And We Begin

So, I have been working on getting healthy recently, for many reasons including of course losing weight. I haven't been doing terribly, but also not spectacularly either. A lot of times I lacked the energy to work out, or was just really craving some chocolate, or some pizza. What do you do when this happens? Well on traditional weight loss plans you pretty much just deal with it, or possibly gain back a pound or two. That can be pretty demotivating!

While on a trip recently a book was recommended to me. It's called The Fast Diet. The long and the short of it is that our current ideas about health and eating are really really screwed up. Many other cultures of the world (both religious and not) have a tradition of fasting. Fasting is in its most basic form eating no, or drastically fewer calories than you normally would for a period of time. The book contains a lot of scientific research and examples of different ways of fasting, and then the author describes his idea of how fasting can work in our modern lives. He came up with the idea of fasting twice a week (on non-concsecutive days) and eating without worry the other five days. You can choose any two days in a week, and they can change if something comes up.

Sounds a little counter-intuitive right? Well I am not going to try and convince you right now, if you want data, check out the book (you can get it for under $6 as a nook book from Barnes and Noble) However the data collected by the writer seems compelling enough to give it a try! Outside of consistently dropping weight he records a positive impact in many basic health screening numbers (Again information you can find in the book if you are interested), he records finding himself with more energy, improved mood and sense of well-being, improved mental clarity, etc. This is definitely something I am willing to try!

So what exactly does this entail? Well two days a week, for me I will be shooting for mondays and thursdays, I am limited to eating 500 calories. The other 5 days I don't have to worry about calories at all. That is FANTASTIC! While counting calories has been working slowly but surely, it is often frustrating and gets really tedious to do day after day after day.

Will this be hard? Heck yeah, I believe it will be. At least to start. But all accounts of this sort of lifestyle indicate that fasting becomes easier and easier as you do it, and quickly. Within weeks according to the current statistics you not only see physical results but feel results internally as well. I have a few ideas on my strategy on getting through my fast days. Lots of tea is involved. Also I think that I will do well to wait to eat breakfast until as late as I can, as I am often not overly hungry in the morning anyway. I am also blogging about my progress to A) Track my results B)Share my experience, and C)Have some outside accountability.

So my first fasting day will be tomorrow! And here are my starting stats:

Height 5'7
Weight: 232
Waist: 39
Hips: 50
Thigh: 27.5

I plan to blog both on my fast days, and the day following my fast days to talk about how it goes, what sort of things I experience and how things work for me. I will also record my progress in the above stats! So here goes nothing folks! I am very interested to see what happens and if it is really true that I don't have to actively change my diet the other 5 days. Results to come! Now before my fasting day I am enjoying some wine, and chocolate mug cake with home-made whipped cream! :)

And for good measure, here is a picture of me at the start. I will do a picture maybe once a week? Once every two weeks? Ill decide later I guess heh. Anyway, I will do the picture in the same outfit every time to see differences! (I know the tank isn't flattering, that was purposeful. It will show changes best!)