newbie with a question...

mercadezporcha

sorry this has probably been asked a thousand times but I'm just getting to grips with what I should be doing :-/

May I ask what your calories are on a non fast day ? mine seems so high so not sure if i've worked it out wrong. Also is it bad that i'm incorporating some kind of snack snack into every day as not sure I could do this diet without them.

thanks for taking the time to read

JAT74

Regarding food, you can eat whatever you want so there are no foods which aren't allowed. In terms of calories, there are stickies at the top of the group to explain how it all works, but basically you are supposed to eat to your TDEE on non-fast days.

In my case I was on MFP for a couple of months before starting 5:2 and was eating a certain number of calories each week in order to lose weight and I was losing slowly, so what I do now is work out my weekly calories as before, but now instead of dividing the number I get by 7 as each day was the same, now I subtract my 2 fast day calories and then divide what I've got left by 5. At the moment this has been working out to around 1600 calories per day on my non-fast days but I'm in week 3 and haven't lost weight so I'm going to try and go lower on my non-fast days.

Some people swear by not having to count calories at all on non-fast days but as I've been losing very slowly up until now I know I can't do that and have to count every calorie which goes in my mouth on both fast days and non-fast days.

I tend to eat whatever I think will fill me up on Fast days and avoid snacks, but on non-fast days I usually have at least 1 snack but other than that I try and get 100g of protein in each day and am also aiming for 25g of fibre. I keep my carbs to under 150g or less if I can too.

jknight001

Hi @mercadezporcha‌! Welcome to the group.

Like @JAT74‌ said there are not many restrictions with this plan. The only thing you need to remember is 500 cals for two days of the week and your TDEE calories for five days. Other than than you are welcome to tailor the plan to what ever suits your needs. If you look through the threads you will see there are many ways to implement this plan. I would suggest looking at the Mosely documentary under the Announcement section of the groups main page to get a good overview of the plan.

Regarding calculating your TDEE, since you are new I would suggest using one of the TDEE calculators to get an amount and try it for a month. With 5:2 your weight may fluctuate so we say here look for the downward trend. If you are over all your weight is going down for the month then the TDEE amount is correct. A simple calculator can be found at the 5:2 Fast Diet website here. Also our group moderator, @orlcam, created a more configurable TDEE calculator which you can find here.

And feel free to ask whatever questions you have there is always someone around willing to answer.

karen_fitzgibbon

Welcome!!!!!

sijomial

What numbers are you getting for your "normal" days OP?
(Are you following the MFP method or TDEE method?)

There's no problem in eating snacks to get to your goal.
From a quick look at your diary would suggest trying harder to hit your protein target though, it's really important when you are losing weight so treat it as a minimum goal. So protein based snacks would be a win/win.

mercadezporcha

Thanks for all the responses my TDEE is coming out as 1855 which seems really high :-/ . Im struggling with the 500 cal days Im averaging at 600 at the moment but I think this is just getting used to what I can eat. Ill check out all the resources mentioned and have a look at my protein

jknight001

The 500 is a bit arbitrary. It is just a guideline (25% of an average woman's TDEE) so its OK to be at 600 for while you are adjusting. Wishing you all the best.