I'm taking up Michelle's challenge to reflect on 3 habits of the past and how they have changed during this past 9 weeks.
Habit 1: Eating Chocolate at Night
where did it stem from? It slowly crept from night time munchies with my partner to night time must have when I was by myself.
why did I become to attached to it? It was my saviour and my punisher. I could use chocolate to feel less lonely at night, to perk me up from feeling sad, to punish myself for being fat and disgusting and unworthy of anything.
what was the bullshit i had around it? i had to have it. i couldn't go the night without it. it was mine. it was all i had left to treat myself - i don't drink anymore or have much else fun in my life...
I haven't had any chocolate at all over the last 9 weeks, in fact I don't even remember the last time I did. I don't miss it, I don't crave it, I don't wish I could have it, I don't feel like I am stopping myself for eating it or some how being restricted.
how can i prevent it from reappearing? I have broken the habit and one step is to not go back to chocolate. If I eat chocolate again, it's to appreciate it's taste and in very small amounts. I have learnt that I am worthy of much more than that punishment and my body is not served by eating chocolate. I have also learnt that I need to find the fulfilment in my day. To love and care for myself and meet my needs all day everyday as that stops me needing something artificial at the end of the day. Planning my meals and exercise and tracking the food I eat also helps to keep me focussed on where I want to be. Chocolate is not my friend, my friends are my friends.
I'll come back to add the next 2....
Wednesday 20 July 2011
Sunday 17 July 2011
And the feelings come.....
I've had a day where I have felt really hungry and more tempted to eat food that doesn't serve me than any other day since I have started the 12 week challenge. I'm just going to put it out there - I reckon it's just an emotional backlash from the blog I wrote last night.
It's a big thing to lay my life out like I have done in this blog. I am usually a very private person and only share my inner understandings and experiences with those very close to me. I have taken on the challenge of a public blog to challenge some of the fear that locks those experiences away and therefore locks me away. I want to be my real self, and to do that, I need to be and show the different dimensions of myself, not in a way that asks or expects of anyone else, but just to be seen. It's a way for me to trust that I can be ALL of me all of the time. I don't need to hide or morph myself into what I think others expect me to be. I just need to be me. Sharing my journey gives me strength and may even give someone else some too.
There does seem to be a bit of a consequence though - when I do it, I struggle with the vulnerability. My fear really kicks up a notch and that is why today I am craving the food I used to use to numb myself and hide. I went to the football this afternoon and I wanted to eat pies and hot chips. I wanted to eat the chocolate biscuits that my son ate. I looked at the calorie count on the biscuits and one was 87 cals. I could have fit it into my calories for the day, but that's not the point. I'm not doing this for the maths. I'm doing this to feed myself well. To give my body the food that serves it, that makes it sing with delight. So I didn't have a biscuit. I didn't fold into my cravings, I honoured my body today.
And instead of doing more of that craving, I'm writing here. Today I feel a little crap and that's totally fine. Today my guard was lowered, and that is totally fine. Today I held my ground, and that is bloody awesome. I might just be able to kick all of these old habits yet!
It's a big thing to lay my life out like I have done in this blog. I am usually a very private person and only share my inner understandings and experiences with those very close to me. I have taken on the challenge of a public blog to challenge some of the fear that locks those experiences away and therefore locks me away. I want to be my real self, and to do that, I need to be and show the different dimensions of myself, not in a way that asks or expects of anyone else, but just to be seen. It's a way for me to trust that I can be ALL of me all of the time. I don't need to hide or morph myself into what I think others expect me to be. I just need to be me. Sharing my journey gives me strength and may even give someone else some too.
There does seem to be a bit of a consequence though - when I do it, I struggle with the vulnerability. My fear really kicks up a notch and that is why today I am craving the food I used to use to numb myself and hide. I went to the football this afternoon and I wanted to eat pies and hot chips. I wanted to eat the chocolate biscuits that my son ate. I looked at the calorie count on the biscuits and one was 87 cals. I could have fit it into my calories for the day, but that's not the point. I'm not doing this for the maths. I'm doing this to feed myself well. To give my body the food that serves it, that makes it sing with delight. So I didn't have a biscuit. I didn't fold into my cravings, I honoured my body today.
And instead of doing more of that craving, I'm writing here. Today I feel a little crap and that's totally fine. Today my guard was lowered, and that is totally fine. Today I held my ground, and that is bloody awesome. I might just be able to kick all of these old habits yet!
Saturday 16 July 2011
Taking on the challenge
It's been a while since I posted. After my last post, I think I got a bit scared of writing again. So much has happened though and I wish I could have kept on writing so that I could look back at this blog and really see what I did, how I did it and what it felt like. I'll try and capture the important points in this post.
After my last blog, I decided that this round was my chance to really let go of my grief. I'm calling it my grief weight and just as I drop the fat, I'm going to drop all limitations that this grief has laid on me. The grief was paralysing and debilitating, it stuck me to the lounge, it stopped my in my tracks. I've broken through those shackles now and can take on any chunk of grief that comes my way by acknowledging it, talking to someone about it, pushing through it in a workout and keeping clear about who I am and what is mine. Grief doesn't serve me and it certainly doesn't lead me to freedom.
Which leads me to another amazing challenge that I have taken on - Emazon's Stand Your Ground workshop. I was quite nervous going in, I had no idea what it was going to be like and if it was a really physical workshop and if my body had what it needed to get through. Once it started though, I realised that I should have been more worried about whether I had what it took to dig in emotionally and come out the other side a different woman.
I find it hard to connect with people I don't know at events like that. I think I sit in my fear about who am I, what have I got to offer, people aren't interested in meeting me, I don't have anything interesting to talk about.... yeah, that's pretty inspiring self talk isn't it! So, consequently I didn't really connect much with the other women in the group. I'm going to keep on working on that. I had a great partner for the workshop though, Cherry was full of spirit and gave it all she had. She took the opportunity to strip back some of her fear and feel more of what it's like to be her. She was also able to hold the space for me quite well and helped me get to where I needed to go.
I really loved the workshop. I got to punch, punch really hard. I got to touch those places inside that have been really hurt and are really mad and they got to fight back. I got to stand up for myself in that workshop. I really felt what it was like to say - Fuck Off! You can't touch me, you can't hurt me! I got to fight back and feel strong and powerful and most importantly in control of me and what happens to me.
So much in my life I have absorbed other people's shit. I've been hurt sexually, physically and emotionally. I have struggled through trying to protect myself and trying to stay safe, but so much of the time I haven't been able to do it well. I realised that I have used my fat layer as an absorption layer. It's been a way for me to stay safe when other people have dumped their shit on me. I stood in the way of other people's shit because I thought I could take it, I thought that it wasn't hurting me that much and I was strong enough to take it on. Emazon changed all that. There was one activity we were doing where Cherry was coming back at me with the pads after I had hit them. I kept hearing Emazon say - move around, don’t just take the punches, and I wasn’t sure what she meant or when it was supposed to apply, and then I got it - just because I am strong enough to hold it and to take what is being thrown, doesn’t mean I have to. Every time it hits, it’s still getting in and it does hurt me. Actually, it really hurts. I don’t want this weight and I don't want the pain, so I need a new way to protect myself and now I’ve found it - don’t take it, give it back, get out of the way, speak my truth in the moment. I can protect myself without fat. I can stand up for myself. I can keep myself out of other's people's shit and out of their way. I can be safe in this world. I have all I need within to do it.
Emazon also went on to talk about being your true self and making the right choices by listening to what you really need. I've been working a fair bit over the last 6 months on connecting to my truth and understanding what serves me in my life and what doesn't. It was a great reminder. Her simple framework for connecting to your truth and making the right decsions was - The Art of Yes/No. When you say Yes to something, you say No to something else. When you say No to something, you are saying Yes to something else. It is so beautifully simple for me and it's a great way to help when things are feeling a little tricky.
Such amazing lessons for me over the past few weeks. I feel so strong and alive. I feel like I am just starting to live again. I have lost 11.4kg and 49cms of fat from all over my body. I no longer have such pronounced emotional highs and lows. I am really enjoying the food and the exercise. I am loving my son. He is the most amazing person, he has been eating all the food I give him, he supports me doing exercise, he is enjoying my more even emotional state. The other week he said to me - Mummy I think you are perfect just the way you are. That's because he can only see the real me and she is perfect just the way she is. It's the outside layer that I'm shedding on this journey. I'm going to work on seeing myself just as he does. What an inspiring person he is.
I've got 5.3kg to lose over the next 4 weeks to get to 80kgs. That is the rest of my grief weight. I am fired up and ready for it all to go. I'm taking this challenge on.
After my last blog, I decided that this round was my chance to really let go of my grief. I'm calling it my grief weight and just as I drop the fat, I'm going to drop all limitations that this grief has laid on me. The grief was paralysing and debilitating, it stuck me to the lounge, it stopped my in my tracks. I've broken through those shackles now and can take on any chunk of grief that comes my way by acknowledging it, talking to someone about it, pushing through it in a workout and keeping clear about who I am and what is mine. Grief doesn't serve me and it certainly doesn't lead me to freedom.
Which leads me to another amazing challenge that I have taken on - Emazon's Stand Your Ground workshop. I was quite nervous going in, I had no idea what it was going to be like and if it was a really physical workshop and if my body had what it needed to get through. Once it started though, I realised that I should have been more worried about whether I had what it took to dig in emotionally and come out the other side a different woman.
I find it hard to connect with people I don't know at events like that. I think I sit in my fear about who am I, what have I got to offer, people aren't interested in meeting me, I don't have anything interesting to talk about.... yeah, that's pretty inspiring self talk isn't it! So, consequently I didn't really connect much with the other women in the group. I'm going to keep on working on that. I had a great partner for the workshop though, Cherry was full of spirit and gave it all she had. She took the opportunity to strip back some of her fear and feel more of what it's like to be her. She was also able to hold the space for me quite well and helped me get to where I needed to go.
I really loved the workshop. I got to punch, punch really hard. I got to touch those places inside that have been really hurt and are really mad and they got to fight back. I got to stand up for myself in that workshop. I really felt what it was like to say - Fuck Off! You can't touch me, you can't hurt me! I got to fight back and feel strong and powerful and most importantly in control of me and what happens to me.
So much in my life I have absorbed other people's shit. I've been hurt sexually, physically and emotionally. I have struggled through trying to protect myself and trying to stay safe, but so much of the time I haven't been able to do it well. I realised that I have used my fat layer as an absorption layer. It's been a way for me to stay safe when other people have dumped their shit on me. I stood in the way of other people's shit because I thought I could take it, I thought that it wasn't hurting me that much and I was strong enough to take it on. Emazon changed all that. There was one activity we were doing where Cherry was coming back at me with the pads after I had hit them. I kept hearing Emazon say - move around, don’t just take the punches, and I wasn’t sure what she meant or when it was supposed to apply, and then I got it - just because I am strong enough to hold it and to take what is being thrown, doesn’t mean I have to. Every time it hits, it’s still getting in and it does hurt me. Actually, it really hurts. I don’t want this weight and I don't want the pain, so I need a new way to protect myself and now I’ve found it - don’t take it, give it back, get out of the way, speak my truth in the moment. I can protect myself without fat. I can stand up for myself. I can keep myself out of other's people's shit and out of their way. I can be safe in this world. I have all I need within to do it.
Emazon also went on to talk about being your true self and making the right choices by listening to what you really need. I've been working a fair bit over the last 6 months on connecting to my truth and understanding what serves me in my life and what doesn't. It was a great reminder. Her simple framework for connecting to your truth and making the right decsions was - The Art of Yes/No. When you say Yes to something, you say No to something else. When you say No to something, you are saying Yes to something else. It is so beautifully simple for me and it's a great way to help when things are feeling a little tricky.
Such amazing lessons for me over the past few weeks. I feel so strong and alive. I feel like I am just starting to live again. I have lost 11.4kg and 49cms of fat from all over my body. I no longer have such pronounced emotional highs and lows. I am really enjoying the food and the exercise. I am loving my son. He is the most amazing person, he has been eating all the food I give him, he supports me doing exercise, he is enjoying my more even emotional state. The other week he said to me - Mummy I think you are perfect just the way you are. That's because he can only see the real me and she is perfect just the way she is. It's the outside layer that I'm shedding on this journey. I'm going to work on seeing myself just as he does. What an inspiring person he is.
I've got 5.3kg to lose over the next 4 weeks to get to 80kgs. That is the rest of my grief weight. I am fired up and ready for it all to go. I'm taking this challenge on.
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