Week Two - Wednesday

I'm going strong and have lost 3kg. I hope to keep this up!

The trial I was doing settled yesterday. It had become my focus hence my less-than-regular updates on this blog.

I am enjoying the feeling of change in my body. I feel lighter and more toned. As I look around at people I see on the train or in the street, I think that we should all be doing a program like this, together. There are so many people who would feel better if they lost weight.

Having said that, I know how hard it is for me, being only a few kilograms over what I should be, to get into the habit of eating well again. I try to imagine how difficult it would be for someone who is grossly overweight, and I can't. I have never been there and I can only imagine how much determination it would take to get your weight down if you had, say, 50 kilograms to lose.  I admire anyone who can do it.

I have changed my fitness regime from the pregnancy/breastfeeding program to the "advanced" weight loss one. It involves more intense running and waaaaaay more intense toning exercised. So far I love it. I intend to push myself with this one. I am actually enjoying the process and hope to continue it for the full twelve weeks.

Today's breakfast was a berry bruschetta. Essentially frozen berries on toast with cottage cheese. It was all right! I have enjoyed the apple muesli the most. It's easy, filling and (I think) probably healthier than any bread-based option. Lunch will be a light salad and dinner something involving chicken, I think.

It's the not eating between meals that makes the biggest difference. I hope to make it a habit.

Day 3 - killing it!

I am eating so much less than I did in my previous life. I feel great about it. I know it's going to have to be a sustained effort in order for me to lose all the excess weight I am carrying around. I am cool with that. 

It's hilarious - having a plan to stick to makes me realise just how disorganised I can be. My life feels chaotic at the moment. I am doing a three-week trial in the Supreme Court (how and why and when I became a lawyer is another story) which is great because I am stuck in court and therefore cannot eat between meals. But then... I don't have time to do cooking or shopping!  So last night I went "off plan" For dinner. I just had chinese broccoli with oyster sauce and some steak. I figure this is ok. The dinner on the plan was pasta with broccoli and cottage cheese. Essentially I replaced simple carbs and cheese with meat.  It was flipping awesome.

I tell you what though - just being on a plan has so far been enough to stop me straying from the path of eating righteousness. I haven't had any cake or pastry or cheese or biscuit or ice cream for three days. This might not sound significant but it really is!

More tomorrow. In the meantime I can't wait to see how much weight I have lost when I weigh myself next week. 

Hurt so good

My arms hurt from push ups. This is a good day. I feel energised.

Going with the flow.... getting into the swing!

The first day felt like a shock to the system, I admit.  But today I was back at work, stuck in Court for most of the day, and able to forget about my diet completely. I felt GREAT. I enjoyed the feeling of being slightly hungry. Maybe this was just because last night I happened to watch a documentary about fasting. Apparently there is a lot of research being done on it in the United States. They're looking at whether fasting can lower the risk of some diseases and provide other benefits, and the research suggests that it can. One method of fasting, called Alternate Day Fasting, required you to fast for one day (eating only a lunch) and then eat whatever you wanted to the next day, and repeating this pattern for eternity. Apparently it reduced the risk of heart disease, some cancers, etc dramatically, even if you had junk food on the eating day. Another researcher found that rats who were starved for two days out of every seven actually appeared to show an increase in brain activity. In other words, the effect of the fasting was to kick the brain into action, which makes sense on an evolutionary level (your brain kicks into gear so you can figure out how to find food, or something). The brain activity was reduced if they ate a lot of fructose though, suggesting it does matter what you eat when you're not fasting. Boo! This documentary could not have come at a more perfect moment for me. Now that I know there are scientific reasons why fasting and being hungry is good, I can just roll with it.

Day 2. Morning.

Have woken up starving but feeling good! I don't want to eat breakfast yet because I feel it will re-set the hunger clock, making it more difficult to get through to lunch without going crazy.

But my 2 year old is demanding porridge so maybe I will just make mine at the same time.

I am going to do my workout tonight when I Get home. It's toning.

Day 1 Dinner

I am eating dinner at 5.20pm. I was too hungry to wait. What the heck am I going to do later when I get the mad munchies!? Brush my teeth and go to bed I guess.

Wow. I must have been eating some serious junk prior to commencing this diet. The withdrawals have been quite alarming. I can only recall two occasions prior to this diet when I have felt like this. One was when I did the cabbage soup diet at the age of 17. The other was during Big Brother (how and when and why I ended up on that show is a story for another day) when they fed us nothing but protein shakes mixed with porridge for three days straight. On both occasions I lost a significant amount of weight, so I hope I do lose weight easily on the current regime. Bring it on.

Meanwhile, I have to keep telling myself that it feels better to be empty and light-headed and like I am on the way to sexy summer skinniness than completely full and satisfied and hating myself! Ha ha.

The dinner tonight is a lamb, pumpkin, pomegranate, cucumber, lentil, eggplant and herb salad with a garlic yoghurt dressing. It is fantastic. If it was on the menu at a local cafe I would buy it.

They say to have herbal tea as your dessert. That is totally laughable. I have already had about 10 cups of tea today to stave of my hunger. I realise that by doing so I was probably just feeding it. But hey. At least I wasn't eating cake like usual.

I hope the significant cut in calories does not affect my breastmilk production. I am on the breastfeeding program so it does factor in an extra 500 on what the other people are eating.

My goodness. Those poor souls on 1200 calories. I do not know whether that is sustainable to be honest.

Makes me want to keep breastfeeding forever. I know, though, that I would eventually start getting weird looks.

I AM STARVING!
Had half a banana and a 200mg low-fat yoghurt.
I AM STILL STARVING! OH MY GAAAAAD.
This is because I am sitting down, I know. It always makes me want to stuff my face.

Maybe I need a stand-up desk. They are all the rage apparently. And Ernest Hemingway wrote standing up, or so they say.

It is 2pm on the first day of this weight loss regime. Going strong so far. I had a cappuccino as my snack and a very boring (cheese, egg, butter and meat free) yet possibly nutritious sandwich.

I feel like I am starving, which serves to illustrate how much I must have been eating over the past two years. I don't think I have felt hunger on more than one or two occasions since I got pregnant with my first baby.

It must be nearly impossible for very obese people to do this. When your mind is so used to the pleasure of eating constantly, it starts to play tricks on you when you're hungry.

I admire anyone who sticks to this plan.

I think I will be able to do it, but it is certainly causing me to give a lot of thought to the concept of weight control and fitness in general. I am spending my day so far looking at fat people in the street and wondering whether they are on this program too (and if they're not, thinking they should be) and marvelling at the thin people (who are thin on the ground, excuse the pun, here in Geelong).

Must do some work.

Day 1 Exercise and Breakfast

I am doing the pregnancy and breastfeeding program because I am still breastfeeding my second baby. Therefore the exercise plan is lighter and the food more generous than on the normal program.

The first exercise program was a walk followed by some pelvic floor exercises!  I took Baby 2 out in the pram which is an awesome Baby Jogger City Select that we bought last year.... but which today has a dodgy wheel! I am going to have to take it to get fixed. I know this means that I will have to get out the vintage Emmaljunga in the meantime. This does not bode well for my aspirations to be a stylish and elegant modern fitness fanatic mother but I just have to tell myself (and everyone else I walk past) that Swedish design never dates.

So anyway I did my walk which was not too taxing, and came home to make my breakfast. Today it was "Strawberry Bruschetta". I mean why not kick off with something completely ridiculous, right!!? But I am following this thing to the letter with no alterations. So: wholemeal bread, cottage cheese, strawberries and cocoa sprinkled on top. Holy moly Michelle Bridges. Quite delicious. Would would have thought.

Will write again after lunch!

It's time to lose weight.

I joined the Michelle Bridges 12 Week Body Transformation. Why? Because a whole lot of people I know have lost weight doing it, and it's time for me to lose weight.

I only have about 10kg to lose. It's not like I am obese. I just want to feel thin and light rather than... well.... a bit flabby.

I had two kids in two years.  That sort of thing takes its toll if you're like me and use excuses such as pregnancy to eat more cake. Lots more cake.

Since Christmas last year, when my second baby was born, I have been waiting patiently for the weight to fall off "naturally". But Christmas is fast approaching and those scales are stuck at 10kg over my pre-baby weight. So something must be done before I slide inertly into another Christmas of cake and wine and general yuletide gluttony.

I suppose if I follow the program, the weight will come off. That is all I am aiming to do. To follow the program down to the last detail.

I will blog the details of each day's food and exercise.