Tuesday 18 March 2014

The Trouble With Having A Social Life

Sorry for missing a post again last week. I did absolutely nothing, so there was nothing to say. And obviously, I went up by 1.5lbs again. This is not news to anyone, given that it has  been happening for 7 weeks now, so really not worth telling you. BUT THEN I went up a pound further and broke the cycle, except in the wrong direction. FUCK.

I've been trying to set my brain right and make a few lifestyle changes. One thing I have done is not leave any food at work. Nothing. Crisps, chocolate, crackers, fruit — all gone. All lunches are now prepared after dinner (when I am not hungry) and that's all I'm allowed to bring in. Seeing as I have no willpower at all, I've just had to remove everything. And it seems to be working, which is really good news. However, I made the mistake of implementing this on a week where I was eating out three times, so I probably won't get to appreciate the results as much. But next week should be better! 

On the subject of eating out — I think I have finally fulfilled all my dinner plans with people. Being social is a fucking bastard. Everyone is too busy to meet up around Christmas, then everyone is skint in January, so come February, everyone wants to start catching up again. Fucking hell, I've never been so busy (well, busy for me!). I am used to having pages and pages of my diary having nothing on them except for eyebrow threading appointments, but since February I have been involved with the following: dinner with bf's mates, work lunch, food market, dinner with my friends, surprise party, work dinner, dinner with bf's mates, dinner with my mates, dinner with BlogMate, dinner with Aunt, and late lunch with my sister. Now this might not seem terrible for someone with willpower, but for me, it's a fucking minefield. 

Since Saturday last week I had tried to be quite strict with my calorie intake and I was doing pretty well, but then I went to my friend's for dinner. They were all having pizza and seeing as the calories were just too much, I decided to go for something a little less calorific so I could enjoy the other snacks and desserts that I knew would be there. This was all fine until it was revealed that one of mate's had bought garlic bread. I could have said no (and I am in no way blaming her AT ALL) but I am so shit that I ended up having two slices of garlic bread, plus a quarter of her Chicago Town pizza. Calories over goal? 407. Motherfucker. I only decided to check calories AFTER I had eaten it, which I won't be doing again! I was so annoyed at myself. Whilst I can control food at work, I really need to work on controlling it in other areas. My friend that we were visiting has a bf and he has lost loads of weight by basically going vegan (I think). He was there that night, and when garlic bread or pizza was offered to him, he just said "No thanks" very easily. No drama, no "Oh my god, no, I really shouldn't… oh go on then", nothing. He just politely declined and that was it. I have no idea if he wanted garlic bread or not, but I am sure that it must have involved some strength of will. I wish I had that. There were a few other spare bits of pizza being offered to me — I'm back to being a human bin! Maybe that is the next thing to work on — staying focussed. Food is always there — I don't ALWAYS have to eat it.

The next day (Wednesday night), I went to Bodeans with BlogMate. We'd had this booked in the diary for a couple of months so we were VERY excited. But that all changed when they told us a wait for a table was going to be 1hr 45mins. What the fuck? In Soho, where there are a million other restaurants? At 6.30pm? It wasnt even a newly opened! Thankfully, BlogMate said that would be too long (I was actually contemplating the wait), but the waitress told us that they could seat us in the upstairs area, which was all long, tightly packed sharing tables… Now, given that Bodeans is based on traditional American rib shacks with chicken wings and pulled pork and BBQ sauce and burgers, I was slightly worried about sitting quite so close to strangers and eating what was bound to be a messy meal… It was also annoying that the Boss Hog Platter that we were going to get was not available upstairs, but it would have been too childish to leave because of that. To be fair, I needed a moment to come to terms with that fact (boo-hoo!), but once we had ordered something very similar, I was fine. 

The food was excellent and I probably ate a little too much, but fuck it — this was AN EVENT. Then we went for peppermint tea and (small pots of) gelato — a thoroughly pleasant evening with excellent company. On the way home, I did try to work out the calories for every thing: turns out I would have had to not eat any food for the next two days to make up for extra calories. Fucking great. I figured the best thing to do was just move on and be good for the next two days until Weigh Day. I can't turn back time — I'm not Cher.

Thursday was a fasting day, and after all that fucking protein, thank fuck. I have actually got back on the fasting again, which has just made life a lot easier this last week. It's not as bad as I remember it, and having no food in the office made it a lot easier actually. It's the only way I'm going to lose any weight and I know it works for me when I actually do it. Also, every time I have been slogging away on the exercise bike or doing weights this last week, I reminded myself that if I dont eat less, breaking a sweat is all for nothing. I will never see the muscles I have worked quite hard to develop — they will just sit there under all the fat from over-eating. The website I posted last week stressed that losing weight is 80% what you eat, so I really need to keep that in mind. 

Friday I ended up doing all-you-can-eat Chinese with my sis and Aunt. We overestimated our eating capabilities and almost had to resort to stashing some of it away secretly in a tupperware box I happened to have in my bag. But thankfully (or unthankfully, depending on whether you are looking at wastage charges or waistage charges, fnar fnar!), we took a breather and managed to finish it. Except for the chicken satay, which was too dry. I really will eat anything, but this was more like beef blimming jerky. Anyway, I went home feeling guilty but also ready to start afresh on Saturday: next week, I will be watching my calories like a fucking HAWK…

Back in the fasting groove and looking at new recipes, I found something quite good: zucchini spagetti! I know we call it a courgette, but the former sounds better, doesn't it? Anyway,  It looked amazing and I figured it could fool the brain a bit, so I bought myself a julienne peeler and made this great meal on the left for a fast day. Courgettes, mushroom, extra light Philly, paprika, half a veg stock cube, chilli flakes and a tiny bit of parmesan. I cannot recommend it enough. After you have julienned the courgette, you just put it in the microwave for 2mins and have it with whichever sauce you want. Blimmin' brilliant. Will try it with bolognese sauce soon… Also just chucking in a pic of a piri piri chicken and sweet potato meal that I had — also delicious. Sweet potatoes are also back on the menu! 


As I have also been on a bit of a protein kick, I went to another good wesite called  http://www.fitnesstreats.com/. This lady is very inventive and makes lots of cool stuff that I have been experimenting with. I made her savoury lentil cake (with hemp protein), which was ok, but I think I might experiment with my own receipe next week… I also made her White Chocolate Protein Brownies, but they tasted more like scones… which was fine by me! Both filled a hole. I have also developed a New York Deli Salad — pastrami (lots of protein), salad leaves, cucumber, tomato, light cheese, red onion, gherkins and a bit of mustard — really loving it. 



So, as my social life is pretty empty from here onwards, I'm actually really looking forward to not having any excuses to be bad and trying my best to shift off this weird plateau I seem to be on. I must be eating too much or I would be losing weight — simple as. And whilst I need to be able to eat out and show some willpower, it's nice to not worry about any upcoming dinner dates and know that I am totally in control — it's all down to me.

FOR FUCK'S SAKE.

As I was typing this, someone just sent me a Facebook invite to an event called "Jolloff Rice Night". What the fuck? See what my life is filled with?? I am being invited to evenings based solely on eating carbs — THERE IS NO ESCAPE. SAVE YOURSELVES.

Monday 3 March 2014

A Very Precise Yo-Yo

Apologies for the post that never materialised last week... My bad. But it is what it is, and we all need to move on.

RIGHT! So what has been happening? Well, I did A LOT of reading about calories, weights, fat, protein, exercise, BMI, BMR, RDA... Fucking shitloads. It got to the point where I was actually stressing myself out with how much I was reading. To be fair, I did learn a hell of a lot — but alas, I am still fat. I can talk the talk, but when it comes to walking the walk, I'm definitely waddling.

I was doing all this research because since I have been doing weights, I am always tired and hungry. It's not that I'm doing too much (30mins exercise a day is recommended) so I thought maybe I wasn't eating enough. After a bit of research, I thought I'd hit the jackpot with a site that was telling me to eat 1700 calories a day (woo-fucking-hoo!!), but then I fucked myself over… I found an a different website that was very well written, really well researched and full of actual info rather than crap. It was excellent because the information was straightforward and busted a lot of myths. However, if I was going to put my trust in this site, I also had to accept that the fact that it was advising me to eat the grand total of 1379 calories a day. That is only 100 more than what I was on with MFP. * Sigh* One thing that really stuck in my head from this website was the screen shot on the right:

Now, I know that this is not new particularly new information, but it really makes you realise how important what you eat is, demonstrated brilliantly in this piece (from the aforementioned website): http://www.acaloriecounter.com/blog/why-am-i-not-losing-weight/.

I mean really, that article is basically my blog summed up, isn't it? But that is the one problem I have — I can't stop eating. I am exercising hard almost every day and really sticking to it, but because I am a little piggy who loves food, I'm undoing all my good work. But I just cant stop. I am seriously thinking I need to get hypnotised — I really just don't know how to control it otherwise. I have no willpower.

But before I go down that route, I really think I need to make a concerted effort to try harder. So some new rules I have are:

1) No crisps until the weekend. Not even healthy ones.
2) FINALLY CHUCKED OUT THE MOTHERFUCKING MARZIPAN!
3) No stockpile of food at work — all food is to be brought in from home. If it's not there, I can't eat it.
4) High-protein lunch, and generally increasing my protein intake throughout the day
5) Eating out less.

The last one has been difficult. For some reason, the last month has been really busy and I've had dinners with people or an event with food every single week since mid January. It's made life more difficult, but only because I'm a little piggy who won't then cut back calories on another day. Why is it so hard? WHY? WHY? All foodies, can't all be fat, surely? I remember the last time I properly did weights and was under 10st (several years ago), I never really went out. People would ask me out to drinks after work but I would decline and go for a run followed by weights. On a Friday night. Depressing. To be honest, I didn't feel depressed, but I missed out on a lot of social events, but I don't think that bothered me that much… So perhaps it was worth it? Maybe that is what it is going to take — cutting back on socialising and not giving myself an excuse to eat extra food every week.

My weightlifting lady (Nia Shanks) advises on her website to stop counting calories and just eat 'real food' (meat, cheese, fish, beans, fruit, veggies) until you are comfortable, but I definitely can't do that. I know she has been anal in the past about her diet and this is a way of relieving yourself of weighing food like a crazy person, but I don't think she ever had a problem with being OVERWEIGHT (she is tiny). So until she shows me a pic of herself as a total fatty, I will not be following her advice! Literally, it's the worst the worst thing you could tell an overweight person to do. Some people need boundaries. I wouldn't be in this predicament if I knew how to control myself, would I? I am actually too scared to even try it for one week. Some people need to follow some strict rules — that is just life. 

However, Nia had some nice recipes for things to do with protein powder, so I have been using some of those in the morning. I have thrown away tonnes of protein powder in my life. My mum uses my old jars to keep her lentils in, and she has quite a lentil collection! But I bought a small tub this time and actually, I like it so much that I could eat it with a spoon. I DO eat it with a spoon! It tastes just like baby milk powder. [God, my mouth is watering right now, but when I google 'eating protein powder neat', all that comes up is "Woah, dude! Why the fuck would you do that? It's gross!". Oh, the shame.] I've had a chocolate one mixed with yoghurt and banana slices — so filling in the morning and I didn't need anything else until lunch — RESULT! (Although I did feel slightly oppressed by it — it took determination to get through the whole bowl). I've also mixed it with pumpkin puree, yoghurt and some pumpkin spice — this was really tasty with a dash of sugar-free maple syrup and some oats. Next week I am going to try to bake with it.

So, what's been going on with my weight, eh? Well, the week that I didn't write a post for I went up 1.5lbs. This week just past, I went down by the exact same amount. Now, this friggin' yo-yoing has been happening for six weeks. It is bizarre. My weight is always up or down by the SAME exact amount as well, which is really hard to believe. It's not muscle, that's for sure (women can only put on like, 0.2lbs of muscle in a week). It might be water. It is very probably fat. My masses of reading has lead me to believe that this can happen when you start lifting because your muscles will retain water, but I still should be losing fat and it should still be showing on the scales, at least on the body fat read-out if nothing else… I dunno, I am trying not to get frustrated, but it is testing me. I can definitely feel a difference in my muscles, but I want this blimmin' bulge to sod off too! Urgh — I just need to lock myself away for a year, not go out, not be allowed to go to the shops, not work out. Maybe then something would happen.

OR... I could stop being such a whiny bitch and just eat less. 

There is no easy diet. If I'm not suffering, I'm probably eating too much. Anyway, lets see if upping the protein, sleeping more to combat tiredness (rather than eating M&Ms), and keeping the calories down will nudge the scales in the right direction next week… Ah yes, next week, where I have two midweek restaurant visits with friends… Oh for fuck's sake. 

Pass me the bastard M&Ms.