Wednesday 7 October 2009

Merhaba!

That's Turkish for 'hello'! Kurdish is Hroj Bosch (phonetically)! We added to our Turkish vocab whilst we were away and now have a few words of Kurdish too. It was a lovely holiday - the place was a bit brash so it was a shock at first, but once you can ignore the restaurants serving 'chicken luggets', fishfingers, egg on toast, English breakfast (in a Muslim country!) and 'lorry driver's menu' (I'm not kidding), there were some lovely places to eat. And the scenery was gorgeous and the people friendly, thrilled we spoke a little of their language and keen to debate politics with us. I even have a faint tan... Bf has a convincing tan. And he was lovely all holiday - it was all very loved-up which was particularly nice after his crotchetiness of late.

I didn't do much shopping (there was alot of tat but not much else) but brought back a 'little' something in the form of 10lb of unwanted extra blubber. Usually in that time I'd put on over a stone so I guess I have to be thankful for small mercies but it still makes me heavier than I've been for a long time - nearly 2st heavier than the end of LL and 2st7lbs heavier than my lightest weight last summer. And critically, 2st heavier than my freak-out weight (the weight above which I can no longer be rational about weight loss and my appearance generally). So, now I have to address this. I tell you this tough, I am not going on another holiday that is spoilt for me because of fretting about my weight. As it was, you'll remember the swimsuit trauma before I left and I can say I actively avoided wearing it whilst I was there - only swimming twice because of feeling so dumpy and frumpy. That would make it c£20 a wear. That's not good sense on any level.

I did have baklava (oh god I love baklava) or an ice cream every day I suppose, but the actual food out there is pretty healthy - no creamy sauces, no mountains of chips - and they'll tell you if you are ordering too much. In fact, if you get chips you get about a dozen which I think is really good - it's enough to enjoy but not an absurd amount. Of course you often get this with mash (which I always left) or rice (which I always ate) AND bread (sometimes I did, sometimes I didn't - it depended on the bread).

So, I did my Circuit of Hell today (before I weighed in actually), having checked the weather forecast and decided that cycling would not be a good idea (and I can't work out how to put my light on at the back). And I'm starving! Part of me is thinking that I'll try to diet without the calorie counting but I don't know if that's really a good idea as it does make me sneak in extra stuff, 'subliminally'. But this is my plan and please, any advice is SO SO welcome.

Food -
During the week:
breakfast = porridge,
lunch = soup mainly and fruit,
dinner = pick 5 low cal evening meals and rotate (I'm thinking: prawn stir fry, omlette and salad (one whole egg, one egg white), fish and veg, soup (again) and one ready meal). Piece of fruit and square of chocolate
snacks = cereal bar mid afternoon, 100g 2% Greek yoghurt with 2 dessert spoons compote mid-morning (during the week)
Weekend (will have to be a bit more fluid):
breakfast/brunch = scrambled egg, baked mushroom, baked tomato, slice seedy bread OR peanut butter and wholemeal muffin for breakfast and salad/soup/cottage cheese for lunch
evening meal = healthy but more relaxed with a couple of glasses of wine. Probably stewed fruit for pudding (I love this, weirdly) or Skinny Cow ice cream bar

Exercise - well, cycle as much as I can, walk where I can otherwise (including fitting something in at the weekend wherever possible and weather allowing) and Circuit of Hell 3x.

What do you think?

Of course, I came home with helva and Turkish Delight so my weekday pudding will be a slivver of helva until that's used and then 2 cubes of Turkish Delight - all instead of the chocolate square.

My loosest winter work skirt is decidedly tight - it was a struggle to get it on today.

3 comments:

Call Me Ishmael said...

Welcome back! Sounds like you had a pretty good time -- I'm glad for you. Everyone deserves a good vacation! Your food plan sounds good to me. I have to get back on track too -- I think I gained at least 5lbs over my long weekend away. (Wine, wine, wine, chocolate, wine, and more chocolate.) Hope to see some pics of where you were, if you took any.
Cheers,
Ishmael

Lesley said...

Merhaba to you too!! It's great to have you back and blogging - I couldn't remember when you were due back so kept checking in!

So glad you had a good time and sorry about the unwanted pals (in the form of lbs that is, not nits or anything!!) you brought back with you. Your diet plan looks quite austere to me but I know you have to be tough on yourself to see results so i guess that's it. As Steve would say to us - life's not fair!! (I hated that)

Good luck and well done for getting straight back onto the wagon.

Lesley x

PS. your "meerkat fascinator" comment creased me up - best gag I've had so far!!

Alice said...

Welcome back! I have missed your blogging while you were away. I'm glad you had such a nice holiday, and am sure you can blast off those pounds in no time. Good luck!