YO-YO WEIGHT LOSS THE STRING HAS BROKEN

 8^th November, 2021

My weight loss journey is two years old. Two years of losing weight, around about 102 lbs, and I am now doing my best to maintain where I am. There is so much information out there about losing weight, but not so much about keeping it off. It doesn't pay the diet industry financially for people to keep weight off so you will never see a Maintenance World at your local church hall 😂 You see, restrictive diets don't work. They are not meant to work long term, but changing the way you think and live can work. If we are predisposed to put weight on if we are not aware of how much we eat, or choose not to see it, we will put weight on. If old habits return, we will put weight on, It is so easy to go back to those old habits when you are not concentrating on what is going on. This is such an easy situation to fall into when you are ill or life gets in the way. This is the time when the weight can creep back on and the time that all you have learnt about eating properly and what works for you hopefully kicks in. There is a group of people that say they want to be bigger, to be obese, be excepted for the size they are and not have to lose weight.They don't have to lose weight if they don't want to but and it is a very big but there may be problems ahead that they can't or don't want to see. Losing weight is not easy and keeping it off can be harder still, so I feel they want to be excepted for who they are rather than try to lose weight and keep it off. This may be ok when you are young but as you get older things change. For your health especially, as you get older you have to do your best to stay healthy and being obese and completely healthy do not make a good mix . 

I read today that a famous singer has paid for their parents to have a personal trainer to help them improve their health as they were about to become grandparents. I would say personally that it should be up to the future grandparents to make that decision, but it was an interesting article. I know from experience that you have to really want something to do it. You are responsible for yourself. It doesn't matter how much you see what  influencers do or have a personal trainer, if you don't want something, even if you try for a short time, it won't last. It's hard to be what you want to be, and it is even harder to maintain change. Change is hard, long term. There are so many so-called “experts” out there, but unless you do what is right for YOU, no amount of spending money to get advice will help. You will, sooner or later, slip back into what is comfortable for you, because it takes continual effort for it to work.

Motivation starts you off, dedication keeps you going. That dedication comes from you, only you, and no-one else. With me, I know short term I need to feel comfortable in the outfit I have for my son and future daughter in law's wedding in two weeks. I know that if I am not careful with what I eat I may put on a few lbs in weight and not be comfortable in what I am wearing. It's not all about how you look but I know that I need to feel confident as the mother of the groom on that day so I want to feel the best I can.Long term I need to keep the weight off for my next surgery. I was told by my specialist that I needed to have a BMI of 35 to qualify for for my first surgery and so I went down from a BMI of 47.3 to less than 35 to have my hip replacement. Now, what I will say at this  point is that as far as the medical profession is concerned I am still classed  as Obese Class 1 with a B.M.I. at this present time of 31.3. I started my weight loss at 284 lbs (20 stones, 4 pounds) and I have now been around 182 lbs (13 stones) for a few months. It has taken me two years to get to where I am now.

The BMI calculator says to be at the BMI that is right for me I should be 9 stones 4 lbs, which means I should lose another 3 stones, 10 lbs (52 lbs) and have a B.M.I. of 21.4. It also tells me if I consumed 1,539 calories a day, I would reach this target weight by December 2022. Just over a year and I would be at my correct BMI but I know that I am not ready, may never be ready to do this. I feel that at this moment in time I do not want to be 9 stone, 4 lbs. I feel I am happy with what I have achieved. If I can stay at around 13 stones and maintain my weight around there, at least for another six to twelve months, then I will be a happy Jackie. At some point in the future I will write about what I think about the BMI system and where I feel it fails and the pressure it can put on the individual to be a certain weight and the problems that can cause.

To continue to lose weight at my current physical ability my app tells me I need to eat about 1500 calories a day, which is hard for me to keep to long term. I don't really know if it is what I want to do. I want to learn to maintain my weight and have a short time eating the way I have learnt to eat. Wedding, Christmas, operation, we will see how it all goes, but for now I am what I am, and this is something I haven't been able to be before. This yo-yo has stopped. What happens next? We will see. To use a well worn cliché, only time will tell.

All for now, until next time,

Love, Jackie

xx

WHITE IS A RELEVANT COLOUR

 

5^th November, 2021.

I haven't written my blog for a while, as I have not been feeling well and I have felt so tired that it has been so hard to motivate myself to do anything. It is very frustrating for me to feel this way but I have to remind myself that this feeling will pass and I will feel much better and will get back to my usual self. I rescheduled my hair appointment once I started to feel better so I could go earlier, because I knew it would help me to feel better about myself, and it did.

If I feel strong enough to get dressed and do my hair and make up, well that definitely makes me feel so much better. I know that some people will think that this is superficial, but if it helps me to feel relevant then that is important to me. My hair has been losing it's colour for many years now, and for a long time I coloured it. To save money I used to dye it myself, until one day my hair ended up being bright orange. That was the moment I thought “enough is enough” and decided to let my hair go grey. Some people carry on colouring their hair late into life and that is their decision, but I love my hair the colour it is now. When I was young, I spent a lot of time with my Grandad. He was a wonderful man who brought me up and he was the father I never really had. His hair was a lovely white colour, and I remember wanting to have hair that colour one day. It's not that far off that colour now and I absolutely love it. However, it has caused issues I have had to learn to live with. When a man has grey or white hair he can be seen as refined or as a “silver fox”, whereas a woman is seen only as a granny figure (not that there's anything wrong with being a granny), or not even seen or classed as being relevant. The difference a head of white hair can make! I was chatting to a lady the other day. She was  a little older than me, and the conversation turned to age and having grey hair. She told me that she felt invisible when she was out and about. That people didn't take her seriously or have any regard for what she was saying. Then she said that she was happy to live like this because that is just the way that it is and it didn't matter anymore. When her husband was alive and when she worked, she dyed her hair to feel that she fitted in with her life role, but now it didn't matter.

Now, that is up to that lady, but I felt it was quite sad. When her husband was alive and she had a job, she coloured her hair because she had a role, but now she had white hair, she's on her own and in retirement and didn't matter anymore. She is happy to live the rest of her life being invisible, but I don't want to be that way. When we get to the late stages of life we have so many life experiences, and have often worked so hard in the past to be able to survive. We still have so much to give, and if we are not taken seriously just because of the colour of our hair, well that is a very sad state of affairs. I know for a fact that I will carry on being just who I want to be and if someone thinks I am just a dithery little old lady, then that is their problem, not mine, and I will soon change their mind. Everyone, no matter how they look, should be given respect, but as we all know, it doesn't always work that way. All we can do is be the best we can be and work on our own self respect and confidence. If we face the world knowing that we matter, then that is a great part of the battle and people that don't matter, don't matter. Let them think what they think as long as you know better. This blog is what happens when you haven't been feeling well and sort of feeling sorry for yourself but I bounce back as always ☺️

By the time this is posted I will have seen my orthopaedic specialist and will probably know what is going to happen now as regards to my next joint replacement. The wedding is two weeks away and the future is looking bright at the moment.

So I bounce back to being the best I can, the hair will still be white, but I certainly will not be invisible. If there is a space there I will fill it even though it will be a lot smaller space than when I weighed nearly twenty-one stone 😊

Until next time,

Love, Jackie.

xx