lose weight, been 40-50 pounds over weight for almost a decade, i keep dropping 20-25 pounds and regaining it again. I enjoy eating and drinking a little too much.
Try total (not intermittent) fasting. I just discovered it and lost 50lbs very quickly but, more importantly, without difficulty. Easier than one meal per day. YMMV.
My goal is to become a lean, fit, machine. First I have to drop a lot of weight. I started 4 weeks ago and I'm down 17 pounds so far. Basically I'm just limiting myself to about 500-700 calories of protein-rich foods a day, plus a multivitamin, a calcium/magnesium/zinc supplement, and more recently, a fiber supplement.
It's very dangerous, and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who hasn't put their body through extreme circumstances in the past and knows their actual (not percieved) limits. I haven't pooped in a week, and my last bowel movement was gnarly.
A safer rate of weight-loss should not be more than 2 pounds a week, or approximately a 1,000 calorie defecit per day. An online search for a basal metabolic rate calculator should be a starting point.
Advice to others, no matter what process you take: I recommend not weighing yourself more than once a week - it's a mental thing.
With such drastic diet - gastric system goes for a toss. You don't want to wait that long between pooping. One option is to try buffered vitamin c. It was definitely give you a poop whenever you want without side effect and dependency.
Things I've faced so far: Constipation and Hyponatremia.
Catabolysis and heart damage is also possible. The body will consume fat first, so this is an avoidable outcome. I added the multivitamin and calcium/magnesium/zinc supplement to help avoid damage as well. Damaging my heart is my largest concern with this diet.
Losing fat inherently raises blood lipids (the fat has to be circulated), which is bad for the heart long-term, but not an acute danger. The body is evolved to live on body fat, it's fine and normal.
My dad survived stage 4 cancer... a bowel obstruction is what took him out... you don't want your bowels completely stopped, otherwise very, very bad things happen. That's why it's dangerous.
Eating only protien (versus carbohydrates) should smooth out the hunger. Keeping busy helps me ignore the hunger. For the first two weeks, the hunger was mostly mental. Drinking lots of water helps also curb the hunger as well as keep me focused. I don't know if there is a universal answer, just my experience. I don't sleep any better or any worse during versus before the diet. And actually, I've wanted to go to bed earlier to so I can sleep through the hunger rather than be awake to deal with it. Four, almost five weeks in, I don't have any mental hunger any more, I still have some occasional physical hunger, but its timeline varies. Somedays I feel like I could go all day without eating, somedays two meals isn't enough. I always stick to two meals a day: one breakfast, and one lunch which eventually moved back towards about three hours after normal lunchtime.
Multi-day. IIRC I've only eaten on six different days since November 10th. Three Thanksgiving parties! One Christmas. Still eating out of social conformity but otherwise, just not. Next time I'll eat will be New Year's Eve.
A suggestion from a friend to stop the weight going back on: set a weekly calendar reminder for you to record your weight and to track + view this on a graph over time to jolt you into action (e.g. being more mindful with calorie intake again) when you see the weight creeping back on. The problem can sometimes be improving the feedback loop so you don't slip back into your old eating habits.
biggest recommendation would be dont do this as a short term goal with a diet.. that never helps and you will gain back your pounds. introduce exercise into your routine. eat healthy but dont deprive yourself of stuff. if you like to eat fried chicken eat it but try to make it yourself.
Specifically about fried chicken, I love it myself, but it turns out making "fried" chicken in the oven is super easy. And it's not really fried, so super healthy. I learned it from this Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jACqgyPAtD4&t=671s
But just to outline how easy it is, the whole process is basically to cover the chicken with some cornstarch and salt, let it sit in the fridge for a few hours, then cook it in the oven for forty-ish minutes. So easy, and tastes 80% as good as real fried chicken.