Journal of my new lifestyle with OMAD .

Prologue.......

I have actually spent most of my life dealing with what is called the Yo-yo Syndrome. You lose some weight and then you gain it back again.
I started out being a chubby baby, but once I was a toddler, then I was slim until around 4-5th grade.
During my teenage years, I maintained pretty well, although gaining weight over the winter and then losing it in the summer.

As an adult, I think that I have probably tried about every diet (and read every diet book !) that came along; so I have starved myself or denied myself for so many years, that I just felt guilty, no matter what I ate. I exercised until I was exhausted, with only minimal results, or very slow ones, and that usually came when I was also eating a low carb diet.

When I started reading about intermittent fasting, it just looked like something that would work, but I had no faith in my ability to go even the 16:8 hour fast, let alone only eat once a day.
However, I started out slowly, having dinner earlier, and discovered that 16:8 was doable for me.

After that, I stopped eating breakfast and just had a protein shake before going to the fitness center and swimming. Then I read that you burn fat better when you exercise in a fasted state; so I skipped the protein shake, too.
Now, I have one cup of coffee with a dab of heavy cream, and I don’t eat until after I am home from swimming, which is any time between 11-3, so I have basically a 4 hour window, but eat anywhere in that time frame for my one meal.

There are so many health benefits that come along with intermittent fasting, and I want to work into having longer fasts once a week. The longest one I have done so far was 51 hours, and it really was not any harder than doing the 1-day fasts.
This journal will be a record of my experiments with different foods, different lengths of fasting, and also a record of my progress back into a slimmer body and better health.
For me, this is not going to be just a temporary diet , there are so many heath and longevity benefits, that this is going to be a complete lifestyle commitment .
 
Last edited:

Jimmy Swartz

Administrator
Staff member
Really looking forward to reading your progress and your journey! Reading your post reminded me a lot of myself and all the yo-yo dieting I have been through as well. I'm glad those days are long gone and behind me.

Being that there are still so many undiscovered benefits of fasting, it's so important to learn from trials and experiences of our own. Your documentation will be a real asset to the community.

You have all the key ingredients that I see successful people have when making a lifestyle change:

  1. You selected a goal
  2. You have a belief in what you are doing
  3. You have written your plan
  4. You have a purpose
  5. You have committment
  6. You are focused






 
My observation for this week is that exercise really helps curb my appetite, more than I had realized. Normally, we go to the fitness center in the mornings, and I have my meal for the day after we get back home, which is somewhere between 11-1pm. On Sunday , the fitness center does not even open until 1pm, and by the time we left home to go swimming, my tummy was grumbling at me that I had missed my usual mealtime.
However, as soon as I started swimming, all of that hunger and tummy-rumbling just stopped (like magic !), and I was fine for the next two hours because it was after 3 when we actually had dinner.

Last week, I fasted a total of 128 hours/78 in ketosis. This week, I fasted a total of 151 hours/75 in ketosis. The difference is because last week, I did a 51 hour fast, so I spent more time in ketosis due to that. However, since I have been eating a ketogenic diet, along with the fasting; I should have been burning fat for more than just the hours that I was fasting.
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Prologue.......

I have actually spent most of my life dealing with what is called the Yo-yo Syndrome. You lose some weight and then you gain it back again.
I started out being a chubby baby, but once I was a toddler, then I was slim until around 4-5th grade.
During my teenage years, I maintained pretty well, although gaining weight over the winter and then losing it in the summer.

As an adult, I think that I have probably tried about every diet (and read every diet book !) that came along; so I have starved myself or denied myself for so many years, that I just felt guilty, no matter what I ate. I exercised until I was exhausted, with only minimal results, or very slow ones, and that usually came when I was also eating a low carb diet.

When I started reading about intermittent fasting, it just looked like something that would work, but I had no faith in my ability to go even the 16:8 hour fast, let alone only eat once a day.
However, I started out slowly, having dinner earlier, and discovered that 16:8 was doable for me.

After that, I stopped eating breakfast and just had a protein shake before going to the fitness center and swimming. Then I read that you burn fat better when you exercise in a fasted state; so I skipped the protein shake, too.
Now, I have one cup of coffee with a dab of heavy cream, and I don’t eat until after I am home from swimming, which is any time between 11-3, so I have basically a 4 hour window, but eat anywhere in that time frame for my one meal.

There are so many health benefits that come along with intermittent fasting, and I want to work into having longer fasts once a week. The longest one I have done so far was 51 hours, and it really was not any harder than doing the 1-day fasts.
This journal will be a record of my experiments with different foods, different lengths of fasting, and also a record of my progress back into a slimmer body and better health.
For me, this is not going to be just a temporary diet , there are so many heath and longevity benefits, that this is going to be a complete lifestyle commitment .

Your story was really an inspiration to us. Your determination and motivation is not a joke at all. You really had a goals and finally you got it. Keep inspiring and sharing your experiences to everyone so that they inspire also.
 
I am still losing weight, but slowly, which is better than gaining weight, which usually happens in the fall. All summer, when it is hot, I do not get very hungry, and a big bowl of green salad and some kind of protein is all that I need for my OMAD meal. Now, it has turned really cold here, and this old body does not keep me very warm anymore, so I am constantly wanting something hot to eat or drink.
I have been making vegetable soups with lots of broth, and that helps because it keeps me satisfied for that need of drinking something hot; but it has not been as good for the fasting part of OMAD.
I am also drinking more coffee or tea throughout the day. I tried making boullion , but that has quite a bit of salt in it, so overall, I think that my cabbage and veggie soup is probably the healthiest choice, and I make that with the pink himalayan sea salt, which has electrolytes.
 
I am still losing weight, but slowly, which is better than gaining weight, which usually happens in the fall. All summer, when it is hot, I do not get very hungry, and a big bowl of green salad and some kind of protein is all that I need for my OMAD meal. Now, it has turned really cold here, and this old body does not keep me very warm anymore, so I am constantly wanting something hot to eat or drink.
I have been making vegetable soups with lots of broth, and that helps because it keeps me satisfied for that need of drinking something hot; but it has not been as good for the fasting part of OMAD.
I am also drinking more coffee or tea throughout the day. I tried making boullion , but that has quite a bit of salt in it, so overall, I think that my cabbage and veggie soup is probably the healthiest choice, and I make that with the pink himalayan sea salt, which has electrolytes.

@Happyflowerlady I am so motivated by your determination and the positive attitude you have towards OMAD and life! Its real life! I look forward to hearing more about your progress and please...continue to inspire us!!!!!!

Keep doing what yu doing!!!!
 
I have not posted an update here for quite a while, so I think it is time to say a little more.
As some background, I have always been an active person, and then my heart started failing when I was in my mid-50’s, and I went from weighing 145 lbs, and walking 3-4 miles a day, to not even being able to walk out to the mailbox to get my mail.
As years passed, I gained more and more weight, and my heart just kept getting worse, until it was finally barely working, and operating at 23% EF.

I had no insurance until I turned 65, and qualified for Medicare, so no treatment for my heart. By the time they did an operation a few years ago, I was still so out of shape that I could not do much in the way of exercise.
Nevertheless, I started a fitness club membership (came with the Medicare), and started swimming and doing water exercises. Gradually, my heart recovered some, the heart failure lessened, and I started following a ketogenic diet, and was losing weight.
Then, in 2017, my heart got worse again, and I gained back all of the weight I had lost earlier. By this summer, I was again doing better, and since starting the OMAD last summer, I have gradually been losing weight again.

Happily, I am now down again to within ONE pound of the lowest weight that I was at two years ago. It is a slow progress for me, but before long, I will lose that last little bit, and then I can post that I am slimmer than I have been for almost 20 years, and I am really looking forward to overcoming that hurdle, and then continuing to lose the unwanted weight by following my OMAD .
 
I have been really frustrated for a while now, because even though I am still exercising, fasting, and eating healthy meals, I simply stopped losing weight, and even gained back a few pounds.
It is very likely my thyroid , because I just had my annual wellness checkup, and it shows that my thyroid is super low right now.
I have been taking Armour thyroid medicine for several years, but we just changed insurance companies, and Humana said that hey don’t cover that prescription, so I have not been able to fill it or the last 4-5 months, and I have slowly felt my energy going downhill, as my weight stopped doing that.
Whether it is covered by my insurance or not, it looks like I really need that thyroid medicine, so hopefully , it will help when I get it refilled and start taking it again.
 
I am doing better again, enjoying activity better , and starting to lose a little of the weight again. My insurance company is now covering my thyroid medication, thanks to me doctor, and I am also taking iodine and other thyroid-help supplements.
I am doing what is known as Keto OMAD , where you eat very few carbs, and mostly protein and fats and greens for my diet.
Some people can eat their OMAD meal of anything they want and lose weight, but not me. Carbs make me crave more food, and then I end up being hungry and wanting to eat at other times besides the one meal.
When I keep the carbs low, I don’t trigger the insulin spike that makes me hungry, and going the whole day without food happens much easier.
 
I am back on OMAD again, and it is going really well this time, and I am once again losing the weight that I gained back a couple of years ago when my heart failure got worse again.
I had to have a pacemaker and AV node block, so the pacemaker totally controls how my heart works, and I lost a lot of energy after that operation, and once again steadily gained weight And was barely walking around the house, let alone doing much exercising. I had pretty much given up on ever losing the weight again.

Also, I found that some of the heart medicines that they gave me will block weight loss, and my doctor has said that I can cut down the dose of those meds as long as everything stays okay.
At almost 79 years old, losing weight seems like it is slower and slower, mostly because of my years of insulin resistance. The fasting is helping that, and now that my body is fat-adapted (again), I am fine eating one meal a day.

We go to the fitness center 3-4 days a week and I swim for an hour , and when we come home is when I have my meal for the day, so I am now working out in a fasted state. I have more energy, and feel like I am also building back some of my lost muscle, which is good.
I am eating low carb, but have to be careful of getting too much protein because of my kidney failure. The low carb helps a lot with controlling hunger that carbs spike because of the insulin.
 
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