As most of you know I’m on a perpetual diet - a quick shifty through my old blog posts will tell you that much. I’ve tried everything, from Slimming World to Slim Fast and calorie counting to cutting out carbs. Unfortunately I have the attention span of a goldfish so nothing ever lasts more than a couple of weeks at best. In August I decided that enough was enough. No more faddy diets, just sensible eating and unholy amounts of exercise. I even roped a couple of friends in for moral support, thinking that if we’re all in the same boat there will be fewer suggestions of a pub meal and a few drinks on Friday night, and cinema trips won’t have to come with a visit to the Ben and Jerry’s counter.
To my surprise it actually worked, we all signed up to My Fitness Pal and made a point of logging everything that passed our lips. This time nothing was negligible, not a cheeky midweek trip to Starbucks or a slab of cake that someone had brought into the office to celebrate a birthday. Everything was logged, everything. A cuppa in the morning? 11 calories. A gin and slimline tonic? 57 calories. The best (or worst) thing about the iPhone app is that it has a built barcode scanner, so I’d often find myself wandering round Sainsburys, scanning things and shouting “943 calories?!” and hastily replacing whatever I’d picked up. I’ll admit I got a few funny looks, but I bet most people in the vicinity thought twice before putting that pizza in their basket.
So far I’ve lost just over a stone by sticking religiously to my 1200 calories per day and taking up residence in the gym. A stone doesn’t sound much but I’ve been told time and time again that the best way to shed some timber is to lose it slowly – a pound of two a week is the way to lose it and keep it off. Now I was quite happy with this – I could feel my jeans becoming a bit looser and wasn’t as concerned that the buttons could pop on my work shirt at any given moment – until one of my friends started to drop two pounds a week, every week, without fail.
I should be happy for her (which I am), but at the same time its soul destroying when the needle on the scale just won’t shift. I know I should have taken measurements before I started, and I know weight isn’t everything but I’m jealous. There, I said it. I’m a terrible person. I go tot the gym 6 times a week for at least an hour at a time, I sweat like Homer Simpson in a Krispy Kreme shop at spinning twice a week and I log every last morsel and some weeks the scales just don’t move. I get up at 6 am to go to the gym for goodness sake – what kind of crazy person behaviour is that?!? My friend does a Zumba class once a week (if you’re lucky) and its absolutely falling off her. I just don’t know what I’m doing wrong. If one more person says “yeah but maybe [friend] has more weight to lose than you” I think I’ll scream.
The old me would deal with this by heading straight to KFC for a Wicked Zinger box meal, but not this time. This time I’m not giving up, I just really wish I could shake off this green eyed monster.
B xx
