Monthly Archives: May 2017

A Quick Transaction

In the here & now, ,

Well yesterday was testing, I seemed to spend pretty much the whole day vexed with one thing or another. My mum had lost one of her hearing aids when I went to collect her after lunch, which is unfortunate because the one she wears in her other ear is currently away being repaired, so with no help in either ear it’s fair to say we’ve had easier days when it comes to communication.

God knows where it’s got to. She thinks she put it in a safe place, only now she can’t remember exactly where that was. She was frustrated because she couldn’t hear anybody and by the end of the day, I was getting that way myself. And then I felt guilty. It’s not her fault, you know? Mum gets very confused these days although to be fair, even before old age messed with her memory my Mum’s safe places had a lot in common with the fucking Bermuda Triangle .

The day wasn’t helped by my decision to burn fourteen of my thirty three points on a big breakfast. I had no weeklies left, so I sailed really close to the wind, in fact I went over by a couple of points at the end of the day. I’d done a supermarket shop, so the fridge was full and the cupboards were looking healthy which is always dangerous when I’m starving. Eating a big breakfast meant that I wasn’t hungry at lunchtime, so I just grabbed a piece of fruit, and ate dinner around 4.30pm, which used up the rest of my daily points allowance. By 8pm I was ravenous. And skint. No food budget left at all.

That’s the point at which the Asshole voice woke up and spied a window of opportunity. Why don’t you have something to eat? This is ridiculous! You’re hungry, and you’ve had a really tough day…nobody would blame you for going over your food budget just this once and you’ve only really bought healthy stuff so what harm could it do? You’re a grown woman, it’s not right that you should have to sit there and starve! 

I resisted all evening. Right up until the moment I went into the kitchen to pick up my bag so I could take it upstairs with me to bed. On the way past the food cupboard I accidentally ate three walnuts and a drizzle of organic honey. As you do. And that little indiscretion pushed me three points over what I’m allowed for the day. I mean, I appreciate that doesn’t sound a lot but it’s almost ten percent over. It’s the start of the slippery slope. That’s all that was racing through my head as I lay in bed last night and reflected on the day.

I’m chasing two pounds this week. Going over my daily allowance isn’t exactly going to cover me in glory, is it? I won’t be doing a victory step-on after I’ve recorded the number on Wednesday if I let that frame of mind take a hold, you know the one that thinks it’s okay to push the boundaries.

In the back of my mind yesterday as I stood in front of the cupboard and pushed those walnuts into my face, tipping my head back so I could squeeze the honey straight into my mouth I was transported back to those days where that kind of action was familiar. It was a quick transaction, you know? A swift surreptitious snack in the half light of the under-cupboard halogens, out of sight of anyone. Well, anyone except the dog, who heard the food cupboard open from three rooms away and immediately assumed the position by my feet like a one-dog SWAT team just in case anything got dropped.

Also in the back of my mind was the intention to knock those extra three points off today’s total…sort of like a loan that has to be paid back. This morning, I can see that for exactly what it is…a fine example of broken thinking. The Asshole was behind that pearl of wisdom, in a move designed to undermine today too. Go to bed feeling like you messed up and start the next day feeling disadvantaged and with an even smaller food budget than usual…way to go to set today up for a fail too. But at least I see it, right? I know his game, and he can fuck right off.

Yesterday’s gone. All I need to do today is colour inside the lines. Stick to my food budget, and make good choices. It’s all okay…I can do that 🙂

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Living On Dust

In the here & now, ,

It’s all very well you know, this new way of spending my food budget but I’ve got to be honest, the days where there are no weekly points on offer are a bit bleak. I went to bed last night feeling like I hadn’t eaten for a week. Seriously, I could’ve gnawed my own arm off.

And it’s a bit of a double whammy, right? The way weight watchers allocates your points budget largely depends on what you weigh, so as you work your way down the scale, they knock the odd point off here or there. I get thirty three points to spend every day now I’ve lost a bunch of weight, but when I started it was well into the forties. And I’m here to tell you, thirty three points goes nowhere. And yet, I guarantee that there’ll be folk in the posse who are much nearer Skinny Town than I am whose eyes are out on stalks at the prospect of thirty three, because they’ll be on like twelve.

It’s weird isn’t it, it’s the only system I’ve ever know that rewards success by taking shit away. I suppose they have to, but given that I’m only halfway to Skinny Town I reckon by the time I get there I’m going to living on dust.

Having lived life as a grown-up without food boundaries for the last thirty odd years, getting my head around what a normal portion of food looks like continues to be a struggle for me every single day. Take yesterday for example. I bought a boxed salad for lunch, with ham, but I had to push it and buy a cooked chicken breast off the deli too, just to bulk it out a bit. Because, you know, a ham salad wouldn’t have been enough on it’s own. Of course it would, for a normal person. But to me it seemed stingy.

And when I cook dinner, I eat a mountain of vegetables. Which happen to be free of points, so that’s all well and good however I don’t suppose that whoever wrote the algorithm for deciding how many points are in stuff imagined for a second that anyone would ever sit down and eat a double head of broccoli and a full bag of sprouts alongside the main event when they decided to make all vegetables points-free. I can do that. Easily.

I’d probably do well to remember that although there are foods which are free of points, they’re not free of calories. And no matter how effective the points system is, if you take in more calories than you burn off, you’re knackered. Scoffing a full punnet of strawberries or a whole melon isn’t necessarily working to the spirit of what the points-free element of my food plan is all about, right? It’s taking the piss a bit, if I look myself in the eye and have a come to Jesus conversation.

I’m chasing a two pound loss this week, off the back of a sedentary week which nudged me a cock-hair in the wrong direction. So I can’t afford to take the piss.

Best stop then, dammit 🙂

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It Could’ve Been Worse

In the here & now, , ,

So I’m not going to win any prizes for slimmer of the week am I, but all things considered it could have been worse. One quarter pound on isn’t the biggest disaster in the world, right? I get it. More than that, I probably deserved it to be fair. I don’t think there’s been a week in the last twelve months where I missed my exercise goal every single day, but I did last week. In my defence, for at least four of those days I felt like crap, although it didn’t stop me from eating my weeklies from the cocoon I created under my poorly blanket. I probably shouldn’t have done that, but I felt entitled.

It’s easier to accept a crap output when you understand the reasons why, don’t you think? I never seethe with resentment and fantasise about taking a hammer to the Shitbird Scale when I know I’ve had a bad week, because it sort of feels fair. When I accept responsibility for putting on a shit show, I have no axe to grind with a shit number. No, I reserve those fantasies for weeks where I’ve brought my A game and the Shitbird’s just being spiteful. Anyway, last week was shit, so let’s move on. I’m going for two pounds this week. Are you in?

I had a dabble with some fake tan last night, and you know what, it looks pretty good. I thought I’d better point it out in case you looked at the Shitbird’s page and thought I had dirty feet. I don’t look as dark as I did when I had the spray tan, but I definitely look like I’ve been toasted. It’s a product called Skinny Tan, I don’t know if you’ve seen it but they reckon it hides cellulite too. Which is awesome, but I can’t confirm or deny those rumours because I only rubbed it in to just above the knee. No point wasting it on no-man’s land, right? It doesn’t seem to have done much for the lumpy bits on my upper arms if I’m brutally honest, but then nothing coming out of a tube is going to fix that particular war zone.

The thing is, I feel nice with a bit of colour, and isn’t that all that matters? When I opened my eyes this morning I saw one of my new shirts hanging outside the wardrobe, with the necklace I’m going to accessorise it with strung over the hanger. I had my shoes picked out, and my pants…it’s so hard to explain to a skinny string bean that the privilege of feeling good in your clothes isn’t simply a given…I don’t think I’ll ever take that feeling for granted, you know? Eighty four pounds ago, I didn’t even notice which shapeless monstrosity I was pulling over my head on any given day, much less enjoy wearing it. Put me in front of a mirror these days and I preen like a fucking budgie.

That’s just one of the dozens of ways in which it’s nicer being me now, as opposed to then. I’m starting to feel like my life is fitting me better, and not just my clothes.  It’s what keeps me going forward. That, and you lot, who never fail to lift my mood when you reach out and tell me about your own journey, and struggles and triumphs.  I can’t even find the words to tell you how awesome it is when one of you takes the time to let me know that what happens in these pages helps you too.

Come on…let’s smash it this week 🙂

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Almost But Not Quite Human

In the here & now, ,

Well, I’m feeling more human than I was this time last week…that ear infection was nasty. I managed to make it to my friend’s house this last weekend, a couple of hours north of here. It was our bi-annual pilgrimage to the craft and food fair that we love so much and I was reluctant to miss it, but we had to adapt our usual drill to reflect the fact that I was feeling a bit feeble. I haven’t seen my friend since we got back from holiday in February, but rather than sitting up chatting into the wee small hours which is customary on the first night, I was asleep in bed just after nine.

I was wiped. And I still had ear ache. I still have, actually, although it’s not anywhere near as bad as it was. I’m going to go stage a sit-in at my Doctor’s surgery today until they either give me something to sort it out once and for all, or chop the damn thing off.

The Asshole voice has been both enthusiastic and persistent this weekend. There was a steady stream of helpful suggestions emanating from the corner of my head where he lives, including his permission to throw caution to the wind and eat what I wanted because apparently it doesn’t count when you’re poorly. Sly fucker. I had to push the voice away at every single stall in the food hall. Speciality sausages, pies overflowing with steak and stilton, brownie bars and a hundred different flavours of cheese were all fair game…the Asshole lobbied hard and fast for all of them.

I’ve got to be honest, I was tempted. Don’t you think it’s harder to resist stuff when your defences are low? I do. I even tried a few samples this time, where last time I had a zero tolerance and managed to make it around without a single one. I counted them though, so it was controlled. I had four fingernail-sized pieces of cheese, a mouthful of pork pie and an eighth of a sausage on a stick so I’m fairly confident it won’t break the points bank. I bought a small pouch of smoked almonds which were all kinds of awesome, but they fitted easily into my weekly points, and that was the only thing I bought in the food hall.

It’s a shame I couldn’t quite pull off the same restraint when it came to the non-food side of things. However. I’ve only got one extra chin nowadays, so it’s harder to resist some of the lovely hand made jewellery because it’s starting to look nice on me again. And even though I’m still a bit Buddha-shaped, my body pretty much manages to squeeze into a size large these days, so the lack of XXXL duds didn’t cramp my style like it has done in the past.

There were lots of lovely little boutiques selling exactly the kind of stuff I like to wear, and I had arms like a fucking orangutang by the time we made it back to the car from carrying all the bags but you know what, I figured it was better than than allowing myself to get talked into buying pies, right?  I can’t be expected to resist everything, I mean I’m still a work in progress after all.

I’m not feeling confident about weigh-day tomorrow. My food plan has been on point, but I’ve been laid low and didn’t make a single visit to the Kingdom of Pain last week due to the pain and the pressure in my ear. But on a brighter note, the Physio has declared that my dodgy knee is on the mend, and I can go back to classes as normal this week, with just a couple of minor adjustments so hopefully I’ll start to build up my fitness again. I missed it, like a proper weirdo.

I’ll update the Shitbird page tomorrow whether it’s good, bad or ugly. Please lets all close our eyes and pray that it’s not bad or ugly 🙂

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