Tag Archive for 'points'

1st May – New Month – New Start

Published
by
thetoad
on 1 May 2008
in Dieting, Food and Mental Health
. 0 Comments

Greetings audience, I offer my apologies for neglecting the blog for as long as I have.

Basically, after the psychiatric assessment I lost the plot a little bit – going over the past and stirring up the mud at the bottom of the pond is never good for me and I got a lot ill for a couple of days. I didn’t much feel like blogging, in fact, I didn’t feel much like doing anything much at all.

Then when I’d just about got myself together, TuT had to go away for a couple of days for a training course for his job. I know couples that don’t mind separation, that can deal with one of them spending Monday to Friday away and just spending weekends together, but that is not the relationship TuT and I have. We both HATE being apart. Especially at night. It was playing on my mind, TuT’s impending departure for a few days, and this further added to my stress in trying to get over the psychiatric assessment.

TuT left on the Sunday afternoon, leaving me with an empty hollow feeling in my stomach, that was never full, no matter how much food I ate. I tried to stick to my weight watchers points, but was comfort eating. I hate spending long periods of time on my own. I was also scared to death that something would happen to TuT on his long drive to the North.

On the Monday I decided to treat myself to something nice for lunch as I was hungry and hadn’t really eaten a proper evening meal on Sunday evening. In town there is a sandwich shop – doing all the typical sandwich fillings and jacket potatoes, but it is run by Thai people. In addition to doing the normal stuff you expect from a sandwich shop they have a Thai menu.

I was craving a Chinese take away with TuT away, but, they are never open at lunch time, so I thought I would satisfy my craving with a Thai Takeaway. I ordered the Thai noodle soup – with eager anticipation. What I got was a bag of micro-waved supernoodles, the vegetable component was carrots and cauliflower – I had no idea that cauliflowers were Thai?! And a few pieces of sandwich chicken. I was disappointed, but starving, so ate a fair bit of it, but then felt really bad.

Supernoodles can be up to 12 points – and they are certainly not worth 12 points. So I just felt like I had ruined weight watchers on something that wasn’t even worth it.

I recently read an article that explained that cravings are not actually your body signalling that you are low on a particular vitamin or mineral. For example just before your period you sometimes justify the chocolate craving as your body needing sugar and magnesium. Or if you crave crisps it’s because your body is low on sodium. In actual fact these cravings are down to a craving for comfort as these are the foods that we associate with happy and comforting times. It’s a psychological craving as opposed to a physical need.

I read this article after the Chinese takeaway cravings I’d experienced whilst TuT was away; and it made sense. Chinese takeaways are my favourite take away and TuT and I often enjoy one together on a Friday night at the beginning of the weekend – I have rarely ever ordered a Chinese take away on my own before moving in with TuT – so I was craving the togetherness of enjoying a Chinese takeaway together, which is something I always associate with Friday nights and the beginning of TuT and I’s weekend together.

On the third day of TuT’s absence my parents arrived for a short stay. They weren’t up for bedding down on the inflatable air bed in our spare room, so stayed in a nearby hotel.

Spending days with my parents also spelt diet disaster. Already, thanks to the evil “Thai” noodles and comfort eating I had a 1lb gain on the scales on the Tuesday morning weigh – in. It was annoying, but not unexpected, due to the foods I had been eating.
My parents took me to the posh sandwich shop over the road for Tuesday’s lunch and then we had some lagers whilst watching the football in the evening, and finally, for me, a Chinese takeaway!!! Craving satisfied, whilst sharing with my mum.

The next day saw us going to Brighton for the day and we went for a lovely lunch at an “all-you-can-eat” Italian – pizza, pasta, salad and garlic bread. It was delicious and I tried to focus on filling up on the delicious salad bar.

In the evening I wanted some “mum cooked goodness”; so I got mum to cook tea for us all out of the ingredients I had in the flat. We had savoury mince with mashed potatoes (the aunt bessie’s frozen version! – thank you Delia!) and vegetables. It was comforting and delicious and fairly healthy I would say; although by this point I had abandoned sticking to my weight watchers points allowance as I had no idea how to point what I had eaten so just tried to keep things as healthy as possible, whilst not pointing.

TuT returned on Wednesday night – hurrah! So happy he returned safely. The parents left on Thursday lunch time and I was pretty stressed out by all the changes. It was wonderful seeing the parental units, but a total change to my usual routine and with TuT being away as well, plus still getting over the psychiatric assessment; the upshot was by Friday I lost the plot big time.
I had this constant churning feeling in my stomach and was convinced that cosmic forces were out to get me. I couldn’t stop crying and my head was constantly buzzing with sounds and thoughts. I managed to get through to the nurse that had conducted my psych assessment – by this point I was thinking that I needed to be on the psych ward I felt so spaced out and frightened, all the time, with a churning stomach. It was awful.

The nurse agreed to see me that afternoon, and there was talk of a doctor being called in to potentially give me something to calm things down a bit for me. I was a total state.

After seeing the nurse things calmed down a bit. I talked through everything and the churning feeling eased off somewhat. The psych nurse explained that there had been a mess up with my referral to the day hospital and it would be a while before they picked me up, so in the meantime she would see me – “off the record” as it were, to keep an eye on me until my support system was properly in place. This was reassuring.

TuT and I enjoyed a wonderful weekend together, without the shadow of TuT going away as we had had the previous weekend.
Tuesday morning revealed another 1lb gain, which to say I had been comfort eating with TuT away and hadn’t pointed my food the whole time my parents were staying and when TuT came home, was expected, and to be fair, with what I’d eaten, I could have deserved to have put on a little more.

I just need to focus now. I bought one of the weight watchers journals, and I am going to fill in every single bite of food and every single drink and track all my points properly from now on.

I am also wearing my weight watchers points pedometer and trying to beat the previous days bonus point earning score.
So yesterday, armed with my trusty pedometer on my pocket, I marched to see my psych nurse for my second appointment with her and to find out the progress of my referral to the day hospital.

What surprise news I was greeted with when we met, She has arranged to take me on her case load officially and will see me until my referral to the day hospital comes through and continue to support me during my attendance at the day hospital. She is my official care co-ordinator and I now have the support of my own permanent CPN (community psychiatric nurse). This level of support is something I have not had since I lived in the north and is a big relief.

Today is the 1st May and I am a big believer in starting new things, or improving on old things. So first thing, I need to keep all you readers entertained and get blogging again! I think I’ve got off to a good start!

“Do you exercise Portion Caution?!”

Published
by
thetoad
on 1 April 2008
in Dieting, Food and Losing Weight
. 0 Comments

Well, it’s Tuesday and this morning was Weight Watchers. I was really good yesterday fight-fighting-friends. I went out on the bike for 13km. It’s all relatively flat along the coast roads, but I could feel my legs working away as I cycled along and I was out for nearly an hour so I was pleased with my efforts.

Lunch was a homemade low pointed vegetable chillie-con-carne. Then I had a small bowl of point-free homemade celeriac soup to keep me going at 5pm as TuT and I went to the gym together. I love working out with TuT, although he does get a bit grumpy when he gets sweaty and does not like me saying anything like:

“It’s the last two minutes, lets make it COUNT!”

I said this to him once and he was not happy! I think I have just taken too many ‘Spinning’ cycle classes where they bark stuff like that at you the whole 45 minutes. It motivates me, but everyone is different.

Relaxing in the pool and spa bubble bath we both felt virtuous to be spending our Monday night being healthy gym bunnies. We made a healthy tea of more homemade soup and low fat cheese toasties for tea when we got home; then I flopped in front of ‘Delia’ that I’d recorded whilst I had been out at the gym.

Loving her curry recipe that she did last night, a quick consultation of the recipe book revealed where she’d sourced her special curry powder from, TuT was already on the tinter’net and bought up the web page, so I have ordered some Tandoori Masala from www.seasonedpioneers.co.uk. It cost under £5 including postage and packing and when you consider how much a decent jar of curry sauce can be to make your own at home I think it’s good value. Delia’s really did look tasty and appetising - curry is probably one of my most favourite things to eat.

So after all my exercise yesterday – cycling the tour de seafront, going to the gym with TuT, watching my points values and eating virtuous food like homemade point free celeriac soup I was not dreading the weigh in as much as I had been doing at the weekend.

But, wouldn’t you just know it, I haven’t got away with the meals out that I had last week, or the takeaway, or the lack of exercise. Did I deserve to gain 2.5 pounds though? I don’t think that’s fair at all!

My usual leader was away today, she didn’t tell us last week that it would be a different leader this week, I think she did that on purpose, knowing that if you didn’t have to check in with your usual leader you might have slackened off at the Weight Watchers coal face this last week. As I did really, but I have to say, it was a relief not to disappoint my usual leader, and it’s only my second week!

I mentioned being on the injection to the stand-in leader, a lady called Laura, and her resulting comments did make me think about water retention. She said that if I wasn’t drinking enough my body would retain water and hence a gain would be reflected on the scales. When I thought about it, I have been slackening off on drinking my two litre water bottle through the day. So I don’t know if there’s anything in this, but on my first week at Weight Watchers I was good about filling a 2 litre water bottle up in the morning and making sure it was all drunk by tea time.

The meeting was all about portion control. Laura the leader had the expensive Weight Watchers scales that tell you the exact points of what you are eating when you weigh it all out. We went on a whirlwind tour of points in different cereals and what the amounts looked like, pasta points when its dry – 20g dry weight is one point, whether it’s pasta, rice or cous cous. Laura the leader was full of punchy one liners on the subject of portion control:

“If your eyes light up, it’s too big” (?!!)

“Do you exercise portion caution?”

It certainly made me think, and me being an advertiser’s dream – if I was an Eskimo and you made a sales pitch, I probably would buy snow from you – started thinking I really needed the expensive Weight Watchers weighing points scales. Thinking that my lack of weight loss is because I don’t have the magical Weight Watchers weighing scales. I placated myself with the new magazine and a proper points calculator so that TuT and I no longer have to fiddle with the cardboard points wheel that isn’t so accurate when we go shopping.

My friend that joined the first week as me has now lost over half a stone! In two weeks, following the CORE plan. I had a really good chat with her afterwards and I am potentially thinking of doing the core plan this week. I excitedly mentioned had anyone watched ‘Delia’ and seen her fab curry recipe that I am sure is low in points. I was met with stony faced stares – not in the Weight Watchers cook book – NO! (Remember, if you eyes light up it’s too big, Delia!!)

Then I spoke to TuT and he said should we think about doing the Weight Watchers ‘Kickstart’ programme of having 18 points instead of my usual amount for a week. My head is buzzing with ‘core plan’, ‘points plan’, ‘kickstart’. Am I exercising portion caution without the magical scales? It all feels rather manic, I am going to have a coffee and play with my new points calculator and have a think about which direction I need to take on the Weight Watchers journey this week.

Diet Starts On Monday!

Published
by
thetoad
on 31 March 2008
in Dieting, Excercise, Losing Weight and Mental Health
. 0 Comments

So here we are on a Monday and I always think to myself, right! – the diet starts today, we are going to change all the bad habits, eat healthily and lose some weight. This will be the week that changes my dieting lifestyle and will crack the weight loss once and for all. This mentality usually means that on a Sunday I eat a bit more than I should – “diet starts tomorrow” – so it is ok to eat a bit more than I should as I’ll be reining it all in on Monday and being super healthy and super disciplined.

I wouldn’t say since last week’s weigh in I have done anything that deserves a weight loss. For starters, last Monday was Easter Monday and TuT was off work and we did bank holiday stuff like having a homemade chicken and mushroom pie for lunch (small piece of pastry – 5 points – argh!) and going to the cinema, and me not doing any exercise. Tuesday’s weigh in revealed the pound loss – quite disappointing, but it had been the Easter weekend; although mine was entirely chocolate egg free! After Tuesday’s weigh in I decided to be good, but relaxed a bit in myself Tuesday night, knowing weigh in was not for another week and enjoyed a high pointed curry for tea and a couple of wineages in the evening, and did no formal exercise during the day.

Wednesday and we had TuT’s brother and his girlfriend come to stay for the night. The girlfriend arrived with chocolate covered treats and we all went out for a meal which included drinking pints of Stella and lime (!!) and I went over my points for that day. Thursday I was still recovering from my borderline day of illness and our evening meal turned out to be a mixture of convenience foods – savoury rice, pasta and sauce, chicken sticks etc. I was not well enough to cook, we just needed something to go in our tummies for tea that wouldn’t cause a lot of effort or time in the kitchen. It fitted into the points plan – just, but wasn’t the best.

Then Friday comes and we always have a take away, and I treated myself to a gorgeous sandwich from the special sandwich deli shop over the road from us for my lunch. I think the ciabatta bread alone worked out to five points without the filling (coronation chicken – yummy!) and then we had take away pizza for tea.

The borderline mentally unwell days meant I did no exercise all week except for a bit of walking about. I have been sticking to my points over the weekend, just about. But at the higher end of the scale. So I am drawing a line in the sand, I can’t change the fact I was mentally unwell last week and so did not eat so well or do any exercise, it is in the past and I am focusing on the present and what I can do to change things NOW.

So I am closing here for now – it is Monday – Diet Starts TODAY – so I am going out on my bike for a 10km cycle workout, with my Garmin GPS watch so I know how far I have cycled and what work I have done when I upload my cycle ride stats to the computer.