Today is my Intermittent Fasting day. I am still thinking about the role of meat in fasting - I know this probably sounds weird, and it definitely sounds weird from someone who has spent some years being a pescetarian who could not face meat, but I find it an interesting topic.
Yesterday, for dinner, I ate a fillet of trout along with vegetables and some mashed potato. Last night the hunger during my fast was not overly apparent; however, I did have a bout or two of hunger pangs, which I did not have when I had eaten meat before starting the fast. I lay in bed, trying to ignore the gnawing feeling I get where my insides feel as if they are nibbling at themselves, and thought about what today might bring seeing as I had not eaten meat pre-fast this time around. Well, today it has been worse than last night. I have probably had about 3 major bouts of hunger pangs - or pains would be more accurate.
At the same time, I am counting my blessings because, despite still getting hunger pangs, they are nowhere near what I experienced in the first week. Even though I don't think the first week was particularly bad, it seems like a horror movie compared to this week. On the first week, 5 p.m. on the IF day could not roll around quickly enough. I was standing at the stove, cooking the dinner at 4.30 p.m. so that it would be ready in time for a 5 p.m. meal. This week I am a bit more relaxed because I know that if the meal happens at 5.10 p.m., I am not going to pass out and die.
Fasting is definitely raising some thoughts and feelings in me that I hadn't really expected:
Food seems delicious and amazing when you are eating the restricted (500) calories on the Intermittent Fast day. I savour my food, take my time and really enjoy it. I am a foodie, and I love food, so it's not as if I don't enjoy my food the rest of the time. Believe me when I say, I do... probably too much! On the restricted calorie day, I guess I just feel more aware of how great it is to be able to actually eat something and I appreciate my food. I feel blessed to have access to food, a luxury which many people in the world do not automatically have.
I feel powerful. As someone who gets frustrated about weight and food intake, I do feel a power from being able to control myself in this way. I have actually started working on long abandoned projects this week, a step I feel has been partly motivated by me realising that: I can do things if I put my mind to them.
It is nice to not have to think about food. When you can't have food, or can have very little, it makes you realise how much of the time you might be spending thinking about food, consuming food, shopping for food, preparing food and so on. It's not unheard of in this country to have 'something' with your cup of tea or coffee, which means that you may have 1, 2 or 3 times in the day when you are eating something that perhaps you don't actually need. I am now more aware of this, which leads me onto...
The fasting and the calorie restriction is paying off on the non-Intermittent Fasting days! Yesterday is a case in point. I was sitting at my computer doing some work, and I noticed that hours had gone by without me even thinking about food or feeling hungry. This probably sounds normal to most people - I don't know, but for me it was a breakthrough. I usually would have thought about food during that time period and probably had an afternoon drink and a snack and then felt guilty for eating something. Instead, I had water. I also have been snacking less in the evening, as once you have 4 evenings a week (due to the IF) where you don't eat anything, it is not that much of a stretch to turn that into 6 or 7, which leads me onto...
You start to evaluate whether you really need to eat something. Now I am more conscious, when I do choose to have a treat or a snack, of whether that snack or treat is something I truly want and/or need. I am not averse to having a treat, but as I have discussed on this blog before, I do have a habit of eating because other people are eating/offer me something. I know that the reason I do this is because I want to make the other person feel comfortable, and to also be sociable. I feel rude if I don't join in or if I turn their offer down. Now, because there are these sections of the week where I cannot have anything at all, or can have very little (the 500 calorie days do not allow for snacks/treats), I am having to actively turn people down when they offer me food. The very act of doing this sends not only a powerful message to myself, but to the other person as well. I think it is almost like training, or retraining, your brain to an alternative setting. In turn, I believe this will make the regular eating days easier for me because I will learn to be able to evaluate whether I want or need the food item and be able to say no if I do not want/need it. In addition, because I am doing Intermittent Fasting, which people around me know to be for health, and weight loss is just a side effect, I am actually able to turn them down easily...
For some reason if you are doing something for health, it's more acceptable to people than if you are doing it to lose weight. Picture this: you are invited to go around your slim friend's house. When you get there, he/she makes you a drink. Then they get out the cake or the cookies or whatever, and offer them to you. In the past I have actually been in the position where I have accepted one of these offerings: a. because I have not wanted to turn the person down and b. because I have not wanted to tell them I am trying to lose weight. When I tell someone I am trying to lose weight, it adds a certain pressure. Suddenly I feel that person is evaluating me and in the future is watching to see if I am losing weight and what I am eating etc. I am not imagining this, as people do comment on my weight. In an Intermittent Fasting situation, I can turn the person down and say I am doing Intermittent Fasting for my health. Somehow that is okay. It would seem really weird if they then turned around and were 'off' to me because I refused their offer of food, when I am trying to improve my health. It's slightly ridiculous, but true in my case.
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