Keep on running

This week I've run three times - Tuesday, Thursday and today. It was especially hard work this morning and very hard to keep going. I was so tempted to cut it short and had to really force myself to continue. I run for the same amount of time (40 mins) but am covering less of the park in that time than I was before Wales. When I start out on my runs it's so dark I have to use the light function on my watch to see the time (for my intervals) ticking away; it only gets light about halfway through. This may be why I seem to have the park to myself again!

One of the reasons I pushed myself so hard this morning was that yesterday I only had one LL pack (of the 4 you're supposed to have and 3 that I'm having) to make up for half a doughnut, a large handful of Maltesers and a wedge of brie from the smack table. I don't even like Krispy Kremes! And wouldn't even if they had a sensible name - just toooooo sweet. I don't know if that's why I'm so hungry today. I had to have my bar at about 11am and I usually hold off until c1pm - and I'm STILL ravenous. Clearly I can't be in ketosis but my feet are freezing too.

Next week I've got to make an effort to find something to wear for my brother's wedding. It's more traumatic if you feel fat of course. I'm planning on trying on 16s but buying a 14. I don't think that's too ambitious given that I was a 14 before this latest blip but as we all know, 14s vary wildly. I should be able to have a last minute panic and take it back though if I can't de-blubber in time.

I'm working - just covering - from Saturday morning to Sunday morning so not a great weekend ahead. No lie in either as I have to be up before 9am on each day! If the weather's nice though we might manage a walk on Sunday - bf wants to lose weight too so it makes sense to spend our time being a bit active if it's enjoyable too. Then Monday back to the exasperating LL class. Apparently one of the 2 big gobs in the class was actually allowed to TAKE the class while the LLC was away (I was in Wales but Naughty R told me)! Arghhhhhhhh.

Satan Sugar

Well I'm back on the pack gang. I'm trying so hard not to be sad or resentful about it. Packs may suck but so does being fat. Of course, at the moment I'm on packs AND fat but it's a question of gritting my teeth (also useful in that it inhibits food consumption!) and get on with it until the scales tip. Literally as well as figuratively.

And by the time I started (yesterday) I had put on a shade less than 2st since my lowest weight a month or two ago. That's shocking, it really is. I am amazed and very, very scared at the rate it piles back on. And this is with running twice last week and doing 3 walks over the weekend, from 5.5miles to 9miles. What does that say for the long term? I know I can't keep yo-yoing in this fashion.

I'm also trying to remind myself of all the bad effects of sugar, especially when it sings that siren, seductive song to me as it will, loudly, over the next few weeks:
1) Makes me fat
2) Makes my teeth get hyper-sensitive and painful (weird but true)
3) Makes me jittery and stops me sleeping
4) Gives me the shakes when it wears off
5) Leaves a funny taste in my mouth
6) Has just started giving me stomach pains (indigestion?)
I'd like to think of more (anyone?) but that ought to be enough to keep me off it - if I am remotely sane. Which I am unsure about when it comes to sugar, frankly.

So day 2 of packs, one hilly 4 mile walk and one 2.5mile run down.

But sadly, I think I'll still be a stone to a stone and a half off the weight I want to be for my brother's wedding to the chav on Halloween - and not even as low as I was before I messed it all up. I'm not sure what to do about an outfit in that case - I don't want to buy something that potentially won't fit me for long (and at the same time I don't really believe I can get much smaller than I was). But then, I don't have any great desire to be anything much smaller than a small size 14 anyway - and I don't know what that will look like on the scales so what I'm aiming for in any case. Hmmm.

Food thoughts

Not that my mind isn't constantly on the subject of food anyway - sad but true. Seriously, I'm constantly wondering what I might fancy to eat next. Sometimes I manage not to pursue this and leave it, often I give in. I possibly think more about food on packs but act on it more seldom. Anyway, these are the things floating around at the forefront of my confused little brain:

1) I seem to be getting some sort of indigestion type thing (I think - I assume that's what it is) when I eat too much sweet stuff. Never happened to me before. Not putting me off. But makes me wonder why...

2) In Wales, on one of the rare walks, I noticed that I had MORE energy last time I did the walk in May. I had been on low carb immediately before that holiday. Interesting...

3) I am completely in conflict about the thought of returning to packs. On the one hand I dread it, especially when I'm thinking about stews, soups, crumbles and general winter fare (NOT about enforced separation from sugar which is what you would think would have me whimpering in fear). On the other I almost feel a type of relief that it will take me away (to a certain extent) from the tyranny of sugar (see above). And get me back into my clothes of course which is the main thing and something I crave as much as sugar.

4) AM starting to feel that panic about wanting to hoover up anything I might conceivably fancy whilst being on pack deprivation. Not good, not healthy and reinforces the yo-yo-ing behaviour I seem to be up to my neck in and that I'm getting more and more anxious about. And don't know what to do about.

So, weekend in New Forest - weather forecast good so walks to balance inevitable big breakfasts and dinners. Culminating in cream tea at my mum's on Sunday. Then packs will commence (dooooom) - talk about sublime to ridiculous. Did a second run this morning despite being so stiff and sore that I could hardly move yesterday. Thinking secondary stiffness is setting in as we speak. It better have busted some lard for all this pain, that's all I'm saying (especially given pending cream tea).

Drying out

Well, we're back from Wales, soggy and fat. I had hoped that the additional weight was caused by water logging but now I've dried out it doesn't seem to be! The weather was atrocious - severe weather warnings, gales, autumnal chilliness, torrential rain, floods - so much so, that although we'd gone with all the gear, we only managed to walk on 3 of the 12 days as the rain was so bad. It rained EVERY DAY. Bf wondered why the sheep were so white - BECAUSE THEY WERE CONSTANTLY ON A COLD WASH CYCLE. In fact, I reckon they'd be easily ten times as big and fluffy naturally but had been shrunk in the permanent wash. So we spent alot of time chuntering about the weather in tearooms, eating cake. Which was nice in a way (and surely very traditionally British?!) but - coupled with enforced inactivity - means that I am now 1 and a half stone heavier than my lightest weight of late July/early August. It goes on so easily! And comes off so slowly! Why??? (delivered in whiny whimper)

This weekend we're in the New Forest for bf's big 5-0 birthday weekend, courtesy of his sweet parents. More eating but hopefully more walking too. Well, a maxium of 2 walks really - and only one will be a long one but I'm looking forward to it anyway. And - shush - the forecast doesn't mention rain. So far..

Then, sadly, it's back to packs for me. I think until the great Chav Wedding at the end of October. At the moment, nothing fits me (just to spell it out, all my clothes are too tight and linger graphically over my lardy stomach) and I have to get back in to them just so I don't have to wear the same thing every day (and feel dreadful in it to boot) and so buying an outfit for Chav Wedding won't be too extraordinarily traumatic.

I'm back to the running. It was SO hard after less than 3 weeks away. I ran yesterday morning (s-l-o-w-l-y) and can barely move my legs without wincing at the pain in my front thighs today (I'm guessing there's a technical name for that bit). But that's got to be good, right? Will be back out there tomorrow at 6.15am, sigh. Assuming that my legs still operate then....

And Naughty R - what a girl! Our LLC reckons she's 3 weeks away from being smack bang in the middle of her ideal BMI and off the packs for good. Wow - a moment of awed silence from me. I don't think I'll ever get to the mythical ideal BMI but I'd be happy - deliriously so - as a small size 14, which I reckon I need to lose at least 2st for.

My biggest challenge is finding a long term way of life that doesn't involve swinging between binging and packs like some demented yo-yo. And I don't have a clue as to how to achieve that. I'm dreading packs but I also feel stuck at the moment - stuck in fat, panic-eating sugary oblivion. There must be a middle ground - it's how I find it and stick to it long-term. Still, short term first! Packs. Embrace them I must. Woman cannot live by cake alone - sadly. I've proved that one beyond a shadow of a doubt - count it as my gift to science.