Two weeks in, and already a lifelong convert

In 2018 at 55 years of age, I had both hips replaced because a lifetime of sport (especially cricket, where my fast bowling involved thousands of hours of running in, landing on my right leg and slamming my left into the pitch to act as the fulcrum) had resulted in a previously undisclosed genetic inheritance called pistol-grip femur assisting to develop the inevitable bone spurs I did not know I had begun to create decades earlier. Over a couple of years, as the pain increased and my walking and bike riding dropped to near-zero, my previously athletic 94kg (206lb) frame began the march to obesity. My eating was based on desire, and my activity had spared me from that fate previously, but being sedentary soon exposed how much trouble I soon would be in if things remained unchanged. After recovery from the op, I was confronted with being 143kg (314lb) and found it very hard to shake off more than a kilo or two via bike rides, and would wheeze a little at the end of every breath taken when I walked. It was not long before soft tissue injuries started, with Achilles strains a special treat, and my motivation waxed and waned. I live on a beach on Australia's Gold Coast, and not even that was enough to enthuse me. My GP recommended Saxenda about a year ago, and I tried it for 4 months, losing about 10kg (22lb) through the daily injections and consequent feelings of fullness/mild nausea. The $385 a month became an unaffordable luxury as work took a COVID break, so I stopped in November and tried a "grazing" style of diet - a little bit of good stuff a lot of times a day. Needless to say, it failed. I recently topped the scales, getting an "over-limit" readout. This meant that I had put on all of the weight lost, and then some. I had been walking more, and riding some, but now needed to educate myself in order to find a workable alternative to the ways I had ignorantly tried without success. The idea of IF popped into my thoughts, as I have always enjoyed fasting and my GP had been regularly reminding me that a new approach to eating was essential to weight loss. I immediately eliminated full cream milk, as some simple math revealed that the 2 liters I would happily and proudly consume a day was adding 25 KILOGRAMS (55 POUNDS) of fat to my diet annually before I took a mouthful of food. I happened upon your video about the changes undergone during fasting and found it hugely informative and deeply inspirational. Autophagy was previously unknown to me, and now I embrace it daily. The same applies to ketones. I also did not know that stem cell production increased during longer fasts, or how important potassium is and especially in combination with sodium, or that a lot of the excess calcium I had been ingesting now likely was stored in every part of my body and working against my interests, etc etc etc. I watched a lot of your videos and took notes. Now I am on 23:1 OMAD, drinking lemon water with gusto and suffering no cravings. I have introduced so many delicious, sustainable changes to my menu based on your recommendations, with kimchi, sauerkraut, a lot of green leafy veg, and avocado all accompanying EVERY meal, in which salmon, tuna, and sardines have assumed a much larger role than before. I am losing 2kg (4.4lb) a week without exertion, and this week will reintroduce 30min to 1hr daily bike rides to boost autophagy and see what effect that might produce. Even if I continue to lose "only" 2kg a week, I will be back to 8-pack and Speedos in January (our peak of summer). Thank you for your superbly informative series of videos. You've given me the knowledge I needed so I could value every moment of each daily fast, and the information I needed to focus on coordinated and focused nutrition.