Tag Archives: control

Nothing In A Crackly Wrapper

In the here & now, , ,

Forty days. Four zero. Forty.

That’s how long it is since I ate something that I shouldn’t…I have to keep pinching myself, you know? It’s a milestone I can’t quite get my head around, when you consider how much my arse was dragging in the last few months of last year. And I’ll tell you what else…I haven’t really found it hard.

I know, right? I don’t understand it either. It’s like the Asshole voice has fallen off a cliff, because he hasn’t rattled his chains in well over a month. And I’m convinced it’s down to the fact that I’m giving refined sugar a really wide berth. I haven’t gone completely sugar-free…I’m not quite ready to go the whole hog and cut it out of my diet altogether, but to be honest I’m pretty close.

For forty days I’ve eaten no processed foods at all. No chocolate. No crisps or snacks. And that means that as I’ve been watching TV in the evenings, my viewing experience has been completely binge-free. Just me, on my own and flying solo without any treats which lead to more treats which lead me directly to hell in a hand cart. I’ve eaten grapes, or melon or a handful of nuts, but nothing which comes in a crackly wrapper.

It’s a weird thing you know…I feel like I’ve been set free. Right now, in this moment and all the moments over the last forty days I haven’t had to fight with myself over every food decision. I haven’t eaten a treat within my food budget and then taken that same budget down to the wire by having one more, then one more, all the time furiously recalculating what I might be able to eat for the rest of the week so I can eat still one more in this moment.

Those mid-afternoon cravings in the office have gone. That’s traditionally where my day took a wobble – everything up to lunchtime would be measured and planned, but whatever I put into my mouth with my afternoon cuppa would pretty much dictate how the rest of the day went, you know? Skidding home in the evening with only a sparse food budget left then spending what was left of the day driving myself mad with thoughts of all the things I wanted but couldn’t have.

Sometimes I’d cave and have them anyway, paying my Weight Watchers points forward with promises that I’d have a lean day tomorrow. Sometimes I’d just think fuck it and blow the budget then spend the rest of the week feeling guilty about the fact that I had no control, and pissed off that I’d left myself no further snacking opportunities. Whichever way, there was no respite from the food thoughts playing on a loop in my head, constantly stirred by my Asshole voice.

Imagine living that way, all the time. It’s like being stalked by some malevolent food beast that you just can’t get away from. The liberation that comes from that all of a sudden not being there is hard to describe. I remember being bullied when I was quite young and feeling like it was never going to end. My meek and gentle mum found out and raised all kinds of hell at the school, and it stopped immediately. What I’m feeling now reminds me of how I felt then, when I realised I could walk through the playground without having to worry about who was hiding in wait for me around the next corner.

Now, all that said, I’m not perfect…I am eating mountains of vegetables, and my portion sizes aren’t getting smaller…I know I need to focus on that, but at the end of the day nobody ever got fat by eating too much broccoli, right? One step at a time.

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Choosy Is Good, Right?

In the here & now, , ,

So, I had two things to navigate yesterday. One buffet lunch straight out of the 1970s with no healthy options whatsoever, and then a working dinner with some colleagues last night. I did okay, in fact you would’ve been proud of me. At lunchtime I did eat half a rather greasy sausage and a couple of fat sandwich quarters, but really only enough to stave off starvation and see me through the afternoon. And last night in the restaurant, I watched everyone else eat their appetisers but because there was nothing suitable on the menu for me I didn’t order one. Yes, you heard that right…even though I was ravenous I said no. I would have had one, but I was choosy, and choosy is good, right?

I practised behaving like a skinny girl. Squid? Awesome, I’ll have that, I love squid…oh hang on just a minute, deep fried in batter with a garlic mayo dip? Nah not for me…what else…oooh look, mini ribs with homemade slaw…I’ll have that! Oh blimey, hang on a sec, that barbecue sauce is probably loaded with sugar, and there’ll be half a tub of mayo in that slaw…shit, move past the ribs, come on we’ve got this. So I ordered a big fat juicy steak for my main, and passed on the starter.

The steak was alright, I mean it won’t go down in history as the best steak I’ve ever had but it was okay. It wasn’t big, and it wasn’t even particularly juicy but to be honest by the time I’d watched everyone else eat their squid and their ribs I wasn’t about to send it back. I’d ordered a side order of healthy greens, and I carefully transferred all my fries into the bowl my veggies came in just to get them off my plate.

I did catch my hand reaching out a couple of times to grab one of the fries…I ate three in the end. Which isn’t going to kill me, so there’s no drama and it’s a hell of an improvement on other similar meals in my chequered food past, where no chip escaped unscathed. Not on my watch. Don’t get me wrong, if I was in diet mode and trying, I would’ve just as carefully transferred the fries off my plate in a great show of willpower but over the course of the meal they would have gotten eaten anyway and that’s not willpower as much as geography. But not last night.

I was waiting, you know for the all-consuming desire to kick in and press the override switch on my willpower, but…nothing. It didn’t happen. And I didn’t eat dessert, although I can’t claim that as a victory because nobody else did either so that wasn’t willpower as much as circumstances. 

Interestingly enough though, when someone said does anyone fancy dessert? and the rest of our party shook their heads, my usual visceral reaction of wanting to beat to a pulp all the crazy people who passed on pudding meaning I couldn’t say yes either was also conspicuous by its absence…I didn’t want dessert. And thinking about it, I haven’t eaten anything sweet for over a month now. Saying that out loud almost makes we want to run to the mirror and make sure I’m still me.

I’m taking some comfort from all the above, and feeling rather hopeful that I might continue in a similar vein on my forthcoming trip…not having to fight with the asshole voice makes dinner out with friends a much more enjoyable experience, you know?

Have a great weekend everyone 🙂

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Jury’s Out…

In the here & now, ,

So I think I mentioned didn’t I, that my friend and I are heading out on holiday in a couple of weeks – I’m on countdown, with just eighteen sleeps to go. My friend is the world’s best travelling companion…she is uber organised. My modus operandi is to skid into my holidays having worked up to the very last minute with no preparation whatsoever but you know what, I totally get away with it because my friend does enough organising for the both of us. It’s the only bit of my life where I happily sit back and trust someone else to crack on and just tell me what we’re doing.

We’re cruising again – you know how I love life on the ocean – and this time we’re picking up our ship in Abu Dhabi and sailing into Oman, Fujairah, Sir Bani Yas Island and Dubai. I’ve never been to that part of the world and I’m curious to see what it’s like. It’s also my first hot holiday in a while, so I’m looking forward to finding a shady spot and devouring three or four good books as we sail through the week.

Things are going so well with my food plan at the moment that I’m in an agony of indecision trying to decide what food strategy I’m going to adopt whilst I’m on holiday, you know? Even though I stayed active on our last holiday by scaling waterfalls and climbing the odd mountain, and didn’t feel like I went overboard on the eating, I put on a ton of weight over the course of our week in Norway. I know I lost it again within a couple of weeks of coming home – once my plumbing recovered from the trip – but even so, watching the needle go up by eight pounds or so when I got home didn’t exactly fill me with joy and loveliness.

I’m not sure I ever really got back to the real focus I’d had on losing weight before the trip. I mean I limped along between getting home from that holiday and setting off for Cuba, but the impetus definitely fell off a cliff somewhere towards the end of summer.

My dilemma now, is that it feels a bit too soon to step away from this much more disciplined New Year mindset that I’ve manage to kick-start. By the same token I want to be able to enjoy the kind of carefree holiday moments where my friend and I throw caution to the wind and work our way through the cocktail menu for example, which always seems like a great idea at the time. The trouble is, my inhibitions diminish with each sip of whatever I’m drinking.

It’s not as if I’m a big drinker…actually I’m a bit of a fanny but it’s different on holiday somehow. And let’s be honest, you only get a thimble-full of french martini in your glass so it’s too easy to order another, and another…I seem to remember doing exactly that last time, and waking up the next morning with the remains of a cheesecake in my bed and a spoon stuck to my cheek. Not my finest hour, right?

Today marks my 31st day of eating properly, in terms of no processed food, and barely any refined sugar. I’m feeling awesome to be honest, and I know I can definitely keep the momentum going for the next two and a half weeks. The question is can I keep it going whilst I’m on holiday. Should I..?

I’m trying to steer clear of the kind of fat-girl thinking which equates having a good time with how much I can fit in my mouth, but I can already feel the asshole voice gearing up to flood my head with suggestions like it’s okay to relax a bit, you’re on holiday, and come on, you’ve been so good you deserve a treat…life’s too short, live a little and eat the fucking cake!!

I know those kind of sentiments are built on a crooked belief that denying myself the indulgences I want in the moment is some kind of punishment which will spoil the holiday I’ve worked so hard for. Which is bollocks, and I know it.

Still…

 

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Rediscovering The High

In the here & now, ,

I drafted this post as I was laid in bed last night, reflecting on the day. I’m not going to lie, I was feeling very smug, having aced day twenty three of my new start. And yes, I know that smug is beyond irritating…I was even getting on my own nerves to be fair but there’s no other way to describe it really…I was smug. I can’t recall the last time I managed twenty three days on the bounce without sneaking in a single treat. Hell I earned smug, right?

It’s interesting to look back at the lifecycle of my diet. It’s gone through different stages over the last seventeen months and one week, which is exactly how long I’ve been on this journey. It’s already taken the crown for the longest diet I’ve ever been on, and it’s depressing to think that if I hadn’t pissballed around I could have been much further down the road than I am right now – let’s not forget that the pounds I’m losing at the moment have already been lost and then found again. Still, it is what it is.

Phase one was nailed on, feet planted firmly in the sweet spot and the thought of cheating on my diet would have filled me with horror. It was all about eating the right things in the right quantities, and slowly weaning myself off the armchair/TV combo. Phase two kicked in when I’d signed up for the Cuba trek and the hurt machine took up residence. The food plan still held firm and my weight-loss started to gather a bit of momentum…happy days.

Phase three was when I got a bit cocky. I’d upped the exercise but at the same time I upped my intake of food and carried on losing, just more slowly. In hindsight I was looking at it all wrong, you know? I sort of fell into the mindset that I was earning the right to eat more because I was working up a sweat and walking several times a week. Or, to put it another way, I was eating more and getting away with it. 

Phase four was when I met the God of Pain, and the exercise descended into torture on a regular basis. Cuba was getting nearer and I was working hard. And yet I was still eating my efforts…sure, there was a slow saunter down the scale but my losses weren’t especially impressive. Cuba came and went, and that’s when I bumped headlong into phase five, which by and large was a fucking disaster. My foot was completely off the gas, my food plan was peppered with binges, and reclaimed poundage moved back into my pants at warp speed.

So this is phase six, and I’ve come full circle. I’m back in the sweet spot and I feel unshakable…maybe because I’ve switched it up a notch. I mean, the diet hasn’t changed as such, I’m just spending my food budget more wisely and shopping like a grown-up. And let’s be honest,  the thought of having to take a picture of my conversation with the Shitbird Scale and show you if the needle has moved in the wrong direction is enough to bring me out in a cold sweat. It’s proving to be quite an effective appetite suppressant to be honest.

I’ve also rediscovered the high which comes with knowing I haven’t put a foot wrong. And I’m here to tell you that it hands down beats the high I get from a crinkly wrapper and a sugar hit. Any day of the week 🙂

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A Stroke Of Genius

In the here & now, ,

So much for my plans to slip into one of those vibrant kaftans and glide around like some exotic creature from a bygone era…cavernous as they are, they don’t bloody fit me! The trying on session didn’t go well from the start if I’m honest…in my head, I’d hoped I might totally rock the Nana Mouskouri look but the reality was nearer to Demis Roussos – and if you don’t know who either of those people are you’re far too young to be in my blog, get out immediately!

Despite the acres of funky fabric there’s a sneaky little side seam in a kaftan which makes the fabric cling to your torso whilst lots of folds of fabric float around the sides. I shit you not, I looked like a sausage roll in a frock. So I shall launder them and put them in the skinny drawer to join the holding pattern of stuff that will fit me ‘soon’.

I did a really tough double session at the Kingdom of Pain last night, I was half dead by the time I got home. Let me tell you though, I’ve taken a few things on board from our friend who wrote the latest guest post and despite my screaming muscles, this morning I’ve decided to embrace the soreness as a signal that last night I worked. Today, every time I move and my abs or my quads or my arse cheeks twinge with a sharp reminder at how hard I worked, I shall have a little moment of celebration, you know? I will visualise every twinge pushing me one step closer to Skinny Town, because actually that’s exactly what’s happening.

I am seventeen days into my renewed resolve, and I couldn’t be happier with how my food plan is going. I managed 11 days’ worth of willpower leading up to Christmas before I fell off the waggon, but I’ve gone beyond that milestone now, and even my binge on the first of the year can’t really blot my copybook. I’ve found the sweet spot again and I can’t begin to tell you how great that feels.

I love waking up in the mornings feeling skinny. Not feeling guilty because I fell at the last hurdle and sank half a packet of Jaffa Cakes and a Daim bar with my suppertime cuppa. I love not waking up with indigestion because my body’s been fighting to process whatever crap I pushed into my face right before bed. Not carrying a heavy heart filled to the brim with guilt and disappointment because I let the asshole voice take the wheel…all of a sudden by focusing on what’s going well, I’m in control again.

Despite a working dinner a couple of days ago, where the menu was awesome and the desserts were to die for, I behaved. I even behaved with a smile on my face, because no asshole voice muscled in on the deal and tried to persuade me otherwise. Some of the people I was with ate dessert, but I didn’t and I didn’t care. It looked all kinds of awesome but I wasn’t interested, because I’m on it.

I’m trying my best not to feel cocky…pride comes before a fall and all that. But I’m in a good place, and I can feel you all cheering me on. On Sunday I saw a steady stream of folk checking out the Shitbird Says page even though I don’t publish as such on the weekend. Nothing to see here except my conversation with the scale. You remember, and I’m incredibly lucky that you care enough to make sure I’m bringing it home. Under your watchful gaze I feel compelled to try my absolute hardest.

It’s a stroke of genius, if you think about it 🙂

 

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