Coming out of the darkness

The hardest part of losing weight – for me - is undoubtedly the mental challenge of it all. This past week or two, it most definitely beat me.

I was more than a week through the new temporary eating plan, and my brain was rebelling by the strict regime, by craving anything and everything unhealthy, to the extent where it was all I could think about. I mean, seriously, there wasn’t a minute that passed where I wasn’t thinking about food. On top of that, I wasn’t really timing my meals very well, so I wasn’t properly fuelling myself after a tough workout, so when a hardcore weightlifting session led to DOMS for five whole days, I stopped going to the gym. In the meantime, I turned up to run 5km with a friend, but got my slowest time for over 6 months, and from there, the whole thing just spiralled out of control.

I actually made myself ill, thinking about it all and getting so worked up. It’s waaay too much to go into, here, but I think my biggest fear is that when I finally get to a healthy weight, I’ll give up with the diet/exercise routines, and pile the weight back on. This past week or two showed me that I can only really focus on one thing at a time – exercise OR nutrition. It’s hard for my brain to comprehend the changes I need to make in order to stay fit and healthy, when I get there. And I don’t know how to beat the insecurities and suchlike, that cause such a barrier.

Anyway, negativity aside, I finally came out of this mini-meltdown at the weekend, and went for another 5km run, this time beating my previous PB time by a few seconds, managing it in 36:04. The following day, I did two shorter runs, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, and got PBs for both. It feels like I’ve turned that corner again, and am on my way to getting back on track.

In addition, this past week my weight dropped to the number than means my BMI is under 30, for the first time in about 5 years!! I’m OVERWEIGHT!!! Admittedly, not something that people normally celebrate, but I’ve been in an “obese” category for about five years now, so being classified overweight is a huge achievement. I’m bloody thrilled.