Four weeks later

I can't believe I've been watching my weight for 4 weeks already! It all started with a what-the-heck-let-me-subscribe-and-see-where-it-takes-me-just-for-laughs attitude and now I am 5 kgs less. (I know I announced this milestone on a previous blog but that was because I had weighed myself midweek and knew where this was going.)

What is making this effort possible is recording everything I eat and drink on a daily basis on the website's calendar. Were it not for this bit of technology, I doubt I would have stuck with it.

You don't have to be perfect to lose weight but you have to be honest with yourself.

I wonder what I will be writing 4 weeks from now...

Energy!

Oh my God, what is happening to me? I have so much energy that I can't get to sleep till nearly midnight and I am up by 7 am. The mid-afternoon nap has become redundant. Of course having extra stores of energy means you must find something to do with yourself, but why oh why has it got to be dishwashing?!!! I think I should try ironing next.

My daughter's dad has been here for a few days and I got to cook some nice calorie-controlled meals with my soutzoukakia taking first place.

Here is the recipe:

500 g. Healthy Living Beef Mince from Tesco (it has less than 5% fat)
Salt and pepper to taste
Garlic powder (a generous sprinkling)
Cumin powder (2-3 heaped tsp)
Dried mint (2-3 pinches)
200-150 g. passata (also from Tesco, it is so velvety)
2 tsp sugar
Knorr cube, chicken flavour
1 tbs quality olive oil

Mix mince with spices and mint and make into 10 even sized sausages.
Pour the passata into a saucepan, add the Knorr cube, some pepper (no salt! the cube contains enough salt) and some garlic as well as the sugar and bring to the boil.
Add the sausage shaped mince and a little bit of boiling water so that they are nicely covered.
Cover the saucepan, reduce the heat and leave to cook for 20-30 minutes until the sauce has thickened.
Add the olive oil at the end of the cooking to preserve its goodness.

Whist the soutzoukakia are cooking, you can boil a sweet potato with two small white potatoes (peel and cut into cubes, don't forget to salt them) and when soft (takes about 20 minutes) mash them with a fork or other method you normally use.

Serve 2.5 soutzoukakia per person with a quarter of the mash and a bit of the sauce along with any fresh salad or steam vegetables of your choice.

Total points value of the recipe: 19 => less than 5 points per portion!

The mince itself is worth 11.5 points for the entire recipe so if you avoid the potatoes, you can enjoy a larger portion with some steamed vegetables (the sauce will make them taste soooo good!)

Thoughts on diets, surgery and... swimming!

Three and a half weeks into my Weight Watchers diet and I've achieved my first weight loss target of 5 kgs. It feels good. It wasn't particularly hard to do, I have eaten more than my allowed points on occasion but did not let that hinder me. I keep telling myself that tomorrow is another day and all I have to do is try to stay within my points allowance.

I just placed a grocery order online to Tesco and managed to avoid the pitfalls of sweets and snacks. A single glance at their nutrition labels was enough to keep me on the straight and narrow. A TV advert that raises awareness about saturated fats and clogged arteries has also helped me stick to my guns.

Do I have regrets? Well, yes. I am human, after all. Sometimes I think of people who can eat all they want and miss the taste of certain calorific foods/combinations. However, my motivation is NOT to have surgery. I keep thinking that God created us perfect, and therefore we have to respect His design and not try to improve on it with surgery. Especially when that surgery changes the way things work. Obviously I would not object to surgery that is meant to fix a gross deformity or help a person see, breathe or chew better. I would even consider a tummy tuck or breast lift acceptable (but not a breast augmentation using implants).

My mother keeps telling me on the phone that she watched this and that on TV and there was this huge person who lost so many kilos following weight loss surgery (WLS)... blah blah blah. I try to explain to her that for everyone that has succeeded, there are hundreds that have failed, but she can't understand.

I think that WLS was a fad and is slowly passing. People are going back to tried and tested methods who have the minimum impact on their health.

So please don't let me hear anyone say that diets don't work. They do, if you are prepared to change your habits, keep a daily food and drinks diary, and stick with it no matter what.

I wasted valuable time... why did I rely so much on bariatrics to solve my problem? Whilst I was going from doctor to doctor, Marcy had been dieting (Marcy is a member of a forum that I belong to). She is much further down the road than I am, much closer to her end goal.

I did not have will power... But what is will power? Where do you get that from? I still don't know. But if you take it one day at a time and always aim to do your best, it works.

It is like jumping off a tall cliff into the sea below. You stand on the edge and stare down and contemplate... but you don't take the plunge. You hope that someone will push you but people are afraid to interfere. So you stand at the edge and stare and wish you could do what others are doing but fear holds you back. Fear, indecision... Then you take a deep breath and step into the void. You think no more. There! It's done. And, damn it, it feels so good! :)

Diet Is a Four-Letter Word

Nearly the end of my third week doing Weight Watchers online and my first time eating out. We went to the Old Orleans restaurant yesterday and I just realised I forgot to count the points of the popcorn we had...

I now know that hunger makes me vulnerable. My daughter's dish was served first (fish and chips) and I just had to have a taste... again, not counting the points. But I refused to order a soft drink or juice so I saved some calories there. I calculated I had 25 points at lunch without the ones that went uncounted. That is a lot of calories in one seating... 24 points is what a dieter ought to be eating in any 24 hours!

At least I enjoyed myself - well, enjoyed is a bit of an overstatement with my daughter misbehaving in public and frustrating me and the slow service and mishaps in the restaurant's kitchen. Sometimes I despair that I shall ever be able to have a normal life, you know dating, eating out...

Talking about dating, I placed an ad online and had an amazing response... from Africans! *sigh* Where have all the good men gone? Why can't a woman like me find a companion who doesn't consider her his meal ticket? I feel sorry for my daughter. The more she grows, the more she realises that things are not right.

I'll try to keep busy now, not to think of my problems. I want to make some paper macher Easter eggs. Might be able to sell some. It would be nice to earn some money instead of just spending it on art materials. LOL

Snowed in!

Today we woke up to a winter wonderland. It had snowed overnight and everything was under 15 cm of snow. Constantina was very excited and couldn't wait to go outdoors and build herself a snowman. My neighbour texted me to ask if our daughters could play together as the local school was closed. It didn't occur to me at that moment that things were more serious than they seemed.



From the news, I hear there are no buses, most schools and businesses remained closed and those that opened are working with limited staff because ... well, who would have wanted to go to work when they can stay home and enjoy snowball fights with their children?

C's dad cannot come to visit as planned because he is snowed in - literally. He lives in the countryside where, unless a local farmer decides to take a ride on his tractor, the roads do not get cleared.

I feel sad. I am so lonely it hurts!

Next I had a phonecall from Tesco telling me they won't be doing any deliveries today due to bad weather and I would have to re-place my order.

Of course my internet connection is playing up since last Thursday, meaning when I do get through, I cannot maintain connection for more than 5-10 minutes and then it takes several long efforts to reconnect. Damned 3 mobile! I rang them so many times to sort the problem out. Apparently they were doing works in our area to make their service better. This is when you say 'if it is not broke, why fix it?' They claim the works are finished and I should have been able to connect since the weekend. Despite numerous hour-long consultations with them (all costing a lot of money as it is an 0870 number), I still have the same problem. ARGGGH!

Can it get worse? I am sure it can, but I don't want it to because it already feels dreadful. I hope the weather will clear soon as we are going to run out of food.

Constantina came back soaked to the bone as my neighbour did not pay much attention to her and I had to put all her clothes and shoes on the radiators to dry. I made her a hot cup of cocoa and she finished up her porridge that she had left over from breakfast time. Then she climbed onto the sofa and covered herself with her duvet to watch children's TV.

Maybe I should use my positive mental attitude and concentrate on the fact that I lost 2 kgs since last week (2.7 since my return from Greece). I am sure if I hadn't cheated, I would have done much better but I am only human and I still turn to food when I am frustrated.

Think I am getting cabin fever. Pray for me! LOL