Patience and perserverance.........

After having my 3 rd child 7 weeks ago it is time for me to begin the long journey to a healthy weight. I have 5 stone to lose after having 3 children in 3 and a half years.

I have developed a huge sugar habit that I need to kick so I will be attempting to stop eating chocolate etc for a while as I cannot just have one. I am sick and tired of feeling so terrible. My knees and feet hurt, I have no energy and my 3 year old keeps asking me if I'll come swimming with her ( we live abroad so swimming is a very frequent activity). It breaks my heart to say no and at the moment I can use looking after the baby as a reason why I won't swim but in a few months time he will be swimming and I won't have an excuse.

In the past when I have attempted a slimming campaign I find that I give up really easily. As soon as I have a small slip up I give up. I think to myself that this isn't working, I'm not going to be able to keep this up and I talk myself out of it as an excuse to binge on chocolate. This time I'm going to stay the course. It occurred to me the other day that if I just followed a plan, without questioning it or tryin to tweak it, it would work and I would be slimmer. So here goes.....I'm going to try to have patience and perserverance.

Tomorrow I am going to plan my meals and go to the supermarket. I need to plan in an afternoon snack as afternoons are my real danger time as I tend to grab chocolate and coke around 4 pm and that leads into a full on sugar binge for the evening. I have a lot of work to do but I am determined to get there!

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Congratulations on your new baby! I believe that the best thing to get us on track is to write a food plan. Just take it one week at a time. You CAN do this x

Congratulations on your new arrival, I have a 9 wks old baby, are you setting yourself any 1st targets? Good luck x

I have stuck to plan for 2 days..... Am very proud as haven't been able to stop scoffing chocolate since the baby arrived. Not a morsel of chocolate or coke has passed my lips in 48 hours.....and I even went for a swim last night! Was going to go again this evening but the baby wouldn't settle.

I had a cracking headache last night and this morning. Must be the sugar/ caffeine withdrawal as I was getting through a 200 g bar of dairy milk and a bout a litre of coke a day plus crisps and sweets. Feel better this evening from all the healthy food.

We had some friends around this afternoon for a swim( as we live abroad we have a small pool in our garden) and as I hid inside on the pretence of having to look after the baby I was watching as they swam. I was so jealous as my friend stepped into the pool with her gorgeous figure in her tankini and our husbands and her played with the children. I am determined that I will be able to do that soon!

Thanks for reading oasis and tesam. I would like to get to 16 stone as a first goal and go from there.

Tomorrow could be a tricky day as my husband and I are going out for dinner but we are going to a cavary so I should be able to stay on track.

Having the afternoon snack planned has helped me a great deal and I also try to jot down what I am planning to eat each day so I am not having to make decisions on the spot.

I am feeling proud but still have a very long way to go! Weigh in on Thursday and I'm hoping to have lost at least 1 kg!

Today's food:

B: 2 x bread ( b), scrambled egg and beans, milk in tea x 2 cups.

L: salad with beetroot, mixed beans, grated carrot and cheese (a)

S: small bowl of leftover spaghetti bolognaise from dinner last night!

D: rice, creamy coriander and minted chicken curry from sw cook book, salad

S: dorito s ( 8? Syns), carrot sticks and sw hummus made with chickpeas and yogurt, branflakes (b) with milk ( a) and banana.

Feels like I ate a lot but I am stuffed. I also drank loads of water to try to help my headache and 2 cups of green tea.

So yesterday was a bit of a disaster! I was busy all day and when it got to driving home at 5 pm I was thirsty ( it is 40+ degrees where we live) and very hungry, I didn't have a snack in my bag so hubby decided it would be a good idea to stop and burger king. I only had half a portion of fries and some onion rings but I felt horrible like I'd blown it so decided that dinner that night was going to be a free for all. We had planned to go out for dinner and it was a cavary so I didn't go too off track but I did have some chocolate cake for pudding and a glass of coke.

Don't know why I sabotage myself like this. It is as though I am looking for an excuse to fail so when I had the fries i thought to myself " well this isn't Working, I'm obviously going to fail" and decide to 'start again tomorrow' or try a different plan. It is that thinking that has got me to this size. I know that recognising ways of thinking like this is the first step to overcoming these negative patterns so hopefully I am on the right track.

Today is another day. Overnight I have thought long and hard and decided to draw a line under yesterday and continue on. I was going to weigh in on Thursday but that won't give me a full first week and may lead to more sabotage so I think I started on a Saturday so I will weigh in on Saturday morning. I am taking my girls out for lunch today but I can have a nice omelette. Tonight is a takeaway as we have friends coming over but the takeaway does a delicious chicken stir fry and rice which is delicious!

A much better day today! I feel determined that I will succeed. I feel as though I have finally faced up to the fact that I am big. It is as though I have accepted it and now I can do something about it. I always felt a bit In denial before. I didn't think I was that big, that I was still a size 16. The thing that made me open my eyes and face up to how big I am was seeing my panel on the left hand side here on minimims. As I weigh in kgs and having lived abroad for 6 years I haven't had any scales in stones as scales out here are kgs or pounds. When I saw that I started at 17 and a half stone and now weigh over 16 and a half it was quite a shock! When I am tempted by something I picture that panel in my mind and no that I don't want it to say 16 stone anymore!

Today's food:

B: bran fakes and milk ( b and a)

L: toast with scrambled egg and grilled tomato (b)

S: tuna salad with cheese and salad cream light ( a choice and 3 syn)

D: chicken stirfry with rice, few chips ( 5 for chips)

S: packet of hula hoops ( 6 syn)

S: quorn cottage pie

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Not been doing well at all! Fell off wagon before I'd completed a week.....how embarrassing! Anyway 'I've only failed if I give up!' so back on the sugar free sw wagon tomorrow.

I'm going to make sure I take a bag of snacks out with me tomorrow as I have noticed that I go for too long without eating and then grab chocolate as I don't feel well and am so hungry. Today I had fruit and yogurt for breakfast at 7:30am, had a play date with a friend, picked my little girl up from school and it was 3 pm before I ate again when I grabbed the children's smarties and crisps and ate loads plus a bacon sandwich! I'm going to try to plan to eat every 3 hours and see if that helps.

Tomorrow is a new day on my journey to slim. Xx

Iam going to try to go to the gym tomorrow. My first time in a gym in 4 years. I am terrified of stepping in the gym. My husband said to go and if it is too busy or awful then leave but go and try. I will do it. I can't put it off any longer , I need to do some exercise to help me on my weight loss journey, to keep me motivated and improve my mood. Will let you know how I get on!

nataby said:

Iam going to try to go to the gym tomorrow. My first time in a gym in 4 years. I am terrified of stepping in the gym. My husband said to go and if it is too busy or awful then leave but go and try. I will do it. I can't put it off any longer , I need to do some exercise to help me on my weight loss journey, to keep me motivated and improve my mood. Will let you know how I get on!

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Plan for tomorrow:

Breakfast: fruit and omelette with onion, ham and tomato

Snack: apple and yogurt

Lunch: salad with tuna, cheese, egg and salad cream

Snack: sw hummus with ryvita

Dinner: chicken chasseur, rice and vegetables

Snack: hula hoops

Hi hun, I hope your journey is going well and that you are feeling happy with.yourself