Intermittent fasting: the 5:2 diet

 

Since Dr Michael Mosley put it to the test on BBC's Horizon programme in August 2012, the 5:2 diet has been steadily gaining in popularity.

How it works is that across seven days you eat normally for five days and on two non-consecutive days you stick to 500 calories (600 if you're a man). The 5:2 diet is also known as intermittent fasting. 

As long as you don't binge on your 'feast' days, and make sure you stick to the calorie limit to your 'fast' days, many Mumsnetters say intermittent fasting has helped them lose weight, without the usual diet-related misery.

Very low-calorie diets usually come under fire from doctors as being bad for you and bound to fail: your body responds to restricted calories as if you're in a famine and your metabolism slows down, then once your calorie intake goes up, your body stores the energy as fat.

But the science seems to show that two days of fasting, non-consecutively, doesn't trigger this response and so you don't get locked into a demoralising fat-off, fat-on cycle. 

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Intermittent fasting: the 5:2 diet

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Regards

Colette Morris 

http://Ukvichallenge.net 

Fighting Obesity 1Person at a time!