Monthly Archives: March 2017

Poking My Fat Muscle Memory

In the here & now, ,

I’ll tell you what, I had a bit of a flashback on Wednesday. At the point that I wrote my last blog post I couldn’t wait to get up and at my day, given that I was starting my experiment…it felt like Christmas day and my birthday all rolled into one.

Let me rewind…for those of you not following the weight watchers diet, you probably wonder what I’m banging on about when I mention points…it’s just the way weight watchers carves up a food budget. Every food has a points value in the same way stuff has a calorie value, right? I get 34 points every day, which is a number worked out based on my weight/height/age (and that’s quite a lot because I’m still fat…the nearer I get to Skinny Town the fewer points I’ll get). In addition to that I get 42 more points to spend as and when I like throughout the week.

I don’t always use my weeklies but this experiment I’m doing to try and turbo-charge my weight loss says I should, and what’s more it says I should squash them all in mid-week. So on Wednesday when I get out of bed I was rubbing my hands together in anticipation of scoffing 76 points’ worth of food.

Imagine that. I’m a fat girl on a diet and everything I’ve done over the last 18 months has been about restricting my portion sizes. Not allowing myself to over-indulge. And yet here I am, staring down the barrel of a day where the gloves are off and it’s open season on points…I was so fucking excited I can’t even tell you.

Breakfast was all kinds of awesome. I had two slices of seeded wholemeal toast (3 points per slice) with a teaspoon of butter (2 points) and three scrambled eggs (6 points). Fourteen points for breakfast…I’ve never done that. I was working from home, and mid morning I made myself a coffee with all milk…another 4 points. Lunchtime came and went, and I wasn’t hungry but I made myself have some more toast and a bunch of grapes. 8 points including the butter.

I was seriously full. I’m up to 26 points by now, and normally I’d be panicking a bit at the prospect of only having 8 left for supper. I’d be studying my food plan intently from every angle to try and squeeze maximum mileage out of those last 8 points.

Not on Wednesday…on Wednesday I still had 50 points left in play. So I made moussaka, which is my absolute favourite thing. All fresh ingredients so it still qualified as healthy eating, except there was a fucking mountain of it. 42 points’ worth to be exact. It was a moussaka mountain.

Thing is, as I sat down in the chair, flicked on the TV and started eating, I got this flashback to a life where my world revolved around sitting in a chair with a plate piled high with moussaka, or lasagne, or whatever. It didn’t really matter back then what the hell it was, because simply eating for a long time until I was fit to burst was the attraction. A self-induced food coma, night after night.

On Wednesday, I found myself having to force myself to eat it all. It wasn’t a pleasurable experience, you know? I was uncomfortably full, and I had to keep reminding myself that I was doing it for a reason. It was an experiment. At the same time, I was equally terrified that my Asshole voice would grab a hold of this thing I was doing like some kind of fat muscle memory and start demanding a return to the life I used to live. Yes Dee! That’s IT!! Welcome back to your old life, holy CRAP how we’ve missed this!!!

I couldn’t manage 76 points…wtf is that all about? I scraped 68 and I was done. I finished the rest of my weekly points yesterday, and now I’m back to two days of basic daily points only, before weigh day on Sunday…in many more ways than I have words to describe, it’s a relief.

If I was scoffing cheese balls and Haagen Dazs, 76 points would be a breeze. I could probably do it in ten minutes based on past form. But 76 points’ worth of healthy food felt like it was going to go on until the end of time. Next week, I’ll divvy my weeklies out over three days and make sure I enjoy them. And, honestly? Right now, the fact that my old life looks less and less appealing with every step I take in the direction of Skinny Town makes me much happier than a moussaka mountain ever could 🙂

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Spend, Spend, Spend!

In the here & now, ,

You’ll be relieved to know that today I have no intention of curdling your mood. I was a proper oxygen thief on Monday wasn’t I? Sorry about that. I do have the good grace to look a bit sheepish. I guess I just needed to vent, and by the way I really appreciate all your lovely notes and emails about my screwed up knee…it’s much better thank you. I reckon another day or so with the brace on and then I’ll be fine.

Thanks also to all of you who reached out with words of reassurance about my snail’s pace weight loss. I take enormous comfort from knowing that it’s not just me. Shitbird Scales across the nation regularly piss on your chips too, so I feel like we’re collectively engaged in a much wider battle with the needle than the shitstorm that goes down in my bathroom every Sunday. Welcome to the life of a dieter, right?

Anyway, you know how I’m always on the lookout for new ideas? Beth sent me the link to an interesting article about some bloke who’s figured out some kind of optimum usage of weight watchers’ points, and he reckons that when you eat them is almost as important as what you eat. Beth’s going to give it a go and report back, but you know what, I think I’m going to give it a go too. I’ve got nothing to lose, have I?

What..? Well yes okay, technically if we’re splitting hairs you could say I’ve got one hundred and two fucking pounds to lose. Smart arse.

Anyway, you can read this guy’s theory HERE if you’re interested, but in a nutshell he reckons that you should stick to your daily points allowance on weigh day and the day after that, then have your daily points and all your weekly ones over the next three days. Finally, the last two days before weigh-in should be daily points only.

His theory is that speeding your metabolism up for a few days in the middle of the week is like sprinkling your food plan with magic dust because your body has to work harder to process the increased volume of food, and on days six and seven it carries on at warp speed when you’ve cut back on your portions and Boom that’s when the magic happens. He also recommends spending some of the extra points you earn when you exercise, and I never do that. I used to, but in recent times I’ve just allowed them to stack up.

What do you reckon? I mean, you are looking at a fully paid up member of the I’ll believe any old crap if there’s a chance it might work society…I’ve gone down so many blind alleys over the years where folk have offered up this or that theory/diet/lifestyle as the optimum way to reduce the size of my arse, and I’d go so far as to say that if I’d been born and raised in past times I would’ve had cupboards overflowing with snake oil, you know? I’m an easy sell when I want to believe that whatever outlandish claims in front of me are true. But in this case, I mean what if…?

So anyway, me and Beth are leading the charge. We’re going to road test it. I mean, it’s not a supplement, or a fad diet, so to be honest if all I have to do is rearrange the running order of when I spend my weeklies, it’s got to be worth a shot, right?

I swear my eagerness to get cracking has got nothing to do with the fact that as we speak I haven’t touched my weekly points, and I’m bang in the middle of my dieting week, so by the time I shut my eyes tomorrow night I need to have eaten a whole weeks’ worth of extra points…

Look at this innocent face. The thought never even crossed my mind m’lud 🙂

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Dee’s Pity Party

In the here & now, ,

You know one of the life skills that I don’t ever seem to get any better at is having the patience to persevere with a plan when it doesn’t run to the schedule I’ve got in my head. And before you start chiding me, I promise I’m not about to fall off the wagon but seriously, I deserved more than the Shitbird Scale awarded me this week. Not even a full pound, despite throwing everything I’ve got at this, including my heart and soul.

How can that be right?  I could accept a nought point fuck-all more easily if I was fannying around like I did towards the back end of last year, taking two steps forward and one step back. That would deserve a measly three quarters of a pound, but seriously, I’m busting my balls here to get a good number. I did four classes last week plus almost ten miles hiking on Saturday and I even stood firm in the face of torture from a cheese sandwich…that on its own deserves more than a nought point seven five on the screen, surely?

If I was able to stamp my foot, I would, but just to add to my list of woes I managed to bust my dodgy knee up pretty good during our hike at the weekend. I have no idea what happened, but somehow it went rogue on me and I couldn’t manage the last half a mile…one of my friends had to walk ahead and bring his car back to collect me. I’m struggling to put any weight through it at all now and the red hot poker that was part of the wallpaper of my life when I lived in Mooseville has all of a sudden moved back in with a vengeance.

I spent yesterday afternoon at the hospital. The doctor reckons my cartilage is inflamed…they X-rayed my knee and all the moving parts look fine, so I just have to rest it, keep it elevated and use ice packs for a few days until the inflammation goes down. Which is fucking marvellous timing. I’ve got a busy week lined up with limited opportunity to work from home, at least for the next couple of days.

I guess the one saving grace going on here is that despite hitting a bit of a pothole, my Asshole voice hasn’t made a grab for the wheel. That would’ve put the cherry on top, right? I was fed up all day yesterday after my conversation with the Shitbird Scale and hobbling around in agony all day didn’t sweeten my mood, in fact I had a full blown pity party going on, which isn’t like me, you know? I guess we’re all allowed a strop once in a while, and I’m just grateful that this one came without a kamikaze desire to face plant into a bucket of Haagen Dazs. Today marks twelve weeks since I brought my A-game. Eighty four days food sober, and there’s not a damn thing the Shitbird Scale can do to pop that balloon.

I’ve woken up with a better attitude today, and I’m forcing myself to focus on the positives. It might only be three quarters of a pound, but it’s the twelfth consecutive loss since New Year and I’m twenty one pounds lighter than I was then. I’m a good dress size smaller now than I was at Christmas. I can still do two classes this week because Muffin Top and Bingo Wings works my core and my arms and demands nothing whatsoever of my knees. And it occurred to me as I laid in bed last night reflecting on the day, that I’d barely got in from the hospital yesterday afternoon before I was in touch with God of Pain asking what I could do this week instead of telling him what I couldn’t.

That’s rather a seismic shift isn’t it?

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I Didn’t See That One Coming…

In the here & now, , ,

So here was I, coasting along under the rather cocky misapprehension that wrestling with the Asshole voice was a pastime well and truly relegated to days gone by. I mean, he’s been silent for so long that surely he must have relocated to someone else’s head, right? Sadly, no. Yesterday I was subjected to four hours of torture over a cheese and pickle sandwich.

I found myself in a catered meeting at work facing my old nemesis, the buffet. I knew it was coming, and I was cool with it, you know? I’ve spent the last 81 days being a rock star with my food choices so I strode confidently into the meeting room, and I even picked my seat before throwing a glance towards the lunch table. Let’s just say it hasn’t always happened in that order…in the past, whilst trying to give the impression that I’m holding back, I’ve been known to cover the area between door and lunch table at warp speed, knocking people over like skittles in my haste to fix a plate.

Yesterday it was a good buffet, I mean it was all seeded wholemeal bread with green stuff, and some wraps with chicken as well as a big bowl of crisps and some cakes.  No sausage rolls or fries or wedges, just a handful of puff-pastry savouries…really, aside from the crisps and cake it was wholesome and healthy. And I made careful choices from the sandwiches, mentally calculating my weight-watcher points as I went. The crisps didn’t worry me, and I barely noticed the cakes. It’s all good, I remember sitting and thinking I’ve so got this…look at me, I’m cured!

Famous last words, right? After we’d finished eating, and there were just the dregs of the buffet table left, well that’s when the fun started. There were two cheese and pickle sandwiches on a tray that nobody had picked. Me, I’d gone for the ham salad ones, and a chicken wrap. I’d scrutinised and rejected the egg mayo and BLT and of course the cheese ones on the basis that they contained stuff from the naughty list and were too point-heavy. I was happy with my choice, right up until I clocked those two leftover cheese butties.

Go on…they won’t kill you. They’re tiny, probably not even an ounce of cheese between ’em… (as I looked at two wedges of cheese clearly cut with a generous hand)…you’ve been so good and besides you’re having chicken for tea and there’s hardly any points in that, so you can afford the cheese. You deserve cheese, you really do. It’s not cake, or crisps, is it? That would be a bad choice but you know cheese is good for your bones. 

On, and on, and on, for four hours. The meeting finished at 4pm, and as I threw a glance back over my shoulder as I left the room and mentally waved farewell to those two cheese sandwiches which were looking a bit curled around the edges by that point, I still wanted them.

I probably could’ve spared the points but you know what, I recognise cheese as a trigger food. It wouldn’t have been the two cheese sandwiches which left collateral damage, it would’ve been the pack of Cathedral City strong cheddar that I might have picked up on the way home which just begged to be grilled until it was bubbly and golden and on my plate. 

Truth is, I can’t allow myself to get the taste. If two curling sandwiches can torture me for four hours, then allowing it over the threshold is never going to end well is it? It was hard not to eat them but on reflection, by the skin of my teeth I escaped unscathed.

Guess I’m still a work in progress after all 🙂

 

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Persona Non Grata

In the here & now, ,

I was in text conversation with the God of Pain yesterday morning – he’s one step ahead of all of us you see, and he makes us book our sessions in advance. It scuppers the chance of any of us coming down with a case of can’t-be-arsed-itus, you know in that moment when you step in from work, tired and hungry after a long day and the prospect of pulling on your exercise pants and doing a 360 out the door again is just too grim?  Once you’ve booked your sessions for the week, the thought of having to explain to his nibs why you’re not now going doesn’t exactly make you feel warm and fuzzy inside and is best avoided…when you’ve committed, you pretty much have to follow through.

To be fair, I reckon that’s why I’m still going, ten months after I started…I need that kind of discipline. A big anonymous gym where nobody would even notice, much less give a shit if I didn’t turn up would play right into the hands of my Asshole voice…come on Dee, you’ve had a long day. Sit down, take a load off and have a hob-nob. Go tomorrow instead. We’ve all been there, right? I’m sure it’s not just me. However, there’s bugger all chance of that happening on his watch, and I’m more grateful for that than I can even tell you.

Anyway, as I was booking my session, I happened to mention that I was on day 79 of my food sobriety, and on Sunday I’m due to graduate from his 3 month clean eating programme. Not only that, but according to his scale, last weekend I was only 1lb over the lowest weight he’s ever logged next to my name. And of course that’s made me extra extra extra determined to get under that number by my next Kingdom of Pain weigh-in.

When I said as much to him, he pinged a text back and warned me not to starve myself, and I just stared at the phone in disbelief…I mean, come on, has he met me? I wouldn’t be capable of doing that if my fucking life depended on it.

Or, would I..? It’s an interesting question.

Does anyone ever set out to get to that place where the exhilaration of flying down the scale pushes the desire to eat off their radar altogether? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not likely to be teetering on the edge of anorexia anytime soon, but I wonder whether the folk who are ever intended to end up in a place where hunger becomes their best friend and the thought of food tips them over the edge.

As I laid in bed last night kicking the tyres of what I wanted to write about today, I remember feeling a bit of a thrill as I realised I was peckish…I’d had a decent supper when I got in from my class, but I’d gone to bed with some of my food budget left on the table and God of Pain’s words jumped up and bit me in the ass, you know? Don’t go starving yourself…

I’ve spent my whole life avoiding hunger pangs. God forbid one might sneak up and catch me unawares. I’ve rarely been more than three feet from an emergency snack, and whilst I appreciate hunger pangs don’t hurt exactly, I’ve always avoided them in the same way I’d avoid a dose of the clap. Hunger pangs are definitely persona non-grata in my world.

And yet. There I was, feeling my concave stomach – alright come on, I know I’m shaped like a buddha but cut me a bit of creative license here – embracing the hint of hunger like a kind of badge of honour. I could’ve gone back downstairs and had a crumpet, but I didn’t want to. I wanted to lay there enjoying the skinny experience and get jiggy with my hunger pang.

What’s that all about?

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