Prednisolone 30g, advice on how not to put on weight

Sorry - you can't say "the only way..." is to follow that regime. It may have worked for you but eating that much would make me gain weight on pred! 

When I was at school I never ate breakfast and didn't have too much of a weight problem. Later I followed all the advice that breakfast was the most important meal of the day blah blah - and changed my eating pattern to more like the one you have just advocated. Now if I eat breakfast it makes no difference to what I eat for lunch or dinner - so it is added calories that I can manage without.

Since I rearranged my diet to omit breakfast and eat very little fruit I have steadily lost weight while on pred.

One size doesn't fit all, that is the primary mantra with PMR - but the biggest constant we have seen on the forums for avoiding weight gain with pred is to cut carbohydrate intake quite drastically. And fruit is solid sugars - simple carbs.

My gosh, if I ate that much I would blow up like a balloon, in the words of my rheumy. You must have a fast metabolism.  I don't think I have had an entire dessert for years, although I may take a small spoonful from someone else's plate! Three full meals a day, that is probably nearly twice what I eat. I try and cut out simple carbs as EileenH mentions although I do eat some fruit as it does have fibre. I also have cut out gluten. I am afraid I don't have breakfast apart from some yogurt to go with the pred. I have not had breakfast since I left school apart from a boiled egg when I go on holiday. I am just not up to eating when I get up. 

They had a TV program saying now that fasting for 24 hours then eating a normal diet for a few days then fasting again etc has been found to be particulally good for health and normal weight retention.  I tried it once and found it did work but I also found I really love eating every day it was not easy. As you say everyone is different.  We have a fruit farm with lots of different fruits growing so I eat a lot of fruit my weight is okay even though I put on a couple of kilos since being on prednisolone and I know doing the fasting thingy will take it off pretty quickly if I get worried.

Are they serious? Common sense tells you that if you eat less you will put on less weight. That is the same as sayng that if you only spnd money some days and dont spend money other days you will save more.

It was a very serious research program and the researcher himself does it all the time now and his age for body health has fallen from 56 when he was only 50 to 40 in a very short time. I know its easier to not eat for 1 day a week than stick to any reduced intake diet long term so I guess for us weak willed people it proabably works better. I can't remember all the details, however I have noticed here at home the older men who were on very short to almost no rations in the war - or were prisoners of war with no other injuries live to a very old age.

When the supermarkets have to close for a day for storm reasons, they cry like babies that they will never make back the lost income - maybe for some there is a lot of impulse buying same as impluse eating  I guess - It is an interesting human failing for some. 

Some eat when hungry. Others - like me - eat anyway - to relieve boredom and because they love the tastes of foods. Some eat a lot at Christmas. Because I am at home a lot with a fridge and freezer and cupboard full of food right there within easy reach it is easier to just go for it and regret it later. So my way is to have a cupboard full of biscuits but only allow myself 2 a day where before I would eat the whole packet. I eat one small meal and one proper meal each day and taht at the most. I rarely snack inbetween

I make a big issue of choosing what to have, cooking and preparing it, I will even sit and read a cookery book with lots of coloured photos and watch tv programmes about food so that I get a food fix, without putting on calories.

My trouble is the steroid munchies side effect, I can become ravenously hungry. I try to never have snacks inbetween meals, but I do think about food a lot since starting pred. 

This isn't specifically a reply to ptolemy but I just wanted to continue this conversation.

I think the diet mentioned by Denise is probably the "5:2 Fast diet". You eat 500 calories a day 2 days a week (but not consecutive days) and normally the rest of the week. It is pretty much impossible to catch up the calories you missed on those two days but you don't get bored with dieting day after day because you know tomorrow you can have that icecream or whatever. You don't ever have a day with NO food - it isn't dangerous in any way because of that - and believe me, with care you can have a pretty good diet for one day on 500 calories (600 for men). There are suggested menus for the fast day all over the internet - 2 or 3 meals that total to 500 calories.

I used it to kick start my weight loss on pred but only for a few months. Within a month I was far less hungry which is something that the person who developed the diet had claimed - and what was a normal plate of dinner before is too much now so it was brilliant for learning portion control. I know quite a few people who have used it to learn to eat less and are back to the weight they should be - and for most of them the place the weight has gone from is their middles even though they aren't on pred! 

It ISN'T something a diabetic should use because the 2 days at 500 calories would probably pose a problem with their medication. Some of the principles otherwise would be helpful for anyone - like omitting simple carbs as much as possible. When you stop that sort of sugar you often lose the craving - you eat simple carbs or fruit, get a sugar rush and then the blood sugar falls lower than it was before, so you crave the sugar again because you believe it makes you feel better. If you must eat, then veggies, especially cucumber and cherry tomatoes and carrot sticks for example, kept ready to eat in the frig gives your mouth something to do and are satisfying crunchy! The sugar content is low and doesn't cause the surge in blood sugar in the same way. A drink of water or unsweetened tea should be your first stop - people often mistake what is really thirst for hunger so eat when they should be drinking. My go-to when I felt like that was normal British breakfast tea diluted 1:1 with water and a squeeze of lemon. Other aromatic teas (Earl Grey maybe) or herbal teas are just as good if you like them. 

Yes you are correct Eileen I think that was roughly the way it went.  Actually I think he was a British man doing the study with others and lots of back up with Drs testing etc.  From memory he had soup at lunchtime on what he called his fasting days and he did have 2 in a row ( I couldn't do that). Recently on our TV here in Australia they were suggesting 24 on 24 off.  The off being the soup day as I said I didn't see all the info on that program so can't give reasons why they would change it from original study.  Maybe like me they couldn't do the 2 days is a row but I definitely could manage 2 days out of the week and yes food doesn't mean quite as much after you've tried this, it seems portion control is probably the real answer and it does work not only for weight control but he suggested his reflexes were better and overall health seemed to improve.  As you say do it with a Dr's eye on you if you have any other health issues.  PS I love Earl Grey tea it got me through the fasting day

It started as a TV programme in the UK but he also wrote a book which I have read (didn't see it on TV as I live in Italy). Michael Mosely is the guy's name and the book is all the background he did and explanations of how the theory works plus a range of planned meals for fast days. I was able to download it for 99p on my Kindle when it was on offer so I thought it was worth a look. It is ideal for working people - say Monday and Thursday as fast days but which are moveable if you have official meals to cover and weekends are free. A cousin who is older than me has used it to finally get rid of the middle-aged spread he acquired as an Ombudsman with too many official dinners and office based work - he is back to the weight he was in his 30s! Having achieved it he keeps one day a week low and at 600 calories if he has put on weight (like on a cruise or hotel holiday ;-)  )

There is some evidence that it can reverse high cholesterol and blood sugars in pre-diabetes. I've never had raised sugars with pred but the cholesterol did go up. I think several people have taken it as a basis and tweaked it a bit then claimed it as their own idea. What has annoyed me has been the sensationalist comments in the UK that fasting is dangerous. It is used all over mainland Europe - for days at a time and often with as little as 200 calories with plenty of fluids. That can be hard work and you do need supervision but it isn't food we need all the time - it is water. The concept of feeling hungry and not snacking has disappeared - when I was a child you got 3 meals, no snacks because it would "spoil your dinner" and feeling hungry before a meal was normal. The western world has forgotten that - and compounded it with the idea of 5 or 6 small meals was better for you and would help you lose weight! Only if you kept the total calorie count and level of activity the same and some experts think it may have been that misguided idea for weight loss that has led to the steady increase in obesity in the modern world.