Week 4 Summary

Day 30, Fast Day #14

Fasting today felt great after putting my body (especially my liver) through a bit of hard labor this weekend. I found I was not very hungry today and craving mostly fresh, raw produce after  eating a bunch of grilled meats, pastries, and fried foods over the last couple of days. I had a ton of energy today, got a lot of sleep, and was enjoying the great and unusual summer-like weather we have been having in Seattle.

Zach and I added in an additional feast day this past week because friends visited us from out of town and there was lots of celebrating with friends to be had. I weighed myself again this morning and I am still holding steady at 13 lbs lost in total despite two consecutive days of going out, day drinking, night drinking, and eating lots of rich foods.

Calories
Week 1: 1,437 kcal or 76% of baseline calories
Week 2: 1,938 kcal or 102% of baseline calories
Week 3: 1,680 kcal or 89% of baseline calories
Week 4: 2,196 kcal or 116% of baseline calories
,
While ADFing: 1,856 kcal or 98% of baseline
Baseline Days: 1,896 kcal

All Feast Days: 2,952 kcal or 156% of baseline
All Fast Days*: 498 kcal or 26% of baseline

For reference
Week 1: 4 fast days, 3 feast days
Week 2: 3 fast days, 4 feast days
Week 3: 3 fast days*, 4 feast days
Week 4: 3 fast days, 4 feast days
*Includes faux-fast day that was my mama's birthday dinner.

It was the most calorie-heavy week since starting alternate day fasting. I ate well over the calories during my baseline days. How did I manage to consume so many more calories than the previous few weeks? One word: Alcohol. Between Friday and Saturday, the consecutive feast days, I consumed about 39% of my calories within just 29% of the week. On Friday, 41% of my entire day's calories where in alcoholic beverages and on Saturday, 33% of my day's calories were in alcoholic beverages. Don't worry, this is NOT my typical drinking behavior and the booze was not all consumed within the same window of time.

What I find most interesting about looking at my numbers from the last month is that my total calorie consumption, as of now, is not significantly less than my baseline calorie consumption. However, I still am down the 13 lbs of weight. 

It is possible the baseline calorie consumption I am using for myself is lower than the number of calories I actually ate on average in the past, since I only tracked two days worth of eating prior to Zach declaring the third day a fast day. (Again, this is not a scientific experiment I am doing, this is just me trying to figure out how intermittent fasting effects my body). My level of physical activity has not changed, so I doubt that is a factor. If my average calorie intake was much higher than my baseline, it is possible my calories are more reduced than I know and this is why I have not regained the weight this week.

The only noticeable nutritional difference that I know of between my eating now and 4 weeks ago, is that my sugar consumption (but not total carbohydrates) is 42% lower. I am not eating much less in overall calories or carbs, so I don't think the lower amount of sugar is a factor in preventing my overeating. However, there is research that suggests that blood sugar levels and glycemic response are related to fat storage. One theory could be that I am not storing fat in the same way because of the large reduction of in sugar in my diet. I have also been eating foods lower on the glycemic index since starting ADF, and therefore explains how I am eating carbs, but not as many of the simple sugar ones. I figured all of those Marie Osmond infommericals selling Nutrisystem was all gimmick, but perhaps there is science behind eating lower on the glycemic index to lose weight.

My only other theory is that the pattern in which I am eating on it's own is changing how I metabolize food. That I will explore this theory on another night, since it is past my bedtime.

Calories: The Birthday Gift to Myself

Day 19, Feast Day #10 - Double Feast

I weighed in yesterday and had lost another pound, so a total of 10 lbs lost. I expect to reverse some if not most of the weight loss progress this week. There is a lot of social eating and drinking in my near future.

Today is my birthday and Zach and I are going out to eat at Poppy and then to see Oz the Great and Powerful in 3-D, since the original movie The Wizard of Oz is one of my favorites. Who doesn't love James Franco? I figure Poppy isn't super unhealthy cuisine, so maybe I can eat somewhat responsibly tonight?

What was on my desk this morning.

On top of giving myself extra calories for my birthday (aside from the shoes, red leather bag, and clothes I just ordered...), my co-workers were thoughtful and planned birthday treats for tomorrow, since it is normally my fast day today and they were working around my weird eating schedule. They must think I have more willpower than I actually possess if they think I am going to fast on my birthday and forego an excuse to indulge on cocktails and a nice dinner. This means, 500 calories is also extremely likely to be breached tomorrow due to birthday treats. I would be happy if I could keep things below 1,200 tomorrow like I did on Saturday... but we will see about that. This all depends on the decadence of the treats.

Then an additional feast day is happening again on Saturday, since we are doing a birthday happy hour because getting together during the workweek is a pain, especially since some of my friends live in the suburbs. With 500 calories being a decent sized margarita, I am kind of doomed this week.

I suppose I can just try to skip breakfast and at least follow an intermittent fasting schedule (16/8) by trying to not eat for 16 hours at a time, then not eat after an 8-hour period. Perhaps that will help some.

Sunday is going to be a brutal fast day.