Oh god. GIANT TRIGGER WARNING

So, I followed Captain Awkward because it served me to have my reading in one place. And I wanted to comment, so I did.

People have been following that link back. People stumble across this blog from who knows where–and I’d just like to take a moment to say, please take care of yourselves. This blog is about weight loss. I have disordered eating. I’m trying to lose weight–under medical supervision and in a healthy way.

If this is going to harm you or trigger you, please tap out now. More specific details below the cut.

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2013
07/09
CATEGORY
thinky thoughts
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Long time no post

So: here’s a revelation.

I haven’t lost any weight.

I’d still like to but–I can’t do it. I can’t punish myself. Going on stupid calorie-restricted diets is not a viable long-term solution. Hell, it even backfires in the short-term. I end up feeling depressed, and I lash out and I end up bingeing. And then I fast to make up for it, lather, rinse, repeat.

I have to not hate myself.

I went to see my dietician on the weekend. I asked about the 5:2 diet. She said “That can be beneficial for people who consistently overeat. That is not your problem. You do overeat, but it’s inconsistent and interspersed with fasting. You have to learn to eat normally, and you have to eat that way for the rest of your life. You have to get out of the diet mindset.”

We were talking about treats and she said “Be honest. If your diet consists mostly of treats, how do you feel?” and I flashed back to the uncomfortably full, headachey blerghy feeling.

I’ve had a couple of health scares lately. Blood pressure that’s too high (turned out to be stress).

I do have to be calorie AWARE. I have to have an idea of how many calories I’m eating, but it shouldn’t be my main focus.

At the moment, I’m just focussing on eating three meals a day, as unprocessed as possible. I’m trying to keep my meat intake around 100 or so grams a serve.

I’ve had the mantra “Just make better choices” going through my head. Instead of mayo, I put mustard on my roll. Half my plate is vegetables. I went to the supermarket and they had fresh-squeezed orange juice which smelled awesome. So I bought a whole orange and ate that.

Once a month at work, we have zaatar for breakfast. It’s a lebanese pizza-ish bread sprinkled with salt, oregano and sesame seeds. It’s very tasty, but low in protein and a little higher in calories than I’d usually aim for.

I had a protein shake before coming in, and I had my zaatar. And I had soup for dinner.

R. (dietician of awesome) assured me that eventually my hunger WOULD direct how I ate. That if I continued having three meals of around that size, that eventually my body would respond. I’m not sure, but I guess I’ll see.

Small victories. The other night I’d not eaten all day apart from a slice of cake. I was feeling headachey and nauseated, but not hungry.

I had soup in the fridge. I ate it and felt better. Baby steps, I guess.

Prepping food turned out to be a big issue for me. Because it DOESN’T always happen and then I go into a tail spin. I have to be able to eat food when I’m buying takeaway and still make good choices.

I’ve discovered that I CAN make better choices. Instead of having goat’s cheese AND meat on my roll, I just have lean deli meat. Instead of buying a HUGE, dense, white bread ciabatta, I buy a smaller wholegrain roll and stuff it with salad.

I’ve signed up for personal training because if I make a commitment, I will actually go. I’m still doing ballet.

I’ve lost a kilo over the last month, and I’m pleased, but I’m trying not to make it my focus. I want to be able to run 5km. I want to be able to do sautes in ballet without my ankle hurting.

Day by day. Not a focus, just the way things are.

Now I need to go buy my wholegrain roll, some salad and roast beef.

2014
04/07
CATEGORY
Uncategorized
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Long time no update

Oh wow. So, simultaneously, nothing has happened and a lot has happened.

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2013
08/07
CATEGORY
exercise
food
health
thinky thoughts
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Enough wallowing, get going, self!

Wow, this blog has been all gloom and whining recently. so I’m going to focus on the positive.

  • My ankle is still sore, but going to the gym and hopping on the exercise bike has finally had the effect the physio said it would. It’s flushed the area out, and while I have a lump at the back of the ankle where calcaneofibral tore, my entire ankle/calf is no longer twice the size of the other! I can see my ankle bone again!
  • For the longest time, I’ve had problems with consuming a healthy level of alcohol. I have difficulty stopping at one or two drinks–you know, the bottle’s there, it’s open, I live alone, etc. Last night I had a beer. One beer. and even though I have a sixpack, I didn’t want to drink any more. I’m hopeful that I can set up a healthy pattern that fits in with my goals and still enjoy myself. I’m aiming to make this six-pack last three weeks.
  • I know I try not to take too much notice of the daily weight, but today was a good day. I’m 0.2 of a pound from my lowest recorded weight, the trend is headed downwards.
  • I am actually slightly over 25% of the way towards my goal weight.
  • I am 100g away from losing 9kg since the start of the year, and 0.5 of a pound away from losing 20 pounds (I like round numbers).
  • Achievements!
  • Over the last week, I have packed my lunch for the next day every night.
  • I have started making my bed again. UfYH would be proud of me! Also, I’ve made my lunch for the next day every night this week, and set out my breakfast so I’ve eaten breakfast at home every morning this week except Monday, when I was still getting organised.
  • I’ve exercised every night for the past 4 days.

I’m starting this weekend with a positive attitude!

2013
07/12
CATEGORY
exercise
health
organisation
weight loss
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Sometimes the hardest thing is waiting.

I’m having difficulty with the holding pattern that my injured ankle has created. I try to balance my food and exercise (being of scientific bent, it’s easier for me to treat weightloss as a purely scientific matter. It also leads to marginally less in the way of brain-weasels attacking me, and ensures I don’t do anything stupid like starve myself) and I eat back (an estimation of) whatever calories I exercise.

Because I can’t really exercise for very long or intensely at the moment, I’m having difficulty with balancing my food intake. I usually have difficulty eating enough calories to balance my exercise and keep my weight loss to ~1kg a week (losing more than that is usually either water, or, more worryingly, the body starting to catabolise muscle, which is NOT what I want.) However, my hunger feels like it’s gnawing at me and it’s really hard not to either just ignore it, which leads to me not eating when I need to, or just saying “fuck it” and eating lots of hind-brain satisfying salt and fat.

The other difficulty is, because I have gained a little due to the three week tantrum, the scales are up. Usually I can ignore that because I plot the trend, but the trend isn’t down at the moment. I know it’ll take time to catch up with eating properly again, but sticking with it is really hard at the moment.

I have to wait until my ankle is healed. I know I do. It’s just that it’s slow, and it hurts and why can’t I have what I want NOW? I’m prepared to work for things (see: sensible long-term weight loss), but it’s really hard when I feel that things are out of control.

I hate waiting.

2013
07/11
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exercise
food
health
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All or nothing is not a viable approach for me

So, it’s been around three weeks since I updated.

In those three weeks, I basically gave up. My ankle hurt all the time and I couldn’t exercise. I ate rubbish, I ate lots of it, and I ate infrequently. I also drank alcohol. It’s the unholy trinity that combined to make me so damn fat in the first place. There was even a two day period where I lived on cake. I actually typed this out in an email to a friend, so I’m going to copy and paste below.

You know that I’ve been feeling like crap because I don’t eat often enough and then binge eat? And basically I’ve been scared to hop on the scales again because JESUS CHRIST, it is such hard work and after my three week long tantrum where I have been living on cake and alcohol, I was all “MOTHERFUCKER, I HAVE TO START AGAIN?!?”

And part of the problem is that this is a self-perpetuating cycle, I don’t have the energy so I don’t take care of myself, so I live in filth, so I feel gross and can’t take care of myself, so I don’t have energy, etc. You get the idea.

At work, K has said “OH HEY, there’s this challenge starting next month, it’s designed to sell their supplements but I figure that’s only an issue if we get into the top ten. They provide a diet and exercise plan for free!” and I was all “Well, there’s a gym across the road, and I am far more likely to stick to a three month effort if we’re exercising together…” and she was all “FANTASTIC it starts at the end of the month, so let’s sign up and motivate each other.” (I’ve looked at past meal plans, and it’s pretty much what I eat now, except more food because they’re exercising more.)

And then I was all “I have to stop this. I’m eating one meal a day and that’s a HUGE meal, and it involves goats cheese, which while I am not allergic to it in the same way I am to cow dairy, it makes me feel like crap.” But I just didn’t have the ENERGY to cook something. Then I read this:

http://captainawkward.com/2013/07/06/little-things-that-people-say-that-totally-shift-your-perspective/

And I thought: holy shit. I can’t start because I lack energy and I lack energy because I can’t start. But you know what I can do? I can pour some cereal into a bowl. (Please note that the Captain does not want diet/weight loss talk in her blog, because it’s triggery to a lot of people.)

So I bought some cereal to work and made sure I ate it in the morning. I was still eating crap at lunch/no dinner. This went on for a couple of days. Then, I went out on the weekend and bought some chicken breasts. I was all “IT’S LATE AND I WANT TO GO TO BED” but I went “Self, come on. You can do this” So I skinned all six chicken breasts, froze three of them and cooked the other three and put them in the fridge. And it only took me 25 minutes and most of that was waiting for the chicken breasts to cook.

The next morning was so, so hectic and I was running late. But I still managed to throw a couple of handfuls of salad into a container, chop up half a tomato and slice up some cucumber. It wasn’t a GOOD salad, but it was a salad. So I ate breakfast, and a healthy lunch.

Then I went to the supermarket and bought a can of pea and ham soup. And I had half of it and a couple of pieces of bread for dinner, and a protein shake as well. And then I went for a half hour walk.

This morning, I got up and I stepped on the scales. Yes, they’ve gone up. Do you want to know how much they’ve gone up over the three weeks that I’ve essentially been throwing a tantrum?

1.8 pounds.

That is NOTHING. I can vary that much over the course of a day. That’s less then a kilo.

So right now, I am starting back into feeling fantastic. I don’t know whether the scales are going to go down, but they should. I have enough energy to go to the gym and hop on the exercise bike for an hour and I’m GOING TO. I have healthy soup in the slowcooker, a serve of pea and ham soup in the freezer.

I CAN DO THIS.

2013
07/09
CATEGORY
exercise
food
health
thinky thoughts
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Being honest is hard

I had a friend contact me and say he appreciated my honesty about my weight. That I had “inspired” him.

I don’t feel inspirational. Mostly, I don’t feel like anything except a big old tired mess.

I injured my ankle on Sunday night. It’s still swollen and is turning all kinds of colours that skin should not be. I’m in pain, still. I went to Emergency because I thought it might be broken. The doctor’s opinion was a torn ligament. (Not that he would actually know. X-Rays only show bone fractures.)

At first, I didn’t eat because I got stressed. Then I ate junk, also because I got stressed. Then yesterday I did a half-decent effort at making good choices. Instead of getting a large bread roll and blowing out my calories completely, I got a packet of small wraps. I got roast beef from the deli and salad. I also got goat’s cheese, which–what the hell. It would have fitted into my calories.

Then I found the almond crisps at the supermarket.

I won’t even record the rest of the day. It basically involved binging on almond crisps and bread and not eating dinner.

The thing is, I have to recover from this. The scales have gone up, yes, but it’s only one day. What’s harder is not letting one day become two become a week become “why did I ever think I could do this?”

Today, I had a wrap and some goat’s cheese that I didn’t need. I was hungry, lunch was delayed (fire drill.) But that’s ok. It doesn’t blow my whole day out of the water. If I am careful not to twist my ankle, I think I can go for a walk tonight.

So, IĀ  move on. It’s all I can do. I still want the goal of being a healthy weight. I’m still tired from four days of unhealthy food–but the way to stop that is not to eat more unhealthy “quick-fix” sugary, fatty food, it’s to start eating healthily again and wait for my body to catch up.

It doesn’t matter how many times I fall over on the way. So long as I continue to pick myself up and try to move forward, that’s the thing that counts.

2013
06/20
CATEGORY
exercise
health
1 comment

UGH

This is an old entry. I’m publishing it as a reminder to myself because the weekend is coming up and THIS STUFF HAPPENS. So I need to plan for it and circumvent it.

Basic summary: one day of the weekend I was AWESOME and prepped my food and took it out with me and STUCK TO IT even though I was out and about. What I didn’t do was drink enough water, but that’s hard to do when you’re out and about (and not always within handy reach of the facilities…)

Then the wheels fell off. I fell into my usual trap of “Wake up late, eat late, go out, forget to eat, lose the ability to cope, eat junk, want to eat more junk because sugar hit.”

Now today I’m feeling like crap. But the good thing was I made my lunch and packed my snacks last night, so I have support for making good decisions.

So. I don’t have [sport I attend religiously] this weekend. This frees up my weekends considerably. Still, I’m actually feeling fantastic at the moment. A combination of exercise, good diet and sleep has meant that I’m feeling fantastic. So. Things I have to do this weekend.

  • Make a shopping list
  • Go into costco.
  • Make soup
  • Go to a friend’s housewarming
  • Make kale chips

In addition to that, I’m going to go for a huge walk on Saturday. I think I’m going to make a practice of going out for a walk at least one day on the weekend. I really feel energised after last week.

My challenges for this weekend are threefold:

  • Get up at a decent time to put soup on, so that I can get out the door and get to Costco before the entire population of [city] descends on it. Prepare my snacks the night before. I know what I’ll be doing and when, so eat to support it.
  • Make sure I take enough water. Yes, that probably means ensuring I drink a heap at lunch, taking two bottles with me (one to leave in the car), and then refilling them before I go to the party.
  • If, at any time, things become too much, I will just leave. I have the ability to do that.

The hardest thing about taking care of myself is actually being realistic about what my capabilities are. I get stressed and feel frazzled when I don’t eat, or when I’m around people too long.

I’m starting to think that this entire process is not actually about losing weight. It’s about learning to take care of myself.

 

 

 

2013
06/14
CATEGORY
enforcing boundaries
food
health
thinky thoughts
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Settling in

I know that this is going to be a long journey. It’s very hard not to get impatient, though. I am seeing results, but slower than I’d like.

Still, I know that part of the reason that it’s best for it to take a long time is that I’m aiming for a long-term habit change. The way I was eating before was neither healthy nor sustainable. So now I’ve shifted to an eating pattern that is more sustainable, and by tracking it every day, I’m going to develop habits that will maintain my body and health. If I just can continue this, then the adjustment I have to make when I go onto maintaining my weight will be less.

I’m trying to get into the habit of going to bed earlier and waking up earlier. The waking up isn’t going so well, but I do feel better now I’m getting more sleep.

I’ve been doing yoga. I’ve found a site called “Do Yoga With Me.” It’s a fantastic resource. I can’t always make myself get out and go for a walk, but I can walk into the spare room and turn on my laptop. (I’d like to do yoga classes too, but finances and time do not allow that at the moment. Also, if I’m failing on getting to the gym, which is a 10 minute drive away, how’m I going to go on going to a yoga studio half an hour away?)

I’m going to do a whole heap of different classes, but I’m hoping to do a class that focusses on a different body part each day of the week. In addition to that, I’m going to start doing yoga pre and post my runs, to stretch out a little. I’m already finding it beneficial. I’ve had sciatica (not badly, but just a nagging pain) for the last couple of days. Last night I did an hour long class focussing on twists and stretches. I’m in no pain this morning.

Running is going fantastically. I managed to run the entire 15 minutes of the free-form run both of the last two sessions, and in the last session I felt like I could have gone faster.

The scale is bouncing up and down and I’m trying not to worry so long as the trend is down (it is). I’m also trying to be a bit more observant of what my body wants, within limits. Yesterday I ended up going for an extra walk because I wanted to eat ALL THE THINGS to balance my calories. Today, I’m going for a run, and I should be eating more, but I’m actually not hungry. I’m still eating–meals and at least one of my snacks every couple of hours is non-negotiable, but I don’t eat the second piece of fruit/yoghurt that I have room for in my calories if I’m not hungry.

2013
06/13
CATEGORY
exercise
food
weight bounce
weight loss
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Actually starting to listen

So, one of the things my dietician was red-hot on was “LISTEN TO YOUR BODY”. I was all “… lady, my body never told me not to when I got fat, so…”
Anyway. I’m trying to draw a line between “I have to eat every 2-3 hours” and “I’m not hungry.” I’m trying to eat something, even if it’s a piece of fruit.

 

There is room in my calories for a cookie or two. I ate my lunch and then I was all šŸ˜€ “… cookies nao?”

Then I paused for a second.

I checked my hunger levels. Nope. I’d just eaten lunch an hour and a half ago. Not hungry.

I waited another three quarters of an hour. OK, I was starting to get a little hungry.

I thought of eating a cookie. Nothing.

I thought of eating a banana. I started salivating.

So, I’m listening to my body. I’m having a banana, rather than a cookie.

It’s what my body wants, after all.

It’s just weird.

2013
06/06
CATEGORY
food
thinky thoughts
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