Well after a really tough weekend and yesterday's shit loss (0.5lb) I should be feeling really down - but actually I feel ok.
I stayed behind after group last night and talked with my counsellor for about 40mins.
I had built it up in my head that I HAVE to get down to 10 stone/11 stone whatever before going into maintenance. Over the weekend I got really scared that I was going to just crack - and not just crack but really binge. I would far rather come off this in a controlled manner - especially now that my weight is ok, than crack and blow it completely.
Also, there's the slim possibility that I will need to come off this for a few weeks at the end of March for reasons I will go into later on.
Anyway, she was SO helpful. If needs be I can come off in a months time and start management early. It turns out maintenance is a year!! 12 weeks of the reintroduction of foods and the rest is counselling as and when I need it. She said that there was also a number of short courses for people who have already done the programme and have put on a bit of weight (like a stone) and want to get it off again - so I could always do this later in the year if I want to get it down a bit further.
Just knowing this has made it all seem so much easier for me. Maybe it's knowing that I have a choice and I won't be a failure if I'm not 9/10 stone before I go into maintenance.
Thing is I would really like to get down that far - but I need to be adult about this too and realise that the main thing here is for me to be healthy and try to return to healthy, balanced eating.
What I definitely want to avoid is losing it, bingeing and purging or just going completely off the rails.
Maybe the talk was all I needed? Anyway, she told me not to look at the scales next week. Go to meeting, get weighed and get it recorded but not look at the numbers. As she said, I have the evidence I need - I'm in ketosis, I'm sticking to the diet, I am losing weight - sometimes it doesn't show on the scales immediately but it doesn't mean it isn't happening.
It's good being in this group as many are returners who have lost up to 7/8/9 stone before and have experienced all this. It was interesting how many people felt that there is a psychological link with weight loss that cannot be explained by science - ie.. your body holding onto the weight for whatever reason because of things going on in your head. Part of me hopes that is true but part of me thinks that the last thing I need is my bloody head to join in with my body in this conspiracy to keep me fat!!!
Anyway, haven't taken any bars this week either - just shakes and booked in for a colonic next Monday. I'm not letting my body or my head piss about with me!! I will lose this bloody weight one way or another!!
Well this weekend was SO hard. I've really really been struggling. I just felt absolutely miserable. A lot of this is because I have been so tired from not enough sleep.
I've been obsessing all weekend about my weight, what my goal should be, when I should stop, willing myself not to go to the fridge/shop and just crack.
This morning I got an email from my mother in law expressing her and my f-i-l's concern that I might not be pushing myself too hard with this. Yesterday was particularly difficult as I had a family meal with my family and OH's family and everyone was saying how great I looked but concerned that i'm going too far. I burst into tears - mainly through being a bit exhausted and fed up with soups and shakes!! Luckily only my mother witnessed the tears thing but I was on the edge for much of the day. Kublai's parents are so warm and loving and take so much care for me and I just don't want to worry them - or my mother for that matter - but then she's probably more used to my ups and downs!
Then also this morning I got a great message from Ninamoonshine replying to my post on day 123. I've also been getting similar advice from AmandaJayne on Minimins. Both these ladies have really helped. Somehow getting the advice from others who have struggled similarly seems to speak more to me than worried/concerned relatives. (bit unfair on the relatives!!)
So......I'm coming to the conclusion that I will stop the shakes/soup thing when I get to about 11 stone 11 or so (in about 1 stone's time) and then go into the maintenance programme. From what I understand, most people will continue to lose on maintenance. I will try to get down to 11 stone whilst on maintenance.
Then - as Ninamoonshine says - I will take it from there. I will be training for the London triathlon and eating accordingly so I should be pretty damn healthy anyway!
I'm coming to the conclusion that staying on the soups/shakes until 10 stone is becoming this insurmountable, huge, horrible thing in my head which just makes me want to eat. The idea of just losing one more stone this way and then doing something different seems so much easier to deal with. I think I'd rather come off this diet earlier and aim to continue to lose but having introduced food than just crack and raid the fridge - it took ALL my willpower not to do that yesterday.
Anyway, WI tonight. I'd really like to lose more than the 2lbs I've been losing weekly recently. I'm thinking that I'm going to have a week of just soups/shakes (no bars) to try and get things moving again. I've recently been feeling pretty much nauseated by all the various foodpacks - so I don't suppose it makes much difference which specific ones I have.
So - fingers crossed for tonight!
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Half a sodding pound!! but I have been rounding down my poundage every week when converting from kilos to stones and pounds... (saving up for a rainy day!!). My weight now in kilos is 81.5 which I believe is 12st 11lbs - so things are not as bad as all that I suppose.
Had a great meeting and I'm still resolved. We discussed maintenance and I feel much better for it now.
So for various reasons I have been thinking ahead about management and when I will go into it.
I initially set my target weight at 11st 7lbs. I remembered being around that weight when I came back from Japan and being happy with it.... although in my heart I sort of wanted to be 11 stone because I had been 11st 3lbs at my lowest and thought it would be nice to be that few lbs less. During that time when I was in the 11s, I was very very active (playing squash competitively 3x a week and gym/pool on other days). Even up to 14 stone I was doing triathlons. At 18 stone I still cycled everywhere. So I'm quite muscley and have a large frame.
But my counsellor said that 11 stone is at the v. top of my BMI scale and I should really aim to go lower. So I looked at the scale and realised that 10 stone is midway in the BMI scale and thought - I'll aim for that. Also I've got a bit of a "perfectionist" thing going on which means that I can't just do something well - I have to do it even better (which is probably means I set myself up to fail sometimes?!? - a thought which has just come to me).
Kublai thinks that 10 stone may be too low for me and tells me that if you have a large frame you need to add 10% to the BMI scale (which would put me at 11 stone being healthy!).
Another problem is that I've signed up for the London olympic triathlon which is August 1st. I entered a few years ago but after a cracking swim time, I crashed my bike. It takes a LOT of training and although I am swimming/cycling lots at the mo, I can't really start to train properly until I'm eating again as I get faint/weak if I overdo it at the moment.
So should I not be aiming so low? When I started this I just thought I'd like to be a reasonable weight. Then I started thinking that I want to be really skinny - I've no idea why - even fantasising about being 9 stone or less. I think it might be because it's just something that is unrealistic for me - especially given how sporty I am - maybe it's a setting myself up for failure thing again??? Then again I have friends who are the same height as me and are 9 stone. It's within the accepted BMI after all! So is it unrealistic?
Am I setting myself up for failure by pushing myself to be 10 stone or am I thinking this now so I can "cop out" and stop sooner?
So last night's WI saw another 2lbs off. I have to admit to feeling a bit disappointed as the previous week was also 2lbs. It seems my weight loss is now slowing down.
However, I was already being a bit of a tantrum throwing child earlier in the day. For the past three days or so I don't seem to have been in ketosis (not according to the wee sticks anyway) and have been feeling really hungry. I've also been feeling really pissed off that I can't go out for dinner or be "normal"..... suddenly everything that has been so easy up to now seemed so difficult. The idea of yet another 3 months on foodpacks is beginning to depress me quite a lot. So having my weight loss slow down just means that I'll be on foodpacks for even longer!
Thank goodness for the meeting. I managed to bite back my tears and got lots of support from my counsellor and the other members - who had to listen to me prattle on when I'm sure they've got their own issues too! What a great group they are! Basically it came down to - and I kind of already knew this - I'm making this decision myself. I can always give up if I want to. Now, I know I'm not going to do that so I may as well get over it and stop making it more difficult for myself. I felt SO much better going home after a good talking to!!
But then this morning I woke up in a FOUL mood after not enough sleep. Really felt like life was pointless and I just wanted to run away. Several hours of extremely stimulating seminars really lifted me though and reminded me that if I'm not feeling stimulated and challenged I get bored and that's when the "need to feed" sets in.
It's tough, I really wanted to relax and do nothing at the weekend and apart from a 3 hour session at the allotment with my craft club girl friends, that's what I more or less did. I had a BLAST at the allotment - but the rest of the time I was restless and pissed off and hungry!
So - the answer seems to be - keep busy! On the other hand I have this tendency to keep TOO busy and take too much on and that has made me ill, so my promise to myself has been to take it much more easy. It looks like finding the balance is going to be tricky!
Anyway, the day ended really nicely with me getting some good news about one of the essays I've handed in after Christmas (the first of my MA) - borderline distinction.... Obviously an outright distinction would be even better but it's the first academic essay I've written in well over a decade and my supervisor was really complimentary - so I'm chuffed to bits. She also said I would be a good candidate to do a PhD.
The not so good news is that if I wanted to do a PhD in the area I was thinking of at SOAS I would have to do a further two master degrees first!! Anyway - will do some more research into that. It may be that a PhD is not the way forward for me - I'm still not sure if that's what I really want to do anyway...
Kublai and I also booked the overnight train down to Cornwall (which I've wanted to take for ages - especially as it's under thread of discontinuation) for our 5 year anniversary weekend. We're taking our bikes and we'll go see The Eden Project and probably the Lost Gardens of Heligan. Trying to get us into a nicer than usual B&B for the occasion. (We'll also be taking the Edinburgh sleeper two weeks before that, as it happens, to go to a taiko drumming workshop in Lanarkshire!).
Oh and despite having "only" lost 2lbs last night - I'm now in the 12s!!
Someone on www.minimins.com asked the question "What made you all get big in the first place???? "
My reply below is really the seriously abridged version of a long history of weight related shittiness.
Always had a problem - or at least I thought I did - looking back it was created from nothing..
Was constantly warned off getting fat as a child as "no one would love me".
Started WWers aged 13 - have since rejoined numerous times. (I'm 34 now).
Teenage years also included Cambridge Diet (not today's version). Having weekly injections and taking prescribed amphetamines (now illegal). Stealing money to buy food secretly, hide it and eat it in secret.
This pretty much went on until I moved out at 18 (even then I was still "only" a size 16 but thought I was hideous).
Moved in with boyfriend and put on 3.5 stone through the staying in and eating thing.
Broke up with boyfriend 4 years later and lost 5.5 stone through depression.
Became bulimic and went on every single diet known to man. And then it really started to go downhill....
Must have been the world's most rubbish bulimic as I started LL in October 2006 at nearly 18 stone.
So lots to sort out really...
WHAT IF NONE OF THIS EVER HAPPENED? AND EVEN THOUGH IT DID - THAT WAS THEN AND THIS IS NOW RIGHT?
Seeing it written down is quite shocking and that's only half the tale. But maybe it's time I just let go of it. I'd really like that to be the old me. I want to be "reborn" I suppose in a non-fundamentalist-scary-nutter way of course. Is it ok to want to disown your past?
Another 2lbs off. Slightly frustrating as I'm now only two pounds off being in the twelves - will just have to wait until next week to get there!
But this week's counselling was really good - really made me think. We were talking again about the idea of the parent/adult/child relationship.
I already know that I have a lot of "rebellious child" within me - I've eaten one packet of crisps, so fuck it, I might as well eat 10 packets and sod everyone else and myself (my "adult self" I suppose).
We went on to talk about how everyone who is fat has a reason for being fat (other than the obvious eating too much thing). For some it's the anonymity, others want to cushion themselves from the outside world etc etc..
I know that I have a lot of issues around wanting to control everything and wanting to do everything "perfectly" - and if I lose control or don't do something perfectly then what's the point? This would go some way to explaining why I overeat - but not what my reason for being fat is. I was wondering if maybe the fat thing is the ultimate in control for me. Staying thin is difficult to do well - for most people - and especially me. Being fat though - that's something I'm good at. If I'm thin I'm in competition with all the other thin people - how thin is "perfect"? But being fat - well I've always been good at being fat - I'm known for it.
To me it seems unthinkable that something that makes me so desperately unhappy - being fat and even more importantly the way I binge eat (which I don't even enjoy, I really don't) - would be something I would want to do. Also I hate myself when I'm fat - hate the way I look, feel - everything. I don't feel like me. So I do have trouble with this idea of "wanting to be fat". But if there isn't something in it - why would I engage in behaviour that I don't enjoy to ultimately achieve this?
Control is an issue in the rest of my life too. I've become ill this week basically from trying to do too much at once. A number of projects I've started (a new allotment for my craft club and a trip to Dartmoor for 30ish people) can be handed over to other people to carry on with. But somehow I find it really difficult to step back and let someone else take over "my work". The same at home - I get really uncomfortable if things aren't "just so" - and I'm constantly cleaning/tidying etc and feel irritated when things are out of place. (Bizarrely my flat seems to be untidy a lot of the time nonetheless!).
So how do I learn to relax and not insist on everything being "perfect" and completely within my control. I've always given myself a really hard time when something isn't perfect and have spent many hours crying on Kublai's shoulder that I'm "useless" and "pointless" - because of some silly little thing that's not so important.
Right.. I've changed my tracker. I've added an extra 3 months time and dropped my goal weight from 11 1/2 stone to 10 stone. It's possible that's a bit lower than I'll want to go but I'll judge that closer to the time.
Joined a new group this week on Monday. My group is actually a refreshers group as there wasn't an appropriate developers group for me to join with my counsellor. So far it seems ok as they're all lovely girls, very lively and it looks like we're going through many of the training principles from the first time round which I missed out on anyway! So another 3lbs off. I wonder if next WI I'll get down to the 12s? It would be nice - but not terribly likely. Still mustn't be impatient!!
Two new friends have signed up... Amanda and Lynda. Both seem to be doing great so far and I'm so proud of them.
I actually can't quite believe it's already done. It passed so quickly. At the start it seemed like forever and I didn't think I'd really do it. But - at last WI (Sunday) I'd lost 4 1/2 stone!
I reckon I'll be on for another 100 days or so to get down to my goal weight. Originally I had that at 11 stone, but I am probably going to revise that to 10 stone now. However, I will wait and see how I'm doing nearer the time.
I've now started training in earnest for the London triathlon olympic - I will most likely be quite muscley by then - we'll see. I still can't train as hard as I would normally and won't do so until I'm eating again, but I 've started running (albeit it gently) and actually training in the pool (as opposed to just swimming).
My main problem now will be when I finally go back to food (which I'm dreading - never thought I'd say that.. ) how I will cope. There are some things that are worrying me.
Firstly, am I getting a bit addicted to this? A large part of me doesn't want to eat again - because I'm scared now of food. I go into the kitchen and there are still half eaten boxes of pringles in there. The rest of my household are just ignoring them - HOW CAN THEY DO THAT? I worry - if it were me, I'd have definitely scoffed them. I still don't feel that I can be like that once I start eating again. I want to be able to eat "normally" - not necessarily counting points, or only eating low fat - in a Paul McKenna/Beyond Chocolate/Susie Orbach way - just a normal relationship with food. I do know what's healthy etc and luckily those are the sorts of foods I really enjoy. But I do have this addiction thing to crisps/bread. I already recognise that I'm an addict - although I wonder how deeply I recognise it? - and accept that I will never eat those things again? Could I maybe just never eat crisps again and accept that bread is there to be eaten as 1 sandwich - not 5 and certainly not by the loaf? I guess this is where the maintenance part of the programme will come in handy - apparently it's done by introducing food groups one at a time to recognise triggers. I already know that carbs are my problem. I've never binged on chocolate or sweet things. I wonder how I will be able to incorporate those back into my life??
Another thing I'm realising more - and it's not as if Kublai hasn't told me a million times, I do put too much pressure on myself to be "perfect" - something i'm recognizing now - hence the binge eating - if I "blow it", I've "ruined it" because I won't have done it perfectly, then feeling disgusted with myself and actually quite dirty and wanting to get rid of it all and making myself throw up. (not sure if I mentioned this on here before, but most people know and I may as well come completely clean - it's been going on for almost 14 years after all!). It's something I have to work on - going a bit easier on myself and not hating myself if I don't do things "perfectly". I know it's going to be really important when I start eating again - will I go on a binge? If I do, how am I going to react? I never want to go back to where I was before...
Anyway, that's my 100 days' thought for the day. I guess this will be a lifelong struggle - just need to try and stay positive and believe I can break the cycle and the addiction.
Thanks for all the support from many friends - you all know who you are.
So the past few days I've been feeing really quite hungry but decided it was probably just one of those things that happens from time to time. I've also been quite stressed and also feeling very tired.
Yesterday evening I went to play badminton as I do every week, taking care to have a food pack before I left to sustain me, as I do every week. About half way through begain feeling very odd indeed - really weak, hard to focus and a bit dizzy. I left early, but by the time I got home I was feeling very very unwell. I went straight to bed but was still needing a 4th foodpack and I was still feeling hungry. Anyway I had a bar (even though I'd already had a bar yesterday) as I was seriously having trouble standing up and couldn't envisage making the milkshake. Actually I was a bit scared to tell the truth. What I did do was wee on a stick but it never changed colour. However, I've heard that sometimes after exercise it doesn't change colour for some reason.
So I've woken up now and used the first wee of the morning - still no change!! And I still feel super weak and tired after a full eight hours sleep.
I've followed the diet completely to the letter apart from two minimal exceptions. On Boxing Day I had 5 packs (had 3 the following day in compensation. On New Year's Eve I did the same. In both cases I was up very late - past midnight - and had the packs very late.
I also use Marigold instead of the savoury drinks but this has caused no problems in the past and in fact I've not had any in the last few days because I ran out.
Am I not in ketosis?? Does it sometimes not show? Can you fall out for no reason??
Maybe it's all in my head - who knows? I just know that suddenly I'm struggling and I really don't want to.
Obviously an outright distinction would be even better but it's the first academic essay I've written in well over a decade and my supervisor was really complimentary - so I'm chuffed to bits. She also said I would be a good candidate to do a PhD.
Anyway - will do some more research into that. It may be that a PhD is not the way forward for me - I'm still not sure if that's what I really want to do anyway...