Move Your Body

One of the things I seem to have a big problem fitting in is exercise. I suppose after working an 8 hour day and then the things I have to get done at home, this is quite difficult, but I have managed to fit it in 4 or 5 times this week. I went dancing one night and took a few brisk walks and I do have to say I felt much better for it.

Exercise is kind of a frightening thing for me. About 12 years ago now, I watched my mother's boyfriend drop dead in front of us. We had just eaten a meal at KFC and were out in the parking lot talking together before we went our various ways, and he just keeled over. He was dead before he hit the ground. Rudy was not overweight at all. He was quite slim actually. He did smoke though, and he smoked home grown tobacco.

Seeing that happen in front of my eyes scared me to no end. I had never seen anyone die before. It had a very profound effect on me. I know that if I don't exercise at all, then I am doing more harm to my heart in the long run, but then whenever I do exercise, I have this little niggling fear in the back of my mind, what if I keel over . . . what if it's too much for my heart?? What if this is the straw the breaks the camel's back? Then, of course, the larger I get, the more afraid I get.

I was doing pretty good 3 years ago. I was walking miles every day and I had managed to lose about 3 stone. But then I developed plantar fasciatis. Every step for me became agony. After being on my feet for 8 hours at work every day, by the time I got home my feet would be so sore, I practically had to crawl up the stairs to go to bed at night. They would still be aching and hurting as I lay in bed and some nights I would hardly sleep at all for the pain went on through the night. The thought of walking or pounding my feet in the floor was enough to make me want to dig a hole and bury myself in it. Imagine with every step, it feeling like a hammer was socking it to your heel and instep. Having flat feet and fallen arches only made it hurt even worse.

I searched and searched for a pair of shoes that would give me comfort. I had physio therapy. Taping my feet was the only thing that helped. Eventually, after months and months, and having finally found a pair of expensive trainers that fit properly, it has become much more bearable. At least I can walk and move about without much pain, although to be sure my ankles, knees and hips do bother me . . . the price I pay for having gotten so large.

I do feel better when I exercise. That's a fact. I like walking most of all, and dancing second of all. I am starting out small. Just a brisk walk around the orchard, walking hard enough to break out into a sweat. I think that is a good start. As I get more used to it again, I will go further and further.

We are going to Broadstairs to visit friends in July and they are BIG walkers. They walk all the way from Broadstairs to Ramsgate almost every day and we like to go with them. Hopefully by then I will be up to it! We're also going on a coach holiday to Austria and I want to be able to walk without tiring myself on that as well. I can hardly wait!

I know that exercise is an integral part of any weight loss program. It increases your metabolism and helps to burn fat.

I am doing really good on the eating side of things. I am only eating when I am hungry and eating pretty much anything I want to eat, which is a massive bonus. Every time I went on a diet I always fell off it after a time because of the feeling of deprivation. It was like being at a banquet and not being able to eat. In fact I used to often have a dream where I was at a banquet and the servers would keep setting big plates filled with delicious food down in front of me, but when I would go to eat it, it was always gone and I would be so disappointed. I am not sure if this is any significance or not? Hmmmm . . . perhaps Margaret will know!

In any case I am enjoying moving my body and I have to say I am enjoying my food more now than I have in a very long time. Life is very good!

Eat When Hungry

I have a confession. When I was a child I used to go to bed feeling hungry a lot of the time. As an adult, I have never felt hungry, at least not as far as I know. My mother was fat as a child, and so when she had us, she resolved that her children would never have to suffer the slings and arrows that she had to as a fat child. That meant that everything in our house was weighed and counted. Woe betide you, should you take anything in between meals or that she hadn't actually given you to eat. That meant we either went hungry or we got pretty good at sneaking food, (which we used to blame on my dad, who suffered with being overweight himself) None of those things set up a good standard to follow later in life. I can remember telling myself when I was a child that, when I grew up, I was going to eat what I wanted, as much as I wanted and whenever I wanted, ohh and whatever I wanted to eat! I did. And just look where that has gotten me. 238 pounds. UGH!

I have another confession. I never ate large amounts. I grazed. The only problem being is . . . that I grazed pretty much constantly, telling myself that it was such a small amount that it didn't really matter, but when I stop and think about it now . . . it probably added up to a considerable amount when all lumped together. It's easy to fool yourself, if you are only eating a few nuts here, or one cookie there, or a small packet of crisps, or a tiny sliver of cake, half a chocolate bar, the leftover food on my children's plate (just so it wouldn't go to waste like), oh and don't let us forget that little bit left in the pot or the frying pan that really wasn't enough left for another meal, but . . . dare I throw it away, what a waste that would be . . . need I go on?

These past two weeks there has been no grazing. I am amazed. I went from full on grazing to nil, seemingly overnight. I think though, that when I made up my mind to telephone Margaret on that first day, I had already made a committment and a promise to myself.

What have I learned so far? I think over these few weeks I have learned what hungry really feels like. I have also learned what starving feels like on those few days when I have been late getting home from work, and havn't had enough forethought to bring something with me to work to tide me over. Like today. Thankfully I was able to keep my hunger under control and then when I was eating my dinner I was able to eat consciously and slowly, and I might add with gusto. Food tastes so much better. I don't think I ever really tasted a lot of what I was eating before. I was eating mindlessly, just shoveling it in, not even noticing half of what I was really eating. I am enjoying food now, really enjoying food for the first time in many years.

Wonder of all wonders, I am also recognizing when I have had enough! (something else I have had a problem noticing in the past) Instead of mindlessly shoveling it in until I either feel sick or severely bloated, I have begun to see when enough is enough before that happens. How do I tell I have had enough? As good as it tastes when I start to eat . . . it stops tasting good when I have had enough, and when it's time to stop. That is my signal to push my plate away, and subconsciously I think I have also made a decision to push my plate away while there is still something on it. It feels good to be able to leave something behind. I no longer have the urge to snuffle it all up. It may seem like baby steps to someone who has never had a weight problem, but it's a huge step to me!

Yes, I have quit the clean plate club. Elvis has left the room . . .

Two Weeks In

I have been going to Margaret for two weeks now. Each day I have been writing everything I eat down in a journal. That's been a big help. Part of me doesn't want her to see me eating bad things so I have been really good at eating only good stuff for the most part. I could cheat of course and not write things down, but truthfully, who would I really be cheating? I paid a lot of money for this for me to quit now and so I am honest and I write down everything.

I have been listening to a hypnosis cd every morning for about 20 minutes. This has been quite helpful. At work I am listening to another cd that I uploaded to my ipod. This contains all the basic principles of the program and hopefully they will become so ingrained in my psyche that it will soon become second nature for me to practice them.

I have weighed myself. Actually I did it before I even went to see Margaret and I was horrified and disgusted by what I saw. I am getting close to 17 stone. At 17 stone that would mean an incredible 238 pounds. How on earth did this happen. I feel so sad about that. The thoughts of it weigh me down more than the actual fat does. I am already on medication for High Blood Pressure and high cholesterol medication. Although to be honest, I was put on that as a purely preventative measure. I am a heart attack waiting to happen. I huff and puff when I go up the stairs. My knees hurt. My hips hurt. My ankles hurt and my feet are in agony. No wonder . . .

Margaret and I have talked a lot at my sessions. She has not actually hypnotised me yet herself. We mostly talk about my feelings about food. I realize that I have a very unhealthy attitude about food. Food is not the enemy but I am using it to kill myself. I love food, but I hate what it has done to me. A lifetime of thinking of certain things as bad foods, feeling deprived every time I am on a diet, of feeling like a diet failure etc. have brought me to a very bad place in my relationship with food. I've spent a lifetime and oodles of money only to learn that diets don't work, and that dieting has only made me fatter. I could not face another diet, knowing that at the end of it I would be slimmer for a short, but ultimately I would end up even fatter than before. A mother who counted every morsel that went into our mouths has turned me into a closet eater that eats in secret. An ex husband that abused me emotionally and mentally helped me to turn to food even more as comfort, solace and protection.

Here are some scary statistics:


99.5% of all dieters fail. For every 200 slimmers that successfully lose their weight and don't give up halfway through the diet (not many of those around I'm afraid), a year later only 1 in 200 of them will still be slim. The other 199, will be like me . . . unhappy, fatter than ever and feeling not able to bear the yo yo cycle of dieting followed by failure and disappointment yet again.

Dieting is all about deprivation. There are no fun foods. No pleasure. Even sinful foods. You go out with your friends, and inevitably you have to restrict what you are going to eat or drink if you are going to succeed with the plan, or you are going to let yourself and your diet down by going with the flow, or worst of all . . . you don't go out at all so as to resist temptation completely.

I am a very stubborn person. If you tell me I can't have something or do something, that only makes me want it more. Deprivation makes me feel sad. I hate feeling deprived. I hate feeling like a failure.

The good news is that this is not how it has to be, and I've finally figured that out.

A big decision

Several weeks ago I was at work and my husband called me. He said that he had been listening to Radio4 and heard a lady on there who was a Hypnotherapist. She did hypnotherapy for lots of things, but had enjoyed a large amount of success with people wanting to lose weight.

I have not always been large, but I find myself at the age of 53 being the largest I have ever been in my life. I have been on a diet since the age of 32 and all that has ever happened with each diet is that I have gotten larger and larger.

Sure I joke about it . . . make light of it . . . but the truth is I hate looking and feeling the way that I do. I have a hard time reaching down to pick anything up from the floor and my husband has to help me put my socks on in the morning and tie my shoes. I hate that too. I hate looking in the mirror and seeing this woman I don't know and the scared woman inside my eyes. I know that this weight is slowly killing me, stealing my life from me little by little and that one day it will ultimately take it away from me altogether . . . unless I do something about it. I feel out of control and desperate. I hate what I have become.

I called the clinic that very day. Margaret and I talked on the telephone for about an hour that day and agreed to meet up the next Tuesday. I was thrilled. I felt like finally, for the first time in many years, here was something and someone that might be able to help me to do what I had been failing at for so many years. I felt like a life line had been thrown my way.

I went to her clinic the next Tuesday a little nervous, a little excited, a little afraid. I didn't really know what to expect. The sum of all I knew about hypnosis was what I'd seen on stage. Tricksters making people wander around clucking like chickens and such. I didn't want to end up hating food. I work with food. It is my life. I really want to lose the weight though, so despite my fears and trepidation I go anyways and am pleasantly surprised.

I think I can do this. I know I can do this. This is me getting a handle on the rest of my life and hopefully going down . . . down . . . down, and staying there.