Tag Archives: control

Me? I Said That?

In the here & now, ,

feet

Well what an awesome weekend we just had…honestly, if laughing was an olympic sport we would have had every place on the podium. I will forever look back at the weekend and smile – the messy and highly inappropriate Friday afternoon session where we worked our way through the extensive cocktail menu in the lido lounge as we set sail across a very choppy sea is one highlight. The Salty Dog cocktail which tasted of feet was particularly memorable.

The Friday evening dinner followed by super-cheesy jazz hands entertainment with more than a few singers who wouldn’t have been able to hit a note if their lives had depended on it was hilarious.  The open-top bus tour of Dublin in the wind yesterday was good fun especially since one of our gang was trying to sleep off the excesses of Friday night on the back seat, and mooching around the Christmas markets was very festive…it’s just been epic, all of it.

I’m very happy to report that even with Singapore Slings and Whisky Sours running through my veins I wasn’t tempted to renege on the deal where my food plan was concerned and that’s one of the things I will look back on with immense satisfaction. I did it! I made a plan, and I stuck to it. Which, you know to Joe Average is sort of normal, nothing to write home about. For me, it still feels like a major achievement when it’s related to making skinny choices.

We came out of the Christmas markets area yesterday with the intention of flagging a taxi back to the ship, which we could just about see in the distance. I heard someone say the words why don’t we just walk? and as I looked around to see who’d made such a ridiculous suggestion, I saw five friends with their mouths open staring at me, and realised it was me. I’d suggested that. WTF is that all about?

So we did. It was about two and a half miles in the end, according to my wrist bitch, which to be fair I almost had to reboot – her internal micro chip came close to meltdown. On a daily basis she’s used to giving me a virtual kick up the hiney with encouraging messages like Come on, you’re an eighth of the way towards your daily move target! and Don’t give up now, just another nine thousand steps to go! Yesterday I’d swear there was a touch of hysteria when she announced You have reached your daily move target! When she realised I’d doubled it she was verging on emotional.

I was so knackered when we got back – I was footsore and my Ugg boots had rubbed blisters on my heels, but I did it. It was the kind of thing a normal person would do you know? I felt awesome. Well, to be more accurate I felt awesome after I’d made it as far as the ship’s spa for an emergency pedicure and foot massage, which I figured I’d earned 🙂 You know as I reflect back to my holiday in August when every step was agony, when I spent the time on shore excursions looking for a place to sit and rest my 300lb+ body and walking was something I was major-league struggling with it served as another sharp reminder of exactly how far I’ve come over the last four months.

It’s a good job – remember I said I was looking around for my longer term fitness challenge..? I’ve seen it…I know what I want to do.

If it doesn’t challenge you, it doesn’t change you, right? Watch this space 🙂

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Three Months A Blog

Freeform thoughts, In the here & now, Reflections on past times, , , ,

3mCan you believe it’s three whole months since that rainy post-holiday Saturday when I sat down and flexed my fingers over the keyboard for the very first time. That’s a quarter of a whole year!! Crikey it feels like we’ve walked miles together since then don’t you think..? I just mooched a couple of hours away this morning by working my way through all the blog posts I’ve written, and of course all your comments which for me, are a constant source of pride and inspiration.

It’s the first time I’ve really properly looked back – I mean I know I’m the queen of edit, often before you get to see my daily dollop of words they’ve spent a few days simmering in the cooking pot and it’s rare that they escape onto the page without having been chopped and changed, pulled apart and put back together again until I’m as happy as I’m ever going to be – that’s just the perfectionist in me. I know I need to get over myself but I just want it to be good you know? Asshole is chipping in here with the words control freak by the way, just thought I’d share that 🙂

I never edit after they’re published, in fact once they’re out there I tend not to read them again, focusing instead on what you write, and of course what’s coming up next. But what I noticed as I’ve worked my way through every post from the beginning, including your bits was how much it’s evolved over a relatively short period of time. I didn’t really imagine this would ever be anything more than a self-propelled written conscience, perhaps with an occasional visitor who’d more than likely wandered in by mistake and politely passed the time of day before moving on. But look what we turned into!

There weren’t many comments in the early days, but the ones I got were treasured. I read and re-read them…I wondered about the person who’d written them. Where they lived, what their story was you know? I wondered what had led them to my blog, and what had prompted them to leave their own footprint on it by chipping in with thoughts of their own. I still do that now. Looking back, I can see where some of our familiar names fell into step and started to really build this community and now, I just feel quite humbled by the way it’s gathered it’s own momentum and become a thing, you know?

I love the way we all relate – all of our stories are similar and yet different. Wherever in the world we happen to live, we’re all unique as individuals, but connected. United in this fight against the fat suits we somehow managed to get ourselves zipped into. In the back office at Skinny Girl HQ – aka my kitchen ha ha – I can look at the analytics tool which shows me how many visitors I’ve had, and which posts they’ve visited, and I get a massive blast of inner sunshine when I see a new visitor has somehow landed on the latest post, and stuck around to have a really good root around lots of the older stuff.  And when someone writes and says they’ve laughed, or cried, or felt supported or understood by something that one of us has written or shared, well that’s the best feeling of all.

So anyway…my name’s Dee and I’m a food addict. But I am 3 months clean and sober, mainly down to you guys. It’s never easy, but so far, this route to Skinny Town is proving to be way more enjoyable than I could have hoped for, and a million miles away from the boulder-strewn paths I’ve been used to navigating in the past…that has to be the posse factor, right?

Happy anniversary, I appreciate your company more than I can tell you…big hugs all around 🙂

 

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Bending The Budget

Freeform thoughts, In the here & now, , ,

budget deficit - recession 3d conceptSo I’ve got to hold my hands up and say that I’ve never been really good at budgeting. Cue hysterical laughter from anyone who knows me – I’m the ultimate ‘champagne lifestyle on a prosecco income’ kind of girl. Always have been. My mum was exactly the same…I always remember the twinkle she’d have in her eye when she showed off a new purchase, usually accompanied by the words, ah I was just looking but the devil got behind me and pushed! So I’m very familiar with that feeling, you know when there’s just too much month left at the end of the money..? But then hey, that’s what credit cards are for, right?

I’ve never gotten myself into a situation I haven’t been able to unpick, but lets just say my bank manager lives on his nerves, and I’ve probably contributed more than most to his permanently furrowed brow and sweaty disposition.

I get it though. I understand why I love to spend. When my boy was small and I scratched a living as a single mum, money was really tight and I had no choice but to be really careful. He never went without, although I often did, but that’s almost beside the point – I became really good at creative accounting. Robbing Peter to pay Paul…borrowing from the fuel budget to buy food, paying for fuel from the Christmas fund and reallocating everything back to square the circle as soon as my work bonus dropped in.

Somehow I always got by, but I never felt like I had it all figured out, I was just good at juggling that’s all. I got away with it. In more recent times, money hasn’t been quite so tight and my splurges have grown in tandem with my income but somehow I’ve continued to sail close to the wind and get away with it,  often by the skin of my teeth before every now and again getting a reality check and properly pulling my belt in, spending virtually nothing until I’ve stepped back from the edge and got my financial ducks back in a row.

Thing is, my attitude towards my food budget has often followed a similar path. When I say food budget, I mean the amount of points or calories or whatever I’m counting on my diet of choice. Let me give you an example…lets imagine I’ve got 1200 calories a day…that’s what, 8400 a week? Woohoo!! Monday Tuesday Wednesday is open season, going great. Thursday and Friday there’s looking like a bit too much week left at the end of the calories but it’ll be ok, I can cut back a bit. Saturday and Sunday I can manage on a few leaves of spinach and half a walnut, it’s all good.

Tell you what, I’ll just borrow a few from next week’s calorie budget, if I even it out across the week I’ll hardly notice…Monday Tuesday go ok, Wednesday and Thursday it’s looking a bit sparse but it’s ok…I’ve still got half a bag of spinach and a slice of ham to see me over the weekend…and repeat. It doesn’t compute you know? It appears that I have to be stricter, more disciplined…more in control of my food budget than I’m used to being with my spending of anything else, ever.

Marry that with my food addiction issues, a tendency to binge and my asshole diet logic, and that boys and girls is called the perfect storm. Even now, from my pole position within the sweet spot, wholly committed to the cause and with the posse shoring up my backbone, faced with a buffet at work yesterday I was acutely conscious of the asshole’s twisted calculations going on in my head. How much of it could I get down my neck, if I just ring fenced a couple of points for supper…if I eat fifteen sausage rolls now I probably won’t be hungry later on anyway, right?

I overloaded on the buffet, and scraped through the rest of the day without blowing my points budget but I could have eaten a scabby donkey by the time my head hit the pillow last night…within plan, just, but not a sensible balanced disciplined choice of food spread throughout the day. Far the opposite…feast, then famine. So…where to spend, where to save and how to budget remains work in progress.

Unless it involves blowing my budget on a new handbag obviously…then the gloves are off 🙂

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Who’s Pulling My Strings?

Freeform thoughts, In the here & now,

brain

For those of you who’ve been following my blog for a while you’ve probably gathered that I have a day job, and writing my blog is a hobby – I get to indulge my love of words whilst keeping my hands occupied at the same time so they don’t let me down by feeding my face when I’m not paying attention. (By the way is that just me? I swear on occasion I’ve found myself munching on something without any recollection of putting it in my mouth – please tell me that happens to you too, I don’t need any more reasons to feel odd).

Anyway, through the course of my work, I’ve been lucky enough to do lots of self-development, and one thing that comes through time and again is the issue of control. Now I wouldn’t go as far as describing myself as a control freak, (although I would imagine my ex-husband might have a different view  *rolls on the floor laughing*) but I do like to control things that are happening around me, and I hate being controlled. In the context of my life generally, that presents me with no problems whatsoever. But it’s completely at odds when you look at it in the context of my relationship with food.

If it comes down to a stand-off between me, and food, trust me when I say I am not the one in control. For argument’s sake, let’s go with the dictionary definition of the word control – ‘to exercise restraint or direction over; dominate; command’. I could probably exercise restraint over a dish of tripe. And I’d definitely jump at the chance to dominate and command a plate of rocket or watercress (all the way to the opposite end of the earth if necessary, YAK ) but if we’re talking about chips, or cake, or Haagen Dazs…pretty much anything else that actually tastes good (!) I’m a lost cause. In the context of that relationship, I’m the Anastasia to chocolate cake’s Christian Grey…to put it another way, I’m not the one holding the whip.

Sure, right now I’m totally in the zone, standing firmly on the sweet spot so at this moment in time I’m doing ok.  But I’ve been here before and I know I can’t be complacent. I’m not dumb enough to think I’ve cracked it, sooner or later whether it’s a mid-diet fall from grace, or an end-of-diet victory lap, the control will shift from me, to whatever it is that gets hold of my strings and makes me eat cake. And yes, on a rational level I know it’s still me. It just doesn’t feel like it.

I wish I understood why. Trying to find the answer to that is like my own personal holy grail, you know? I can see the quest to understand it becoming my life’s work. The desire to be skinny is alive and well. I don’t lack motivation, I work really hard and like to make a success of stuff…I’m as stubborn as a mule if I set my mind to something and I usually get my own way. All my ducks seem to be lined up in a row but STILL food controls me, not the other way around.

Answers on a postcard please..?

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