57 -9M

All good.. well, apart from the glass and half of wine that I had yesterday with dinner.. and today.

However, everything else has been on schedule. I did my cardio yesterday and my weights today. I find exercise to be essential, not just for my body, but for my mind. In fact, more for my mind than my body. There is something about training that just puts me in an 'I can cope' mood. The annoying thing is that when I'm in an 'arrrrrgh, I can't cope' moment, it's hard to motivate myself to exercise. That's why I'm trying to do it as soon as I get up. When I look back on times when I did successfully lose weight there are two things that are consistent. 1. I was exercising on a schedule and 2. I was on some sort of relatively sane eating plan. And, by 'plan', I don't necessarily mean anything really difficult. I did the zone diet for ages before I read the book. I just skimmed through it at the library, got the idea and started combining protein and carbs at each meal without much thought to quantity or quality. That worked. I did Body for Life, that worked, I did Atkins, that worked. I did calorie counting, that really worked, except I took it too far and wigged out into starve-binge land. So now I'm kind of on the Sara plan, which is a bit of everything I've learned. Lots of veges and fruit, proteins and fats, some nuts and beans, a little sheeps milk cheese (really my only dairy) and .. everything else in extreme moderation, when I feel like it, with control. I've de-caffed down to a sane level (although I did go a bit woo-hoo on the mate tea today - then Googled and found it is packed with caffeine and theobromine.. oops) and my alcohol consumption is pretty average. I'd say I'm 90% where I want to be, just working through the last of the stress and distress eating.

As part of my studies I am reading through tens of binge eating studies, to decide on which ones to include in my report. It's been distinctly helpful. The thing I'm onto now is mindfulness. That is centering myself. Dealing with what is right in front of me, realising I do have choices, right here, right now, realising that my automatic thoughts are not necessarily true and that I can choose to think and act in a different way to usual. I used it tonight. It was an hour or so from dinner and I was a little bit hungry. My first reaction to hunger is always a bit of panic - I have to eat, now. Instead I took stock. I told myself that I wasn't really super hungry. That dinner was just an hour away and that I'd enjoy it much more if I didn't spoil my appetite with a snack. I relaxed my mind and decided to get a bit of work done while dinner cooked. And, look! I didn't even starve to death between that moment and dinner time. Amazing.

The weekend is coming. I'm looking forward greatly to seeing my brother and family,but also mildly daunted by the prospect of managing my eating in an out-of-home situation. Good practice for the upcoming trip around Europe. At least since I started eating more fruit and got less anal about having to eat protein six times a day, it's all gotten a lot easier... I'll be fine.. breathe.. breathe...