Happy Plodder
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: UK
Posts: 5,006
S/C/G: 238/158.9/138
Height: 5'2"
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Vacation ~ a postlude
So I had that few days away a couple of weeks ago. Thoroughly enjoyed it, and part of the enjoyment was that while by no means slim, I am considerably slimmer than 5 months ago, I can buy human clothes, I can look good, yeh.
Eating was - interesting.
My Plan is 1400 calories and 100g carbs, no wheat bread. Breakfast was fine: the lovely landlady made me lean bacon, eggs and mushrooms every day. Low carb, no wheat, good stuff.
Day 1 ~ walked for 2 hours, didn't have lunch. Only tea rooms or bigmeal pubs in the village, and the 1 supermarket didn't have salads, so I had 4oz chicken meat for dinner. Didn't die of it, felt smug.
Day 2 ~ walked for 2 hours, Decided, deliberately, that instead of trying to find something that fit my WOE and failing, I'd just eat small amounts of whatever was on offer. Lunch was a small curd tart. Bought a sandwich for dinner and ate the complimentary cookies (2) instead. Loved it.... but the carbdevils had got in.
Day 3 ~ walked for 90 minutes. Today was the day I'd planned to have lunch out. I usually plan one Meal into my holidays. Roast pork dinner with tons of veg. and no potatoes. Ice cream, my first dessert in 145 days. It should have been ok but the carbdevils were working. I bought a bar of fudge to take back to the B&B to eat.
Day 4 ~ walked for 2 hours. By the time I got to my lunchstop destination, all the tearoom had was sandwiches. Then when I got back, I bought fish and chips, I'd got to the cramming everything stage. Although to be fair, I only ate the fish, binned the chips.
Day 5 ~ home day. To the breakfast I added a sausage and a hash brown. When I got home I went shopping and bought and ate a whole apple pie (4 person size) and cream. It was Sunday, it was my treat......
Things I observed:
Last year when I went to Spain, I lost weight in a week through making healthy choices of what was offered to me. I'd thought I could do the same again. However, summer salads, lean meat and fruit in Spain were no brainer choices; the same things are not available in a small northern village in autumn. Duh. Research more next time.
Carbs are still the devil for me - I literally could feel myself change from "It's ok to have a small bit of this" (which it is) to cram, cram, cram.
Wheat carbs made me feel ill; but also sluggish and desperate to eat more of them.
I felt panic by last Monday. I knew that it was back to it time but in my carb-addled state, I could not for the life of me think how. I can't describe vividly enough the dreaful sensation of being sucked towards the plughole.
So I went back to low carb (Neris and India's Idiotproof Diet), because that's where I started back in May; I knew that, although it didn't agree with me digestively after a few weeks, because of the luscious, luxurious meats you can eat, I wouldn't feel 'deprived'. This was important, because what I was feeling most of all was, 'I can't be bothered' 'I'm not doing this any more'. I'm amazed at the effect of the wrong carbs on my mood, because I love losing weight. Truly. Only on Monday I didn't.
By Tuesday, I'd got the (TMI) hideous runs that I get with low carb, so had to start reintroducing good ones like oats; but even 2 days strict low carb had done its work, and the rest of last week I ate back on my usual plan. It wasn't always easy, I had the tremendous urge to overeat; when I went shopping foods that had become invisible to me got together and sang to me in 4-part harmony.
However, made it! I went away on Oct. 13th at 174.2; I returned to the scales on Oct. 18th at 179.4; this morning I'm 173.8 - retrieved the water and fat gain of last week, and got further on. Phew.
What makes me glad is that I have had one experience of having to regroup and get back on plan. Prior to that, I'd had 145 days of perfection, and I'd been getting anxious: I'd got all my strategies in place as automatic behaviours - what to do in the face of sudden cake, how to resist when shopping etc - but had no strategy for getting back on the waggon. It was every bit as difficult as I feared it would be BUT - I made it, I worked out how to do it. If/when it happens again, sure it'll still be hard but I'll have previous experience to work with.
Phew.
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