Preparation, preparation, preparation!

At the risk of sounding like Uncle Tony in his speech here (we're not really related, just have the same surname, honest!), this post is as much a kick up the arse for me as for anyone else struggling to stay on track with their weight loss journey (AGH! I used the J word, again!!!).

Here's what we've been up to recently: a couple of weeks ago, my boy and I had a week's all inclusive holiday in Tenerife. It was so lovely, we just completely chilled out for the week.  Before we went, I had grand plans of not going mad with alcohol, sticking to grilled meats and fish with salad, not having dessert all the time, daily walks... Yeah, well that didn't quite happen!  To be fair on myself, I didn't have a lot of alcohol during the day bar a couple of days where I treated myself to a couple of Pina Coladas and beers by the pool.  But I hardly moved my legs for the week, apart from going from the pool to the restaurant.  I did stick to grilled meats and fish with the fresh salad for most meals, but also developed a dependency on dessert with every meal!  Even breakfast would end with a coffee and a pastry, oops!  But I was on holiday, it was lovely.  I went to my Slimming World group when I got back and over the 2 weeks from when I was last weighed I had gained 5lbs.  Not that bad really, but imagine if I had really gone to town with fried foods, burgers, chips, beer, cocktails, etc etc. It's so easy to undo all the good work.

The week after we arrived home I had a really horrible cold that I'm still trying to shake off.  As much as I tried to eat healthily, I just wanted toast and butter, and tea and biscuits.  So another week of not being great with what I was eating and it was beginning to be the norm again.  Yesterday I started to feel a bit better.  It was a lovely sunny day so I got my backside in gear, planned our meals for the week, made a shopping list, and went to buy what I needed.

This has to be the best bit of advice I could give to anyone trying to lose weight, whether it's on Slimming World or any other plan.  Prepare!!!  A good plan gives you the chance to make sure you have a variety of food throughout the week, it can make sure you use up your leftovers so you don't waste food.  Budget is a big factor when i am shopping, money is tight so i need to make things go as far as possible.  Yesterday I made a batch of bolognese sauce (will make a good 6 portions), a batch of chilli bulked out with black eyed beans, peppers and mushrooms (should do a good 6 portions too), a pot of veg and lentil soup, and a Chilli Papas chicken balti bulked out with a tin of chickpea dahl and peppers (about 4-5 portions). My freezer is packed :)

Here's my bag of food for bringing to work today: (my awesome bag was given to me by my lovey cousin, Nicola, it's by MooMoo Bags!)

Breakfast is a portion of baked oats that I made last night, I'll heat it up in the microwave at work and I have a tub of fat free cherry yogurt and some blueberries to have with it. (recipe here) I only used about 50g of blueberries, rather than raspberries in the baked oats.  I also substituted the 3 tbsp of sweetener as that seems an awful lot and I tend to react badly to a lot if artificial sweetener. Instead I used a teeny squirt of a vanilla sweetener that I put in my coffee, worked just fine.

For a snack I segmented a grapefruit, just because I really like grapefruit in the morning.

Lunch was a portion of leftover pasta bolognese from last night's dinner, plus a tub of salad leaves and cherry tomatoes.  I almost just heated them up and ate from the tubs but instead I put them on a plate and had my 1/3 plate of 'speed' foods as recommended by Slimming World.  Doing this, I didn't eat the whole portion of pasta as I couldn't fit it all on the plate, but I was satisfied with what I had - I ended up nibbling on the rest later in the day but that was better than nicking a Krispy Kreme donut from the office next door!  I also had a couple of teaspoons of grated parmesan to put on my pasta, dead tasty and filling lunch!

For a snack in the afternoon, I had a banana and also took an Alpen Light cereal bar for having with my afternoon coffee.  Jaffa cake flavour, nice! Although not as nice as the Slimming World chocolate orange Hi-fi bars :)

Dinner tonight will be home made chilli with some boiled rice and salad.  Here's how my day looks in a Slimming World sense:

Breakfast:
baked oats recipe - Healthy B choice (oats)
baked blueberries - 1 Syn
yogurt/blueberries - free

Grapefruit - free

Lunch:
pasta bolognese - free
salad/balsamic vinegar - free
1 level tbsp parmesan - 1 syn

Snacks:
Banana - free
Alpen light bar - 3 syns

Dinner:
Chilli - free
rice - free
salad/balsamic - free
2 tbsp salsa - 0.5 syns
2 tbsp half fat creme fraiche - 2 syns
30g mature cheddar - Healthy A choice

Supper is going to be a ham omelette.  I find if I have eggs at suppertime it fills me up so I don't pick at rubbish the rest of the night.  That's the theory anyway, evenings are my downfall.  I have some studying to do tonight though so hopefully that will keep me busy enough that I don't start picking.  If I do, I've got grapes and apples in the house, I'll try VERY hard to stick to them!

But I think I'll be ok, I feel very re-motivated this week.  I even started my Christmas shopping and I really couldn't be bothered even thinking about it last week.

Hope you all have a great week!
(Oh, here, have a picture of a dolphin that swam by our boat in Tenerife on a day trip.  Just because it's beautiful!)

Big love,
Jill xx

No chocolates, please - I'm winning

Again, not really a blog post about home cooking, sorry Pots of Love!  I'll bore you all over the next few weeks with some of the things I've been rustling up recently though.

This time I wanted to do a quick post about a new phenomenon to me - Weight Loss Sabotage!  I don't think any of the recent events have been intended as malicious, but that doesn't make them any less confusing, or hurtful.

I've lost weight in the past, a couple of stone, then get a bit cocky when people start noticing, and eat a pizza, 4 jars of Nutella, a bottle of wine, bag of Maltesers etc etc....every weekend...until...BOOM! 2 stone back on, plus a bit more.  So to have lost significantly more than that over the past few years (see my blog post here) is a pretty big achievement, as my friends and family all know.

I still have a way to go, I'm a good 2 - 2.5 stone over what would be considered a healthy weight for my height and age so that's my ultimate aim now.  It's quite exciting, I don't remember the last time I was only overweight and not obese!! But overweight i am.  I know BMI charts aren't the most reliable indicator of this, but since I'm not a muscle stacked weight lifter or anything, it'll do as a fair guide.

But I couldn't tell you how many times in the past few weeks people have said "you're not going to lose any more weight though, are you?", and variations of that, I've also had "you need to stop, you've got a lollypop head".

Well intentioned they may be, but I think they made me feel worse than any veiled dig at me being fat in the past to the point where I struggled for days to keep myself on track and not just have a huge self pitying blow out of salami pizzas, cake, chocolate and wine.

I might dress to cover up my wobbly flabby bits, but they are definitely there.  They don't bother me, I know they will shrink soon enough. Every pound closer to that target I get is a pound less my heart is having to work harder to carry around.  I'll never have a toned taught body, I have too much loose skin for that, but this isn't about how I look, it's about making my insides healthier.

I can't help where I lose weight from first.  I seem to have shrunk quite quickly across my shoulders. I put weight on my boobs first and lose it from there last though.  Honestly, 7 stone lighter and I've only gone down a couple of bra sizes, it's mad - but that's how my body works.  So as much as i know that to say anyone with 34JJ boobs might have a head that appears large in comparison to their body is a bit ridiculous, it still hurt.  If looking at my freakishly gigantic head (because that's what I've made it in my mind now) offends you - well, tough shit really.  If you have a friend/colleague/family member who is on a weight loss (sorry for using the 'j' word) journey, they really don't need to hear shit like that, no matter how much you think it's helpful.  If you can't say anything positive, just button it, really!

I'm a 41 year old grown woman. I know my height, I know my weight, I know what I look like naked.  Only 1 other adult recently knows what I look like naked and it's none of the people who have made comments to me.

I also had a birthday recently.  I could have opened a sweet shop with the amount of boxes of chocolates I was given.  Thank you if you gave me any, it's always nice to receive a gift - thank you also from the local food bank as that's where they went.  Apart from 1 box.  That was eaten (the WHOLE box) over 2 nights.  Because I have no OFF switch with chocolates.  I devoured 1 box (2 layers!) and then realised I couldn't keep the rest in my house so I donated them all to a food bank.  So please, please, again if you know someone who has worked really hard to lose weight, don't stick temptation under their nose. Get them a lovely fruit basket, flowers, a gift voucher, smellies... Put a bit of thought into it, it will be so hugely appreciated, I bet.

Like I say, I don't believe any of the recent events were meant with any malice, but just because I, or anyone else, laughs things off in front of you, it doesn't mean they haven't hurt.

Big love, be kind to one another.
JB xx

Blow your trumpet!!

First things first...2 years since my last blog post?! Life has been busy!

However, something happened today and I felt the need to bore as many people as possible with it :)

A bit of background: In May 2011 I decided to change the future for me and my son, Alister.  I abseiled off the Forth Rail Bridge in aid of Chest Heart and Stroke Scotland, saw photos of myself, and was so horrified at how big I looked that I weighed myself for the first time in a long time. The number on the scales terrified me: 19stone 8lbs. I was less than half a stone away from 20 stone, how did that even happen without me noticing? 

Seriously, if you need some motivation to lose weight, get your arse in a safety harness, it's a real eye opener!!

My immediate thought was that I was essentially killing myself. Having lost my dad far too young, I couldn't willingly make that a possibility for my son. None of us can stop bad things happening, but we CAN stop making them more likely if we want to.

Over the next few years I lost about 3 stone through using the MyFitnessPal app to log all my food and exercise. I would go through spells of losing weight easily, then during holiday periods I would fall off the wagon and put a bit back on again. But at September 2014 I was at 17 stone 2lbs and had taken up running, using the C25K app (I'd definitely recommend this if you fancy giving running a go). I was also following the Fat Girl's Guide to Running (with Julie Creffield) on Facebook. I signed up to Julie's first monthly fitness challenge which included daily and weekly fitness and nutrition challenges. At the end of September I was thrilled to have lost 10lbs!! 

In the meantime, an old friend of mine, Nikki Williamson, had trained as a Slimming World consultant and was going to be starting her classes in October. I'd gone to groups in the past (Rosemary Conley, Scottish Slimmers...) but was in the "I'm not paying someone to weigh me" camp. But as it was Nikki, I decided I would go to support her in her new venture. I even believed that I wasn't going for me for a bit :) 

So I hopped on the scales on the first night and the 16stone 6lbs that showed on the screen wasn't a surprise. I set myself an interim target of 13stone and it felt like a mammoth, unreachable number right then.  

Apologies, this has become a bit of self therapy, but hang in there, I will get to the thing that happened today!!

To cut a long story a bit shorter, on 16th June this year I reached that first target and set a new one of 11stone. 3stone 6lbs lost in 9 months, happy days! Slimming World just seems to fit in to my life easily, and I finally admitted that a group support network is exactly what I need. We have a walking group set up now on a Wednesday too, which is lovely!  I've now lost 3stone 11lbs, and managed to not put weight on over my summer holiday period, a massive result for me. Shopping is weird, I can't remember when I last shopped for size 12 or 14 clothes, but it's nice trying stuff on. I absolutely can't remember when I last weight 12 stone anything, but I do now!  I even won the Woman of the Year award in our Slimming World group. Me! Ha ha!! This is the same girl as in the first photo up there ^^

Anyway, today I went to Aldi. I have lots on this weekend and was planning to get a Tesco delivery but rejigged some stuff and went to Aldi today. It's about a 5km round trip walk for me and I needed lots. Now school and work are back to normal I'm determined to get back in the habit of planning the meals for the week and shopping for that.  So I took Alister's big rucksack and another couple of bags and off I went with my list.

I put all the heavy stuff in the rucksack and carried the lighter stuff in bags. So in the rucksack I had bags of veg, frozen peas, frozen prawns, tins, masses of fruit, 6 litres of milk, bacon, mince, eggs...it absolutely weighed a tonne. I had to stop a couple of times on the walk home to take a rest but then plodded on. As I was walking I tried to guess how much the rucksack of stuff weighed. My estimate was about 4 stone. As I've lost 4.5 stone since last September I thought it would be interesting to weigh the bag when I got home to see how close it was.

2stone 2lbs. That was it. Nowhere even near 4 stone.  This huge, rammed full bag weighed less than half the amount that I've lost in the past 11 months.  A third of what I've lost since I was at my heaviest.  I don't feel much different to how I did back then. I'm not smarter, or happier, or prettier, or funnier, or more caring, or less loving.  I'm just smaller and weigh less.  And healthier. The weight loss has been gradual so I don't really notice anything different. But I've said to a few people recently that if I was given a 7 stone bag to carry around with me I'd sure know about it! And I'm completely blown away by this thing today. Even half the weight of that rucksack is heavy! I know so many people in our group who have lost a stone or 2 stone and aren't blowing their own trumpets about it - GET BLOWING!!!!

Fill a bag with stuff, weigh it, get it to the weight you have lost, and I bet you completely underestimate the enormity of what you have done! Go on! Do it today!! Then give yourself an almighty pat on the back, and a big hug!!