As A General Rule

It amazes me how damn good food tastes right now.  Or to be precise, how damn good it is to have variety again – to enjoy all the things I’ve steered clear of for so long, whilst at the same time noticing how bland and blah a lot of other food is.  Those bland and blah foods are a mix of things I’ve been forcing myself to eat for so long because they were easy “low point” options and also foods that I’ve craved because they were “banned” and now I remember that they’re totally not worth it.

I think that I’m slowly getting used to being able to pick freely again, and some of my early food obsessions are starting to lessen now.  Initially, I was obsessed with fruit crumble and custard for instance, and it’s still something I love but I think I’ve got my fill of it now.  What I realise now is it’s worth (or still worth, as I think this was a theme from my diet days) just going for the good stuff.  Good cake over cheap cake.  Good bread.  Good restaurants.  Basically, if you’re going to use your calories (and don’t feel guilty about that!) then use them wisely.  Personally, I never feel guilt for eating an excellent slice of delicious homemade cake.  I definitely feel regret for cheap cake that I could have got anytime.

I read something really nice the other day, from a nutritionist, about the idea of food rules, and in particular having a “general rule”.  Her idea is that rather than saying “I’m giving up coffee”, or “I’m trying not to drink alcohol during the week”, which totally sets one up to fail the minute you deviate from an absolute rule, you say “as a general rule I don’t eat crisps” – which means that if you’re offered something you really like then you can take it without guilt, but you know as a general rule you’d rather eat something a bit healthier.  This, for me, meshes perfectly with the idea of finding balance between looking after yourself and never feeling guilt for what you eat.  It’s something I can sit alongside the healed eating habits I’m aiming for as a mantra for life.

Right now, I’m not there, but I hope I’m getting there.  Slowly.  I baked this week – something I haven’t done for ages for fear of either having cake in the house and eating the lot, or spending a lot of money on something I enjoy but having to give the results away all the time.  Last night I wasn’t particularly hungry so I didn’t bother with dinner and had a cup of tea and a smallish slice of the aforementioned cake instead.  That’s actually huge progress for me, as a few months ago I wouldn’t have even considered not having dinner just because I wasn’t hungry and would likely have had the cake afterwards as well.

It’s a frustratingly slow process to heal all my bad habits, and when you’re in it you can’t see how anything is changing.  But like learning anything, sometimes you look back and can see how far you’ve come, or a particular situation will make you reflect on a specific change you automatically make now, and that encourages you to keep slowly pushing forwards.

As before, my weight hasn’t changed recently – sometimes it goes down a bit, sometimes up a bit, but I’m still  averaging where I was when I left Weightwatchers and stopped dieting. I’m certainly no worse off than I was, and I’m much happier to be maintaining effortlessly whilst not dieting rather than not losing weight whilst actively tying myself in knots on a diet program.  It seems like a bit of a no-brainer really when I put it that way!

Other than that, I've booked to go to Borneo in August with friends exploring (wooooohoooo!), I'm trying to organise a weekend in Budapest to keep me going holiday-wise until then, works kind of tottering along and I really need to get back surfing before I forget which end of the surfboard is which.  Oh yeah - and I cunningly (foolishly) entered myself for THREE races next month - what on earth was I thinking???  So I might be lucky if I'm still alive in August to go on holiday at all!!!

I'm dreaming of beaches like these until then: