Started with elation
Post-Christmas elation of actually losing weight over Christmas was swiftly followed by the blues of waiting for the next lbs to shift. It took 11 days of being back home after Christmas to actually shift another lb...the wait felt like a lifetime. I still recorded losses each week (lost some weight on the Monday, recorded the following Saturday and didn't lose anything again until the Friday after that and recorded on the Saturday). I guess there was a lesson of patience in there somewhere, but it really was very hard.
I hadn't expected to lose any weight over xmas at all, but because I had lost those few lbs, I expected that as soon as I start being 'good' again, it would start to fall off. The fact is I ate better, but didn't exercise as much. I know exercise is critical to my journey - I explained that in my last post. So I shouldn't have been surprised at the slow down.
Getting back up after feeling a false bump
I was back on course again, achieving goals - I hit the 3 stone and surpassed it and I fit in the dress that has been hung on my wall for months! However, I kept struggling emotionally.
Perhaps it is impatience, perhaps it is just that I was back to normal life and fighting the battle again, rather than being on annual leave and my only real responsibility was to keep the weight off.
Being back at home - I have to look after myself and the cat and work, all alongside the struggle with Fibromyalgia - and still find the energy to get on my bike and burn off the flab.
Ironically, while I was on leave I watched the Katie Hopkins documentary where she put on the weight and then lost it again. She found it hard to put the weight on - well I don't think many of us try or actually put on 3 stone in 4 months, we just eat 3500kcal too much every so often, over time, not every day and those lbs just creep up on us one at a time. She then found it hard to lose it, but still came to the same conclusion that it was easy to do!?!! Honestly...I'm lost for words. She said half way through that if food was your emotional crutch she could understand it would be difficult; well it is for me, that's for sure. That's why this diet is so good for me - it takes out choice (to a degree) and emotion (again, to a degree). It gives someone else the responsibility of choice, time and all those other decisions relating to food which all, for me, are merged with that emotion and that food is a 'treat' and it is the only way I know to 'treat' myself. In fact, I'm not treating myself, I'm actually making myself more unhappy, but it feels like a 'treat' at the time - not just because of the science of sugar and other hormones etc, but that I have taught myself and been taught over the last 31 years that food is a 'treat'.
An enjoyable time trying on clothes?!? Yes, really!!
I did have a very satisfactory clothes moment - trying on dress after dress which didn't fit (too big!!) - I'm not sure I've done this before...ever! It's usually the other way round (too small). Once I'd done this I tried on a few outfits which I didn't think I'd get in or thought would be too tight and some were tight and that was OK, but some fit well. That was AMAZING!
I wore a jacket 2 sizes smaller to a meeting. Jackets are something which you just can't generally wear unless they fit, and if anything, I am always a size up, not down. I then tried on some coats which hadn't fit; even with a big thick jumper on I could get them on! I felt a little like someone had transported me to Alice's wonderland and shrunk me just for a while and that I would soon go back to my original size, but no, I really am much smaller!!
Its hard because I still feel the same. I look in the mirror and can't see the difference - I have photos over the journey and I can't see where I've lost it, but I must have done!
All this and I was sill finding it hard. I have not even considered quitting though, which is a big change. Even though I'm finding it tough, somewhere, mentally, something has changed as I know I'm on a long journey and there will be bumps. I know though, that it will get better and recognise just because I'm feeling bad it's not necessarily true that it's going badly.
Ironically, while I was on leave I watched the Katie Hopkins documentary where she put on the weight and then lost it again. She found it hard to put the weight on - well I don't think many of us try or actually put on 3 stone in 4 months, we just eat 3500kcal too much every so often, over time, not every day and those lbs just creep up on us one at a time. She then found it hard to lose it, but still came to the same conclusion that it was easy to do!?!! Honestly...I'm lost for words. She said half way through that if food was your emotional crutch she could understand it would be difficult; well it is for me, that's for sure. That's why this diet is so good for me - it takes out choice (to a degree) and emotion (again, to a degree). It gives someone else the responsibility of choice, time and all those other decisions relating to food which all, for me, are merged with that emotion and that food is a 'treat' and it is the only way I know to 'treat' myself. In fact, I'm not treating myself, I'm actually making myself more unhappy, but it feels like a 'treat' at the time - not just because of the science of sugar and other hormones etc, but that I have taught myself and been taught over the last 31 years that food is a 'treat'.
An enjoyable time trying on clothes?!? Yes, really!!
I did have a very satisfactory clothes moment - trying on dress after dress which didn't fit (too big!!) - I'm not sure I've done this before...ever! It's usually the other way round (too small). Once I'd done this I tried on a few outfits which I didn't think I'd get in or thought would be too tight and some were tight and that was OK, but some fit well. That was AMAZING!
I wore a jacket 2 sizes smaller to a meeting. Jackets are something which you just can't generally wear unless they fit, and if anything, I am always a size up, not down. I then tried on some coats which hadn't fit; even with a big thick jumper on I could get them on! I felt a little like someone had transported me to Alice's wonderland and shrunk me just for a while and that I would soon go back to my original size, but no, I really am much smaller!!
Its hard because I still feel the same. I look in the mirror and can't see the difference - I have photos over the journey and I can't see where I've lost it, but I must have done!
All this and I was sill finding it hard. I have not even considered quitting though, which is a big change. Even though I'm finding it tough, somewhere, mentally, something has changed as I know I'm on a long journey and there will be bumps. I know though, that it will get better and recognise just because I'm feeling bad it's not necessarily true that it's going badly.
Happy Scale App cheers me up!!
I have the Happy Scale app which I've mentioned in a previous blog, but I really did find solice in the figures. It showed me that I was doing well and even though I felt I was doing badly I was doing just as well as times when I'd been on top of the world! I'd lost 2.3lb a week for the whole of January- that was .3 a week over my target. I'd learned in CBT once that 'thoughts aren't facts' and this really demonstrated this to me. Not only does the App give you historical information but it gives you projections and I find it really motivating to see what weight I'll be in a few months time and by the time I go on holiday. I look at the figures and think 'there's no way I'll be that weight', but then think back and I would've thought the same at the beginning of this journey about my current weight. It is possible that I could reach my goal. I'm already 40% there!
Thank you Happy Scale app people and thank you Jane. Happy Scale you give me the information I need to snap myself out of that mindset and Jane, I don't know how you have done it, but you've changed my life (as well as Aine - my nutritionist and weekly support).
Lbs lost 48
Lbs to go 72
Lbs to go 72
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