Tag Archives: bitch in the bathroom

She Wouldn’t Dare…

In the here & now, , ,

scale

So I woke up on Sunday feeling really skinny, you know that way where you’re laid in bed and you put your hand on your stomach and it’s at a lower altitude than your head? I must’ve laid in bed for a good half an hour debating whether or not to chance my arm with the bitch in the bathroom, or whether just to call it, you know? I feel skinny therefore I am. I’ve obviously lost weight this week. Girl done good, the end.

I decided I needed to know. I could sense my Asshole voice gearing up to rub salt in the wound…you stuck, again? Really?? That’s so unfair, you tried so hard and totally gave it your best shot but look you’re over fifty now, and your body has obviously settled at where it’s meant to be…eighteen stone is a good weight for you. 

The fuck it is. And I wasn’t scared of the number as such…I was more worried about the drastic measures that I was muttering about under my breath if I’d been forced to step off for a fourth week with no movement. I was seriously worried that I might demand an appointment to have my jaws wired or try to get my stomach tied in a knot. Surely she wouldn’t dare …I swear, even the dog was sweating as I nudged the bitch onto the correct tile, but to everyone’s relief the number had gone down. Two pounds off.

Well, I say that. The first time I got on it said two pounds off. Then I got on another twice just to make sure and it stayed at two. Once more for good measure and it said three so I nearly broke my neck getting on for a fourth time hoping it would continue going up. I should have stopped at three because the needle went back down to two, and I stubbed my toe on the bath.

Note to self, I clearly weigh more when I’m grinning like the village idiot, so in future I’ll stay mardy. But whatever, the impasse is broken. Two pounds off, and I’ll take that thank you very much. I deserved those two pounds, you know? I worked really hard, in fact last week I walked almost thirty miles, fitted in five exercise classes and stuck to my food plan. The Asshole voice thinks it’s a fucking travesty that I didn’t lose ten pounds and between you and me I agree, but I’m keeping schtum…don’t want to piss off the Gods of Skinny by appearing ungrateful, right?

So yesterday, you’d have thought that buoyed by my success, I’d ace the diet, and you’d be right, I did. Right up until the point that a work colleague rocked up to a late meeting with scooby snacks. One packet of salt and vinegar crisps and two Oreo cookies later I had to re-think my dinner options. I wouldn’t care but I don’t even like Oreo cookies all that much. I mean they’re okay, you know if you’re desperate. For emergencies. But I wasn’t desperate, not even a little bit and there was no emergency. They were just there in front of me for the taking, and I felt entitled. Silly moo.

Whatever…I’m back in the saddle and we continue on. I’d like to think maybe I just paused to admire the view, after all it’s a while since I’ve stood in this spot…I’m officially lighter than I’ve been in probably five years, and when push comes to shove, I toughed it out, right? I faced down the plateau without throwing the towel in. I found something to celebrate…resilience, patience, whatever you want to call it, it’s ass was mine.

Come on, lets push on…that skinny life is waiting 🙂

Like it..? Tell your friends!
 

Slowly Slowly Catchee Monkey…

In the here & now, , , ,

impatience

So I had a bulging mailbag on Friday following my post about getting stuck on the same number, and as with all things diet-related there’s safety in numbers. It was a massive comfort to know it’s not just me, you know? Although I’ve got to say, some of the posse are blessed with far more patience than me. For two weeks now my number hasn’t moved, and I think that’s bad…one of our lot has just four pounds left to lose after shedding almost a hundred, and her number hasn’t budged for five weeks. Christ on a bike, I’d be a basket case if the needle hadn’t moved after five weeks.

Nobody mentions the patience needed in this game do they? Determination, yes…willpower, yes…motivation, yes that too. All those qualities get bandied about as the cornerstone of dieting success and when I’m in the sweet spot I have all of those in abundance. Patience, not so much so. Impatience is one of my things in fact. I honestly think it came free with my vagina in sort of a buy one get one free kind of deal…I’m just not very good at waiting. For anything.

And the thing is, it’s when impatience turns to frustration that my Asshole voice sits up and starts rattling his chains. I’m dangerously close to the edge, so I spent a chunk of time this weekend scouring the world wide web for as many perspectives on weight-loss plateaus as possible. I figured if I can at least understand why my needle isn’t moving, it might help.

According to her website, Jillian Michaels (who I’ve often observed from the comfort of my big fat leather recliner whooping ass on The Biggest Loser as I vaporised a family bag of cheese balls) reckons that a weight loss plateau will typically last for around three weeks. Which made me feel a bit better, I mean she’s da man, right? Professor of making fat folk fit strong and skinny. Except then she went on to say that in her experience, a plateau usually means that you’re not paying enough attention to what you’re doing.

Which pissed me off a bit, I’m not going to lie. It kind of feels like she’s saying I’m not trying hard enough, but I shit you not I am consumed with trying. I have never worked this hard in my entire life. Mainly down to the fact that Cuba and its mountain range is now less than four months away and I’ve still got the equivalent of two arses inside my pants.

I’ll give you yesterday morning as an example…I went for the double whammy again, circuit training followed by boxing. Three quarters of the way through the circuit training as I got to the second set of one of the kettle bell exercises that nearly wipes me out, I was so tempted to feign some kind of cardiac arrest to get out of doing it. My shoulder was hurting, my chest felt like it was going to explode and it took every bit of backbone I could summon to keep going. But I did keep going. I turn up and work hard every day…trust me, even if I wasn’t a fully-paid-up wuss I couldn’t work any harder than I am.

But I did take a long hard look at what I’m eating, just in case. And looking back over three weeks’ worth of food plans, although I’m following the principles that God of Pain outlined and I’m eating within points, I have to admit it’s a bit samey. I’m sticking to the same things, at roughly the same time of day. There’s a definite order, which is something I’ve worked really hard to achieve because it goes against my nature, but it seems that routine in what you eat is a no-no.

Loads of you told me about switching up my food budget for a couple days and then reducing my points back down – apparently it’s a thing, and Jillian Michaels offers the same advice. So I’m going to give that a whirl this week. I’m also going to drink more water…yeah, that old chestnut. I know I always say that, but in practice I seem to run out of steam after a day or two, and I find myself back in the place where I really only actually drink water whilst I’m in the fitness studio sweating my cahoonies off. Outside of that, I don’t touch it, even though I know I should.

So this week I’m going to drink like a camel, and fool my body with an eating plan that is less predictable. Whatever not takes, right? I refuse to be passive whilst the bitch in the bathroom decides whether she’ll grant me a lower number. I hold the power, not her and I’ve so got this 🙂

Like it..? Tell your friends!
 

Stepping Off The Hot Mess Express

In the here & now, ,

losing weightI wore a linen dress to work on Friday. Yep, you heard that right… Me! In a frock!!

I guess in order to understand how huge that is, (not the dress, which to be fair was pretty cavernous, but I mean huge in terms of the fact that I wore it in the first place) I probably need to explain that since I started working there a couple of years ago, nobody’s ever seen me in anything other than stretchy black pinstripe pants teamed with a wide selection of loose-fitting tops. Walking through the door in a dress felt all kinds of weird, but I’ve got to say everyone was full of compliments. Well, once they’d picked their chin up off the floor that is 🙂

So, that’s something else I can add to my growing list of firsts…it ranks right up there with discovering I could cross my legs again, and being able to cut my toenails and breathe at the same time. Only people who’ve been seriously fat will get what I mean with that one…it really is the little things that normal people take for granted which all add to the feeling that slowly but surely I’m stepping off the Hot Mess Express, and reclaiming normal as my very own.

You’ll never guess what the bitch in the bathroom offered up this week…three whole pounds. How about them apples, eh? I lost nothing last week but I was more relaxed about it than I ever used to be, because I know that the input has been pretty solid. My diet is on track and my exercise has gone to a whole other level, so I was confident that sooner or later she’d have to concede some poundage. I did a happy dance right there in the bathroom.

More importantly I can feel it…I feel skinnier, somehow. Even though I didn’t manage to have quite the super-clean eating week I’d promised myself, I did okay you know? Much better than the week before. And now, I have just two pounds to go to hit the 70lbs mark, which is my five stones milestone and folks, I’m going after it this week. Big time…hello seventeen stone something, your ass belongs to me. 

I had a bit of a splurge and bought myself some new clothes over the weekend with the money I made from selling my too big for me now wardrobe. Some of them are in the next size down again from where I am right now, because I wanted to choose some things for my holiday before all the summer stuff gets picked over.

I’m excited about the parcel arriving, which is a bit of a turn up for the books…something else I haven’t felt for the longest time. Buying new clothes is an ordeal when you’re the size of a moose because nothing looks nice or feels nice. Ask me if any of my new stuff came from a fat-girl shop..? NO! I mean they’re still fat sizes from a normal shop, but still. It’s a big step forward. Another first.

God of Pain is back from his jollies, and  classes start again tonight after a three-day hiatus. I’m ready to go back. And yes, you heard that right, too…I’m ready.

I still keep having to pinch myself to believe that I’m really doing this. Come on!

 

 

Like it..? Tell your friends!
 

Radiating Sunshine

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

mad cow

So I woke up this morning ready to face the music – isn’t it funny how in the night things always look very bleak? I’ve never been one to worry about stuff, and sleepless nights are an unknown concept to me but I must ‘fess up and tell you that last night whilst I was watching TV, and starving after vaporising every single available smart point by mid afternoon, I made a coffee with all milk to try and fill a hole…it’s the first time ever I’ve gone over my weekly points. I know, right?

It was the lesser of two evils – there were several items of food that had collectively serenaded me from the fridge all night and I came within a cock hair of caving in…I didn’t, but I needed something. I could have had a large glass of water but quite frankly that was never going to cut it. But although I savoured every drop, the milky coffee weighed heavy on my mind, and from the point at which I woke up for a quick tinkle at normal work get-up time then tried to go back to sleep for my customary Sunday morning doze-fest I had the most bizarre dreams.

I have this mental picture of the Asshole sitting on his buffet in the corner of my mind, furiously loading movie reel after movie reel of things designed to convince me that I’d blown it. The words start of a slippery slope were playing on a loop in my head, accompanied by moving pictures of me whizzing down a giant slide, being chased by one of the Cravendale cows who wanted the milk back. In the next scene I was laid underneath the cow drinking from its udders whilst someone blew my arse up with a bicycle pump and in the last scene I was the cow…it all got very weird at that point.

I walked the green mile to the bitch in the bathroom with great trepidation when I finally shook off the weirdness. I’d managed to convince myself that the half pint of semi-skimmed milk that I’d had over and above my weekly allowance was going to mean a gain this week. I was suitably downcast and ready to take it on the chin, until she told me that I’d lost a pound.

What?? I did my usual double-check on several tiles to make sure she wasn’t taking the piss, but sure enough…another pound gone. And immediately, I started radiating sunshine. The day looked great. I’d dodged a bullet…okay I’m being overly dramatic, it was half a pint of semi-skimmed milk, not ten litres of Haagen Dazs and a ton of cheeseballs. But, for the first time in eight months and eight days I’d stepped over the boundary…thank god the bitch didn’t clock it.

So, it’s a brand new shiny Weight Watchers week and it’s an important one. It’s the UK Blog Awards on Friday in London…I’m too giddy for words. My boy got fitted for his Tux yesterday. I’ve bought new sparkly flat shoes and I’ve totally gotten over myself about the palazzo pants.  I’ve booked Thursday off work for a little turd-polishing, and on Friday we’re doing the whole first-class-train-swanky-hotel thing…it’s going to be an epic weekend.

The week’s got off to a cracking start…I did a long walk with the furry one this morning, and I’ve finally got around to sorting out that mountain of fat clothes. No messing, I’m going to make this week count. No wobbles allowed, right? Onwards! 🙂

 

Like it..? Tell your friends!
 

Don’t Forget The Sausages…

In the here & now, , , ,

image

So I’d obviously given serious thought to the ways in which I could avoid getting sucked into the naughty corner at the spring fair that we’ve been to today. One strategy I flirted with was avoiding the food hall altogether but as I left home yesterday my boy’s parting words were mum don’t forget the sausages…kind of ruled out that option, right? One of the stalls which comes every year sells speciality sausages, and they are heaven on a plate. And trust me when I say my boy knows his way around a sausage…he’s never actually been to this event but he looks forward to it as much as I do and I guarantee he’ll have his nose in my bag of booty faster than a ferret up a trouser leg as soon as I get home on Sunday.

So, my number one strategy for a no samples consumed shopping experience was ruled out before I set a foot out of doors, although as I laid in bed last night and thought about it I decided that was actually a good thing, you know? I wanted to be able to look back and feel proud that I’d faced down the Asshole voice and resisted every single temptation, instead of wimping out altogether. Mind you, at the time I was basking in the afterglow of a big glass of red which always adds a touch of bravado to my thought process.

Let me try and set the scene…did you ever watch that episode of Friends, where Joey tried to make ends meet by taking a job in a big department store, and he was in competition with another bloke to see who could spray the most people with scent in the hope that they’d be the one to sell the most..? Right, well it’s exactly the same as that. Every three steps, someone materialises right in front of you with a bit of cheese on a stick, or a tray of bite-size brownies, and waves them under your nose in the hope that you’ll visit their counter and fill your boots with whatever they’re selling.

It’s what every fat girl imagines heaven would be like.  Times gone by I’m not gonna lie, we’ve probably done two or three circuits. Can you remember where that chilli-infused oil vendor was? No..? Neither can I, we’d best go around again. Oh, you’d like me to try that..? Certainly. They didn’t even make it a challenge, you know…no ‘one sample per customer’ rule in this food hall, we didn’t even have to try and look different second time around. Let’s swap scarves, and I’ll put your glasses on, I’m going in for more Camembert…

So if you’re dieting, it’s carnage. And, all joking aside, it’s hard. It’s hard not to feel resentful that you can’t just face plant into everything and do your best impression of a food hoover which is what you desperately want to do. Well, it’s what I desperately wanted to do.

I guess what helped me get to grips with the Asshole voice today was…well, there were a couple of things actually. Visualising my encounter with the bitch in the bathroom when I get home tomorrow was the first one. Tomorrow’s Sunday…weigh day. No getting away from that, right? No week stretching ahead of me where I can be extra good and unpick any collateral damage before I step on board…today was it, day seven of my dieting week. 

And also, my friend had checked ahead of time what I could eat, and had gone to a lot of trouble making sure she’d organised food to fit my diet…pushing two of everything into my face as we walked around the food hall would have totally disrespected her thoughtfulness, and I wouldn’t do that. So, Houston it turned out there was no problem here after all.

I had saved half my additional weekly smart points, so I had a bit of naughty in the bank. I know these vendors like the back of my hand, I mean come on, I’ve broken bread (or fudge or cake or cheese or sausages) with all of them over the seven or so years that my friend and I have been going. I was able to select my favourite thing ahead of time. There’s a bloke who makes brownies, and without question his white chocolate and raspberry brownies are the most amazing brownies in the world. They are the rock star of the brownie kingdom, and one of them is sitting on a plate in my friend’s kitchen right now with my name on.

No samples, but one treat, within budget and much anticipated all day…it’s going to taste even better than I remembered because it won’t hit a jaded palate. I haven’t assailed my senses throughout the day with all kinds of wonderful. I’ve sampled everything with my eyes, and nothing with my mouth…I’ve had a lovely day and yes of course I still wish I could have dived headlong into all of it. But I didn’t, and I’m feeling strong. Happy.

Most of all I cannot wait to wrap my chops around that brownie ?

 

 

Like it..? Tell your friends!