7 April 2015

Still here. Still not losing any weight.  Still upset at myself for not trying.

It's Easter  break now.  10 days.

10 days to complete a to do list that has around 25 dot points.  Some more urgent than others. But a lot that definitely needs to be done.  Some of it house stuff, some of it health stuff.  Some of it looking after parent stuff.  Which I hate.  I swear I'm going to end up spending more time looking after her, than she ever had to look after me growing up.  If we were close maybe it would be different.  But my mother is a nasty bitter unpleasant woman and causes far more stress than is healthy for me.  And it never seems to end.

But back to my physical health.

I'm really really over being fat and overweight.  I just want to fit into clothes again properly.

I'm slowly working on the food issue.  I've worked out a fairly good system of making meals and freezing them.  I'm eating a form of dinner at work at 4 o'clock and then only fruit or crackers later at 7pm.   Now I've just got to get back on track with weighing and logging everything.  After all this time, I still find it a time consuming thing to do. It would probably work better if I took more time on Sunday to plan out and log my entire week in advance, just modifying where needed from where I deviated.  Yet another system to set up.  And stick to.

My whole life has been like this. I am full of ideas and plans and projects. I am a great starter of things but not a great finisher. I either get distracted or my enthusiasm wanes. I have so many incomplete hobbies and projects everywhere.  I wouldn't be surprised if they made up around 15-20% of all the stuff I own.  Which I'm still sorting through.  Which is yet another project to work on.  And I've already come up with yet another new project to do. And I can't let it rest until I have more time,or at least a better time because my enthusiasm will wane and I'll be left with this half finished project  that  wont get completed for another two  years.   *Rolls eyes*  This is the way I live my life. Every single day. Does this happen to anyone else? Is it fixable? Is it a learnt behaviour that can be unlearnt?

It's frustrating that's what it is.

You know it's hot when...

It gets to 6 in the evening and you realise you haven't eaten anything all day   :S

Seriously.  I've been drinking lots of fluids, but I don't recall actually eating anything yet.  Lol.  Maybe my body knows that eating food will just mean my metabolism will create heat energy.  And it's just too hot for that today?  Who knows.  The prediction was for 40*C, but I think we only got to 38*C (100.4*F).  It certainly didn't feel as hot as 40*C (104*F). 

Oh wait!  I've nibbled at bits and pieces today.   So I haven't gone completely food free.  I'll tell you more in just a minute...


We have a long weekend this week because of the G20 summit. 

I have seriously never known my neighbourhood to be so quiet!  There was lots of media noise about Brisbane being a ghost town and I would have to agree.  It was actually kind of eerie.  I live in an inner city suburb - normally there's lots of movement and action and noise.  Friday it was silent.  So strange.

Instead of getting out of town, like most of the people must have done, I chose to stay at and get some things done at home.  Namely cooking.

That's right.  I chose to spend a weekend when the temperature was 35+ both days, in the kitchen with the oven on or the stove going.  Often both at the same time. 

Why?  Because I'm crazy.  : /

No, of course not really. But I needed to make hay while the sun shone.  And my hay making was getting myself organised meal-wise.  I've noticed the past few weeks I've been busy, both during the week and the weekend.  So busy that I've been neglecting to eat properly.  I've been grabbing lunch from a local greasy spoon often backing that up with some form of takeaway for dinner.  Or worse: ice-cream for dinner.  O_O  So, I realised that had to change.  So I took the opportunity this weekend to cook ahead some foods to keep in the freezer.

      Oh Yeah!  Did I say?  I bought that upright freezer I'd been thinking about back in October.  The Good Guys had a model that was going on clearance.  Whilst originally a few litres smaller than I was thinking about - for half the price of similar sizes, I wasn't going to be choosy!  Only paid $445 for a 180L freezer.  Bargin!

 I made:

• Mexican Mince - My take on chilli con carne.  I dose it up with cabbage, grated zucchini, grated carrot, spinach and 5 bean mix, on top of the mince, onion & tin tomato.
• Mushroom & Bacon quiche - with light shortcrust pastry, light sour cream, zucchini and shallots.  The bacon I use are those cubed bacon bits.
• Chicken & Mushroom quiche - using leftover roast chook.
• Devilled sausages - Look ma, no packet mix!  Added carrot for extra vege.
• Chicken Curry Pasta Bake - this I used a jar of curry simmer sauce for.  I added some grated zucchini for extra vege.
• Peanut Satay stir-fry - chicken, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, onion, celery, carrot, zucchini, green capsicum, green beans
• Beef stroganoff - again, not using a packet mix.  Lots of mushroom.  Steak, zucchini. 
• Creamy tomato sauce & filled pasta - you know, using those fresh filled pastas?  Angiolotti, ravioli, and so on.  And apart from using the most vegetably tomato pasta sauce I can (I LOVE Five Brothers' Summer Vegetables pasta sauce!) I add in (have you guessed?) grated zucchini and carrot.  

Not bad for a weekend's work, right?  And some of those I have already portioned up with a side of frozen vege.  So all I have to do is take a plastic carton from the freezer, defrost it and nuke it, and tuck in!

I am also going to get a salad mix going too.  Red cabbage, lettuce and baby spinach.  Chop/Shred a big bowl of it and put it in a ziplock bag - grabbing some to add to lunch each day, or as a side with dinner.  I came up with this salad mix a few years ago and I tore through it like there was no tomorrow.  It became the base for other salads that I adapted from day to day.  Sometimes adding cold brown rice, or carrot, or beetroot slaw, or cucumber, or whatever I had handy.  I even adding dressing some days, other days I didn't.  I'm hoping that I get a similar reaction this year.  I figure because I haven't done it for a few years, I'll be all excited and "why did I ever stop doing this?  This is fantastic!"  Lol. 

In any case, being busy this weekend cooking food, washing dishes (!) and portioning food, I ended up only eating the scrappy bits left over in the cooking dish in order to clean them up before dumping them into the sink.

So, with that in mind, it seems about time for me to portion up the next chunk of cooking.  That Mexican Mince is still really warm and I finished cooking it at 4pm.  !  That's how hot it is here.  O_O 

And I'm going to put on some rice so I can have the stirfy for dinner.  With a side of salad.

Still no Gym

Hi all, quick update. 

For starters, thank-you to the people who've jumped on board with me and have chosen to follow my blog.  It makes me feel a whole lot more motivated to know that there are people watching me and offering advice and support.  

I still haven't made it to the gym yet!  Thursday, I was so caught up finishing a report before I went, that when I emailed it, I realised it was ten past six - I missed the gym!  However, didn't go for a walk like on Tuesday, because I had to go grocery shopping.  Again, I analysed my spending and I spent $33 on food that I could have done without.  However, I spent more money on stocking up on good food, so maybe this is a good idea to keep analysing and watching my spending. 

No exercise, Friday or Saturday, although I could have gone for a long walk Sat, but I didn't.  I also didn't eat very well from Thursday onwards, mainly from coming back late enough from grocery shopping that I didn't feel like cooking.  So I ate 'convenient' foods, but not healthy ones.  I didn't start eating properly until Saturday night.  Outlines for me that I need to start planning my food and writing it up somewhere I see it.  And reminding myself that I have perfectly good food already sitting in my fridge.

Today, I got back to the swing of things with eating healthily (a salad for lunch - go me!), drinking plenty of water, and go for a walk.  A medium distance walk of 4.63 km.  Added onto my tally and I'm going to need to get my butt into gear if I'm going to meet this 100km challenge!  Nearly halfway through the month, and still not halfway.  Better get cracking!  But not now, as it's late and I am getting up early in the morning for my Monday Measurements.

-SunnyDuckling

Winner is you!

Haha!

Am sticking to my plan of watching what I eat fairly well.  Some slips ups obviously, what with it being Easter this weekend.  I'm not a chocolate fan, but I am a food fan.  So, some seafood salad, and potato salad and bread rolls and salmon on toast and smoked herring and oh-so-many foods.  But, I ate a little bit and I stopped when I was full.  Normally I keep eating and eating and eating til I'm in pain from so much food.  But I felt I did really well yesterday for lunch and stopped.  I even managed to ignore my mother when she tried to force more food onto my plate - win!

I've also exercised twice since my previous post.  Win again!
This I do have to credit my mother for: we went to a pilates class at the community centre.  One with mat work and resistance bands.  Never done anything like it before.  Must admit, I did enjoy it!  I wish that I weren't just on holidays and visiting for the week.  I would love to undertake exercise classes like this, but where I live, we have slim pickings when it comes to fitness activities.  Boo.  I also went for a 6 km walk along the beach front this afternoon too.

Third news of Win!
I had the massive-ist craving for chips -> corn chips/potato chips the other evening.  I was full, had eaten more than enough food, and then out of nowhere, the desire for chips came upon me.  Of course, it was 10 o'clock in the evening.  I wanted them so bad!  I even started going through my mind, bargaining out "well, I have time tomorrow, I can duck out to the shops and they should be open and I can buy a packet then."  Problem was, then I started to think further and even tried convincing myself that maybe I should buy two packets, in different flavours, in case I get the craving again. 
       Now, I don't know about you, but I know what happens next.  I buy the two packets, open one and eat "just a handful", "saving the rest for later", right?  That's how it goes doesn't it?  It certainly is the intention.  However, reality means that what occurs is that I eat "just a handful", then, just a handful more, and more.  I eat until the taste becomes so salty/strong that I finally ween my self away from gorging on the entire bag.  To see that I have eaten approx 4/5 of the bag.
      So not only do I feel sick from too much salt, and additives and flavourings, I also feel sick from guilt, that I allowed myself to eat *so* much of the chips, when I was only supposed to have "a handful".  If this is like you, I can offer some suggestions that have been given to me, or that I've read.  I try and use them both.

• Pour a small serving into a dish and put the bag away and just eat the amount in your dish.  Why this works? You portion control the amount you are eating; physiologically, you've satisfied your craving (sweet tooth, or savoury crunch); and psychologically you feel satisfied that you've eaten everything in front of you.  I've also found that if you're a couch potato and in the middle of a good movie, you don't want to get up and get more - lazy bonus! :)
• Use your non-dominant hand.  Why this works? Because you are doing a natural action, with an unnatural hand, it makes you more mindful of what you are doing.  You actually end up having to concentrate on what your hand is doing and it helps you realise what you are doing. It's in part connected to the concept of the left brain-right brain training.  

The craving got so intense that it got to the point where I thought I was going to scream for not having the chips.  And yet... somewhere in the depths of my memory came a tidbit of information that I read on another weightloss blog.  I wish I could remember which one.  It may even have been a post from 'Promises Promises Webcomic - a humourous look and fitness and weight loss by Jules Faulkner.  Link here! --> Promises Comic. This information was the "scientifically proven fact" that cravings only last for 15 minutes. 15 minutes?! But I was dying over here....!
        So I dstracted myself, mainly by going onto Google to see if I could find anything else that mentioned how long cravings lasted for.  And I read some interested information about how eating other food, no matter how healthy, may not be the best strategy when you have a craving, because it doesn't quite satisfy the same way. Then you overeat calorie-wise, meaning you've gone over your energy input anyway!  So you may as well have had some of the food in the first place!  But then as mentioned above, I have trouble stopping when that crave is over.  Weight loss and healthy choices are a battle, but a battle worth winning!
       However, essentially google, and other people's weight loss blogs agreed with this idea that food cravings do only last a few minutes.  And I won!  That craving did not beat me! :)  I felt so good at the end of the evening, realising that I had a craving and this is the first time that I have not succumbed to it at all.  Normally if I don't have the food I'm craving, I eat something else in the hope that works.   And as a result, overeat badly.  This time round, I just staved it off - hurruh!!  Very pleased. 

Cartoon for the efforts!

I couldn't think of a better blog title...

I want to share the funny stuff I see, and occasionally say, and wanted somewhere to do it. So here it is!

On top of which, I also wanted somewhere to document my attempt to get fitter and lose weight.  Right now, I'm about 20-25 kilos over weight, which makes me unhappy.  I don't fit into clothes properly.  (Or doorways or in my car for that matter).  I don't have the energy to do all the things I used to enjoyr doing - like going out dancing.  Now I just sit on the couch and brood about how overweight I am.

But I'mma gonna change that! (I hope!) 

Resolutions:
 1.  Eat better.

• By this I mean not eating when I'm bored.
• When I do feel I want to eat something, but I don't know what, I need to remind myself to go for vegetables and fruit and dry crackers and healthier things than I have been eating. (Namely chips and microwave pasta 'n' sauce packs).
• Choose to eat smaller but more often?  I dunno if this will help
• Think about what I'm going to cook for the week and plan to shop for those things
• Not bring chips and other savoury goods into the house.  If they're not there, I can't eat them, can I?

 2.  Move more.
I don't exercise very much either, so I want to increase the amount of exercise I do.  I used to be slender enough that friends of friends used to ask if I was a dancer.  Alas, they ask that no more...

• Walk for 1/2hr at least three times a week.  This is valid for starting out right?  I want to eventually increase it to 45min x 5 times a week.  
• Find a space in which to do some exercise videos.  I live in a tiny 1 bdr flat, so I haven't really the room to do it at home.
• Commit to actually getting out and moving!  As I just mentioned, I don't have room to exercise at home - I barely have room to even do push-ups and sit-ups.  I have to move the desk chair out of the way and lay down just right.  So I need to get out of the house to move and exercise.
• Go for a bike ride on the weekend.  You know, just to mix it up a little! :)
• I don't have much money so I'm not going to try a gym just yet.  Besides which the gym in my area isn't open on weekends (when I would have more time to exercise) nor is it open late on weekdays (shuts by 7.30).  The times they are open there's a lot of people there, and I'm too self-conscious at this stage to want to exercise in front of people I know.  

What do you think?  Acheivable or too much at once?  Help me out and comment if you read this! :)

P.S.  Look! A cartoon to motivate !