4th November 2012
Unexpected kindness is the most powerful,
least costly, and most underrated agent of human change. Kindness that catches
us by surprise brings out the best in our natures. Bob Kerrey
Well I’ve been awake since about 4am thanks to the smoke
alarm battery dying and doing that beeping thing, why does that always start
around 2-3am in the morning – I wonder if they’re programmed to go at that time
;-)
At least getting up this early means I’ll get loads done
today hopefully, well this morning anyway. Although having said that, I started this blog
an hour ago and have spent that time faffing about on facebook and the internet
– so maybe I won’t get much done today!
Went to my Weight Watcher meeting yesterday and having
tracked for the last 9 weeks religiously, I’ve lost 4lb and I’m thrilled! I know most of you wouldn’t be happy with an
average of less than 1/2lb a week but I am because I’m eating exactly the type
of food I fancy and in the quantities that are satisfying me, I’m not aware
that I’m trying to lose weight which is brilliant. Yes I’m going over my ProPoints allowance
every day but I’m still obviously creating that calorie deficit that’s required
for weight loss and for me that’s good enough.
I’m working on what’s called the ‘mindless margin’ it’s a term coined by Brian Wansink, in his book Mindless Eating and it explains how most of us have put
on a few pounds over the years. The Mindless
Margin, is where we can either slightly overeat, or slightly under eat,
without being aware of it. Most of us can knock off or add to our food intake
by 20%, without even noticing it. And if you’re not in a rush to lose weight,
this could be the key to long term success.
This could be the reason, if you’ve wondered how you got overweight
because you don’t really eat that much, well you don’t think you do
anyway! You only have to overeat by as
little as 100 extra calories per day, (100 calories = most average bags of
crisps, a small bar of chocolate or a couple of biscuits, that extra slice of
cheese – it’s not difficult to overeat by 100 calories) for one year, you can
increase your weight by approximately 10 pounds per year! This can add up
drastically over your lifetime, here’s the maths;
Overeat 100 calories /day for a year:
100 (extra calories
per day) x365 (days/yr) = 36,500 calories/year
36,500 divided by
3500 (approx. calories in one pound) = 10.42 pounds gained per year
If you leave school aged 16 weighing 10 stone,
and overeat those 100 calories a day, by the time you’re 26 you could be 100lb
heavier, that’s 17 stone and you weren’t even aware you were doing it! You carry on doing that and by the time you’re
40 you could be about 28 stone! Most of us do not get
to this point because we realise we’re gaining weight and do something about it. What’s important NOW is that we don’t begin (or
continue) a lifetime of yo-yo dieting; instead we need to make changes that we
can continue with for the rest of our lives.
I know I was guilty of the ‘yo-yo’ diet for many years, all through my
twenties for sure, I think somewhere in my mid 30’s was when I realised what I was
doing wasn’t working (I used to make unrealistic changes that I could only do
short term) and since the last time I got to goal with Weight Watchers, I’ve
more or less stayed around my goal, yes I fluctuate depending on what’s going
on in my life, but I don’t continue to spiral out of control.
It’s important to make the plan work for you because as I said yesterday
“every BODY is different” and that’s why you need to tailor the plan to suit you,
we may get a similar amount of ProPoints but what we spend them one will vary
depending on you – your tastes, your bodies tolerance, your bodies requirements
– always remember YOU ARE UNIQUE don’t compare yourself to others because YOU
ARE GORGEOUS!
This is your journey, no one else’s, so you decide the route you take,
the speed you go and the destination you arrive at! I’m more than happy to help you along the
way, heck I’ll be your sat nav ;-)
Have a super Sunday. xx
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