Hi Squidge

Yes, I’m in Worcestershire. Where are you? Good idea about using the beautiful crystal glasses. The other thing I did was to serve my food a bit ‘chef’ style in a wide rim bowl rather than my usual dinner plate. I guess it’s a form of disassociation with the old ways by creating a new way!

Don’t be alarmed if you feel a little headachy during your first week. It’s whats known as carb flu. Withdrawals basically. Once through it though, you will feel amazing! By my 2nd day, I was walking quicker, more alert. After my first week I noticed that all the little aches and niggles had disappeared!

Kazzee

I’ve just worked out why my carbs have seemed so high the past few days. I’m used to the Australian displays of net carbs with fibre already deducted, but I’ve just switched to MyFitnessPal and it doesn’t do that! It tells me total carbs. It was puzzling me dreadfully why fruits and veges were so much higher in carbs than I remembered.

I’d like to start the full 8 weeks again and am already on the 4 week challenge thread. Target for week 8 is to get to 10 stone. Not sure whether this may be a bit ambitious, but have generally been losing 7lb per month, excluding Christmas, so we’ll see. Good luck everyone x

I’m very late with my final weigh-in. I had a really strange week where my weight blipped up to 83.6kg overnight (maybe a delayed result of my Christmas higher calorie and carbs?), but after a few days it has gone back down to 81.2. So I didn’t meet my target of 80kg for this challenge, but still recorded a loss of 1.5kg. Thanks to everyone who provided support and suggestions for quick and easy BSD meals to help keep me going when life got busy and stressful. I’m doing much better with ensuring that I get my veggies and no longer resorting to frozen pizza and ready meals, so that is a big improvement over this time last year.
Looking forward to the next challenge!

Hi,

To everyone

Wishing you all a Happy New and Healthy 2018.

To those who are starting in the morning, my best wishes.

To those who haven’t or cannot decide to start in the morning, please can i suggest that you read my early blogs. I break the Blood Sugar Diet steps down into smaller ones.

If you cannot change everything just reduce the carbs.
E.g. leave the cereal and do berries and yoghurt.
Leave the mashed spuds and have cauli or. Carrot and turnip mash.
Leave the bread, one meal at a time.
Leave the pasta

Try it one meal at a time.

One day at a time.

Go for a walk around your room, then your property, then your road, then your block, then just walk until you have had enough.
Use benches, or bus stop seats to rest then come on back.

Try and do something different, that makes you happy. Volunteer, or clear a cupboard out and donate to charity.
Learn a new language, or craft.
Join a group, go to church. Join a walking club, join a cycling club, join a dance group.
Meet people, share, enjoy.

Oh and be lazy…. it takes less muscles to smile than to frown.
Smile, smile smile.
And you watch , at others smiling back at you,

LIVE each day and be who you are meant to be. And not live as a shadow of yourself.

Do this for me. Do it for yourself. Do it for the Minions. Do it for Ironman. Do it for Mr D’arcy.

Just do it. Dont forget to let me know here in the blog.

Happy new year.

Love lucia
Xxxxx

Just checking in to wish everyone a happy new year. The 3lb gain I had over Christmas has gone, so I’m back to 10st 13lb and looking forward to starting the year in the 10s and hopefully losing another 2 stone to get to my target weight. My target for this challenge is 10st 10lb, so just 3lb to go. Feeling optimistic.

Marie123, well done on your results, didn’t realise you had accessed them yourself. Here’s to getting to your healthy BMI. And Natalie, don’t give up!

Verano – read the article you mentioned and found it very interesting. Not going to start experimenting yet until I’ve got to target weight though and am always keen to learn from long term BSDers/maintainers.

As well as continuing with BSD, I’ve also committed to doing TRUE yoga with Adriene on youtube (link below if anyone else is interested). I think it was mentioned on another thread by Salty Sea Bird, so thanks for that. I’ve dipped in and out of yoga, and usually ended up in a heap on the floor, so is good for a laugh if nothing else. If you sign up, she sends you a daily email with affirmations if you’re into that kind of thing. I’m going to give it a go anyway, hoping my weight loss to date will make it easier!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UUP0zqPP_E

Looking forward to starting the new year with everyone, and hoping that this is going to be a great year for all of us, especially those with health problems. Thinking of you all.

Lots of love, Sandy x

Monday weekly weigh in, 75.4 kg which is 0.8kg down this week. Considering this week included Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year’s Eve, I am absolutely delighted with that! I did have some non-BSD treats but ate well in between and it paid off.

Happy New Year 2018 everyone! It’s Monday morning here so I’m starting my 8 week reboot now, not tomorrow. I did start four days ago actually – but I gave in to a few temptations with all the gatherings so this is my offical clean start with no more excuses.

Starting weight: 75.4 kg
Eventual goal weight: 58 kg

I would love to lose 6.4 kg in this eight weeks and get down to 69 kg which is my marriage weight a bit over 15 years ago.

I actually believe that there is only one thing you can believe in a newspaper and that is only correct for one day…the date. The 5:2 diet is less than 10 years old. Weightwatchers/Slimming World, and all the other low fat/high carb diets have been around considerably longer. They don’t work. That has been proved time and time again. Any diet is doomed to failure if you continue to eat the way you did before you lost weight. I have no intention of eating “white carbs” again as I know, from my own experience, that I will gain weight if I do.

Biltea, if you follow this way of eating and lose weight, it will be up to you to continue. There are many people here who are successful, some quicker than others. You are very welcome to join us. Give it a go, you may be pleasantly surprised.

I hope this has helped a little. Good luck. Happy New Year!

Nonna Mary
xxx

In my honest opinion (I prefer to type it in full not IMHO) anyway – if I wasn’t diabetic there is no way I would be on such a strict regime, it is madness. BUT if you want to lose weight quickly it is a good short term plan. As for another aspect of the oranges, anything that is so sweet is going to make it more difficult to withdraw from sugar / carbs but on the other hand, if that is the only sugar you have so what. I am strict because I am diabetic and dont want to lose a limb or my sight etc so do what works for you.

If you’re only planning to do this for 8 weeks then you can probably be as restrictive as you like with no ill effects, but — now I’ll stop saying ‘you’ because this is about me — I intend to make this a long term WOE so I don’t want to miss out on the vitamins, minerals and fibre I’ll get from eating a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. Especially as my family is very cancer-prone. If my weight loss is a bit slower, so be it. I do check my blood sugar levels occasionally (I have a tester because I had gestational diabetes with my second child) and I know what pushes my blood sugar up (anything made from rice!), unlike sunshine-girl I’m ok with an orange so for me it’s about speed of weight loss. I may have to drop carbs if I hit a plateau.

As gardenista said, the book always makes carbs like fruit part of a meal, not a snack on its own. Fat lowers the GI of a meal so your body processes it much better than if you eat carbs alone.

It depends what you mean by no evidence I think. I also read the fast diet forum and there are many people on the maintenance thread who are long term weight controllers, but no evidence for the many who have presumably stopped posting/logging/tracking online either way. Scientific evidence takes time to accumulate, and it is true that these specific diets are just too ‘new’ to have such evidence, but I have the evidence of my own experience of being a long term yo-yo dieter and now – not, thanks to the 5:2 and then BSD.

Looked at another way ‘rather thin’ is exactly how I feel thanks to MM 😁😁😁😁😁

I seem to have unaccountably missed reflecting and reviewing on this thread, so as we approach (in the UK) the start of the new year, here it is.

2017 was the year when it all came together for me. It wasn’t faulty willpower that made me formerly obese, it was an actual physical problem and only the first step on a spectrum of health problems I had thankfully to that point avoided including but not limited to type 2 diabetes, insulin resistance, PCOS, and many other seemingly related conditions. It even has a name. Hyperinsulinemia. If your body pumps out far too much insulin it has many effects, but the primary one is a consuming need to eat more simple carbs, and no ‘off switch’ when you do. I now eat simple carbs again, but have ‘rewired’ my off switch to be controlled by my brain rather than other organs, using mindfulness techniques.

I end the year a little heavier than I started, but I am profoundly unbothered by that fact, as from tomorrow the tools I have from this year of experimenting are being pressed into action again, along with a few new ones (Veganuary, I may well try to stick to that, at least on my weekday fasting days, and really pack in the good veg 5 days a week, at least one week may also be FMD.) I have also signed up to the better body program on my health mate app, which will run for the next 8 weeks of my reboot, tracking my body fat level as I try to reduce it.

I couldn’t have done any of this without this forum and the inspirational people who inhabit it, both in the past, the present and indeed the stars of the future who are just joining us. May you all have the very best of fortune in 2018.

PS New Scientist often mentions studies confirming it works in mice, which they use to test things before they do human studies.

Hard to tell out of context, was Mosley agreeing there is no long term evidence because the diet hasn’t been around that long? They’ve only just started getting results from scientific studies of the Fast 800 part.

Hi
This is my first post and apologies if it seems a bit critical.
The Sunday Times today (News, page 7) has an article by a Jonathan Leake, their Science Editor. Briefly, it says that “the 5:2 diet lacks any evidence that it can help with long term weight loss, researchers have found.”…………………..”Mosley agreed there was no evidence of long-term weight loss among people following the Fast Diet plan”…………………..”Mosley agreed that no studies had been published confirming that intermittent dieting led to long-term weight loss.”
There is much more in this vein.
As someone who has recently purchased two of Dr Mosley’s books and am considering going on the 5:2 diet *, I would welcome comments from people who are more knowledgeable on the subject than I am.
I would point out that I am not assuming the Sunday Times article is correct – but perhaps it is worth considering?

* – as I am pre-type 2 diabetic, recent HBa1C score of 43

My 2017 positives.

1: I still fit into all my new clothes (and my 25 year old wedding dress) just over a year after my 8 weeks at 800 calories experience.
2: I managed to get in over 15,000 steps today, while dodging all bar a couple of raindrops from storm Dylan, and only getting blown off the pavement into the road once (with no oncoming traffic!).
3: I found a pair of Rohan light walking trousers in a charity shop for £3.80 which mum estimates is about a 20th of what they originally cost, and they look practically brand new. Ready for a step up in activity into 2018. Happy new year everybody. 😀

I quite often just ask for soda water with a slice of lemon in pubs, very rarely am I even charged for it as long as the pub has the soda making system installed rather than using bottled. I often even when I am drinking have at least one ’round’ of soda, interspersed with whatever else I am drinking.

Happy new year everyone – here are my positives for today

1.it is the first day of the year – looking ahead – absolutely anything is possible
2. It is a perfect early summer morning here, blue sky, fresh clear air, birds singing, and
3. I’m spending the day at an annual new years day pool party with some of my favourite people

Also if we consider today just about the end of the silly season, I’ve made it safely through, on plan and alcohol free and it’s just about end of week 7 – all on plan! 🤪 In addition to the health benefits, maintaining this 8 week commitment is really strengthening my confidence and self esteem. Hadn’t anticipated that but now expect it will have a reverberating effect for a while.

Enjoy the day

That is so awesome and inspiring. I have recently became a vegetarian and I feel so energetic. By eliminating processed foods, sugars and meats, I think my body is feeling nourished and happy. This blog has always been helpful to me http://www.marathonist.com

SunnyB, having a daily milk allowance is a good plan. I’ll have to factor that in. (Gosh, it’s a long time since I’ve done this much maths!)

Kazzee, you’re right about breaking the cycle and creating a new habit – that’s exactly what we want to do. We both used to drink quite moderately, but the amount has crept up and up. We need to get back to it being a little bit of a treat to have wine with dinner, rather than something we always do.

Good idea about the mint, lemon etc. We have some lovely crystal glasses which we rarely use as they’re too huge for wine (even by our current standards!) If I fill them for each meal and make the water look a bit more interesting we should start to drink more of that – it seems that drinking lots of water is helpful with this diet.

We’re in the UK. I guess you are too?

Welcome Squidge! 😊

Thank you Allie, I would be delighted to help and support in any way I can.

Make sure you and OH measure your vital statistics tomorrow. Upper arms, chest, waist, thighs and calves!

Squidge, I used to drink red wine every night up until about 3 or 4 years ago then just weekends. This January will be the 4th time I’ve done dry January and sometimes February as well. It is just a case of breaking the cycle and creating a new habit. I just drink loads of tea with soya milk or black coffee – the fresh sort! Buy yourselves two lovely china mugs and a couple of nice tumbler glasses for water. I find it easier to drink a small glass of water several times than trying to finish a pint! Keep a big jug of water in the fridge. Infuse it with fresh mint, cucumber, lemon and add ice! I’m not sure which country you are in but after dinner, bundle yourselves up and go for a brisk walk for 20 mins if you are able to. Invest in a decent pair of kitchen scales perhaps.

You sound pretty organised already, and that is key, so I wish you both good luck and I will be here to champion you both.

Have a look on YouTube for the following: Michael Moseley, Gary Taubes and Jason Fung for educational talks and programmes. This way of eating (WOE) transforms lives. I’m just a third of the way on my journey and I aim to be at target by next Xmas! If not sooner and giving up alcohol definitely makes a huge difference, as Allie says. So I’ll be doing it with you.

Happy new year!

Kazzee

I too took up the BSD purely to lose weight and not because of blood sugar issues, however, I very soon found out that if I didn’t keep a close eye on the carbs, weight loss badly stalled. It is very evident that not all calories are equal, so my advice would be to account for carbs as well as calories, even if you are only on the BSD to lose weight.

Cow’s milk is fine, as long as you account for the calories and carbs. You might be surprised that although there are only 37 calories in a 100ml of skimmed milk, there are 5g carbs and if you are trying to keep carbs at 50g per day or less, this can soon eat up the daily allowance. As you say you drink lots of cups of tea a day, my advice would be to decide on how many cals/carbs you want to use each day on milk for drinks, then measure the relevant amount of milk into a container, so that you can easily ration yourself throughout the day.

Good to hear so much positivity to end the year.

My 3 positives for today are….

1) Had a wonderful Christmas with family staying (Hotel Theodora was open for business yet again) but we waved them all goodbye this morning (apart from my mother, whom I will drive home on Tuesday) Lovely to see them all, but a week was long enough, so great to have the house back to ourselves.

2) We all took my mother out for a very yummy lunch yesterday at our favourite waterside restaurant to celebrate her 93rd birthday. I indulged in 3 quite decadent courses (no white carbs though – well just one sauté potato) and several glasses of wine, plus a glass of champagne but this morning I managed to have LOST two pounds, so still have 7lbs of wriggle room.

3) Going out this evening for dinner with friends at their house, along with 6 other good friends, to see in 2018. Their house is even within walking distance (1.5 miles) so will be walking home in the early hours with my husband, hopefully by moonlight, but we’ll take a torch just in case 😉

Happy and healthy new year everyone.

My three positive things are –

1. My husband and I are starting the fast 800 diet tomorrow, so will soon be slimmer and healthier.
2. We’ve already started doing some exercise which should help.
3. I’ve ‘met’ some relly helpful and supportive people on this forum.

Happy New Year everyone. I look forward to us sharing our successes on here during 2018.

Hi Allie, Yes, I’m attempting the fast 800. From reading other people’s results it seems possible to get close to my target weight loss (25 lb) in 8 weeks if I stick to that. It seems as though I could have wine OR dinner, but not wine WITH dinner!

Joining up with KazzUK sounds like a good plan. Please do send her a message – I’ve not worked out how to do that yet.

Luvtcook – thanks for the suggestion, but I’d rather stick with cow’s milk. Neither of us are diabetic, so hopefully it won’t matter if we stick with the kind we usually have as long as we keep to the calorie count?

To my comrades

Much love and arm linking to all my friends here as we march along this road together into a new year! I feel quite emotional! 😊. I am quite humbled by everyone’s support since I joined mid August, thank you all so much!

My family came for lunch today and I am pleased to report I have converted my sis in law to the joys of cauliflower rice which I did for myself to go with my chilli con carne! Result!

Thank you Allie, yes, this is going to be my year although I don’t want to tempt fate!

I’ve just sat down, 4.45pm and am watching Gary Taubes talk on YouTube – why we get fat! Seeing out the New Year buoyed up and ready to go! Tonight I shall open my back door to let the old year out and open the front door to let the New Year in with great relish!

Have a wonderful New Year EVERYONE!!!!!

Kazzee xxx

Allie, I wish you a less eventful but superbly wonderful 2018….you have certainly earned it! You have been such a wonderful friend to so many on these forums that I wanted you to feel the warmth radiating back at you.

I also so appreciate Esnecca’s help. You two have been my rocks….thank you both so much.

And again, a wonderful 2018 to you and all the others on these forums. See you on the other side in 2018.

XOXO

LtC

Squidge, re cream vs milk….yes cream is better carb wise but as Allie has alreay alerted you ….its another thing that eats pretty quickly into your daily 800.

Several successful BSDers like hemp seed milk (or almond milk). Hemp milk is creamier as it has more fat.

For 2 Tbs ( 1 oz) it has : Calories 16.3 Total Carbohydrate 2.5 g (.1 gm fiber) so lots fewer calories than cream and less carbs than milk

Hi Zolou, yes, sparkling water makes a very good substitute for beer. I’m also quite keen on zero-alcohol beers – they’re low in carbs too. Interestingly, in Spain, it’s very common for bars to sell ‘sin alcool’ beers, so you don’t get funny looks or snide comments when you ask for one.
SSB

Me, again, Squidge! Are you doing the Fast800? On 800 calories a day,
alcohol can really eat into that allowance. My poison of choice used to
be white wine, and at 3.8gm carb per glass, you can see how the carbs
would add up. I do have an idea, though. A poster that you most probably
have not met yet, KazzUK, is also beginning a dry Jan. starting on the 1st.
You may be able to support each other? I’ll leave a message for her if you’d
like, and I’m sure she’d be happy to look in on your thread. 🙂

Welcome SueBlue and Squidge 🙂 I feel like I cracked the question of what to drink in the pub last night – I ordered a large bottle of San Pellegrino. It was less than the price of a pint and I wasn’t left with an empty glass while others were still supping pints, which is what normally happens. I’ve got some in for seeing the new year in tonight.

Mini goals sound like a good idea – that might stop me feeling like a failure and giving up if I don’t do as well as I hope.

Here are some Q&A clips from Fung’s site. While he recommends bone broth during a fast, I tend to think Esnecca is right in that it might impair some of the benefits of a fast. I guess it also may come down to how your own body reacts to it. It certainly curbs any hunger pangs for me….which makes me even more suspicious. At some point I plan on doing a test of one and try a 3 day fast with and without bone broth and see if there is any difference. Given the variability of how I lose weight, it may have limit dependability, but want to try it nontheless.

Can you drink bone broth while you are fasting?
Yes – Bone broth is highly recommended. It contains numerous minerals and vitamins and is quite ‘filling’ in terms of reducing hunger pangs. The other benefit is that you can add a good amount of sea salt to it. The other fluids taken during a fast – water, tea, coffee – don’t have sodium and you can become dehydrated. Mild dehydration, for example may lead to cramps and headaches during longer fasting.

So, yes, bone broth is highly recommended (recipe). Also very ‘Paleo’ in the sense that this is a very traditional food with long healing traditions.

While fasting is it okay to drink coffee with milk? I can’t do black coffee. I have a little milk with my coffee.
Technically, the milk does not fall within the guidelines of a true fast, but the small amount of milk/ cream added to coffee improves compliance tremendously for some people. So in our program, we absolutely allow milk/ cream in coffee, but no sweeteners or sugar.

I am sorry for this stupid question but how much is little amount of cream ?:-)))) I want to hear it from you because otherwise I am starting thinking that 250 ml are ok, which I don’t think so:-) I am on my day 3 of fasting and today I had whipped heavy cream ( 33% percent ) 2x 40g in my coffee. Is this too much?
Yeah, I was more thinking along the lines of 1-2 teaspoons, not the whole carton. Because cream still contains milk protein, it will stimulate insulin which defeats the point of fasting. Pure fat, such as coconut oil, will be less.

Sunshine-girl, you’re very organised! I’m not good at weighing and calculating stuff. I like cooking, but do most of it by guesswork. I’m going to have to get better in this respect. Much better.

Allie, we’re cutting out all alcohol for January. I think that will be hard, as we’ve gradually started drinking more and more. It should help with the diet though. If we have one drink it’s often closely followed by more and then by snacks and another drink.

We usually eat our evening meal quite late in front of the TV and drink until bedtime. Or rather we used to. From tomorrow we’ll eat earlier, at the table, and try to keep all food and drink (except water) out of the living room. That might help break that bad habit?

Happy New Year 🙂

I love my menus. I usually do one on a Sunday night so I know exactly what to get when I shop on Monday (just for 3 days) and again on Thursday (main shop). I know exactly what I am going to have and all my snack in advance. Really keeps me on track.

I type mine and print them out, when they are finished I put them in a file, they have all the calorie and carb calculations included. Then when I do another one I can refer back instead of having to work it all out again.

Just arrived back home and as I had breakfast at 5am and wanted to get back here for our house sitters to leave so decided not to stop for lunch on the 7 hour journey. Now I have had one fried egg and half a tin of baked beans. Oh how the simple things can taste so good when you are back home.

Tonight I have a meal of bolognaise sauce but nothing to go with it so I will just have extra and we have put a bottle of champagne in the fridge. Then that is it. I have suggested hubby might do Dry January and he sort of nodded when I reminded him it might be good for his next blood test (triglycerides were up) so that will definitely help me through the next 8 weeks. Happy New Year everyone.

I had a bit of a shock with oranges, I did my blood sugar test just after eating one satsuma and it was over 220 (around 12 on the other scale), no more oranges for me.

Squidge, that’s an excellent idea! That’s what worked the best for me, too.
I still do that, even though I’m 8 months in maintenance. I hope planning
meals with O/H will become a happy activity that you might share. Did you
mention the subject of alcohol, too? It took me 10 months to lose 140 lbs,
and I chose to do it dry. That’s a very individual decision, of course 🙂
I only made exceptions on 2 holiday occasions, and those 2 weeks the
scale didn’t move. I got the message!
There is one other thing you might consider if it appeals to you. For
reasons unrelated to the BSD, we started having our weekly groceries
delivered just prior to starting the diet. So, there literally was no extra
food or bad carbs/sugar in the house! It’s amazing how you don’t crave
stuff when you know there is none around 🙂 🙂 🙂
If I can help with anything else, just SHOUT!

Allie

Thanks, Allie.

I think I’m going to have to make menu plans – so I have everything I need and nothing extra.

Hi Squidge, and welcome to the forums! I hope you and your husband do
very well on this plan. SunnyB has just shared the best of advice with you,
and I can’t improve upon it, other than to tell you to never underestimate
the importance of keeping well hydrated, 2-3 litres a day. I also found that
keeping a bowl of hard boiled eggs in the refrig. and a small portion of nuts,
i.e., 6-8 almonds bagged up, got me through any change in plan, and were
the perfect solution to days out when my schedule was unpredictable. I
still do this, 18 months in and at the maintenance stage. We all look forward
to following your journey and answering any questions that arise.

A very happy 2018 to you,

Allie

I’m sure the books says oranges are too high in sugar, so aren’t included?

Thanks, SunnyB and Luvtcook. That’s very helpful.

We currently have semi skimmed milk and quite a lot of it. I drink lots of tea (no sugar) and would really struggle giving that up. Would full fat milk be better, even though it’ll add some calories?

Last day of the year, and what an eventful year it has been! O/h and I have
endured some life threatening health problems, I weigh 56 lbs less than
I did 1-1-17, after losing 91lbs in 2016, and I have become an avid blogger 🙂
I read a lot of threads before registering 8-13-17, and chose this one not
because I had issues with alcohol, but because I saw something very special
going on at that time. We were a group of fiercely honest, loving and
loyal women who had formed our own sisterhood! I hope to see all who
are “slumbering” , as MnM says, dropping back “home” in the new year.
I wish you all a 2018 with absolutely no boundaries to achieving your
goals.
The very best to those who remain also. Kazzi, this is going
to be your year to become the beautiful butterfly you envision, I can
feel it in my old bones! You have all brought genuine joy to my life,
and I’m grateful to have met you. Who knows what 2018 will bring, but
I’m ready to find out! 🙂 🙂 🙂 See you on the journey…

Allie

That was really interesting reading, Luvtcook. I think the BSD has shown us all the validity in the content, for sure, not all calories are equal and I think we all understand now, how carbs drive our hunger. Most of us have at various times been on the usual diets and not been able to sustain weight loss or maintain once the weight was lost. Understanding the role of carbs in this pattern is important. What is a crying shame though, is that ‘the establishment’ refuses to admit it was wrong in the guidelines fed to the populous all these years and so the same rubbish is being trotted out and people are still on that desperate treadmill getting nowhere.

Good to know you’re both on board for the reboot Cameron and Zippy. I’m looking forward to taking control again and I’m sure we will all be posting and supporting in the weeks to come. Best of luck for 2018 everyone.

Hi Squidge – welcome along on the BSD journey. My advice is to keep things simple, so think in terms of your usual meals, just without the high carb elements – so for instance dinner could be roast chicken and veggies without potatoes, or bolognaise sauce over steamed broccoli or courgetti. Initially you will probably find sticking to three meals a day easiest, but you might find that saving a little of your calorie / carb allowance for a small snack at your most vulnerable time of the day.

As for a list of low carb foods, any leafy veg / salad, berries if you want fruits, avoid things that as badged ‘low fat’ and opt for natural products wherever possible – butter not marg. Lean meats and fish are great. Remember fats will help you feel sated sooner and stay feeling that way, but also remember, you need to weigh, measure and record EVERYTHING consumed – even salad. Watch out for the sneaky places carbs hid as well, some foods we think of as healthy are high in carbs, like apples, tomatoes and onions for instance. Don’t forget that herbs and spices can add a lot of flavour for little to no impact on the cals and carbs and help to keep foods interesting.

Finally, remember to look for non-scale victories as well as the weight loss – getting into a garment previously too tight, sleeping better, more getting so breathless when exercising. Also, make good use of the forum, shout if you need advice, support or want to celebrate any little success. There is always someone around to offer some wisdom, encouragement or whoop with joy for you. Keep posting, as we’ll all want to know how things go for you. Best of luck!