Weigh-in Day 25.04.14

This is what a glitch in the Matrix looks like.

 

No, you are not experiencing déjà vu. Please do not adjust your set. This is my scale reading from this morning which, if you are possessed of keen powers of observation, you will notice is exactly the same as last week’s.

 

 

Ag it’s alright really. I still have 6 weeks in which to lose the 4.8kg that’ll get me under 100, and I’m confident I can still pull it off in time. I’m not depressed about the number – yes it would have been nice to have seen it go down, but staying the same is way better than going up. Which is what I was sort of expecting after a certain Easter Sunday chocolate tart-eating, red wine-drinking, Peter Stuyvesant-smoking incident.

So ja, feeling strong and will keep pushing forward. Project Wonderland is still a go people!

Have a lekker long weekend, and spare a thought for me vomiting my guts out at my HIIT spinning session tomorrow. Losing weight is FUN!

 

 

Weigh-In Day 18.04.14

I believe the word you’re looking for is “woooohoooo”.

 

Today is a Good Friday indeed! Because not only is the scale down, it’s down a fuckload! Last week I was sitting at 107, this week I’m at 104.7! Which means, if my maths is right (and it should be because I checked it three times) I’ve gone down 2.3kg in the past week! Wooooohooooo!

Now, a lot of that can be attributed to the fact that I ate a bunch of crap about two weeks ago before I started Project Wonderland, so this is the last of the water weight gone, due to the excess carbs and sodium, etc, that I was carrying around. But I also worked my butt off in the gym and counted my macros to within an inch of their lives, so that helped a lot too.

All of which means that after today’s weigh-in, I have 4.8kg to lose in the 7 weeks before my birthday! So I’m super on track for that milestone, and super on track for my fabulous reward hairdo!

 

Lady lovely locks!

 

It’s also been a great week for a number of other reasons:

• I managed to have ONE glass of wine at pub quiz this week, and made it last 2.5 hours, thanks to the judicious application of sparkling water.
• I managed to fit a white chocolate marshmallow Easter egg into my eating plan on one occasion, and it tasted great!
• I also managed to fit an Ultra Mel caramel dessert into my eating plan, which tasted like absolute shit and was promptly thrown away. I think someone should call Guinness, because food NEVER gets thrown away in my house, unless it’s into my belly.
• I managed to get through a number of stressful situations this week, not by drinking through them as I normally would, but by actually resolving them like an adult. Apparently that’s what other people have been doing all along. Who knew?
• And I’ve now gone two weeks completely SMOKE-FREE! I have apparently not smoked 70 cigarettes, saved R105, and added 7 hours to my life. Almost enough time for me to binge-watch Season 3 of Game of Thrones. So winning all round really.

 

 

So yup, to sum up, I’m feeling good, I’m feeling strong, I’m feeling motivated, and I’m feeling mathematically-minded enough to fit in a Simply Asia dinner and an Easter Sunday glass of wine in over this long weekend. I am the queen of macro juggling and the scale is my bitch. Long may I reign supreme!

 

 

(P.S. If you’re worried about staying on track through the sugar coma that is Easter, simply follow my foolproof plan to resisting hot cross buns and chocolate. Don’t buy any.)

Nicola needs a hobby!

 

It has come to my attention that since removing so many bad influences from my life (smoking, drinking, eating like a mofo) I now have to fill the empty gaps with good influences to stop me from going bat-shit crazy.

This brings me to the subject of hobbies, and this is where I fall down. For years, my hobbies have been the following:

• Drinking
• Eating
• Drinking some more
• Eating some more
• Lying around watching tv all day
• Calling up people to see who wants to go to the pub
• Drinking wine and watching Bridget Jones’ Diary
• Drinking wine and listening to music
• Smoking a box of cigarettes in one evening
• Facebooking
• Calling Mr Delivery
• Having a running competition with my friends to see who can drink the most shooters in one session
• And concentrating very hard on driving in a straight line afterwards

So now that I’ve given up all the fun bad stuff, my list of hobbies looks like this:

• Watching MasterChef while cooking dinner

 

 

There HAS to be something out there I can do that fulfils my need for socialising with other people but doesn’t cause cirrhosis of the liver at the same time. My friends have recommended it, my nutritionist has recommended it, and my hypnotherapist has recommended it. Nicola needs a hobby!

Unfortunately the only things I can think of that I used to enjoy are embroidery (ok, but too solo) and playing piano (ok, but I don’t have a piano).

So this is where I appeal to you, my phenomenal phalanx of Losing It readers – regale me with tales of how you fill your time and enrich your lives. Do you do ballet, sailing, cookery, dance classes, origami, fly fishing, pottery making, mime, topiary, taxidermy, ghost whispering or anything else of interest? Reply in the comments section and help me build up a list of hobbies that I can actually tell my mother about.

Thanks in advance for all the wonderful help I know you’re going to give me! Here’s a big smoochie to show how much I appreciate your efforts:

 

75 thoughts every ex-smoker has when going out for the first time

 

1. Ok, it’s a Friday night, I’m out for drinks, I got this!

2. Damn look at all those smokers sitting outside.

3. Try to inhale as much second-hand smoke as you can while walking past.

4. Aaah, that’s the stuff!

5. Now, where to sit? Guess I don’t have to ask for the smoking section anymore.

6. Hey that doubles my seating options. That’s cool.

7. Oh, no space outside because of all the smokers. So I have to sit inside on a sunny day. Fun.

8. Great, my friends aren’t here yet. Not sure what to do with myself now.

9. Helloooo Mr Waiter, please come take my order!

10. Ok drink ordered. Now what?

11. Seriously, now what. Am I just supposed to sit here?

12. Oh my word, what do non-smokers do with their hands??

13. Ok, fold them in your lap, that’s a good idea.

14. Great, now I look like a 5-year-old at a tea party.

15. Ok, rest your hands on your knees.

16. No, now I look like a mafia boss about to order a hit.

17. Hmm, I could do with a manicure.

18. Manicure. The Cure. Lovecats. One of my favourite songs in high school.

19. Oh god, high school reunion coming up.

20. How am I going to get through THAT without nicotine??

21. Seriously, how late are my friends?

22. I feel like everyone is staring at the girl just sitting in the corner.

23. At least if I was smoking I would actually be doing something.

24. Fuuuuuuuuuck.

25. Look around, look around, see what other people are doing!

26. Hmm, this is actually a really nice place. Probably wouldn’t have seen the inside if I was smoking.

27. Ooh and there’s a band.

28. To accompany all the smoking that’s happening outside.

29. What are all the smokers doing? They look like they’re having so much fun.

30. Whereas I’m stuck in here, all by myself.

31. Thank god finally, the first friend arrives!

32. Come come, order a drink, then we can finally chat.

33. And I can DO SOMETHING with my hands.

34. Ah, here comes your Cosmopolitan.

35. A Cosmopolitan is one cigarette long.

36. Is it weird that I measure the time it would take to drink a drink by how long it would take to smoke a cigarette?

37. I wonder if I’m the only person who does that?

38. Hey, your friend’s talking – look lively!

39. You know with that white top and red hair, she almost looks like a lit cigarette.

40. Aah, cigarettes.

41. Come on man, keep it together!

42. OK there’s a pause in the conversation.

43. Normally you would take a drag of a cigarette here.

44. The pause is getting longer.

45. And now it’s getting awkward.

46. Think of something to say.

47. Think quicker!

48. OHMYGOD this is the longest anyone has not spoken ever!

49. Oh thank the pope, here comes other friend. She’s a smoker – perhaps she’ll insist that we sit outside!

50. No such luck.

51. I wonder how I can convince her that she needs to go smoke.

52. Let’s try telepathy.

53. You. Want. To. Go. Outside. And. Smoke!

54. Why is she just sitting there smiling?

55. Ok we’ve established that I suck at telepathy.

56. And that no smoking appears to be happening.

57. Sigh.

58. Ok ok concentrate on the conversation. Interesting things are apparently being said.

59. Hey, look at the time – it’s been 30 minutes and you haven’t thought about smoking!

60. And the clock resets to zero.

61. This would be a nice place to come in winter though.

62. And I can FINALLY sit inside.

63. Unlike that woman who’s standing outside by the window smoking, talking to her friends inside.

64. And I guess it would be nice to stay part of the conversation, rather than having to run off for a smoke every 5 minutes.

65. Ooh, this means that I can finally go out anywhere I want without having to check if they have a smoking section first!

66. I can finally go to fancy restaurants!

67. Like the Test Kitchen!

68. Mental note: Find a boyfriend who can afford to take me to the Test Kitchen.

69. George Clooney can afford to take me to the Test Kitchen.

70. And he doesn’t smoke either.

71. Maybe this non-smoking thing isn’t so bad after all.

72. Hey look we’re paying the bill.

73. My first night out as a non-smoker and I survived!

74. I rule all! I am now a non-smoker! Nicotine, you are powerless against my awesomeness!

75. But let’s walk back past the smokers again on the way out, just to be safe.

 

Weigh-In Day 11.04.14

 

If you’re possessed of keen powers of observation, you’ll have noticed that today’s scale reading is a bit up from previous weeks. But don’t worry – I’m all over it. No more solving problems with food, booze and nicotine anymore – it’s health health health all the way baby! And anyway, this scale reading is actually 0.8kg down from last week, so Nicola for the win!

What’s more, how gorge do my nails look? That’s thanks to the experts at Rouge Day Spa who pampered me silly last weekend, and drenched my tootsies in a divine colour called Halley’s Comet. Because I am rare and sparkling and wonderful, don’t you know! (And judging by my love life I only come once every 76 years.)

 

Orly Halley’s Comet – it’s out of this world!

 

I’m not going to bore you to death telling you about how this week has involved me counting my macros like a crazy person (hard), exfoliating the palms of my hands with a bajillion bear crawls (very hard) and staying away from bars (very very very very hard). Instead, I’m going to tell you about Project Wonderland.

 

 

On the Biggest Loser, when contestants finally drop to 199lbs or less, they call it getting into ‘Wonderland’. (ONEderland if you’re just not getting it.) This is a huge milestone for people who weigh in lbs, and there is usually much crying and dancing and laughing, etc, etc. For us Metric mense who weigh in kg, our milestone is a little different – getting under 100kg. So because I want my own crying, dancing, laughing, etc moment, I have pinched their name and started a Project Wonderland of my own. And this is what it involves:

 

Getting under 100kg by 8 June 2014.

 

That’s what I’m talking about!

 

If you’re a friend or a stalker of mine, you’ll know that this is my birthday (so feel free to start saving for presents). And I cannot spend yet another birthday lolling around in the 100kg zone. FML, no! So I have vowed, on all the boxes of cigarettes I won’t be smoking, and the bottles of wine I won’t be drinking, and the junk food I won’t be eating, THAT I WILL BE UNDER 100KG BEFORE I TURN 37 HAVE MY NEXT BIRTHDAY PARTY!

You heard it here first chaps!

Now as you can see from the scale, I’ve got 7.1kg to lose, and just over 8 weeks in which to lose it. It’ll be tight, but that’s no reason not to push for it. I’ve got a goal, I’ve got my motivation back, I’ve got healthy plans in place, and by the power of Greyskull, I’ve got a mighty need to break through this barrier once and for all.

So that’s what I’ll be getting up to over the next 8 weeks, along with some of the Sleek Girls who are coming along for the ride. I urge you to please get your pom poms out because I’m going to need all the support and encouragement I can get. I apologise in advance for how boring I’m going to be over the next 8 weeks, but a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do. I’ll make it up to you at my birthday party, I promise.

 

Where my hair will look like this

 

PS: Oh and if you haven’t received your invite to my birthday party yet, don’t worry – it’s in the mail.

I quit: Part 3

Here it is folks: the final chapter in my trilogy of quitting. The third instalment of the Lord of the Rings series won the Academy Award for Best Picture – let’s see if I can continue that prestigious trend. (There’s an Oscar for best blog post, yes?)

If you’ve been following the series, you’ll know that so far we’ve quit smoking and binge drinking. What else could there possibly be to quit (besides my inevitable and inexorable descent into terminal dullness)?

Well, I’ll just have you know that for my final trick, I’m quitting….

 

<drum roll>

 

Binge eating

Ooh, that’s a bit of a dirty secret then isn’t it? Well folks, I hate to break it to you, but if you tend to consume vast quantities of things in a short space of time (cigarettes, drinks, guilt, shame), one of those things is bound to be food as well.

 

 

For years I had a nifty little trick to avoid dealing with any kinds of negative emotion. It involved calling Mr Delivery and having a constant queue of nice men bringing me burgers and pizzas and ice creams, oh my. Fight with someone? Eat three pies. Get shat on at work? Eat a large pizza with a large pasta for dessert. Catch sight of yourself in the mirror? Eat a 21-piece bucket from KFC, do not pass go, do not collect 200.

 

 

It got so bad that after a while I stopped recognising that I was experiencing any emotions at all. Any good emotions were drunk, any bad emotions were eaten. I didn’t have anger or sadness or disappointment, instead I had Steers, KFC and McDonald’s. Which is why one of the biggest learning curves for me in this journey so far has been cultivating the ability to actually identify and understand what it is I’m feeling, and develop my awareness around that. Apparently other people experience emotions, not page 3 of the Mr Delivery menu. Who knew?

I’m not going to go into an in-depth exploration of my history with food addiction; that’s already been documented here. But what I will say is that, like my treatment of my binge drinking when I started this journey, my legacy of binge eating wasn’t something I really set out to change. I figured that all I would need to do would be to just NOT do it, and everything would be fine.

Um, ja, no. Because while I was very good at putting my binges off, you can only postpone something for so long. And every 6 – 7 weeks, the cork would come shooting out of the bottled-up emotions, and all junk food hell would break loose.

 

 

At first I thought that if I kept my outbursts to one meal, or at most, one day, I could keep on losing weight no problem. And that did work, for a time. But since my mental state has been so up and down recently, my demons have noticed my vulnerability and come out to play like no-one’s business. Combine that with the binge drinking (which usually precedes the day of binge eating) and you have a recipe for weight going up and down and up again, and frustration levels at an all-time high.

 

 

In my defence, I turn to binge eating in times of stress and anxiety, because I literally have nowhere else to turn. It’s safe, it’s comfortable, it’s familiar, and it’s the only thing that makes me feel better. That’s because at no time in my adult life have I worked on finding alternative coping mechanisms for when things get hard, and I have no experience when it comes to working through my negative emotions in a positive healthy way. It’s much easier to just zip through the KFC drive-thru than it is to get in touch with your anger (and it’s much tastier too) – so that’s why I keep doing it, time after time.

But no more. I want to get to my goal weight before I turn 90 for fuck’s sakes. And if that means finally growing up, then I guess that’s what I’ll have to do. There must be people out there who have ways of dealing with stress that don’t involve eating two King Steer burgers in a row (yup, I’ve been there – don’t even try and challenge me to an eating contest). So from now on, I’ll be making a conscious effort to actually deal with my issues, rather than eating six chocolate bars and hoping they’ll go away on their own.

(On a side note, if anyone is conducting a study on how binge eating can contribute positively to one’s physical and emotional health, I’ll gladly chip in for some beakers or something.)

 

Because, science.

 

And so ends the trifecta of unhealthy physical and emotional behaviours in my life. Goodbye, smoking like a chimney, drinking like a fish and eating like a pregnant mother of three. You’re the last of my habits to go, and the first step towards a completely healthy, positive, vibrant life ahead. (Right now it looks more like barren, featureless desert, but whatevs.) By saying goodbye to this trio of drama, stress and weight gain, I’m hoping to make a turning point in my journey – one that leads to sustainable success, a new zest for life, and a teeny tiny ass. So watch out world!

 

 

On the other hand if that doesn’t work out, look for me at Banana Jam in 6 months’ time. I’ll be the one surrounded by beer, pizza and a carton of Stuyvie Filter.

I quit: Part 2

The second chapter of my ‘quitting stuff that’s bad for me’ trilogy. Critics have called it “the most gripping drama since Game of Thrones, although sadly thin on violence and nudity”.

Sad is right. Because it is with great regret, wailing and gnashing of teeth that I quit:

 

Binge drinking

This has honestly got to be one of my favourite things to do. When people ask me what my hobbies are, I don’t say knitting or scrapbooking or Minecraft. I say drinking, because it’s the truth. Ever since I discovered the delights of Dionysus in high school (again, boarding school is awesome), I have been a fan of consuming vast quantities of alcohol in a ridiculously short space of time. Some people crochet; I down pints of lager and chase them with neat tequila. Because that’s just how I roll.

 

Pictured: How I roll

 

When I started this journey last July, I obviously realised that going to the pub three times a week would no longer be an option. So I came up with a brilliant plan. Stay away from booze for 3 to 4 weeks at a time, then go bat-shit crazy and drink all the drinks. That surely would be fine, yes?

 

Woooohoooo!

 

Um, ja, no. Because I forgot one teeny tiny detail – I wasn’t actually dealing with whatever it was that was making me drink like a sailor on shore leave. I was just postponing it. Because honestly, I didn’t really want to stop. There’s something wonderful about sitting with friends at the pub till the wee hours drinking pints, then going to Pirates at 2am on a Monday because we are MAD CRAZY FOOLS. Or drinking copious amounts of white wine in the sun at Groot Constantia over Sunday “lunch” (I say “lunch” because not much eating ever got done). Or sitting with one of your best friends at his dining room table downing shot after shot of flavoured vodka “because I got it for free”.

Damn, even just typing all of that made me want to have a drink.

Now, if all of this had no effect on my weight, I’d happily carry on. Some of my best memories involve me having a drink in my left hand (and a cigarette in my right, sob). So if I could do it free and clear, you can bet your next shot of Cuervo I’d be doing it like a muthafucka.

 

 

But, unfortunately for me and my waistline, there are more calories in alcohol than there are Russian girls in Mavericks. Not to mention all the calories in the burgers, pizzas, slap chips, ice cream and shit you eat the next day because YOU ARE SO HUNGRY YOUR STOMACH IS EATING ITSELF. Of course that’s if you can eat – because often you’re so busy trying to not to yawn in technicolour, you can’t stomach the thought of eating anything.

 

Do I look happy to you?

 

Binge drinking is something I’ve tried to bring with me from my old life into my new life, because I’m not quite ready to let go of that part of who I am. I still want to be the girl who drinks guys under the table, who’s the life of the party, who you can always count on to have a good time with, and whose alcoholic achievements are legion. So I’ve been trying to find ways to keep that side of me going strong, while losing weight at the same time. And after nine months of trying, I’m forced to admit defeat. Because it’s just not working.

So where do I go from here? I’m not sure. I’m not ready to give up alcohol entirely, because I don’t think there’s anything wrong with having a glass of wine every so often. So perhaps that’s what I have to do – instead of saving up all my drinks for one giant blow-out a month, I have to evolve into The Girl Who Only Has One Drink. This causes me great distress, because these are usually the people I make fun of. I have NO idea how people can have just one glass of wine, and then go home happy. One glass of wine is what I have while you’re trying to decide what to order.

 

Immediately followed by a second glass.

 

But if I want to make a big change in my life, then I’m going to have to make big changes in my lifestyle – and that starts with learning how to enjoy people and places without pickling myself in alcohol for hours on end. And ultimately, learning who I am when I’m not using alcohol as a distraction, an upper, a crutch or a friend.

So that’s the plan then. Have the occasional drink if it fits in my macros for the day, and make every effort not to metamorphosise into The Incredible Drinking Nicola. I’ve tried it before and it is FUCKMYLIFEHARD. Although on the plus side I won’t be on the receiving end of stories like “Remember that time you drank half a bottle of vodka at home and woke up wearing a skirt around your neck, a sock on your left foot and found handfuls of chicken curry on the sheet next to you?!”

And that can only be a good thing.

 

 

I quit

 

I’ve been thinking about this for a while now, particularly in light of the fact that the past few weeks have been pretty rough on me. My weight has gone up and down since Jan, and as of Friday, I’m pretty much the same weight as I was when I started the year, which is a bit depressing to think about.

I’ve put a lot of work in, but because the same old issues have raised themselves once again, I’ve done a lot to negate all that hard work. Which is why I have come to one inevitable glaring conclusion. I can’t do this anymore – it’s too hard. So I quit.

But maybe not in the way that you’re thinking.

What I’ve come to realise is that while I’m becoming this new, better version of myself, I’m still clinging to some old bad habits from the past – because they’re comfortable, and familiar, and ultimately they’ve ended up defining me. And because I’ve made no effort to change them, I’ve been struggling to reconcile my past with my future, and ultimately failing. But finally, after weeks of struggling, I call bullshit. I AM capable of letting go of these things, I AM capable of completely evolving into the best version of myself I can be, and I AM capable of replacing bad habits with good ones.

So with that in mind, there are a few things I’m going to be quitting right away. And this is the first.

 

Smoking

Yes, shock horror – I smoke. I had my first cigarette at a Sixth Form party in high school (given to me by a teacher’s boyfriend – boarding school was awesome) and ever since then, I’ve been a smoker. I’ve been in love with Peter Stuyvesant longer than I have George Clooney, and that’s saying something.

 

You sexy thing you.

 

I was never a big smoker – five a day was my maximum – but I liked the fact that I smoked. I thought it made me a bit more interesting, a bit more rebellious (I don’t care if I live or die – oooh!) and saved me from being completely vanilla and dull. Or in the words of Chandler Bing, “I don’t care what anyone says, the bottom line is that smoking is cool and you know it!”

 

 

Since doing a detox a couple of years ago, I cut back hugely, and now I only smoke when I go out with friends, so about once a week. Although as I’m a binger of note, I can easily get through a whole box in one session. If you’re going to do something, do it properly.

My sister has been begging me to quit for ages, but I’ve always ignored her. I can’t be the boring person who doesn’t smoke – there has to be SOMETHING interesting about me. Besides, the smokers’ corner is always the most interesting place to be at a party, the people at the smokers’ tables always have more fun, and having a beer without a cigarette is just plain WRONG. Like having ice cream without chocolate sauce, or a burger without fries. They just go together man, come on.

 

Seeee? Look how perfect!

 

But if I’m going to be healthy – if I’m going to embrace this lifestyle once and for all, I have to let go of the things that are dragging me down. And I have a sneaky suspicion that this is one of them. Plus I’m a fitness ambassador for crying out loud – it does no good to promote health and wellness one minute and smoke yourself into oblivion (or even at Oblivion) the next. I have a saying for that – “all talk and no pork”. If I want to do this, I have to go all in. And that means ditching the fags once and for all.

If you know me at all, you’ll know just how OHMYFUCKHARD this is for me. But it has to be done. Hopefully by taking this first step to wellness that’s never been taken before, I can overcome my dark side once and for all. Plus it’ll be nice to finally sit inside a restaurant in winter – usually I’m outside freezing my tits off with a cigarette clamped in my frostbitten hand.

So goodbye Peter. Goodbye to 19 years of loyalty, and to the longest relationship I’ve ever had. Goodbye to coffee and cigarettes in the morning and beer and cigarettes in the evening. Goodbye to French inhaling and Zippo lighters and the smell of a freshly opened box of smokes. It’s been real but it’s time to part ways. Think of me fondly, and try not to text me the next time you go out and get hammered. Have some dignity man.

 

RIP, the man who founded New York in 1653.

 

Stay tuned for Parts 2 and 3 where I officially become the most boring person who ever existed.

 

(Yes yes of course I know that’s not true. But give me a moment here, I’m going through what has to be the worst break-up ever. And I can’t even have a cigarette to calm my nerves. FML)

 

 

True confessions

It always amazes me how people who have been overweight for years, with bad habits up the wazoo, start following a healthy eating and living plan and immediately become different people overnight. They shun junk food, train twice a day, go teetotal, start forgetting to eat (WTF?) and become pseudo-militant health Nazis who never, EVER, fall off the wagon.

I am not like this. I don’t know who these people are, but I am most definitely not one of them.

 

Look at me! I am brimming with health, vitality and self-righteousness!

 

No matter how much weight I’ve lost, or how impressive my health achievements, I still want to stuff my face with crap, drink SAB’s yearly output in one day, and shoot myself in the head when my alarm goes off at 5am for gym.

My successes over the past 8 months have come as a direct result of being able to grit my teeth and go against these natural instincts. The past few weeks, however, have looked a little like this:

 

Tuesday – Friday: Gym, work, home, cook, bed

Saturday: Gym, work, work, work, bed

Sunday: Work, work, wo-FML I CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE- drink, drink, drink, bed

Monday: Eat, eat, eat, bed

 

Lather, rinse, repeat.

 

 

It’s super fun having to admit your failings in black and white by the way – I’m having a grand old time right now. Falling off the wagon is one thing – falling off the wagon when people mail you daily telling you how inspiring you are, asking for help with their own weight loss, asking you to write articles about your achievements… well, it’s just soul-crushing. You feel as if you’re walking around with the word ‘IMPOSTER’ tattooed on your head in giant (non-Comic Sans) letters, big and bold for everyone to see.

I debated whether or not to write this post for a while, as I felt that owning up to my transgressions would be letting people down. But then I realised that by not writing this, the only person I would be letting down would be myself.

As much as I’ve done amazing things like reversed my diabetes and lost 30kg (although it’s probably less than that by now thanks to my Mr Delivery dialing finger), it’s clear to me that I still have a massive amount of work to do mentally. I can do the eating and training thing, but the mind thing is still a total mind fuck. There are still a lot of things I need to work on, namely:

 

• Dealing with stress
• Finding a work/life balance
• Sustaining my willpower
• Letting go of guilt
• And most importantly, reserving the bulk of my mental energy for myself, rather than work or other things

 

Quite honestly, if I had hardened the fuck up, I would have been under 100kg weeks ago, with my lovely lady locks as my reward. But because I still have a whole mess of mental and emotional issues to deal with, I’ve been losing the same few kilograms over and over for the past few weeks now, and quite frankly I’m getting sick of it.

 

 

At times I make the mistake of looking at other people who are getting it right, and getting results thanks to their consistent hard work and apparently zero emotional issues to deal with. And then I look back at myself, who’s doing the complete opposite, and I get bleak as fuck.

But then I remember that everyone’s journey is different. And the issues I’ve identified as having to work on are things I’ve never been able to resolve, which is why I’ve never been able to reach my goal weight before. Perhaps these things are coming up now, because it’s finally the time to deal with them once and for all. And once I do, the scale and my skinny jeans will be my friend once more.

I’m not entirely sure where I go from here, but I know what I need to work on, and that’s a good start. Hopefully with a lot of thinking, planning and redesigning of my current lifestyle, I’ll be able to move forward, and start putting a whole mess of good days together, one after the other. I’ve said it to a million people who’ve asked me for my “secret”, so now I’m reminding myself – the key to sustained weight loss is preparation, discipline and commitment. And that’s something I’m going to focus on connecting with in order to get me over this hump. Because that’s all this is – just another obstacle I have to get past as I go along my journey.

A friend of mine posted on Facebook this morning, “An arrow can only be shot by pulling it backward. So when life is dragging you back with difficulties, it means that it’s going to launch you into something spectacular.” I can’t wait to see just how spectacular life is from here on out.