Monthly Archives: October 2015

Part Woman, Part Ostrich

Freeform thoughts, Reflections on past times, , , ,

ostrich

In the way that I often do when I’ve said something out loud – or written it on here which pretty much amounts to the same thing – I’ve been reflecting on something I referred to yesterday. Remember I talked about voicing my determination to stay skinny in between mouthfuls of cake..? It sounds so utterly ridiculous when I put it like that. But as much as I was being flippant yesterday in the interests of provoking a smile and a shared ‘eyes to the sky’ moment with you all, that’s literally what happened.

When I look back I can see myself walking away from Skinny Town, a place I loved and had worked so damned hard to get to. I was walking in the opposite direction without a backwards glance, sitting in my big fat leather armchair night after night with a family bag of cheese balls and a large carton of Haagen Dazs, having already eaten my way through the day. It’s all very well me looking back now and wanting to scream “what were you thinking?!!!” at myself…I don’t think I could answer that even if the Dalai Lama himself rocked up to help me find enlightenment. I wasn’t thinking – my head was empty. I mean yes of course, on a rational level I must have known that the wheels had come off but where I should have been having a word with myself…nothing.

I can’t seem to recall a single conscious thought about what I was doing and yet every day I watched myself get bigger and bigger. Discarding the skinny jeans in favour of elasticated waists and shapeless sweaters. I lived in the moment, and never thought about the pattern. The trajectory, you know? Where I was headed. From Skinny Town to Mooseville in one long straight run, stopping only to replenish the  supply of cake. You know what I think? I think it went beyond just not thinking about it…I think I made a conscious choice to ignore what I was doing to myself and stick my head in the sand. I was an Ostrich. And I’m struggling to understand why, I mean that’s not right is it…normal folk just wouldn’t do that. I mean, maybe they’d turn a blind eye to five pounds, or even ten pounds at a push. But one hundred and forty pounds…? No.

If someone had asked me why I wanted to put the weight back on, I would have looked at them as though they’d taken leave of their senses. I didn’t. And yet, I was.

You know I still don’t have all the answers, right? I know on here I come across as fairly well in control and self-aware, but it’s mainly because I’ve had some wonderful encouragement and feedback from you guys – I know you’re drawing inspiration here and there from the odd post, and the posse in general too which is amazing. I guess we’re all just figuring it all out as we go along. Getting skinny is a familiar journey – the unknown bit, the hardest part for me at least is going to be staying there. Pulling up the drawbridge and becoming a permanent resident of Skinny Town.

But you know, I thought it was worth talking about this today, because we’re all at different stages of this journey, and if just one of our posse is sitting in their armchair every night, walking away from Skinny Town without anyone there to hold the mirror up and yell WHAT ARE YOU THINKING..???  Well I’d feel like we’d let them down.

Please don’t be that person…don’t do what I did. Please.

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A Dollop More Codswallop

Freeform thoughts, In the here & now, , ,

dollop

So, according to another informative article written by experts, I can seemingly blame all of my weight issues on the layout of my kitchen. Marvellous – I knew if I waited long enough that some ‘ologist’ or other would identify a reason for my chunky disposition based on factors which didn’t include me eating the wrong things in industrial quantities whilst glued to the armchair watching tv. Written by an esteemed professor of something – aren’t they always – this guy seemed to want to absolve me of any responsibility whatsoever for being fat. And as always, I was ready to listen.

The piece started with a question, about whether I walked past the fruit bowl to get to the biscuit tin.  Well…duh. I’m 140lbs too heavy for my 5’5″ frame, so why don’t you take your best guess..? Apparently if you ‘proudly display your bananas’ you’re likely to weigh 13lbs less. And what’s more, if you have cereal and soft drinks sitting out on your counter top, you’re likely to weigh 46lbs more. He didn’t mention more or less than what, which was a bit unhelpful. I mean it’s information we need to know – if the control subject is a moose for example, proudly displaying my bananas to shave 13lbs off seems a bit pointless, right? (But just in case, I’m proudly displaying two bananas and a tangerine…it doesn’t hurt to hedge your bets.)

Doubt about his credentials started to creep in when he went on to assert that if you only had healthy food on display and the goodies were out of sight, you wouldn’t think about eating them. Do you think he’s ever met a fat girl..? I’ve been known to defrost emergency ice cream with a hairdryer because I couldn’t wait 10 minutes till it was soft enough to get the spoon in. And let’s be honest, opening a cupboard door to get at the hob-nobs hardly requires Oceans Eleven type planning does it…no, much as I wanted to latch onto all the reasons he listed as to why my kitchen might be making me fat, it seems he was in fact talking utter shite.

But you know what, I’m kind of ok with that – there have been points in my life where I would have bought into every word, not to mention handing over wads of cash to buy the book he was selling or join the seminar he was running, because blaming anyone but myself for the size of my arse was far less painful than admitting that I’ve done this to myself. I do have thyroid issues, but I had them when I was skinny too, so I’ve stopped hiding behind that excuse. What was I thinking? I want to go back in time and shake myself, for every time I’ve gotten skinny, and voiced my determination to stay skinny this time…in between mouthfuls of cake. I did this to myself, again, and now I’m undoing it. Again.

I’ve come quite a long way in the last couple of months. A few things have happened as I’ve been writing down my thoughts and sharing them on here. I feel more accountable…I know if I tried to pull any bullshit you’d all call me on it. Giving my asshole voice a name and personality all of his own has boosted my ability to unravel lots of twisted thinking and dodge things going on in my head designed to poke holes in my willpower – finding out my asshole voice has a very large family of similar asshole voices who live with each and every one of you guys has helped even more. If I can do it, you can do it because you know what? If you can do it, so can I. There’s power in numbers.

Onwards ladies…we’re really doing this 🙂

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Moving The Goalposts

Biggest struggles, Diet update, Freeform thoughts, ,

goalSo back on the 17th of August, which was a Monday, (obviously, because Asshole logic dictates that diets can only start on a Monday, it’s practically the law) my dieting goal was to shed a couple of dress sizes before the trip I’ve just been on. I started my blog the following weekend and I can honestly say that since then I’ve not stepped out of the sweet spot…not even once. I did back the wrong horse I think, by starting on a carb-free regime at first but it’d worked for me before, and fairly quickly. Not this time.

I don’t have a scooby doo what I weighed when I started, which in hindsight probably wasn’t my smartest move. If you’ve been reading along since the early days, you’ll remember that a few weeks in I got weighed for the first time, only to discover that I weighed more than I’d imagined I had at the start. That made me swear, a lot. But once I was over being a diva, I took it on the chin, cracked on with the regime and didn’t let it throw me off course.

I checked in with the bitch in the bathroom again about 3 weeks ago to find that although my lard is on the move, the pounds have been slow to shift with only another 5 gone. So I switched out to the Weight Watchers’ food plan instead, dropped a couple more pounds and although I haven’t been on the scales yet since I got home, I’m not expecting to have gained anything on holiday. I’ve found my groove with the points malarkey, and I’m still in the game.

But I need a new focus. Visualising that helicopter trip has kept me 100% on the right path but you know what, getting skinny is just not happening quickly enough. And yes, I know I have my wrist bitch to bully me now (trust me, even the asshole’s running scared) but I need a new focus too.

And that is..? I’m going to be in a size 22 by the first of the year, and I’m going to get there by meeting or exceeding my activity goal every day – as well as the food plan of course. That’s my new short term goal. I was a size 28 when I started and I’m a good size 24/26 now, kind of on the cusp you know? 22 is where I’m headed and I’ve got nine weeks and two days to get there.

Now I have to ‘fess up and say I feel a bit of a fraud with that bold statement, given that today I’ve missed my activity target and I’ve welched on the deal to walk Charlie for half an hour every day after work. Great start, really, way to go Dee you’ve reached new heights of wimpdom. But guys I’m soooo tired – jet lag has kicked in big time, and despite staying up all day yesterday and not feeling too bad, when I went to bed last night at around 10.30pm, ping…wide awake! I saw 3.30am come and go before I could find an ounce of sleep in me. And my alarm goes off at 5.30am….a 50 miles each way commute and 10 straight hours in the office on less than two hours’ sleep is a stretch too far…my tank is running a little low.

I have the opportunity to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat…after all it ain’t over ’till the fat lady sings….oh wait a minute, listen…do you hear that? Right then…I’ll walk twice as far tomorrow. Promise.

Doh Ray Me Far So Laa Tee Doh…  notes

Me: 0 – Asshole: 1.  Sorry posse…I feel like I’ve fallen at the first fence  🙁

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Kick-Ass Technology

Freeform thoughts, In the here & now,

whip1

So…last day off work before I’m back for the long run up to Christmas, sadly I have no annual leave left now at all. I looked, twice, in that way you do when you’ve just eaten the last hob-nob and you have to re-check the packet to make sure you haven’t missed any crumbs. Bugger. I hate it when I’ve officially used up every last drop of time off for the year. Even though I really love my job to the point where time flies and I enjoy being there, my time isn’t my own when I’m on someone else’s clock you know?

Still, I shall make the most of my last day off by trying to impress my watch. Yes, you heard me right. I have a new voice to add to the cast of characters, another person to whom I’m now accountable. I mean strictly speaking it’s not actually a person, but it has a voice and the capability to nag me into doing things I have no desire to do, without any input from me. And it’s just as hard to ignore. I haven’t landed on a name yet – it’s like having a newborn, you kind of need to get to know them a little bit before you know the name you like really suits them – but it’s alive and well and sitting on my wrist and due to my jet-lag-inspired long lay-in this morning it’s already given me the hard word that today I’m being a lazy cow and need to get moving.

In addition to delivering a non-stop stream of email, texts, calls and other assorted crap to my fingertips, it also counts my steps, nudges me to make sure I move around on an hourly basis if it feels I’ve been sitting down for too long, gives me an exercise target and nags me on a regular basis if I don’t appear to be making much progress. FFS, it’s like having a personal trainer chewing my ear on the hour every hour. I can almost hear it clearing it’s throat in the background as I’m sitting typing this – last time it prompted me to get up and move around for at least a minute I went and made a cup of tea and I’m starting to wonder whether that was against the rules…I mean maybe I was supposed to do a minutes’ worth of power-yoga or something?

Trouble is, I’ve already set the bar quite high – it took up it’s position as nag-in-chief on my wrist whilst I was away. And whilst I was away there was lots to see and do. As I limped, footsore and knackered back to our room every night after long days spent exploring stuff which distracted me in the moment from just exactly how much my feet hurt, it gave me a big pat on the back and told me I’d achieved my target for the day…no shit, Sherlock. It’s a different story now…a half day’s worth of activity yesterday followed by a 10 hour flight, an early night and an extra long sleep have all contributed to a swift re-calibration of my overall output, and it’s sitting on my wrist with it’s micro-chip pursed in disapproval and a renewed determination to kick my lazy ass.

That, together with Charlie the dog’s death-stare because he wants his walk means that I have little option at this point but to get up and get moving. No rest for the wicked and all that. I’ve already put two loads of washing in and cleaned the kitchen, this is surely the time where I can sit and catch up on all the things I’ve sky-plussed whilst I’ve been away..? Charlie and the watch both have other ideas, so it appears that I’m out-voted…that’ll be no, then!

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Milestone Moments & Memories

Biggest Triumphs, Diet update, In the here & now, ,

IMG_3697

Hey posse…home at last, to a rock star welcome from my four-legged fur baby and an enthusiastic welcome from my boy, who’d managed to empty the fridge whilst I was gone…quelle surprise! 🙂 It’s been a memorable trip, and now it’s lovely to be home. Thanks for all your input, comments and emails re yesterday’s post – I love that whilst I was away I sense-checked my decisions and choices every time against the question ‘what would the posse do…?‘ and I love even more that I pretty much hit it straight for that very reason. And I’m here to tell you, you are ALL getting on the asshole’s last good nerve!

In response to both dilemmas, I took a mouthful, made all the right noises about how amazing it tasted and how much I appreciated the gesture, then handed the baton – along with cake and spoon – to the girls who executed a pretty perfect mexican wave of appreciation. They know I’m dieting, and even when the kind of cocktails that would happily take the enamel off your teeth were in play they had my back. Teamwork at it’s finest.

And I needn’t have been terrified about being frog-marched out of the sweet spot for my lack of willpower, never to return…no lack of willpower, and no asshole victories, just some creative accounting within a framework of accountability which means I’ve had treats, but they’ve been totted up instead of written off. I pared back on some of the drinking because eating the food I wanted was more important to me…I had as much fun as everyone else and what’s more I even remember it all, which is an added bonus! Did I wish I could throw caution to the wind and have everything I wanted..? Yes, of course I did, but the realisation that I can’t has wormed its way into my psyche, and even on holiday, I’m all over it.

For those of you who remember the heifer in the helicopter post, and were wondering how it went…yes I had to pay a $100 heavy levy, kind of an arse tax if you will, but it was a little discrete tile on the floor where I had to weigh in, just like everyone else and no alarms sounded, no SWAT team arrived to take out the fat girl and we had the most amazing time, flying over the Grand Canyon and eating a picnic lunch with champagne next to the Colorado river. I’ve even attached a picture by way of evidence, instead of my usual clip-art! For those of you who like or follow the Break Out The Skinny Girl Facebook page you’ll find a couple more pictures on there too.

So, enough…I’ll quit banging on about my trip now, and let’s pick up where I left off with the usual motley assortment of head spam shall we?  I have to ask myself the question what now?  This has generally been the danger zone for me…I’ve got form, in terms of dieting hard for a special event and then leaping off the dieting bandwagon with indecent haste as soon as the milestone moment has passed.  I half expected to be locked horns with the asshole at the first post-flight meal but I think he was too busy working on his exercise avoidance strategy to pay much attention to my food choices so I’ve just quietly carried on making good choices. But I need a new goal, another milestone moment to work towards…I’ll share it with you of course once I’ve figured it out:)

To coin my friend’s phrase, I’m thinking Kylie by Christmas?

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