Sensible

This blog is such a mess, seriously. It's kind of embarrassing, the 'journey' I've been on in this blog in the last year, with a new start every post. ARGH. Not to mention the fact that in a couple of months, I'll be turning 30, and well, I'm still fat.

I go between feeling like YES LET'S DO THIS and feeling utterly hopeless. I keep wondering when I'm going to commit to making a change that will actually stick more than a few days.

By the way, thank you for all your comments, I really appreciate the encouragement.

I think I need to get back the attitude that I had when I started this blog - to not try and lose a huge amount of weight for some upcoming deadline (in other words, I need to stop worrying about my graduation photo coming up in July). Yes, it's unlikely that I'll look dramatically different by then, so why spend weeks worrying and putting pressure on myself?

The attitude I had when I started this blog was to just calm down, take one day at a time and just eat healthier. If I did that, then change would happen without me having to force it. Somewhere along the line I lost the plot and started going between periods of pigging out, then feeling guilty, and then not eating much for a couple of weeks before the process would start again.

From now on I'm just going to try my best to make the right decisions. I need to remember to look after my body. Right now, the most important thing in my life is feeling better about myself - learning to actually love myself. My self-esteem issues have held me back from so much in life.

We're starting paleo today. M's persuaded me to do some gentle kettlebell exercises (I have to be careful though, because I tore something in my shoulder last time, and I'm not sure it'll ever heal properly). I already did a 20 minute pilates/cardio workout this morning, and it actually felt great. I always get up a few hours before M, so it's the perfect opportunity for me to try and include a bit of exercise. M's also desperate to get into yoga, and we have a very basic yoga DVD that we're going to try later.

As usual, we'll see how it goes. I really want to change. The only person stopping me is me, and so on... Let's see what Calming Manatee has to say:

Thanks, Manatee. You're the best.

1st June, another new start

It's the first of June, which obviously means another new start. I haven't bothered to weigh myself because the last week has been so horrendous that I know my weight will be up a lot. I'm estimating that I'm at least 195lbs right now (and I think that's a pretty kind estimation). Which is 7lbs than I was a month ago in my last post.

Excuses: This month was my final month at university, the workload was extremely heavy and it was a tough time. But of course I know that's just an excuse. If I was really committed to losing weight, I'd have found a way to stay strong. But somehow food always wins. It's such a gross addiction, I hate it. I HATE THIS.

So I'm frustrated. This blog was all about losing weight before I turn 30, which is in just under three months. On paper, that amount of time is still enough to make a big difference...

But the problem is, I just don't know what I'm doing. I've tried so many different things, and maybe the main problem is that I've never stuck at any of them for long enough to see results - but I just generally feel completely clueless about the best approach to take. The simplest approach for me is to count calories. It's the only way I can regulate how much I'm eating. I just need to be more hardcore and start taking this seriously.

Also, I have my graduation photos in a month and a half, which is putting pressure on myself to do something urgently. 

Basically, this isn't going to work. I just feel like I don't have a plan. Pretty much doomed to failure right here. I've got this little voice in my head, though, screaming "DO SOMETHING". I mean, nothing will ever change unless I am prepared to do the work. Anyway, I didn't want this post to be one of those "I'm back, LET'S DO THIS!!!!!!!!" posts, because I'm just not really feeling like that. I know the chances are, I'll post back here in a couple of months, and I'll still be the same weight. It's depressing knowing that. I just need to get my head in the right place. Maybe if I can have a week of eating right and exercising, I'll feel like maybe I can do this. But first I have to get through a whole week. And that means just getting through today first.

I feel like it's such a stupid struggle, and that if I were just mentally stronger, it would be easy to do this. Why can't I commit to making this change?

I'll try and post again soon.

April 30th

Long time no see!

I actually deleted this blog last week, but thought better of it today and was happy to see there was an 'Undelete Blog' option in Blogger. So, I'm back! I keep thinking I have to start a new blog every time I start over - when really, my weight loss journey began last August, when I started this blog at 205.6lbs.

As of today, I'm 188.1lbs, which is 17.5lbs down from my starting weight of 205.6lbs, which was 35 weeks ago exactly. That equates to a loss per week of 0.5lbs. If I'd just stuck to the plan and lost 2lbs a week, I'd be 135.6lbs now - pretty much my target weight. If I'd even just lost 1lb a week, I'd be 170.6lbs.

OH WELL.

I'm still less than when I started, and that's the main thing.

I've enjoyed looking at some of my early posts on here, including my Food Lists of Shame. I can't believe the stuff I used to eat. Not that I'm some healthy food goddess right now - I'm only just getting into the swing of things and it's a daily struggle to not pig out.

Anyway, the main thing I'm excited about is that as of today, I AM NOT OBESE! WOOHOO! I haven't been just 'overweight' since 2011, so I'm thrilled! Onwards!

January 22nd

Thanks for all the encouraging comments on my last post!

Today, I stepped on the scales and it said 189.8lbs.

I'M IN THE 180S!

Just barely. But it doesn't matter - I'm so thrilled about it. Total loss so far: 15.8lbs. It feels amazing to be in the 180s. According to the BMI calculator, if I lose another 1.4lbs, I'll be out of the obese range, and just merely overweight. YES.

My husband and I are going to Japan in April, and that is seriously motivating me to lose weight. I've been on so many holidays where I've been fat and this is going to be the trip of a lifetime for us, so I'd like to try and lose as much as I can, even though there isn't much time.

Anyway, I'm happy to have said goodbye to the 190s. I feel like I'm finally getting somewhere... next up: the 170s!

January 1st.

Apologies for the sloppiness of this post. I just wanted to write here to say that I'm still alive, still 29 and fat, and that I'm determined to change my life this year. No more screwing around.

Okay. So before you all think I suck, a few days ago I was 191.6lbs. While that means I haven't exactly had a huge amount of success with losing weight since I started at the end of August, it still means that I've lost 14lbs in total. So that's where I was at a few days ago, right before Christmas.

Just weighed myself, and I'm 195.6lbs. I'm not particularly worried - I know that will drop back to what it was pretty quickly.

But yeah, not an amazing result, really. Certainly not worth having a blog about! Basically, I didn't try very hard. In the last few weeks I've had a really long, hard look at myself and I've finally started to deal with my underlying issues. Self esteem, self worth, confidence - all of that sort of thing. And my head is in a much better place now. I want to do this for me, because I deserve to have a healthy body. It's going to take a lot of effort, but aren't I worth it? It sort of saddens me to think of all my failed diet efforts before, because ultimately my failure meant that underneath it all, I didn't think I was worth the effort. At some point, I told myself "nah, I can't be bothered, just stay fat".

Anyway, we'll see how it goes this time. I don't want to sound all fired up and determined on here because well, I just need to DO it instead of writing a load of crap about it. I'm trying to do it properly this time, though. No more half-assed attempts. It's this or nothing. I'm 30 in August, and I have about 60lbs to lose (that will get me to 135lbs, which must be pretty close to my goal weight). I can totally do this.

My husband is in on this too - we're both going to go to the gym each week together, we're both going to be eating paleo (which kind of means eating a lot of protein from meat, and avoiding carbs unless they're from fruit or vegetables), and also sticking to a calorie limit. Hopefully if we support each other, we'll both get there in the end. I'm also going to do extra cardio a few times a week.

It sounds like a lot, but if I want to get this done, I have to stop being so lazy. I remember seeing so many forum threads on My Fitness Pal from people who started in January and actually stuck with it, and they had completely transformed themselves by the summer/autumn of that year. And I would just be sitting there looking at the photos, wishing I'd bothered to do the same.

Okay. That's all for now.

Week 11 Weigh-In Result!

I am so happy, fellow blog readers!

This week, I lost 4.8lbs!

!!!!!!!!!

After all those weeks of not losing any, or gaining a little bit - I have finally had a really good week. My current weight is 192.4lbs, and I've lost a total of 13.2lbs.

The really exciting thing is that if I have another good week, it means that I COULD ACTUALLY BE IN THE 180S by next Monday!

That would be so amazing. I feel like, I'm almost at the end of what I call 'Phase 1', which is getting out of the 200s and the 190s. It's like the introductory phase, that might not feel like proper, proper weight loss because I've spent such a long time in the 190s, going up and down.

But once I get into the 180s, things start to feel a bit different. Man, I'm just so high on this little wave of optimism right now. I've already had a good week of feeling good about myself, and I know there's just a lot more of that to come if I carry on. Things can only get better!

I've been spending a lot of time on the 'Success Stories' section of the My Fitness Pal forum, and it's made me realise that I've forgotten how to even imagine what I might look or feel like as a slim person. I used to think about it all the time, but I suppose I got so used to being my old weight and thinking that I was never going to escape it that I just stopped thinking about it. It's hard to believe that there is a thin person in here waiting to get out. I have no idea what she looks like, though.

I always stare at my face in the mirror and try to imagine what my face would look like if there wasn't so much chubbiness. Seriously, I have one of the chubbiest faces ever. I remember when I got down to 140lbs in 2004, I was getting happier with my body but my face still seemed quite chubby. Here's a photo of me taken in Paris for our first wedding anniversary when I was 21, I think I was about 143-147lbs in this photo (excuse the cheesy pose).

That set of photos from Paris is important because they're pretty much the only evidence I have of me being in the 140s. I think I got down to 138lbs, and then promptly started to just increase in weight over a period of many years until... you know - getting to 205.6lbs on August 27th, 2012. Anyway, that photo is how I know my goal weight is not in the 140s. I have a tiny wrist, maybe that means I have a small frame and I need to lose a little bit more because of that - who knows.

Look at me, getting all carried away with myself because I had one good week of weight loss. I suddenly remembered I'm still in the 190s and that sort of snapped me out of it - I have a seriously long way to go.

But still. 180s. That's something to be really excited about. Hope you all have a great week!

Week 10 Weigh-In Result and the 5:2 Diet

Well, I put on 0.6lbs last week, and as of Monday, I weighed 197.2lbs.

So basically, I've made no progress at all in the last five weeks. And to be honest, I haven't really been trying. I've still been logging my food on My Fitness Pal, but I haven't been careful about what I've been eating.

But, this week I started turning it around. I did a little mid-week weigh-in this morning, and I'm back to 195.4, so by Monday hopefully I'll be a little lower and back into Weight Loss Territory.

I know for the last few weeks I've been saying things like 'oh, I'm really determined now' and 'I'M IN HARDCORE WEIGHT LOSS MODE FROM NOW ON', but now I actually am. I started feeling really depressed earlier in the week - not the kind of depressed that makes me want to eat, but the sort that makes me desperate to start making some progress.

I've also started reading a book about emotional eating, and it's helping me to bear a few things in mind when I'm bored/tired/lonely/depressed - and I'm trying to hold back from eating during those times, when I know I'm not actually hungry.

Anyway, here's something I haven't talked about before. After the first couple of weeks of trying to lose weight through Being Sensible, I decided to switch to the 5:2 diet. Obviously, in the last 4-5 weeks I haven't been putting much effort in and I wouldn't say that I've been following the diet at all, hence the stall in weight loss. But in the first few weeks, it worked extremely well for me. If you haven't heard of it, it's a slightly easier version of the Alternate Day Fasting diet (which is when you fast every other day). With the 5:2 diet, you just fast two days a week, and have five 'normal' days, when you're supposed to be able to eat whatever you like - except I usually try to stick between 1500 and 1800 on those days, just as a rough guideline so I don't go completely crazy and eat all the foods.

I should mention that the fasting days aren't proper fasting days - I usually have about 500 calories on those days. For guys, you're supposed to have about 600 on those days. Anyway, for those weeks when I've been following the diet, I've been losing weight very comfortably. It's been more like a 6:1 diet for me - in other words, I've usually just been doing one fasting day, and six normal days - and I've still been losing 1.5-3lbs a week.

I know people might be quick to jump on what sounds like just another faddy diet - which I suppose it is, but I've found it quite easy to stick to - and most importantly, it's been WORKING for me - and so I'm going to keep doing it. For me, I find it easier to just have one slightly more painful day in the week where I don't get to eat much and to have all the other days as normal food days, than to have 7 more restrictive days of calorie counting. It's just something that I find easier to deal with, mentally.

So this week, I'm trying to get through the week doing two fasting days instead of one because I desperately want to see some progress after having spent the last month hovering between 195 and 198lbs. Today is a fasting day. I won't lie, these fasting days suck, but I never do the two fasting days in a row so at the end of a fasting day, at least I know there's always a normal day ahead.

Anyway, I'm not advising anyone to follow this diet - I'm just talking about my own experiences of it so far. And as long as it's helping me achieve my goals, I'm going to stick with it. I mean, I know that restricting calories will always work, however you do it - but I've struggled so long to find a way of doing it that actually works for me, so I'm going to keep going with it.

Of course, I have been slacking off in the last month or so, so what went wrong there? Well, I'm putting it down to my issues with emotional eating. I was stressed with work, so I ate. I'm working on cutting those ties right now. It's something I've never really paid attention to before, I've just accepted it as part of who I am. But I've started to realise that I really need to work on it so that maybe one day, I'll be able to function like a normal person and not have my mood dictate whether or not I pig out.

Well, this has been a long and rambly and not-very-coherent post. Hopefully I'll have a good result to report on Monday for my next weigh-in. I'm hoping to finally be below 195 - watch this space!

Week 9 Weigh-In Result!

I didn't quite manage to lose the 3lbs I put on last week, but I did lose 1.4lbs. So that's something. My weight is now 196.6lbs.

I know I said I was really determined to do well last week, but somehow things didn't go to plan. I'm blaming it on stress from coursework - I mean, I have been stressed out from coursework - but I know it's not really an excuse. I know lots of people with lots of stuff going on, but they're still managing to find the willpower to watch what they eat. I just keep asking myself, why am I so weak? Don't I want this? I think it's because in my brain, I keep going from one extreme to the other - being too harsh on myself and then rebelling against it because I'm so sick of telling myself NO all the time. So I end up saying yes quite a lot.

It's not a very good excuse. I just need to get my act together.

I've got a new strategy this week - I've already planned out all my food (and have made an allowance for alcohol at the Halloween party on Wednesday) and if I can stick to it this week, I think I should have a much better result on Monday and I'll be back on track. I'm mainly having stir-frys with turkey, lots of vegetables and brown rice for dinner this week. It probably doesn't sound great, but man, it's good. Really filling and satisfying.

I'm feeling good about this week, and I'm confident that I'll finally get below 195. I know at this point I'd usually do my Food List of Shame for last week - but it's just more of the same bad food choices. You know what I'm like (see previous posts). But this week, I'm really determined to stick to my food plan - no more sneaky trips to Subway or McDonalds.

I'm glad I've got a proper plan for this week, because for the last couple of weeks I've been feeling as though I've been losing control and spiralling back towards 200. I'm done with this mini-plateau (which isn't even a proper plateau because it's basically just down to me eating too much) - and I'm ready to start dropping the weight again. Yeah. I'll have a treat when I hit my 20lb goal of 185.6. 11lbs to go!

Week 8 Weigh-In Result!

Well, it was going to happen sooner or later - I had my first proper binging-and-pigging-out-and-not-caring-about-what-I-ate week.

As a result, I went from 195.0lbs last week to 198.0lbs this week! THREE POUNDS UP!

That's quite horrifying. But as horrible as it is, I know it'll be alright. I am NOT going back over 200. I've had my fun, I've had a nice few days telling myself not to care and to eat whatever I want - so now it's back to work. It's just part of the ups and downs of losing weight. It'll be alright.

So, time to go through my food diary for the latest Food List of Shame:

• Alcoholic beverages (which came to a total of 777 calories in one night - argh!)
• Cake
• One full English hangover breakfast
• 3 course meal at the Loch Fyne Fish Restaurant, also with several large pieces of bread and butter and mixed olives! (This was absolutely delicious though...)
• Half a large Domino's pizza
• Half a box of Domino's Chicken Kickers
• 6 inch Subway meatball marinara
• 1.5 pints of beer

Awful. As you can see from the list, I quite clearly did not give a crap about what I ate this week. Well, that's not strictly true - the first four days of the week went very well and I had everything under control. It was that hangover day that threw me off. I felt so awful that I just started not caring. So, in future, I'd like to avoid getting a hangover and just y'know, drink less the night before. It's not worth feeling that terrible the day after AND having it throw me off my diet completely.

Just to give you an idea how many calories I ate (I managed to track everything all week, even though sometimes I really didn't want to). My total amount of calories for the week was 14778, and the daily average was 2111. Now, some people would tell me that there's no way I should have gained three pounds from that, since 2111 is roughly my TDEE. If they're right, I shouldn't really have gained weight at all. So then what - are we just looking at a lot of food weight that is still in my system (I only ate the pizza about 10 hours ago...). Perhaps a lot of water retention from the increased sodium levels? It's all possible, I suppose. It's reassuring to think that maybe I haven't just gained three pounds of fat back, but I have no idea what's actually going on, really.

But anyway, I've been hovering around last week's weight far too long (195), and now I've just given myself more work to do to just get back to that weight. Not a happy thought. I knew last week was going downhill pretty quickly, but I'd hoped I would be able to maintain or just have a small gain. But anyway, I've had a gain and it's the first gain I've had since September 17th - so that's not too bad. Now for many more weeks of losses!

This week is going to be flawless. I wouldn't normally say that, but I'm really, really determined now!

Week 7 Weigh-In Result!

I lost 0.6lbs this week, bringing my total weight loss to 10.6lbs and my current weight to 195.0lbs.

Food list of shame for last week:

• Chocolate eclair
• Chicken tikka biryani, 1.5 poppadoms and half a peshwari naan (from the Indian restaurant down the road) - this was a LOT of food... and after everything else I had that day, my calorie total was probably about 3000 - argh!
• KFC Boneless banquet for one
• Lots of Haribo Tangfastics (had a massive container of them, but thankfully they're all gone now)

I think I need to start paying more attention to the amount of carbs, fat and protein I'm eating. Here's a little summary of my week's food, according to the extremely awesome My Fitness Pal app:

I really need to find a way of getting more protein into my diet without having to pay too much (meat is so expensive!). Low fat cottage cheese is a good option, but let's face it - there's only so much of that you can eat... If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know! I can't afford to buy loads of meat, and eggs also have a lot of fat so I can't just gorge on those. Help!

I've also been using a little NHS app on my phone for tracking my BMI - here's where I'm at as of yesterday morning when I weighed myself:

OBESE! But I'm edging closer to the yellow. The lovely yellow. To get out of the obese section and into the plain ol' overweight section, I just need to lose 7lbs. That will be awesome. To get into the normal green section, I need to lose 38lbs. But still, just to be able to tell myself that I'm not officially obese any more will be wonderful! Just think, in a few weeks I could just be overweight!

Had a little non-scale victory a few days ago. There's a friend's birthday party coming up, and after traipsing around the city centre for many hours and not finding anything, I ended up ordering this dress online from New Look:

I looked at the size chart, and eventually decided to risk it and order a size 16. I instantly regretted it - why oh why hadn't I just gone for a size 18? I was going to have to send it back and it would be a pain in the arse and I'd have to find something else with not much time left - but IT ACTUALLY FITS! Usually when I try stuff on from New Look, their size 16s never fit me - I guess it just shows that I'm starting to shrink a little bit. YES.