Diet Progress 2

Well last Saturday I created my weight monitor ticker, went public with how bad my problem is! My friends still do not know the full horror of my weight, only my weight loss. When I get nearer to my target weight or a significant milestone I may feel able to share with them how much control I had lost.

Although I created the ticker last week, I had actually gained 2 lbs over the previous week to take me to 345lbs. I had a week where anything and everything was impacting on my willpower. I had put in for a position at work and was not shortlisted. I had not wanted to put in for the position but felt the security of any job was better than being an interim senior manager, yet I knew the position was wrong for me. The Director knew I would hate the job within months if I got it, so rather than appoint someone who would end up hating what she had done he asked me to stay on for at least another 6 months and carry on with the level of work I am doing. I feel better about that. This also helped me to deal with another decision I have to make, whether to put in for a very senior level post back down in London again - it would be the pinnacle of my career if I got it, and more than that, the position really motivates me when I think about it. So I have made up my mind to go for it.

I lost control of my eating for the week before last because I was scared I would be shortlisted/get a job I would hate yet I never listened to my own feelings, I just listened to my practical self. I am my own worst enemy sometimes (well, all the time).

I lost 2lbs this week (weighed in today). So back on the right track again. I feel I have lost March, I could have been so much further on! I have to start listening to my own innermost feelings and stop reacting. Easier said than done! I have not been perfect this week, but I stuck to the plan on 4 out of the 7 days, so that has made the difference. Now, if I can stick to the plan on 7 out of 7 days I will definitely notice a difference.

One major difference I did notice is that I start to feel more physically mobile at 343lbs, my knees are less painful with the arthritis and I move around with a bit more agility. If I could listen to my body it would be excellent.

To help me with weight loss, now I have lost some weight myself, my doctor has offered me Oralstat. Having done some research on this drug I am not so sure I want medical intervention to help me, I want to do this by re-educating my eating pattern and eating style. Before I re-think again about medical intervention I am going to give myself until the end of June (just over 3 months) and work on my feelings, the triggers to me eating, my feelings of hunger and when I find it difficult to be controlled. If I can understand these I may be able to work with them for long-term weight loss and, more importantly, weight maintenance.

Come on girl, get on with it for another week! Take the positive from this week - I have lost 2lbs! I also found I had passed my VTCT Swedish Body Massage and Health & Safety courses, and got 2 lovely certificates. Only reflexology to complete and that is two new practical subjects learnt that could help me to a different future. I want to learn how to do facials next (beauty and holistic).

Diet Progress 1

Now you have some background about me I should let you know how my diet is going this time. Well, I have been on the diet since the beginning of January and as of yesterday I have lost 1st 9lbs. I gained 4lbs this week!

I weigh myself every Saturday then e-mail a group of friends my progress for the week together with my eating chart for the week.

I have only gained weight on two of the weeks, this week and four weeks ago. A pattern is beginning to emerge. Even though I had a hysterectomy 7 years ago, and my ovaries were retained, I still have my monthly cycle. I used to have terrible PMT and although my PMT is less severe, the desire to over eat is still there every month. Now I know this I can start to deal with it in 4 weeks time, I will take oil of evening primrose for a week before. I found this worked years ago.

I am not going to slip back to over eating all the time again though! I have carried on with preparing my weekly food chart and shopping list, got my weeks shopping in and got back on track again. Watch this space for a weekly diet and weight loss update. My targets are:

lose 10% of my starting body weight;
keep losing weight through to June, when my husband and I celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary by renewing our vows and having our marriage blessed in Rome;
keep losing weight through to my 50th birthday in August, when I go to see Aida at open air opera in Verona; and finally
keep losing weight through to March 2008 when I go to the British Virgin Islands and Antigua.

I want to be a healthier, fitter person when I do these things. I do not want the pain I currently have.

I had began to feel more sprightly and more able to get about (walking). This has taken a backward step this week though with gaining 4lbs - mostly fluid on the ankles and knees. The fluid retention has been greatly improved without having to continue taking tablets or supplements until this week. The one thing I can think of that has had an impact this week is eating processed food - crisps (even though they were low fat crisps), sausage rolls, ordinary chocolate bars, cakes, and an Easter egg. Some of this I have eaten openly, meaning I did not hide the boxes from my husband, but most have been eaten secretly, surreptitiously.

When the children were small they had the ability to eat half a chocolate bar and leave the rest for another day, they could even save their Easter eggs until Christmas! I used to finish the chocolate off and replace it with another bar to avoid being caught, which meant I had to eat even more so they did not realise I had eaten any at all. I used to do the same with cakes. Any cakes left over would be eaten, unseen, and replaced (less the portion originally eaten by the family). I could fool myself I was hardly eating anything, and look as if I was in control in front of my family, but in reality all my eating was being done in secret. I used to leave things to be found (empty chocolate boxes) in the hope that it might help - well it did not help. Year on year I gained stone after stone.

Having two children certainly has not helped the weight, nor has studying for a degree, professional qualification, and masters degree. I have found that studying and eating go together very nicely!!

I have had 2 periods of significant weight loss. In 1979 - 1980, when I met my husband, I lost over 7st 7lbs before going on holiday to Germany. I never went back to the slimming club when I came back with, not just presents, but a stone more weight. The second time was in 1999 - 2000 when I lost almost 8st, but was distracted by the hysterectomy and never got back to it again.

This time I had not realised I had gained so much, all the weight I lost in 1999 - 2000 plus another stone. I could barely walk without pain, arthritis in the knees, and I faced the humiliation of not even being able to clean my own bottom as I could not reach. Losing almost 2st, including a lot of fluid from my ankles and knees, has made a huge difference to me, I can wipe my own bottom!

I cannot go back to what I was like at the beginning of January, I must go forward and deal with this debilitating weight so that I can have a better next 50 years.

Anyway, that is enough for today. I will sign in next week with Diet Progress 2, which will be better than this weeks effort. I will avoid processed food and aim to eat only good, wholesome, natural food.

Why Am I Blogging?

I have booked a holiday to the British Virgin Islands and Antigua for March 2008. Why is that significant? I was 26st 2lbs when I booked it in January, and the holiday is a sailing holiday. How many elephants go sailing?

Hubby and I are celebrating 25 years of marriage this year and are both going to be 50 as well, so to celebrate these events hubby and I have arranged a variety of things. Well, I have arranged them as they are from my long wish list of things and places I would like to do and see, but hubby is more than happy to participate. He does not really have dreams, or more correctly is dreams have come true as he now has his yacht which will be going to France in April. Hubby is, except for our sex life (or lack of it), generally happy with his lot now he can see an end to teaching and is looking forward to his next career as a carpenter. Otherwise, he loves me, his children, sailing and orienteering. I love him dearly and he is my best friend, but life could have been so different (happier?) for us if not for one event in the past.

I am blogging to finally put my ghosts to rest, record my slimming struggle, and maybe bring some hope to others. Through this blog maybe I will get some extra support as well!

My History - Feeling guilty!

I am the classic yo-yo slimmer. From childhood (a very, very long time ago) I have been a big girl, most of the time bigger than 'normal'. I was an active child with cycling and swimming but when I started work, and the activity stopped, the weight started creeping on.

There have been times when the weight came off, always through going to a slimming club, and these times were usually connected to wanting to impress a new boyfriend. That is the key, I have never slimmed for myself! I have always slimmed for someone else!!

The other key to success I have recently identified is the link between my emotions and eating for comfort. I suppose I have always known there was a link between how I felt or what had just happened to me and eating. Whenever someone upset me or I was unhappy or I was bored or I needed comfort or..................(any excuse really) I would eat.

I can (could?) eat any amount of chocolate, cheese, biscuits, cakes, crisps, ravioli, mashed potato with cheese and tomato sauce, tomato soup etc that was in the house at any time - as well as my breakfast, lunch, and dinner!

Everybody thinks I am a really happy person with a very happy marriage and 2 lovely children. I have had a super career, for which I have had to work hard to get there, and have 2 lovely homes (England and France). So why did I get to be 26st 2lbs?

Until the beginning of January my health has been declining greatly with arthritis of the knees, breathing difficulties, depression, constant tiredness, unable to sleep. Walking anywhere was a chore, especially as I had fractured a knee a couple of years ago in a fall and I have not fully recovered from that. I virtually crawl upstairs and waddle around all the time. The impact this has on my confidence is huge and I end up thinking that I have to put up with what life throws at me because I have no other options. Don't get me wrong, despite how I might appear to people I am not the super confident, organised and cheerful person everybody else sees.

I have been struggling with making decisions, I have had dark thoughts about the future (would my family be better off without me? Well, yes financially they would). I am fed up to the back teeth with how I feel and how I look.

How did I get here then? The turning point in my life was 1983. I had given birth to a lovely daughter, yet I found it difficult to bond with her because I had her for my mum (who was dying) and I was going to have to go back to work when she was 6 months old just to keep a roof over our heads. My husband loved her from the beginning, she was the first thing he noticed when he came home from work, not me. I was jealous of a baby, but I was also desperately unhappy because I was going to lose my mum and would not be able to stay at home with my baby. Of course, I had not heard of post-natal depression - depression happened to celebrities and rich people with the time to be depressed.

Within 2 months life settled down a bit and sexual relations with my husband resumed (there had never been a problem in that department since the day we met in the 1970's). That was when life threw a googly at me, the first time we resumed our sex life I fell pregnant again. I believed that if you were breast feeding you could not fall pregnant! How stupid!

I was ill from the beginning but I was also sick at heart, I could not possibly keep this baby. There was absolutely no way we could afford it, and I could not cope with 2 babies under a year old and supporting my dad with my dying mother. With a terrible heart I made the decision to seek advice about a termination, so at 6 weeks pregnant I went ahead with the termination with the support of my husband. Life changed after that. After the termination I had to be hospitalised as an emergency as part of the placenta had been left behind and this left me very ill and potentially unable to have further children. I took this as a punishment from God, I had committed (to me) the worst sin of all.

My GP tried to help me cope by telling me I would probably not have survived a pregnancy due to how badly my body reacted to the hormone changes. Pregnancy is the only time I can lose stones without trying! For all 3 pregnancies I was constantly sick from beginning until about 24 weeks and ended up in hospital with severe dehydration. My GP said I had not given my body a chance to recover, and the pregnancy test was weak. Nothing he said helped, I felt I would have been a better person to try with the pregnancy and die or lose the baby naturally, rather than take the action I did.

I have spent a life-time taking my guilt out on me and, and to a large extent my husband and family - 24 years of guilt have led me to being 26st 2lb in January this year. I could not stand for my husband to touch me and, apart from the occasional attempt, we have had a mainly celibate marriage for those 24 years. Sex is not a normal part of our married life, it is a special occasion when we stay at 'posh' hotels. Despite some up and downs during those years, we have grown closer together and are best friends. We are the only two people who will tell one another the truth rather than what they want to hear.

We did have another child 3 years later. This time my body was telling me to have a baby, there was a huge longing which could only be resolved by having a baby. The conception was pained, still riddled with guilt as I was, and again without realising it or being able to put a name on it, I suffered from post natal depression. The only good thing was being able to afford to be at home to bring up both my children - an experience I loved. Don't think it was perfect though.

I was a strict mother and could be very horrible to my children, especially my eldest. I sometimes think I was resentful of her as my life changed so much after having her, and I had her to make my dying mother happy not because I was ready or wanted children. I was even more resentful as my husband doted on her, and 24 years later still does! When I realised I was having a problem holding my temper, especially when I was tired, I got very scared about the damage and hurt I could cause to my children (especially my eldest). That was a wake up call to me and I owned up to my husband about my actions and my fears for the safety of my children when I got mad with them. We worked through that. When I felt myself losing control I would phone him and talk it through, I would also just put the children to bed or take them to a friends house and I would go to bed until I felt able to cope again. Eventually I learned how to recognise the signs of losing control and put coping strategies in place to avoid them or minimise them.

Nowadays there are help lines for new (all) parents to help them cope, but in my day you feared that Social Services would condemn you and take your children away! How long did my period of feeling out of control last, no more than 6 months at most. I had not heard of, or realised, that I might be suffering from post-natal depression. I just thought I was a bad mother. By then my own dearly loved mother had died and I felt bereft and alone. I felt I had nobody to turn to.

I love my children dearly and try very hard not to put my guilt and fears on to them. I also try very hard to accept them warts and all and just support them through whatever life throws at them. As the years of gone on I have grown to love my first child very dearly, and have always loved my second child unconditionally from birth.

The biggest thing to blight my life has been my own guilt and being unable to deal with it. I call it beating myself up, I am very good at that.