts to what you take in with a huge influx your talking about its almost like eating one huge meal a day. That throws a lot of things off in your body.

Lets look at daily nutritional needs, how many do you really feel like you are meeting with 500 calories ?

One huge meal a day is what human bodies are built for. Many animals eat like that as well. It's grazing, resulting from constant availability of food, that is unnatural. You need to read some research on intermittent fasting before you spout your well-worn nonsense.

Anonymous wrote:For those complaining, there is a lot of research on the health benefits of eating this way. Maybe do some research before you snark?

+1

I understand the desperation, but wish other methods had worked for those of you trying this. It seems like a slippery slope to an eating disorder. That said, I will share my favorite light lunch:
1 can tuna mixed with 2 tsp light mayo, 1 tsp. cranberry mustard
2 celery stalks
Half an apple
Dill
Bit of chopped red onion
Delicious, diet or not.

liamw wrote:The thing I am getting at as some one who has trained for combat in a ring and in war is 500 calories 1-2 days a week does more harm over time than good. It's a lot like the people who do the cleanse + sauna thing, it may be good for your waist line but it isn't good for your body.

Your body adapts to what you take in with a huge influx your talking about its almost like eating one huge meal a day. That throws a lot of things off in your body.

Lets look at daily nutritional needs, how many do you really feel like you are meeting with 500 calories ?

Given that I eat almost entirely lean protein and vegetables on my 500 calorie day, I am actually doing pretty well nutritionally.

I am very healthy - low cholesterol, low triglycerides, lots of energy, good blood pressure, etc. I just gained a lot of weight with my pregnancies and in the last I resorted to starving myself, binging and purging, and diet pills to lose the weight. Those are all bad ideas - far worse for than that cutting out calories 2 days a week. And all of the studies I have read have actually supported intermittent fasting for health reasons. So for me, its worth a shot.

liamw wrote:OP before getting your panties twisted it was a generalized statement to the other people involved in this thread.


you notice I said why are WE fat. WE as in Americans.

Where in my post did I say OP your fat because your a lazy slob.....NO where.

My point is that generalized statements about why "we" are fat does not help individuals lose weight bc everyone is different and as many other posters have noted, its more often than not, not just a matter of getting up to turn on the tv or choosing grilled chicken instead of a burger. If I could lose weight without dedicating 90% of my mental and physical energy to it, I would be happy to switch from whole to skim milk, but as someone who has struggled with her weight for a long time, I know better than to waste any calories on milk at all (except for my coffee creamer

liamw wrote:Why are we fat? Because we will wait 15 minutes in a drive through instead of taking 3 and walking out lazy butts in.

If you cant find the remote do you watch tv ?

Who Rides bikes with their kids instead of parking them in front of an X Box ?

the problem with the American waist line has more than food to blame.

OP here -

I have never had fast food, so never waited in a drive through
My tv doesnt work without the remote
I take my kids biking or to the pool 4-5 days a week (and I exercise 4 days a week)

Before you judge, maybe realize that not everyone that has weight to lose had the same habits.

To the PP who asked what is causing the obesity epidemic, if it isn't that we've all gotten gluttonous and slothful, since obviously our genes haven't changed: our intake of carbs changed, for the most part. You can map the rise of the obesity epidemic against 1) the advice to eat low fat, high carb starting in the early eighties, and 2) the beginning of sugars being added to EVERYTHING. The theory here is that sugar and swiftly digested carbs like flour drive the release of insulin, and insulin drives the hoarding of calories as fat. There is really, really good evidence that this is so - not just the circumstancial stuff above, which proves nothing. But I think our culture is so primed to make a sin of being fat that people in their hearts want the theory that being fat is purely caused by overeating to be true, and they reject evidence that it is not. If overeating and not moving enough is the cause of being fat, than everyone who overeats and doesn't move enough should be fat. That is how causality works. But they aren't. Lots of skinny people eat horribly and are sedentary. There is more to the story, and we do all people, fat and skinny, a horrible disservice by trying to make it about the sin of gluttony.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You're totally going to mess up your metabolism by eating that few calories a day.

This is true if you eat that low every single day but it is totally false if you eat that low every other day.

Oh ok, don't really know much about this diet. My apologies for judging, I'm admittedly a bit sensitive to this kind of stuff as a family member had an ED and then her body couldn't handle it when she was diagnosed with a chronic illness. Died of a disease that otherwise would have been totally manageable.