Category Archives: Freeform thoughts

The Gift That Keeps On Giving

Freeform thoughts

pressies

Well folks it’s getting to that time of year again…have you done your Christmas shopping? One of my favourite parts of Christmas is being able to spoil my special people…I’ve always loved giving gifts, and I especially enjoy putting a huge amount of thought into what I’m going to buy. Some people are easy to buy for, mainly due to the size of the hints they drop from around September onwards. Others are more difficult but I enjoy a challenge so it’s all good.

I was laughing with my friend earlier when we compared notes on our best and worst ever presents…my boy has got better in recent years. I still tease him about the Christmas he presented me with Season 2 of ‘Lost’ on DVD – I hadn’t seen season one, but he had and was desperate to see the second. Poetic justice was duly served when it took at least a couple more years before the big secret was revealed, and when it was nobody understood it, including him  🙂

As my friend and I were chatting, it occurred to me that some of the really shit presents I’ve received over the years probably contained more of a message than I’d realised at the time. I mean, not in quite the same league as waking up with a horse’s head in my bed, but when I reflect on the presents and who they came from, there was definitely some passive aggressive gifting going on, I was just a bit too naive to clock it at the time.

A couple of years ago I got a ‘tangle tease’ hairbrush as my ‘Secret Santa’ gift at work – for those of you who haven’t seen them, they’re guaranteed to basically brush out a birds nest, and this was before they were really popular so some cheeky knacker had clearly gone out of their way to go looking for one. I felt like conducting some kind of interrogation to find out who thought that was funny, but since I work in human resources and we’re supposed to be nice people I decided that might not be my best ever idea.

Then there was the Christmas when my ex mother-in-law bought everyone in the family Christmas jumpers to wear to her annual Christmas Eve dinner…now I adore Christmas jumpers, they never fail to make me smile, and there were some lovely ones. Happy snowmen, jolly reindeers, robins and crackers. Mine? Biggest fucking Christmas pudding jumper you’ve ever seen. Bitch! Mind you I did get my own back the following day when a bit of nifty thinking and a swift re-wrap meant I was able to present her with her very own pre-read hardback copy of ‘The Sociopath Next Door’…sadly I suspect she was too dim to make the connection but it made me feel a bit better.

I’d love to think that over the years I haven’t committed any absolute howlers myself – well, all except maybe the Jackie annual I gave my best friend when we were about eight years old. I might have accidentally  filled in the quiz about Donny Osmond before I wrapped it up, but it was only in pencil, and once I’d rubbed out my answers you could hardly tell. I guess it’s always possible that someone somewhere may be harbouring a long-standing resentment over an ill-chosen gift, but I hope not!

I shall keep my fingers crossed this year that Santa remembers my fondness for handbag tokens…can’t go wrong with those, right? 🙂

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Missing The Old Me

Freeform thoughts, ,

cake

I have a friend – a really good friend as it happens – who told me this weekend that she misses the old me. It took me a bit by surprise actually, and I’ve spent quite a bit of time thinking about what she meant. Don’t get me wrong, she sort of explained, and I sort of got it, but I guess it hit me again about the way my changing perspective on stuff is affecting those people around me.

So we were trying to arrange a shopping date, which is something we usually do a couple of times a year. January sales are fast approaching and we’re normally limbering up by now you know? The way those days normally go is this – we meet up and head straight for coffee, talking each other into some kind of badass cake whilst we’re at it, after all it would be rude not to. We then make a serious assault on the shops, talking each other into buying frivolous things we don’t need, before heading somewhere amazing for lunch or afternoon tea where we generally linger over a nice bottle of fizz. Or two.

The number of bags I stagger home with largely depends on how fat or skinny I am at the time, but whatever diet I’ve been on in the run up to our shopping date, I can’t ever remember a time when the diet of the hour wasn’t suspended in honour of the occasion. One of the things that we’ve laughed about most over the years is how easily we are persuaded by each other to be really wicked.

We egg each other on, you know? Find excuses as to why the other needs this or that, which removes all guilt associated with whatever the purchase happens to be.

We’ve all got friends in different buckets, right? I’ve got friends I go to who I’ll know will be on my side no matter what the situation, because…well they always are. They tell me what I want to hear. Then I’ve got friends who tell it me straight, and if I’m being a diva, or if I’m in the wrong, boy do they let me know. I’ve got friends who try to talk me out of stuff, and friends whose counsel will invariably be hell yeah, go for it.

I select who I’m asking the advice of depending on the answer I want to hear…if you’re smiling right now, you know exactly what I mean. And whilst very few of my actual friends know I write the blog, if you’re one of the ones who does, and you’re reading this, you’ll also know exactly which bucket you fall into 🙂

What I think my friend is struggling with is that the dynamic of what we do might be changed forever if I carve out a whole new set of rules. She’s used to me being the one telling her that the double chocolate fudge cake can’t have any calories in it because it’s laid on it’s side so obviously they’ve all leaked out. That if we want a second bottle of wine that’s perfectly fine, because after the first bottle your body is so busy processing the alcohol that anything we eat doesn’t count so let’s order a large portion of that and make the most of it…I’m that friend in her bucket.

I’m not the sensible friend, or the one who holds the mirror up and makes her accountable…I’m the one who knows the answer she’s looking for, and finds a way to make it ok. And she does the same for me. She’s responsible for a fair number of those black and white boxes on top of my wardrobe…always mad keen to give me a little push in the direction of a fuck it moment when I’m wavering, finding reasons why it would be a disaster if I walked away.

So she knows we’ll still laugh together, and shop together and there’s no chance in the world of us not getting up to mischief together…it’s what we do. But she was astute enough to know that this is more than just another diet. There’s a genuine step change in the way I’m trying to manage my relationship with food, and the days of us working our way through the cake menu in whichever coffee shop we land in are probably over. I’m glad she was honest enough to come right out and say how much she’s going to miss that.

So am I, as it happens.

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Flunking The Pizza Test

Biggest struggles, Freeform thoughts,

pizza dog

So, I’m a tiny bit partial to the odd slice of pizza – not thick doughy based bendy pizza, that isn’t my thing at all, I’m a thin and crispy girl all the way. It’s a rare treat though to be fair, it would never occur to me to order pizza in…if we’re having a takeaway it’ll usually be Chinese food. Pizza’s a bit brutal on the points budget so it’s not a great choice, but I spent the evening with friends on Friday night and that’s what everyone fancied so I threw myself into the spirit of things. Four slices, within points, enough to feel like I’d had a good innings at the pizza box and it was scrummy. All things being equal that should have been it for a while. Except I just ate it again last night for the second time in three days. But I swear, this time I only meant to sniff it.

Someone had put a late meeting in at work, five ’till half seven and it’s kind of an unwritten rule that if someone expects you to extend your working day into the evening, the least they can do is feed you. I did a quick risk assessment on the likelihood of being offered something worth having, but given that it’s generally nothing more exciting than half a dozen custard creams on a plate in the middle of the boardroom table – which is so wide that nobody can ever reach the plate without a very undignified bend and reach manoeuvre  – I thought I’d be safe. And I was, until the pizza arrived.

Ten large pizzas…five of which were thin crust, and two of which were thin crust pepperoni. And they smelled amazing. It was six hours since I’d had my lunch, and it had been a really trying day…my defences were low m’lud…that’s why, when the asshole in my mind suggested I could go stand next to the pizza box and just, you know breathe in, it seemed like a great idea. I mean, no harm in that, right..? And I might have gotten away with it too if someone hadn’t handed me a plate, before staring at me expectantly, waiting for me to take a slice and move on, get out of his way.

What’s a girl to do? I could hardly say it’s ok, I’m just sniffing it…even I know that makes me sound like a freak. So I allowed myself to get carried along for the ride and before I knew it my jaws were moving and I was staring down at my plate which appeared to have a half eaten slice of pizza on it. I mean it’s not the biggest disaster in the world, since I can point it, and count it. Along with slice two and slice three, dammit. But the point is, I didn’t make a conscious choice to eat it…I just didn’t make a conscious choice not to. Eighteen big fat points on three slices of pizza. I am weak!

I lectured myself all the way home in the car. I was within my points budget for the day so it’s not that that I’m cross about. More that I had no intention of eating pizza at all…if you’d asked me at 3pm as I walked through reception, ignoring the pile of Ferrero Roche with ease whether I’d make a dodgy choice later on I’d have delivered a resounding no, I am strong! The offer of a muffin as I crossed our trading floor earlier had been met with a curled up nose and a polite no thanks. I’m hardcore! Apparently though, if you show me pizza and hand me a plate, I turn into a complete fanny. FFS!

No harm done…well aside from the fact that by the time I got home I was starving, with no daily points left. So I just had to have an early night and suck it up. Muppet.

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A Rock To Lean On

Freeform thoughts, Reflections on past times, ,

holding-hands
Who’s supporting you on your dieting journey? I’m not talking about the posse here, I mean that’s a given and we all know we’ve got each others’ back in this corner of the virtual world that we’ve carved out for ourselves…I’m talking in a real ‘day in the life of’ kind of way. Because you know, when we get serious about staying on this road to Skinny Town it’s not just us that have to make changes to what we do, and how we do it…it’s the people around us too.

For me, it’s my son who’s born the brunt of this broken relationship I have always had with food. We’ve never sat and discussed it as grown-ups…maybe we should, one of these days. His perspective would be fascinating – maybe I’ll ask him to write the foreword of this book you’re all encouraging me to write 🙂 But either way, one thing I know for sure is that all he has known, practically his whole life is me either going down the scale, or moving up it. Diet, or binge, with no middle ground.

To be fair, he has the patience of a saint. Well actually that’s not strictly true…like me, he got a raw deal when the patience gene was handed out in vitro…he’s definitely his mother’s son. But despite his short fuse with the little things in life that drive him bat-shit crazy, with me he has all the patience in the world. And trust me when I say he needs it.

He is blessed with an appetite for food that you can get away with as a young bloke standing six feet three inches in your stockinged feet. With the exception of liver, I’ve never found a food he won’t eat, and whatever diet I happen to be on he tucks in with enthusiasm to whatever comes out of the kitchen on any given day.

He can quote points values in food with a higher degree of accuracy than I can. And to my eternal shame he’s seen his own weight fluctuate when I’ve been cooking with no carbs, using lots of protein, cream and fats instead, but serving them to him with carbs too since he wasn’t dieting..he’s got the constitution of an ox and believe me it’s been challenged at times. He’s been supportive of all my efforts, to the moon and back again, whatever diet I’ve been doing, and through every false start.

But over the years he’s learned to walk on eggshells, when he’s seen me fall off the wagon. You know the kind of thing – one day I was dieting, the next there I was in the armchair vaporising a litre tub of Ben and Jerry’s and a large bag of cheese balls. When he tried to talk to me about it in as supportive a way as his twelve or fifteen or eighteen or twenty five year old self knew how to do, it would largely depend on how shit I felt about myself in that moment, or how much of a sugar rush or craving I was in the grip of which dictated the tone with which he got his response.

Trying to broach the subject must have been excruciating for him, and I’m sure there have been times where he’s just bitten his tongue and said nothing. But to give him his due, he’s never said an unkind word, or made a sarcastic comment or even rolled his eyes when I’ve mentioned that the diet’s starting on Monday, and this is going to be the one that sees me crack it this time. He just quietly supported me through it all.

As a mum, I could weep when I reflect back on how utterly conflicted and confused he must have been. It breaks all the rules of being a good parent you know? Being a role model, doing the right thing. Showing, as opposed to telling. When I really look back at how this constant cycle of binge – get fat – diet -get skinny must have impacted on him, it’s hard not to feel guilty.

But I can’t afford to do that – it gives the asshole in my mind too much leverage you know? It’s done, and by some miracle my boy turned into an utterly lovely, funny and warm human being, with a normal perspective on food. And as the person who’s lived that life, I’m not sure before this point I could have done it any differently anyway. I just wish I could have found a way to do this work and sort my head out sooner.

But I’m here now.

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Waste Management

Freeform thoughts,

picky-dog-15252915

I’ve always hated wasting stuff – it’s impossible to pass comment on the fact that we live in a  society where throwing stuff away is the norm without sounding as old as Methuselah but seriously, we do. And lets face it, I’ve just had a milestone birthday so I’m catching him up now anyway right? That pre-qualifies me as entitled to turn into a grumpy old boot from time to time.

I have a bit of a strop about the food waste that comes out of my own house on a weekly basis, although to be fair we have got better…it’s just too easy to take your eye off the ball and notice ‘use by’ dates after the event. I’ve started relying on the sniff test now rather than paying too much heed to what’s written on the packaging. If it looks ok and smells ok, it’s probably ok. If it’s slowly turning green and smells like something died in the packet, I consult the dog, who is an expert on both food, and dead things. If he’s not impressed, it goes in the bin. I’ve not managed to kill anyone yet so you know, I’m fairly confident that the system works.

I’ll be attending a few seasonal events over the next couple of weeks where there’ll be a buffet lunch, and that’s another thing guaranteed to send my waste barometer into overdrive. The difference this year of course, will be that I shall be on guard against that moment where my ‘waste not, want not’ button is pushed by the sight of a dozen unclaimed sausage rolls or a few slightly curled butties. Not to mention the killer bowl of crisps…lets face it, who can leave that half full? In the past I think it’s fair to say I’ve single-handedly assumed responsibility for ensuring nothing goes back to the kitchen…not on my watch.

What I’ve never really got my knickers in a twist about, but I need to wake up to it fast, is waste in relation to wasted effort. How many times in the past have I broken a diet and totally wasted all the willpower I’d managed to summon up until the point I fell off the wagon and went under the wheels…? More than I can count, that’s for sure. I mean come on, I’ve scored some heroic wins in the last few months. I wrestled with a double cheese and onion sandwich all afternoon one day for God’s sake – and I never gave in. What was the point of putting myself through that battle, if I was going to cave in without a fight over something else later down the line?

That’s tantamount to disrespecting the effort I’ve put in so far. And why would I do that? There have been far more moments than I’ve written about where I’ve had a short and snippy exchange with the asshole in my mind, and I’ve resisted, played it straight, walked away from a golden hob-nob opportunity in honour of this journey to Skinnytown.  And you know what, no way am I going to waste all that effort, and write it off like it didn’t matter.

Because it did matter. Every single one of those moments counted towards how great I’m feeling right now about this journey and how it’s going…trust me, it matters. It’s why I’m still here. I’ve invested thought, planning, hopes and dreams into what I’m doing, where I’m going…to one degree or another, this whole journey over the last few months has been built on the effort that I’ve put in, not to mention the support I’ve had from you guys. Can I even contemplate a situation which would make wasting all of that ok..? Hell no, of course not.

On balance, a wasted sausage roll is nothing by comparison, right?

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