I am not into "fat
shaming", if you are happy with yourself and feel beautiful then feel free
to work it no matter what your size is. But my truth is that I'm not happy and
feel far from beautiful. Now before I start to sound like I'm throwing a full
scale pity party, the other areas of my life are amazing; I'm confident and
healthy, I have a stunning and supportive husband, a great career and a
seriously fantastic shoe collection. The only gap is not being able to look
like the person I am outside that I feel I am on the inside.
Now I didn't just wake up
at age 10 and *boom* size 22! It took a good few years to pile on the pounds.
Truth is I'm pretty lazy on the exercise, during P.E I was usually found
smoking behind the math block (a habit I have long since replaced with bread)
and I never really felt the love for team sports, it just took too much effort.
I also have a completely
foodie family, we celebrate over it, we commiserate with it and most of all we
like the pile it into our gobs. For us food isn't about fuel, it's about the
pleasure that goes with it and unfortunately when pleasure is combined with an
inactive lifestyle you are on route to a serious problem.
I have pretty much been on
some kind of diet since the age of eleven, it wasn't that the diets didn't work;
the problems lie with my lack of control. Fast forward to now and I'm teetering
on the edge of a serious health problem.
They say you have a moment
and my wake up call came when I started getting tingles in my hands, headaches
and a constant feeling of fatigue. After weeks of blood tests and many doctors
appointments it turned out that I had seriously low iron and foliate levels,
all related to my yoyo dieting. I have a pattern of feast or famine when it
comes to my eating habits. Quite simply my body was pissed off and it had a
right to be. I now have to take such strong supplements everyday that can make
me sick and make visiting the bathroom after me an extremely unpleasant
experience, I also have to have blood tests every four weeks to make sure that
I don't keel over from anemia.
It isn't all bad though,
around the same time I found out that there was actually a physical activity I
enjoyed! I had been seduced by all the very cute and uber stylish retro bikes
that had been popping up around where I work in East London. When I decided to
buy one, I did in the back of my mind half believe that it would be a passing
phase and would end up rusting in the shed or on eBay but when I actually
started pedaling I completely fell in love. So in love in fact that when I
hooked up my heart monitor, it showed I was going further than I thought and
really burning up the calories! That was my light bulb moment, maybe I could
lose the lard and still really enjoy myself.
So That takes us back to
why I am writing this blog, I not only want to document the process but also to
prove that being healthy doesn't have to be about spandex and counting points.
I might regret writing this, but maybe it could actually be...fun?
