I had a somewhat traumatic evening yesterday, and after putting myself through the emotional wringer, I found myself at the crossroads of Eat Or Just Feel Bad.
I compromised. I didn't eat til dinner time, and I didn't open the wine until Hannah arrived for dinner. We had fajitas for dinner, which is comfort food after a bad day, without being too excessive, but there was also a little too much wine, and a box of 5 millionaire slices between two of us. I may have eaten 3 of them. So there was a degree of comfort eating, but contained to a social environment and a single meal. After all, it never really replaces the emotions and neutralises them, does it?
Thankfully, there was also much needed unloading and sage advice, and later on, somewhat tiddly laughter. Breaking up with people is crap, but having friends close by makes it a bit better.
This morning is fresh, shiny and new. Yes, I'm very single again, but I can look good in a pretty dress, eat right and go to a much needed spin class at lunch. I haven't been to spin in aaaaages and I've missed it. And it will help quell a little of the shortbread guilt from last night.
We are strong.
Thursday, 29 September 2011
Tuesday, 27 September 2011
Mini-battles
I went back up to Malvern last night to go visit my dad, and to pick up my new phone handset which had been delivered there over the weekend.
One if the problems I always encounter at Dad's is the sheer amount of crappy food he keeps round the place. It's a sore subject for me, because he always moans about his weight but eats atrociously.
He confuses restricting his food for eating healthily, but what he eats is pure rubbish. Take yesterday for example, he told me he'd eaten tea before I got there, and when I guessed he'd just eaten toast (I could smell it in the kitchen) he admitted it was actually just a buttered teacake!!! In response to my sighed "oh Dad!", he said that it was fine because he'd had a bit of haggis and some tomatoes for lunch which was a "proper meal". He has no idea. At all.
No vegetables, no lean proteins. Too little fruit. Too much processed food. And far too much refined sugar. He thinks that if just eats less he'll lose weight, but instead of cutting out the junk, he cuts out the meals!! And then wonders why he gets hungry and snacks on biscuits and chocolate. The cupboards of full of them, but with very little real food to be seen. I utterly despair, because no matter what I say, he ignores me.
Of course, this means another challenge for me, because when I visit, I have to navigate the cupboards too. It's a smorgasbord of rubbish. If I make a decent dinner, it's still all sat in the cupboard singing its siren call all evening.
Last night, I wasn't too bad - not perfect but not terrible. I managed to get back to the flat to pack after work, and just grab a banana to tide me over til I got Dad's. Once there, I rustled up dome pasta with chicken and low fat creme fraiche. No veg other than onion, but a small portion was just enough. I did attack a couple of biscuits and a Tunnock's teacake, but it was all tracked. I just had to keep reminding myself why I need to be good: de-larding for the half-marathon while I have the time before training starts.
I managed to locate porridge with some frozen blueberries for breakfast this morning, and escaped the lure of the biscuit tin to make the drive back to Bristol. A mini-battle negotiated and won.
- Posted from my iPhone
One if the problems I always encounter at Dad's is the sheer amount of crappy food he keeps round the place. It's a sore subject for me, because he always moans about his weight but eats atrociously.
He confuses restricting his food for eating healthily, but what he eats is pure rubbish. Take yesterday for example, he told me he'd eaten tea before I got there, and when I guessed he'd just eaten toast (I could smell it in the kitchen) he admitted it was actually just a buttered teacake!!! In response to my sighed "oh Dad!", he said that it was fine because he'd had a bit of haggis and some tomatoes for lunch which was a "proper meal". He has no idea. At all.
No vegetables, no lean proteins. Too little fruit. Too much processed food. And far too much refined sugar. He thinks that if just eats less he'll lose weight, but instead of cutting out the junk, he cuts out the meals!! And then wonders why he gets hungry and snacks on biscuits and chocolate. The cupboards of full of them, but with very little real food to be seen. I utterly despair, because no matter what I say, he ignores me.
Of course, this means another challenge for me, because when I visit, I have to navigate the cupboards too. It's a smorgasbord of rubbish. If I make a decent dinner, it's still all sat in the cupboard singing its siren call all evening.
Last night, I wasn't too bad - not perfect but not terrible. I managed to get back to the flat to pack after work, and just grab a banana to tide me over til I got Dad's. Once there, I rustled up dome pasta with chicken and low fat creme fraiche. No veg other than onion, but a small portion was just enough. I did attack a couple of biscuits and a Tunnock's teacake, but it was all tracked. I just had to keep reminding myself why I need to be good: de-larding for the half-marathon while I have the time before training starts.
I managed to locate porridge with some frozen blueberries for breakfast this morning, and escaped the lure of the biscuit tin to make the drive back to Bristol. A mini-battle negotiated and won.
- Posted from my iPhone
Monday, 26 September 2011
Successful Weekend
I'm feeling pretty pleased with myself today as I've tracked fully over the weekend, and not come into Monday with a stupid deficit and a feeling of being bloated, like I have the last couple of weeks. Hooorah!
I had a lovely relaxed Friday evening with friends from the surf club - we went for a few quiet drinks in a local (but new-to-us) pub, which turned out to be very nice, and ended up having tapas on a floating restaurant (Under The Stars in Bristol harbourside - I can recomend it!). We sat on sofas around our table, which was a claw-foot bathtub with a glass top, and lots of black and white stones in the bottom with star-shaped fairy lights glowing gently up through the glass, and listened to the entertainment from the open-mic night which was happening. We also had very tasty tapas platters, and just-maybe-possible some of the best Oreo brownie ever! The evening ended quite early since we were all knackered, and some were working on Saturday morning, so I even got an early night out of it too.
I didn't quite get the lie-in I'd planned for on Saturday, as I ended up getting up to watch the England rugby game, and then stayed up to watch the France - NZ match rather than head back to bed. Since it was looking like a beautiful day out by the time they'd both finished, my friend Hannah and I decided that a bike ride was in order. Since I was stiff from circuits on Friday, and she's still recovering from a broken ankle, we took the bikes for a nice potter up the Bristol to Bath cycle trail and stopped off for lunch at The Jolly Sailor at Saltford Locks, where we had amazing chilli bowls with doorstep slices of home-made bread and butter on the side. Who needs rice or chips, or even a jacket potato, when you can heap it on bread??? We finished off lunch with proper hot chocolates made with white chocolate with cream and all the toppings, and (very slowly due to full bellies) pottered back to Bristol. The evening was passed with old 90's rom-coms on DVD and some chocolate.
Yesterday featured a proper lie-in, reading in bed for a bit, a light lunch, and a wander into town to the shops. City Boy then cooked my Sunday roast for dinner and we chilled out and watched a film, before I had another early night.
All in all, it's been a very chilled out weekend, and a very pleasant reminder that it's possible to eat lovely food and relax properly, without trashing the diet or spending too much money. The looming shadow of half-marathon training has definitely given me pause to consider my choices when I'm faced with yumminess, and as per usual, cutting back on the booze helps me with those choices an infinite amount.
Just a four-day week this week, before I head off surfing in Cornwall this weekend - yeehaa!
I had a lovely relaxed Friday evening with friends from the surf club - we went for a few quiet drinks in a local (but new-to-us) pub, which turned out to be very nice, and ended up having tapas on a floating restaurant (Under The Stars in Bristol harbourside - I can recomend it!). We sat on sofas around our table, which was a claw-foot bathtub with a glass top, and lots of black and white stones in the bottom with star-shaped fairy lights glowing gently up through the glass, and listened to the entertainment from the open-mic night which was happening. We also had very tasty tapas platters, and just-maybe-possible some of the best Oreo brownie ever! The evening ended quite early since we were all knackered, and some were working on Saturday morning, so I even got an early night out of it too.
I didn't quite get the lie-in I'd planned for on Saturday, as I ended up getting up to watch the England rugby game, and then stayed up to watch the France - NZ match rather than head back to bed. Since it was looking like a beautiful day out by the time they'd both finished, my friend Hannah and I decided that a bike ride was in order. Since I was stiff from circuits on Friday, and she's still recovering from a broken ankle, we took the bikes for a nice potter up the Bristol to Bath cycle trail and stopped off for lunch at The Jolly Sailor at Saltford Locks, where we had amazing chilli bowls with doorstep slices of home-made bread and butter on the side. Who needs rice or chips, or even a jacket potato, when you can heap it on bread??? We finished off lunch with proper hot chocolates made with white chocolate with cream and all the toppings, and (very slowly due to full bellies) pottered back to Bristol. The evening was passed with old 90's rom-coms on DVD and some chocolate.
Yesterday featured a proper lie-in, reading in bed for a bit, a light lunch, and a wander into town to the shops. City Boy then cooked my Sunday roast for dinner and we chilled out and watched a film, before I had another early night.
All in all, it's been a very chilled out weekend, and a very pleasant reminder that it's possible to eat lovely food and relax properly, without trashing the diet or spending too much money. The looming shadow of half-marathon training has definitely given me pause to consider my choices when I'm faced with yumminess, and as per usual, cutting back on the booze helps me with those choices an infinite amount.
Just a four-day week this week, before I head off surfing in Cornwall this weekend - yeehaa!
Friday, 23 September 2011
Keeping It Real
The Scales of Doom have decreed that I have officially put on a lb this week. After a quick glance at my tracker, I think I can say I deserve that. I wrote a post a couple of weeks ago, saying exactly the same thing, and whilst my eating has been better this week, I think this is the cumulative effect of weeks of not very clever eating. I'm just being honest. With myself and with you.
Here's what I realised looking back at my tracker:
So continuing that pattern - this week will be a good one. Limit the silly weekend excesses. Get in the exercise. Aim for a clean week on my tracker. I've got two really clean days of eating behind me, since my H-M Revelation of Fear. It's a good place to start from.
And to finish on a positive note - I may have gained this week, but last night's 5k run shaved another 15 seconds off my pace per mile, and it felt pretty strong. And I didn't eat the entire contents of the fridge when I got home whilst I waited for my dinner to cook. Good stuff :-)
Here's what I realised looking back at my tracker:
- a month ago, I got down to 12st 4.8lbs after 4 weeks of conscientious eating.
- at the beginning of that run of conscientious eating, I had a frustrating couple of weeks when the scales only moved by tiny increments, despite the effort I was putting in, and we all concluded (yet again) that these things take a while to show up on the scale.
- in the past 4 weeks, I've eaten badly, and gotten away with it at the scale in a pretty light fashion - any one else thinking "yeah, but it takes a while to show up, dumbass"?.
So continuing that pattern - this week will be a good one. Limit the silly weekend excesses. Get in the exercise. Aim for a clean week on my tracker. I've got two really clean days of eating behind me, since my H-M Revelation of Fear. It's a good place to start from.
And to finish on a positive note - I may have gained this week, but last night's 5k run shaved another 15 seconds off my pace per mile, and it felt pretty strong. And I didn't eat the entire contents of the fridge when I got home whilst I waited for my dinner to cook. Good stuff :-)
Thursday, 22 September 2011
Trendsetter
Funny enough, when I first started losing weight, I found I'd set a trend amongst my friends. My flatmate jumped on the bandwagon, her boyfriend jumped on the wagon, my best mates both jumped on the wagon, my next door neighbour joined in too. All in their own ways; some did Weightwatchers, same as me, others did their own thing whether it was copious salad eating, cutting the booze or hard-core exercise. The best thing was that they were all successful to some degree or another.
Sadly, all except 2 of us, later stopped and put it all back on.
Since signing up for the half-marathon yesterday (is it weird that those 2 little hyphenated words still cause me little heart palpitations?), I seem to have started the same thing again. Several people I've spoken to have said they might sign up too. Mostly after using the word "crazy" in varying degrees to describe me. I have to admit that the idea of running the race, and all the training leading up to it, seems marginally less fearsome if there's other people doing it too. So finger's crossed they decide to join me!
I'm not sure I feel crazy though, just a bit over-whelmed. The 12 week training plan officially begins in mid-December. Until that time, I just intend to keep the exercise steady, and continue running once or twice a week for my normal distances, which is roughly a 5km round the harbour.
I've been tracking my running and exercise all this year in an Excel spreadsheet I keep at work. At the moment, I've clocked about 250km of running (249.7km if you're feeling pernickety - I'm not), over some 28.5 hours of running. Last week I finally got round to opening an account on GMAP Pedometer, which is where I measure all my runs for distance - this means that I can now track my runs directly into their online log, and they give me all kinds of cool statistics back about my runs. For instance, my last run on Tuesday felt tiring. I really felt like I was struggling a bit, and walked once or twice. But I did push on to do the full circuit of the harbour and not the shorter version. And, as per usual, when I logged it, I found that the reason it was harder was that I'd actually run it at a slightly quicker pace than the last 2. Each run had been a tiny bit quicker than the last.
Whilst I do love GMAP, it's a bit of a pain logging all your runs and routes manually, so what I'd really love for my half-marathon training is one of these beauties - the Garmin Forerunner, so I could geek it up completely over how I'm doing, and even where I've been when I'm biking too, but that might have to wait til my birthday or Xmas, since it's money I don't have right now (unless Garmin fancy giving me, in which case I'd love them forever, but somehow I doubt that will happen!)
I also love seeing how my exercise has built up over the year. Here's another little stat for you - since I've started tracking all my exercise, I've averaged 4.2 workouts a week this year (that's since 24/01/11). I include any walks or bike-rides over an hour in my tally, but most of those workouts are gym, running, or proper outdoor hiking / biking / surfing.
That's fantastic, but also tells me that I've been eating quite a lot, if I'm doing all that and still effectively maintaining my weight. As has been mentioned before, my weight has been within a constant 7-8lb zone for the last 2 years - 3 or 4lbs above or below 12.5st. It doesn't seem to vary much outside of there. But with the amount of exercise I do, it really shouldn't be hard for me to lose some more, and move myself into a new ball-park. As I said last night, I'm sure this is something that I'd find hugely beneficial for my run. In fact, I'm so damn scared about the run, that I think I'm going to find hiterto untapped reserves of determination to lose.
As Badger pointed out on last night's post - once I'm into the training, I may not find that much comes off me although I might change shape at that point. So I've got about 11 weeks before then to make a real effort to lose a bit, and make the whole endeavour as painless as possible.
I've got the fear, people! The FEAR!
(so much so that I didn't even finish my jacket potato with tuna and cheese at lunch ......unheard of!)
Sadly, all except 2 of us, later stopped and put it all back on.
Since signing up for the half-marathon yesterday (is it weird that those 2 little hyphenated words still cause me little heart palpitations?), I seem to have started the same thing again. Several people I've spoken to have said they might sign up too. Mostly after using the word "crazy" in varying degrees to describe me. I have to admit that the idea of running the race, and all the training leading up to it, seems marginally less fearsome if there's other people doing it too. So finger's crossed they decide to join me!
I'm not sure I feel crazy though, just a bit over-whelmed. The 12 week training plan officially begins in mid-December. Until that time, I just intend to keep the exercise steady, and continue running once or twice a week for my normal distances, which is roughly a 5km round the harbour.
I've been tracking my running and exercise all this year in an Excel spreadsheet I keep at work. At the moment, I've clocked about 250km of running (249.7km if you're feeling pernickety - I'm not), over some 28.5 hours of running. Last week I finally got round to opening an account on GMAP Pedometer, which is where I measure all my runs for distance - this means that I can now track my runs directly into their online log, and they give me all kinds of cool statistics back about my runs. For instance, my last run on Tuesday felt tiring. I really felt like I was struggling a bit, and walked once or twice. But I did push on to do the full circuit of the harbour and not the shorter version. And, as per usual, when I logged it, I found that the reason it was harder was that I'd actually run it at a slightly quicker pace than the last 2. Each run had been a tiny bit quicker than the last.
Whilst I do love GMAP, it's a bit of a pain logging all your runs and routes manually, so what I'd really love for my half-marathon training is one of these beauties - the Garmin Forerunner, so I could geek it up completely over how I'm doing, and even where I've been when I'm biking too, but that might have to wait til my birthday or Xmas, since it's money I don't have right now (unless Garmin fancy giving me, in which case I'd love them forever, but somehow I doubt that will happen!)
I also love seeing how my exercise has built up over the year. Here's another little stat for you - since I've started tracking all my exercise, I've averaged 4.2 workouts a week this year (that's since 24/01/11). I include any walks or bike-rides over an hour in my tally, but most of those workouts are gym, running, or proper outdoor hiking / biking / surfing.
That's fantastic, but also tells me that I've been eating quite a lot, if I'm doing all that and still effectively maintaining my weight. As has been mentioned before, my weight has been within a constant 7-8lb zone for the last 2 years - 3 or 4lbs above or below 12.5st. It doesn't seem to vary much outside of there. But with the amount of exercise I do, it really shouldn't be hard for me to lose some more, and move myself into a new ball-park. As I said last night, I'm sure this is something that I'd find hugely beneficial for my run. In fact, I'm so damn scared about the run, that I think I'm going to find hiterto untapped reserves of determination to lose.
As Badger pointed out on last night's post - once I'm into the training, I may not find that much comes off me although I might change shape at that point. So I've got about 11 weeks before then to make a real effort to lose a bit, and make the whole endeavour as painless as possible.
I've got the fear, people! The FEAR!
(so much so that I didn't even finish my jacket potato with tuna and cheese at lunch ......unheard of!)
Wednesday, 21 September 2011
Have Just Realised ....
.... that entering the stupid half marathon is going to be very good reason / motivation to get some of this remaining lard shifted - surely carting around a stone less of me round the 2 and a I-don't-know-how-long hour course has got to be better? My knees and quads will surely thank me mightily for it.
Must remember that, when I'm next looking at a piece of cake or glass of wine and pondering how good it will really taste!
Other realisations include:
Must remember that, when I'm next looking at a piece of cake or glass of wine and pondering how good it will really taste!
Other realisations include:
- it's
probablydefinitely time I finally got round to treating my feet to some new trainers - if the weather's going to be as cold as they say this winter, I might want a new sports fleece and possibly a running jacket too to minimuse excuse-making opportunities ... or I'm going to have to learn to love the treadmill
- I must get in the habit of getting more sleep - too little sleep is meant to affect your metabilism negatively, and those two nights I had earlier in the week where I tucked myself in at 10pm were kinda blissful, and I had sooooooo much more energy the next day.
Madness!!!
Holy CRAP!!!!!
I've just done something epic-ally stupid. I've just entered for this. Paid and confirmed.
My sanity has officially left the building.
I'm not sure what I was thinking, but ever since I spectated the Bristol Half a couple of weekends ago - the one that I thought I might do then utterly chickened out of - I've been regretting not doing it. All those people had such a sense of achievement on their faces. And bling round their necks that they'd well and truly earned. And as much as I'm terrified by the idea of trying to run 13.1 miles (holy crap, holy crap, that's a reeeeeeeally long way!!!), I'm also terrified of not trying.
Before I started all this, I thought I'd never be able to run properly. I longed to be able to do a 5k - my holy grail that I aimed for whistfully when I first started plodding around the streets under the cover of darkness. I never ever thought I'd manage a 10k - that was just stupid. And here I am - signed up to attempt 21.1k in just under 6 months time.
You've come a long way, baby.
I've just done something epic-ally stupid. I've just entered for this. Paid and confirmed.
My sanity has officially left the building.
I'm not sure what I was thinking, but ever since I spectated the Bristol Half a couple of weekends ago - the one that I thought I might do then utterly chickened out of - I've been regretting not doing it. All those people had such a sense of achievement on their faces. And bling round their necks that they'd well and truly earned. And as much as I'm terrified by the idea of trying to run 13.1 miles (holy crap, holy crap, that's a reeeeeeeally long way!!!), I'm also terrified of not trying.
Before I started all this, I thought I'd never be able to run properly. I longed to be able to do a 5k - my holy grail that I aimed for whistfully when I first started plodding around the streets under the cover of darkness. I never ever thought I'd manage a 10k - that was just stupid. And here I am - signed up to attempt 21.1k in just under 6 months time.
You've come a long way, baby.
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