Thursday 22 December 2011

Death by chocolate?

I nearly killed myself yesterday. Or rather, I wished I were dead. I ate too much chocolate. It didn’t seem excessive (by my admittedly warped standards) – about 4 Quality Street, 2 Celebrations – and then in an effort to keep myself off illegal milk chocolatey stuff (which, weirdly, made my teeth hurt) - 2 x 80% pralines (disgusting. 1st one - oh, how odd I don't like this. 2nd - of course I like it, it's chocolate. No, I really, really don't) and 100g of 70% orange chocolate. I felt so ill I didn’t know what to do with myself. I had a coffee, then a tea. Then I went home and had water. But I still felt incredibly sick. I was simultaneously hungry and sick. Bf had a piece of chocolate log (I LOVE chocolate log); I felt intensely nauseous. I looked at some Godiva chocolate inadvertently; I felt sick. I couldn't bear to open my advent calendar for fear of the small chocolates lying behind the doors. I went to bed at 11pm, still feeling really sick.

As Scarlett pointed out, today is another day. I don’t feel sick (I have laryngitis and a chest virus which make me dizzy, hoarse and headachy – as well as having a fetching deadman’s rattle of a cough - but will take it over feeling sick). In fact, I am feeling quite interested in chocolate again. I sincerely hope I’ve learnt my lesson about sugar overload but I wouldn’t place money on it..

Wednesday 21 December 2011

A Christmas angel

Up until approximately an hour ago, I have been exemplary in my Christmas eating. Or lack thereof. By now I would usually have fallen headfirst into a vat of canapés, chocolate (Big Purple Quality Street, mmm), chocolate log and booze. To name but a few. This year, despite the devils ‘stress’ and ‘temptation’ – along with their evil genius sibling ‘oh-sod-it’ – I have not had anything that was not diet-compliant. Despite a few meals out, one of which where I had roast beef and left the potatoes and Yorkshire pudding, not a morsel of pudding or carbs have passed my lips. Even my niece proffering a Hotel Chocolat tiddy caramel chocolate penguin was resisted. And she was asking questions that would make a tougher woman than me crack for sugar (“are you going to have babies? Why not? Don’t you like children? But I want to meet your children”). Fortunately a man in a white woolly suit and a small boy whizzed through the air which distracted her (we were at the Snowman ballet, lest this sound just too surreal).

Last night, after the day from hell which concluded with a trip to a chaotically busy Westfield East , I went home and made mince pies for the office (my cunning secret is an orange pate sucree and cointreau and pecans in the mincemeat). Hot out of the oven and smelling enticingly Christmassy and I didn’t even have a bite. I’ve had one today (not a pie, an actual mince pie) though and so much chocolate that I feel sick and my heart is racing. Let that be a lesson to me.

I think it’s because I WI on a Wednesday and I know there will be off-piste eating from now, I mean, Friday to New Year’s Day. I lost 1lb this week – I’m not sure that fully rewards the heroic levels of restraint I’ve practised but it’s better than nowt.

I’m now almost back to what I was before the US. Far short of my goal, made in November, of being Porky.0 by Christmas, I am in fact Porky.4 ½. And when I read back to my entries of the beginning of the year, I was adamant that I wanted to be a size 12 by now. Oh. I am in fact (still) a size 16. I think I’ve spent most of the year yo-yo-ing within the Porky stone bracket. Possibly I was heavier at the beginning of the year (probably in fact as my first entry of the year records me giving in and putting my size 18 jeans on) but the earliest date I’ve recorded my weight is the 20 April when I was Porky.10 ¼ - it’s not a stellar performance is it? Effort 8/10, achievement 1/10.

I can’t tell you how much I hope that 2012 is the year that I crack this. Not least because I got quite tearful out at dinner with one of my best friends on Monday about how scared I am about looking fat and ugly in photos that are there for posterity (my fat posterior captured for posterity, a scary thought) and how traumatic I fear finding a wedding dress is going to be.

With that in mind, whilst I’m going to have treats from Friday night til New Year’s Day, I’m really not going to go into calorie free-fall. I’m already so behind on what I want, no, NEED to achieve, I need to give myself as much of a headstart for 2012 as I can. My friend and I are planning a Bodypump class on a Monday and I may do the Pilates class beforehand which should help build some metabolism-raising muscle. I really need to lose at least half a stone every month from January to April (it won’t take me far enough but I reckon it should take me comfortably into a size 14, even allowing for some Christmas excess baggage). It’s a tall order for snail-metabolism me so I’m going to need a fair wind and a lorra, lorra luck. Please keep your fingers crossed for me, I need all the help I can get.

Tuesday 13 December 2011

The bitterness of chocolate

On this diet if you really crave something you’re supposed to not have it. As this is a sign of a food intolerance or candida, apparently. I am surprised that I am coping okay without fruit as I do love it (probably helps that it’s not nectarine season) but chocolate seems to be a different issue.

When I was on SW, during the week I would have one square of Lindt dark with orange, which I would nibble at slowly, and at weekends I’d have a 30g mini bar of Montezumas with butterscotch. On Harcombe I am supposed to only have chocolate for 70% cocoa solids or more (ideally more) and my Lindt was a shockingly paltry 45% (the Montezumas milk was 55%!). I have discovered that Godiva plain 72% is delicious (or even better is their 85% praline – which I suspect is cheating) – none of the bitterness I associate with plain chocolate. And Hotel Chocolate’s plain orange rounds are also really nice (their regular chocolate is not great). But rather than having one piece, I’ve been having 3 – or even more. I don't know how much more on Saturday but it was a lot. And the fact that I didn't have lunch doesn't atone for this. Harcombe would say it was an addiction to the sugar (and I know I have a problem with sugar) but I just can’t bear to give it up completely; I really feel the need for something after my dinner. Yesterday I managed to keep it to just the one advent calendar shape (Hotel Chocolate 70%) but it was an effort. Maybe I just need to come up with a chocolate routine that I stick to and don’t question – like I did on SW.

But given that it’s the season of cute canapés in M&S and Waitrose which I just LOVE even though most of them revolve around pastry which I am indifferent to – and which became our Sunday night supper most weeks last year – I think I’m doing okay. I was surprised by your comments on what I eat as I tend to think it’s masses – I certainly don’t feel deprived. And I feel well on it- no crazy blood sugar see-sawing – I’m even managing the ‘3 meals a day and no snacking unless absolutely essential’ pretty well which I never thought I would. Apart from the last couple of days when I’ve pretty much been starving all the time – I assume this is fleeting and hormonal and it will pass. Soon please. But if it doesn’t make me slimmer, then it’s going to have to go (oh Claire – I read your comment with a sinking heart!). I’ve yet to find anything that does work for me though and I’m prepared to tinker with a more hard-core version of what I’m already doing if I have to (low fat dairy rather than full fat springs to mind).

Tomorrow is our team Christmas lunch (which there are threats of having to cancel). I’ve chosen the best options I can (including cheese for ‘pudding’, sigh) and am planning on 1 potato and a little stuffing and off-loading the rest on to my very keen team-mate. Then I have supper with my niece and nephew on Saturday – should be do-able although I fear we’ll end up in a pasta/pizza place (they must have something non-carby though, right?). That’s all for this week. Lucky I don’t have much of a social life, isn’t it?!

Thursday 8 December 2011

The horror, the horror

I keep having nightmares. On Monday I dreamt that I was being chased by T-Rex (the dinosaur, not the 70s band – although I do, admittedly, fear a poodle perm). I was hiding and hoping it wouldn’t find me whilst I could hear it breathing just above me. I awoke with my heart pounding and feeling very unrested. On Tuesday though, the nightmare was worse. I was in a fitting room in my underwear, trying on wedding dress after wedding dress – they all looked absolutely dreadful. Tears were pouring down my face and I felt wretched, demoralised, inadequate and very fat and ugly. Somehow this was more terrifying- I doubt that I’ll ever be chased by T-Rex (either the band OR the dinosaur) but the second nightmare could all too easily be true. In fact, it could be a prophesy.

I imagine it came from a combination of a constant level of anxiety about just this, the knowledge that in April I will actually have to start looking for a dress and my experience in the Levis shop last week.

Now I am not a girl who has posh jeans. There’s no point – there is no denim, no matter how miraculous, that can disguise the fact that I am dumpy. But my mother wanted some black skinnies. Hilariously she told the assistant she was a size 12 – I gave her A Look, “a 10-12” she amended. The assistant and I looked at each other dubiously; she brought out a 10; it was too big. They had 20% off. “Why don’t you get some jeans?” asked my mother merrily, and against my better judgement, I tried them on. They looked pretty much as jeans do on a dumpy person. And despite their famous curve system, they still gaped at the back – and the next size down cut me in half (I felt like a tube of toothpaste that had been ruthlessly squeezed in the middle). On the plus side, I wasn’t tempted to spend money I can’t afford, but on the minus side, I felt pretty low.

That was before I weighed myself and found I put on 2lbs from my very abstemious and minimal participation in her birthday celebrations. Seriously, I made cocktails all evening and didn’t have one (I like cocktails). I did have a Carluccio’s chocolate meringue which made my heart absolutely race though – and I do not speak metaphorically. Anyway, by WI I’d lost the 2lbs and an additional ½ lb. This is not getting me very far towards escaping my nightmare/prophesy though.

Tonight is our Christmas party – I won’t be eating or drinking anything (other than water). I have a week ahead mercifully empty of any social event with emotional arm-twisting of food/drink consumption to overcome.