95.6

I had my stats wrong when I wrote the other day, I thought I had lost 9.5 but it was actually 9 kilos. It's a little confusing on the Rapid Loss progress page because as soon as you are under a number it's calculated as a kilo. So if I was 96 and lost to get to 95.9 it would say I had lost 10 kilos even though it's actually only 9.1kgs. Anyway, it doesn't matter, it's going down! Another .4 this morning so .8 this week so far (weigh in in 3 days so I should make my 1kg) and 9.4 altogether.
I'm getting back into routines of school runs, only the last day or two so this week will be the big tester. More so if I can keep up my water intake. Driving a lot makes me panic a bit as I have always weed a lot anyway. I know they say that your body gets used to it so hopefully it will and I can start adding more. I'm trying for at least 4 bottles of 750ml, one on each drive, one in the middle of the day, one when I get home. I also wee a lot during the night so try not to have it too close to bedtime either.
I saw my gorgeous osteo this morning who said she thinks I look different and that my skin is softer which was lovely. She sees more of my body than most so she would know. Oh hang on, you've all seen it now too haven't you?! Not so close up though. I think my front on view has changed a little too. I'm not so big on the sides, they're evening out a little instead of being bulgy above my knickers and bulgy again below. It'll be interesting to check out in the photos on Tuesday.
So I'm battling along. Again, the support on the Rapid Loss Forum is so valuable. I remember when I went to weight watchers, they said that the success rate of dieting alone or dieting support were so different, it's so important to have that support. It's great to connect with others who are going through exactly the same thing. And Ray Kelly himself is on there a lot, he's a funny fellow actually, we all have a bit of banter which is nice. I'm still a bit of a newby so haven't been around as long as some of the others but of course I'm making myself known!
Speak soon xx

Down to 96

OK so it's officially 9 kilos. I lost another .4 this morning. The biggest amount I've lost since I went to weight watchers starting at 82. How exciting!
I didn't think I'd lose any yesterday as I had a busy day and didn't drink much water at all. Now I'll be back in the routine of school runs I shall make sure that I have my bottle on the way home from dropping off and another on the way home from pickup. That leaves 1 to add in the middle and if I can handle the nights, one to add at the end of the day. I seem to have a day with no loss then a day with a goodish loss so I'm ok with knowing that now.
I cooked a roast chicken meal last night. I have had frozen chooks sitting in the freezer and I thought 'I have to start cooking good wholesome meals, even if I can't eat all of them'. The night before I had steamed some chicken and some of the veggies we'd be having so I did extra veggies. And I roasted the chicken on a rack so that it wasn't sitting in fat. So I heated up my extra veggies, had nice moist chicken that was fresh and it was yummy! So I've now proven I can do it, another hurdle to get through.
I've been receiving such heart warming emails and messages from friends about my journey. Many to start with were about the fact that I put it all out there, photos and all, to show how huge I was (my words, not theirs). With a smile on my face mind you! A few though are from people who have said I have inspired them to do the same. In fact I've had three separate friends who have said that they're going to do either this challenge or something similar. To me, that's what it's all about. I put my photos on to show that I'm a real woman with real curves, I felt like shit and I decided to do something about it. I'm sure there are many who can relate to that. So I'm totally stoked to know that I have in fact inspired others to join me. I feel so good already and I'm nearly a third of the way there - weight wise at least.
I'm going away for the weekend in a week so that will be my challenging time. But at this stage I have such a strong mindset that I have a plan in mind anyway. I spoke to Ray Kelly himself who devised  Rapid Loss, he has says it is ok to fudge a little when away but just not all the time. I shall have my shakes as snacks. I shall pick meals with meat and salad with no dressings and by then be able to probably have a chicken wrap as I will be in stage 2. I can even have a poached egg on toast for breakfast so I still feel like I'm having my Sunday breaky. So I'm looking forward to the challenge.
Speak soon xxx

End of week 2 weigh in

Woo bloody hoo! I lost another 1.9 kilos this week. A more realistic loss than last week, as the week went on I realised that that wasn't going to happen again. The more I lose the less I will lose each week if you get my drift? So so far I've lost 9.1 kilos. Pretty stoked with that! I've put progress photos, I will put side by sides from when I started. I don't think I look particularly different yet though I feel different. I guess it just shows how much I had to lose in the first place if you can lose nearly 10 kilos and look much the same. That's ok though, I'm nearly a third of the way there!

So the ones with my glasses on are from 2 weeks ago and the ones without are from today. Hopefully next week I will start showing some more differences. I don't care anyway, I don't think I've been this light for years, 96.4 kilos, I'll be under the 95 soon, then next goal will be to get to 90!

 

Birthday Weekend

I've had my boy Bill's birthday weekend. He's turned 13. God help us. He's a beautiful boy, lovely natured, gentle and kind and very, very supportive of me. Whether it was to do with Dad's passing last year or to do with checking up on how I am going with weight loss, he's my rock. He's also got attitude and stubbornness, he's very clever and is ALWAYS right. He gets those things from his fathers side. Except for the cleverness - he gets that and his love of writing from me.
Anyway, I've found it very difficult to cope with birthday celebrations full of junkie food so I've done lots of hiding in the bedroom! Saturday Bill had a friend for a sleepover. During the daytime we went next door for lunch so I was all prepared for that. My in-laws live next door.  It's a good thing for the most part, certainly no 'Everybody Loves Raymond' there. Except that my father in law likes to hang shit on my weight which really pisses me off. He clearly thinks it's funny and I guess because I always just smile and don't say anything he will do it until I tell him not to. Just little things. We were talking about going in the spa and he said - do you fit? Or when we were building here, the side of the house is very skinny, and we were talking about getting a thin shed down there. And he said 'You wouldn't fit if it was that skinny would you?' I don't say anything, really because I find it so offensive that somebody hangs shit on somebody that clearly has issues with that exact problem. But also because even though I feel that he is just being mean, he thinks he is just being funny.
So off we went next door and I took my salad that I had made and my tuna. And that was all fine. Then when Bill's friend came for dinner they ended up deciding on takeaway as it was Paul's turn to cook! I said that if I had known that I wouldn't have had a lunch but saved it for dinner and had a piece of grilled fish. So again I hid myself away. Then yesterday, which was his actual birthday, he chose what he wanted and again we got takeaway. (an expensive week this week, we don't normally have it 3 days in a week.) He chose Subway. It was a toss up between that and Hungry Jacks. Hubby was very supportive actually. He asked what I wanted and in a nearly tantrum voice I said 'well I can have nothing from either of them anyway so don't bother about me!' He asked what I would have had and I said the grilled fish so he went out of his way and got me one. I made my salad up of my allowed ingredients and I even asked for my fish to be grilled with no flour. I'm not sure if it was the no flour or the fact that it took ages to come but it was a little dry, but still, lovely. Subway had run out of meatballs. Not just at Belgrave but at Ferntree Gully too! Paul said he thinks if he hadn't said 'you've got to be kidding me, it's dinner time' they probably wouldn't have gone out the back and made some more! Anyway, the crux of the story is that I survived a weekend full of takeaway foods and didn't slip up once.
There seems to be no rhyme or reason to this weight loss gig. Saturday morning I had had a loss, I put it down to eating my big meal at lunchtime on Friday. So I did the same on Saturday and not only didn't have a loss but put on .1. Then today after my takeaway fish dinner I had lost .8! That's why I think it's probably better to weigh in once a week as suggested.
The main reason I'm weighing in each morning (besides being addicted to it and just because I can) is that once I've hit the elusive 10% loss of body weight I can go on to stage 2. I bought my preparations for this on Saturday while shopping for last minute birthday presents. It will put flavour in my meals at last. And it's pretty cool that it reminds me of Mickey Mouse ears!

 

 

I'm not quite sure the way this works on the Rapid Loss site. They don't seem to count in points with their numbers. In fact when you write your progress in during the week it even says, write it in in whole numbers. I of course write it in fully, so that I can see where my progress is. This means though that as soon as you go under a number it says that I have lost a kilo more. As you are meant to lose 10% of your weight before moving on, I'm not quite sure when that will kick in. I started at 105 kilos (I know, jealous right?) which for me means that I have to lose 10.5 kilos before starting. It will be interesting, I am 96.6 now and as I'm under 97 they've counted that as losing 9 kilos which it nearly is. I wonder if they round down the original weight? So when I go under 96 and they consider is 10 kilos if that will be my 10%? I am imagining that they will tell me when I can start on stage 2. They acknowledge my updates in an email so I would think they would say 'you are now at stage 2'. Not long to go now! There are other things you can add but I think it's more boring veggies so I haven't really checked it out yet! 

 

 

Day 4 of week 2

I'm feeling a bit better than yesterday. It's Saturday today. On Thursday I went shopping with my niece in the evening. I'd been really good all day, had my shakes for breaky and lunch, had my fruit and yoghurt for snacks. I got home and realised that I hadn't bought all the ingredients for my tuna salad dinner so I figured I was going to bed soon, stuff it I'll just have another shake and I'm bound to have an even better loss in the morning. But when I got up there was nothing. I had lost no more, 97.8 kilos was the same as the day before.
The Rapid Loss forum is terrific, I wrote on there about how disappointed I was. I didn't mention that I had had 3 shakes, more the fact that I had lost so well last week and how it has slowed down incredibly this week. They suggested measuring myself which I shall do, I had forgotten about doing that. Even if it's just my tummy which is my main hurdle. A friend saw my pictures on here and asked how I could be 105 kilos and I didn't have a fat arse! I said yes I do, maybe it's just because my gut is so big that it overshadows it! But then when I went and looked back on them I realised that my arse isn't actually that big, it's my gut that I have the biggest issues with. I'd like my visible bits thinner too, my arms have gotten big and my chins all seem to run into each other now, but it's my gut that I mainly want to get down. I suppose everybody had their trouble spots don't they?
I also thought about the lack of weight loss and thought, if I'm not eating my veggie and meat serving then I'm not having the required amount of nutrients that I need for the day. It's a well thought out program, devised with maximum weight loss in mind if you follow the plan. Maybe I was slowing my metabolism down by not having the fibres and protein?
Anyway the one thing I was pleased with on Thursday night was that I made sure it was pizza night at home so I was away from the delicious aromas of my favourite food! So I was proud of that one.
I popped in to see a friend yesterday and stayed for lunch so I changed my meal time to lunch. I was really pleased with myself, I chopped up my salad ingredients in the thermomix, took my tin of tuna and away I went. I even took some skim milk in a little bottle as she didn't have any, so I could have my cuppas. And it didn't bother me at all. In fact it was lovely and it was filling. Then I just had the shake for dinner. And drank shitloads of water. And was pissing like a horse every 5 minutes. But I lost another .5 this morning so very happy about that one! I'm actually thinking that if I can organise myself I will try to have my meal at lunchtime if possible. I cook something different for the rest of the family at night anyway so that's not an issue. The meals are quite big in quantity and pretty filling, often I don't want to eat the full serving. Then I go to bed on a full stomach. Not sure if it will make that much difference but it's said to be the best way of eating anyway so I'll give it a try. And it breaks up the shakes.
So I'm clearly not going to have a huge loss like last week but I wasn't really expecting that, it was a whopper. I am wanting to keep checking though because once I've lost 10.5 kilos I can go on to the next stage which includes wraps and flavourings which I am missing. For some reason the Rapid Loss progress thingy seems to kindly round the weight loss down so it's saying I've lost 8 kilos even though it's actually 7.7 kilos. So I'm wondering if they will tell me when I hit the 10.5 kilo mark as they send me an email each time I adjust my weight during the week. I've lost 1 kilo so far this week anyway so at least I got over that hurdle. Hopefully I'll get another half in there at least!

Water

I am doing what everybody tells you not to and weighing in every day at the moment. Because I had such a good loss last week and I'm still in the detox stage, I want to keep seeing how well I'm doing. I had lost .2 and then yesterday had lost nothing and as I'm doing everything to the letter I wasn't sure why. So I upped my water. I think because I'd been doing a little bit of driving around I hadn't been drinking as much as I should. I drank lots yesterday and was rewarded with a .5kg loss this morning. I should have known that. When I did Weight Watchers years ago I could have a crap week foodwise but drink heaps of water and have a good loss, or have a great week foodwise but drink stuff all water and not lose much. It's such a simple thing, but I'm sure I'm not the only one who doesn't drink enough of it.
I had a bit of excitement today when I looked down and saw that I could once again see the little bones that are my ankles. I had this experience when I lost a little weight last year but they fattened up again as the rest of me did. I'm determined to make sure that doesn't happen again!
I'm already feeling better as far as my joints are concerned. I have been taking magnesium since last week so that may have something to do with it too. I'm tired as I haven't been sleeping the best, I'm trying not to have too many coffees and to tell you the truth I haven't even really felt like having them that much.
I've not even really been that hungry at night, by the time my 'real' meal comes. I have taken to using the Thermomix and chopping up my allowed foods - mushrooms, carrots, capsicum, lettuce, tomato, onion - these are the allowed salad ingredients. Half of these I don't like raw so I chop them up finely and chuck my tin of tuna on top which is pretty yummy. The allowance of food for meals is rather large and I often can barely get through it.
I am going away for a weekend in 2 1/2 weeks so I'm hoping that I'm on to stage 2 by then. I don't think there's a hell of a lot of difference but you can add flavour to your meals which will be lovely. At the moment I can just have fish or chicken with veggies which I bake or steam and it's bland as anything. I can have things like pepper and lemon which I haven't tried, I have had balsamic vinegar though. I can also have wraps in stage 2 so am already trying to plan my meals in my head. I'm thinking I'll swap to the shakes for my snacks and eat the meals I'm allowed. One of the breakfast options is a poached egg on toast so at least I'll still feel like I'm having a cooked breakfast if we eat out.
So still going! I'll check in again soon! xx

I'm Excited! Written 20th January 2015

I know I've just posted my day 1 post but I actually wrote that a week ago. I was planning on publishing them another way but it didn't work out so plan B is in action now with my new blog. So here's my chapter 2!

If Big Kev was around in this day and age of text speak, and if Bert would have allowed it, I'm sure that he would have added to his catchphrase to make it OMFG I'm excited! And that's how I'm feeling so far! 6.7kgs down already. Wow! I've been really, really good mind you. In the past I've allowed myself bits and pieces that I love, telling myself that I want to still be able to treat myself by limiting myself to those special times when we have my favourite foods. Pizza once a week. Bacon and eggs on Sunday mornings. And a sweet treat at art class on a Friday morning. And guess what – I didn't lose any weight! The reality is that yes, when I get down to my goal weight that's exactly what I do want to do, eat the things I love once in a while but not all the time. If I just had those things when I say I'll have them and eat properly the rest of the time I'd probably not need to lose weight. I don't want to be stick thin. I'm a socialiser, I want to be able to brunch with friends on occasion or have cake when I want it. My problem was that I was mindlessly eating. So I'd have my social day and we'd have lunch which is normally fairly healthy with wraps and salady things. But then we added the cheese and spinach pastries to the spread. And if it's someone's birthday then there would be cake. Or we might see some yummy scones to bring around. Pizza night would follow, if I'd had a big piggy day I may as well finish it off with pizza and they hey, what the hell, let's have some chocolate. And we may as well eat the whole family block, otherwise I'll eat what's leftover tomorrow.

This week I am proud to say I've not had pizza. I went for a walk Sunday morning while my hubby cooked bacon for the rest of the family. I've had no sweet treats. I've done the weight loss program to the letter. And the numbers reflect that. I'm not saying that I'll be this good every week, though I'd like to think I will. But one week at a time, and for this week I'm bloody stoked!

Sometimes it really hits me how big I've got. I went shopping the other day and I could hear myself walking. I thought how weird it was because I didn't have thongs on but I could hear the flip flapping sound. Then I realised it was my thighs! I had on a long skirt but with nothing underneath (except knickers of course.) I had a laugh to myself, what else is there to do. At least I know I'm doing something about it now.

There are forums to be written on to qualify for the challenge that I'm doing. I'm good at forums. I clearly like writing about myself. I must remind myself to write on other people's ones also as apparently it's not all about me. The people are lovely on there and it is a great support network. There is a section where you write to the man who devised the program. I wrote asking when the dates would be for the week in Fiji for the 10 finalists. So that I could organise my hubby to have the time off to do the school run for me. Hey, gotta put it out there. Remember The Secret? I'm going with that philosophy. I know it will be a hard top 10 to get into, either way I know (and this sounds like cheesy Biggest Loser talk) I will be a winner because I already feel fabulous and it's only the beginning of week 2.

Lots of people are scornful of shakes. I've had people say that 90% of people who lose weight with shakes put it back on, that if you lose weight too rapidly that you'll put it back on. It's not just shakes, it's any weight loss program. Often these people fall in to one of two categories. People who are overweight themselves and have tried all sorts of things which didn't work. Or people who have never had an issue with weight yet still don't have a problem telling you that you're overweight. Each to their own. People put weight back on because they tell themselves that it's temporary and if they believe that they'll put it back on then they will. I need a good boost. I've got 30 kilos to lose. 30  fucking kilos. (Please excuse the French). If I can lose a good chunk of it in the first few weeks then yay me! If I can start looking better, feeling better, fitting in those clothes that are a wee bit too tight at the moment then how can that not be an incentive to keep going. And seriously, at least I'm trying, not sitting on my arse telling people not to bother trying because it wont work. At least this year I wont be sitting watching Biggest Loser with a bowl of ice-cream in my hands, jealous of the weight losses they have but not doing anything about it.

So I've done all I can this week. I haven't had any social occasions to contend with mind you. My youngest had a friend over last night so we did order fish and chips. I had my soup early and left it to hubby to deal out the food, taking myself to bed early so that's a victory. I've been more active. I've taken the pooches for a walk. I've even had my hair cut. With a bit of a nod to the Seinfeld episode where Elaine cuts her hair off to win a weight loss challenge. Just in case you didn't realise, I love TV and I will refer to people on it a lot. There may even be a Brady Bunch reference or two if I can get them in somehow. That's just how I roll.

The photos I've chosen this week I thought would be amusing as I feel like I look like a pregnant woman, but I'll be going backwards. So instead of looking lovingly at my baby bump I'm looking lovingly at my reducing gut! I am having a lot of fun putting the photos in, my 10 year old isn't as happy about it as I make her take the photos! I think I already look a bit smaller, a bit rounder.

 

So now I'm on to week 2. I'm still feeling pumped and I already feel so much better in myself. Not sure if it's pride for sticking it out for a week or the fact that I've already been told how much better I'm looking. It could just be the happier look on my face. A few weeks ago I was walking with a walker because I had done my back. I'd get out of bed in pain and amble down the hallway. Now if somebody knocks on the door I jog to get it. Because I want to. Thanks for reading, I hope that you're cheering me on or even considering joining me. You've seen the photos, I'm out there for the world to see. Embarrassing I know but I'm a real woman with a lot of weight to lose. And I'm doing it. One day at a time. See you next week! xxx