As I said I decided to try Tesco Finest Greek Yoghurt and it does seem to be thicker and creamier than the Tesco Greek Style, but this is from memory of last weekend rather than a side by side trial.

Interesting that you are very tired- I’ve found quite the opposite, loads of energy, which I’ve put down to either no wheat/gluten, and/or no sugar. Others have said they’ve noticed energy levels up, so let’s hope that’ll happen for you too a bit further in. Great that you’re not finding it too difficult, I am amazed to find that I’m actually enjoying it!

I managed to finish my bottles of both Bombay Sapphire and the Hendricks just before day one! (And no it wasn’t a binge 😉 )

WRT to the Q tonic, I’ve never heard of that one, but agave is another no no for me, organic or not, it’s still 90% fructose!
A good book to read for the lowdown on fructose is David Gillespie’s “Sweet poison” available on Kindle.

You have a good weekend too,
MaryR

Oh, Bill, that is a fantastic site. You’re a star. I’m dashing back round to corner shop to get more gram flour – never used so much in my life! 🙂

Thanks for the book reference I have ordered Sweet lies. Hope it will convince hubby to join me in this.

Thanks Bill, you are a legend 🙂

Wow lynne amazing loss, you must be thrilled! 🙂

MaryR so glad to read your post, I was coming on to have a moan and you’ve just nailed it for me, esp point 2 re fluctuating weight. I was so exhilarated after 3 weeks and weight loss of 10 lbs and have been despondent this week as there has been no loss at all, just a fluctuating up a pound down a pond routine. I feel better after reading your post, thanks x

Hi All,
Fabulous thread, second everything Kimgall said. At 64, I can relate to so much you are all saying! I’m 5 weeks in, 18lbs and 4″ off the waist. Things that might help others, that have helped me:
1. Taking on board what Michael says about dark chocolate, I have 1 square of dark chocolate (10g) almost every night with my tea/coffee after dinner. I eat it very slowly, small bits at a time, and enjoy every microgram.
2. Over the 5 weeks, there have been fours blips in the downward weight graph, where it goes up a bit, and then keeps on coming down, so I no longer worry (or wonder why) when that happens. It just does, and doesn’t seem to relate to anything I do, or eat.
3. The carb cravings DO go- just hang on in there!
4. At one point, three weeks in, on one day, I was ready to eat the chair legs. I felt that my primal brain had finally realised it wasn’t getting sugar/carbs and had woken up. So I planned and cooked an off plan meal, but keeping very carefully to the Med diet principles, no wheat, no sugar, no seconds, and not calorie counted. It turned out to be a 1500 cal day, completely cured the desperate craving , and it hasn’t happened since. And I had lost the next day! I’ll do that again if I need to.
5. Make every single calorie worth eating!
6. To keep you on track with the sugar/fat issues, books by David Gilespie, “Big fat lies” and “Sweet poison” both very readable and inspirational, and by Robert Lustig, “Fat Chance”, a bit more dense and scientific, but brilliant. Lustig also has lectures on You Tube.

And keep up the great support work- that makes so much difference!

For the record … Another 3 pounds lost.

One more pound and it will be 2.5 stone or 35 pounds off 😃

I’ll be weighing again tomorrow and Monday, then away until Friday so not weighing again until next Saturday. It will be interesting to see the results next week!

http://www.foodiefiasco.com/the-perfect-easy-grain-free-pasta-and-a-giveaway-winner/

Hi Col. Welcome to the forums.

Looking forward to reading your progress.

Ami, I have a lot of weight to lose and have been reasonably active and the weight has been coming off quite quickly ~ 2kg per week. I have been weighing myself daily and within that loss there are several periods without much loss and then sudden drops such as this week, not much at first then 300g yesterday and 800g today.

I do find it very hard when I have a few days of no movement though. Make sure you haven’t changed anything and persevere. Are you walking less? As you are now 1 stone lighter when you do walk about you are probably burning few calories – probably shouldn’t be a significant factor.

Hi Bill. You’re doing great.

You’ll soon be making a new hole in that belt – or pensioning it off!

Can’t tighten the drawstring on my trousers any more, so on to the charity shop pile they go. 😱

Hi cherrieanne, yes I grow tumbler here too, i don’t think there are any you can’t grow if you have a greenhouse. I bet you can grow them all year round there. My son won’t touch tomatoes once the home grown ones are over. Not too keen myself either.
I ll be googling that chickpea pasta! 🙂

Morning (or evening) cherrianne
Another pound and a half gone which I’m really pleased with. Given the way my blood sugar has behaved this last week, I wouldn’t have been astonished if I had o
put a stone on.
How did the market go ? Sell all the soya melts ?

I live in SA Hashimoto, in the hills, and yes those tomatoes were harvested today by me and my 6 year old. Quite a few accidentally fell into her mouth! Don’t know if you can get that variety, it’s called ‘tumblr’, no e. Very prolific fruiter and well worth growing. We’ve had kilos and kilos. The kids take 6 each to school most days with cheese and crackers for a morning snack. The zucchini is also fresh out of the garden. It’s one of the sneaky ones that hide under the leaves and grow and grow! That one is destined to become soup.
I can well believe some parrots have escaped and bred. Budgies are native to Aus and I’ve seen them wild in the UK. We read reports of wallabies over there too.
It can be heartbreaking to see family emigrate. It’s a lovely lifestyle here but the sacrifice of leaving home and family is tough. At least you’ll have some lovely people to stay with on your holiday! 🙂
Bill nearly always has the answers! My sister and I had chickpea flour flatbreads from his recipe and mushroom soup for a late lunch today. I will definitely search for a chickpea flour pasta recipe.

Hi Col and welcome to the forums
I love reading all these amazing stories from ordinary people.
No marketing budget here, no one selling anything, just a whole new way of life that really works
Soon, your own story will be inspiring others
Best of luck

Absolutely right, captainlynne- demonstrate the the proof – and that will take determination and persistence. I did not mean never tell them- just wait until you have proved it works for you, and then go on to show that it is sustainable. If enough do this, opinion must change, and the initial evidence is already there, from Professor Taylor and the Newcastle group, and others. And yes, if they see their drug costs reducing, they will like that!

Fofi, I do have complete sympathy with the medical profession- I was part of it. before I retired. They are between a rock and a hard place, with NICE guidelines to adhere to, imposed targets to meet, and an ever increasing regulatory workload. But I don’t have sympathy with those who are blinkered, think they do know everything, and won’t listen!

Great result Louck
I hate to say told you so but I’ll make an exception 🙂
You’re at the start of an amazing journey, enjoy the ride.

Well that’s the end of a weird week 5
After a meal out in which I avoided carbs my blood sugar levels went wild with readings of 9, 8 point something and high sevens. Got it down to under seven but last night I had a few nuts instead of the usual yoghurt and this morning 8.2
I don’t understand what happened but I’m telling myself I’m not eating anything wrong so the extra sugar levels are down to stored sugar being released and that can only be good.
I,m going to get some ketastix next week just to check that things are happening as they should.
So week 5 weigh day and I’ve lost another pound and a half and had to tighten he belt another notch to it’s last hole !! I started this new lifestyle on hole 1 🙂
Looking forward to seeing the results of my blood test this week although I know it will cover only 4 weeks o the plan, it will show if I”m heading in the right direction.
So week 5, 19 pounds lost daytime sugar readings n the high 4s to low 5s. Fasting readings have had a holiday but are expected back next week.
Best of luck to everybody having a weigh in today
Onwards and upwards

Another one here with no gallbladder!! Had mine out about 9years ago and have successfully followed a lower carb, higher fat diet to lose weight with no problems whatsoever …..give it a try and keep in touch 😀

And how long did it take?

Well I started Wednesday and was due to go docs yesterday and gym induction Thursday. I had to change gym induction until Friday.
Woke up Friday morning and my dog wouldn’t get off the bed to go for wee’s. So had to pull her off the bed only to notice her back end and her legs were completely immobilised. I took her straight the vet and they ruled out paralysis and said they thought it was more than likely arthritis. They gave her pain meds and she has been improving enough to actually have small walks and even managed to rip the post up. I keep meaning to buy a letterbox basket lol. It was quite a scare seeing her not being able to stand and I did almost turn to chocolate for comfort.

So gym induction re-booked as is doctors appointment.

But, today I weighed myself and have only gone and lost 6.5lbs since Wednesday. OMG, how did that happen? I am beyond delighted. I still have the chocolate craving as I’m not eating anything sweet.

So keep at it people, it does work 🙂

Hi everyone….started the bsd yesterday, was a good day and much easier than I anticipated. Been lurking here for a few days reading the posts and getting such great inspiration that I thought I would join in!

Prepared by reading the book through twice, going for the real food option and cooking all from scratch, looking forward to trying some of the recipes already posted.

Thanks a lot to everyone for the inspiration 😀👌

The flat breads idea sounds great to me too, that way you can still eat something your kids have made for you and enjoy it rather than feeling guilty/ pressured into eating something that you would rather not. Mind you, it really sounds like you have got this and if yu did have a bite it would not derail you from your long term plan…😀

You’re brill, bill 🙂

CAS you can make pasta with chick pea flour, I found the recipe last week, Google it.

MaryR you must have some sympathy for the medical profession. They seem to be wrong this time, but they spend their lives fixing problems made worse because people followed some advice on MumsNet or a magazine rather than finish a course of medicine that would have cured the problem straight away.

I know of so many people who have given up on a short term course of medicine which might well have cured the problem because they read somewhere that it was bad for them. I could never be a GP.

Anybody have IBS? I have been on the diet for 6 weeks now and managed to lose 23lbs which is great. However, I have had to introduce some starches with meals because the diet is too high in insoluble fibre and wondered how other people were managing and what they were eating?

True MaryR. But if we let them think we are following their advice, things will never change.

The best thing we can do is stick with the plan and record everything. When the medical professionals ask how we’ve done it (and they will) we can show them. They will then be able to see from our records that the official advice was not working for us, but this is.

It might be a slow process, changing the system, but if we persist it will come.

Until then, we keep on doing what we are doing. Often despite the system rather than with it.

Perhaps even more important then showing fantastic results in 8 weeks, we need to show that the benefits are sustainable long-term. That was the issue with the doubter yesterday. Seemed to be saying ‘that’s good, but it won’t last’.

If nothing else, when the GP practices notice a difference in the amount spent on drugs for diabetics they may just start to wonder what is happening.

Well done on pointing someone to this forum 😊

Hi Bill, how did your weigh day go today? I dressed for the expected warm weather today and walked out into a world of cold and misty weather lol!!
Checked the forecast, still said 29 so off we went. No fun setting up a market stall when you’re freezing 🙁 Quick SOS to home, hubby brought some extra layers, changed in the van not having a phone box handy lol. Emerged a much warmer superwoman ready to tackle anything 🙂 that’s what the BSD does for you. Kicking diabetes’ butt, sugar under control, way more energy. Loving it.

Hi Lachlan,
I am a TOFI too! 5’2″ and 52 kg so no need to lose weight. I did the first two weeks at 800 cals with no problems, started seeing good blood sugar results despite also suffering from the dawn phenomenon. This has been a problem for me since I started monitoring two years ago when I was diagnosed.
Lost just over a kg so upped my calories but keep my carbs around 50g/day. I’m now starting week 4 and for over a week have had fasting levels under 5. Totally happy with that, still needing a snack before bed just to make sure that sneaky dawn phenomenon doesn’t sabotage it.
The only suggestion I can give if you want to keep on this diet is to increase your calories but keep your carbs low. It’s the carbs that affect my blood sugars badly. Also have the fat/ protein snack before bed, it really helps to keep the fasting levels down.

Plodding, do you have weight to lose? If not, maybe you would be better just adopting the med lifestyle with no counting, less carbs but more protein, veggies and legumes. If you do have weight to lose, the 5:2 is a good option.

Hi Teej
As you are so highly motivated at the moment, my advice would be not to eat the things your children are going to bake but to make some flatbreads, as already suggested here, some pancakes and/or the muffins that are on the website here and/or the brownies from the book. Of course, any of the family could help you in eating them. I think it will be good for your mental strength to know that you can avoid the other stuff when it is right in front of you and at the moment, you are feeling so strong that you can do it easily. Save indulging in that stuff for another time.

Hi Kimgall,
Everyone has so much in common here. I know when I say I am struggling people understand and also when I’m doing well, people know that feeling too.

Auntylil, well you know my feelings on mushrooms – so its definitely easy to live without them. Fermented things – unless its hops, I’m really not interested in those either. I think tofu is fermented? The other half of my packet went in the bin. I have only just started eating nuts again as part of this diet but I find I don’t want to spend much of my allowance on them. Rose Elliot said that nuts in shells are the best ones for no fungus. Might that help you? I imagine you can burn quite a lot of calories getting nuts out of shells.

Love, love, love this thread … All these lovely people with similar goals … And similar trials and tribulations to myself!! I have just spent the last half hour being fed with positivity and hope!! 😃 With every comment read, I wanted to say “yep, I’ve been there … ” or “wow! What a good way of looking at that … I’m going to try to remember that” or “gonna have to do that”.
What I wanted was to tick or acknowledge every comment on this thread … But I couldn’t, as there is no way to do that … And I certainly can’t thank each and everyone of you for your excellent support and guidance, as I’d be here all day … And you’d all be fed up of me taking over this brilliant topic!!
So, I just want to say a huge THANK YOU to everyone that has taken their valuable time and energy to share their innermost secrets, thoughts, suggestions and guidance.
I have taken it on board … I will make mistakes, I’m human … But I’m going to try and utilise what I learn from each and every one of you when I slip. X

Firstly Teej, congratulations on the weight loss. I too can’t believe how eggs can fill me up……before, I used to eat something like branflakes or porridge (when I ate breakfast at all) and was hungry by mid morning, which I could never understand. Now, when I feel like eating breakfast (not really much of a morning eater), I’ll have a couple of boiled or poached or scrambled eggs and don’t feel hungry until lunchtime. Amazing!

Anyway, with regard to your kids’ afternoon tea for their grandparents (what lovely kids you have!) and your worries about what to eat and hurting their feelings if you don’t….does it really matter if you do go off piste for that one meal? My thoughts are that this way of eating (I don’t mean staying on 800 cals, but the general principles of that, 5:2 or the Mediterranean diet) is going to be a lifetime thing, so having a very occasional ‘off piste’ meal isn’t going to hurt. Just get straight back into it with your next meal. It’s not ONE ‘wrong’ meal that’s going to do the damage, it’s having them continually, don’t you think? I would say go ahead and have a scone and brownie and piece of cake (best not have too many though! lol) and then carry on with the diet immediately after. Well, that’s what I would do anyway. I am finding that this way of eating (I don’t want to call it a diet, it’s far too enjoyable) is a lot less stressful than previous rigid diets I’ve been on.

🙂 L41DA, your nurse will be pleased with you

Auntylil, I love that, todays storm is tomorrows rainbow. I will remember that! 🙂

Hi Teej, good news about everything you have been achieving. I am so impressed!!! What a dilemma! Perhaps you could get your tweenies to make some coconut flat breads (posted by Bill1954) but leave out the salt so you can have them with cream and strawberries on top as your nod to afternoon tea? The gluten free flat breads (posted by Ingenue) are delicious – get your tweenies to make a batch each but with different flavours/spices in them. Then you can have them as sandwiches or wraps. Best of all your kids will have a new baking skill to show off to their grandparents!!! If they make enough you could have some to store in your freezer!!! 🙂

Cherrieanne your new recipe looks delicious!! Those must be home grown cherry tomatoes, I’m drooling! Here in Blighty it will be late June before the home grown are ready.
Would you believe this – about 20 years ago in my previous (large) garden I heard a familiar sound. Shouted it sounds like parakeets! I remembered the sound from the Blue Mountains. Suddenly one swooped from the hornbeam tree – I couldn’t believe my eyes. They are actually breeding in this country!
Do you mind me asking which state you live in? I’m guessing it can’t be somewhere like Perth WA? I’m hoping to head out to Perth, possibly in May, to visit my aunt, uncle and cousin. I haven’t seen them for about 16 years when they came over to England for a visit, before that it was about 28 years ago when I went out to Australia. They are such lovely people it broke my heart when they emigrated to Oz ( I was about 10 at the time).
I like your idea about chick pea flour for pasta. I have had to substitute courgette and aubergine for pasta in lasagnes for years because I am gluten intolerant. One of us will have to experiment with it!!! 🙂

The other day in the supermarket I asked the cashier how many more hours she had left to do, too many she said… and explained how she was eager to get home as her two young children were poorly and had kept her up all night. I showed sympathy and she looked at me and said ‘It’s okay, todays storm can be tomorrow’s rainbow’. I’d not heard that before.

Being kind to oneself can be quite a challenge – if we have a negative self image (source of binge eating, comfort eating etc.) then it’s hard to get into a place where we even think we’re worth being kind to. I definitely think my immune system is compromised currently and the diet changes seem to have upset things; I may be wrong but mushrooms, fermented things and now nuts seem to be aggravating me. So… rainbows tomorrow anyone?

Hashimoto I am walking and exercising a lot more, but the blood sugars are more important to me than the weight loss. I’m extremely happy with the diet and only wish I’d started it earlier. I can’t recommend it enough. I’m due to have my Hba1c in 6 weeks I’m actuallylooking forward to getting the results for once

Tomorrow is the start of week three and I am having a wobble! I am not T2 but, following a basic blood test strip that just worked on colours, I was bordering on prediabetic. Weighed in at 14st and now down to 13st 4lb which is a weight I haven’t seen in st least 2 years. I am absolutely amazed by this way of eating (I am not going to call it a diet as it brings to mind a chocolate mini roll when I have had enough of the diet!). I was already feeling too big around my middle when my eyesight started to blur very slightly. I started to google it and came across the symptoms of T2 and ultimately this book. I downloaded immediately, read in one afternoon and knew I had to make a change. It took me a week or so to get my head around it as it is so removed from how I was eating. I was the person who got hungry on every diet I ever tried and felt sick by 10.30am. Biscuits were my absolute downfall and a chocoholic to add to the mix. Eggs for breakfast? No way! I couldn’t imagine how anyone could stomach that. What a difference two weeks can make! I read somewhere on here that one way of doing it is to accept that the diet you have is not working and rather than try to amend your usual routine, accept that things need to change. Boy, was that person right for me! We have two ‘tween’ children and I changed our morning routine right around to enable me to get up and instead of eat breakfast straight away, do all the other morning things and eat breakfast calmly at the end, by which time I can face eggs, and I love them! I am absolutely blown away by the fact that 2 eggs (cooked with a little butter) can fill me up until lunchtime without hunger pangs. Taking time to make fresh lunches from the book is something I never thought would happen but then I realised that it’s only 10 minutes. Getting up half an hour earlier has made a difference to everyone’s lives in this house and the children now sit with me for a YouTube 5 minute meditation before we leave the house, we leave in a cloud of calm, the complete opposite of 2 weeks ago.

Sorry, didn’t mean to waffle, that just started to flow as I typed! What I am really saying is that if I can do it, anyone can!

My problem is this. Our wonderful children have invited my parents to afternoon tea tomorrow and have planned a bake fest! They are really good bakers and have planned cheese and plain scones, brownies and Victoria sponge and are so proud and excited to have us all around a family table for the celebration. They know that I am ‘cutting down on my junk food’ and the effects have affected them as well as they are eating much better (10yr old cereal freak ate eggs for breakfast before school yesterday!). So, what to do? One side of me is saying stop stressing, I can get them to make the cheese scones with wholemeal flour and use less sugar in the sweet ones and maybe only have half a scone and top with butter for the savoury and cream on the sweet? And just have a sliver of brownie or cake? I know that I am committed to 800, I have been using myfitnesspal and it has been so easy over the last 2 weeks, with no worry about continuing. I don’t want to hurt their feelings by saying no thank you but I seem to be obsessing about eating sugar and carbs when I have completely avoided them. Any advice/thoughts would be appreciated.

I really didn’t mean for this post to go on for so long! I love reading this forum at the end of the day. You have all given me so much support and advice from afar.

Thanks for listening 🙂

Wow! Great results L41DA! In just 3.5 weeks! I am totally impressed! Amazing results on your blood sugars too! 🙂

Thank you I am beginning to think the 5.2 might be the better option.

Hi wyrdsister. The coconut flour is good for the coconut flat breads posted by Bill1954. I’ve used them for savoury and, if I omit the salt, I put a dollop of greek yoghurt and berries on top for a bit of indulgence which is still carb and sugar free.
If you look at the ‘get started’ tab at the top of the page there is a sugar pyramid you can print out and stick on your kitchen wall as a reminder of what not to eat – and the advice given by Spirit is good.
Tallyho is looking at recipes and planning ahead – the ingredients in the recipes will keep you right and make shopping a lot easier. Aldi sell the cheapest coconut oil (thanks Bill – that is where I will buy my next lot) which you will need for the coconut flatbreads and coconut flour I got from my local health food shop.
Good luck 🙂

I have been losing weight steadily at an average 2lb per week and so far have lost 1 stone. BUT, I have been stuck on the same weight now for the last 11 days and it’s getting abit soul destroying. I’m not doing anything different so I’m at a loss as to what’s happening? Anyone had the same?

Mary R. wow what thorough research! fantastic, thank you. the bottle of Bombay Sapphire has been put in the back of the cupboard so I can’t see it! no alcohol and under 800 calories for 11 days now. 41 to go. I keep telling myself that this is good for me.
I had a great email from Q tonic
“Each of our products is crafted from all-natural ingredients with no artificial sweeteners to make the best mixers and sodas in the world.
For example, we use:
• Real quinine and organic agave for Q Tonic……”
Unfortunately they are not available (yet) in the UK anyway!!
A huge well done to you for doing so well for 5 weeks!
In spite of the absence of the wine and g&t, I must admit I am not finding the diet too hard’, only issue is that I am so tired (by 8.00 p.m. I am ready for bed) and I feel more emotional and ‘touchy’. (Doesn’t help that I have only lost 1lb this week.) Even so, trust this will shift and I will get the energy high soon and I am committed to seeing it through.
Keep posting how you are both doing.it is very encouraging.
Have a great weekend.
M.

Tallyho, impressive weight loss and very good news about the blood sugar readings! It certainly is easier to plan ahead. It seems laborious at first but then how long does it take each day to think ‘hmmm, what can I make for dinner, what have I got in the fridge?’. You can also keep all you weekly plans and once you have a few just base a new week on one. 🙂

Well done Bob Fox, the past is another country, so they say and the future is bright!! I’m full of clichés this morning, lol. You’ll shift that 5 stones on this plan and become an inspiration to many!! 🙂