Week Nine. Day One.

Yesterday saw the end of my 8-week Blood Sugar Diet. If I’m honest, I probably only to stuck to 800 calories-a-day limit for maybe half of the eight weeks, which would realistically leave me with another four weeks to complete.

It was hard to stick to the calorie limit every day; I struggled and failed many times, although some days I did very well. These were the days I tended to be busy – usually Mondays and Tuesdays. By the end of each week I was usually diet-fatigued and willing to indulge with my family while we watched films and relaxed together. I admit, I still haven’t gotten over my habit of emotional eating neither have I broken the ‘weekend feast’ habit!

Despite this, I have lost 12lbs overall. I look leaner and I feel so much better. My enthusiasm for running has returned and my mileage over the last four weeks has sky-rocketed! This is an amazing accomplishment considering that before I started this diet, when I really should have been running every day because I was eating so much, I was always reluctant to go and rarely did.

So, I have lost 12lbs. Nearly the stone I set out to lose. Although I’m a bit disappointed I didn’t stick to the diet a little better and lose the whole stone I wanted to, I am still amazed at how much I’ve lost. Over the last four years I have fought to lose about 5lbs and then have put it back on again almost immediately.

This morning though, the diet came to an official end. The eight weeks – which seemed like such a long time at the beginning – have abruptly finished leaving me with a sense of emptiness when I woke up this morning and realised I could legitimately eat whatever I want for breakfast – toast, cereal, crumpets – anything! So what did I do? My willpower kicked in and I reached for a protein shake and decided to keep going! That’s right – you heard me! I am continuing with the Blood Sugar Diet, by my own free will.

Now, in my last blog post I know I said I was carrying this diet on for another week, and I am. But I could have eaten anything I wanted for breakfast this morning, because technically, the diet is over. So I was pleased with myself for not reaching for the toast and Nutella (yay me!).

I mentioned I have lost 12lbs overall, my mum has lost 13lbs overall. We have both done extremely well and I’m proud of us both. Our exercise levels have risen from sedentary to active, and I think we are both feeling the benefits of this.

I, for one, feel excited about continuing this diet for a little longer. I am excited to switch over to the 5:2 diet at some stage. I also think I will give this blood sugar diet a whirl for four weeks following Christmas, after all, I am not a robot and I will not be able to resist all those treats that come hand-in-hand with Christmas…


 

Week Eight

Hello Week Eight. Here we are, face to face.

We are nearly there. At the end.

When this started I never thought Week Eight would come. But here you are...

We’ve had some slips, and a few family dilemmas and stresses – which is why I haven’t been blogging lately – but the wall chart has never been taken down. I have dutifully crossed off every day, even if my calories sky-rocketed for a day (or two). One day I ate so much rubbish that I woke up in the night feeling sick three times!! It was a terrible night and I regretted over-doing it. The next day I had a food hangover – honestly. I was sluggish, my brain wasn’t functioning properly and I had little-to-no tolerance for my family. I spent the whole day on the sofa watching mind-numbing TV with my three-year-old shouting at anyone who came near me – lucky I didn’t have work that day.

I am back on track now and have been for a few days. So is Mum. We are both still losing weight, although it’s much slower and we have both been forgetting about the 800 calorie count on some days (for me it’s usually the weekends).

I have been running more and going out for longer runs, which I am pleased with. My times are getting faster and I feel good while I’m running.

This diet should be over on Sunday (five days’ time) but because I have been going over the 800 calorie a day limit on occasion, I am extending it until next Friday. Mum and I are calling this ‘Two Perfect Weeks’. We are trying really hard. And earlier this evening, when I came so close to eating a spoonful of peanut butter but turned my back on it at the last minute, I was very proud of myself. So here I am again writing my blog and encouraging anyone who is reading this who’s had a slip up to get back on the wagon. It's not too late. A few bad days doesn't ruin everything. Start again. Do Two Perfect Weeks with Mum and me. Turn your back on the biscuit tin and feel great!

(P.S. I still haven't eaten a biscuit)  

Derailment

I haven’t blogged for a few days. There’s a reason for this: I suffered a derailment and I couldn’t muster the enthusiasm or brain power to blog about it. Until now.

There was also an element of shame, I suppose. After feeling big headed for doing so well I suddenly felt ashamed of myself and following a rather large (binge) consumption of refined sugar, I felt a bit depressed and down. I was nervous I wouldn’t be able to get back on track. And I probably wouldn’t have got back on track, if I hadn’t weighed myself yesterday morning.

When you have a few evenings in a row (I was quite good during the days, and I went running) where you break your diet; eat the wrong things and way too much of them, or scoff vast quantities of not-too-bad-for-you snacks which still pushes you over your calorie limit, you will perhaps feel like you’ll never get back on track. But you can.

My willpower, sticking power, whatever you want to call it, has never been steadfast. I change my mind, a lot – I think it’s hereditary. I will do this, I won’t do this, I can’t do this, I want to do this... It sometimes feels like my will and my body (Id, and Super Ego?) are at war with each other; tugging on each end of the rope until I fall one way or another. I have always been a bit prone to binge eating and it doesn’t take a lot for me to fall from the tightrope of a diet. But after I weighed myself yesterday morning and found out that the damage wasn’t that bad after all, I managed to climb back on the tightrope, or get my train back on its rails, and carry on with renewed willpower.

There are eighteen days left of my eight weeks. One of those days is my husband’s birthday so there might be a day where some cake is consumed… But I will do my best to stay on track until the end.

We all encounter set-backs, in everything we do. We have to learn how to pick ourselves up from these set-backs; to get back on track. Doing the 8-Week Blood Sugar Diet is a great teacher of this.

Snacking and Me

Today I realised that one of the biggest single changes the 8-Week Blood Sugar Diet has enforced on me is that I no longer snack between meals. This is partly because there aren’t enough calories in my daily allowance to spare on a 100-200 calorie snack. It's also partly due to the Blood Sugar Diet teaching me what I should be eating so I'm not as hungry between meals. I try to eat only breakfast, lunch and dinner, and no puddings! Sob!!

Of course, occasionally I’ll need assistance to get me through to the next meal. I will usually have a hot drink but if that doesn’t work I will have a small handle of almonds and several raisins. And I'm pleased to report I have found eating this small, far more nutritious, snack is far more satisfying than eating half a tin of biscuits.

It was today, while I was adding some chocolate digestives to our biscuit tin (for the boys - not me!), when it suddenly dawned on me, that only a few weeks ago I would have eaten two or three biscuits while adding them to the tin, without even thinking about it. Then I might have made a coffee and sit down with another three…
There are 86 calories in a single chocolate digestive. If I’d have eaten three that’s 258 calories. Six chocolate digestives: 516! That’s more calories in a single snack than I have for most dinners! And that’s not even counting the sugar… (29.4g of sugar for six choccy digestives if you wondered – it’s recommended to have around 5g per day!)

Biscuits were my go-to snack, but they weren’t exclusive. I’d snack on anything but rarely anything healthy. Snacking had literally crept up on me and had become a way of life, a habit, without me even noticing. I would begin my snacking at around 10.30 am – with a coffee. Some mornings it seemed to take forever for the clock hands to tick round to 10.30 am while all I could think of was that tin sitting in the cupboard. And I might snack again after lunch and again after the school run and again after dinner… You get the gist.

Snacking and me go way back.

But things have changed lately, and while I’m on the 8-Week Blood Sugar Diet I won’t eat a biscuit or snack on anything so horrifyingly innutritious (think of all those empty calories I’ve consumed!). I am slowly reprogramming myself not to reach for something to eat the moment I feel hungry and cutting down on sugar has certainly helped me fight those urges to feed my hunger.

I am most certainly not a robot, so I will never say I’m not eating a biscuit ever again as it just simply wouldn't be true. But I certainly hope that they won’t creep up on me to become my go-to snack ever again.      

Functioning with Fatigue

Today I suffered. With fatigue.

I was fine when I woke up; I made the boys their breakfasts, I cooked and ate my own breakfast. But somewhere around 9am, and my second cup of tea, I started to feel unaccountably weary. I just wanted to go back to bed and sleep. And sleep.

But I couldn’t. The two boys were looking at me to provide some kind of activity for them. It was a beautiful day; sunny, warm and very little wind. How could they miss out on that because I wanted to sleep? So I told them that I’d take them to the beach for a swim before lunch.

Somehow (after a strong coffee) we managed to get out of the house by around 10.30am. We walked to the beach. We found a spot that wasn’t too crowded and I dragged the buggy across the sand, near to the water’s edge. We put our towels out. The boys put their trunks on. And I did all this with my brain functioning like a zombie's (except instead of wanting to eat brains I wanted to get the boys to the beach).

Then we went for a swim – and the water was amazing.

And then, miraculously, I started to wake up. The fog started to leave my head and I was able to think about things other than sleeping or closing my eyes.

Whether it was the walk that did it, the sea or the joy of watching the boys playing in the sand and splashing in the water – I don’t know. But I woke up. And since then, the rest of the day has been fine. I managed to get two loads of washing washed and dried, ironed and put away. I made dinner for the boys (although one of them had a tantrum and went to bed early). I went for a short run, made dinner for Andy and me, washed up and then made Andy’s lunch for tomorrow. And now I’m writing this blog.

There were two notable factors about today’s weariness:

1) I wasn’t hungry, not at all, all day, and

2) Not at one single point ever did the thought of eating biscuits occur to me – a few weeks ago if I woke up feeling tired I would eat biscuits at the earliest opportunity.

So when fatigue strikes, my advice would be to just power on through. Don’t reach for easy way out and eat sugar. Maybe even have a cold shower. It might not seem like it while your brain is foggy, but you might just achieve quite a lot if you fight the urge to get back into bed and eat biscuits.

photo credit: dreaming in milan via photopin (license)

Did you say Extra Fries or Exercise?

It’s Friday again. 

In Bournemouth it’s the weekend of the annual air festival and just a few miles away I can hear something terrifyingly noisy performing stunts for thousands of freezing revellers who have braved a typical English summer’s night to gather and watch the spectacle in the sky – gale force winds are predicted for tomorrow.

It’s the third Friday in a row where I haven’t sat down after dinner to a large glass of red wine and a bag or sharing chocolates which I have no intention of sharing.

One of my biggest worries before I started this diet was ‘how on earth am I going to get through the weekend without eating chocolates, ice cream and drinking wine’. But I can tell you after three weeks, it’s not so hard after all. It was a silly worry to have. And actually the weekends are quite pleasant without all those things.  

Today my calorie total is just below 600. Having gone over my 800 limit for the last few days, I thought I’d better rein it in for a while. I even went for a run today having only eaten 300 calories at that point, I felt surprisingly sprightly.

While I was out running I started to think about how unmotivated I was with my running a few weeks ago. I knew I needed to get out and exercise because I was doing less physical activity and eating more and more – of entirely the wrong foods. But all the eating was making me lethargic and try as I might, getting my running bra on just seemed like too much effort (in all honesty it is quite difficult to get into). The more I ate, the less exercise I wanted to do. That seems funny to me – not hahaha funny, but, odd.

Since I have been eating a LOT less I have gone out running and enjoyed it. I’ve been out three times this week. Again, odd.

It seems that by eating 800 calories a day I am left with more energy and enthusiasm than I have when I eat pasta for dinner, have cereal for breakfast and sandwiches for lunch. Obviously I have days when I am tired but they are few and far between. I generally find that the busier and more active I am, the easier the diet is and the easier it is to go out for a short run.

Maybe if you cut back on those extra fries you’ll have more tolerance for exercise. I certainly have!

All the Better for a Frozen Berry Bowl

Everyone needs a go-to breakfast that’s quicker than boiling the kettle. Something you don’t even have to think about. Something you can make with your eyes closed while you’re still half asleep. And it has to be tasty. It has to be so tasty you look forward to eating it.

For me, that something used to be toast with an unhealthy spread (chocolate spread was a favourite) or sugary cereal. I could make it with my eyes closed and I didn’t even have to think about what I was doing.

Whilst on the 8-week blood sugar diet that has had to change. I can no longer have toast or cereal in the mornings and the suggested breakfasts of eggs and shakes can be a bit time consuming (and produce more washing up than I would like!). This is how I fell into the ‘frozen berry bowl’.

We always have a large tub of Greek yogurt in the fridge. And recently I’ve had frozen berries in the freezer. The perfect breakfast for me at the moment is two tablespoons of yogurt with about 100g of frozen berries – blueberries and raspberries are the favoured ones at the moment. I also add a small handful of flaked almonds – about 5g. This comes to around 200 calories - perfect. 

Once the berries have started to defrost a little (about five minutes) I mix my bowl of yogurt and berries together. The cold berries turn the yogurt into a kind of ice cream and the result is honest-to-god amazing. It tastes too good to be a breakfast and I am literally salivating whilst writing this; I can’t until morning.

So there you have it. My go-to breakfast. My frozen berry bowl. If you make only one change in your life, try swapping your morning toast or cereal to a ‘frozen berry bowl’. I promise you, it will not disappoint!    

  

Three Litres of Water a Day

Three litres of water a day seems a lot to drink. But is it...? 

It is vital that you drink between two and three litres of water a day while on the 8-week blood sugar diet to try and prevent constipation and headaches. In fact it's a good idea to drink plenty of water whether you are dieting or not. 

You can drink any calorie-free liquid that you wish; fruit tea, tap water, fizzy water, tea and coffee (but go easy on the milk). I enjoy a mixture of all these, every day.

You must absolutely not drink fruit juices or fruit smoothies. And absolutely no sugar filled fizzy drinks at all. At a push you could have a diet fizzy drink but do this infrequently, if you go out or are doing something special.

If you are not keen on drinking tap water (I’m not) try buying a large bottle of ‘nice’ water. I like Volvic or Buxton. You can then see how much water you are drinking and it becomes more rewarding. Or buy a water filter which definitely helps make the water taste better. If you are really struggling with water, try adding ice and a few frozen raspberries, a slice of lemon or a squeeze of lime.

I thought it would be interesting to work out how much fluid I drink in a day. So, during the course of an average day I’ll have a large-ish cup of tea with breakfast (if I’ve got time – which at the moment in the summer holidays I’ve got plenty of – I might have two) let’s say that’s 400ml. I have an effervescent multivitamin drink in the morning too, let’s say that’s 200ml. I’m already on 600ml!

I’ll drink a glass of water, maybe two throughout the morning and another with lunch (1200ml). 

Maybe another cup of tea after lunch (400ml). And about four o’clock I’ll have a coffee (250ml). That’s an additional 1.8L of fluids. And the day is not over yet! 

I’ll have a glass of water with dinner (400ml) and if dinner was particularly salty perhaps another, and after I have washed up I’ll sit down with a peppermint or Redbush tea (250ml).

This works out to just over three litres of water in one day – I never knew I was consuming so much liquid! And I haven’t even been trying!  

    

You will notice that you pass a lot of water too – this has got to do with drinking so much water, obviously, but there is also an interesting scientific reason about the release and use of glucose from your body. I’ll try and write a blog about that one day…

  

Running on 800

It has been fifteen days since my last biscuit. Fifteen biscuit-less days which have gone by fairly quickly. 

My husband has joined us on the diet now. He isn’t weighing out every nut and counting every single calorie like we are but he is eating the same foods, and most importantly, not snacking between meals on sugar-loaded biscuits and chocolate or ice creams (of which there is an abundance of in our freezer at this time of year – how I’m avoiding them is beyond me). He’s had a tough first day; I can see it in his tired face. But hopefully over the next couple of days he’ll adjust, and feel a lot better.

So what I assumed would be a lonely, unhappy time for me is turning out to be a bit of a diet social. I certainly do not feel alone with this.  

I weighed myself this morning and I’m pleased to announce a loss of one solitary pound. A loss is still a loss no matter how small (small positives are still positives too!). My mum weighed herself and she has lost two pounds. We are both pleased with our efforts.

I went for a run today. Three miles in my new Nike Free Runs. I went along the beach and soaked up the atmosphere like a sponge. And although I am still slow, having not done much training this summer at all, I felt stronger and faster than I felt yesterday morning when I went out. I loved it so much I might even go again tomorrow evening!

Breakfast, 200 calories

With regard to running having only consumed 400 calories, at the point I went out, I didn’t feel it negatively affected my run at all. Now maybe if I was training for a marathon… but that’s a different matter altogether, maybe even another blog... 

To summarise:

This week I lost: 1lb

In total I have lost: 7lb

This week Mum Lost: 2lb

In total Mum has lost: 6lb

Combined Weight Lost Overall: 13lb 

Well done to us!