Many people I meet are shocked when I mention I do the 5:2 diet. There is a general perception that the 5:2 is quite ‘intense’. Those who have never heard of it seem to believe that they would perish if they attempted to live on 500 calories for 2 days a week. The funny thing is I can actually remember having a similar reaction when I first heard about the 5:2, thinking it would never be something I’d have the motivation to do, wondering what people could even eat on a ‘2’ day. Since I first heard about the 5:2 a couple of years ago, perceptions of it have changed. Generally now it has become so popular that most people know someone who is on the 5:2, or a friend of a friend and by and large, the reviews are pretty favourable. But I still get asked the question; “how do you survive on just 500 calories?” to which my most common answer is: my body has simply got used to it. It has become a habit, and not even the type of habit that is tedious and annoying. People look at me like I’m a Martian when I tell them I actually find my fasting days really refreshing. Because we are of a generation and culture who eat so frequently and have such an epic fear of hunger, people believe that we 5:2ers must spend our fasting days curled up in a corner in a semi-human state, incapable of normal interaction. This is not how it goes. I’ll walk you through a typical fasting day: Continue reading →