my journey to health

I freakin love boxing, this 6 week block of shapeshift is boxing and it is awesome, it is like doing exercise without even realising you are doing it!! Except monday, we did squats, not loads of squats but jesus my legs are still killing me 3 days later, they are so ridiculously sore, I am still walking like a cowboy but I went back and did a class again today. It hurt but I did it and actually enjoyed it too!!

I am doing 3 classes a week and am thinking fuck this surgery shit, I am going to do this on my own, I can I just gotta move my ass and commit myself, hell I even went back to the gym this week!!
It was quite interesting actually – I love doing weights my fav is the lat pull down, we obviously don’t do many things at shape shift that use similar muscles because I had definitely gotten a lot weaker at that, I used to do 5 sets of 10 reps at 60 kilos, yesturday I did 3 x 10 at 50 kilos and I barely managed it, however when I did clean lift ( i think that is what it is called) another favourite of mine, I have always done 5×10 of 10 kilos, this time I reached 50 and hadn’t even broken a sweat, will try 12.5 next time and see how I go!!

So as I hate cardio at the gym, like really, really hate it, I will use shape shift as my cardio and of course everything else and will go back to the gym to do weights cause that is what I really enjoy!!! Lets see if I can keep my motivation up for an entire 6 weeks!!!

On another note, my bowels are playing up really badly, for the first time in a really long time I have been living on tramadol again, I hate how tired it makes me feel and how spaced out but at the moment I am in a lot of pain!!
I am sure I have mentioned this on here before, but I have things called diverticuli, which are quite literally pockets on my bowel wall, most people have a flat wall I have pockets, what happens is things get stuck in these pockets and they cause infections, which cause a lot of pain and these attacks are called diverticulitis. It is funny because every year since they first discovered it I have ended up in hospital around june/july I don’t know why it flairs up at this time but it does. The first time it got so badly infected it actually perforated my bowel wall which left me on iv antibiotics in hospital for a week – not pleasant!! Since then I watch my diet and am now aware of the things that flair it up. I am not sure what is going on this time as I have been eating pretty well, I barely drink anymore and the worst thing is I can feel it happening and getting worse and there is nothing I can do to stop it – this time the pain is pretty severe in  my back as well which is very unpleasant, so I am trying to keep it at bay and carry on as normal, fingers crossed it goes again soon as I really don’t want to go back to the days of living on tramadol

So yesturday I took my jeans off without undoing the button or zip. Today I put on jeans I bought two years ago that I have never been able to the buttons up on – just saying!!! I would stay and chat but am too busy basking in my awesomeness

So it has been a crazy week or so, I have had my brother here from canada, which means we have had a house full of people, with him and josh home and all the friends that entails and all the noise and the food and the drinking. Diet?? What diet?? Actually I have not been too bad and am doing well on not drinking so much as well, that week of not doing it led into the next week of only having the odd one and we haven’t even been buying our fortnightly bottle!!

Sometimes I crave peace and quiet and alone time, now don’t get me wrong, I love a house full of people, I love the noise and the chaos, I love people feeling comfortable enough to make themselves at home here but just every now and again, I want to spend some time with just me, no kids, no husband, no one, just me, this rarely happens as someone always pops over, or calls. Last week two days in a row tristan went to kindy for full days, I was so excited!! Two days without children, for at least a few hours, I was determined to catch up on some sleep, read a book, just relax. Hahahahahahaha that was not going to happen, people always interrupt my plans!! So I am thinking I might go walking again, on those days tristan is in kindy I think I might take my book, walk to a nice secluded spot and just hang out with myself.

So amongst the chaos this week we also organised a pink ribbon breakfast, with the help of two friends, which mean’t more people coming to stay, tracy came from whangarei and claire from hamilton, so friday night we had some drinks as you do, I bought myself some bubbly wine, holy shit that was a stupid idea, those who know me know what bubbly wine does to me. I got a little drunk, like teenage giggly girl drunk, I went to bed around 3, which was okay except I had class in the morning at 7am. Everyone was like don’t go, take a day off but as I hadn’t been to the monday class I had to go, god I wish I hadn’t. I spent 20 mins on the bike, I actually hate that bike, I don’t mind the pedalling bit I actually find that quite easy as it doesn’t puff me just fatigues my legs, but the seat, jesus! You would think that with the size of my ass I would have enough padding, well I don’t, that thing hurts and after 20 mins it was not pleasant.
Now I have to say yesturday was the first time, i felt awful during class, there were 6 of us and although I get it, I couldn’t have done what the others did and my fitness level was not close to the others who were there, I felt really excluded as my exercises were different from theirs and for the first time I felt like the fat girl that didn’t fit into the class.
I had to do the bike then the hill and some squats and crunches in between then the hill again, I did this three times, the others also did the hill but with logs and with loads of exercises in between and as glad as I was not to have to do what they were doing it meant that I was doing my part on my own, I did one go of the hill all by myself and I didn’t like it at all!
I will say but ffs don’t tell mike, the hill is getting easier, I can get to the top without puffing so much I feel like I am going to die, but it does still kill my calves, today my calves are exceptionally sore, though that seems to be a permanent state of being at the moment I can’t remember the last time I didn’t have sore calves.

After class my head was starting to hurt and my hangover was kicking it pretty badly so off I went to the breakfast, what a turn out and an exceptional day, we had amazing raffles and thanks to vanessa an amazing venue it all went so well, but it mean I spent another few hours on my feet cooking breakfast for 70 people, god bless my daughter who helped me out and was amazing!!
When I spend too much time on my feet I have this issue with a pinched nerve, it means that my left leg goes completely numb and to touch it feels like it has been bruised really badly it is incredibly uncomfortable, standing for long periods also means my diverticulitis plays up really badly and causes me a lot of pain,  so by the time I came home I was very, very sore and seriously considered popping a couple of tramadol but I didn’t as it has been such a long time since I have had to rely on them I prefer not to.

We then decided to go to dinner, wildfire it was! OMG the meat was amazing, so much meat, I swear I ate an entire lamb to myself the crust on the lamb was to die for!! And yes I ate too much, way too much and I didn’t feel the slightest bit guilty about it either, after a wander round town we headed home where I proceeded to fall asleep sitting up on the couch!!

Now we are off to a day at the zoo with hubbys work, my hips hurt, my back hurts (stupid leg raises) my calves hurt and I am so looking forward to sitting down tonight and doing nothing!!!

So I have four children, 22,  16,  5, and 4. My eldest is from my teenage relationship with whom I guess you could call my first love, we were together around 18 months which as a teen certainly seems like a lifetime.

I had him on my own and struggled quite a bit as a single mother. I also started struggling with my weight around this stage. I was not a fat child or teen, sure I was always a bit bigger than some of my friends but by no means was I fat. At high school I had a friend who was obsessed with being skinny and diets, it was the first time I had ever struck it and I used to do stupid diets with her, the bread diet, a diet where we ate nothing but crackers, and apples, all sorts of crazy things, I never really took them seriously but she certainly did!!

At 18 I joined jenny craig and went on my first real diet, I was 68 kilos and wanted to get to 63 because everything everywhere told me that was my ideal weight! I hit my 63 kilos and I thought I looked awesome, I look back now realise how ridiculous this was and it started a downward spiral to maintain the “ideal weight” I put on a bit of weight when I had josh but still sat under 70 kilos, at stages over the next few years I went through phases of losing weight, one such phase I stopped drinking and smoking, I barely ate and I did aerobics numerous times a day off a video at home. I distinctly remember one day eating a peanut butter sandwich and feeling so guilty I did an hours aerobics afterwards.

At this time I met my first husband, he was a friend of my flatmates who came to stay and he was nice to me and pretty much adored me, I look back now and realise I was just desperate to have a family, to have a father for my son and live a proper life of being married, owning a home and living happily ever after like I was supposed to do.
There were signs right from the start that things weren’t right but this was what I wanted so I ignored them and carried on, we were married within a year of meeting, moved to christchurch, I got pregnant, we bought a home and were supposed to live happily ever after!! Three months into the relationship I had stopped my obsessive exercising and had put on a little weight, not a lot but I remember him telling me he didn’t find me as attractive as he did when we first met, as I had put on weight, I should have run right there and then, but I didn’t, instead I watched what I ate and was paranoid about putting weight on.

Now don’t get me wrong this was not a miserable marriage we had a lot of happy times but he was very obsessed with my weight and I was supposed to look a certain way, he would do things like when we had people over if I ate a handful of chips he would say do you really think you should eat that? Haven’t you had enough, that kind of thing, always in front of people and it was mortifying, so I stopped eating in front of people and I snuck food, I would eat when he wasn’t home, I would hide packets and evidence, it was here that my really bad eating would start.
I would go to the bakery to get us all something for lunch and I would grab a donut, stuff it down on the way home before he could see, it was very destructive and I wonder looking back had he not been like this would I have a much healthier relationship with food now??

He used to point out how attractive other women were and how unattractive I was, now I am not a little doormat of a women who would tolerate that kind of thing, but it was done slowly over time and I don’t think I really noticed it happening until it was too late, and I become the type of woman who had a lot of insecurities and very little self esteem. I lived in a city where I had no family, very few friends (because he didn’t like any of them) I was alone and lonely. Even after he had a 6 month long affair with a close friend I still stayed with him. And my eating became comfort to me

We eventually moved back to auckland and we went to a new years party at a friends, there I met a man who was incredibly kind and just a lovely man to talk to, at some stage during the evening he gave me a hug and I remember thinking I cannot remember the last time anyone bar my children had hugged me or shown me any real affection. It was a real lightbulb moment for me. That week I left my husband and a month later I started dating this man who would eventually become my husband and the father to my youngest two children.

Now this man was the opposite of everything my ex husband was, when I met him I weighed 85 kilos, there was no need to hide food from him, he didn’t care what I ate, he didn’t care what I drank, he didn’t care if I looked like crap in the mornings, he genuinely loved me for who I was, I didn’t have to worry about gaining weight or what I ate, it was incredibly liberating and felt wonderful.
Alas the bad relationship I had with food was well and truly entrenched in my life and I let myself go I think because I was finally allowed to and I did the opposite from what I had always done and I started putting on weight, I think I was almost testing my husband to see when he would comment, he never did, to this day 55 kilos heavier than when we met, he has never commented on my weight nor has he ever criticised me.

I still have moments when I will go to buy food for the family and scoff down a treat before I get home, and I don’t know why I do this, I don’t need to, I don’t even want to, I do it and afterwards think WTF, why did I do that, though those times are getting less and less now. I am learning that I can have bad food just in smaller quantities I don’t have to eat a whole bag of chips, I don’t have to go without the chips I can just have a handful and enjoy them and move on. It is however a hard thing to change a habit of years, to be able to stop at that handful and not scoff down the whole bag, and I know people say it is willpower make yourself stop, but it just isn’t that easy, if it was I wouldn’t be fat!!! And I think this is something I will struggle with for the rest of my life and it is a real mind fuck as well, on one hand I know what I am doing but on the other hand I cannot stop.

So I exercise so I can still have these treats, still have these slipups and not have to stress about how much weight I will put on. Now my focus is on getting better, I don’t want to focus on weight loss because this is what I have always done and I have always felt like such a failure when I put it back on, this time it is about my health, getting fitter, getting better, eating like a normal person, stopping the gorging, the eating late at night, the taking a packet of chips to bed with me – and as I do this as I slowly work on everything, the weight loss will come, I know it will, I have complete faith it will but I am not going to give up when it doesn’t happen overnight.

So last week was more than a little chaotic, with the death of danielle and getting josh home, her death has affected me more than I thought it would it is just so sad and I hate the fact that these kids have to deal with a friends death it just shouldn’t happen. I guess I have been exceptionally lucky the only close deaths I have really had to deal with is my grandparents, it has been 4 years since both of my grandmothers passed and it still makes me tearful to think about them.
So watching the fall out of dani’s death and the effect it has had and is having on her friends is just awful.

The funeral was very emotional and her parents are just incredible, so strong and so determined to get the message across to everyone to talk about problems and let others help them. Myself and two of the other mums made 527 yellow ribbons for everyone to wear at the funeral, we thought we had made far too many but there were only a few left at the end of the service, the parents asked that everyone put them on the coffin as they said their goodbyes.

I worry about some of her close friends and how they are coping, it is going to be a struggle for them over the coming weeks. And I am glad Josh is home to help ash through it as she can only be strong for so long before everything gets on top of her.

Anyway so being the emotional eater I am I have struggled this week, yes I have eaten some bad stuff but I have been very aware of it as well so have had a reasonable ammount of control over my food, and drink funnily enough, I am going without and it is not bothering me, don’t get me wrong I have had a few drinks this week but it is one here and there not a whole pile all week.

Saturday I missed class because I slept in, something I rarely do, I may not get out of bed but I am usually awake before 7am, saturday I slept in till well after 8 and awoke to texts from mike oops!! He made me do 100 squats, 100 crunches and 50 push ups x 3, I did it x1.5 cause it was just too hard, and I just wasn’t in the mood!!

Today I again had class and I am tired, really tired, did I want to go? No, not at all it was a real struggle to make myself do it, but I did and it was hard I really struggled today I was tired and some of the exercises were just a little hard for me, but I had the alternative of crunches so it was okay I got through it – planking though seriously that shit is hard, I have way too much body weight to be holding on my elbows and toes lol, its okay though I did it on my knees rather than toes!!

I am glad I went I do feel better and much more motivated and I do really like the women I do it with, we have a really nice little group so was good to lift the spirits a bit on a dreary monday morning