A weight off my mind (and body)

I went to see my locum yesterday as a sort of 'half way through' check up. So these measurements are completely accurate and not subject to dodgey scales or wishful thinking.

In 7 weeks since I started I've gone from a hippo-tastic 15'10 to an aerodynamic 13'2! That's 2 stone 8 pounds in 7 weeks! I've lost 13cm from my boobs, 11 from my tummy and 11 from my hips! Doors that I once had to navigate myself through I am now dancing through whilst shaking my considerably smaller booty.

AND my hair hasn't all fallen out, which everyone assured me it would.

AND I've been asked out!

AND I told one of the not very nice people at work to shove off today, instead of muttering sarcastic quips under my breath and then running back to my computer to tell everyone about them on here.

If I had a party popper I'd pop it right now and hang the consequences.

WEEK 7

AND, JUST TO REMIND YOU, WEEK 0

Still no news on the man I'm afraid. Haven't even seen him since. Am getting all sorts of very conflicting advice - should I go seek him out myself? Should I flirt with someone near to him (a laughable suggestion, clearly put forward by someone who's never seen me attempting to flirt)? Should I remain aloof and wait? Or should I just chalk it up to experience and remember that I'm not even entirely sure if I like him anyway!?! It's a bit of a conundrum quite frankly!

The pupil becomes the master

Have been overtaken by an uncontrollable urge to dance today. All day long I've been pirouetting, moonwalking and making jazz hands at opportune moments and I have no idea why!

Normally this is the result of watching Dirty Dancing/High School Musical/Other classics of the genre, but today I have no idea- I'm just absurdly happy!

Spent the day at my Mums, which is always fun. She's thinking of doing this diet too, and I ALMOST found myself doing what other people have done to me; the old "oh you don't need to lose weight" because they're too uncomfortable around the subject to offer a real opinion. I stopped myself just in time, and told her all about it (technology and Mum don't go that well together, not sure she'd be ready for the idea of reading a website just yet).

So I spent the afternoon showing off my newly acquired knowledge about fatty acids and the difference between good carbohydrates and bad carbohydrates etc, feeling very superior. It was interesting for me, because if my Mum doesn't know this stuff, exactly where was I supposed to learn it from? I have no intention of turning in to some Jamie Oliver-esq hippie rushing around schools and pushing pamphlets about the power of wholegrain under people's noses, but I honestly didn't know this stuff! And if I didn't know it, no wonder I kept putting on pound after pound (although admittedly I did know that chocolate cake was bad and that didn't stop me much.)

Would I have become 6 stone overweight if I'd known all of the things I'm learning about now? Would I have paid attention if someone had tried to teach me before I had hit rock bottom? Who knows, and I'm not trying to pass the buck on to society/advertising/peer pressure or anything like that, but do you want to know what I learnt about in food technology at school?

We did one term making Christmas cakes, one term making soups, and one term making sandwiches. Seriously, I did a whole 12 weeks learning how to make sandwiches!! I honestly don't remember anyone mentioning that if I ate white bread instead of brown for the next 5 years I'd wind up on a Doctor's couch hearing the words "morbidly obese" followed by "severe coronary complications."

Pros and Cons

NEGATIVES:

• Feeling much colder than I normally would. I was told this might happen, something to do with less excess energy for heat and less body fat than I'm used to. Find this interesting, does it mean that skinny midget girls are constantly cold? And if so, how on earth do they walk around with bare midrifts all year round?
• Keep getting pins and needles randomly. Bit weird, apparently it's because I'm still not drinking enough. Because all food contains some water, so you don't really realise how much you're taking in, and blood needs water to get round the body. So must do better there.
• Still have a slightly dry mouth, but think this is to do with the water thing again. I'm supposed to drink 5l a day but that's a LOT!!!

POSITIVES:

• Fit in to my size 20 jeans today, which I brought a year ago and never wore
• Also fit in to favourite top which have never actually worn and thought it would spend it's days lying in my wardrobe looking pretty but unatainable
• Bowels nice and regular, think we've definitely clearer up that little fiasco
• Lots of nice compliments from various people
• Compared photos of myself now and 3 weeks ago and my goodness but you can notice it!
• Learnt lots more about foods - apparently brown rice, bread and possibly sugar is much better for me than white rice, bread and possibly sugar (may have made up the sugar thing, I'll look it up at some point)
• Evil girls in office appear to be giving up
• Feeling much more confident at work, better able to voice opinion without assuming that everyone else is thinking "well what does she know, she's fat!"
• AM 14stone, 3pounds and 9 ounces!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOP!
  

Temptation

14st 4lbs (v.g.), calories 450 (slightly repetitive there), Cravings denied 1,000 (v.g.), Cravings given into 0 (excellent!), Books read Moved on to Bridget Jones 2 now

Don't worry people, you can stop crying hysterically, I'm not dead! Nor have I fallen off the dieting bandwagon! I just went out and got me a life for a couple of days and I'm afraid to say blogging took a bit of a backseat for a while.

But don't worry, that madness has passed and I shall probably not do anything vaguely interesting for the next few weeks and will be able to write every day about the sheer mundaneness of life. Guess that's one of the problems with blogging - if I led a more interesting life worth talking about in great detail then I wouldn't have time to write about it. Bet Edmund Hillary doesn't keep a blog.

The last few days, I've had friends round, and I've been out with friends just like most crazy, 'mad fer it' 24 year olds. What struck me the most is how much of life revolves around food.

Most social activities include some sort of accompanying food. We went to see Bond (bloody awful) it was popcorn and ice cream. We went bowling, it was hotdogs. We went shopping, and 'popped in for a coffee and maybe just a little slice of cake.' We had a girls night in with a dvd, and of course, pizza was ordered. We played poker, and it was crisps and nibbles.

Now I wasn't hungry for most of this, and, like Howard's Way promised, by now I'm really not craving food in the same way as before. But it's very hard to break the habit of eating food that's in front of you - it's almost an unconscious thing.

These were great friends I was hanging out with, and not people who were deliberately putting temptation before me, but I couldn't help noticing just how much I must've eaten before!! When I used to 'record' the food I ate each day, I never would've thought to include the obscene amounts of 'nibbles' I ate, or little snacks used to 'keep me going' when shopping, or the bars of chocolate used to 'pick me up' when I was a bit down. Guess I'm finally learning what I actually need to survive, and what is excess!

These past few days would've been really hard for me, what with all the food under my nose the whole time. Of course my amazing friends offered to not get all of the junk food in, and of course I said that they should and it wouldn't be a problem, but it sure wasn't easy to keep having to stop myself as I leant forwards to grab some popcorn. Think I looked like I'd developed a twitch actually.

But I got through it, I live to diet another day! And at 14stone 4, I've seen enough results to keep me well and truly on the straight and narrow!

Me and the mastiff

Read a great post today from another guy on a liquid diet. He'd just passed the 250lbs mark, and was feeling justifiably proud of himself, and he chose to put this photo on his blog:

Why? Because the average black bear weighs 250kg apparently! So it got me thinking that I could rate my weekly success by which animal I weighed the same as (to be honest, much as I'm LOVING doing my little Excel graph which documents my weightloss (this is of course slightly unreliable now after the 'wrongly callibrated scales' debacle, which has RUINED my beautiful downwards curve!), and I thought that a beautiful chart which had a photo of a different animal each week would be something else that I could waste time on. (I lie, beautifully colour coded graphs are never a waste of time, just so long as the line goes downwards!)

Anyway, turns out it's harder than I expected to find out the average weight of animals. I google-d it, I wikipedia-ed it, I even encycolpedia-ed it, and all I got was a bunch of nutters worried that their poodle might be pregnant. But during my highly unsuccessful attempt to visualise my journey from hippo to ...hamster (alliteration won out over making sense there I'm afraid) I did find out some fascinating facts to share with you.

• An average African elephant will eat AT LEAST my weight everyday in food, and drink 113litres of water (I'm struggling to get through my required 4!)
• A mastiff (biiiiiig type of dog) averages 170-220 lbs. (That's the closest I could get to an animal that weighs the same as me.)
• Americans stop eating when they're full, whereas Europeans stop eating when they're no longer hungry. Big difference if you ask me, and it's the main thing I'm going to put in to practise when I'm back on regular food.

I went to the gym yesterday. Normally, when I was on diets before, I went first thing in the morning before anyone got there so that I could exercise without anyone worrying about the structural damage to the building. And although I've not lost a really noticeable amount yet, although I'm still obese, I didn't feel the need to hide today. I felt like people were staring at me, but somehow those glances and little smirks didn't seem the same today, they seemed positive, encouraging almost. I don't know if that's a difference in perception, or a difference in confidence, but I really noticed it today and I did the longest workout I've ever done because of it.

Maybe people just suddenly woke up nicer! Guess we'll wait to see the girls at work on Monday to find out how long it lasts!!!

yet another constipation based posting

Now I'm not normally the sort of person who rates their days based on the number of times they've managed to poo, but if I were, then today would have been a good day.

Three whole poos! I thought the constipation had gone a couple of days ago, but I was still having a few problems in that department, so my locum lady suggested a stronger laxative. And it worked wonders! Feeling more sprightly as a result - which is funny, because it wasn't like there was a lot there, but I feel much lighter now it's come out.

Bad news today. Turns out my scales are calibrated slightly wrongly, and have been giving me readings that were about 2lbs under what I actually am. I go to the gym or Tescos to get officially weighed once a week, so I've been thinking that on those days I just happen to be randomly putting on weight and the day after I'm doing well (yes, it did take me a whole 2 weeks to notice, please don't laugh!)

Anyway, I thought I was 14'8 when I woke up this morning, turns out I'm really 14'10. It's still good, it's still a stone lost, but there's still a long way to go before I'm going to be prancing around in a bikini.

Sketch show humour

Weight: 14stone 10lbs, alcohol units: 0, calories: 450 (v good), encounters with mean girls: 450 (conservative estimate), styles of writing copied from Bridget Jones: 1

Funniest thing ever happened today. I almost had to look around me to make sure I wasn't in a sketch show because it was so damned ridiculous!

I was talking to some girls at work, and they're both maybe a tad overweight but nothing to write home about. One of them offered me tea, and it's always a bit embarassing turning down tea because no one understands why I'm not allowed things like that (technically I am allowed tea, but no milk in it - yuck!). So I reminded her about the diet, and she apologised and said she was being inconsiderate. Then the other one, straight off, said "I'm getting a McDonalds later, bet you wish you could have one!" At which they both chuckled hysterically.

So I (after counting slowly to 10) said "I know this diet may seem a little extreme to you, but it's really working for me and hopefully in a few months time I"ll be thin."

Then they (and this is the funny part) said "OH. SO YOU'RE SAYING WE'RE FAT ARE YOU!?"

Self absorbed much?

It was only afterwards when I thought how WITTY it would have been to say "oh shove it up your bottoms you big stinky piles of horse manure" or something of that tone, but alas, I was still spluttering away to myself when they linked arms and marched away, noses in the air.

Putting it back on

Since well before I started this diet, I've known that losing the weight is the easy part. The hard part is keeping it off for the rest of your life.

The way I feel at the moment, it's almost impossible to imagine that after 12 weeks of this diet, I'll EVER put myself in a position where I'm overweight, even less dangerously obese, again.
I'm feeling so strong right now, like nothing can stop me achieving this. And I know I've only been on the diet for a 10 days or so, and I know that it's easy in the beginning because the weight comes off so fast, but having been obese for so long, and feeling so wonderful now, I feel like every time I look at that second slice of chocolate cake in the future I'll remember and I'll have that incentive to stop myself.

Because it's all about incentive. I got fat when I was depressed, and I didn't think anyone cared about how I looked. Then, once I was fat, I had no incentive to stop eating, because what did it matter - I was already fat. And that's how I became obese.

I nowhere near where I want to be yet in terms of size or appearance, but the difference in how I feel when I walk in a room now, compared with just a fortnight ago is just breathtaking, and if that carries on, then nothing is ever going to bring me down again.

...except possibly the weather. That's a bit shite.

Blogs

Also, I spent a lot of time today looking at blogs (in my spare time of course, I would certainly never consider wasting time while I'm at work looking at blogs on the computer when I could be doing so many more productive things like....)

It was really nice to be able to comment on some of the people's blogs that I've been reading for ages, when I was trying to get up the courage to start this diet and this blog. I think people on the internet can be a real inspiration to other people, even if they're a million miles away, because it's always nice to know that whatever you're going through, someone else has been there are felt that.

So thank you to everyone who inspired this diet, because I really feel that it's given me a massive boost already. I'm a stone lighter than I was a week ago and if I'd known it was this easy, I'd have done it years ago!

Opinions on surgery.

Read a great post today from "Tales of the morbidly obese". It's an old post, but will always be relevant I think.

"Sometimes I wonder about the people who stumble upon this blog from comments on other blogs or just from searches. Are they just disgusted like people are in the real world by morbidly obese people? Am I somehow even less since I used surgery to escape the prison of morbid obesity?

Just I am just starting to learn what it is like to travel in a regular size body. No one can know the cumulative effects of morbid obesity without having lived it. Every day is one indignity after another. While you are suffering through those, people expect a constantly sunny disposition. You feel beholden to give them the funny, smiling fatty persona they expect.

What about you? The ones who have stumbled on this blog. Look at my before pictures and tell what you would have thought of me seeing me on the street. How does your impression change by seeing recent pictures of me? Or does it? Is the fat lot cast?"

It makes me really regret my previous post about people who get surgery to 'release themselves from the prison of morbid obesity.' At the time (and this was only a week ago), it seemed like surgery was a cheat. That somehow, by paying rather than working for the weight loss, you somehow don't deserve it. It's taken me a week of drinking nothing but milkshakes to realise that being morbidly obese is payment in itself, and anything that you do to relieve yourself from that prison is a positive step, and one that everyone should respect.

Surgery is not for me, it's not something that I ever considered, but I would like to apologise to everyone who has 'gone under the knife,' because I realise that I've been trying to disassociate myself from you. In my arrogance, I've passed judgement on other people who have been through the social ostracism, taunts, and feelings of self disgust that have plagued me for most of my life, and I have labelled them cheats because they found a way out of it.

Do other people consider me a cheat because I've chosen the relatively easy weight loss plan of a Very Low Calorie Diet instead of stomach crunches every morning? Probably. This diet is the easiest thing I've ever done - I don't have to even think about cooking or washing up, and the weight is just falling off me. It's probably considerably easier than surgery, and involves considerably less risk, money and pain.

I watched Louis Theroux last night, doing a documentary on plastic surgery in which he actually wound up getting liposuction. It was amazing to see the confidence people gained from their surgery, and the happier they were in their lives afterwards. I'm still no fan of it, but who am I to deny other fat people their chance at a happy life where people don't stare at them as they walk down the street. From now, anything that makes someone happy is just fine by me.

Constipation update

I know that everyone is just dying to know the updated state of my bowels after Thursday's riveting post on the subject. How could I be so callous as to do a whole post without mentioning it!?!

Well, you'll be pleased to hear that I am no longer getting the tummy pains or making the embarrassing gurgling noises. I took a slightly stronger laxative that my locum recommended and believe that there is now officially nothing left to come out.

Let me hear you say wooooop!!!

I'm so happy today. I went to the gym and did a good workout, I am over the constipation debacle, I passed the test so I know everything there is to know about what's going on in my body, and I got through a shopping trip to Tescos without really desiring anything. Also, my pyjama bottoms fell off when I stood up this morning!!!

I brought a top ages ago that I really liked and then promptly put on about half a stone before I had the opportunity to wear it. It's been sitting in my wardrobe for months, staring at me accusingly every time I chose my trackybums. It even still has the price tag on it, but I couldn't stand to take it back and hear the shop assistant thinking "bit optimistic were we fatty?"

I shall try it on tomorrow, and if it fits I shall go and find that hypothetical shop assistant and I shall do a little dance infront of her, and then she'll be sorry! Then they'll all be sorry!!!

other people's reactions

Normally when I start a diet, I don't tell anyone.

It's not that I'm afraid of their reaction if I fail or anything logical like that, it's just that I find that people fall in to about 4 basic categories:

- Supportive. I can deal with these people, they're nice and leave me to get on with it while occasionally remarking how thin I'm looking

- Bemused. After the unbelievable frustrating chorus of "oh but you're fine the way you are!" (which traditionally leaves me unmotivated and with an overwhelming desire to scream "apart from the fact that I'm about 4lbs away from being Jabba the Hut!")

- Critical. Thought I was over-reacting to the bemused people? Try telling me that I'm dieting all wrong and should try cutting out all carbs and jogging 6 miles every morning if you want to see me turn slowly purple in an effort not to choke on my own bitter retorts.

- Destructive. These are the worst. They pretend to be your friend, and start of all supportive, whilst secretly plotting to undermine your willpower by 'rewarding' you for losing a pound with a large slab of chocolate cake that they cooked especially for you and will be soooo hurt if you don't just take a bite. There is no circle in hell deep enough for these people. Except the one populated by double-glazing sales people.

So that is a basic summary of why I don't tell people when I go on a diet, but unfortunately that means that there's not as much pressure to stay on the straight and narrow. This diet, I decided to tell everyone about. Mostly because it's quite hard to hide the fact that I'm only drinking milkshakes for 12 weeks, but more importantly, it's because I'm actually really proud of myself for deciding to do this diet.

This is not a fad diet, this is me changing my life around. I've done all the research to answer the critical people, I have more than enough bitter retorts in my armoury for the bemused people, and frankly I am quite prepared to bitch-slap the destructive people. So bring it on.

Constipation.

Constipation is not a funny thing. It may sound funny, but it is quite definitely not.

Was feeling so good today. Although it was Halloween and I'm surrounded by sweeties (I'm sure that England has become more Americanized in it's celebrations of Halloween - there's costumes and special sweetie jars and pumpkin carving kits and, is it just me, or have all the supermarkets done massive discounts on all things sweetie? Back in the day it was a hollowed out pumpkin and possibly a witches hat made out of paper you coloured in yourself the year before.)

Apologies for the brain splurge there. Stay with me.

Back on to the poo thing... I've been having a few laxatives, which have been helping, but I keep hearing these loud and slightly embarassing gurgling noises from my belly which my locum lady has suggested might be a sign that there is more to come out.

So what do you do? Do you force it out, do you wait until it comes out naturally, or do you dose yourself up with laxative? I lost 2lbs today, which is so amazing, but I can't help feeling that if I could just get rid of whatever is left in my belly, I'd lose it even faster.

So that's today's little anecdote, many apologies if I grossed you out with my bowel movements (or lack thereof)! I'm really chuffed today because I've had loads of energy all day, haven't been hungry at all, and I mixed my foods properly at last and have decided that the tomato soup one is actually really quite delicious. Possibly this is just the lack of anything to compare it with, but I'm finding myself looking forward to it like I normally would a bag of chips. Still not big on vegetables of course, but it would take the disintegration of every other food source on the planet before I happily ate most vegetables.

Also today I had my one week check up at Howard's Way. They took pictures (you can already see a big difference to the ones they took a week ago), and took me through all the stuff I've been learning about what's going on in my body (which I shall explain in the next blog).

So, drum roll please.... it's one week in, and my official weight is.....

14stone 12pounds!!!

It's been sooo long since there's been a 14 at the start of my weight!!! And tomorrow I'm allowed to start on the Howard's Way 'bars' which are part of the food I'm allowed from now on and I'm really looking forward to something a wee bit solid (unless I have to shit it all out again of course!!!)

why girls are bitches to other girls on diets

Why are girls such bitches? I'm sorry, and I don't mean to be unfair on any of my sex, but mention that you're on a diet to another girl and suddenly the talons come out and she will stop at literally nothing to put you off it.

I was feeling pretty vulnerable today. Although I wasn't expecting the 4lbs a day thing to last, I was pretty gutted when I'd actually put on weight yesterday, so I didn't have my defensive cloak of self belief that had helped me through work yesterday. I was not emotionally prepared to deal with the people sitting next to me and staging long discussions about which foods they were craving and what they were looking forward to for lunch.

Since I decided to go on this diet, I've met with some pretty mixed reactions from the people I've told. I know that Very Low Calorie Diets like this have had some pretty bad press in the past, but if one more person tells me that all my hair will fall out and that I'll be fainting every five minutes, or be left infertile, or probably be dead within a week, I shall think of some very scathing retort and say it to them with one eyebrow raised. And that will show them.

Do people not think that I've researched this? That I didn't spend weeks and weeks on the internet, reading what other people had been through and listening to medical advice before choosing this diet? I've put it down to a few reasons, which I shall now expand upon in my little list that I shall call "why girls are bitches to other girls on diets."

WHY GIRLS ARE BITCHES TO OTHER GIRLS ON DIETS:
- Every girl likes to have a fat best friend to go shopping with/ the beach with/ have as a bridesmaid to make themselves feel better
- Every girl has tried to diet and failed, and the possibility that you might succeed is too much to bear
- Girls figure that the fatter the rest of the world is, the thinner they will look by comparison
- Girls are naturally bitchy, and this is simply an opportunity to show it.

I will undoubtedly think of more and add them to the list in the coming weeks.

Anyway, on the (vaguely) plus side, I lost 3lbs today, which makes up slightly for yesterdays little debacle, and I'm back on track. Sorry for the rant.

bugger

Bit depressed today. Put on 2lbs and have no idea how.

I did everything right. I ate my milkshakes, I drank loads of water, I peed in a bottle... how can fat possibly have found its way in to my body!?!?

I even pooed today, which is something that I actually hadn't done since starting the diet. I know that no one wants to hear about my bowel movements, but I think it might be important. I hadn't been for a few days, but hadn't really noticed, what with all my trips to the bathroom for the other one. So Denise recommended Senokot, and she said it was pretty common, so I took that and I went twice so how did I put on weight!!!

And I was having such a good day too! The headaches gone, the food was mixed better and really quite palatable, and I had this amazing burst of energy mid afternoon where I was more energetic that I've been in years.

Bit depressed, but am going to solider on. They did say this might happen, but it is gutting. Ruins my whole chart!!!

oh...my...god!!!

No one is going to believe this...hell, even I don't really believe it and I have the print out to prove it... I lost 4lbs today!! 4 whole pounds! How is that even possible! And how did I not do this sooner!

I wont pretend I had the best day. I've still got the headache that I went to bed with last night, and I'm not sure if it's related but you surely can't just lose 4lbs with no side effects whatsoever. They did mention I might feel a bit headachey in the first week- I'm supposed to drink more water, but seriously, I'm running to the bathroom every half hour as it is!!!

I had to go all the way to Tescos to get myself weighed again so I could get the official print out for Howard's Way, and while I was there I brought myself some electric scales (something I've never had any inclination to do before!!!) so I can keep track a bit better. I had to do the food shopping for my Dad and sister too, which sucked! The foods I've been given do take away my hunger, and it's not like I feel a need for food, but it's pretty hard to be around all that food, and all those smells and variety of different tastes.

Today's foods were better than yesterdays, I think because I mixed them better. I had strawberry milkshake for breakfast, chicken soup for lunch and chocolate shake again for dinner. All reasonably tasty, which is a huge relief. I asked the people at Howard's Way about it actually, when I was deciding which diet to do and was petrified that I'd wind up eating something that tasted like turd in water for 12 weeks, and she said that they made them 'nice' rather than 'delicious' because with delicious some people will love them and some will hate them, but with nice, everyone likes them enough. Seems a bit weird, but I like them and they're certainly working thus far so no complaints from me!!!

First day!

Today was my first real day on the Howard's Way Diet, in 12 weeks I shall be frequently mistaken for Twiggy!

I woke up early and excited- I had my first call with my locum (random thought: what is a locum exactly? I shall Wikipedia it...

"Locum, short for the Latin phrase locum tenens (lit. "place-holder," akin to lieutenant), is a person who temporarily fulfills the duties of another. For example, a Locum doctor is a doctor who works in the place of the regular doctor when that doctor is absent. These professionals are still governed by their respective regulatory bodies, despite the transient nature of their positions."

...so that explains that one.)

I called my locum, her name is Denise and she seemed really nice and positive, set my mind at rest about a few things and got me all buoyed up and confident that I can do it. What's nice actually, is that all of the staff of this diet thing have done it themselves before- they were obese and now they're not, which helps because I have always hated it when people tell me they know how I'm feeling (normally as they show me the half pound that they put on over Christmas) but I've seen pictures of Denise when she was my size so at least I don't have the words "skinny bitch" going around in my head every time she says she knows what I'm going through!!

So first thing I did was to test my pee. That's to see how my body is functioning and responding to the treatment. I pee in a bottle (which is an art in itself) and then someone I trust (my big brother) dips a papery thing in it and records the colour it turns and fills it in on a little chart. Apparently I'm a level 5, although whether this is a good thing or a not I have no idea.

Charts help. I'm going to make loads of charts of my weight going down and all of my measurements, and then I'm going to put them into Excel and colour code them and get all excited. These are the things that make me happy. It's a sad life, but I enjoy it. I may even buy some stationary!

Anyway, had a chocolate milkshake first thing, but I added too much water and it came out a bit weird. I drank it anyway and it was ok, nothing to write home about but I can definitely live with it. Had a bunch of stuff to do today, as it was a Saturday, so I kept nice and busy and didn't think about it much, but I really didn't get hungry until lunch.

I never know how much of what I eat is hunger and how much is just plain boredom, and that's what worries me slightly about this diet. I've read enough to know that it'll stop me being hungry, and curb my cravings, but how do I stop boredom/comfort eating? I guess that's where the will power bit comes in, and there are special bars and stuff that I've been given, but if I do fail (which I wont) then that will be why (even though I wont.)

So I got me a swanky new hairdo (to go with my new figure...a little premature some might say, but I've always been an optimist), and did some errands before lunch, which was a vegetable soup thing. Not a big vegetable person, so I wasn't really expecting to love that one, and I didn't. Luckily I'm allowed to choose the flavours I want, so I'll ask them to not send any more vegetabley things.

Then I went to see High School Musical 3 with a mate. Totally rocks. Zac Efron is totally hot. We were probably the only people in there who had hit puberty, but I danced my little heart out!

Supper was a butterscotch milkshake. Mixed it right this time and it was pretty tasty. Not Ben and Jerrys, but I could happily live off them for a while! I weighed myself again. Didn't see a difference, but I put it on my chart :) I rang my locum lady as well- they check up on you a lot during the first week, I guess because it's all pretty complicated and new. Apparently I'm still not drinking enough water (drank 3 litres and spent a good half of the day running to the bathroom!), but other than that I got me a gold star. Going to bed now because I have a bit of a headache coming on, hopefully will lose some weight in the night. Bridget Jones often did.

ps. According to the advertising (which I am a sucker for), "Howard's Way is the next best thing to going to bed and waking up thin." I'll let you know tomorrow!!!!!

The 'F' word

Do you know what I find hilariously hilarious? The effort people take to avoid mentioning the word 'fat' in front of me- do they think I've not noticed? That perhaps just saying the word within my vicinity will shatter my self esteem?

I've been called 'large,' 'round', and my personal favourite; 'cuddly.' Think I'd rather just be called fat and have done with it! The problem is of course, that the word fat now implies just about every negative characteristic under the sun; to be fat is to be stupid, lazy and probably flatulent as well.

So I officially start my diet today. I'm very excited! I got myself weighed last night though, and it turns out that I've put on 3 pounds since I signed up! How is that even possible!!!

I thought I'd been pretty good, but it just reaffirms to me that I have not got a clue about what is healthy and what is not (although even I knew that the two McDonalds mid week were probably not good). Looking forward to just being given food and taught what to avoid in the future! I was watching 'Mock the Week' and they were laughing at the idea of kids having lessons in how to eat fruit- sounds dumb, but if they can teach me a way of making fruit more appetising than chocolate cake then I'm sold!

So I'm now 15st 10pounds, which is my official start of diet weight. In 12 weeks time I'll be a svelte 12stone 10, and then I shall conquer the world (or at least be able to keep jeans for more than a few months without them rubbing holes in the thighs). I'm aiming for 3 stone, although I do know that I'll still be overweight. I wanted to pick an amount I knew was achievable, and go from there.

I shall eat/drink my first milkshake now. Hope it doesn't taste too ick and that it fills me up. Those are my main worries, but I spoke to my locum last night and she promised that they aren't too gross and that they fill you up as well as reducing your appetite. Sounds promising, but I shall let you know! Don't go away!!

TFR Total Food Replacement

Oooh, forgot to say- my food came today!

The Very Low Calorie Diet that I'm on is a TFR, or Total Food Replacement. That means I'm not allowed to eat or drink ANYTHING except what they give me (and water). I knew that bit already, but didn't realise how strict it was!

I'm not allowed to
- chew gum
- have headache tablets with sugar on (!)
- have milk or sugar in my coffee!

Apparently in a few days after I start (can't start til I've done a few more checks, which is good because there's so much information in the pack I got this morning that I don't even know where to begin!) I go in to 'Ketosis' which means "state in metabolism occurring when the liver excessively converts fat into fatty acids and ketone bodies which can be used by the body for energy" (gotta love Wiki!). This is apparently a good thing, because when it happens I don't crave food any more and my body uses is better able to use my stored glucose to run my body.

I hope I sounded like I knew what I was talking about there, I've been reading for hours and I'm still a bit confused. Guess that's why I go to Howard's Way for classes and support once a week!