Morning L
You’re all over this hun, there is no way you’re going to let yourself down, we’re all here for you.
If absolutely necessary, I’ll send some of the boyz to tie you up and feed you low carb stuff until you get your head straight again but you won’t need that (although you may want it 😉
Have a great day.

Thank you ever so much for that straight forward answer patsy
Everyone’s been so helpful in here
Alan

Hi Alan
diabetic comas are more a type 1 thing unless you get really low blood sugar readings.
The accepted practise if you do have a hypo (under 3.9 on the meter and may cause dizziness, perspiration and light headedness, you will know it without needing to read your sugar) is to swallow a glucose tablet or have a glass of milk with a biscuit or 2 and then test your blood when you are feeling better.

Just completed the 8 weeks and here are my results:

Start weight 13st 4lbs
Waist measurement: 42 1/2 ins
Fasting BS: 9.2

Weight no: 11st 11lbs
Waist measurement: 391/2 ins
Fasting BS: Between 5.5 – 5.7

Still have a long way to go so will continue (last month I was travelling a lot so even though I kept to the basic diet rules I wasn’t able to count calories – found restaurants were very good offering a side salad or extra veggies instead of potatoes). It has been an incredible journey and shared with incredible people! I feel so much better – the bloating has gone and my mood has lifted. Great news from Bill about his meds – hopefully that will be me giving that news in the not too distant future! My annual hospital appointment is in October and I am confident that I will be back down to ‘normal’ weight for my height by then. I just want to thank my mum as well because she found out about this diet and I said “oh, I might give it a go after Easter and she said “why wait until then, why don’t you just do it now”, so I did and I am so glad.

Rolled or porridge oats are OK according to the book. It’s the instant stuff such as Ready Brek or the kinds in sachets where you just add hot water or milk which are the problem.

Read the ingredients. If it only says ‘rolled oats’ then they’re fine. If there’s other stuff, such as oat flour or sugar then give them a miss.

Hi, was wondering if the diet works best if i follow the menu plan exactly, or can i replace some meals with other recipes from the book?

Hi Christine
Glad you had a good journey over. Just enjoy yourselves. Don’t worry about being good or naughty, if you want it, have it. If you can resist, then all the better! We don’t get enough holidays. Its only a week ,and you know what to do when you get back!

God I’m hearing that phrase on a daily basis now.
Come on all you people who have spent years doing commercial weight loss diets.
How many times have you heard anyone say that they can’t see themselves ever going back to eating the old way ?
That ladies and gentlemen is why the BSD works so well. It isn’t just a diet, it really is a new lifestyle.

Don’t worry Bill.
My Week 10 weigh day as well and have lost 4lb this week …at last!
For the previous 10 days had been fighting to lose and gain the same elusive pound in weight.
No significant difference in my eating patterns so goes to show how erratic weight loss can be over 3 weeks.
Very well done to be off your meds. Hope to come off mine in the future.
Hope my results this week are an encouragement to others if they hit a plateau or put on weight.
In the long term it works.
Stick in there. Good luck.

Thanks Bill

Being the shy, retiring person I am, I did hesitate about posting my progress. If they help people I am glad that I do post.

There are so many people on here (including you) who are keeping me going and helping me keep my focus now I’m in it for the long haul. I’m around the halfway point to where I want/need to be weight wise (unless I suddenly grow several inches taller LOL)

But perhaps my most important goal was getting the fasting bloods down, and they seem to have stabilised between 4 and 4.9. I am thrilled that you are now off the Metformin *does happy dance*

I have some questions as I read the book:
is it 300g Almonds or some other number?
is a TBL spoon my silver table spoon or the small plastic one?

I would suggest a title “Questions on the DSB book”

Thanks
ben

Yeah I’m happy about that, especially as I had a naughty Friday night when we went out for an Indian meal.
I had a chicken tikka starter followed by tandoori king prawns with salad.
Absolutely delicious and no appreciable effect on the sugar readings.
Just goes to show, as long as you make the right choices, eating out doesn’t have to be avoided.
Patsy, looking like you have this cracked 🙂 Well done.
BTW as far as I remember, once you have climbed all the way up to a plateau, all you have to do is cross it, then it’s all downhill again 🙂

I just want to throw this in to show the power of low carb eating.
My stepson and business partner has been creeping up in weight until he was at 17.5 stones. Last week he decided to cut out the bread, pasta, rice etc (I have to stress that he is NOT following the BSD) and he asked Mum and me to bring in the meals I’ve been having for lunch for him.
In 5 days, He has lost 7 pounds. How’s that for not over thinking it ? 😀

So here begins week six and 10.3kg down. This is so exciting someone pinch me🙃

Well done, Marcus.

I think just taking control of what we eat and knowing we’re doing something positive to help our health is enough to start us feeling better – and of course more benefits will kick in as we continue with the diet.

Worth having pulses to add a bit more variety to your diet as well as the reasons others have given.

It’s more likely to be carb withdrawal symptoms. These have actually been christened the carb flu on the forums.
Most have had them to a greater or lesser extent during weeks 1 – 2. Don’t worry, it means you are doing things right and the symptoms vanish pretty quickly.
Try to make sure you keep your water intake up and take painkillers for any headaches, in a few days you will feel much better.

This seems to get more and more complex,so no foods for breakfast which really fill me up ?
Thanks to everyone on here for advice I will continue trying to unravel the dark secrets of the diet.

If anybody has the name /brand of a safe porridge I’d love to know or any safe cereal,or filling breakfast allowed on this diet
Thanks all

Alan

Great news Bill. Meds free! Yipppeeee 😃

Hi April
that’s a good start to your new healthy life, keep doing what you’re doing and you’ll get there. Any problems, just shout out and the BSD will come running to assist.
Can I suggest that you now look at that photo and think “I’m NEVER going there again”
Best of luck on your journey

I know bit about sugar spikes but what about drops ?
As I’m not eating sugar foods how do I get it back up if I get those shakes ,,or do you go through it,is that the diabetic coma thing I read about
I’m type two on third day on this
Many thanks one again folks Alan

Hi April

Welcome to the BSD family, and well done for taking control now.

I had gestational diabetes many years ago but was never told I would probably develop type 2 in the future. I like to think if I had been told I would have made changes to my lifestyle, but would I?

You’ll meet lots of new friends on here who will help and support you along the road. If you have questions there is usually someone around to answer them as we are from different time zones.

Please don’t wait 7 weeks to post, but keep us informed of how you are doing along the way. We love to hear progress reports😃

Morning folks, I’ll take a look through the day and see what I can come up with.
Please bear in mind that I don’t know what platform the forum is built on soI have no idea of what can be done with it.
I’m sure most platforms do have a private messaging system but be aware that can be open to abuse as well as being useful.
Stickies shouldn’t be a problem.
I suppose the best thing would be to make a list of improvements we would like to see and run them past admin for approval and action if possible.

Well done, Stingle!

I’ve been very successful so far – 12 lbs loss in 12 days and feeling great but I just find there isn’t enough veg in the diet. I’ve made a few of the recipes and variations of them and they’re great but just need to add a lot more salad and veg or either I don’t feel satisfied or I get constipated. I drink 2-3 litres of water a day.
Does anybody else add more? My friends are doing other diets where veg and salad are considered ‘free foods’ but these diets tend to be low fat rather than low-carb.
I’m using variations on spinach, rocket, broccoli, cucumber with roasted hazelnuts, pine nuts or sunflower with peppers or capers and feel much better. How does this affect the outcome of the diet?

Hi Stingle

I’d love to be a fly on the wall at your docs appointment. Please let us know what she says. 😃 Love to see her face!

Got to agree Lynne, you are without doubt the BSD pin up girl but not just that.
You have given us all a target to aim for along with the inspiration to take matters ino our own hands and get there ourselves.
We may not all do it at the same speed. but you are living proof that the lifestyle works and so many newbies are going to read this and think “If she can do that, I can do”
I know if I get to your point, I’ll be delighted.
Anecdote time, Is dieting the only thing where a loss is classed as a gain ? 😉

Morning Lucia

Are you coming out to play today? I’ve found my skipping rope 😃

The nearest to unprocessed porridge you will get is called pinhead or steelcut oats. It is basically the oat kernel chopped a few times. The traditional scottish way of preparing it was to soak it in water overnight and boil up for a few minutes the next moring with a pinch of salt. It was served with a cup of ice cold full cream milk on the side, so you could dip your spoonful of porridge, rather than pouring your milk over the porridge,.
It is delicious and creamy, and definately doesnt need to be made with water. You would need to test your BS after at 1 hour and 2 hours to see if it was causing a spike.

On another aspect, ther is a lot being written about resistant starch, where cooked and cooled starches increase the dietary fibre (cellulose), reduces calories (because you can,t absorb the starch), and improves gut health. It applies to potatoes and rice, so I suspect it applies to porridge too, because it also becomes gelatinous when cooled. I know you can reheat porridge (slowly with a bit of extra water), so Im. going to try it. Any food scientists out there able to confirm my theory?

Hi EvaZ

You are very welcome. Hope to see more from your side of the pond on here😃

Looking forward to reading about your progress.

If you have any questions, just ask. There’s usually someone around to answer – we cover a lot of time zones now 😃

Bill
That is fantastic news about your meds. I am delighted for you.
Janice 🤗🤗🤗

Congratulations on being med free, Bill! That must feel great.

I’ve lost another pound, despite a few days away which made it hard to avoid carbs. There just doesn’t seem to be a quick, warming carb free option when out and about. Maybe we could have gone to a restaurant and had soup, but some don’t like you just having what they consider a starter.

Week 1 – 4lb
Week 2 – 1lb (it was my birthday thay week!)
Week 3 – 3lb

Great news Daria. There are two threads on the next forum down for those over 8 and 16 weeks. Come and join us on there 😃 The more the merrier!

Hi Pandora, and welcome

Hi cherrianne no I haven’t been counting carbs just calories avoiding all carbs and sugar . I am at my docs this morning …boy is she in for a shock as I haven’t seen her since before I started the bsd😀 I will see what she thinks and report back x thanks for taking the time to post appreciated

Week 10 weigh day and the long expected plateau has arrived !
I suppose I’m lucky to have gone this far without having one, so, no panic, I’ll just keep on doing what I’m doing.
On a brighter note, I stopped my last Metformin tablets on Saturday so at the moment I’m med free and over 2 days there have been no adverse effects on my blood sugar readings.
Just a little silver lining 😀

Oh no I’m having porridge oats today too !
Can anyone tell me the make brand etc of oats that are OK to eat in morning as I really need an easy filling breakfast ?
One or two eggs doesn’t seem very filling for me
Any cereals makes which are ok ??
Many many thanks Alan

That’s great, I hope I manage to do as well as you! I’m certainly hoping so.

It seems to me that perhaps unlike some of us, you don’t have that much weight to loose and that’s why you’re not seeing the massive loss that others here have experienced, also the pork scratchings would have an incredible amount of salt in them which would lead to water retention.
They’re definitely not something I would consider as good food to have, the whole point of the diet is to move away from processed foods and retrain ourselves to eat a healthy low carb diet.

Hi Natalie
The BSD book ( p132 ) only states the daily standard recommendation of protein for women is 45g & 55g for men.
No mention of fat or carbohydrate daily allowances? It would have been nice to have had at least a guideline or way of making that assessment yourself.

There were a lot of confused newbies when the forum began. They trawled through other sites for info & most settled on 50 – 100g daily carb allowance. It was & is trial & error as to how low you need to go with carbs before they spike you! I have to go low!

Some people were having trouble with the Dawn Phenomenon , high fasting blood sugars. They found that eating something fatty eg small amount of cheese or full fat yoghurt prior to bedtime reduced or normalised their FBS.

People were & are posting their own experience of what does & does not work for them. There is no quantity of daily fat in the book to guide us. We have to work it out & count the calories. 800 calories daily.

I did the 5:2 diet & know what 500 & 600 calories daily look like. I weighed & counted everything on that diet. I don’t need to weigh & count now.
In the absence of carb & fat knowledge I posted this.

The Original diet shake was Optifast. We can’t get it in UK , it’s from Australia. I posted the info from the Optifast site: Optifast.com.au on forum Fast 800, Topic Percentages 17.2.16 page 6

Optifast shake : 54g serving
Energy Kj 870. Energy cal 207. Protein 17.5g. Fat 4.5g. Carbohydrate 22.5g. Sugar 17.8g. Dietry fibre 3.6g.
Gluten – NO. Lactose – YES. GI 24 – 33.
x 3 shakes daily. + 200 calories of non-starchy veg 250g in weight
Daily allowance from shakes :
Protein. – 17.5g x 3 = 52.5g
Carbohydrates – 22.5g x 3 = 67.5g. + carbs in veg
Fat. – 4.5g. x 3 = 13.5g
Sugar – 17.8g x 3 = 53.4g

Quote from prof Roy Taylor 22.06.15. http://www.ncl.ac.uk/magres/research/diabetes
“Do not be concerned by the high sugar content as after the first day of very low calorie diet your body is able to handle this reasonably well. Ideally , low calorie meal replacement would be made up with water, if unpalatable using skimmed milk is reasonable. The period to achieve weight loss will be slightly longer”.

Test before & one & two hours after meals to see what food & how many carbs spike you

Hope this helps & explains the ‘ confused newbies’. You have to research, read & learn to really help yourself understand what Type 2 Diabetes is. Don’t rely on others to do that work for you. Knowledge is power. The power of choice & change
Eureka

Hi Lucia,
Let’s link arms and I will hold my brolly over you and keep you dry until this little rain shower passes. You aren’t a failure, you are a blazing success and have come such a long way in a very short time.
Go back and read your very first post. There you stood, embarrassed and afraid, not quite sure if you were able to take the first step on this journey. We were there for you then, encouraging you on and ready to catch you if you fell.
Read on, remember your growing confidence and the joy you felt as you became aware that this was something you could do. We saw a new Lucia, succeeding in overcoming her issues with food, overcoming temptation, and revelling in her new energy and zest for life.
Don’t listen to those doubts, they are trying to steal your joy and rob you of what is rightfully yours! That size 12 is yours, you’ve earned it, you deserve it so go get it.
You’ve posted here about cleaning out cupboards, dusting the house, anything to avoid food tempting you off the path. Well I’m telling you now that those doubts and fears are like the dust bunnies that hide in the dark under the bed. You only notice them if you are down on your hands and knees and looking for them. Well you’ve seen your dust bunnies, now get out the vacuum cleaner and banish them forever.
We know you won’t fail, and have we ever lied to you yet? All your friends here on the forum will be wishing you well, we believe in you 🙂 xxx

G’day I love to bike ride,
Welcome to the BSD. Sounds like you are all set for success with your tracker and apps all organised. You will soon lose the urge to snack as long as you keep your fluid and fat intake up. It’s surprising how quickly this works, once you’ve reduced your carb levels.
If you need to snack at first, make sure it’s low carb eg boiled egg, a few almonds or pecans ( pecan pieces from the baking aisle of Coles or Woolies are very cheap and you feel like you’re eating more), some strawberries, 20g slice of cheese etc.
Keep posting and let us know how you’re going. 🙂

Hi EvaZ, you are very welcome here, the more the merrier. You will definitely get your HbA1c down if you follow the fast 800 and join our BSD tribe here. Read the over the 8 week line post to see just how many of us have reduced our blood sugar levels to the non diabetic range. We have people who have come off meds, including insulin, or are no longer at risk of needing them as the next step in managing their diabetes. The success stories will inspire you. 🙂

Hey Daria, well done you.
It is wonderful to read the posts from people achieving the 8 week mark, and still enjoying this way of eating.
I’m only 1 week in and I have to say I’m loving it.
I also wish that I had commenced this way oc eating a long time ago.
Red

Hi everyone,

Have just finished week 1 & lost 2kg. My scales are a bit dodgey, showing between 2 – 3kgs so I’ve decided to claim the lesser. I’m following the recipes in the book as I’m doing this for weight loss only. I did find the meals quite big so will be giving hubby a much larger portion in future. I (we) have enjoyed every meal so far. Not a fan of the “brunch” over the weekend so will look for alternative suggestions. Having a bit of trouble trying to walk each day as I have a lower back problem.

Love reading all the posts and hope to report another loss next Monday. Keep up the good work, TTFN, Susan.

Good points.

A ketogenic diet (very low carb, typically coupled with high fat) is something quite different, and many recipes from the book would not fit in a ketogenic diet. The chickpea and hazelnut salad I made this week, for example, had 45 grams (33 net) carbs. Many people on a ketogenic diet limit their carbs to 20 grams per day.

I’ve been eating a low carb/moderate fat diet – and I’ve tried to be clear about the distinction when I talk about how I’ve been eating because the theories are different.

Although I am being cautious about carbs, I am trying to eat consistently with the BSD – which intentionally includes pulses and some other things I would not have chosen to eat (in large part because studies have shown they are actually helpful, long term).

(But to be fair – some of the carb talk comes from newbies who have walked in asking how many carbs/how much fat they are supposed to be eating.)

I recently lost considerable amount of weight (9kg in 5 weeks) by following the 800 Calorie diet for 5 weeks and have returned to my ‘normal’ weight and blood pressure range for the first time in many years. Thanks you Michael for the motivation and sharing the know how.
I simultaneously upped my physical activity and woke up muscles from lengthy periods of underuse. I have experienced the normal expected stiffness but have found that recovery time seems to be substantially longer. Is this a common experience for dieters and if so what is the science behind the phenomena?

Hi everyone – today is day 1 of my 8 weeks. I’m another middle-aged Aussie trying to reverse my post menopausal weight creep. I use a Fitbit as well as the My Fitness Pal site for entering food. I also use the Map My Ride, Map My Walk apps and these all synchronise with my Fitbit and My Fitness Pal. I like exercising but I also like to snack too much especially in the evenings. I’m looking forward to reading about the progress you are making as well as the struggles on the way!

Hi Lucia
April’s notorious for it’s showers, but they pass. I love walking through cheerful yellow daffodils, they always brighten my mood.
Have you noticed the fresh green buds are unfurling? Very soon everything will look all new, colourful & different. I think another four weeks should do it. See us into May with the warmth of the sun on our backs. We’ll be enjoying the promise of Summer & chasing beautiful butterflies. Can’t wait
Eureka ☀️

Hi and welcome EvaZ. I’m using the vivosmart. I’m finding it very good as it also “talks” to Myfitness Pal, where I’m logging my calorie intake. It can all be a bit addictive though. Lol.

I wanted to point out to confused newbies that the rules some commenters here are following are not the same as Dr Mosley outlines in his book. As I understand it, the Fast 800 diet means 800 calories per day, eating fresh healthy food – nothing processed, no sugar, no “low fat” products. Meat, vegetables, and pulses. Some fruit. Healthy low-GI carbohydrates are fine, and only calories are measured. Full fat products like milk and cheese, healthy fats from nuts and olive oil, but the diet is not high fat. Processed meat like bacon only a few times a week.

Some commenters here are having great success with staying under 50g of carbohydrate, lots of fat to put you in ketosis, not necessarily counting calories. There is nothing wrong with that if it’s working for you, but it doesn’t seem to be that close to Dr Mosley’s plan. More like Atkins maybe? I just wanted to mention it because a lot of people are reading the book then coming here and getting confused that they are told to eat under a certain level of carbs or over a certain percentage of fat when it doesn’t say that anywhere in the book.