Helen Barber - My Blog

I’ve become a huge fan of Biggest Loser USA, and make a point of watching it at 12pm every day weekday (when work allows of course). The programme itself is so motivating and inspirational, a both Bob & Jillian the trainers are equally as fantastic. I’ve been moaning that they haven’t produced any DVD’s of the programme as frankly I would buy them all and watch them over and over again.

Then, thanks to the wonderful world of point advertising, I spied with my little eye Biggest Loser the game for the Wii. Hoy hoy what do we have here then! Naturally I immediately contact my good friend Amazon and order my copy straight away. I waited patiently for a whole week, and yesterday, all my dreams came true - it arrived!

After watching the latest installment of the programme I fired up the Wii and had a look. I think I was more than a little excited when Bob came on screen to give his opening pep talk! Then came the setting up of profiles. You put in your age, height, and weight. You then have to select what your goal weight it, the only bad thing with this for me is that it only allows a maximum of 45lbs, so no problems, when I reach that mark, I’ll just go into the profile again and readjust the settings.

As you would expect from a class show like that, he main menu of the game is bursting with options to choose! After setting up my profile (I wanted an orange shirt, they didn’t have a black one only gray), and choosing my trainer (Bob or Jillian - I went with Jillian of course!!) and then played about with a couple of the options on the main menu. As ma was sitting next to me, from the comfort of the sofa we had a go at one of the challenges, basically the idea the character moved across two wires elevated above a swimming pool on their hands and knees, when the got to the end of the wire, the climbed down, and banged a wooden stopper into a wooden barrel, when the stopper was all the way in a bunch of balloons were automatically released, whoever does this in the quickest time wins. It was hard going doing it from the sofa! But fun. I then tried out a couple of the single upper body exercises, where you simply choose the move and the length of time you’ll do it for (30 seconds, 1 minute etc). It was all great fun, but not very serious.

When I got home though, that’s when I got serious! I had to redo my profile as the information of course is stored per wii console. The first thing I did was have a proper look through the main menu.

The first option you get is the Fitness Programme, here you see your activity calendar where your workouts are planned. You also get a performance graph to see how much weight you’ve lost, a calorie counter to input how many calories you had each day and an additional training log where you input the amount of ‘extra’ workouts you’ve had.

Back to the main menu, the next button is Health & Lifestyle, where the basically give you random hints & tips, healthy recipes, and a calories counter. Mainly I think it is to plug their various books etc! You then get Exercise Routines, Challenge Events and Single Exercises.

After going through all this, and still being really keen, my first job was to do the challenge I had done earlier, but ‘properly’ - meaning standing up and jumping etc! Have to say as I was nearing the end of the challenge I had a minor stitch in my side and I was quite sweaty & out of breath - I won the challenge, but don’t think I’ll win immunity from Saturdays weight in!

Any how, after the challenge I spotted that I had a workout outstanding from the calendar, so thought hey what the hell I’m here anyway! It was only an 18 minute circuit workout, but by jove was I hot and sweaty! (thank goodness for showers!!).

It’s become a little bit of an obsession at the moment as I went to bed I dreamt about biggest loser. I had set my alarm at 6:30am this morning as wanted to get back into ‘getting up and starting the day early’, which to my credit I did. The alarm went off, I untangled myself from the dog and came into the living room. Very briefly caught up on laptop stuff, half contemplated playing the sims when I saw the Wii looking at me saying play me play me!! Oh why not, it’s what I really want to do this time of the morning anyway!

Unfortunately, my calendar didn’t have any work outs schedules for today, apparently you only get 5 out of the 7 days scheduled. Ah well, that wasn’t going to stop me! I hopped onto the exercise routines, and did 18 minutes of Yoga instead. Never done yoga before, it’s trickier than you think! still really enjoyed it though, and entered the ‘18 minutes light exercise’ into my extra workouts screen - just so that we all know I’ve gone beyond the call of duty.

Speaking of which it’s my turn for the dog walk this morning, half thinking about taking him round the lake just so I can chalk up more ‘extra workouts’!

Ah well, can’t sit around here all day, got to keep moving!!

I’ll try to keep this short and to the point this morning. Woke up a little late, but feeling ok and more or less happy with things.

As sometimes happens with life, I perceived one frustration after another, after another, after another. Started with the dog, then the fact I couldn’t wear the top I planned on wearing, then escalated into the fact that all my ‘fat’ clothes had been washed, but not allowed to hang dry properly so were still wet after two days, so as far as I was concerned this morning I had nothing to wear. I wanted to wear my joggy bottoms and a sports top with a mind of a day filled with housework & exercise. I was going to work my behind off! I have one top that I could wear, but I tried it on, it was too tight, showed every ugly ounce of fat no matter how much I tried to stretch it. In the end I threw an eppy, and settled for a ‘fat’ skirt and vest.

I can’t even wear my apron today cos it’s not dry! Now in the scheme of things these things are not really important. But I’ve ended up with an enormous amount of frustration. So much so I punched the wall (and yes, my hand is still aching & reminding me why it actually isn’t a good idea to punch solid walls).

Stupid thing is I know exactly what the root cause of my frustration is. It’s my fatness. Yes I was 0.0000000001% annoyed that some of my clothes were till damp - so actually not very! What I was more annoyed at was the fact that I have all these wonderful clothes sitting in my chest drawers, most of which 2 months ago I’d be happy and confident wearing. But now, no way! By coming off the wagon I have limited my fashion options again. Just another reminder that I’m an over weight lazy stupid bint. Why can’t I ‘just do it’!?

Now the question is, do I need to walk this out, or talk this out? I don’t feel like eating or ‘drinking’ which usually would be the first thing I’d grab in these times of crises, but that’s more likely because I ‘know’ that not only are they the root cause of my evil, if I indulged now, it’d make me feel a million times worse, and not even a little bit better. Hey, at least I’ve learned something?

Where to go from here? I’m not sure in all honesty, perhaps just simply getting off the sofa, and crack on with the house cleaning & tidying. Maybe put a few xmas decorations up to try and get back into a ‘festive’ spirit?

As promised to myself, the first thing I did when I got home last night was to have my bath therapy. 45 minutes of just me, my mp3 player, and my thoughts. The lifted my spirits with some good old fashioned present wrapping therapy! I love wrapping presents for other people, really does get me in the festive spirit! I was thankful that at the very least, the day ended on a much more cheerful note than it had begun.

This morning, I forced myself to face up to some hard truths. Getting my old slimming world book out, I finally faced up to how much I have gained since stopping in September, that figure would be 16lbs. Basically I have almost put back on what I had lost. Not a very happy thought that. In addition, I took the dog out this morning and tried to work into some running. Did 1 minute 20 seconds before I was gasping for air, so in a nutshell fitness & weight wise, I’m pretty much back where I started from in July!

Getting things in perspective you kind to get to thinking, ok, so I worked my butt of July & August and then 3 months later I am back to square one again, so what’s the point?

Actually I can take something very valuable away from this. From a diet that I enjoyed eating, had a relaxed approach to and was low in fat (i.e following slimming world) and exercising where I’m pushing myself to the limit at least 3 times per week, in about 6 weeks I can lose 1 1/2 stone. That’s a black & white fact, I have the numbers written down in my slimming world book to prove it. By the end of August I remember feeling on top of the world! My clothes were getting bigger, my body was getting smaller, and I felt thinner! People were begining to say ‘you’re face is looking slimmer’, which was fantastic!

That was then (only 3 months ago mind), and this is the reality now. Now I am back to square one, with noone else to blame but myself. Which is fair enough really, as I am the only one is responsible for this body and what does and doesn’t go into it.

I’m back to the start, but you know what, I’m actually going to forgive myself for this slip up. You make mistakes, things don’t work out exactly how you intend for whatever reason, it happens, it’s called life! The important thing is to remain focused, and in my case, it’s called getting that focus back which I do believe I have. I have to remember that this still is only ‘week one’ so to speak! Ok, so my brain hasn’t come round to the #new way of things’ as quickly as I had hoped, but I think body & brain are in sinc now.

It’s about time I started working hard so that I can celebrate the success I deserve! Let’s make myself proud today

Half way through the afternoon and I really wish today was over all ready. As I’ve already said in my previous blog, didn’t really start today in the best of moods, bit tired, but remained awake and got to work early none the less. Was just about gripping onto reality until Curves session. Got to the 3rd piece of equipment and body simply gave up, had no energy and to top it all all my waist started to get painful on one of the machines which threw me completely.

But this isn’t what pee’d me off. What is annoying me at the moment is that I am so very obviously not as fit as I used to be a few months ago. I can really feel now was far back I have gone, and appreciate how far forward I had become before I fell off the rails. It’s frustrating. It’s disturbing, and it’s hard to not utterly hate myself because of it. Body issues much? well duh!

Just have to keep head above water, out of the cookie jar and try to take one small step at a time. Perhaps even treat myself to a bubble bath for some ‘calm reflection?’. Perhaps.

ah well, hopefully will be able to have a more positive blog either this evening or in the morning :/

So yesterday has come and gone, is there anything I can take from yesterday and use today?

Well, firstly, actually getting up out of bed at 6:30am makes no difference what so ever regarding how tired I feel of an evening which makes things very easy. This morning I awoke before the alarm, and got up 1 minute before it was due to go off (go me!). Eyes are feeling a little heavy sitting on the sofa here, but as I’m not going back to bed, I’ll just have to soldier on.

I’m also pleased to report that it hasn’t taken me so long to ‘get round to’ writing up the blog. I’ve already done a quick ‘touch base’ with a couple of the games I have going on, then it was over to Jillian for today’s inspiration - weighed myself, and no, no weight loss yet! but nothing gained either so at least that’s a positive thing.

So what else can I take away with me from yesterday? Well, I am still crap when it comes to nibbling, it was a lot less than I ‘usually would’, but still, nibbling is wasted calories. I also learned that it was perfectly possible to have a full day at work (and yesterday for some reason was a complete brain strain!), come home, and make the dinner. Ok, so dinner wasn’t the healthiest - sweet & sour chicken & white rice, the sweet & sour bit coming out a jar (which if you really need it pointed out, was the unhealthy bit), but at least I suppose it could have been worse?

Apart from that, bum remained firmly on the sofa yesterday, so I guess you could say over all success rate for the day is quite low (bit like my mood this morning then really).

So today then - what can I make happen today to make it more successful.

1. No nibbling or drinking anything other than water

2. Less time on the sofa, more time moving

3. Plan my evenings instead of just ‘letting it happen’ - tonight I will be baking bread, wrapping presents, giving the house a little tidy.

4. Limit my lap top usage this evening to 30 minutes max & entertain myself in more mentally stimulating ways such as doing a puzzle or reading a book.

Trying to keep focus whilst you have a screaming headache is harder than I thought! Random I know, but I’ve had this headache since yesterday, maybe it’s time to reach for the nurofen.

Ah well, that’s all from me (and it hasn’t even reach 8:00am yet, marvelous!), time to put my best foot forward and activate the day

You may have noticed that I haven’t been blogging lately, which naturally means those rails I was on, have been left far behind. Haven’t been a happy bunny for a while, and this has been reflective in my ‘falling back into old eating habits’. At the moment, things like the cruise feels like its not going to happen, if I don’t get to my goal weight, I can’t go, simple as and I really mean it too.

As ever we are trying to claw our way make to some sort of grip, not easy when your working out at curves, look own and see a massive wobbly belly and feel like you wanna just burst into tears? too much home truth? well, yes, but that’s the point of these blogs, to get down and dirty with the good, the bad and in my own particular case, the down right ugly.

Tried to do our own biggest loser diet club thing last week, ma lost about 2lbs which is fantastic, I gained 3lbs, which isn’t surprising with the amount of calories I’ve consumed this past week. yuk.

Where do I go from here? well the first thing is to remove myself from this road I’m and currently going down and make changes into my daily habits. I have started with setting my alarm for 6:30am, and have been able to do this for the past two days. I haven’t said to myself ‘get up & exercise’, which is what I am intending to do at some point, but for now, I find is enough that I get into the habit of actually getting out of bed. It is very easy, especially on these cold dark winter mornings to remain warm and cosy under the duvet, but that also means I don’t wake up until 8 - 9am, and consequently feel as if I have already wasted part of the day, which sets me up in a negative state of mind.

For my life style, I do actually want to be getting up early, when I have done it in the past, getting up at that hour seems to give both my body & mind a good kick start.

The second thing I have started to change is my working hours. Instead of coming and going at all hours of the day, work dependant and staying at home doing relatively flop all when there is ‘nothing to do’. I have committed myself to being out of the house between 9:00am - 4:00pm. This way, it doesn’t really matter so much what I do between these hours, it just give both R & I a much needed ‘routine’.

Thirdly - I am making myself more aware of ‘wasted time’, for example, the large amount of time I spend playing games on the laptop. I am not saying that I’ll stop this full stop, just moderation is key. Time of an evening is usually spend sat on my bum on the computer, I want to get away from this, and spend my evenings a little more constructive - making dinner, doing a little house work, reading, doing puzzles - something of this nature, rather than staring and clicking and a laptop screen.

Finally, yesterday I bit the bullet and signed up to Jillian Michaels website. For those who are blissfully unaware, Jillian is one of the trainers in the Biggest Lose USA, her contestants have won all but 1 series so far and she has been branded as something of a tough cookie when it comes to actual training style, but it gets results. She is on the same level of excellence for me as Cesar is to dog training, or Tony Robbins is for motivational speaking and I bow down humbly to their brilliance.

So website then, a little excited and a little nervous! There is way too much information to take on board all on one go, so have decided to take the route ‘read something new each day’.  The nuts and bolts of the site are really she give you your meal planner and exercises for the day. At the end of the day you fill in what you’ve eaten and what work out you did. Then at the end of the week (on Friday I think it is) you fill in your weight and the website tracks your progress. You also get a ‘fitness diary’ to record your thoughts and actions for the day, as well as numerous hints, tips, members message boards, access to help lines etc. Really on the face of it, your one stop shop for everything diet & fitness related!

So this morning I have popped on, seen the menu (which I wont actually be following today as already worked out what my meals are for today), and viewed the prescribed exercises (which will be done this evening when R goes to the pub). I have also discovered this ‘tracker’ website, which again, is another free tool to allow you to track in a visual way the pounds you have lost, and how far to go to reach target. At the moment, mine looks quite depressing because it hasn’t actually gone anywhere! But I keep telling myself next week, I’ll start to see my little ‘jogging icon’ move! (my tracker is a park background, with a little person ‘jogging’ towards their goal, thought that would be appropriate!)

Well, it’s 8:00am, time for one last application check, then it’s off to get ready for work xx

Morning all! This morning I have woken up in quite a contemplative mood. Wednesday marks my 29th year on this planet, and as is usual, one tends to look over ones past year and over all life and generally take stock of things.

So where am I with this life of mine. Well, ok, I am not yet at my goal weight, I am not yet in my chosen career and ok, so I am not yet living self sufficiently out in that cottage in the country. But you know what? this morning I don’t care! I know that these things will come when I have worked hard enough for them. At the moment I AM losing weight, slowly - but that’s ok! It’s going completely in the right direction and these things take time My career, again, I am making good but slow progress. I am further now than I was four weeks ago. Finally, my beautiful dream cottage, well I have every confidence that will come, eventually! But until then?

Until my ‘dreams’ come true, what do I actually have around me right now? Let’s start with right up close and personal.

I have a wonderfully loving and supportive fella, who in his own way, always tries to help and offer advice on any given situation in order to try and ease ‘the load’. He makes me laugh and brings so much joy to the household. Equally, I have a wonderfully loving and supportive dog, who keeps me company when R spends those long hours away with his magic. He is (almost) a complete angel. He is good natured, and learns very quickly what is desired behaviour, and whatisn’t. He does what he is told and hasn’t got a bad bone in his body. I am very proud of him, and both how R & I have raised him over the last 17 months.

It would only be fair to also mention the hamster at this point. It is only recently that him & I have ‘bonded’, to the point that last night when removing his house roof to take him out, I found the hamster all snuggled and rolled up. I poked my finger in, and gently tickled his back to wake him up. Hamster responded by rolling slowly onto his back, little paws in the air, and seemed to be enjoying me tickling his under belly! Its those little moments in life that mean so much

If you haven’t quite decided to stop reading because I am going all gooey - wait! I have more!

I am very grateful living in the house we do. It is warm, dry and located perfectly for our current needs. Forgetting about the inequality of space : our material items ratio, all I am proud to call it ‘my home’. It is our refuge from the outside world and is far more luxurious than most have.

Extending the branch but still being close to home, what else do I have? I have a sister who is great at kicking me up the bum and keeping me in check. She is inspirational, supportive, loyal and truly if I had to pick anyone to be my sister, it would be her hands down, no questions asked every time. When the chips are down, as a team her & I are really a force to be reckoned with mwahha ha ha. But wait, there is more! I have a father - yes I really do! Who also is wonderfully loving, supportive and loyal. He is the male strength looming in the background ready for if ever I needed it. He is hard working, stable, and quite jolly when the burdens he carries are lifted, as I believe they have already done so.

The final figure that makes up this clan is the woman herself. She who is really the head of the household despite what anybody else thinks! And of course the she to whom I refer to is my mum Wonderfully loving, supportive, loyal? my mum? do you really need to question! these qualities are second nature to the woman! But mum, now you see, there’s something simply magical about my mum. She has a zest and a thirst for life and living that the majority of us could only dream of! Think Del Boy in Only Fools and Horses. Always rising to the challenge. Always taking what life has on offer. Always grabbing any opportunity that comes her way! She doesn’t like having regrets does my mum, and like me, what she wants to do something, she wants to do it NOW! Her success in business is something to be admired (and written about I assure you!), you think Richard Branson is good, well she may not have his millions, but my mum is way better than him! I can’t leave the site of mum, without mentioning her spontaneity, generosityand loving heart to all and sundry around her. She would do anything for anyone, and has the longest fuse and more patience than a saint. She puts up with a lot of flack, but always puts on a brave face and is never far away from the next ‘day trip’ or ‘jolly’.

Alas, Tempus Fugit, my time here has almost come to an end. So taking stock of me and my life, I realise that I have a lot to be thankful for, and believe you me, I am so very thankful. I consider myself a very lucky and blessed person. I feel so much love, support, trust, loyality - the list could go on!

Yes the past year may have had it’s ups and downs, as could be said with life in general. But lets live for the moment, let us live for the here and now. Open your eyes and have a really good look around you. Don’t just see the bad, see the good for there really is so much to be had!

Mine is not ‘my perfect life’, but that doesn’t matter because I have a good home and good people all around me, and for that I thank you xx

So here we are at last my most favourite time of year! The weather is fresher, more crisper and the variety of colours for the eyes to feast upon is always over whelming. It is at this time of year I feel at my most happiest, the clothes in my wardrobe are finally suitable for the weather, and I can eat, drink and be merry to my hearts content thanks to baggy jumpers and over sized unrestricting skirts. All sensibilities fly out of the window as preparations for the final birthdays and Christmas get underway. Time spent in bed increases as it’s ‘just too cold outside of the duvet’ and the credit card companies rub their hands with glee as we just can’t seem to stop spending!

Yes indeed, what a fabulous time of year it is! But as November begins to build it’s momentum, I’m feeling a remarkable change in the air. Let me explain. In comparison to last year (and I have the photographs to prove it) I am 2 dress sizes smaller. Oh yes, you heard me correctly, that would be 2! Despite my yo yo weight over the past couple of months, I slipped into my size 18 skirt this morning not only with ease, but just a hint of room to spare. To reiterate a previous blog, this is the very same skirt that was purchased about 10 years ago give or take, fitted for a brief spell, but had made it’s way back into the ‘clothes I really want to fit into’ suitcase.

Last week, I wore this skirt and got a bit panicky because it had started showing signs of ‘tightening’ around the waist.

So Sunday I decided to be brave, and hopped onto the scales to see what the damage was. The figures will be protected to save the not so innocent, but needless to say that quite a few frustrating pounds had come back on. Ok, I screwed up. Lost my way a bit, it happens, let’s not dwell, I know what I did, what I was eating, how little exercise I was doing etc. Fine, let’s move one.

My next move? well, I had a couple of microwave weight watchers in the freezer, so biting the bullet thought I’d actually give them a go. Negative points. It’s not fresh. It’s a microwave meal for goodness sake! There’s no loving preparation, no experimentation with flavours and you just don’t want to look at the amount of artificial preservatives! Positive points, they actually taste really nice, you know the number of calories / fat / salt you are eating per meal if you choose to look, they are quick to make, but in my case more importantly, they are portioned correctly. First time I had one I didn’t think there was much to it, so added a few crackers with bulk it up. Oh my, was my stomach bursting! Taking away the crackers and just having the meal, if I don’t listen to the objections from my brain, the meals fill me up so the hunger is satisfied but I don’t feel bloated and over full. Which is the main reason why I am liking the whole idea.

So that is attack number one. The second is of course exercise! I haven’t written out any strict ‘I am going to do xyz’ as I always do as to be perfectly honest, I’ve never kept to it in the past so lets get over it, move on, and just do what I fancy. At the moment, Curves is back in favour, so is taking the dog for the odd walk. Went to curves yesterday, came out, and was emotionally high on the ceiling (in a good way!) all day! Went again this morning, not feeling to ‘high’ but feeling very in control and master of my universe! I have the power!

Now we come to my guilty secret - attack number three. I’ll go back a little and explain my reasoning first. A couple of weekends ago R, as part of his new direction as ‘demonstrator of extra-sensory curiosities’ (the more I say it the more it just flows naturally off the tongue!). A couple of days after he came home, he asked to try it out on me. Quite skeptical that I could be hypnotised in the first place, I agreed and the outcome had my mind buzzing in confusion an questions, and for a few days after I couldn’t stop thinking about it. On a very basic level, he got my arm to be stiff, me to only chose 1 particular card and ‘forget’ my name. I didn’t forget it, my brain was screaming it out, it’s just that my mouth seemed to have been disconnected and couldn’t say it. To finish up he said that I would remain in a happy light hearted state for the rest of the evening and enjoy a restful nights sleep. Boy didn’t I just though! I was perky and smiley all evening and yes I slept well. A couple of days later, I began thinking seriously about this hypnosis stuff, thinking that maybe he could help me not eat so much, and so much junk! I had been meaning to ask him to ‘plant’ the suggestion in me, but I never got the bottle. So, going my own way (as I have a tendency to do anyway), I went straight onto amazon, just to see what mp3 downloads in hypnosis they had.

Frankly, there literally hundreds of tracks, and most were complete nonsense. £6 for 12 tracks, 1st track talking, the other 11 just music. Not what I wanted. I eventually found just a single track, lasting for 20 minutes and cost just 79p. So I thought, ok, so apart from 79p, what have I got to lose, it looked good to me, and the voice sample sounded non irritating. I downloaded and listened to it with my eyes open. I wanted to hear exactly was this woman was saying before I allowed myself to ‘get into it’. As she was talking, I couldn’t help but smile. The suggestions she was planting was exactly what I needed ‘you eat less, and feel fuller’.

She’s become my best friend, on the first day I downloaded it I listed to the mp3 about half a dozen times whilst I was out walking the dog, doing the housework etc. I have now started to listen to it if I can first thing in the morning, and always last thing at night before I go to sleep. When it came to my first meal, I was a little worried and I wasn’t sure how things were going to work.

So first meal, I had a can of mackerel in the cupboard, so thought I’d have them with ryvita. In the bowl the fish went, but looking at it, I thought to myself ‘that’s a very meaty fish there is no way I’d get through all that!’, so I separated half of it a bowl and put it in the fridge. The other half, I just sprinkle a little salt and vinegar, then went to the ryvita. I went to take out about four which is the usual amount I would normally have, but ended up only taking one out, for what reason I had no idea. I then sat down with my meal. I ate more slowly than usual, and when I had finished, not only did I feel fuller, I actually found that the ryvita took my body to the just ‘over full’ level, so wasn’t really needed in the first place. Let’s get perspective here, If i was having the meal normally it would consist of the whole can, perhaps in addition to the salt & vinegar a good dollop of salad cream and / or ketchup would be added for good measure. The whole thing accompanied by about 4 ryvitas and / or several crackers. Very curious. The next day for lunch I had the same meal, except without the ryvita, and still felt nicely full.  I still haven’t quite got my head around this yet. I am enjoying listening to the Mp3, and I am enjoying my meals more even though I’m eating about half the portion size.

And it’s not as if I am restricting my food in take on purpose! I had a dougnut yesterday AND a weight watchers mint choc chip mousse thing (oh my goodness it was heaven!). I may eventually join the weight watcher eclair club, but for me, I could only have one, and not two or three at a time!

I can feel my attitude towards food this week slowly shifting for the positive, but I do have concerns. Last month I did a big food Christmas shop for all the savoury snacks, wine, and spirits we were going to ‘enjoy’ the season with. Please note the words ‘were going’ as I have a feeling that this year I wont be eating or drinking anything near as much has I have done in the previous years, and may have quite a bit left over in January!

My ramblings for today almost over, I think it only appropriate to end on a goal. If I can begin december 14lbs lighter, I shall be a very happy gal indeed

Evening punters! Well the day started off less than productive, but that’s mainly due to last night dinner, then snacks, um, them a few more snacks. Oh and there was of course 2 bottles of fizzy rose wine & 1 bottle of red thrown into the mix! Oh come on, it was R & mine’s anniversary, 4 years on and we still haven’t killed each other - see miracles do occur outside of the festive season

Barring a slow start, this afternoon proved more than fruitful. Had a meeting with my ‘other’ marketing person and have finally come up with the wording for first advert / leaflet and brief action plan for this weekend which gets things a little more moved on. Also discussed websites and getting mine done professionally, which was actually what I had on my list from the very beginning, so was good that someone was finally on the same wave length

Got back from meeting & cracked on with dinner - garlic & butter chicken with lightly spiced boiled / pan fried rice, very nice even if I do say so myself - you know, I have a sneaking suspicion that I may just be a genius in the kitchen!

All in all turned out nice again - I love days like this

Righty, in need of an early night tonight, as have to be up and early quite early in the morning to drop R off at the station. Hey ho!

Night all

When things pull you down, what it YOUR immediate response? grabbing that packet of cigarettes? having yet another cup of tea or coffee? My three habits are over eating, drinking alcohol, and taking a hot bath. At the time, these three habits seem to be fulfilling their purpose. My brain ‘knows’ that when I eat, I feel better. It ‘knows’ that when I drink a little bit, I can get a little buzz and be giggly. It ‘knows’ the feeling of sinking into a warm bubble bath and just laying there to relax. So surely by doing all three throughout the course of an evening should be making me feel a whole lot better right!? Well, when you’re in that emotional state the logic and reasoning is all there! You do these things, and then wonder why it’s not working, why your emotional state isn’t lifting!

You go to bed emotionally empty and when the cold light of day arrives, the inevitable remorse over your previous nights’ behaviour sinks in. Not only have you sabotaged your slimming regime and abused your insides with all the non nutritious substances you’ve been pouring into it, your gall stones are on the brink of letting you know precisely has angry they are with you, for it’s only a matter of time but worst of all, what could have been a thoroughly productive day, ended in a total waste. Nice one.

Not such a pretty picture is it. So how could yesterday have turned out any differently? Well, the first thing I should have done was stop and breath, instead of allowing my emotions get all caught up in a dark whirlwind. The second thing, refer back to my 5 steps to success! 

Step One: Identify - When you think about it hard enough, you should be able to pin point the exact moment your state of mind went from flying high, to crashing down low. For me, I don’t have to think too hard, as I have been dwelling on this ever since. For me, it was a telephone call from a marketing person I have paid to help me with my business. The nuts and bolts of it was that he requested I call him on a ‘discussion on work load’ pretext, but when I actually called him back, well frankly I was literally bullied into going through a sales role play scenario. Despite the fact it was obvious that said person was still clueless regarding my sales process (despite one short and one rather lengthy email trying to explain this). He was trying to get me to go through a procedure I hadn’t yet prepared for, and despite me trying to tell him over and over again that I wasn’t ready for this, and we were to do this when I WAS ready, he wouldn’t take no as an answer. So I reluctantly ploughed on, getting more and more annoyed. I think I even said at one point he was annoying me. This is the second telephone call I have had from this person and both times I have ended the call in a negative state. I don’t like people pushing me like that. I don’t mind being pushed, don’t get me wrong. But to keep pushing when I had already said no? That was his cue to drop the matter, and he chose not to because he wanted to ’see how far I had come’. Er no, that’s not how it works I am afraid. You will see how far I have come when I am ready to show you have far I have come and not before. We both left the phone call on less than a cheery state, and he mumbled something about he would see about getting some adverts together (with what? asides from the fact that I’ve said my main focus is weight management, he doesn’t have enough knowledge about me & my business to competently put adverts together. Besides which I haven’t actually decided what sort of advertising I will be doing anyway so how the hell CAN he put ’some adverts together?’. To be perfectly honest, with what I have received back from him so far, I’m dredding it. My initial reaction was to simply get rid of him. Starting a business is suppose to be a fun process! At the moment I only have 1 real cause of stress and that’s him! So why should I put myself through any further stress when I could just get rid, kiss goodbye to the money spent, BUT be happier because of it. If I had to choose losing a certain amount of money, and being happy, I’m sorry it’s bye bye money - my happiness is more important. It is on that note, the aforementioned habits started to kick in.

Thinking things over this morning with slightly more clarity, I have ascertained that my downturn was due to me not putting my foot down hard enough and losing control over the situation. Then when it was over, my brain remained in an out of control state.

Step Two: Brainstorming, what are the options available to me? The issue is control. Control over my business, and equally control over what goes into my body. The other thing I need to consider is once I do go into those ’states’ how do I quickly get myself out of it so that yesterday never happens again? All of which I have thought long and hard over. Now please remember, that at the moment I am brainstorming! just because i have put something down, doesn’t actually mean this is an action I will take! It’s important just to get all those ideas out there, and written down at this stage.

The business - or more specifically - gentleman in question. How am I going to make things better? Here are some options I came up with: Email him to say I don’t want his help anymore / ignore any phone calls & only deal with him via email / ignore him completely and just get on with things myself / telephone him and try to resolve this ‘issue’ / hire someone else / book a meeting with him to discuss events to date.

My Body - go back to a slimming club / starve / eat only 1 meal per day / detox / slimming drink / cut down on portion sizes / cut out junk food / ban myself from the kitchen / have someone else prepare all my meals / cut out all fat / take diet pills

Changing State - listen to music / go out for a drive / go out for a walk / watch a DVD / sing / read a book / go to curves

Step three - TAKE ACTION!!! This is the most important step of all! If you don’t take action, how will things change?

The Business - I have decided that I will cease all telephone contact with person in particular and will continue to email him on an ad hoc basis as I have previously done over the past couple of weeks. I have also decided to just ‘get on’ with my business, in my way, in my own time. Should I need help, I have also decided on the main person I will go to for help - this person has been in business since the age of 10 (technically) so really does know a thing or two about starting up! (even if this person does get bored after a while and decides to start ’something else’ up! lol). BUT, looking at their business history, they have a proven record of successes and potential successes (if they were interested enough to follow through properly!).

My body - After careful consideration I have decided that it is about time I gave my body a bit of a holiday and go on a short term detox in an attempt to get rid and apologise for all the junk I’ve subjected it to in the past few weeks. It’s a thankless job, being my internal organs, so it’s really the least I could do

I’ll come to steps four and five in another post, as for now, it is time for action - I’ll keep you updated on the changes as they occur