The Final Countdown

breakfast: porridge and bran cooked in milk with apple puree and a tsp of honey

lunch: two eggs on toast with a pepper and an apple

snack: ricecakes

dinner: veggie stir fry with garlic and herb goats cheese and an apple

slice of ‘courgette cake’

Today was OK, boring packing and worrying about forgetting something important, then five minutes later worrying I’ve taken too much. Eurgh.

I had a bit of a snack-attack after lunch. I’m not sure if I was really hungry or not, but I could feel myself wanting to eat for the sake of it (I was craving sugar). So, I had the ricecakes, only 90 calories and seemed to stop me wanting anything more. I am finding it really difficult to strike a balance in eating enough, but not too much. I know thats EVERYONE in the worlds problem, but its still annoying me. I think the honey might have had something to do with the hunger this afternoon actually. I had a tiny teaspoon and it fit in my calories, but I have this awful habit of using even the smallest ‘slip-ups’, like having some honey (!!) as an excuse to eat everything in sight. So stupid.

I’m also still bored a lot of the time, which doesn’t help. I just need to keep going until I get to York, then other distractions will help me out.

Plan for tomorrow is to head into town to put this cheque in the bank finally and do a little pre-move shopping. Then when I get home extreme packing will start! I need to move everything into the hallway ready to load into the car and then check every room in the house for stuff I might have forgotten. Hopefully on Saturday all I’ll need to do is load my bedding, toiletries and last bits of washing into the car and we’re off…

October 5th

I finally got to the bank today, deposited a cheque, picked up some more wheat bran and came home. I walked in the door and the post had been delivered, a letter for me from the bank with a cheque in it. Argh! If I’d procrastinated another 30minutes I would have got the letter and could have taken both cheques in. Now I have to drive all the way into town again. Its not going to clear until next week either way, so I’m aiming to get it in by Friday, hopefully I’ll have another reason to go in by then.

Rest of the day is packing and writing lists of what I need to do before I go, three days and so excited!!

Yesterday: 

breakfast: porridge and bran cooked in milk with a banana and yogurt

lunch: salad with ketchup and an apple

dinner: veggie stir fry with a basil and tomato sauce. apple

Today:

breakfast: porridge and bran cooked in milk with apple puree and yogurt

lunch: two eggs on toast with an apple

dinner: veggie stir fry with tomato sauce and tuna. apple

Happily back on the healthy eating wagon now (apart from a lingering headache-sugar kills me, why is it so tasty?!!), I just need to keep up with it. Easier said than done, but I’m making small steps and will remember that slipping up is not the end of the world. I will also not be eating my feelings. It never works, just gives you new, worse feelings of illness and regret.

Its exactly one month until Guy Fawkes Night, I am going to find a huuuuge bonfire and a toffee apple in York. 🙂

Meal Planning

Feeling very positive this morning. I do think the root of my current issues are that I’m living at home and unable to control what food is bought and eaten (which, again, I stress, is fair enough-its not my house!) I’m also boredboredbored. As soon as I get up to York and start filling my days with working, a part-time job, the gym, socialising etc, the weight will come off again and I’ll be happy because I’m doing something.

I sent off my photo for Unicard approval today, but I have a feeling it’ll be sent back-I can’t work out how to make it bigger and it doesn’t quite fit their specifications. Oh well, I’ll deal with that when I get to it. Today I need to put a cheque into the bank and buy some more bran for my breakfasts! I get these huge bags from Holland and Baratt and mix them in with my porridge to bulk it up. Yum.

My breakfasts are incredibly cheap actually: oats (£1.50 per kg, lasts 2 months) + bran (89p per kg lasts 2 months) + milk (£1 for 6pints, lasts a week) + yogurt (£1 per 500g, lasts 2 weeks) + banana (maybe £2 a bunch? Lasts a week), the only expensive aspect, but can easily be swapped out for frozen berries (£1.50ish for 300g, lasts about a week) or a scoop of peanut butter (£3.50 for 450g, lasts about a month). So in total, my breakfasts for a month would cost about £10 (without peanut butter). I like those numbers. 🙂

Lunches, I’m working on. I usually have eggs on toast, the eggs here are free, they won’t be in York 😦 Bread is usually 2 loaves for £3 and if I freeze it, will last me about 3 weeks, margarine, is maybe £2 for a large pot and would last me until christmas. Fillings. Eggs (I have to buy free range, ethically produced) will probably be expensive and they just won’t be as good as the fresh from the garden ones we have at home. BUT, they’re an excellent source of protein so I will buy them on occasion.

I also won’t be able to eat them when I’m working or on campus, so I’ve decided that I’m going to make my own hummus for lunches. A big bowl with a couple of tins of chickpeas (£1.50), some tahini (£2-but lasts for months), lemon and garlic will be enough for sandwiches for a whole week. If I add in some sugar snap peas or lettuce (whichever’s cheapest) I have a delicious, well-balanced lunch. I’ll also add an apple to that, I know they’ll get more expensive as the year goes on, but I just love them…

Finally, dinners. I have a master plan and will basically be living off stews, bakes, chillis and soups. Tins or bags of dried beans and tinned fish (when there’s a deal) + with bags of frozen veggies (in bulk, on deal) and in season cheap stuff (so at the moment, squashes!!) all cooked up together in one of the above forms would last for 3-4 dinners. I really won’t have time to cook every night, so once or twice a week is maintainable. I will sometimes have different things obviously, but this is my main plan to keep healthy and under budget. I have a shopping list too so every week I can update it with what I need to replace or something else I might want to try out.

Definitely feeling better, I love having a plan!

Off-topic, but I’m watching the Amanda Knox coverage and its making me quite emotional. I’m glad they’ve been released, because I don’t think they did it, BUT, I do think they know something and for the Kercher family, hopefully once Amanda Knox is out of Italy and away from the threat of extradition, she’ll say something. I hope she doesn’t get ‘famous’ (TV shows, books etc) though, that would be incredibly distasteful. :-S

Reality Check

After my post yesterday, I felt really relieved, I have been pretending everythings OK for a while now and actually, I am struggling. I need this journal for the bad days as well as the good, but was putting up a front. No more. I’ve been overeating, trying to start again, then overeating again, because there’s nobody to see me and I’ll be ‘fine’ when I get to York. Actually, I won’t unless I stop doing this now. I’ll gain all the weight back plus more. Life’s not all about food and weight, I know, but that is where my inner stress/turmoil manifests itself so its something I need to stay on top of.

Today, has been good. I feel a little hungry, but I’ve eaten enough for the day and am NOT going to eat more. I’m definitely at the point where I’ve stretched my stomach larger than it should be, so I’m just going to have to put up with the ‘hunger’ for a few days and keep drinking water.

Sidenote: I hate sugar, its the root of all evil and I genuinely think I might be addicted to it. It scares me that I cannot seem to control myself around it. When I was working at the summer camp, I ate three healthy meals a day (full of veggies and fruit), no sugar, no desserts and in FIVE weeks I was down to 146lbs from around 160lbs and felt amazing. All the salt, water retention and crap was gone. Thats what I need to do again. Its not difficult. Lots of veggies and proteins, minimal processed carbs (I wasn’t eating so much bread, more potatoes and squashes), no snacking or desserts and lots of activity. I didn’t even feel hungry. I had a life. I was active. This is what it will be in York. I won’t hide, I won’t obsess about my body, I’ll just let the weight fall off.

I only overeat when I’m at my parents house because I have no control over the food there, which is fair enough, its not my house. In York, I pay the rent, I buy the groceries and there is no excuses.

I’m still debating whether to weigh myself, but at least it’ll give me a starting point when I leave here. Maybe I’ll do it the morning I leave, then won’t take the scales?

 breakfast: apple and banana with yogurt

lunch: green salad and light dressing. apple

dinner: veggie stir fry. apple

Not a lot, but not hungry after the weekend, trying to pack nutrients in. They always make me feel better.