a little more... or less, as it were

I weighed in at 20 stone 8 pounds at the weekend, which is another 2 pound loss.

I was a bit surprised by this - it was an okay week, but nothing special.  I did hit my target for walking, but didn't really exceed it, and in terms of eating there were a few extra bits I ate that were a bit naughty.  I therefore figured I'd stay about the same, so a 2 pound loss is good.

I'm not really getting my hopes up, so at minimum if I can lose another pound and keep it off then I will still fit into all my new clothes for the holiday.  I guess if I was to get close to 20 stone that would be the "hopes up" version, but as I say I'm not really thinking that will actually happen.

I've also decided I will not do any walking in the week before we go - well, obviously other than to move about to places I need to be!  But I mean I won't go on any specific walks.  My intention is to try to rest my foot a bit.

However, and trying not to tempt fate, I've actually been doing okay with the foot.  I don't know if it's simply easing naturally or it's a coincidence, but I've been doing some stretching exercises recently and things got better after that.  The specific exercise that seems to have helped is actually one that stretches my Achilles tendon and back of my leg.  It involves leaning into a wall and stretching each leg.

The exercise is recommended on the NHS website, so it's not quackery and it's a stretch you see runner's doing.  The point they made is that the plantar fasciitis thing can actually be made worse because of tight Achilles tendons, which makes sense as it would obviously be making the plantar thing taught.

As I say, I don't want to count any unhatched chickens, and it's still not fixed in the sense that I still get discomfort, but it's not the horrible pain that made it difficult to walk I was having a couple of weeks ago.

that's a bit more like it

I'd lost 4 pounds at this week's weigh in.

I therefore now weigh 20 stone 10 pounds, which is good.  If I can keep on the right track I should at least be safe in terms of the new clothes I've ordered for Canada.

I've got all the clothes I've ordered so far and have only had one failure in terms of fitting, which are some boxer shorts.  I will admit I'm a bit finicky when it comes to the fit of boxers, as I prefer them to be loose (that's the reason I switched from Y-fronts, after all).  However, the terminology used to describe boxers often doesn't help with understanding the fit.

So these I ordered turned out to be tailored for a tighter fit, but even bearing that in mind they were too tight and I would have had to send them back anyway.

I've not ordered all I need, but I wanted to try some stuff on before ordering more.  Sizes can get a bit tricky when you're in the super-large category, as what one company means by 4XL doesn't necessarily tie up with what another company means, as the boxers show.

Anyway, I wasn't entirely surprised at the loss - the last couple of weekends I think the numbers were a bit inflated by circumstance (retaining fluids from drinking and some sluggish-ness in my digestion.  This isn't to say I hadn't put on weight, but I think perhaps I hadn't put on quite as much as the numbers suggested.

That's not entirely unusual - everyone's weight fluctuates naturally, though for normal size people the fluctuations probably wouldn't show up on a regular scales.

I've scaled my expectations down and am now basically hoping I can get below 20 stone 7 pounds before the holiday.  Any more is a bonus.

I should note that I've done something to my foot that is causing me some problems.  I've done a classic bit of self-diagnosis and all the symptoms line up with something called Plantar Fasciitis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plantar_fasciitis).  This basically means I've damaged the big mass of connective tissue that runs along the bottom of your foot (it acts like a sort of cushion/spring).

Of course the only real treatment is to rest... which is hardly an option right now and will be impossible in Canada :/.

scary

I got a bit of a shock on Sunday when I weighed in, as I'd actually gained 3 pounds, meaning I now weigh 21 stone.

This obviously puts me above where I've been since my supposed recent push to try to lose a bit more weight.  It also means I'm heavier than I have been for quite a while.

I have a few excuses, but the honest truth is I've lost my way a bit.  I've been feeling rather down if I'm honest - looking for a new job hasn't resulted in anything, even when I changed my "search parameters" to loosen them up.

I've had a fair few interviews, but no real sniffs of a job.  I actually went to an interview on Tuesday (it was one I was contacted about before I stopped for Canada, but has taken ages to result in interviews).

I think it went well as an interview - certainly better than most of the others I've had; however, I don't think I'm quite what they were looking for.  I'm therefore anticipating that there will be someone with more relevant experience that they will interview (I was first).  In fact, they may have let the cat out of the bag in that they have a temp covering for someone who was on maternity and then left, so I wouldn't be surprised if really that person will get the job.

The honest truth, though, is if they offered me a job I'm not sure I would want to take it.  I mentioned above that I'd widened the parameters, but I think really in my heart of hearts I don't think I want to stay in this sector (it's quite difficult to explain as I can't really say properly!).

I've actually now stopped all of the automated search e-mails and turned my CV "off" on the job websites.  Once I'm back from Canada I'll fire it all back up again and go back to looking outside of my current sector.  Trouble is I'm really not enjoying working at my current place any more, which is why I loosened things up in the first place, to try to get something to happen quickly.

Either way, my current focus is to get real on the diet - I can't have a situation where even my old clothes don't fit me because I've put on weight!  I mean at the very least it would be ruinously expensive to have to buy everything in bigger sizes again!

that's yer lot

I'm just going to do the one post this week.

Yesterday I was snowed under with stuff and tomorrow is my last day for the week, as I've mentioned before.  It's actually two people's last day at the office tomorrow, so I'm sure we'll be going to the pub, which will probably eat up what spare time I have where I might write a blog post.

One of these leavings is not a surprise as he is retiring, but the other came as a bit of a shock, as I was given the person's leaving card to sign yesterday and that was the first I'd heard about it!

For such a small company, communication is terrible here.

Weirdly, I actually had an offer of a job interview for on the Thursday - I'm still looking to move on, of course, but have put everything on hold for a few months until after Canada so I declined.  To be honest, they've also not filled me with confidence given they've taken so long to contact me and finally did so only 4 days before the interview, which is miles away in Bristol.  I'd rather not have another depressing waste of my time where I'm just making up the interview numbers and it's costing me a fortune to attend.

Anyway, I'm going to use some of my couple of days off to buy the stuff I know I will need for Canada, both in terms of online and in the real world.  Obviously the disappointment here is that my grand plans about losing a few stone have not borne fruit, so the clothes I will be buying will be big size stuff.

Speaking of which, I'd dropped 2 pounds on Sunday's weigh in.  I can't say I was surprised by this as such - I don't think it represented a genuine loss, as such, more the reflection of the fact that I was weighing myself after a more "regular" week, as opposed to after the weirdness of the Easter weekend.  I therefore now weigh 20 stone 11 pounds.

wowser

So I weighed in on Monday, and it was not good news.

I'd gained five pounds... taking me up to 20 stone 13 pounds.

It was not a good weekend, generally.  I wasn't too bad with my old problem of buying too much food, but I certainly wasn't lacking stuff to eat.  Well, I say that - I'd actually had a couple of curries during the week (with the training course I felt the need).  However, there were two big problems.

The first was a lack of exercise - on the Friday I was short on walking and on Sunday and Monday I basically did nothing.  There was sort of a reason for this in that I've been having some trouble with my right heel, but really this was a combination of laziness (I played a lot of Civ 5) and a hangover.

And that was the second issue - I went out for a "few drinks" on the Saturday and actually got wasted.  In total I had 8 cans of lager, a half of a small bottle of vodka with 2 cans of Dr Peppers as mixers and two thirds of a bottle of red wine.

I also ate a load of junk - both on the Saturday and then on the Sunday.  Indeed, I even cleaned out the limited supply of junk type stuff I keep at home when I got back, so it really was pretty bad.

I'm therefore not surprised I gained weight, though I have to say the scale was surprising.  I'm slightly suspicious that some of it may be temporary effects, but still, it's a significant gain and completely wipes out the little I had lost since resolving to lose weight for Canada.

I really need to get serious here - I'm getting close to when I need to buy new clothes for the trip and I therefore need to know what sizes I should buy.

fat lad

I wrote the following last Friday, but failed to post it:

No change in my weight last weekend, so I still weigh 20 stone 10 pounds.

This was obviously a little disappointing, but not entirely surprising.  As previously mentioned, I'd bought way too much food and this spilled over into the full weekend as well as the following weeks itself.  In other words, I was eating pretty badly all week, not just on those few days off I had.

I've not eaten particularly well this week either, so I'm expecting some horrors when I get on the scales on Sunday.

Easter is rapidly approaching - I've got a few days book as leave for my birthday too, so I now enter a period where I'm not doing a full 5 day week for ages.  However, I'm a bit nervous this will also impact the diet situation quite badly.

I need to clean my bedsit this weekend - I don't generally clean when there's a grand prix on and it's been a double-header, so things are getting a bit mucky.  I'll probably do a spring clean over Easter, but another week is a bit long to leave it.  Plus cleaning this weekend will make the job easier next week.

---

In actuality I weighed in on Sunday morning and found I weighted 20 stone 8 pounds.  So, in other words, I'd lost the two pounds I put on.

I have absolutely no understanding how this could be the case - I ate really badly all week and it was nothing special in terms of exercising.  I mean, we went to the pub on Friday as it was two people's birthdays, and both brought in biscuits and cakes, which I partook in.

I even had a small donor kebab on Wednesday evening!  I do my washing on Wednesday evenings now and I wanted something cooked and would usually have had a portion of chips to satisfy this need, but the chip shop was open so I went to the kebab shop next door, which was expensive but nice - the salad was very fresh, which is a good sign in a kebab shop.

So yeah - no idea how I lost 2 pounds :/

weight

I mentioned this yesterday, but I unfortunately gained two pounds this last weigh in.

I therefore now weigh 20 stone 10 pounds.

I cannot confess to be surprised by this outcome.  The last couple of weeks I have been eating quite badly.  I've had quite a lot of shop-bought sandwiches and also lots of cakes and various other treats (I've been quite weak when it comes to cream eggs, which have of course become more prominent with it being near Easter).

However, I've also not been doing quite so much walking.  Owing to having the interviews I've had a few half days and haven't wanted to get sweaty, so my number of steps has dropped quite a lot.  The interviews have also been a reason for eating badly - both in terms of having to grab something to eat quickly, but also comfort eating when they've not really been very positive.

I'm actually thinking I will put the whole job hunting on hold until after Canada.  It is proving something of a distraction and messing about with my schedule.  I'm not sure yet if I will fully stop or be a bit more selective, instead.  Because I got so unhappy at work (and there was the fuck up so I was worried I might lose my job) I've been applying to most everything that looked a possibility, rather than the heavy filtering as I did when I looked before.

I also had some slight issues with minor "injuries" - this is too significant of a term to use, to be honest: what I mean is I had a few aches/pains/tweaks/bad night's sleep that meant I decided to take it easy with walking on a few occasions.  This has not been anything long term at any point, and I'm still way above target in terms of steps, but I think it probably contributed to some of the fluctuations.

It's also become apparent I really need a new set of walking shoes.  My current pair the outermost layer of the sole on the bottom has worn through in a few places - indeed, in some places the entire tread is worn away.  I'd been hoping to hold off until my birthday, but I think I will need them before them.

unhappy

I've been feeling down for a while.

I'm finding work to be quite an unpleasant experience.  I find the lack of any clear direction, the lack of common sense and, in particular, the lack of any ability to make change for the better very frustrating.  I have known for a while that I disagree with some of the things they seem to have decided on, but even then I'd be happy if stuff was actually happening - I'd kinda be happy to be proved wrong, but the whole "limbo" aspect of things is just not fun to be involved in.

Of course I've also been more proactively looking for a new job again.  This hasn't been going too well.  I clearly have a good CV - at the least it is good enough for me to get interviews.

I've now had a total of 5 interviews, though these have not been all they could.  I'll hopefully blog about it separately, but I don't really see myself getting/wanting those jobs.

And of course I'm back to the old situation of no apparent prospect of a salary improvement at work (it's now getting on for 2 years), despite my rent and various other costs going up, so I'm struggling financially again.  Particularly since I desperately need to save money for the Canada trip.  This last month or so I've had to spend a fortune on my car:

£450 for a complete new set of tyres
£200 on a service & MOT (plus some replacement parts)
£250 on insurance
£175 on Car Tax

So that's over £1,000: I only take home about £25K a year, so I've had to spend nearly 4% of my entire year's salary in one month!

I've also been struggling with the weight thing.  I decided I was going to lose a few stones in preparation for the Canadian Grand Prix and blogged about the "progress" here, but just recently ti stagnated and then, while I wasn't blogging, it actually went into reverse - I gained 1 pound a few weeks ago (although I lost it again the following week), but this week I'd gained 2 pounds.

The problem - and it's been a problem all my life - is that when I feel down I eat.  I am the very definition of a comfort eater, and since I feel down quite often, I eat quite a lot.  Of course it's a vicious circle - when you get very big and find it difficult to do things like walk up flights of stairs that becomes a source of unhappiness, prompting me to eat more.

The other problem is I've not really gone about it by sticking to a proper diet.  I've increased the amount of exercise I do, which has been helping to keep the last few weeks of not eating well in check, but I've also slipped back into some of my weirder habits.  In particular I've been "multiple buying" again - this is where I buy several meals worth at one shop, then for some reason buy stuff for the same meals at another.

So, specifically, while I was away I had several meals to buy for and bought cheese on toast, hot cross buns and some mini-sausages plus buns as meals.  Only if you do the maths while I needed 4 meals worth I had therefore actually bought 7 meals worth.  Since none of it was particularly long lasting, that meant I had to eat more meals than I needed and for those meals to be bigger.

And to be honest, I didn't really need to buy any of them - I have stuff in the freezer and cupboards that I really need to get rid of (and, of course, would, therefore, effectively be free meals instead of spending more money).

I think I need to introduce some will power and/or start actually thinking about stuff more.

flatline

I've not had the chance to blog just recently, and this may be my only post this week.

I thought I'd give a quick update on the whole diet & weight situation.  I mentioned last week that the problem was going to be temptation, and I roundly failed in resisting that temptation.

Just to give you a "for instance", I ate 6 cream cakes last week.  And we're talking big cream cakes - 2 large éclairs, 2 chocolate cream doughnuts and 2 cream buns (like giant profiteroles).  I also ate 4 custard tarts, which I don't count as cream cakes, but are in the same ball-park.

So not good diet-wise.  With the interviews I have to confess I was also expecting the walking to go badly (in the sense that I don't want to be sweaty for an interview, and also it takes time to prep that ate into time I would usually go for a walk.  Well, this didn't prove to be the case.

I also had a few bad nights sleep, due to nerves for the interview, but also the usual semi-insomnia stuff I get bouts of, where I fall asleep no problem but then wake up at 3AM (or similar).

While the latter isn't a good thing, it does seem to eat calories, so I'm guessing the fact I did sufficient walking and this must have counteracted the poor diet, because my weight remained the same - 20 stone 8 pounds.

This makes the third week at this weight, which is good in the sense I've not gained weight when I could so easily have done so, but very bad in terms of the targets I'm aiming for for the Canadian holiday in June.

Part of the problem I'm experiencing is that I'm okay all week (though not this week, to be fair) but then Friday I get a sort of attitude of "having a treat", only the problem is I get several treats (Friday is my shopping day) and basically then spend a chunk of the weekend eating badly too.  And this seems to counteract the good part of the early week.

Well this week hasn't been too bad, although I'm going to be a bit down with the walking, so we'll just have to see.

self-sabotage

Last week could potentially have been a reasonable week, weight wise.

However, I unfortunately sabotaged myself across the weekend.

Basically, it got to Friday and I was really hungry all day.  When I then did some shopping I gave in to temptation and bought some naughty stuff.

First of these were some double chocolate muffins.  I've mentioned I tend to have pain au chocolate on Saturday, but I replaced it with these muffins that were on offer.  I would guess 1 muffin is probably equivalent to 1 pain au chocolate, but there were four muffins, rather than 2 pains, and I at all four across Friday and Saturday.

The second was that normal walker's crisps were on offer, so rather than the lighter crisps, I bought a six pack each of prawn cocktail and Worcester sauce crisps (two of my faves).  I unfortunately then had a total of 8 packs (4 of each) across the weekend.

The next thing was that I bought a pack of chipolata sausages, only this had half as much free, so it had 18 sausages, rather than 12.  I also obviously bought some large rolls to have the sausages in.  Unfortunately, they only had brown bread in one shop, which I bought, but then in another shop I bought some white rolls as well.  And double unfortunately these were also on a two for one offer, which I failed to resist.

In other words I had 12 large rolls across the weekend.

Now this wasn't enough for me to gain weight, but it was a classic case of me getting on the scales on Sunday morning and seeing "no change" and thinking "If I'd not gone nuts I would clearly have lost some weight".

My current weight is therefore 20 stone 8 pounds.

I don't really know what's going to happen this week.  I'll blog about it later hopefully, if I get time, but basically I'm going to be out and about and there's going to be a real temptation to eat badly.  It's also going to restrict my walking, as I'd rather not be sweaty on certain days, and then won't have the spare time to walk on others.

It could be a disaster if I don't resist, and this week has proven me rather wanting in that regard.

one is better than none

So my weigh in this Sunday showed I'd lost one pound.

While 1 pond is disappointing, it's better than staying constant and way better than gaining.  I therefore now weigh 20 stone 8 pounds.

I have to confess I was a bit disappointed at losing only one pound, but also not entirely surprised.  It was another good week exercise wise, but I wasn't quite as strict with my diet.  I mean, I didn't go nuts or anything, but I also didn't stick completely to it.

There was also a slight gross issue last week, which I guess if you're a bit squeamish you should probably not read.  But basically it wasn't a normal week so I was a bit puzzled as to what impact it would have on the whole weight loss thing.

I had a weird sort of constipated then not week.

Basically from Tuesday to Thursday my bowel movements were quite dysfunctional and I felt quite "bloated" and backed up.  It was a bit like one of those adverts for laxatives aimed at women, tbh.

However, on Friday the dam kinda burst and from Friday to Sunday I had 11 bowel movements (I usually have 2 per day), all of which were significant and relatively "normal".  I mean, I didn't get the shits or anything, I just seemed to have all the poos I'd not had earlier in the week.

The weird thing is I can't work out what might have caused it.  My food consumption at the weekend hadn't been particularly unusual, and as I say, I hadn't gone bonkers during the week, so I'm a bit lost as to what it was that ceased me up.

no change

There was no change to my weight when I weighed in on Sunday morning.

While this is disappointing on one level, it actually kinda represents me dodging a bullet.  Diet-wise, last week was very bad on the whole, but the increased exercise regime has, it seems, counteracted this.  I therefore still weigh 20 stone 9 pounds.

I'm always left wondering with weeks like last week, where one aspect goes well but the other not, what would have happened if I had done okay with that aspect rather than badly.

So why did it go badly?

Well, there were a couple of smaller things.  On Wednesday someone came in to the office and bought in a load of pastries - more than were needed for us to have 1 each.  I therefore had two.  However, also on Wednesday I do my washing and that usually means I buy some shop-bought sarnies to have for dinner, so Wednesday is not a totally good day in the first place.

On the up-side, when I do my washing I go for a short walk and on this particular Wednesday I'd already done a few reasonable walks so I was way over 10,000 steps for the day.

However, Friday was the real problem.

I'll talk about it tomorrow, but that's when I had the review meeting and it turned out I wasn't going to get fired.  As such, I kinda let things slip a little at lunch, buying some cookies.

However, I then also bought some cream cakes when I went shopping in the evening.  And I mean some cream cakes - these were full-on naughty and they were on offer, so I ended up with four of the things.  Each must have been at least 600 calories each (I didn't dare look!) and of course that was on top of the cookies.

I always buy some pain au chocolate to have on Saturday as a mini-treat, and I didn't compensate in any way for the naughty stuff, so I had these too.  Overall, then, it was a pretty bad weekend diet-wise.   I mean, I did have salad for my actual meals and of course did full walking at the weekend, so even though I consumed at least 4,000 extra calories (the best part of 2 pounds in weight-terms) my weight was unchanged.

Things should hopefully go a lot better this week.  It's odd actually, but when I first started my dieting I had some similar patterns - a really good week, followed by a non-week, so I'm not too worried I've slipped already!

take that fatso

So last week I weirdly gained 1 pound.

This week I pleasingly lost 4 pounds.  This means I now weigh 20 stone 9 pounds.  That means my BMI is still in the "morbidly obese" range, but only by about 2 or 3 pounds.

I've reached a good way below that before, as I've said.  I got down to about 19 stone 6 pounds at best, so I've still got 1 stone 3 pounds to get back down to that level.  In other words of the 1 stone 8 pounds, which is 22 pounds, I needed to loose to get down there I've lost about 7 pounds.

My ultimate goal is a fairly significant range.  My target is 18 stones, which will put me half-way up the "obese" range (BMI 35).  I will be very pleased if I get down there.  My kick-starter-style stretch target is 15 stone 5 pounds, which puts me just on the cusp of being "overweight" and obese (BMI 30).

I'm fully aware BMI is not seen as being the best of measures.  The whole waist-size ratio thing is supposed to be a much better simple measure, for example (the really good ones are not ones you can measure at home).  However, there's also a problem there that I am one of these people you see on the extreme weight loss programs where they end up with loads of extra skin.

As such, waist is going to become quite the deceptive measure for me.  Now of course it also impacts weight as you're carrying around all this extra skin, but that's kinda a bonus thing in a way - I'll know that I weigh less than what I apparently do, if you see what I mean.

Plus I'm a long way off from either measure really mattering in terms of fine details.

So yeah, I'm doing okay.  Still no real explanation for the "up" last week, but if going 4 steps down, 1 step back, 4 steps down isn't too bad.

I have, however, had to work quite hard at it this week.  I've been going for particularly long walks first thing in the morning and there were a couple of days where I ate quite minimally.  In particular when I was at the height of worry over this job thing I found my stomach a bit too "churny" to eat.

up - not down?

So I weighed in on Sunday morning and I'd gained a pound.  My weight is now 20 stone 13 pounds.

I really couldn't make head nor tail of this.

I mean, don't get me wrong - it wasn't the perfect week by any stretch, but I at least figured I would come out neutral at worst.  Gaining a pound seems bizarre.

In terms of walking I actually did more steps than my targets.  And this is with my newer upwardly revised targets of 7,500 steps on Tuesday - Thursday.

Eating wise I was pretty good all week, though things went a little pear shaped on Friday.  Obviously, we went down the pub as I mentioned and had carvery (we always have carvery nowadays - the boss is not an experimental eater and assumes we're all fine with having the same thing over-and-over, but also it's relatively cheap).  However, that evening I also had packaged sandwiches, crisps and 4 small éclairs bought from Tesco.

I usually shop on Friday evening, but on this occasion it was after a 12 hour day where I'd not slept particularly well the previous 2 evening.  Usually, lack of sleep seems to "help" the weight (you obviously burning more energy in "wake" mode) but I don't think it did this time, so Friday was a bad day, but I honestly didn't think it was so bad I would put on weight.

There are a couple of excuses I could give.

Saturday I seemed to be a bit constipated (Friday's food was obviously quite rich) and on Sunday had (not wanting to get too biological) some large bowel movements after I'd weighed myself.

I also didn't go for a walk on Sunday.  There were several reasons for this - I had to go in to work to finish off and wanted to do it early.  But also, when I was finishing at work someone came in to do the cleaning and I thought best to leave, rather than go for a walk then.

However, I was also swayed as I have been having a bit of trouble with my ankle, as it's been a bit uncomfortable when I've been walking just recently.  I suspect I might have strained it a bit last week - I need some new walking shoes more urgently than I thought as the souls are worn smooth and it's been quite icy on a few mornings recently so I've been slipping.

Lastly, the scale doesn't give detail beyond pounds.  I could easily have been 12.4 pounds last week (round down to 12) and 12.6 this week (round up to 13), which would appear like a more significant gain than it really was.

However, these are all excuses - I mean, I could have been 11.6 last week (round up to 12) and 13.4 this week (round down to 13), for example - so I'll just have to see if it helps me stick more closely at it this week.

de-munch

As part of the preparations for the trip, I've decided to get back on it properly with the diet and weight loss.

I mean I never really properly stopped, and I won't say I was doing the whole yo-yo dieting thing where you quickly put all the weight back on, but certainly I've gained back quite a few pounds.

At best I got down to about 19 stone 6 pounds, but my weigh in after Christmas was 21 stone 2 pounds, so that's a gain of 1 stone 8 pounds.  It also took me back into the morbidly obese range, so I needed to pull my finger out.

To be fair, Christmas has always been a period when I've loosened off with dieting and put on anything around half a stone, but basically just recently my weight was staying a bit too constant.  I've been walking, so that's helped keep it in check and means I'm still as fit, but I feel I need to get back on it.

It will also help longer term as I will be able to buy some nicer clothes - particularly for work and, more pertinently, interviews.

My weigh in this weekend was 20 stone 10 pounds.  This means I lost 4 pounds, though to some extent that's a pinch of salt number - as mentioned I tend to put a lot on over Christmas and when I stop the excess a few pounds usually go automatically.  However, I definitely did step things up in terms of consistent walking and the diet got a bit better - I unfortunately had a few things to finish off from Christmas, but these are almost all gone and I even had salad all weekend (I'd forgotten how I enjoy it Saturday lunch, but then it gets repetitive the next two Saturday dinner & Sunday lunch).

I'm going to get some new walking shoes though.  I was going to need them for Canada anyway, but I think I'll have to get them sooner as my current pair are worn almost flat in places.

I'll try to keep the blog updated with the progress.

a month away

I’ve obviously not been blogging for the month of August.

This wasn’t deliberate.  Well, it became deliberate, but it didn’t start that way.  It started as just the usual lack of blogging, but then some stuff happened that meant I haven’t really been having much fun, so writing a blog didn’t really seem like something I wanted to do.

I’m feeling pretty miserable, actually.  I definitely wouldn’t go so far or as dramatic) to say I was depressed, but I would rate my mood just recently as being below average and I’m one of life’s less cheery people, so you can see I’ve not been happy.

I’ll make some posts in the future about some of the stuff that’s been happening.  These won’t be immediate, and I’m not sure this blog will be particularly regularly updated for a while, but I’m definitely going to do my best not to be totally silent for a whole month again.

I thought though for this return post I’d mention something a little bit positive.

I’ve been struggling with the diet/weight for quite a while now.  I’d basically reached a point where my weight has stabilised, but it was some way above where I wanted it to be.

Now part of the problem was that I‘ve been eating bad things - high calories, stuff. However, it wasn’t like it used to be and I was a bit puzzled how my weight wasn’t really changing either way.

However, I've now figured out that exercise is also a big part of the problem.  It’s not that I’ve stopped doing my walking - indeed, I’ve been doing the same amount that I’d built up to before.  And that is the problem.  I think my body/metabolism has built up to cope with this level of exercise.

It’s difficult to explain, but basically the last couple of weeks I’ve been testing out doing more exercise and it’s led to some more significant reductions, despite still doing badly with sticking to the diet.  So the key is for me to increase the exercise.  It’s going to be difficult as it means more time spent doing it, but I’m some way below the recommended 10,000 steps per day so it’s not like I’m going nuts.

fat bastard

I mentioned previously I was intending to do a food diary.

That didn't quite work.

A part of the problem is that I was doing it online and as this very blog shows, sometimes I can't be arsed.  Also the format for doing it - a blog - wasn't very helpful, because this blogger thing fits better with single posts a day.  Editing posts is a pain or just posting after each time I ate wasn't practical and didn't make a lot of sense when I was trying to review it.

So basically I gave up, but one thing it did prove was that I was eating quite a lot of bad things.  I mean, I hadn't gone back to the old ways of eating loads and loads, but I was certainly eating lots of things that I wasn't eating while I was properly losing weight.

Over the last few months I've unfortunately been steadily gaining weight, such that I'm about a stone heavier than I was at the peak of the weight loss.  To be fair I only hit this peak for a very brief period and about a stone is the maximum I've been over that.

My weight has actually been bobbling around quite a bit during that period, where I'll lose a few pounds for several weeks running and then have a bad week where I put it all back on plus a little more.

One problem I've been having is the weather.  The period when I did my best weight loss was when we last had something resembling summer.  I found it much easier to lose weight when it was warm as you more naturally eat less when it's warm (or rather, you tend to eat more when it's cold - it's a natural reaction that is made redundant by our modern central heating).

Also it's much easier to eat salads and things like that when it's cold.  I found it a bit naff trying to eat salad when it was cold and I have to admit I got a bit sick of it.  It's also much easier to walk for longer, more concentrated periods of time (meaning the mornings) when it's warm.  I mean, walking in the winter is nice enough (assuming it hasn't snowed and isn't raining) but I tend to find longer walks easier in the summer, not least of all because it's lighter earlier and later.

So I'm hoping that this warm spell represents a summer proper and will last a while.

I've also decided my cereal at lunch idea hasn't really worked properly.  It works in terms of the number of calories I'm eating as a meal and it's perfectly good at filling me up until dinner.  The problem is it seemed to encourage me to eat poorly in the evenings.  I think a part of it is that the meals are very repetitive, so I end up craving variety - not only in terms of taste, but also texture too: the cereal is very samey.

However, also, because I know that the cereal meals are light on calories it seems to have encouraged me to have treats (this was clear from the food diary) thinking I could "afford" the calories.

weight for it

Last year didn't go well on the diet front.

Well, if my aim had been to gain a stone then it would have been a good year, but as it was almost exactly the opposite, it was fairly poor.

Christmas was particularly problematic this year.  I always put on weight at Christmas as I tend to stuff my face, but this year I had a bit of a problem with a tendon in my left foot and so decided to snot walk on it for a few days while I was on leave.  However, I didn't reign in my eating at all, so I gained 6 pounds just in the week that I was off, which is double what I've done before.

I'm fully expecting that over the next couple of weeks this will come off as that's the other part of the pattern.  However, the 6 pound loss was a addition to a 7 pound gain across the rest of the year, so not at all good.

This also actually pushes me back into the morbidly obese range, where I was hoping I would get a good way under that.  I never really set proper goals as such, but it was always the basic aim of the diet to take myself a good way under the morbid obesity range.  The odds and stats get quite... sobering for people who are that size.

On the up-side the walking has gone pretty well.  Apart from Christmas where I couldn't walk I stayed on target throughout the year.

It became particularly apparent to me how much fitter I was when I took my leave at the end of summer.  There's a little village I often walk around in Devon and where in previous years I'd struggled with some of the walks, last year I was easily able to walk right around the village (it has this loop around it) and wasn't really tired at all.

One of the things I have thought about on that front was whether I should step up the exercise.  Now that I'm able to walk longer distances with no problems does that mean I am working less hard?  Certainly I'm carrying around less weight so it's not quite the same level of workout.  And is that part of why my weight has gone up - I need to do more to achieve the same affect?

However, I think when I analyse it the reality is that the weight gain has been more to do with eating.  There have been a lot of weeks in the last year where I've not really stuck to my diet properly.  Indeed, it would be tough to really say I'd dieted with any consistency across the year, and it was that rigid sticking to my diet that I think gave me the greatest gains in previous years.

The problem I think therefore comes down to a slip of willpower combined with a fatigue over the diet.  I ate a lot of salad during the time I was successful and that's great if you want to fill yourself up, but I think I got very bored.  I've never actually been that big a fan of salad and after months and months of it I think I really wanted change and that change meant I strayed into areas of buying rubbish.

Anyway, I guess the point is I don't really make New Years resolutions, I really need to start taking this thing seriously again, particularly if I'm genuinely going to do some of the other stuff I want to in the next few years.

rather damp

I'm back off of holiday.

And I have a bit of a case of post-holiday blues if I'm honest.  I think it's particularly affected by the work related situation (looking for a job, getting an offer, turning it down, expecting things to improve) this year.

The holiday was gone in a flash.

It rained quite a bit and if the rain had been accompanied by thunder and lightning that would have been an even more cool statement, but it was mostly just regular rain and lots of it.

It wasn't quite as bad as up north.  The forecasts had been very bad before the week and I think the rain they got was basically predicted to also badly hit the south West.  Well it got it on the Sunday when I drove down, but then Monday it was actually rather bright.

Indeed, although it was wetter than was ideal compared to what the forecasts had said it wasn't actually all that bad.  It was only really Wednesday where it poxed things up - I'd planned a beach walk day and it rained almost constantly so I couldn't really do that.

Generally I did lots of walking.  For the first couple of days I was also very good with diet as I was expecting that when I went to my Dad's at the end of the week I'd end up eating badly, and this was the case, so I think overall it's all sort of balanced out.

However what was very clear to me is how much fitter I am.  The walks I did were generally a breeze and they were of a similar length to last year when I found them much more challenging. Indeed I did further walks more often and felt fine.

I've not much else to say - I didn't take any pictures with the weather.  I also tried a new route home, which was a lot more fun to drive, but was also therefore more tiring as it required a lot more concentration.

disappointed

I was rather disappointed with my weigh in this last Sunday.

I thought I'd done quite well during the week with only a few relatively small slips.  However, I'd only lost a pound, which was quite disappointing.  Particularly since my weight has been see-sawing around without any real gain or loss for a good few months now.

Having said that, when I think back at the week I can see that the small slips I'd felt I'd made were actually probably much bigger than I'd really thought.  I ate a few too many sweet things and it all adds up.  Also I'd really struggled with the walking.

Well, I'd actually really struggled with sleeping, having had a night where I'd basically been unable to get to sleep at all and with this then being followed up by a night where I'd woken up incredibly early.  Usually when I have a bad night the next night I sleep like I'm in coma, but this time I woke up at 4:30AM, a good two hours before I usually get up.

And this waking up early pattern suddenly seems to have become something of a norm - with the exception of Sunday I've been wide awake at least an hour before my alarm was due.  I've actually started to suspect that something is going on, like someone is getting up early for wake and making a noise that wakes me up, but I've no real evidence for that and besides, I usually sleep with earplugs in.

Anyway, the point is that the lack of sleep left me very tired and therefore in no real mood to do much walking during the week.  Now usually there's a compensation when I'm suffering from insomnia in that I burn a lot of calories when I'm awake lots of hours like that, but in this case I'm not sure it's quite worked like that.

It was all rather disappointing, as I say.

In fact, I got rather depressed about it all on Sunday and ended up buying some actual proper chocolate bars when my walk took me past Sainsbury's and scarfing them.  I felt bad... but also good.

What's been particularly frustrating over the last few months is that I've not been losing weight.  I still do lots of walking and it's not like I'm eating loads of bad stuff like I used to, but I don't seem to lose weight.

I mean, don't get me wrong - I know bad bits I'm eating and the walking are cancelling each other out, but the depressing part of it is that it's not loads of naughty eating, it's just a bit.  It's like I can't even have a bit of fun.