Doing it!

Hi Folks. Thanks once again for so much support. You're showing me a lot of love here and I really appreciate it. Writing the last post helped me calm down a bit about things over the weekend. The problem is still there and still needs to be sorted, but I really had to put it on the backburner for now just to save my sanity - or the last shreds of it anyway.

I mentioned how sometimes in the past when everything is feeling so bad and there are seemingly unsolvable problems, I turn to the one thing that I can fix - my weight. Previously this has sometimes happened deliberately and sometimes it just happened.

I have felt out of control around food for most of the last 4 months. I have not been able to turn this thing around at all. I did manage one good week but it was a struggle and I wasn't able to sustain it. I was in the binge mode not the healthy eating mode. I failed to switch modes.

But over the weekend it happened.

Admittedly you could say I have been working up to this given that I had spent the previous 3 weeks doing a lot of walking. This gradually calmed my blood sugar down and I was able to reduce my food intake. I was still eating too much though.

It wasn't until Sunday that I was FINALLY able to start my diet and return to healthy eating. It wasn't until then that I felt able to commit to a diet and exercise plan.

I have returned to eating the Hay Way - a way of eating which is otherwise known as Food Combining. It is principally about not mixing protein and carbs at the same meal. It's a way of eating which makes sense to me and which I have sustained for long periods in the past. It's not specifically a reduction diet but can be adapted to that. And it doesn't involve counting calories. It naturally lowers your (starchy) carb intake by limiting them to one meal a day.

I have thought about going low carb and my one good week out of the last 4 months was achieved by adopting that approach. It was great for my blood sugar and I was very happy with it - apart from my skin. Over the course of just one week my skin really suffered. I had seen this in a friend over 10 years ago who was low carbing. Her skin looked dreadful. And when I tried the Atkins diet a decade ago the same thing happened.

I don't know how to solve this problem. If any low carbers have any experience of skin problems related to their eating I'd love to hear about it.

So, my goals are

1) to eat healthily for weight loss in the food combining pattern I have now re-established

2) to do a walk of at least 1 1/2 hours 4 days a week

3) to get to bed between 12 and 2am (rather than 3 and 5am)

In the last 4 days I have eaten brilliantly and done 3 long walks. I even made it through a VERY stressful Tuesday without slipping up.

It went like this - Walking into the centre of town to pay a bill at the bank (a very long queue), going to a couple of shops - one on the High St and then a trip round the supermarket and walking home with heavy shopping. Putting the washing on. Then downstair's cleaner asked if she could borrow my hoover as their's was broken. So I felt unable to relax while the washing was on because at any moment there might be a knock at the door with a question on how to empty it or just thank you for lending etc. Then when the washing had finished I had to take it to the launderette to dry it because the dryer is broken. There I had to deal with strangers and the old lady who helps run it - let's just say she's *a bit of a character*.

And, after ALL THAT I still really really wanted to do a walk! I had to stop myself for fear of overdoing it and ending up calling in a convenience store on the way home and buying the old bag of rubbish.

So, I AM DOING IT!

Doing OK

Hi Guys. Thank you for all the offers of tea, shopping and laundry. If I'm ever in America (where most of you live) I'll never be short of a cuppa! Seriously, your support means a great deal to me.

I've been eating pretty well since Wednesday.
Thursday:
200g diet yoghurt + banana + 2 cups 40 cal choc drink with instant coffee added
Fish in parsley sauce + veg + 1 choc drink + Galaxy chocolate bar (48g?)
Fish pie + veg + salad + 1 choc drink

The chocolate bar was left over from my mega binge on Tuesday - I had two left over from that night and ate one on Wed and one Thurs. A miracle I didn't scoff them both for breakfast on Wed - that's what normally happens with any left over binge food. Eating them after a meal with tons of veg meant that it didn't tip my blood sugar off.

Fri: as Thurs except no chocolate bar and 1 extra cup choc drink. Pissed off I had so much choc drink, but I was really fighting the urge to binge in the afternoon. The only thing which stopped me going to the shop and buying the bag of rubbish was the fact that I couldn't face having to write here that I had another bad binge. So accountability does work!

Walked to a supermarket in town in the evening - easy on the way there but very difficult carrying heavy bags on the way back. All that veg weighs a lot more than cakes and chocolate etc.

Sat:
200g diet yoghurt + banana + 2 choc drink with instant coffee
Fish in parsley sauce + veg + choc drink
Binge: 1 bowl porridge (35g oats) with sultanas and honey + banana + choc drink
Fish pie + veg + salad + Ribena Really Light made with hot water

In the evening, before my last meal, I walked 15 mins to a different supermarket in the out of town direction and walked back the long route round the houses which took about half an hour. I really struggled on the way back even though I only had one bag but managed to only stop once for a few moments. I felt so pissed off that I am so unhealthy. Ridiculous at my age to struggle with such a short walk, especially when I was walking 1 1/2 hours several times a week earlier in the year.

I am also really pissed off about that mini binge. I ate it because I had been fiddling for ages trying to get some software downloaded and it was really difficult and frustrating so in anger and tiredness with it all I binged. I ate the porridge because it was already cooked - I had cooked it Wed morning and then decided against it (a first - normally I can't cook porridge and not eat it) - and made the mistake of putting it in the fridge. I should have chucked it because I wouldn't have eaten any porridge on Sat if I'd had to cook it. That 6 minutes of preparation time would have ensured it didn't happen. I know in terms of calories it was still a good day, but I had intended to go a few days with no cereals at all.

And it could have been a whole load worse. After the supermarket I went to a nearby Tesco Express - ostensibly looking for some fish or fish pie. It was a nightmare in there! This was 9pm at night and they close at 11 but they seemed to have a mass of freshly baked donuts, brownies, muffins, pastries etc. The smell filled the whole shop. Why do that so late at night? But they wouldn't do it unless they were going to sell them so I can only guess that people already well refreshed and going from the pub to the clubs in town probably call in there on the way and buy some carbs to absorb some of the alcohol.

I know from experience that I can't manage more than one food shop in a day - my will power tends to collapse the more food choices I am faced with. I wandered around the shop for about 3 minutes looking at so many possibilities but amazingly I made it out of there without buying anything. The thought of how miserable I'd feel to fail yet again stopped me from doing it.

Today:
I woke up about 9 and felt really "off" and like I needed an alcoholic drink - very unusual for me to have a hankering for alcohol. I decided as I was feeling so ropey to go for it and I had my favourite tipple of Ameretto and white rum - only a very small amount - with 2 pieces of crystallised ginger. Then I went back to bed. When I woke up I found I had a big, gurgling cough - the type which threatens to sit on your chest for quite a while. This explains the need for alcohol - I find I often need a tot when I'm fighting something like that.

200g yoghurt with some sultanas on top + 3/4 banana + 2 choc drinks with coffee
200g yoghurt with sultanas sprinkled on top + another 3/4 banana + 1 choc drink
Eve meal: Fish in parsley sauce (sorry to be boring!) + veg + salad + 1 large Worcester apple + 2 small pieces crystallised ginger. Ribena RL and 1 choc drink

I think I had a lighter food day today because of being a bit unwell so I just didn't feel like eating anything heavy earlier on.

So I've had 5 pretty good days. Cutting out cereals ('cept that one bowl) has really calmed my blood sugar down. I haven't been waking up with the carb monster raging and the usual struggle to even wait for the porridge to cook, so my breakfasts have been very light.

The first few days I was quite stressed out with all the prep and cooking and having to do plenty of shopping because I don't have a large enough fridge to store many days veg in. I've calmed down about it now and feel more on top of it. Hearing about the prep that many other bloggers are doing to make sure they have healthy food at the ready has helped (eg escape from obesity and Losing Waist). And having to get out to the supermarket is very good for me both in terms of agoraphobia (although I'm only managing it in the evenings) and exercise.

Yesterday after my binge and all those dreadful thoughts at the supermarket I really didn't think I would carry on with this way of eating. I felt confused. I've had no desire to eat the usual bowl after bowl of cereal and porridge but I'm still quite uncertain about my eating at this point; as to how sustainable it is - can I really keep this up? I've felt so wobbly in myself about it that I've been unable to set any goals or commit to anything which has been really annoying when everyone else is doing "The Hot 100"!

Earlier this year I successfully dieted for 3 months eating The Hay Way - separating carbs and protein, and I ate that way for most of 2007. It was one of the best years I've had in many years; I lost weight and I felt good about my appearance the whole year. My eating went to pot in December 2007 because I had a breakdown of course - due to a combination of psychoanalysis, which I have heartily regretted doing ever since, and trying to reconnect with my father as a part of that - and being rejected yet again. I've been in chaos in my head and with my eating ever since then and put on a huge amount of weight. Apart from 4 bursts of dieting (the longest of which was the 3 months this year) I have been in no routine with my eating at all. The times when I've been dieting, and therefore eating in a regular pattern are the times when I've felt much better psychologically. But which way round is it? Eating in a restrictive regular pattern makes me feel better or I feel better so I can eat like that? I think it's a mixture of both.

So I may go back to eating The Hay Way again as this has been sustainable in the past, but for the moment strangely enough, cereals just seem like so many unnecessary calories - not to mention blood sugar issues. I'm just going to have to continue feeling my way along, not just one day at a time, but one meal at a time.

Finally, thanks to Leslie and Amy for each giving me an Over The Top Award! I'll answer all the questions in my next post and possibly even think of a few people to pass it on to.