Weigh-in: 1.5lbs Lost

Sorry I’m so late with this update.  I’ve had a nasty cold this week and haven’t been doing the things I usually do.  However, I did go to my WeightWatchers meeting on Wednesday morning although I didn’t stay to class.  The official scales said that I’d lost 1.5lbs giving me a total of 6.5lbs over the three weeks I’ve been attending.

Last week I set myself a little exercise challenge.  I have the WW Pedometer which counts your steps and converts them to Activity Points.  So last week I decided to make sure I always got into the ‘healthy’ range (this is related to your height and weight and is the minimum number of steps one has to take before Points start to be earned).  I check the Pedometer at dinner time and, if I’ve not hit the target I have to go for a walk or use the Wii Fit until I do.  And I got into the Healthy range each day!

This week, despite the cold (from which I have now recovered), my exercise challenge is to earn 0.5 Points each day.  And, of course, I’m continuing to track everything I eat or drink and bank as many Points as possible.  My period is due so I may not get a loss at the meeting on Wednesday but would be ecstatic if I could have that 0.5lb to get me my first ‘silver seven’ award!

With Unreasonable Disappointment

All week I have stuck to the diet.  All week I have watched the numbers on the scale go down, down and down until, this morning, I weighed 3lbs less than last Wednesday.  So I went along to my official weigh-in at WeightWatchers confident that I’d see a loss and maybe even get my first Silver Seven (an award for losing 7lbs).  And I got weighed and informed that I’ve maintained.

Now, if I’d cheated and maintained then that would be fine.  If I’d cheated and gained then that would be understandable.  But I’ve done what was asked and I want my reward.  And, yes, I am pouting.

Of course, my clothes are different this week – I’m wearing jeans instead of a light, summery skirt.  And, no doubt, my female body is doing slightly different things this week.  But I’m still unreasonably disappointed.  I’m trying to use this as a motivating experience but I’d really rather sulk.  It won’t be a bingey sulk though as I’m determined to see a loss next week!

Tardy but Happy

Sorry I’m so late in posting here – I’m not sure where the week has gone, to be honest.  Anyway.  My first week properly back with WeightWatchers sees me getting a whopping loss of 5lbs.  It’s been easy to stick to the plan and still have the odd treat (chocolate cheesecake, anyone?)  My car spent most of the week living at my parents’ house and I’m sure the added exercise helped so I should really take it back up there tomorrow.  It seems to have crept back to lurk just outside my front door.

My plan for this week is to continue doing more of the same – track everything I eat or drink, stay within my Points allowance and walk instead of driving wherever possible.  I’ll update you on Wednesday …

14th July 2010 – 13st 11lbs

Sometimes all you can do is start over.

Having gone back to my lovely blueprint, I found myself still lacking the focus to stick to it.  So I played and tweaked and cheated.  And saw a gain when I stepped on the scale.  So I stopped weighing for a few days while trying to consume the entire contents of the corner shop.  Then I remembered I’d be seeing my GP who would weigh me whether I was happy about that or not.

The blueprint derives from WeightWatchers and I still had my online subscription (cancelling it had fallen prey to procrastination) so I decided to go back to doing that.  Which would have been fine if I’d actually done it.  But I said I’d start the next day or the day after that or next Monday.  And, well, there was ice cream and chocolate and cake …

I had the appointment with my GP and obediently stood on the scale.  She’s a kind woman and we agreed that dieting is very difficult when there is ice cream and chocolate and cake.  And then I went home to have a think.

On Wednesday, I transferred from WeightWatchers online to WeightWatchers meetings.  My official weigh-in saw me at 13st 11lbs (after breakfast, with clothes – I’m 13st 7lbs on the scale at home first thing in the morning).  I was given a warm welcome by the leader (Holly), collected a stack of books, stayed to class (which was suitably motivating) and won the raffle so I’m now the proud owner of a WeightWatchers Pedometer Plus.  Then I took the car to my parents’ and walked home.

I’m restarting my journey and plan to travel from 13st 11lbs to 9st 6lbs by the most sensible route.  Of course, there’s always time to stop and look at the sights – and ice cream and chocolate and cake!

Maintain

I’ve been watching the numbers all week and was pretty sure I knew I’d maintain this week.  Of course, I’ve been hoping I’d see a loss so I’m still a bit disappointed.  But I have a good handle on the whys of this maintain – a few packets of crisps while out and hungry plus milk with a higher fat content than I usually buy.  This week it will be skimmed milk all the way and no snacking between meals.

The good news is that I’m once again off sugar so should start to feel a lot better (and lighter!) soon.  Exercise-wise, I’m not using my car nearly as much and am back to slogging up hills under my own steam.  I’m surprised at how much fitness I seem to have lost in the two weeks (or thereabouts) that I was driving.  I seem to have gone back to the beginning where everything is full of effort and slow.  But at least I know the ‘stuck in treacle’ feeling will pass if I just keep doing what I’m doing.

Going Down!

Finally! The numbers on the scale are going in the right direction.

It’s been a difficult few weeks and those numbers have gone up, stayed the same, wobbled a bit and now – phew! – I’m 4lbs lighter than the last time I updated you.  In the meantime, I’ve done a bit of bingeing, a bit of WeightWatchers, a bit of SlimmingWorld and am now finally, joyously back with my own blueprint of What Works for Me.  Believe me, just giving up sugar and walking as much as possible is a whole lot easier than the alternatives.

I’m feeling positive about my weight-loss journey again and confident of my ability to nourish my body.  That confidence has been lacking of late.

So, my plan for the coming week is to continue with the eating blueprint and to leave my car at my mother’s house.  It’s back on the road (although it now needs more work it is safe to drive) which is good.  Kind of.  Having a car parked outside my house is like having chocolate inside it – too big a temptation to this dieter.  So the car’s about 15 minutes walk away but available if I need it which is the best compromise I could work out.

See you next week!

4lbs Lost

The numbers are going in the right direction again!  I’ve lost 4 of the 5 pounds I’d gained last week which is really good.  Just one more to go and I should be able to do that over the next seven days thus sticking to my plan of getting back to where I started over the course of a fortnight.

I’m not really very happy though.  I’ve lost those 4lbs more by good luck than good management as I’ve not been sticking to my plan.  A treat today (it’s hot – I need ice cream) has morphed into a treat everyday (it’s Tuesday – I need ice cream).  And, meantime, I’ve had a couple of social occasions which have revolved around food and alcohol (as these things tend to do).  I know from (bitter) experience that, when things start to slip this way, it’s a short step back into bingeous-extremis.  I need to stop the rot now, before I’m back in a size 26 and the Land of Back-Ache.  Actually, I have had a bit of back-ache over the past week and that little reminder is more than enough.

I really feel a lack of confidence in my ability to stick to the eating plan I’ve designed.  Probably because I’ve been ‘proving’ to myself that I can’t.  Or, rather, won’t.  I’ve been here before and, really, it’s never had a happy ending.  However, I’ve thought a lot about my past experiences and have come to the conclusion that if I retrace the steps I took at the beginning of this weight-loss journey, I might be able to do something different this time.  So I’m back to tracking everything I eat or drink through the WeightWatchers website while following my usual blue-print.  This has automatically reduced my portion sizes to where they should be and stopped the sugary treats.  As these are the things I knew I had to address, the website is working for me rather than forcing me into something I don’t want.  I’ll keep using it for as long as I find it useful.  At the moment, I’m finding it very reassuring to keep within my Points and not have to think about whether X amount of pasta is too much or whether I really need to eat item Y.

As you know, there are two other strands to my Healthy Laura Campaign:  exercise, and caffeine.  I’m a little further along the path of being willing to exercise.  Yesterday, when I was walking to my destination I decided to see if I could run between lamp-posts.  I can.  And then I can walk for the next three lamp-posts and run between the next ones, etc.  Unfortunately, my knees and hips protested quite quickly and I’m sore today but the fact that I was willing to try is a big step forward.  Being in pain is obviously a sign that I’m still to heavy to run which is fine.  I’ll try it again when I’m down to 12st something lbs and see how it feels.  In the meantime, I’m nearly ready to say I’ll do some intentional exercise on the days I’m not in pain.  Nearly.  Almost.  But not quite.  The reality is that I’m lazy and busy with other things.  So I’m going to accept that this is where I am and just continue walking instead of using the car (easy when its brakes are broken!)  My mindset has changed over the past few months and, I think, if I continue accepting instead of nagging myself I will get into mindset of being willing to exercise.

Caffeine is another area in which I’ve slipped.  And I’ve slipped further into old habits with this than I have with food where, I think, I’ve stopped the rot fairly quickly.  Sigh.  I know what I have to do.  I’m still on decaff for tea and coffee but am happily quaffing soft, sugar-free drinks.  It’s hot.  I’m thirsty.  And, heck, I like them.  At the moment I’d rather have a Coke than a coffee.  I’m also really tired (perhaps because of the extra weight?) and ‘needing’ the kick of caffeine to get myself moving.  But, with that kick comes anxiety later in the day.  And it’s not really worth it.  Sainsbury’s is going to deliver my groceries tomorrow night and I’m going to add some caffeine free Coke to the order as it’s not easily available locally.  This means I’ll be extra-tired and very headachey for a week or so but should be worth it.  I do hope so.

See you next week.

Weigh in: +5lbs!!!

Well, it’s my first gain in months and if you’re going to do something you might as well do it well, OK?

Last week, I had one binge, one supper with friends, one meal with friends and one BBQ with family.  If you count it as 1lb per event (plus 1lb because bodies do funny things sometimes) it doesn’t look so bad.

While I’ve been doing all this socialising, I’ve really taken my eye off the ball.  I’ve not been weighing every day and I’ve allowed caffeine and sugar (in the form of ice lollies – it’s hot here) to sneak their way back in.  It’s the lack of focus I’m peeved about rather than that +5lbs I’ve just written.  If I’d kept my focus, I could still have enjoyed myself but I’d have known what I was doing to myself and could, therefore, have made better choices.  Or not.  But it would have been a conscious choice rather than my actual ‘What the heck?’ attitude.  And there would have been no nasty surprises when I stepped on the scales this morning.

I wonder how long it will take to lose those extra pounds?  I’d really like to see them gone by this time next week but don’t think that’s a realistic target.  If I could say ‘Goodbye’ to them over the next fortnight I’d actually be quite happy.  Three weeks is dragging it out just a little too long.

How am I going to achieve the loss I want?  I’m going straight back to my normal blue-print of eating breakfast, lunch, dinner and supper with nothing in between and sensible portion-control.  I’ll be avoiding sugar and caffeine and that means I’m going to feel rough for a few days.  Am I going to exercise?  I know the weight would come off faster if I did …  But feeling rough and demanding more of my body probably isn’t a recipe to happy exercising.  And I’m an honest person – I won’t exercise if I’m hating every minute.  So no intentional exercise still although I’ll continue to walk and use public transport even if the car gets fixed soon (which it may).

I have a plan.  See you next week!

Clearing the Clutter

I’ve made two big decisions recently.  And I do mean ‘recently’ because although I’ve been heading towards these lifestyle changes for a few months, I’ve only become committed to them in the last 24 hours.  I think it is perhaps true that an addict must ‘hit bottom’ before embracing recovery.

The changes I’m referring to are:

*  Giving up caffeine.
*  Giving up sugar.

Regular readers will know that I gave up caffeine for Lent and, liking the reduction in anxiety and migraines I experienced, decided to keep the change.  But I wasn’t committed to it.  Not really – I’d happily quaff a Diet Coke for a ‘treat’ or take painkillers bundled with a caffeine hit.  Yesterday I made myself feel really ill and decided to cut out caffeine totally.

Meantime, I’ve been successfully slimming by avoiding my trigger food (sugar) and, therefore, not bingeing.  Until today.  So what went wrong?  And what’s going to be different in the future?

What went wrong is clearing out the larder.  I’ve been meaning to do it for a while – as you can see from the ‘before’ photo it was a mess and I’d got the the stage where I’d no idea what was in there.  So having decided the caffeine had to go for good, I decided to kill two birds with one stone and clear it out while purging the caffeine.  And all went well until I found the sugar.  My trigger food.  The sugar.  Had I forgotten it was there?  Kind of, I suppose.  It certainly hasn’t been preying on my mind.  I’d kept it to bake (for charity events, not for me to eat) and it’s been lurking on the second shelf of the larder without causing me any problem at all.  Until I had to handle it this morning.  And see it.  And smell it.  And taste it.  Sad to say, the rest is history and I’m feeling very sorry for myself as the hangover begins.  And, of course, tomorrow I’ve to weigh-in with my Doctor when my body will still be bloated and unhappy and heavy.  So I’m cross as well as headachey and nauseous.

But onwards and upwards.  What’s going to be different in the future?  I’ve learned that the sight and smell of sugar is enough to trigger a binge.  Previously, I thought I was OK to have it in the house and even cook with it so long as I didn’t taste it.  This isn’t true – would you ask an alcoholic to work in a pub?  So I’ve thrown all my sugar into the bin – even the icing sugar for which I haven’t yet found a non-sugar alternative – and I won’t be allowing it back into the house.

What happened today is part of the learning process and I’ll try hard not to beat myself up about it.  This will be easier when I’m feeling less physically ill, of course.  It’s hard to feel ill and know it’s your own fault.  But I do now have a tidy, usable larder and a familiarity with its contents which was previously lacking.

Another Pound Bites the Dust!

This past week has had its ups and downs but, as it’s resulted in a 1lb loss, I’m quite happy.

I had a slip on Thursday or Friday and ate a large portion of chocolate confectionery.  I wasn’t hungry – I was tired, had stomach cramps, felt faint and just wanted sugar.  So I ate it.  The next day I weighed in and had gained 2lbs.  I was non-pleased and remained non-pleased until this morning when they disappeared and took one of their friends with them.  Does that mean I lost 3lbs this week?!

I’m starting to think about exercise.  This is probably because the weather is lovely – we’ve had blue skies and sunshine for a few days now – but I’m also conscious that, when I hit my next plateau, there’s not much more I want to reduce in my diet.  My plan was to change my supper (currently a big bowl of porridge) to a mug of hot milk but I’m baulking at that.  I really enjoy my porridge – it’s the ultimate comfort food to me.  So I think exercise may be the next change I choose to make.  However, as the weight is till coming off, I don’t need to worry about that just now.