Day One. Again.

Well here we are, day one all over again. It’s a bit annoying that we’ve got to this when we were doing so well before but what’s done is done, there’s no point beating ourselves up about it.

Neither of us weighed ourselves this morning, we’ll probably keep Monday as our weigh in day from now on. We remember easily and a Monday feels like a good day seeing as it’s the start of a new week. I don’t know exactly how much we’ve both put on but it’ll be at least half a stone, easily. To be fair I just have to look at a cake and I could put that on… well, not quite but I do have a big glycogen regain quickly and easily but then that comes off easily too so just got to keep on with it. We might weigh ourselves tomorrow but I have to admit I don’t really want to face the scales or make it so official by putting it on here but I probably should.

Neither of us are feeling too bad but then Day 1 is never particularly difficult usually. Drinking plenty and we’ve still got 2 packs left and it’s 6pm so I think we should be ok. We’ll have to put a new order in soon, looking forward to trying some of the new things. Here’s too a good restart and here’s hoping it carries on this way!

Thinking back about what went wrong I think the main reason for it is clear, we got too used to things. We let our protein meal become more than just a treat at the weekend, instead it was pretty much daily. If we didn’t have that meal we felt like we were missing out and depriving ourselves so we were no longer choosing to have it, we had to have it. Then soon swede chips were boring and I didn’t want them anymore and having that meal together at a weekend wasn’t special anymore so meals out snuck back in at the weekend and then that weekend meal out escalated into a full blown off plan time. Then with our holiday coming up it was so hard to refocus but now that’s gone, we’re back and we can do this. We’re stripping meals back to the occasional treat again, not only do we think that it’ll help us focus more but it’ll also be cheaper too! Hopefully it’ll help, we’ll see.

Wake Up Call

I’m not going to lie, I’m not going to skirt over or dilute the truth… these past few weeks have been an epic fail. After starting so well life got in the way, WE LET life get in the way. There were social things that we didn’t turn down, we should have but we didn’t. We shouldn’t have turned them down because you can’t be social on a VLCD but because we knew we weren’t quite strong enough to resist temptation at that moment in time. Then we had a little holiday and there were just umpteen excuses (some valid reasons) for not being on plan. We’re back from holiday now though and other than a meal out tonight (already booked and paid for, was supposed to be last week while we’d be off plan anyway but had to reschedule) we have nothing to distract us, no reason or excuse not to do this and do it properly.

Some of the photos that we took of ourselves while we were away were a real wake up call for us. We knew that we needed to lose weight but we disliked every full body shot that we took. The wedding is now less than 6 months away, we don’t want to look at our wedding photos and feel the same way. So after tonight it’s back on track, we NEED to be back on track. I have a feeling the first week or two will be hard, we’re going to need all the support we can get!

 

Facing reality and being honest with ourselves

It’s been a while since either of us have posted on here, I think it’s been a bit of an avoidance tactic – if we don’t say it, if we don’t write it then we don’t have to face it. The past few weeks haven’t really gone as well as the first few weeks and we have no-one to blame but ourselves. This falls on us.

We had a great first couple of weeks, no distractions, completely 100% focused and motivated. The losses were great and spurred us on but then things changed, there were things thrown in our way to tempt us. Social food situations are so hard to deal with on this diet whilst staying on plan but it’s possible, you can choose things that aren’t 100% but that are as closest to it as possible but the problem was, we didn’t always do that. There were also a couple of times that we were at Aaron’s parents so we didn’t get to pick off a menu, it was just the one choice – eat or don’t. To be fair o his mum, she did try and make it as good for us  as we could but then pudding was so tempting!

We weren’t too bad though, our weekends weren’t great but during the week we were 100% on it. Until last week. I got poorly with tonsillitis and so i didn’t want packs, I didn’t want to diet, I just wanted food to make me feel better and so when I fell off the wagon, I pulled Aaron down with me. At home our success comes in a package, maybe we need to be stronger than that, maybe we need to get to a point where even if the other one is sitting and scoffing down a kebab (which neither of us did!) we can still just sit and have our packs.

So we went off plan, not spectacularly but when we did it, we did it properly but on Monday morning we decided that was it, I was feeling much better, it was time to get back on plan. We both went off to work fully intending to get back on plan but the week was full of failed attempts, with an afternoon tea (booked a while ago) next weekend and then a trip to Dublin it’s been so hard to get focused. I don’t know why but when I know that there’s something coming up where I’ll go off plan and that it’s  coming up fairly soon I find it so difficult to focus and stay on plan. Those  first few days are hard work and I guess something in me says what’s the point in battling on knowing that I’ll have to do it again so soon, why put myself through that. When I do I feel like I’m setting myself up to fail and every fail, no matter how  big or small, makes it that bit harder to try again. It makes that voice inside me telling me I’ll fail that bit louder. It makes that feeling of hope that bit weaker. So I’m not going to do that to myself, I’m not going to set myself up to fail.

I might get through these next 5 days 100% but then even if I do I’ll just be starting to feel ‘normal’ and it’ll be time for our break, which will involve food. We could cancel the afternoon tea and lose the money we’ve paid for it but I’m not going to make excuses here, I don’t  want to. I want to go, I want to spend that time with Aaron, my sister, brother in law and nieces.  I could go to Dublin and stick to packs but I don’t want to. I want to enjoy eating out, I want to have a few drinks in different pubs, I don’t want to have packs. So no excuses, right now I just don’t want to. If I really wanted to I could but I haven’t got that in me right now so for now it’s damage control. The next 5/6 days won’t bee going mad, eating takeaway every night but it will be ‘normal’ food that I’ll cook myself and try to keep as healthy as possible. I’m not saying it’ll all be perfect but I’m going to make it as good as I can. Then we’ll have half term and enjoy all the things that it brings and after that be back ready to get back on track with nothing to distract us and everything to focus us. Including my wedding dress which I swapped for one that’s 2 sizes too small so we HAVE to do this. After half term/Dublin/afternoon tea etc. we’ll have 6 months. We WILL do this.

Watch this space.

Taking a Leap of Faith

This isn’t my first time on a VLCD, it’s probably my 4th time at it and each time was less successful than the attempt before… until now. Yes it’s only been two weeks and yes this week hasn’t been perfect as we had a meal at Aaron’s parents but this is by far the strongest I’ve ever felt, the most motivated I’ve been in a long time and generally the most positive and optimistic that I’ve felt about actually doing it, actually getting to my goal weight.

This week that optimism and faith in myself has been tested. Like so many other people I’ve bought clothes in smaller sizes in the hope of them fitting for an upcoming holiday or event and again like many people those events have been and gone without those clothes ever fitting. When Aaron and I got engaged the idea of going dress shopping terrified me. I’ve never felt like a pretty girl, I’ve always felt really self conscious about myself and so have never really felt comfortable or pretty in things so the idea of going on and trying all these dresses and feeling like a fat whale was so daunting and not really something I looked forward to. I ended up going alone one Saturday when bored and Aaron was working overtime, I had no intention of buying a dress or probably not even trying any on, I just wanted to go and look at the pretty dresses. An hour later I walked out of the store with MY dress, the one for me. It was perfect. I felt amazing in it, for the first time in my life I didn’t feel fat, I felt beautiful and just so comfortable so I couldn’t not buy it.

So now here comes the dilemma and the test of faith in myself. Once I bought the dress I got complacent, that urgency to lose weight disappeared and I went well off the Slimming World tracks but now that motivation is back and I’m having dress wobbles. I bought the dress in a size 22, which is what I was at the time, and it fit comfortably and then now I’m more a size 20 and with doing SML, I’m wondering about whether the dress will really fit. What if I keep losing and it’s too big? I can get it altered but will it lose it’s shape? Will it lose it’s ‘magic’ or cost a fortune? I emailed the bridal shop as I was worrying about it and they’ve confirmed that the dress can be altered down 1-2 sizes without any issues so more than that, which is quite possible, could distort the whole dress. Now the test comes in what they’ve offered, a free of charge swap of my size 22 dress for the exact same dress in a size 16. It’s an outlet store so there’s no guarantee they’ll have one if I wait, this is the only one they have in stock.

So here comes the doubting. I know if I keep on with SML I’ll need that 16 and will probably need to get it altered smaller anyway so why all the doubts about whether I should take it? Because once again I tell myself that I want it but I can’t have it. I’ll fail. I have before and I will again. I’ve never made it before so why will I now? Well because this isn’t just another holiday, it’s not another party, this is my wedding. I only get that once. There’s no tomorrow, there’s no second chance. For the first time it feels like now or never. So maybe it’s a mistake, it’s sure as hell a risk but for the first time I’m going to take a chance on myself, I’m going to believe that I can do it and I’m going to go and get the size 16 dress. I can do this. I will do this.

Who am I?

There’s one thing that I think all people have in common, one question that we all ask, one question we all search to answer – Who am I? I sit here today, a 27 year old woman and admit that I still don’t know.

You see, for so long my weight and my size haven’t just been part of my life, I’ve allowed them to be part of who I am, part of my identity. I am the fat girl. The one who never compares to her friends, the one who shrinks away into people’s shadows. I’m the one who can’t do x, y or z because I’m fat. The one who can’t wear nice clothes and feel good because I’m fat so don’t deserve to.

Being fat doesn’t just feel like something that I am, it feels like who I am. So embedded into my lifestyle and way of thinking that I don’t know how to be anything else. You see, the problem isn’t that I’m fat, the problem is that I’m afraid and being fat is a nice wall to hide behind. Being fat means that I have an excuse, an excuse not to try and if I don’t try I can’t fail, I can’t get hurt, I can ignore the things people might say because I can tell myself well I didn’t even try. I don’t need to wear nice clothes and try to look good because I’m fat, when really I think I’m afraid to make that effort and still feel like and have people think I’m just fat and ugly,  somehow that’s easier to accept when I haven’t put the effort in because there’s an excuse there. If that’s what people say or think when I have really tried then that means that even my best just isn’t good enough. Being fat means I can’t go and do things like paint balling, go ape etc but really, I’m just afraid I’ll look like an idiot and fail, that people will look at me, the fat girl, and think I shouldn’t be there and hope I won’t be on their team. Being fat means I don’t want to meet new people because they automatically won’t like me when really I’m afraid that it’s me, my personality that someone might reject so it’s easier to not give them the choice. I’m tired of making excuses. I’m tired of not living my life to the full just because I’m too afraid of what can go wrong, that I could get hurt, that I might fail. That’s life. That happens. Not because I’m fat, not because I’m fundamentally flawed but just because that’s life.

I’m not Caroline the fat girl. I refuse to be Caroline the fat girl anymore, there’s so much more to me than that and I need to stop putting that name on myself. I’m Caroline the teacher. Caroline the sister. Caroline the daughter. Caroline to girlfriend and soon to be wife. Caroline the creative one. Caroline the numbers freak. Caroline the untidy one. Caroline the talkative one. Caroline the friend. Caroline the neighbours fan. Being fat is really just a tiny part of me. I need to start being brave and step outside of my comfort zones,  to challenge myself and to find out just who the girl inside this fat suit really is.

Week 2 Weigh In

So week 2 is over and it’s on to week 3, where is the time going to?! We really can’t believe how quickly the time has gone and how relatively easy the journey so far has been. Although we knew we’d be able to cope, we did expect there to be more hurdles and struggles than there have been. I think that that says something about us and where we’re at at the moment, which is a good thing. We don’t really have the time to mess up, to go oh this one little x, y or z won’t hurt or to start again tomorrow. There has been the odd chocolate craving but we’ve pulled through this far and glad we have.

So, we weighed in on Thursday to mark the start of Week 3. Here are our results.

Caroline

Starting Weight: 19st 2.5lb
Current Weight: 17st 13.75lb
Loss this week: 5.25lb
Total loss so far: 16.75lb

Measurements
Chest: 43in (-1in)
Waist: 41in (-1in)
Hips: 52in (same)

Aaron

Weight
Starting Weight: 19st 4.5lb
Current Weight: 17st 13.75lb
Loss this week: 18.75lb

Measurements
Chest: 43in (-1in)
We’ve decided not to bother doing waist or hip measurements for Aaron as we can never remember exactly where I measured him! We’re doing update photos for every stone that we lose so we’ve uploaded them to the galleries on our individual progress pages. There’s really not much difference at all, none that we can actually see, but then we didn’t really expect much at this point. We can feel a difference though, Aaron was saying that his knees feel better when walking up the stairs to our flat and my jeans that were a little on the tight side are now a little on the loose side, still wearable though thankfully as they’re the only pair I’ve got for now!

Week 1 done, on to Week 2

Can’t believe how quickly the time has gone since starting SML on the 2nd, doesn’t really seem more than a few days ago. We had our Week 1 weigh in on Thursday, went surprisingly well!

Caroline

Starting Weight: 19st 2.5lb
Current Weight: 18st 5lb
Loss this week: 11.5lb

Measurements
Chest: 47in
Waist:43.5in
Hips:54in

Aaron

Weight
Starting Weight: 19st 4.5lb
Current Weight: 18st 5lb
Loss this week: 13.5lb

Measurements
Chest: 44in (-3in)
Waist:44in (+0.5in, think we measured wrong last week!)
Hips: 46in (-2in)

It’s a bit annoying that Aaron has caught up with me weight wise and will, most probably, weigh less than me next week. Feel like that’s just not how it should be, I shouldn’t be bigger than him and it’s just not attractive but all that really matters is that we’re both on our way down.

Overall we had a really good first week. The ease into ketosis wasn’t too bad for either of us, very slight headaches to start with as we said on a previous post but then after Day 3 it really was plain sailing. I’m not sure why it’s been so easy, it never has before but we’re certainly not complaining! We’ve added in a low carb meal along with 3 packs on a couple of days and that’s been really enjoyable, we’ll keep having them as the odd treat every so often as we’d rather plan these meals ‘on plan’ every so often and keep us away from unplanned meals or cheats.

Grown to really love some of the packs, almost as much as ‘real’ food! My favourites are the choc mint shake, which is amazing hot, and the nutty bars. I also really like the pasta carbonara and have got Aaron into it, he didn’t order any thinking he wouldn’t like this. His favourites are the toffe shake and the chilli meal pack. There aren’t really any that we don’t like, I’m not a massive fan of the spaghetti bolognese though I can’t even put my finger on why. It’s nice to enjoy the packs though, don’t think we’d be doing so well if we didn’t. On to Day 10 now and Week 2 seems to be going well as well, hoping for another couple of lb off each this week. Work is busy so posts are a bit quiet but we’ll keep the blog up to date whenever we can.

Three Days In

So here we are, we’ve managed to reach Day 3, the day that is notoriously the worst and yet it’s really not been that bad a day. I woke up with a very slight headache which was really more of a fogginess than an ache but I’ve been trying to get the water down and that seems to help. I’ve always struggled with water and there’s been days where I get to 8 o’clock and realise I’ve not drunk anything and even on VLCDs seem to struggle to hit 2 litres but I’ve been able to do that (not counting water that goes in packs) fairly easily, day 1 I had 2.2L, yesterday (day 2) I had 3L and today I’m at 2L but will make sure I get at least another bottle in to bring me to 2.7L, if not more.

My expectations and the reality of starting a VLCD again have actually, surprisingly, been vastly different. I’ve been here before, more than once, enough times to know what to expect (hunger, headaches etc. starting on Day 1 and gradually getting worse until Day 3 when it starts to get better with real head hungers particularly in the first week) but the diet has surprised me. Or I’ve surprised myself? Either way, it’s been a lot easier than I expected. Day 1 was probably the hardest but it wasn’t really too bad, I felt a bit hungry at times but I usually then had a pack and that did me fine. Yesterday (Day 2) was extremely easy surprisingly, I was in school (I’m a teacher) sorting some bits out and it got to 4pm before I realised that I hadn’t had a single pack yet. In the evening I even found a box of chocolates that we managed to miss in our food clear out and they’ve been sat there since not bothering me. Today I’ve been out for a bit and some of the food smells in town were amazing and gave me a slight pang of ‘oh I wish I could have that’ but I wasn’t actually tempted to. I guess knowing that the wedding is coming up is a major motivating factor, maybe more of one than I realised. Maybe I CAN actually do this!

Day 1/2 – Aaron’s Perspective

Day 1 / 2

Well I’ve now completed my first day of SML and am wading knee deep into day 2!

The first day went really well; drank lots of water and had 4 packs of which were a mint chocolate shake (really nice), Praline bar (not a fan) and 2 packs of shepherds pie (was nice; added a bit of pepper and hot sauce).

All of my work colleagues also know that I’m doing SML, as I’m in an office of 10 people it’s hard to hide something like that, so rather than be sheepish about it I decided to tell people what I’m doing. Better they know than wonder why I never want to go to the canteen with anybody!

All in all ended the day feeling completely OK – no hunger pangs or anything. Excellent.

Starting day 2 feeling confident, although I did wake up with a slight headache, a bit of water has sorted that straight away 🙂

Day 1 – Caroline’s Perspective

Well that’s day 1 done, on to day 2! It wasn’t too bad yesterday really, I generally sail through the first day and don’t even notice that I’m doing any kind of vlcd but it was a little bit more difficult yesterday. I don’t know whether it’s jut the fact that over the past few weeks with Christmas and New Year I’ve been eating worse than I normally would and so I had a bit of a sugar/carb crash but I had a little bit of a funny head and just felt a little bleh at times but it really wasn’t too bad, nothing I couldn’t handle. I think there was one point where I felt genuine hunger which was about 8pm so I made a chocolate mint shake and had a bath and that sorted me out. I think today will be easier with the lack of carb crash but harder as I think I’ll feel genuine hunger more but I’ll be kept busy today, just waiting for a parcel to arrive between 10 and 11 and then I’m going to head over to pick up a bookcase I bought on eBay (£3 bargain!) and go to school to change my reading area in my classroom. The biggest thing for me in the first few days is keeping busy, it’s if I stop and have time to think that I feel the hunger creep in.

Packs weren’t too bad really, liked some more than others but they’re all more than bearable. Here are my reviews.

Creamy Chocolate shake: Jury is still out on this one, it used to be a favourite on a previous diet and I often added in coffee which was lovely but this time I tried the Caramel Douwe Egberts coffee and I’m not sure if that was the issue or not, going to give the shake another try by itself in the next day or two. It wasn’t too bad though, definitely drinkable and I think it probably was the coffee that made it seem like it had a slightly funny taste as I don’t think I added enough to give it a strong enough flavour to make it distinguishable but enough to slightly taste it without really recognising it.

Chocolate Orange bar: Lovely flavour but a little dry really, it helped me get some extra water down though!

Pasta Carbonara: Mmmm lovely!! I just wish there was more of it, I added a little garlic powder and pepper and it was lovely. Not to self, less garlic next time though! It certainly is better than the one I used to have before that I would end up having to leave to soak for ages so the pasta wasn’t hard, I was quite impressed with it.

Chocolate Mint shake: AMAZING! HEAVEN! I think that says it all… a firm favourite.