MAKING AN EFFORT

This morning I woke up feeling blaaah. Motivation zero.

I lay in bed looking for an excuse not to train. Maybe I didnt have enough time. (Plenty of time slack-arse just get up and do it). Maybe I had a pain or an injury. (Yeah right. No pain happening today). So damn there was no excuse which meant getting up and doing it so I'd have no regrets later in the day.

On days like today I want to eat "treat food". Fuit toast with lashings of butter. Or maybe seedy, grainy bread with butter/honey/peanut butter. Dont even start me on the possibilities if we were having breakfast out. Luckily I had prepared my oats last night. They had soaked overnight, the protein powder was all measured out and the container of psyllium husks was next to the stove, ready to be added. Foolproof strategy for staying on track and perfectly timed.

I had some shopping to do and the house had to be sterile for another open inspection today (the last one, we hope). I really felt like dagging around in trackie pants, a windcheater, no make-up and being a bit of a slob. But instead I showered, defuzzed, scrubbed and washed and styled my hair (takes less than 5 minutes). Then I put on a pair of jeans, a nice hoodie and even a little make-up. Lordie, even some lippie went on (insert goggle eyes here).

And all these little things put togther made me feel so much better and the motivation came to stay on track today. We had lunch at our local cafe while our house was open. WH and BS both had meals with fries while I had a chicken salad and peppermint tea. The chips werent that great anyway - yes they underwent a taste test but they were easily resisted. After lunch I had to duck to another shopping centre and I even skipped my fave skim capp as I didnt need it after lunch. My one indulgence today has been a small glass of wine with dinner.

Istarted the day feeling awful and at major risk of just blowing away the training and good eating. Had that happened I'd be feeling much worse now. But I made an effort. An effort to train, to eat well and to spend time on my appearance. And I can tell you, it was well worth the effort.

Cheers all

Magda

BETRAYED BY THE MM AND A NEW OUTLOOK

Fifi was right.

The Metal Monster cant be trusted. Despite eating well and doing more than my required training I have been betrayed and "rewarded" with a gain. Yesterday it was .8 up from last Sunday and today it had dropped down by .2 (so still a net gain of .6 this week). F*CKER!!!!

And then the f*cker thinks its going to talk me into having the binge to end all binges (I would have previously). Well mate, I might not have been 100% on plan today but there was no binge within coooeee.

YES!! Thats another run on the board for me and as for the f*cker ... NIL!!!

Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out.

I will spare you the monotony of how I've somehow managed to ward off the lurgies, my ongoing battle with Windy City and moaning yet again about the week that was. Its hardly riveting reading.

What I do want to share though are some of my thoughts around how my life has changed since I saw the SP and I have stopped binging.

It still amazes me on a daily basis. Its like winning the lottery and the value hasnt sunk in. You wake up and pinch yourself that "geez you DID win the lottery". A little voice in my head (probably Inner Fat Girl) keeps harping "you might stuff it all up any day now" or "it cant be long before you cave and I win". But in all honestly I havent even felt close to that feeling of tipping over the edge and falling face first into Binge Hell.

So I have decided that from now on I will only view myself as a non-binger, or maybe a reformed-binger or ex-binger. It will always be a thing from my past but it no longer has a place in my current or future life. I will not be amazed that I'm not binging. Instead I will treat not binging as the norm. This is another leaf to be turned over and another step in the positive direction.

I think thats enough for a Saturday night. I have more up my sleeve but will save it for future posts.

Cheers all

Magda

A TOUGH WEEK

Its been a tough week and its not even over.

As you know, Monday was pretty awful at work. Nobody felt good and we were glad to see the end of the day. Tuesday improved and things moved up a notch with our house sale. We moved into the "seriously exciting" zone and kept eveything crossed.

Yesterday was another madly busy day at work. The list of things to do just kept getting longer and very little was getting croosed off. I had my hair cut again (even shorter - stay tuned for a photo) straight after work and then WOOHOO it was contract singing time on our house. Yes our legendary agent did what we thought was the impossible and we have a contract on our house. Great price. Great conditions. If we'd had the energy we would have celebrated last night but instead I spent the rest of the evening preparing meals for today.

Today has been fanstastic in the morning (I went on an excellent training course) and dreadful in the afternoon. I'm frazzled, drained and I'm battling the worst stomach cramps as I try to get my dose right for my new fibre supp. Man talk about Windy City in our household tonight!!

I've also battled the "lack of quality sleep syndrome" this week. Most nights I've slept but not deeply. You know that annoying type of sleep where you keep waking up, looking at the time and then realising that you can sleep some more. In the morning you wake up feeling like you've hardly slept (beacuse YOU'VE HARDLY SLEPT). Many times I just wanted to blow off my training but smartly talked myself out of it before I made such a bad decision.

Funnily enough my meals have been on plan (bar an extra couple of skim capps) and any thoughts of binging have been fleeting. So I might be tired, have a sore tummy, have a BAD case of wind, feel quite drained and low in energy but AT LEAST I DONT HATE MYSELF BECAUSE I TURNED TO FOOD TO DEAL WITH THESE ISSUES.

:-) M

BATTLING DEPRESSION

I spent yesterday battling depression and today wasnt much better.

Why was I depressed?

Purely 100% work reasons. My colleagues are depressed, my boss is depressed and buying lipsticks to cheer herself up. Miss C has a new Country Road skirt because it was her "feel good" activity for the day. Putting together a works program is no fun when there is so little money.

So after lunch I took myself off to GJs and treated myself to a skim cappuccino and had a big piece of toasted banana bread with lashings of butter. Yummo. That was so nice that I decided to follow it with a friand and a muffin for good luck.....

.
.
.
.
.
.
.
. HA!! Fooled you!!

I did have the skim cappuccino and I did look at all the cakes and acknowledge how good they would taste but I was calm and in control and deep down I knew that I wouldnt have any. Previously I would have used the sweet food as a cheer-me-up and once I started I couldnt stop. My how things have changed.

So even though I was surrounded by depressing circumstances, ironically I was still happily content internally and I didnt need crappy food to cheer me up. I'm liking this way of thinking and this way of life.

:-) Magda

THE WEEKEND ROUND-UP

What an awesome weekend but sadly its almost over. Geez they go so quick dont they?

On Friday night I went to my bestie's place for a Body Shop at Home party. She had 20 friends over (amazing her circle of friends) and at the end of the night she was buying out the catalogue either for free, 1/2 price or 20% off.

I spent most of Saturday out with my mum as a belated birthday celebration. I got up early and did my training and then picked her up and we headed to Westfield Marion. A skim cappuccino to start us off and a nice chinwag. Then a bit of shopping followed by lunch. We shared a medium woodoven pizza with chicken, bacon and veges. It was delicious and not too much. Oh and I couldnt resist getting us some lambrusco. Mum's not much of a drinker but she loved the lambrusco and it really got her talking. She's so funny after a glass of wine. A real chatter-box LOL. Then we watched My Sister's Keeper and had a good cry before heading off home.

In the evening WH and I conferred again about the house's external selections. We're going quite different from before (although its very much like our Queensland house) so some more talking and considering was in order.

Today I christened my new slow cooker and made an awesome coq au vin. I used chicken breasts and browned them in a heavy based pan with a lite spray of oil only so the dish was very low in fat (bar some lean well trimmed bacon). It tasted superb but was too watery so next time I'll know to not use as much liquid. I have quite a bit leftover and will enjoy it for some dinners with that lovely chicken stock / red wine flavour it cooked in.

The house sale is ramping up over the next 2 weeks as we have now gone to the market. That means no life. Every spare minute is spent tidying, cleaning and keeping the place sterile. With 2 opens on the weekend we'll be like aliens in our home - dont touch anything, dont move anything, dont create cooking smells etc etc. Man I just hope it pays off.

Well better toddle off to preapare for tomorrow. I have back and biceps followed by an interval cardio session. I love Monday mornings (until I get to work).

Cheers all

Magda

PS The Metal Monster rewarded me with a nice 1.2kg loss this week. He's my best friend right now :-)

ON A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT NOTE

Things have been moving well on the house front. We have selected the plan for our new house and on Friday morning we do all of our selections. Contract signing comes soon after that and we'll know our start and finish dates (which are guaranteed).

Our home is now on the market so we are living in permanent declutter, tidiness, cleanliness and sterility. Its been a week or so and we are already over it. In fact last weekend we spent all of Saturday and then Sunday morning just preparing the place for groups to come through on Sunday afternoon. In the 3 years we've lived here the place has never seen such a thorough clean LOL. Fingers crossed that our agent chalks up a quick sale at an excellent price. Then we have the fun of moving into a rental property to look forward to....NOT!!!

In amongst all the agent meetings, preparing for opens, being out of the way for opens and everything else going on I havent let any of that be an excuse to eat crap. I may not have been 100% on plan but my variances were minor and controlled.

I absolutely love the fact that we are going to build our own home again. I love new houses and I love the fact that everything in them is exactly what you want, where you want it and how you want it. The only compromise is matching tastes to budgets but a happy medium isnt too hard to achieve there. However the new home comes at a price: disruption to our current very comfy lifestyle, another major move around the middle of next year, the financial drain of establishing it all and then settling into a new environment. I had big plans for next year but in reality I'm just gonna sit tight and see how things pan out.

Cheers all

Magda

AND STILL MORE TURNING THE CORNER

During July I celebrated another birthday, this one taking me closer to the 50s than the 40s. I’m ok with that though. Age is a number and I’ve been told many times that I look good (fit, healthy, good skin etc) that the number is irrelevant. I have days where I feel 26 and others where I feel 86 so the actual number is pffft.

Our family is BIG on celebrating birthdays. I had a dinner out with my husband where I ate oven-roasted quail with a fairly robustly flavoured risotto. I love both of the dishes so the combination was gastronomic heaven. No room for dessert that night. The following evening my bestie cooked a dinner for me and I shared all my holiday delights with her (my shopping). Another lovely meal with a small dessert and a few wines on both occasions.

A week later my mum cooked my favourite meal including my most favourite dessert (100% home-made vanilla slice). I have it once a year and its superb. For the first time I showed some restraint in my portions chalking up yet another success. Tomorrow mum and I are going out for the day. There will be shopping, a movie, coffee, lunch and a good chinwag. Its such a great day and I know that it wont result in a big pigout as has been the case previously.

In fact through all of these celebrations I have eaten well for all other meals, trained regularly and not allowed it to turn into another big eating-free-for-all. I’ve even lost a small amount of weight instead of gaining the usual 2-3 kgs of bloat (and about 1kg of scale weight) that accompanies such celebrations. Woohoo that’s another first for me and another run on the board.

The other thing that I’ve achieved which has eluded me for years is that today I have completed a binge-free month. Yes there has been no binging whatsoever this month and I’m pretty pleased with myself about it. Until now I’d start every month with the goal of not binging and I’d never make it past a few days. It was so debilitating and made me feel like such a failure so its great to finally kick that destructive habit out of my life.

So here’s to a great August continuing in the positive spirit of July. I hope you join me for the interesting journey I have ahead.

Cheers

Magda

MORE TURNING THE CORNER

Soon after my second session with the SP we left for our Singapore holiday. I must admit I wasnt in good spirits at all. I felt fat and pudgy and very disappointed that my previous efforts to lose weight for the holiday had failed. What was I thinking when I packed a pair of white shorts to wear over there?? Eeegads they looked awful further adding to my feelings of despair. Nevertheless I put on a brave face and pretended that I was having a ball.

OMG then I had to decide how to tackle the shopping. Here was my chance to seriously wear out my credit card but I couldnt think of anything worse than buying all these fat clothes. But the Great Singapore Sale had to be taken advantge of so I made a decision to "buy for the future". Whenever I saw something that I'd normally like and wanted to buy, I'd try it on and then buy the size smaller. In one shop I tried on a gorgeous dress and in a 12 it was a perfect fit. When I told the shop assistant I wanted the size 10 and got my card out to pay for it she was gobsmacked and teetered around asking if the dress was for me (obviously thinking I was insane or totally delusional). So I confidently replied that it was my Christmas present to myself and by Christmas I would NOT be the size I am now. It would fit. I'm sure she then thought I was definitely insane but WHO CARES. It will fit and it'll look fantastic.

So I shopped my little heart out and the opportunity wasnt wasted. In fact I got some fantastic stuff that just made my day and helped to lift my spirits.

The other thing that lifted my spirits was my decision to exercise and eat well during the holiday. Feeling so fat and awful at the start, I stepped on the scales in the gym on Day 1 and decided that I didnt want to see the number go higher. So I didnt stuff myself at the breakfast buffet nor at the dinner buffet. When we had beer-o'clock I had a couple of handfuls of nuts instead of about 10 handfuls. I rarely ate dessert but took a liking to a sweet called nonya way (spelling???) which was of a gluttinous rice texture with coconut and ????? A small piece after dinner was all I wanted and I was happy with that. And this time instead of just talking about exercising every day, I actually DID IT. Sometimes I just did a little prehab work in our room (thanks Liz) or I did weights in the gym, incline walks on the treadmill or a walk or walk/jog along the beachfront. The latter being my absolute favourite. It was about 30 minutes /day but it made the world of difference for how I felt each day and how I managed my diet.

For the first time ever in my life I came home weighing the same as when I went away (and in fact less if you discount the crappy airport food and wierd meal times on the trip home). I have never achieved this before as holidays have always been an eating free for all. A breakfast buffet would mean a big plate of toast, eggs, bacon, mushrooms, hash browns and whatever else looked good in big quantities. Then I'd have pastries. Yes you read that right pastriES (3 or 4 usually - again if it looked good, it'd have to be eaten). And this mindset would continue throughout the day for every day we were away. A 3-4kg gain used to be the norm for me.

So thats another installment in my renewed life. Small changes but huge impact. I came home so much happier than when I went away. I have a lot of work ahead of me to get to a good weight and a shape I'm happy with but the difference is that this time I have a quiet confidence that I'll do it and I'll do it happily without feeling like I'm stuck on Struggle Street, battling my demons every day.

:-) Magda

TURNING THE CORNER

Hello to anybody who may still be dropping by to see if I'm still on the face of this earth.

Yes I am and I have so much to write about that I think it'll take a few installments. In case you're yawning and ready to flick me off I urge you to stay tuned even if just for a few paragraphs as I believe I have some interesting stuff to report. Now less waffle and let me get on with it.

As you may remember from my earlier blog posts I had reached a point of total desperation and complete lack of belief in myself a couple of months ago. My binge eating was constant and I felt powerless to change it. I just repeated the same destructive behaviours over and over again, never seeing a way to break the cycle. So I bit the bullet and sought help in the form of a Sports Psyche (SP).

After my first visit I had some positive feelings and could start to see a way forward. I had a second visit just before going on holidays and I felt like we really made some inroads after some very frank discussion, realisations, analysis, advice and her just being bloody good at her job. I can honestly say that I left that session feeling different, thinking different and ready to act different. So I was quick to put my new approach to the test and that I did (I'll expand on it later) and by golly IT WORKED.

After my holiday (again I'll expand on it in another post) I went back for my 3rd session and reported on all I had done, not done, thought, felt and believed and it was obvious that I didnt need to see her anymore. I HAVE NOT BINGED FOR SEVERAL WEEKS AND I FEEL LIKE A NEW (AND IMPROVED) PERSON.

So what's different? Now I understand how some of my thoughts and beliefs were setting me up for repeated failure. I was giving myself no choice but to binge and continue my negative cycle. So I had to let go of some of those beliefs, remove some of my self-imposed rules and view things quite differently. I had this conviction that eating off plan or having "treat food" or similar was a disaster. If I ate off plan (which I did regularly), all good was undone and therefore I may as well have a complete free for all. The SP kept drumming it into me that food is just food and I needed to remove the emotion from certain foods. So if I ate a piece of cake I was not to view that as a disaster (which then gave me licence to keep eating cake cause well I'd blown it all anyway). So I ate some cake and was able to stop at one piece. AMAZING. So I did it again and again stopped at one piece. I ate cheese and crackers and stopped without feeling like I wanted to devour the whole lot. I was thinking differently so I could act differently. OMG IT WAS WORKING.

Thats a very simplified version of it all but I dont need to go back to the SP unless I hit a "hiccup" (her words) and I need to refocus. I'm doing ok. Over the last few weeks I've faced several situations which previously would have had me eating out of control, justifying that I deserved it, what-was-the-point-of-trying-to-eat-well, OMG-the-diet-will-start-on-Monday-so-I-better-eat-everything-bad-that-I-can-possibly-get-my-hands-on and I've hardly been tempted to revert to my old ways.

I'm still fat but I'm working on changing that. I have new skills and a new outlook that will help me achieve my goals instead of making it a bloody hard battle to fight. But the biggest difference is that I finally feel happy within and not just on the surface for show. It may sound corny but I honestly feel like a different person and I look to my health and fitness future with hope and happiness in my heart.

:-) Magda

THIS BLOG IS CLOSED TIL FURTHER NOTICE

Tomorrow we leave for our holiday to Singapore. Then its the All Females in Melbourne so I'll be away for some time.

Last night we had our friends over for a BBQ following a girlie get-together in the afternoon. As I started on my ??th glass of wine, realising that yet again I had eaten too much crappy food, a great sense of sadness came over me. I felt awful both physically and emotionally yet I continued to pretend that everything was great and that I was really happy. I dont want to continue on this way.

When I return I'll be starting a new journey. One of recovering my physical self to a level that I'm happy with. One of finding true happiness that comes from honouring yourself with positive thoughts and actions. One of believing that you can achieve the goals that mean so much to you and claiming the right to do so.

Farewell for now.

Magda

(LACK OF) PASSION

Tonight I read Kek's post about passion and it dawned on me that right now I have a serious LACK of passion. I have drifted through the first half of 2009 ... well I actually feel like I've crawled over broken glass sometimes ....and not made any inroads on the goals that I set at the start of the year. For instance here is what I've cut and pasted from my "Goal Post" done in early Jan.

My first goal is to to get my weight down to 60-62kgs and I want to achieve this in 12 weeks which will be very close to my wedding anniversary: Bombed out on this one.

A week later I'm off for a girls only weekend to Sydney. My girlfriends are both quite slim and this year and I dont want to be the fat-girl-out: Bombed out here too.

I long to be happy in my skin and generally happy with how I look. I want to enjoy good healthy food and the occassional treat and I want to feel good - happy, relaxed and not always fretting that I need to lose weight - over and over again: Yep still longing for all this.

..... my next goal of maintenance: This one has me laughing. I'm so far off the "m" word that its not even a flickering light in the distance.

To compete or not to compete that is the question: Not any more. The issue is more like "how do you expect to run when you cant even walk properly?" This is on the backburner for now.

..... to overhaul my wardrobe ....... Its my goal to ditch everything that is unflattering, unsuitable, dated, cheap and ready for donating to charity and then slowly replace with quality items: Yes but not at this size and shape. Cant stand the thought. Wont even entertain it.

Finally if there was one thing that I wanted for 2009 it would be BALANCE: And I still want it but havent found it yet.

So I sit here nearing the half way mark for 2009 and realise that when push came to shove, my efforts to achieve my goals fell by the roadside and I'm still where I was when I started. A classic case of lack of passion = lack of progress, I think.

I'm not sure that I can can just turn the passion fire on but I can start to take small steps towards achieving my goals in the second half of the year. Perhaps I'll look at it like this:

I spent the first six months learning that certain beliefs, actions and attitudes did not result in the changes that I wanted so now its time to do it differently. And I'll approach this with some excitement and determination and let the passion follow.

:-) Magda

DREAMING .... from Kristy's blog

If I had all the money in the world I would use it to my advantage to be more involved in my son’s life.

By me not working he could sleep til 7.30 each day and not be woken up at 6.40. I could take him straight to school and not drop him off at Before School Care. I’d get more involved with school activities. I’d volunteer to listen to children read, I’d help out on school excursions, I’d get to know the other mums better and keep abreast of all that happens in and around school. I’d love to be the class rep.

At the end of the day I’d pick him up from school and have the luxury of really listening to the details about his day, instead of hearing bits and pieces several hours later.

Selfishly I’d train after school drop off and not at 5am. What a luxury that’d be.

So as you can see for me money would buy time. Time that could be put to much better use by making my family and me happier.

I wont even start on the material things as they rate a distant second to the above.

M

ROUND 2 WITH THE SP

Today I had my second visit to my Sports Psyche (SP). Funnily enough, because I’ve been so busy with work, I had decided to cancel it but ironically it was because I was so busy that I didn’t get around to making the call. Then last night I found myself in a situation that confirmed how important it was that I make that meeting today, no matter what. Down the track I might share what it was but I cant just yet.

So today’s session was a real eye-opener. It took a while for me to get on the same wavelength that she was on because I just couldn’t see things that way but slowly step by step I got there and went WOW (not a good WOW but a light bulb moment WOW). I can now see why I repeat my binging behaviour over and over and it was a bit in-your-face I must admit. I can also see why I just wasn’t able to work it out myself. I needed somebody to take me through it step by painful step, ask pertinent questions, question my thoughts and feelings and put it all together to get where I always take myself. Then it was the deconstruct process (that needs more work but the seed has been planted) that we tackled and I finally felt I had an understanding of it all and hope that I would learn to manage this in future. I havent had that feeling before so this is PRETTY BIG for me.

So my "home-work " is to recognise my negative thoughts around eating and write them all down. We identified some today but I'm sure there are more lurking in different situations. My SP also made some interesting statements about what my triggers actaully are. And they ARENT the most obvious things that spring to mind. Hence another WOW moment and more thinking about it all and moving towards an answer.

But the thing that impressed me the most is that she has prepared a plan for what we need to do over the course of our sessions. Yes its all there in black and white and I can refer to it anytime and track our/my progress.

I dont want to get too smug too soon but I cant help that I finally feel good about this and can see some positive changes happening in the future.

:-) Magda

THE WINTER SOLSTICE

I love the winter solstice (not sure of its exact date this year but always around the 21 June). I love the thought that from now every day will be a bit longer than the one before and that summer is heading our way. Its like "hump day" and that feeling of getting to the other side. So what did you do on the winter solstice?

Today I focussed on two things and I forsaked all others.

1. Preparing our house for sale. Now this would have to be one of the worst jobs in the world. De-cluttering is like a bottomless pit. No matter how much you put away or throw out there is more around the corner and you turn your back and what you've already done, just mutliplies back. I skipped training today but managed a half decent upper body workout just scrubbing anything and everything in the quest for "sparkling clean". I'm well and truly over it but the job is far from done.

2. Playing with my son. We had a ball playing a make-believe game that we do regularly. Then it was a couple of board games before heading to our local shops. He rode his scooter and I walked (lifestyle cardio??) and we went to the local cafe (yum skim cappuccino time) and then stopped at the playground on the way back. The weather was beautiful and it was great to be out.

We have one week before we're on holidays and off to Singapore on the 30th. Counting down the sleeps now.

Cheers all

Magda

WHAT REALLY MATTERS TO YOU

After a massively crappy week with way too much work, late nights working, missed training and some crappy eating days thrown in, I thought I'd unwind with the following D & Ms.

What do you really want deep down inside?

To love and be loved. To find inner peace and balance. To not die wondering "what if".

What matters to you, in the big picture?

Family. My son growing into an independent adult and finding his "happy place" in life. My husband and I continuing our partnership. Loving each other, laughing together, and being the yin and the yang.

What do you want to stand for?

Being caring, understanding and loyal. Commitment and perseverance.

What do you want to do with your brief time on this planet?

Wow. Considering that next month I'm well into "middle age" I better get a move on and start making my dreams a reality.:
1. Raise my son to be independent, socially capable, confident, balanced and happy.
2. Grow old with my husband.
3. Promote happiness and harmony in my extended family.
4. Then there's some material stuff which is personal and not for sharing now.

Who do you look up to?

This will surprise people. I love my mum very much but I live my life very different to hers so I dont really look up to her.

Professionally: My husband. My Director.

Intellectually: My friend at work Miss J.

In the health/fitness area: Shelley (love the postive attitude), Liz (is there anyone who knows their stuff better??), Tara (has anybody come so far and has so much potential to go so much further??) there are more ....

Who inspires you?

My friend Kerry right here in Adelaide.

What personal strengths or qualities do they have that you admire?

Determination. Not afraid of hard work. A can-do attitude. Supportive. Ambitious. Focussed. And a down right lovely person to boot.

If you achieved your goal, then what would you do?

Material goals (not listed): celebrate and then regroup to work out "what next". Personal goals (listed): I'd die happy.

How would your life be different as a result?

It probably wouldnt be a lot different, if at all.

How would you change?

Perhaps I'd have a different outlook on things, maybe a different feeling about myself and what I believed about myself.

What would you do differently from there onwards?

Maybe I'd aim higher. Maybe I'd just be happy with what I had achieved. Maybe I dont really know cause its such an "unknown".

And on that note its time to log off and get some shut eye.

G'night all

M

SPEED POSTING

Just finished work.

Very tired.

The day started good but ended sh*tty.

Binge Monster was trying his hardest again but he was out of luck. Mojo and I conquered all today.

Could post heaps more but sleep is more important.

G'night

M

THE RETURN OF MY MOJO

A funny thing happened yesterday. There was a knock at my door so I went to have a look at who was there. Lo and behold, but what do I discover?

Me: OMG you're back. Where have you been? I've missed you and I cant live my life without you.

Mojo: Yeah yeah you say that all the time but when I'm around you dont treat me how I like to be treated. You always find a way to make me feel useless. I always try to help you but too often you just dont listen.

Me: I'm sorry. Its just that I .....erm, you know I just .......errr. Yeah there's no excuse. I should trust in you and honour you like you deserve.

Mojo: You know if you did that and stuck to it even when the going got tough, we could make such a great team and together we could achieve so much.

Me: You think so?

Mojo: I know so. Why dont you give it a try? You've got nothing to lose. Lets not waste any more time trying to be perfect, beating yourself up if you werent perfect and making poor choices when you know you deserve better.

Me: OK now I'm outta here as there is cardio and prehab work waiting to be done, followed by a healthy breakfast.

So yesterday was quite a good day. A drank heaps of water / herbal tea. I ate enough veges. I had no alcohol. I ate mindfully and whilst I did have a couple of small treats, I savoured them instead of stuffing them down in 2 seconds so I could go trolling for more.

On the other hand, today was a totally shitty day and I was in a foul mood, upset, weepy and beating myself up over totally different stuff. Seeing me weak and vulnerable my Binge Monster decided to sweep in for the kill and all day he nagged and nagged about how I should eat more crap cause it'll make me feel better. But luckily today I had Mojo on my side and she talked him down every time. Thats one for me and my Mojo and the Binge Monster scored a big fat zero.

Amen

:-) Magda

CELEBRATION TIME

Today as I arrived at the pool for my son's swimming lesson the real estate agent rang to say that our offer had been accepted. We have purchased the block of land that forms part of Plan B and its all systems go.

My best friend Miss E visited this afternoon and our boys had a play together and we caught up on this stuff that she knew nothing about. A bottle of Trilogy champagne was opened and consumed in the name of "celebrating this significant first step in the next exciting phase of our lives." Even WH had a glass with us. To say that I'm happy and excited is such an understatement :-)

From-Fat-To-Fit-And-Fabulous has started rolling along albeit very slowly. Not aiming to achieve anything groundbreaking before the Singapore holiday just making sure that everything is in place for when I get back. I'm treating the next 4 weeks as time to plan and prepare not just physically but emotionally too. Geez I'm beside myself having 2 such big things to be excited about. Lucky me!!

:-) M

AND MORE ON PLAN B

Today I faxed off our offer for the land.

Then the sales rep from our prospective builder rang to tell me that he'd made a mistake on our house estimate. A mistake of underquoting by $28,000.

WH was NOT HAPPY!!!!!!

I still think its a great package but some of our higher hopes and expectations have just been cut down a size or two. This property business is an emotional rollercoaster and I'm already exhausted. Maybe if I had something to celebrate I'd feel better.

M

On a happier note, I've put my new From-Fat-To-Fit-And-Fabulous mission into action. Now THATS positive and exciting :-)

PLAN B UPDATE

Over the last wek or 2 we've had 2 different sales people pricing up 2 different houses on 2 different blocks of land. Plan B (to me) was the preference with less hassles and therefore less cost (albeit Plan C had the slightly better address). Plan C is proving to be really problematic which will translate into lots of exta cost and very little return for your money.

How appropriate then that today we got the house estimate for Plan B and it was considerably lower than what WH had calculated. In fact it was so attractive that Plan B was lifted to Plan B+ status and over a bottle of wine tonight (is there any other way??!! LOL) we made the decision to put an offer to the vendors of the land in our Plan B. I'll be faxing it off to the agent tomorrow morning and then we'll wait and see how desperate the vendors are for the sale (they are in the USA on a work transfer).

Fingers crossed that we get the land and that in a few short months (note my level of optimism here) our dream home will be under construction. To say that I'm excited yet again, is an understatement. We might not have our dream address but we'll do everything we can to make this house our best ever (BTW it'll be our 6th home, not counting rentals).

My health and fitness plan is still in the making and I'm getting quite excited about it but have some more work to do on it.

Cheers all

Magda

A SENSE OF CALM

....has come over me. Its really odd. For the last 4 days I've been feeling awful. Food was my comfort except that its a false pleasure. A few minutes of enjoyment followed by madly craving more and more as though its a drug you just cant get enough of. Not to mention the many glasses of wine consumed in the name of sociability/stress relief/"a good meal deserves a good wine" and just downright enjoyment. Not good for the waist-line nor for fat loss so that pleasure comes at a price.

So whats different today?

Last night as I lay in bed unable to get to sleep (due to 2 great sleep-ins on the weekend) I thought about all the things that arent working for me right now - the physical, the mental (thinking) and the emotional (feeling) stuff. There was quite a bit there and I started looking at ways to address some of the issues. Thats when I made a decision about my next course of action and its left me feeling positive and with hope in my heart. I have some time to work through it before we do our Singapore holiday and then I'm hoping to kick it off when we return. That may even be when I'm in Melbourne for the All Females. Deep down I've known this is the way for me to go but I've just been loathe to admit it. Now I'm embracing this option as I believe its right for me.

Stay tuned folks.

PS We are seeing the agent about the Plan B block of land early this week so here's hoping we're in with a chance and its not snatched from under our noses.

M

AND NOW FOR PLAN B

....... on the home front. Plan A is dead and buried. We wont have our "ultimate avenue address" and whilst I'm still sad about it, I know I must move on. So after many long discussions over several glasses of wine (is there any other way??) WH and I have agreed on our plan B on the homefront. (There is a Plan C as well but we're both apprehensive about the cost and the house in Plan C doesnt work as well as the house in Plan B).

Its taken us a while to agree on Plan B. The block is bigger than that in Plan C. The house works better and we think there will be better value for money. So whats the problem you ask? Plan B actually has us moving back to the suburb we lived in before we moved to Brisbane. Its a nice suburb and I liked living there but the resale on our house was bit disappointing and when we bought where we are now (which sort is the same area that Plan C is in), it was certainly more expensive. This shouldnt matter as our next house MUST be long-term but you always worry that you'll sink a lot of money into that bit of dirt and bricks and mortar and it'd be nice know that you'll get it back in the event of a move.

OK enough analysing that nobody is really interested in anyway. I've called the agent about said block in Plan B. He hasnt returned my call so I'll be calling again tomorrow. We talked to him on Saturday and we're ready to take it to the next stage. In the meantime two different builders are costing up two entirely different houses on two different blocks of land for us. Fingers crossed that Plan B wins on value for money and fingers crossed that we get a hold of the agent and get the ball rolling to make an offer.

Is it any wonder that I feel so highly strung and stressed to the eyeballs?

M

TIME TO TURN THE "NEGATIVE NELLY" SWITCH OFF

A big thank you to all the lovely and kind ladies who left comments on my last down in the ditch post. Each and every comment struck a chord in my heart and made me feel a little better and certainly not so alone in my struggles. Some even brought a tear to my eye and reminded me how selfish I was to not take the time to congratulate others on their achievements and successes (GO KERRY!!!!).

Its scary to acknowledge that I clearly am my own worst enemy. For too long my lifestyle has been ruled by self sabotaging thoughts and behaviours. Through various thoughts and actions, I set myself up to fail and then when the inevitable happens I make sure I blow it out of all proportions so I can really beat myself up over it and then wallow in my misery and self-pity, reinforcing how hopeless I am. This has hit home lately and I'll be taking these words of wisdom to the SP with me in a weeks time (I think I'll even email them before my next apppointment). Man, have we got some work ahead of us!!

For now I've decided to give the diet shit a rest. For one week I will NOT do any of the following:

1. Trawl through my bookshelves, resources, internet etc looking for the "perfect diet /program".
2. Weigh every morsel that I eat so I can log it with 100% accuracy on CalKing.
3. Analyse and re-analyse my food so that my marco-nutriet ratios are just right.
4. Eat as though there is no tomorrow. Instead follow 3 easy steps: 1. Engage brain. 2. Open mouth. 3. Feed only until satisfied.
5. Whinge and moan on my blog.

I will replace these behaviours by doing the following things:

1. Focus on eating for good health and enjoying the foods I like in moderation.
2. Drink more water/herbal tea.
3. Take some of my training back to basics and only do what I enjoy. Its not about 100% effort now, its about consistency and just doing it.
4. Turn the "Negative Nelly" switch off and be positive ... even if I have to fake it til I make it.

Thank God tomorrow is a holiday. I had a great sleep in this morning (at least I'm not sleep deprived) but its bed time now so I'll bid farewell.

Magda

PERMISSION TO EXIT NOW

Yesterday the BM claimed victory. Being home with a sick child, yet faced with a heap of work that HAD to be done and being housebound (which meant no cappuccino or the fruit toast I so desperately wanted for breakfast) meant there were way too many trips to the pantry throughout the day. At least I'll have something to report back to the SP from which we can work on (was there ever any question about this??)

I have come to the realisation just recently that I've truly lost my motivation for all things health and fitness related. Although I have managed an hour of training both yesterday and today, getting going was a huge mental battle. Today's session (shoulders + ss cardio on the exercise bike) was quite good and in the main yesterday's was too (back / chest supersetted + ss cardio on the rower) but am I giving 100%? Not even close. What about 80%. Nope. Its more like 70 -75%. I tell myself "something is better than nothing" (thanks Kek) to make myself feel better.

Diet .... well what can I say? Sick of it all. Over it all. Just fed up with it all. Good days followed by bad days over and over again. I know you shouldnt dwell on the negatives / failures but when they're staring at you no matter which way you turn, its hard to look past them. Boy is my head in a crappy place right now and I'm sounding like a total misery guts. Permission to exit now if this negativity pisses you off.

Does anyone else go through the repeated torment of what to eat, when to eat it, how much to have etc etc? I have SO much information about 1000s of different ways to get lean / lose fat / be slimmer / be more toned/muscly etc that my head feels like it'll explode from information overload. No joke, during an average week, I'll drag out 2 or 3 of those 1000 different plans and analyse them to the nth degree (again) looking for "the perfect solution". I'm driving myself crazy.

So there it all is. My honest feelings right now. I could have deleted tonight's post (I hate it coz its so negative) but I've decided to blog it, warts and all. Some of my thoughts arent sensible or rational but hey, its where I'm at right now so I wont pretend otherwise. Cant wait to see my SP again next week. I'm counting down the days.

M

DEALING WITH THE DISAPPOINTMENT

I'd be lying if I said I was ok today. What has "saved me" is a combination of being very busy at work, enjoying a lovely lunch with my friend and work colleague Miss J and focussing on my June goal of clocking up a BFM (Binge Free Month).

I headed off to work earlier than usual today. BS has a virus of some sort and WH took the day off to stay home with him. (Its my turn tomorrow). Going a million miles an hour made the day go very quickly and I even got to enjoy 2 cafe meetings and have my favourite skim cappuccinos. Miss J and I usually have lunch together on Thursdays. Today's catch up was great as it let me get some of the sadness off my chest and we chatted about my future comp prep plans and about her life as the wife of a surgeon. She has some interesting tales to tell!

After lunch I knew I was at geat risk of losing a round to the Binge Monster as my usual negative thoughts started creeping in. A quick refocus on my goals and some stern reminders about how incorrect those thoughts were, managed to keep me on track. Anyway, what did I have to complain about? I'd allowed myself the lunch of my choice (salt and pepper squid with a small serve of chips and salad) so I was hardly deprived. I held it together and was very pleased with my efforts.

So my plan this week has been to eat mainly lean and clean but by no means to aim for "perfection". Sometimes this approach works better to keep the Binge Monster at bay but the trade off is that weight / fat loss doesnt necessarily happen (and right now I want a few kilos off). So I'm weighing up the alternatives:

1. Go "hard core" on a "diet", drop some kilos before we go to Singapore but risk a blow out binge OR
2. Maintain the status quo, go to Singapore feeling fat and frumpy but maybe win the BM war this month.

Geez its like grim and grimmer :-(

M

NOT HAPPY JAN!!!!!! :-(

Its over. I'll reveal all now.

2 weeks ago we spotted a property for sale at a time when we had decided we were going to sell up and build new. (I wont bore you with all the details around why but I'll just say that its taken us years to come to this decision).

This property was awesome. Its in the general area where we live now and the area I grew up in. Its the most beautiful tree lined avenue with a wide median strip that has lots of beautiful full grown trees. The location is about 6kms from the city which is perfect for us as we both work in the CBD. Houses in this street .... sorry, "avenue" are beautiful with a mix of well maintained old houses and quite a few new ones, some of them VERY grand and expensive. Every time we'd drive down this avenue we'd dream about living on it and it always impressed us. It was our ultimate dream.

So here is a property for sale in "our avenue". Its on a big block of land (800m2+) and the house is a wreck (demolition job) which is just what we want. After analysing our finances to the nth degree WH says we can offer X. I immediately decide that we'll offer X + $10K as it has to be our best offer. We delay our offer to await finance approval and in the meantime circumstances allow us to add another $10K. I'm so excited as I truly believe we have a good chance of getting it and I'm well on the way to planning my new life at my dream address. Offers closed yesterday at 2pm and I almost expected a call last night.

It didnt eventuate but the agent rang today to advise that the trustees had accepted another offer. My dream address has gone to somebody else. I'm so sad and so disappointed. This is NOT how its meant to be.

Binge Monster was whispering in my ear that some junk food would make me feel better but I whispered back "FUCK OFF" and hit the computer to do some work. I couldnt control the outcome of that property sale but I can control how I react to it and how I manage my feelings around it.

Cheers

Magda

SPORTS PSYCHE - SECRET UPDATE

I've had a busy few days. Mum's birthday was a lot of fun and Sunday's dinner, while not my best effort to date, was still really nice. The lamb shanks were a hit, yet again and the tiramisu turned out better than expected. Nobody complained about the food.

Monday was taken up with various meetings, phone calls and then my first appointment with the sports psyche. I like her. Whilst I did most of the talking in this sesssion, she was very down to earth and we had a few good laughs together as well. I poured out my life story (in brief) focussing on the particluar challenges I've had over the last 2 or so years. She was able to quickly identify where I was going wrong in my thoughts, behaviours and choices but I'm also doing some CBT (Cognitive Behaviour Therapy) to give us something specific to work with. Her question about "what do I see when I look in the mirror" was a very interesting one that I found quite hard to answer, especially as she was posing it from the physical perspective. When I did eventually respond, she said that my body image was "reasonably realistic" so I took some comfort in that. My next appointment is in 2 weeks time but my goal is NOT have any instances that we can analyse through CBT. (I'm to record situations, thoughts and outcomes when I am faced with an urge to binge and when I give in). I'm aiming to make June 2009 my BFM (Binge Free Month).

On my "secret issue" I'm pretty sure that all will be revealed tomorrow which is well before the 9th June deadline I mentioned previously. Things have moved along faster than first anticipated and this has been much easier to deal with. I hate things dragging out forever. If I want something, you can be rest assured that I WANT IT NOW. So tomorrow is THE DAY.

So I'm off to bed as soon as I log off. I've had a horrid headache for 2 days and I'm hoping that a good sleep will relieve it. If not, I'll be suffering through another mega busy day at work. But who knows I might be celebrating tomorrow night, or I might be crying into my chicken and green veg.

Stay tuned.

M

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM

My mum turns 73 tomorrow. The picture above was taken about 5 years ago but I just love it. It shows perfectly how totally selfless and loving my mother is. There is NOTHING she wouldnt do for her grandson. She loves him with all her heart. My mum has always worked hard to make our home a loving and caring place. All her life I've seen her give, give and give some more. She never wants anything in return except our company and to know that we'll be there as she ages.

My mum has never uttered a critical word about me. She alone has been my biggest and number one fan. She has always believed in me, even when I didnt believe in myself. If anyone dared to mention even a slightly bad thing about me, she'd cut them down quick smart. You couldnt ask for a better guardian angel.

So today was "part one of her day". I picked her up mid morning and we headed out for an early lunch together. Then it was off to see a chick flick which had us laughing our heads off. After the movie we went for a coffee and talked and laughed some more. On the way home we checked out "my secret" something that I just loved sharing with her. Of course she could see my passion and enthusiasm and immediately offered to help me and WH achieve what we want so much.

Tomorrow is "part two" when I'm making dinner for our family to further celebrate her day. I've made a tiramisu for dessert (its chilling in the fridge now) and tomorrow it'll be slow cooked lamb shanks at her request. I hope she enjoys it all. I'm sure she will.

So I'm getting in early as tomorrow will be a busy day ...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM. I LOVE YOU.

XX M

A TOUGH ADMISSION

Sometimes it takes ages for some things to sink in. It might be denial. It might be that you think you can manage it yourself. It might just be that you don’t realise how much you’ve suffered and struggled and the time you’ve wasted on it all.

At the end of the day all of that is irrelevant once you admit that there are some things in life that you just need help with. No need to feel embarrassed or ashamed of it. No need to feel inferior or inadequate (although this is easier said than done). It takes a big person to admit they have a problem AND then actively do something about it.

I’m at that point in my life.

Don’t get me wrong. In many ways my life is wonderful and I truly have a lot to be thankful for and I am thankful for it all. But unless I can get my mind in order and learn ways to keep it in order and to deal with my trigger situations in a positive way, I’ll forever be on this depressing merry-go-round of battling my Binge Monster and losing too many of the battles.

I’m admitting that I don’t know how to solve this problem. What I do know is how important and powerful the mind is in this regard. But how do I get it working for me instead of me constantly battling with it or just giving in cause its all too hard? I’ve read heaps of books and articles but it hasnt gelled for me. You could say that the penny hasn’t dropped or that I’m still missing pieces of the puzzle.

So I’ve taken a step that I’m hoping is in the right direction. I’m hoping that I get the help I need to learn how to overcome this problem once and for all. On Monday I’m seeing a sports psychologist at The Wakefield Sports Clinic. My mind is open to the possibilities here and let me say “I’m so ready to start believing that some of my longer term goals may just become realities”.

Watch this space folks.

Cheers

Magda

SHORT AND SWEET

Tonight's post is short and sweet.

Work has been very busy this week and it meant working in the evening on Tuesday and having some later than usual nights. Subsequently I'm really tired by late afternoon which presents all sorts of extra challenges.

I skipped training yesterday morning and managed a little extra sleep. Today, despite being really tired, I got up early and did chest, tris and a little cardio. Worked to (almost) failure on some of the chest work, pushed hard on (fatigued) tris but cardio was a bit pissy (steady state on the ex bike).

The melting pot has changed slightly in that one of the things in it will be decided a little before 9 June (if it goes to plan - its out of our control) and the other is up to me. Not ready to post about it just yet though.

Signing off to get an early night.

Cheers

Magda

HAVE YOU EVER WANTED ......

.... something so bad that you didnt want to let yourself want it that bad because of the disappointment you'd feel if you couldnt have it? The melting pot is bubbling away and it should be done on 9th June. My phone will be in my hand until I get the call with the good news .... or not.

M

THE MELTING POT

This weekend has been a big melting pot of exciting opportunities and possibilities. I know I'll have trouble sleeping tonight with this stuff on my mind.

On Friday night WH had made a significant discovery relating to the personal stuff thats on the drawing board for us. Its HUGE!! We talked it over, and over and over. We went from "oh we cant do it" to "we're giving it our best shot". I wont reveal anything yet but all will be known after 9th June. The wait will kill me but in the meantime I must breathe, breathe and breathe some more.

On a personal level, I'm exploring an option that is exciting but scary too. My changed attitude has me thinking positively instead of repeatedly convincing myself that I cant possible do it because ......(insert any one of 1000 excuses). I'm seeking an expert opinion on the matter - and it may come back that "no its not feasible" but I'll be ok with that. At least I've looked into it properly and not just written it off beacuse of a lack of belief in myself.

So with two (major) things up in the air like this, winding down and switching off will be very hard to do. And I need my beauty sleep.

I had breakfast out with a couple of friends this morning and purposely chose the high fat option to cure an extremely bad bout of being clogged up. The ultra low carb approach is NOT a long term option if things dont move for a week - yep you read that right :-( As great as it was for dropping a decent bit of fat over a relatively short time, the morning oats / psyllium husks are back on the daily menu. Fingers crossed that the fat continues to melt off.

Actually how "wrong" is that statement??!! Fat melting off is not a product of good luck coming from crossing your fingers (duuuuh I'll just cross my fingers for the next 5 weeks and I'll be 5 kilos lighter at the end of it).

Consistently eating lean clean food in reasonable quantities + training with intensity and purpose + managing headspace and emotions + repeating those habits over and over = leaner and more toned Magda. Simple really.

And on that note, this genius is off to update CalKing LOL

:-) Magda

DOWN BUT NOT OUT

I usually take Fridays as a rest day but since I missed training on Wednesday and I feel so "on fire" I set my alarm for 4.40am and did chest and tris before heading out for 30 mins of walking / jogging.

My strength wasnt good today and I failed on a few exercises before I made 12 reps. I gave it my all though so I cant ask for more. Then it was time to head out so off I went. About 3/4s of the way through I was running on a footpath (well lit) and stepped onto the kerb to cross the road. My foot got caught on the uneven surface and I went crashing down on my right side. My elbow took the brunt of the fall which of course meant my shoulder got a damn good jolt as did my upper back on the right side. My scrapes are minor as I was well dressed in thick layers. I have too many sore spots to mention and my right arm, and shoulder blade are very sore. Thank God nothing is broken as everything that should move, still does, albeit it not well. I suspect I'm not a candidate for osteoporosis (I drank milk by the gallons when I was young).

I struggled to get ready for work and WH convinced me that a day of rest at home was well deserved today .... and I've obeyed. I'm pottering around and practicing ambidexterity. I refuse to be beaten.

So I was downed this morning but I wont be "struck out". I've had a couple of hours of feeling sorry for myself and now its time to suck it up, remind myself of all the good in my life and put that smile back on my face. I've made a list of what I want to achieve today and its time to get cracking.

Cheers

Magda

A NEW BEGINNING

Sorry, couldnt resist posting one more pic where I'd styled it just a little bit different today. I like my style better as it has a bit more body.

Thank you to all who left such lovely comments on "my chop". I had resisted the cut for so long because I thought the longer hair "looked younger" when in fact it dragged my face down and aged me. As soon as my female work colleague saw me today she was blown away with delight and the first thing she said was "it makes you look younger". I'm happy!!

So today I felt INVINCIBLE. I havent felt this good in a very long time. I've decided to embrace a new attitude, a "CAN DO" attitude and as a result of this I feel so much better about myself. This morning I got out my size 10 DKNY skirt and gave it another go. I last wore it early March when I was about 1kg lighter before I messed up badly again. It was tight but it fit and because the fabric is thicker it didnt show any "sins".

I've re-thought my approach to my diet and training (yes ANOTHER change) and I'll be road testing it over the next few weeks. I'm in a reasonably good place with my weight but the long-term very low carb approach just wont cut it when I need my brain functioning at work. More on my new approach later.

So with this newfound energy (well mental anyway) and enthusiasm I tackled a more traditional weights session again and did a nice leg workout. Not a killer as I need to ease back in but in a few weeks I should be firing on all cylinders again. I followed it up with a 45 minute brisk walk to my favourite lakes and back and recorded 500+ cals burned on my HRM. Great start to the day. Cals and carbs were still low today but tomorrow is a planned re-feed with a treat that I know I'll enjoy.

So here's to a bit of a new beginning with a new attitude and a new outlook. The past is gone and I refuse to waste energy beating myself up over past mistakes. I've learnt many lessons and gathered many valuable tools along my journey. Now its time to put them all to good use.

Bring on tomorrow, I say.

Cheers

Magda

CH CH CH CHANGES

From this

To this

What do you think?

New hairstyle.

New attitude.

New achievements.

Look out. I feel unstoppable.

Magda

SLACKING OFF .... SORT OF

Last night my head was reeling from once again researching a better diet approach. Good results and decent progress are an absolute priority as Singapore is only a tad under 5 weeks away so there’s some serious fat to be melted in that time. Although having said that, I slept so badly last night that I turned off my alarm and tried to get some more sleep instead of going out for my morning cardio. Yeah slack I know but I just dreaded being dead tired AND carb starved.

Today has been really busy at work and I’ve had less time to think about food and diets etc. This has been much better as the last few days were unsettlingly quiet and had me indulging in all sorts of inappropriate thoughts. Tomorrow I’m at a seminar for most of the day so my lifesaver may be a protein bar for morning tea and fingers crossed that they provide something suitable for lunch. No I wont be packing and taking my own food. Cold salad is SO unappetising in this cold weather that its likely to be a binge trigger so I aim to eat moderately of what’s available.

And on that note, its time to sign off and eat my smoked tuna and salad. But at least I have my little heater keeping my tootsies warm LOL. Stay tuned for pics tonight or tomorrow.

Cheers

Magda

CARBS GLORIOUS CARBS

During lunch today I struggled with my Binge Monster who was making a lot of noise and trying to score one against me. I was out of the office for a while and here's what I went through as I had a small wander through the city.

BM: Hmmm it must be time to get something nice to eat. There's pizza and you get 2 slices for $5. Or what about some cake? You know you love cake more than anything else.

Me: But I want to be slim when I'm shopping in Singapore. I want to buy nice clothes. So shut the f*ck up!!

BM: Yeah but just imagine how nice the cake will taste. And it'll make you feel better.

Me: Its not all about the taste and I'll only feel good for 5 minutes and then I'll be disappointed in myself again. F*ck off I tell you!!

BM: Come on, just this one wont hurt.

Me: You know its never "just this one". It always turns into a 5000 calories + blowout and then I'm back at square one over and over again. So shut up, f*ck off and while you're at it go f*ck yourself!!!!

I went back to work still in control (just!!) and started to do my project reports.

Except I stared at my screen forever waiting for my brain to work. It (my brain) was blank. I looked at the writing on the screen and I didnt know what to do with it. My brain had closed for the day but I couldnt afford to be in this position so I made a decision to feed it some carbs and caffeine.

Off I trotted to the health food store where I bought a small vegan blueberry muffin. Then it was off to GJs for a small skim cappuccino. I enjoyed the treats together and I swear I walked out of GJs feeling like a new person. I had energy, I had some vitality, my mood was better, I was warmer and I was laughing and happy again. Back at work I killed the report writing with no probs at all.

But here's the icing on the cake (not that the vegan muffin had any icing LOL). After I had that I felt ok and was still in control and I knew I DIDNT WANT ANYTHING ELSE. No binging urges. No guilty feelings of "oh I've blown it". No regrets. I listened to my body and I gave it some of what it needed (not wanted but needed) and it repaid me with a feeling of contentment and maintained control. Now thats worth even more than winning the earlier battle with my Binge Monster.

Cheers all

Magda

FBS VS DELICATE BALANCE

Well its set in. And its parked itself comfortably in place. Its engaged and fully operational. What is it?

FBS aka FUZZY BRAIN SYNDROME.

My memory, which wasn’t fantastic, to start with just got heaps worse. In the last few days I’ve forgotten:

1. An important appointment that was to be coordinated with my dad and relied on a phone call from a contractor yesterday advising that it was time for that appointment. So I had totally forgotten to tell my Dad about it and when the call came yesterday and I was in a meeting I rejected the mobile call twice before finally answering (having forgotten that I would be getting said call) and realising my stuff up.

2. To pack spare clothes for BS to wear after school at grandma’s house.

3. Dropping BS to school this morning we were half way in when I realised his blazer was still on the back shelf of the car.

But while these are all relatively minor and excusable, it’s the work stuff-ups that are causing concern. I just cant afford to be making stupid mistakes so a re-think of my eating plan is pending. Drawing board here I come or it might just be a tweak of what I’m currently doing.

On a different note I’m really loving my morning cardio but am missing the traditional muscle building weight training. Which all suggests that its time to look for a happier balance, one that will still see me achieving my short-term goal but that also has me working towards my longer term goals. Right now I’m treading water on the long-term stuff and that doesn’t sit too well with me. God knows how easy it is to stop treading for a moment and before you know it, you’re going under.

But as long as my headspace stays positively focussed and in control then I know I can sort this all out and get the delicate balance just right.

Cheers

M

BLOWN AWAY, WIERD DREAMS AND BINGING TRIGGERS

So my week one results are absolutely awesome and a bit mind boggling actually. A NICE drop on the scales and several cms lost too. My black work pants which are normally quite snug but always look ok as the fabric has some stretch, are hanging baggy on my bum and the backs of my legs already. I'm just blown away. Yep the carbs have been LOW and there has been some hunger (when isnt there??!!) but I've eaten 5 times a day (on most days) and enjoyed a bit of a relaxed weekend. All training has been moderate intensity and weights arent "muscle building" but more "muscle maintaining" focussed. This may need tweeking soon but right now I'm basking in a great start t0 getting in good shape for Singapore.

I must share something really funny and I wonder if anybody else has the same thing happen to them. Because I've been dieting and focussing on body fat loss my eating has changed to what I've been doing so far (it needed to). I've been having some really wierd dreams and even nightmares. The other night I dreamt I was eating a muffin and I was just stuffing it in as quickly as I could so nobody would see me have it. I woke up feeling guilty. LOL. Last night my dreams were a bit more nightmarish which wasnt a nice thing to wake up to. I think my stomach is sending "help me" signals to my brain and they're manifesting in wierd dreams.

I realised today that pressure/stress at work is a binging trigger for me. (I've actaully known this for ages but it really hit home today). After a morning out at a site visit / meeting I came back to the office to a number of issues that could have blown into significant problems. Couple that with the horrible task of telling one of your staff that they will be finishing up at the end of their contract and what was my reaction? Yep you guessed it. I WANT FOOD..... NO. I WANT JUNKY FOOD. Its like flicking a switch. All I could think of was what I REALLY wanted to eat.

So time for a self-pep-talk and a reminder of my May/June goal and time to think about how totally crappy I felt 2 weeks ago when I'd given in to similar cravings. Yep I didnt want to go there again and I forced myself to put those thoughts out of my mind. Thats 1 for me and the Binge Monster can just go and F*UCK HIMSELF. hehehehe

:-) Magda

APPLAUDING MYSELF

Its great to read about KatieP, Shelley, Selina and others' competition achievements today. Placing or no placing they are winners for purely sticking with their plans and seeing it through. When times got tough, they got tougher and today they reaped their rewards. Ladies I applaud and respect you all.

But tonight I'm also applauding myself for I can honstly say that this weekend I kept it all under control. No eating frenzy of junky carbs and fats. Wine kept in moderation. And no eating to the point where I'm ready to burst. Its a really good feeling.

The "controlled re-feed" didnt happen as such. I had a bit of a night off on Friday with a couple of reds, some crackers, blue castello and a tiny serve of nuts. When it came to dinner time I wasnt really hungry for it so I left it for having the next day. WH was a bit surprised but I said "I'm full and I dont want to stuff myself" and he let it go. Over the weekend I had a few skim cappuccinos, a Slim Secrets Bar and a (paleo) Thai meal out on Saturday. All good and tomorrow its back into my modified Paleo cutting out the skim Cappuccinos and the wine of course.

Training has been on plan. Yesterday I did the full-body weights session again focussing on moderate weights and higher reps, followed by a brisk walk. It all took well over an hour and I burnt a nice number of calories. Today was purely cardio (brisk walk + ss exercise bike ride) but I added some ab work too. Then the Adelaide Figure Girls met for brunch and a catch up.

WH and I are powering along with our personal plans and life goes from being really exciting to really stressful. The emotional rollercoaster is draining but if we achieve our goal it'll be the best reward. More on that later.

Cheers all

Magda

ROUNDING UP THE WEEK

So I’ve made it to Friday on my modified Paleo eating plan and I feel better than I thought I would. The drop on the scales has been awesome and looking down I’m so much leaner through the abs. Now if my thighs would like to do some catching up I’d be even happier LOL. There have been times when my energy has been low but no lower than when I’m trying to lose weight and I’m eating carbs in the form of oats, fruit, rice cakes – not to mention all the junky carbs that I’d have when I ate off plan. Most of my low energy comes in the afternoon. No matter what I eat for lunch (unless it’s a completely free meal and its potentially high in carbs and fat) I slump in the afternoon and snacks barely pick me up.

I admit my calories have been a bit low and if I were to continue this plan then I’d have to increase them to make it sustainable. The bonus is that I’m going to test having a “controlled re-feed” on the weekend and see what effect it has on me both emotionally and physically. Not sure what it’ll be but we are going to the movies and dinner tomorrow night so it might be a free Thai meal. I’ll see what takes my fancy.

On a completely separate issue my head is reeling from a lot of stuff going on in my “other life”. WH and I are discussing some MAJOR plans for the future. If we go through with this idea it’ll be another dream come true for me. Its so exciting but circumstances are making it a difficult endeavour. On a more personal level I’m still contemplating doing some study starting in the second half of the year. I’m just undecided about which course to do and I’m weighing up the viability at this time in my life. There’s heaps happening here in my temp job too and right now its pretty much up in the air as to what I’ll be doing come August / September. Aaah so many balls in the air and I don’t know where any of them will land. Don’t you love uncertainty?

Cheers

M

COULD IT BE TRUE.....

... that 100mls of red wine has only 2.6g of carbs and of those only .6 are sugars. (Thanks Wikipedia) But what about the 10g (I think) of alcohol? How nasty can that be, if your food is clean? I'm sure the antioxidants in the wine make it an acceptable option and if they dont then my case for having it is based on the Friday night rule*. Hanging out for my first treat this week and it'll be a glass of red with dinner tomorrow.

Arriving at mum and dad's tonight, the smell of pizza had me literally drooling. I'm so glad that I'd rung mum to tell her I would bring my own food because then I felt obliged to have it. Luckily it tasted great and I enjoyed it and no pizza passed my lips. Aaaah the power of the mind and having some determination to stick to the plan.

Cheers all

M

* If there is one time in the week that I'll have alcohol, its Friday night. WH and I share a bottle of wine (I wont be having 1/2 this time around) and have a really good talk. Its therapeutic, relaxing and its our "quality time". Its one of life's pleasures that I'm NOT prepared to give up.

SCORING RUNS ON THE BOARD

This morning the MM delighted me with another small drop. If there’s one thing that’s just about guaranteed to make me feel good its seeing that number go down. Cardio was the usual walk / jog which I’ll stick with for a while, I think. Unless I get bored and then it’ll be time to shake things up.

I had my usual lunch out with my work friends today and was a bit nervous about ordering something that fitted into my eating plan. I needn’t have worried. I quickly ordered a mineral water so as not to be pressured to have wine. When the bread came around, I refused it. A tough decision but worth it. Then I chose quail (which I love) on bruschetta (which I didn’t eat) with red capsicum and olive salad. The serve was tiny but with the oil on the salad and the skin on the quail, it was surprisingly satisfying.

Dinner is at mum and dad’s tonight with home-made pizza on the menu but I’ve packed a serve of protein and veges and will have that with everyone instead.

So once again I’ve gotten myself to my happy, positive, can-do headspace and I can tell you, this is a much better place to be. I'm scoring runs on the board and I like it. My focus is to get my weight down for the trip to Singapore so I can enjoy some retail therapy and then my focus will be to keep any weight loss off so I can wear all the fabulous new clothes I buy there. Simple isn’t it?

But more than that I’m working towards finding a happy weight, a flexible and enjoyable eating plan and a sense of balance and control in my life. When I get there I swear it’ll be like achieving nirvana.

Buddha described nirvana as the perfect peace of the state of mind that is free from craving, anger and other afflictive states. The subject is at peace with the world, has compassion for all and gives up obsessions and fixations. (Thanks Wikipedia)

Cheers all

Magda

BETTER BODY UNDER CONSTRUCTION

Well after 3 full days on my modified Paleo eating plan I feel surprisingly good considering my carbs have been low. This afternoon my herbal fibre supps kicked in and coupled with my magnificent vege/salad intake things really started moving leaving me feeling SO much better. (Enough on that though LOL).

I'm enjoying added good fats to most of my meals as they make lean protein with veg / salad so much more palatable. Has anyone tried the smoke flavoured John West Tempters? There is a tuna and a pink salmon one and they taste SO good. A little higher in calories than plain tuna or salmon but on my plan they're perfect as I need the extra fats. I find I'm not dreading my morning and afternoon snacks of tuna/salmon with salad and thats keeping me going on my merry way.

Tomorrow I face the challenge of having lunch out whilst maintaining this eating plan. I'll choose to skip the wine :-( and hope that the menu has a suitable option for me. Not even sure where we're going but I should research and make the suggestion. If I'm in control I stand a better chance of staying on plan.

Singapore is 46 days away and I have a better body "under construction". Stay tuned for more ....

Cheers

Magda

PS Valley Girl I visited your blog to say thanks for registering as a follower but it wouldnt let me leave a comment ????

FIRSTS

This morning was one of some “firsts”.

Number one was a date with the MM and a nice drop of the bloat leaving the building with 2.7kgs down. I swear just knowing the number is under 70 makes me feel so much better. I have a small spring in my step and am living the saying “results breed motivation”.

Number two was a decision to drag the size 12 skirt out of the recycle bag. It was put there some time ago when my weight was heading down around 66kgs but now that its higher I’m suffering a serious lack of clothes that fit and look good. I’m determined that this a temporary measure until some of my smaller clothes start to fit and I’m not restricted to a few pieces that get worn every couple of days.

Number three was a tough decision. As I’ve mentioned before, one of the things I really love doing is stopping at a café on the way to work, ordering a skim cappuccino and enjoying it while I read the paper. However in my quest to stay low carb and 95% paleo, I’m trying to avoid the skim capp. Now you also need to know that I HATE strong coffee and also HATE black coffee. So what did I do today? I ordered a weak black coffee and drank it “neat” no sugar or sweetener. In all the time I was waiting for it, I kept telling myself “You can enjoy this. You will acquire the taste. It’ll be ok”. Hmm it was ok (just) but I’ve decided to find a nice tea, which I can truly enjoy if I want to enjoy that “me time” before work.

So that’s my news of my “firsts”. Riveting stuff isn’t it. But hey, I’ll blog the good, the bad, the downright ugly and even the boring LOL.

Cheers

M

TAKING ACTION

So what have I been doing the last couple of days when I havent been giving myself the proverbial slap-out-of-this-misery pep talk?

I've been eating modified Paleo. Why modified? Well I'm keeping carbs low so there's been no fruit just lots of veges without necessarily counting their carb content. And in my scrambled egg whites for breakfast, I've added some low fat creamed cottage cheese. Why? Because I have some left over from last week, nobody else here eats it and I dont want to throw it out. My protein intake has been high, my intake of good fats is relatively high and my carbs are low.

But get this ... I've even skipped my morning skim cappuccino on the way to work. Not sure I want this to be permanent or to even go on for a longer time but I've managed 2 days without dying for this favourite experience (I go to a cafe, have my coffee and read the paper before going to work).

I've done about 45 mins of cardio in the morning cranking up to my 1 song walk / 1 song jog combo which was necessary as walking alone wasnt getting my heart rate up enough. I enjoy this combo as its challenging enough to get my HR into the zone but not exhasuting and the constantly changing pace makes the time go quicker than just walking, or dare I say jogging. Weight training is temporarily modified to full body, moderate weights, higher reps, circuit style work.

I'm feeling pretty good physically but I suspect I'm not really depleted yet. Whilst I'd like to keep up this eating regime for some time, I'm mindful just how tough it is so I'm prepared to modify it so as not to risk another binge session because I felt so physically crap.

Emotionally I'm still feeling a bit fragile but that'll pass after a few more days of eating well and putting distance between me and the last over-eating session on the weekend. To be honest, I feel quite internally sad about so many things that result from my behaviour patterns. The fact that I hardly have any clothes that fit me and my stubbornness to not buy new stuff while I'm trying to lose the weight. The embarassment of not making any weight loss progress after telling many people that I was competing again this year. And just looking at my body and feeling so unhappy about how it looks.

But I'll not dwell on all that. I'm taking action and I'm looking forward to seeing some good results. Not just on the scales but also in my headspace and how I ultimately feel.

:-) M

EIGHT STEPS TO GETTING OUT OF THAT RUT

Step One: Stop waiting to be rescued from your situation.

Others might help, encourage, support and even cheer you on (all good things) - but ultimately the only person who can genuinely change your life is you. So stop looking in the wrong place. It's not about finding the right book, program or guru, it's about finding some courage and self control.

Craig is talking to me again. I have shelves full of diet books, training books and self –help / motivational books. Always searching for THE SOLUTION. Every time I fall off the wagon with my diet and/or training program I’m searching for a better diet, different training, ways to fix my headspace. I’m on that luggage pick-up carousel going nowhere.

The answer is in me and yes it boils down to self-control and not giving into the Binge Monster. I’ve read books on it and been helped through PT coaching on it so now its time to DO IT. Apply your knowledge Magda. Find the courage to give it a go. Yep it’ll be hard sometimes but that’s life. There are people out there doing it FAR tougher than me. SUCK IT UP. Life could be worse.

Deep down, most of us know exactly what we need to do; the only problem is... it freaks us out! Take control of your life today; your relationships, your body, your finances, your career and your attitude. Control what you can and don't waste energy on what you can't. Hate to tell you but the Dude with the red boots and the 'S' on his chest; not real. He ain't gonna show. You'll have to rescue yourself.

Control. Who controls my life? I’ve let my Binge Monster control many days convincing myself that I deserved every first bite, that the 100th bite still gave me pleasure and the 1000th bite was a case of “oh I’ve blown it so why bother trying to be good”. Enjoy the food today. Diet tomorrow. Sin now. Pray later.

Attitude. When its good, its great but when its bad its destructive. Sometimes I feel like I’ve accepted this crappy pattern, which frequently makes me miserable. My actions certainly suggest so. But in my heart I know that I don’t want to live my life this way. I want to be a happier person, happier on the inside knowing that I’m living my life to its full potential and not wasting precious energy on repeatedly dragging myself out of this rut.

If I posted a photo now you’d see my palm print on the side of my face. But that’s not a bad thing. Sometimes you need a wake up call and if others are too kind (or in the case of my WH – just under too much pressure and stress at work to deal with my issues) to slap you into action, then its up to you to make it happen.

To be continued ….

Cheers


Magda

THANKS CRAIG

Sometimes life feels like quicksand - unpleasant, messy, exhausting and like you're about to sink at any moment. And all too often it seems like one of those baggage carousels at the airport where you feel like you're getting somewhere for a moment, only to end up in the exact same place on a regular basis. Again and again and again. Groundhog day. If only someone would throw you a rope for the quicksand situation or come and collect you from the carousel. Well, more than likely nobody's gonna show, so you may have to do something about it yourself......

These arent my words of wisdom. They come from none other than the brilliant Craig Harper from a post entitled "Eight Steps to Getting out of that Rut". (Sorry I dont know how to link to it but its listed on the right hand side bar of his blog in the 'popular posts').

Well its time to get me out of my rut. Its time to stop thinking, analysing, considering this option and that option, wondering who / where to turn to for help and just GET THE F*CK ON WITH IT.

And once I've gotten on with it , its time TO STAY WITH IT. Not for a week, or two or three but until I reach my goal. I have honestly lost count of all the times I started gung-ho, motivation sky high, trained like a demon, dieted like a woman possessed only to let the slightest thing upset me and give me a vaild reason to blow it all off (or so I convinced myself), eat junk til I felt sick, ditch the training and then feel sorry for myself because it was all so unfair.

Unfair, my arse!!!! Magda! You know what to do. You know there'll be times when it wont be easy and there'll be times when things dont go perfectly. DEAL WITH IT!!!! And not by stuffing crap down you're throat "to make you feel better". Learn the lesson once and for all woman!!

So on that note I make no further bold statements about competing until I get this part of my life sorted out. The foundations are shaky and need work to make them stronger. Its time to put that work in and it'll take time. I got off to a great start about a month ago and again I'm back at square one but I aint giving up. I refuse to accept that I am 70+ kilos and a prime candidate for middle-aged frumpiness. I'm capable of so much more than that but I have to believe I can do it and then DO IT. Less contemplation. Less talk. More action.

In 7 weeks time we are off to Singapore for a resort holiday. Thats 49 days away. The world famous July Singapore Sales will be on. I have an extra budget allowance to buy clothes that I desperately need (I havent shopped properly for ages as I'm always waiting to lose weight before I buy clothes). But I want to do this for more than the holiday. I want to get lean, stay lean and learn to love life ... I mean REALLY love life.

Thats my vision. Stay tuned for my plan.

:-) Magda

MY MOTHERS DAY

Today I got to indulge my (not so) inner princess. I woke up before BS was up so I lounged in bed reading yesterday's paper knowing that I would be treated to breakfast in bed once BS was up.

Upon his waking I was showered with gifts. Now I dont mean expensive shop bought gifts but ones that he'd made in school. I got a lovely "bag" made of ice cream sticks stuck together with pictures that he'd drawn, cut out and pasted on himself. The Art teacher attached the bag handle from some brightly coloured wire and it looked lovely. I got 2 hand written cards, one in Chinese and the other was a hand written thank you card with all the things I do for him that he's thankful for. I also got a laminated "poster" that reads:

MY MUM MY.
LOVELY
HAPPY
PINK
ME
WORD FINDS
SALAD
PRETTY
I LOVE MY MUM
At the bottom is a picture of mixed lettuce leaves.

This is my favourite gift as it shows what my son thinks of me and what he thinks I like.
Lovely - ahem YES!!
Happy - I always try to be around him.
Pink - wierd!! I'm more of a red lover.
Me - ????
Word Finds - yep I love word puzzles.
Salad - this made me LAUGH!!!!!!
Pretty - oh shucks
I love my mum - I love you too sweetie
And the picture of lettuce leaves just CRACKS ME UP LOL.

Breakfast was croissants - one with ham and cheese and one with berry jam. (Yes it was quite a piggy feast) - eaten in bed and then more reading of the paper. It was 10am when I got up :-)

In the evening my WH cooked dinner for us and my parents. It was a lovely evening. Photos are lacking as I feel a bit fat and ugly so I avoid the camera at these times.

So I sit here tonight feeling a bit stuffed from too much food and more wine than I should have had. But gee I enjoyed today.

Stay tuned for my new plan which kicks off tomorrow.

Cheers all

Magda

PREPARING TO LAY NEW FOUNDATIONS

As I'm now clearly in another one of my "Struggle Street" zones it would be so easy to quit blogging. I mean who wants to put it out there for the world (well the blogging community) to know exactly what our weaknesses and shortcomings are. I mean we put so much energy into convincing people how good we are, reminding people of our brilliant achievements and singing our praises as loudly as we can. You know the saying ..."I'll blow my own trumpet coz no-one else will".

Yet I sit here and openly admit that I have an aspect of my life that I REALLY struggle with. In fact I suck at it and despite (almost) 46 years of experience I still cant do it right.

I did well at school and on leaving school I got a job easily. I've been promoted quickly to a level that I'm proud of and am now in a managerial position and getting great feedback on my performance. I'm doing work (at a managerial level) that I've never done before, which I've had to learn quickly, and I'm doing it well.

I've undergone (and passed) the very rigorous testing and screening which is mandatory if you are adopting a child. Trust me, its not for the faint-hearted ... EVERY aspect of your life is scrutinised to the nth degree. Despite a failed first marriage, I managed an amicable and fair split of which both my ex and I came out of ok. Husband #2 (otherwise known as WH - or Wonderful Husband) is just that. My man has the highest morals and ethics and expects the same from those around him. If somebody doesnt measure up to his (high) standards then he wont seek a friendship with them. Sometimes I wonder how we ended up together but I can also see that we complement each other well. I'm a good wife, a good mother and a good daughter.

I've had a successful sideline as a popular and reliable aerobics instructor. The gym at which I had worked since the early 90s, sadly farewelled me when I moved to Queensland in 2005. Upon my return to SA 2 years later, they happily gave me a job again and my old class members welcomed me back. In Queensland I built my PT business up to a level that I was very happy with. I had some great successes with clients and I really clicked with females of all ages but especially those that were somewhat more mature.

So when I look over all the things I've achieved which all point to the fact that I'm smart, capable, hard working etc I'm left wondering why I cant get something as fundamental and basic as eating right. Or maybe its not that fundamental and basic. Or maybe we lose sight of the forest for all the trees.

At times like these I need to get right back to basics. Peel away the layers of disappointments, self sabotage, self doubt, expectations, bad decisions and poor choices and lay the foundation again. Hoping that this time the engineering is right and its strong enough to ride out the future stresses.

A new approach is in order and it needs some thought. Be back soon.

Magda

LIFE OUTSIDE THE ZONE BUBBLE

Well there's no doubt that my health and fitness journey has travelled a very bumpy road lately. In fact its been bumpy since about 2 months after the October comps in 2007. And in fact, well before then if we look at my weight struggle history.

Sometimes I think I have the answer and I slip into the "zone" and its so damned easy that I wonder what all the fuss and struggle was before. I delight in seeing the number on the MM go down and my expectations rise with every weigh in. I tell myself that they shouldnt but it just happens like an involuntary action that we cant control like our heartbeat.

Then there will always be something that bursts my "zone bubble". It can be anything from a "wrong way dickhead moment" or a "what! I only lost ???? after all the effort I put in" or maybe a "gee I've been soooo good that I now deserve this ..... (insert name of a junky crappy food)" and it all comes crashing down.

Events of the last few days confirm that I need to work on my handling of life outside the zone bubble. You know when your motivation to stick to your healthy eating plan sinks to rock bottom, when you give in to the Feast Beast and when you start convincing yourself that yep its all too hard so you might as well have the ...... (insert name of a junky crappy food).

The sad reality is that I go over this chain of happenings, thoughts, emotions and outcomes over and over again like living the infamous Groundhog Day. The detail may change slightly but the pattern remains exactly the same. You'd think that in my ripe mid 40s I'd have this one worked out and well under control.

Well folks I have a long way to go and right now I'm not even sure which path is right let alone risking that first step. The search continues. Watch this space.

M