What I Wish I Could Have Told You

As I mentioned way back at the beginning of this year, I’ve been having some difficulties with my physical health for a while now. Over the summer I was put through physio which was actually really helpful and every day that passed made me feel stronger and less weak but underneath it all, I still felt overwhelmingly tired and there were days when my muscles literally felt dead and my joints just screamed at me. As far as I’m concerned, these things were not normal.

So I booked another doctors appointment because I would really like to get to the bottom of everything now. Unfortunately my regular doctor wasn’t available at a convenient time for me so I had to book with a different doctor. This was the first thing that went wrong.

Now I am not in the dark about my weight. I am 100% aware that I am in the “obese” category of BMI calculators. I am also very much aware that I have put on a lot of weight recently - which is often what happens when an active person is physically unable to exercise regularly but you know… whatever.

But I am also 100% sure that my weight is not my overall health problem at the moment. I am very certain that my weight is exasperating the situation. That if I lost the pounds, I may not be in as much pain but I am also certain that I would still be in pain as I am positive that there is an underlying problem going on.

Of course, my belief of this in my own body is hard to portray to a doctor in 10mins. So in a way I am not surprised that she blamed all of my issues on my weight but at the same time, I am devastated. It felt like all of my concerns about my own well being were being dismissed. That I was just wasting her time and my time when all I needed to do was lose some weight and stop complaining. I felt like I was taking up too much space - which I feel enough without the help of a doctor basically saying it to my face.

But the real problem was that the second she mentioned my weight. The minute she told me that I was in pain because there was extra strain on my muscles and that I was tired because when you become short of breath after exercise you generally are tired, the fight went out of me. I became submissive and passive, agreeing with her instead of arguing that I knew that and this wasn’t that.

At one point I tried to tell her how active I used to be and she just gave me this look that took my breath away and nearly made me cry right in front of her; she didn’t believe me.

So today, I want to say those things that I should have said in that room. Because I need to explain to someone that I am not okay and it is not just because of my weight.

• I have always been overweight. I have always been active and energetic and I actually kind of love doing exercise. The fact I wasn’t in pain before now makes me believe I’m not feeling this just because of my weight.
• I am napping in the middle of the day. Maybe not a huge thing for most but I have never been able to nap. I could never get so tired that I needed to nap.
• I am always tired. I have been tired from the age of 16 onwards but I still managed to do things. The tiredness I have now is different. It is exhaustion at it’s highest point. There are days when I simply cannot wake up and get out of bed.
• I went from running 10k to barely being able to walk 5 mins without being in excruciating pain.
• I am getting frequent migraines which never happened before. I have noticed that my trigger is over-doing it. If I’ve pushed myself too hard, my body repays me with a migraine.
• I miss being active so much. It is metaphorically killing me not to be able to go for a run or a gym session or a swim easily.
• Before this, I very rarely went to the doctors because I hate them and I just dealt with whatever was thrown at me. I don’t make a fuss of things. I am now because I know deep down that something is really wrong.

Maybe next time I will be able to make the doctor understand. But for now it is back to waiting and hurting and dealing. For now, it is just getting on with life, one day at a time.

Read More

Not Counting the Calories

A few weeks ago, Laura wrote about how she had begun counting calories as a means of losing weight. I was really interested in this piece as calorie counting has often been employed by me so that I can try and lose weight or at least maintain a healthy weight. However, since the beginning of May, I have neither weighed myself nor actively counted calories.

“I am an eater of numbers. I prefer packaged foods, foods with a bar code, because they make the math simpler in counting calories and that gives me a sense of peace. It’s just an illusion of control, really, but that illusion is everything.” – Melissa Broder

As someone who has very polarised views, as well as being wholehearted and putting my all into everything I commit to, I could probably rightly claim to have an addictive personality. This clearly has its downsides. If I’m trying not to worry about what I’m eating, I might eat too much and put on weight in a short period of time. The biggest problems for me come If I’m intent on losing weight, however. 

I will weigh myself daily and count every calorie that enters my mouth. I become obsessive. I have been in tears if the final meal of the day puts me seven calories over my recommended daily allowance. I will avoid any packaging that shows food that contains a large portion of a particular food group. I will spend ages in front of a supermarket chiller, trying to find the lowest calorie sandwich. If, after all this deliberating, I have still put on weight, I will reduce my intake the next day. My meals, in those moments, have become about numbers instead of nourishment.

I’ve been overweight and in that period of time, I really didn’t like the way I looked. I was desperate to look like I thought I was supposed to, forgetting that at 5 foot 10, I’m unlikely to ever be a size 6. I was appalled at myself and yet, even then, I knew that losing weight wouldn’t change the way I saw myself. Alas, now within the healthy range again, I still dislike what I look like. I’m learning that weight doesn’t equate with happiness.

So what does this mean for me?

 I want to be healthy. This is so that, as Laura said, I reduce the risk of disease later in life and my body works well. I want to be eating a balanced meal, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t have the occasional cake or a tub of pick ‘n’ mix if I feel like it. I want to treat myself respectfully and this means both not overeating, but also not under-eating as well. Food is meant to nourish us and give us the energy to live our lives. I want to know that I have the capability to do what I want to do, without being hindered by myself. I want to be happy because who I am is enough, whether that person fits into a smaller pair of jeans or has a little bit of flesh overhanging.

The more I practise eating in a way that allows me to keep fit and still enjoy food, the easier I hope it will become. I think I will gradually continue to adjust to what works for me in terms of portion sizes and the food I eat, but I don’t want weighing or numerical values to be a part of that. Having my happiness decided on by something as changeable as a digit means my mood and my self-worth are likely to be all over the place and we all know that’s not helpful.

I'm excited to try and find a place where food isn't another addiction for me. I’ll let you know how I get on in the months ahead!

Read More

Counting The Calories

According to the BMI calculator on the NHS website I’m obese. 

Awesome.

I know I’m not healthy and I know I’m overweight but I’ve never ever been able to do anything about it. I’ve never had enough will power or self-control to try and improve my health. I’m the kind of person who says on a Monday morning ‘I’m going to start eating healthily’ and by Tuesday morning I’m back to my old ways because I haven’t lost three stone and got thin in the space of 24 hours!

Over the past few years I’ve become more and more aware of my own mortality and am realising that if I don’t start looking after my  body and health now then I’m gonna be in trouble later on in life. I don’t want to end up with diabetes or high blood pressure and I don’t want to put myself more at risk of cancer and heart disease and all the other nasty things that could happen to me if I don’t look after myself now.

So I’ve started to follow the NHS Choices lose weight plan. It encourages you to eat only the amount of calories you actually need in a day and to make sure you stay active. Simple. And the best way to get healthy.

I don’t believe in all these fad diets or replacing meals with shakes or supplements. The best way to stay healthy is to eat in moderation and to stay active. It’s as simple as that. I’m not going to start banning myself from eating the things I like because then I will end up seriously grumpy and will give up much more easily, it’s just about eating things in moderation.

So instead of having a whole bar of chocolate, have one square. Instead of having a whole cake, have half. Instead of ordering a large takeaway pizza, order a small.

Part of the NHS plan is also to make sure you hit your five a day fruit and veg target which is harder than it sounds! I’ve never really paid much attention to how many portions I eat a day but now I am consciously measuring it, I realise that I don’t eat enough!

Same goes for the calorie counting…

Now that I’m counting the calories in everything I eat, I realise how much I was over-eating before. I would keep eating and eating and normally it wasn’t even because I was hungry. In fact, my body hardly needs anything to keep me going. According to the BMI calculator, due to my weight I need to be eating 1,600 calories a day and I am SHOCKED at how fast I can use those calories up. I dread to think how many calories I would have been eating before.

I’m also making sure I drink at least 1.2 litres of water a day to keep myself hydrated and thankfully water is calorie free so I can have as much of that as I want!!

I’m actually quite excited to be following this plan and I LOVE how the NHS provide you with check sheets for you to measure your progress each week. The whole plan is for twelve weeks and I am hoping to stick to it for that long. I find that I can follow things a lot easier if there are rigid plans and a structure to something. Before when I’ve tried to eat healthily I’ve found that I just don’t have the ability to keep track very well!

This isn’t something I’m doing as I want to be skinny (that would be nice!) but something I’m doing because I want to be healthy and happier and full of energy, rather than sluggish because I’ve eaten too much.  I want to give myself the best possible chance of living a long and healthy life and I know that I’m never going to be stick thin (it’s not in my genes!) and I don’t mind about being slightly large. I just want to be healthy and give myself the best chance of living a long life!

If you fancy giving it a go too then there’s all the information here. Good luck! I shall keep you all updated on how it’s going.

Read More

Choosing Happy Not Skinny

Disclaimer: This post is being written from a privileged position of someone who has never been “over-weight” or had any weight-related disorders and is only *my* feelings on this subject as they relate to *my* body. I’m not trying to tell anyone what is right and what isn’t. Your body is yours and nobody can tell you how it should look or how you should feel about it or what you should do with it.

So I’m going on holiday tomorrow. Yep that’s right- tomorrow. As I’m writing this I’m trying to get the packing for me and Le Boyf done (because I have the odd need to be in control of the packing so I know we don’t forget anything), I have to work Wednesday before we drive over to my parents that night so I’m understandably a bit stressed right now.

I did some shopping the weekend before last to get some clothes to take on holiday and had a rather uncomfortable wobble with my self-confidence. I’m well aware that over the last year or so I’ve put on about a stone but since I don’t buy new clothes that often I’ve not had to deal with the nightmare that is women’s clothing sizes. It wasn’t all that fun.

If you didn’t see my tweets about my shopping mishap then here you go. Basically I opted to get vest tops a size larger than I thought I would need in the end rather than have to suffer through wearing super-clingy clothes while in America. Baggier is better when you’re feeling kinda delicate about your middle. The number on the label is bollocks anyway when you think about how wildly sizes vary from shop to shop. A Topshop 10 could be a Hollister XXL (because damn it if the clothes in there are made for human-sized Pepperami sticks).

Growing up I was always very lucky to be able to eat what I felt like and even with the minimal amount of exercise I did, not have to worry about putting loads of weight on. I was pretty much a size ten for all my teen years, maybe a size 12 for tops to accommodate my boobs. Apparently I have some genes on my side in that my biological father (who we’ll *not* be talking about further) was always fairly slim without trying. Silver linings I guess.

But now I’m in my mid-twenties I think the environmental factors *cough pizza cough* are getting the upper hand. I’m hovering around the 9st 12lb mark at the moment which is not making me all that happy. Most of that extra stone has ended up on my boobs (which isn’t an entirely bad thing because, hey bitchin’ cleavage) and round my hips and stomach.

This is what’s making me dread somewhat going on holiday. Currently my stomach is anything but flat and I have noticeable love handles on my hips. Add in the fact that my body is weird and has zero fleshiness around the middle of my hips before curving back out on my thighs makes it very difficult for me to like seeing what I look like in bikinis right now.

I know that my weight is perfectly normal for someone of my age and height (According to this chart anyway) but that doesn’t stop me from feeling horribly insecure about my middle and how crap *I* think it looks in tight fitting clothes. The other weekend I bought a stretchy body-con dress and the moment I tried it on I knew it was going back with NO swapping for a larger size. Even if I bought a size 12 it still would've only drawn attention to the oddness of my hips which just doesn’t work with that style of dress.

I know that the feeling like you don’t quite fit your skin is one that most girls and women experience all too frequently as they grow up. Society shoves these unrealistic ideals of what women’s bodies should look like down our throats from the moment we’re old enough to consume media. As a teen I didn’t really give a shit about being a size 6 and felt comfortable being the size I was which considering how my friendship group comprised of at least three girls who ate little more than fruit and diet coke every lunch it is surprising that I didn’t feel more pressure to be thinner than I was.

Even now I don’t want to be super-thin, I just want to feel comfortable in my own body. I’d like to be able to look at myself naked in the mirror and not frown at the handfuls of flesh that I can grab. I want to fit into all the clothes I own so I don’t have to keep buying new things that I can fasten without sucking in my entire gut. I want to feel happy to wear a bikini on holiday even if the only people who will see me will be my boyfriend and my immediate family.

Artwork by SiminiBlocker

I don’t give a shit if I’m not the magazine ideal of a bikini body (seriously though fuck that), I’m not trying to feel sexy for other people or even myself really, I just want to be able to look at myself and not immediately see flaws. Which I know is a lot to ask when we’ve all been pretty much conditioned as a society to constantly seek out the minutiae of our bodies and obsess over how it doesn’t adhere to some unattainable aesthetic standard.

There’s a pretty damn epic quote from Julie Murphy’s book Dumplin’ that ought to be the mantra of every single woman regardless of her size. It's what I'll be repeating to myself while I'm on holiday when the traitor part of my brain is saying that I should avoid going in the pool because I won't "look good" in my swimsuit.

Those thoughts need shutting down before they dig into your subconsciousness and linger like a poison, slowly dismantling your self-confidence until all you want to wear is baggy clothes that hide everything.

Now it's unrealistic of me to say that I'll feel better about my body by the time I get home from America. With the quantity of guacamole that I intend on eating it's likely that I'll feel even worse for a while but then I can begin to address those feelings and work on getting my body back to a size that feels right for me. Just me. No one else's opinion matters. 

Skinny or not, bikini body here I come. (By that I mean a bikini is going on my body. obvs.)

Read More