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The 5:2 Bikini Diet exercise programme is designed to burn as much body fat as possible while improving muscle tone, giving you a leaner, healthier body in just 30 days. Remember that the diet will help shift the excess pounds, specifically some of the fat. Where we need to help out with exercise is to bring some definition to the flab.
Exercising three times a week for four weeks, as well as following the 5:2 diet, will bring noticeable changes to your body shape. After four weeks put on your swimsuit again and see if you can spot the changes. Then slap on a bit of fake tan if necessary and get yourself to the beach!
Your first fast day
You need to do a bit of planning before you start on the first fast day. There are many different ways in which you can eat your 500/600 calories, but I would recommend that on your first day you have three small meals.
For women this means something similar to:
100 cals for breakfast, 150 cals for lunch, 250 cals for dinner
For men this could look like:
100 cals for breakfast, 200 cals for lunch, 300 cals for dinner
You should plan out exactly what you are going to eat. Take a look at the recipe section (see here (#litres_trial_promo)) for some inspiration. Try not to eat much carbohydrate as this is very calorific. Stick to lean meats, vegetables and complex carbohydrates such as pulses or beans. Don’t consume too many calories in drinks. Drink black coffee or tea, diet colas, etc. An omelette (one large egg has 89 calories) makes a good, filling and simple meal. A salad is also a good option for lunch or dinner.
If you normally drink caffeinated drinks, don’t cut them out, as a sudden lack of caffeine could give you a headache and make the fasting day harder. If you like milk in your tea or coffee just remember to count the calories. A cup of tea or coffee with (50ml/scant ? cup) semi-skimmed (low-fat) milk has 25 calories, made with skimmed milk it has 19 calories. A short skinny latte from Starbucks has 67 calories and a tall skinny latte has 102 calories.
You may find the evening rather long and drawn out too. As you have hopefully had 250–300 calories for your dinner you actually won’t feel as hungry as you did during the day. But if you are at home with some snacks in the cupboard then you may well need some will power. Top tips to get you through your first fast day evening: find something good on the television, have a hot drink and go to bed early!
Remember:
• Feeling hungry is a natural state.
• Have a calorie-free drink to satiate your hunger.
• The first fast day is the hardest.
• You only have to do it once.
• Tomorrow you can eat like a king.
• You are actively losing weight right now.
• Feel proud and revel in a real sense of achievement.
Your first normal day
Congratulations on making it through your first fast day! If you want, you can weigh yourself before you eat or drink anything. You may well have dropped 1lb in your first day. Now, normally I would be suggesting that you eat healthily and don’t snack on the day after a fast, but I think the rules can go out of the window on the first day. So you can eat what you like. Even though you have most likely been looking forward to your breakfast for most of the day before, you may find you are not as hungry as you thought. Or you may find you are starving and can’t stop eating. Don’t worry about it. It’s just your body adjusting and you can allow yourself some treats.
I remember on my first normal day I didn’t feel as good as I was expecting. The big breakfast made me feel tired and lethargic and I found it hard to get motivated all day. I have heard similar tales from others when they were just starting out with the 5:2 diet. These feelings will change quite dramatically as you continue with the diet. Just as the fast days get easier, the normal days get more, well, ‘normal’ really.
FAST DAYS (#ulink_4a180be7-5d05-59a7-a362-f12122057362)
I suggested that you should eat three small meals on your first fast day. As you continue with the diet, you will probably want to adjust this to suit your body’s needs and your lifestyle. It is normally wise to leave at least 50 per cent of your calorie intake for the day until your evening meal, although you can eat this meal as early as you like, any time after 5 p.m. But how you split your breakfast and lunchtime calories is more interesting. You could skip breakfast, skip lunch or have a small meal at each.
Here are a few questions that might help you decide how best to manage your meals on a fast day.
• Do you get up early?
• Do you work in an office?
• Are you exposed to unhealthy food during the day?
If you answered yes to some or all of the above questions then it might be worth considering missing breakfast and having a slightly more substantial lunch. Why? Because eating at lunchtime will make it easier to avoid snacks during the day. If you are rushing out first thing, you should find it easier to miss breakfast.
• Are you busy during the day with little time to think about food?
• Do you feel cranky if you skip breakfast?
• Do you have a morning ritual which involves breakfast and coffee?
If you answered yes to some of the above questions then you should try having a bigger (200–300 calorie) breakfast and then going through until your evening meal. Why? If you are busy at work you will not notice lunchtime.
If you are still unsure, stick to three small meals and perhaps adjust a little when you discover your hungriest times of day.
Count your calories
This is, I admit, the boring bit of a fasting day. You have to count calories and you need to do it accurately, without leaving anything out. Don’t allow yourself any snacks between meals (except low-calorie drinks), as a snack will just waste your calorie allowance.
Read the packet of anything you are planning to eat, as practically all packaging will list the calorie content, then use one of the recipes in this book, which has been accurately calorie counted for you. Or, make up your own recipes, counting the calories in each individual component, using the calorie reference at the back of this book (here (#litres_trial_promo)).
You will find that you have a few favourite dishes that you come back to time and time again. It’s often omelettes or eggs in some form, or a salad. You will be able to work out the calories once and know for next time.
Feeling hungry – it’s a good thing
I’m going to be totally honest here: you will feel hungry on your fast days. It may be a new kind of hunger that you have never experienced before, but it’s not a bad thing. It won’t make you ill and your body adjusts to it very quickly. This is because hunger is a natural state for our bodies, which haven’t fundamentally changed since the Stone Age. Hunger makes us energetic and efficient and we use our coping mechanisms to find solutions to the hunger. In the old days this would have meant hunting for food. When we feel hungry by choice, this means finding distraction mechanisms.
‘I have a drink to deal with hunger pangs or nibble on a carrot stick.’
Sarah
You will notice two positive things on your fasting days that you won’t believe until you try it. First of all, you will have more energy, not less. It’s unbelievable I know, but the majority of people on the 5:2 diet feel great on their fast days. I tend to feel lively, very chatty and have a natural buzz – the same kind of buzz that I get when I exercise. This feeling may not appear on the first fast day, but give it a week or two and start enjoying the feeling.
‘I’ve had more energy, so the house is cleaner. The windows have never been so clean!’
Deek43
The second thing that seems a bit crazy before you start is that hunger comes in waves and normally passes in a few minutes if you think about something else. I tend to feel a real wave of hunger mid-afternoon, a time when in the past I would tend to snack unhealthily, but I now head out for some fresh air and don’t think about food, and the feeling goes away. I might not feel hungry for another couple of hours and then it’s nearly dinnertime and I’m on the home straight.
Special mention to mums at teatime
Are you a mother of young children? Do you struggle on a fast day at teatime? Because I do. With a meagre breakfast and/or lunch, by teatime I am hungry, and then I have to prepare food such as pasta or chips (French fries), which I can’t eat. It’s just the temptation to pick up the odd chip that I find really hard to resist, because I could do it without even thinking about it.
So if you find yourself in a similar situation, you are not alone. I try and eat with the children or soon after. This helps, as I know my food is on its way. If there’s ever a time to employ the best of your willpower, it is now. Remember there are many mothers out there sharing your pain.
My backup plan after a hard day: fish fingers and beans, then we can all eat together. Two fish fingers and a quarter of a 415g can reduced sugar and salt beans has 220 calories and is very filling.
Fast day evenings
Do you eat your evening meal and then find the evenings rather long and boring? Do you find yourself constantly wishing you could eat some chocolate or cake? Don’t worry, this happens to the best of us. You are probably not that hungry, it’s just a bad habit, which is worse because you are relaxing.
Here are some of the things I like to do to keep myself busy and keep my mind off food until bedtime.
Take up a hobby – anything will do, something you do at home or go out to, as long as there’s no food or drink involved.
Watch a movie – go to the cinema or put a movie on the TV. A movie is longer than a TV programme and if you are enjoying it, you won’t be thinking about food.
Go for a swim – exercise is generally not a great idea on a fast day, but some gentle swimming is very distracting and no one is eating at the poolside.
Have a hot drink – fruit tea has no calories. I like peppermint myself. Another option if you have allowed yourself the calories is a low-cal hot chocolate drink. Normally around 40 cals, these will stop that chocolate craving.
‘I make myself a black tea or glass of water, ring a friend and try to take my mind off it. It’s only really bad just before I go to bed as I’m relaxing and nothing distracts me, but it doesn’t last and when I wake up the next day, I’m no more hungry than normal.’
Deek43
Different ways of managing your fast days
Everyone has slightly different ways of managing their fast days. You may find there’s a right or wrong way for you. Or you may find it develops over time.
‘After the first week, I realized I had to adapt the diet to suit my needs. I start with a minute quantity of bran flakes and semi-skimmed [low fat] milk. Any diet of mine just has to include a minimum of three cups of tea plus a low-cal chocolate drink at night. I have a mug of Bovril for lunch and calculate all this at about 200 calories. I then have a proper dinner in the evening.’
Peggy
‘Routine is key to the running of our household. I have breakfast at 7.15 a.m., a piece of fruit mid-afternoon and a light evening meal at around 7 p.m.’
Deek43
‘I drink lots of water and limit myself to one cup of tea and one black coffee during the day. I keep myself totally busy so I don’t think about food. I eat one meal in the evening, normally salmon and vegetables.’
Lou Piac
‘I eat lunch (200 cals) and tea (300 cals).’
Jo
‘Three meals – 150 cals for breakfast, 150 cals for lunch and 200 cals for dinner.’
Sarah
There are also plenty of tips about how to deal with the dreaded hunger pangs. The most frequent is simply, ‘By dreaming of tomorrow!’ but there are some other ideas too.
‘To deal with hunger pangs I drink a lot more fluid and look forward to my hot drinks as though they were food. I tend either to be more active in the evening or go to bed a bit earlier.’
Rachel
‘I drink more fluid, which helps with hunger pangs. I also try to do something interesting in the evening. I might go to the cinema or the theatre. In fine weather, I’ll go in the garden or out for a walk.’
Christina
‘I use drinks and snacks like Diet Coke, herbal tea, zero-fat yogurt and miso soups to take away the hunger pangs.’
Mikep
NORMAL DAYS (#ulink_e610023e-2337-531c-ad31-ed3329b833ab)
So now to the five normal days in a week. If you have tried the 5:2 diet before you may have heard the term ‘feast’ day bandied around for the non-diet days. This is a term I have made sure not to use here.
Let me explain. If you have tried the 5:2 diet before and found you didn’t lose much weight or you lost weight at the beginning and then it tailed off to nothing, then you are one of many. Lots of people who have problems losing weight on the 5:2 diet have the same problem. We are eating too much on our normal days and negating all the good work we are doing on our fast days.
Let’s look at me for example. In November 2012 I had been following the 5:2 plan for three months and was very close to my target weight. My plan was to continue following the plan right up to Christmas week, hopefully reaching my target weight in time for Christmas, and then I’d allow myself a week off. But as Christmas approached, although still sticking to my fast days, I stopped losing weight and even gained a pound or two. At the time I couldn’t understand it. But as I re-examined my goals after Christmas I realized how much I had been eating on my normal days. I would allow myself the mince pies or chocolates or fancy canapеs because I could eat what I liked and enjoy it. In fact, I ate far more than I have done in previous years at Christmas because I felt I was justified in doing this, as I was still on a diet. But I’m sure, looking back, that I was eating far more than my recommended daily calories. No wonder the diet was no longer working for me.
The revelation that I had in the cold light of January is that you cannot go crazy, binge and eat rubbish for five days a week. It just cannot work. For sustained weight loss and a healthy, long life, you need to eat healthily on your non-fasting days too.
The difficult truth is that it took me until the end of February to get back to the weight I was the previous November. So if you are reading this because you are finding that the 5:2 diet isn’t working for you, then take a look at your ‘normal’ days and re-assess. The more people I have talked to about problems with the diet, the more often I find that this is the cause of a de-motivating failure of the 5:2 diet.
Since my moment of revelation in January, I have found a simple and logical solution. Feast days become normal, healthy days and the 5:2 diet is a winning formula once again. Here I set out the rules or suggestions that can make your normal days work for you. Don’t worry, I don’t suggest cutting out all fun and treats, but as with all healthy eating it involves saving snacks and chocolate for an occasional treat, rather than making them your standard diet. Your formula for a successful ‘normal’ day is as follows:
• Eat three healthy, balanced meals a day.
• Have light, healthy snacks such as fruit or yogurt if you feel peckish between meals.
• Do not calorie count or reduce portion size; you are not on a diet.
• Do be aware of what you are eating. Is it necessary? Is it healthy?
• Do allow yourself the occasional treat.
• Cut back on processed food and ready meals.
• Prepare home-cooked food as often as possible – the recipes in this book are just as good on a normal day as a fast day.
• If you are still hungry after a meal, wait 20 minutes and see if you are still hungry.
• Do allow yourself a glass of wine or two, a tasty dessert or even a few squares of dark (semisweet) chocolate.
Foods to avoid:
• biscuits (cookies) and cakes
• pastries
• crisps (potato chips)
• non-diet fizzy drinks
• chocolate bars and sweets (candies)
