Week One: Easy Come, Not So Easy Go

The first week was both very easy and yet, not so easy. Old habits die hard and it was the bad habits that were more of a hindrance than the actual food itself.

Let's start from the beginning. 

The first week I was supposed to be using an 8-hour eating window. Nailed that sucker to the wall! However, after looking at the book Fast, Feat, Repeat mid-week, I'd forgotten something. I was supposed to skip a meal. Oops.

The book says two meals a day, no snacks. Now I'll be honest here; before I started this fasting program, I was basically eating four meals and a snack a day. Breakfast and lunch before work, come home to a half meal and a snack, then dinner. Most times dinner would have second helpings. Now that I see this in print, that's a lot of food, though it didn't seem so when I was eating it.

So at the beginning of the week, I was having breakfast for lunch, having a small snack during my work hours and after work, then have dinner about thirty minutes before my window closed. My eating window was 11:00am to 7:00 pm.

Then I reread the fast requirements. I was still getting really hungry by mid-shift at work, so I trimmed the snack down to one thing, ate it during my shift, then had dinner in the evening. It's still too much food (according to the book), but still much better than the amounts I was eating.

By the end of the week, the bad habits started kicking in, but just for a second or two.

I'd finish my iced tea by the end of the window, but the tiny bit of tea was left around the ice cubes. The cubes would melt, and I'd drink the infused tea water. Big no-no. Not calorie-wise of course, but I'm not supposed to have anything but water or unsweetened drinks (no sweeteners at all) because that sets off my body to think food is coming. By the end of the week, I did this twice accidentally, and now I put the glass in the sink after I eat and get a fresh glass with water to drink until bedtime.

Image by Engin Akyurt from Pixabay 

Then we had pizza on Friday. A rare treat for us, and though I didn't overindulge, when we were done and my eating window was closed, we were putting away the rest of the pizza and I grabbed a bit of meat and cheese out of the box (my favorite part!) and popped it in my mouth. 

I stopped short, realized what I did, and immediately spat it out into the now empty pizza box. My husband realized why I did that and we both started laughing. He knew I was trying to behave myself. I rinsed out my mouth and got my water for the night.

By the end of the week, I was having two meals, no seconds, and one small snack. Still not quite the book requirements, but I still have another week to work on it before the next gauntlet- one meal and one snack by the fourth week.

Here's what the entire month looks like:

Week one- 8-hour eating window, two meals

Week two- 7-hour eating window, two meals

Week three- 6-hour eating window, two meals or one meal, one snack

Week four- 5-hour eating window, one meal, one snack

Week two will be a window from 11:00am to 6:00 pm if I'm eating leftovers, and 12:00pm to 7:00pm if I'm cooking. Breakfast will have to be made ahead of time and packaged for eating during my shift when I do the latter hours, so some adjustments have to be made. My biggest hurdles will most likely be the snack skipping and eating dinner before the window closes. I still have a lot to do after work, and last week I actually skipped dinner because I was involved and forgot I had to eat by a certain time.

At this point that's probably a good thing!

I'll be looking at the next chapters in the book starting week 3 so I'm ready for the next steps. As for how I'm feeling? I found my energy going up on most days, and though I feel hungry sometimes, it's not that overpowering 'gotta eat now' kind of hunger that leads to binge eating. Being busy helps a lot, and since I have more energy, I've been putting it to good use after I get home. 

I never realized just how much I was eating because I was bored or tired!

All in all I think I did fairly well for my first week. The best part is even if I backslide, I can get right back into it without beating myself up! This is a learning process and it allows a lot of wiggle room to get it right- and I love that!