Thursday, March 02, 2006

Busy, busy

I seem to get busier and busier each week at the moment. The weekends aren't so bad (although those long runs take up increasing amounts of time), but the weeks are just one thing after another, and the jobs I need to do are piling up. Wednesday to Friday I'm out each night, Tuesday I worked til 7, I have Spanish homework to do, new recipes to try, half marathon photos to peruse, I need to keep on top of bills, book hotels for Berlin, London, Amsterdam, Madrid and Prague (which will probably need to entail actually buying and reading guidebooks to get an idea of the area), I have blog entries to write, blogs to read, tv to watch (I'm stupidly behind on Shameless and Desperate Housewives), working out a training plan to cover the next couple of months before I start properly training for Berlin. Let alone keeping up with buying new clothes like the new sports bra and running shorts I've been meaning to get for weeks.

What has surprised me though is that I haven't used this as an excuse to eat rubbish. I've had three consecutive days of work buffets for lunch and I've been sensible. I didn't get in after working til 7 on a new client pitch and order takeaway, I got in and I cooked a vegetable curry from scratch. I'm planning like a madwoman to make sure that there are always ingredients in the house that can be combined into a sensible sounding meal (I actually sometimes take my recipe book to work so I can plan menus for the next few days while I eat my lunch and write a proper shopping list to make sure I buy the right stuff). I went for my veggie cafe treat tonight before Spanish. I've planned something to take to the rugby tomorrow night. I'm not cutting out exercise to fit other stuff in, a lot of the time it's the exercise that's cutting down the time I have to do the other stuff. I'm making sure I do the things that are good for me rather than simply the things I enjoy. Not that I don't enjoy the things that I do, but I prioritise the beneficial enjoyable things ahead of the lazy enjoyable things.

But despite being busy I feel somehow balanced. Like I'm in control, and organised, and capable of keeping all the balls in the air at once. My head feels clear, my planning helps me know that I can stay on track each day, and I know where I'm meant to be and what I'm meant to be doing. I have a plan. It's a nice feeling, I'm just wondering how long it will last.

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One thing that I've noticed recently is that I'm letting myself become more relaxed with my eating (in a good way). I'm getting more confident about reintroducing food that I've not eaten for a while without worrying about how it will affect my weight. I've not been low carbing as such (the fact I eat porridge every morning should indicate that), but I did cut my carbs down significantly for quite a while. I used to eat a lot of pasta and rice and bread, and I largely cut that out of my diet. Cheese, too. But after last weekend's pre-half carb loading I've found that I've been eating more bread, (brown) rice and (wholemeal) pasta because it's in the house and easy to cook, it hasn't thrown me into a huge carb binge and it hasn't led to a gain on the scales. I'm still keeping an eye on making sure I'm eating whole grains instead of refined carbs (mainly), but it feels good to be reintroducing those foods as it gives me a lot more flexibility in terms of what I eat. For a long time I've been sticking to a couple of tried and tested recipes because I know that they work and they feel safe. But with the vegetarian challenge I'm actually excited about trying new food again, and giving myself a lot more variety. It feels like I'm starting to discover a maintenance frame of mind, that I don't need to cut out entire food groups as long as I eat sensibly, and I like it. I don't want to be neurotic about being able to eat certain foods and not others, I just want to rely as far as possible on exercise, portion control and common sense. Time will tell whether that's enough, but I want to at least give it a shot.

It's working so far though, I'm down to 74kg (163.5lb) and within touching distance of that 100lb goal.

1 Comments:

Blogger Shauna said...

g'day! there is nothing more satisfying than being busy AND organised, i reckon!

hope you don't mind me going (slightly) off topic, but thought I'd mention a guide for Prague. I've often used In Your Pocket guides when travelling in Eastern Europe. They're written by western expats, and have heaps of great info on accomodation, food, siteseeing etc etc. You can download PDF summaries, lots of good free info! Here's the link to the Prague one.

10:17 AM  

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