Banishing the dietary blues

Tim Horton's delicious Oreo donut... mmm

All week I have endeavoured to keep my calorie content under 1000 while still having treats and varying my diet. I have also been getting off one stop early and walking home, as well as endeavouring to go for a little 10-15m walk at lunchtime. Largely, this has been a success.

There have been aberrations from this path of comestible austerity. I had a long weekend of feasting as a result of a birthday; albeit I did keep portions small and tried not to snack. Snacking is a problem. I have snacked in the evenings post-dinner, not much, but it has happened. Biscuits usually. Digestives. It is hard for me to turn down a few with a cup of tea. So I have hidden them in a cupboard.

One day, the train I needed was cancelled so I did the household shopping instead, resulting in me not getting off a stop earlier. That day I also felt weak and starved, so I had a piece of pie, mash AND bread and butter pudding for dinner. While everything was home-made, including the bread, this was still a carb and fat overload at 8pm - not good for weight loss.

Despite this one-week crash diet and more activity I do not feel I have lost anything. I still feel bloated and unfit. I hope that by giving up crisps and cake and cutting down on caffeine, portion sizes and bread that I will have lost some pounds this week. But I have not checked out the scales. I do not think weighing one's self daily is mentally or emotionally healthy, despite the temptation to do so. However I have in my mind a target.

I AM targeting an overall one-month weight loss of 20 pounds - roughly five pounds a week. This would get me back to the weight I was before I got engaged (and started embarking on eating out more). I even had to have two people squeeze my stomach and boobs into my wedding dress as I had not lost the additional pounds before the wedding. Well, the night before I did have a pizza ....

There are so many 'diet and exercise' books out there, website, adverts, etcetera. But
I do not see the point of these. This is a billion, no trillion-dollar industry and the only pounds I would shift would be from my bank account. Want to lose weight? Just use up more calories than you eat. Swim a couple of times a week (booked in my diary me going swimming before work twice next week). Eat fewer heavy, processed carbs. Lay off the bread and cheese. Walk a little more. Get up from the desk and move around at lunchtime if you can. Legally, you can. Walk up 100 stairs a day to the fifth floor instead of taking the lift. In any event, walk down the stairs. No crisps. No pancakes. No cheese. Or digestives. Seriously, how good is mature, creamy cheddar on a digestive? I absolutely love that combo. Mmmmm .... No! Stop it. No cheese or digestives.

Do I feel positive? Yes I do. I believe I can achieve my goal. I am working towards a healthier, less bloated, more-of-my-nice-clothes-fit-me-again me. Am I going to need help? Well yea.... I am. None of these scary diet pills or threatening personal trainer or bashing my body into submission. My body is a temple and food offerings are required (not Digestives). That said I am going to indulge in some spa therapies such as wraps and heat treatments on my saddle bags before my holiday. I managed to get a great 75% off deal on a course of six, which should help my side-buns get me back into my holiday clothes.

This is not all vanity, although I will grant that 80% of my need to slim down is vanity. Another 10% is fear... Fear of being a middle-aged woman in the workplace not being able to cut it with the young ones.

But 10% is medical. At my age, it is twice as hard to shift the jelly rolls and I have been told by my gynaecologist that based on my GP history, I am at the biggest BMI I have been since my GP records began (not too surprising given my records began when I was 12). She did suggest that if my body was struggling to cope with the extra weight on my small frame, this could be a factor in our so far unsuccessful attempts at becoming natural parents. So anything that can help - exercise, treatments, dieting, hiding the digestives - well this is all to the good and I will jump at the chance to get back into that little Figure-hugging Karen Millen dress for our 2nd wedding anniversary celebration.

Onwards and upwards? Well, not upwards, the weight needs to go down not up. Onwards and downwards, then, and let the good times no longer roll around over the tops of my barely buttoned-up jeans.*

*Until I get to Canada and eat lobster thermidor and Dairy Queen and Tim Horton's timbit donuts and my friend Helen's amazing salsa dip and her raisin bread...

.....



Sent from my iPad

Eat your Way to Five Pounds a Day

Jabba loves dat chicken. MMM finger lickin' good.

I have been trying to eat less by eating smaller meals, more regularly. 

However I have been failing. We keep being sent sweets and treats to the office, which means that instead of slowly losing weight, little by little, I am probably gaining the pounds, little by little, until a month before the wedding I suddenly wake up out of my desk-fodder induced stupor and cry: “I am never going to fit into my Pronovia 2013 collection design”.

This is the fault of a desk job, according to workplace health advisers Vielife. A survey conducted among Brits found that 12 million of us suffer from “Nutrition Attrition”.

This means workers have eschewed their five a day in favour of free cake and easy sandwiches, which may be convenient, but it is hardly helping them to work effectively and healthily.

The data showed that more than 40,000 working adults in the UK - based on Vielife online health and wellbeing assessments - show that 36 per cent of working people have poor nutrition, creating personal health risks and losing 3.5 weeks of productive time each a year - an urgent wake-up call for employers and businesses.

Only one out of 10 people said they eat the recommended six portions of fibre per day and less than one in five people manage to eat their five portions of fruit and vegetables.

Actually, I am good like that. I eat a lot of fresh fruit and vegetables. I just like to wash them down with a packet of crisps afterwards.

However, Vielife found that people with a ‘good’ nutrition score have a 6 per cent higher job satisfaction score and 15 per cent higher mood score than people with a ‘poor’ nutrition score.

Stress levels increase for those without a decent diet - perhaps not surprising; but absenteeism increases. Respondents with poor nutrition scores report 50 per cent more sickness absence than those with good nutrition scores. That’s 4.8 days a year per employee against 3.2 days a year, costing the average UK organisation an extra 576 days for every 1000 people employed.

This means productivity declines, costs in cover increases and the whole team suffers as a result of one person’s doughnut disorder.

But if we ate better and cared more for ourselves and our staff, we could not only work better but maybe also play better, take up hobbies, have energy to do other tasks or go to events more often.

What this means for providers is that they should be kind to my waistline and instead of offering the odd lunch or chocolate goodie, they should just hurl a banana in my direction.

What this means for me is that if I want to earn more and to be more productive, eating healthier and fresher means I might lose those 5lbs but I’ll gain £5 a day in additional revenue through freelance or selling more of my handmade jewellery and cards.

This will also help to paying for that dress.