Worst days of my year so far.

Well the last few days have been the worst of the year so far....this has nothing to do with diets but i've needed to get this off my chest!

My (now ex) housemate owed me nearly £600. I have asked for it repeatedly the past six months, and when I asked for the money I needed this month for the bills (not the £600) she said I was spitting my dummy out by asking for my money!

This is the so called friend I gave a place to live when she had nowhere, lent her money when she had none and have put up with her and her girlfriend's selfish attitude towards me and the house.

So that's it. I've left. Managed to find a new house, sign paperwork over to her and will collect the keys tomorrow- all in four days!

She has since tried to go to the police and lawyers because apparently i've left her with a house and all the bills....well after three days of her not answering her phone to me or replying to texts what else could I do? Suffice to say after speaking to a lawyer she has no leg to stand on, and she has taken this on board and is now backing down and staying the hell out of my life.

It's such a shame, as she was once a great friend and I am going to find it hard to get over that loss, odd- it's like dealing with death.

I know it was the right thing to do, the best thing, but still life does deal us some shit blows sometimes and I guess how we get over them and cope through these tough times is what life is all about. What doesn't kill you certainly does make you stronger.

Andy x

Old habits die hard...

In a previous blog I spoke of how when younger my main problems for weight gain was due to the bullying and also how I would hide and eat food at night at home when my parents couldn't catch me. This always helped me deal with my pain.

Well I am staying at my parents right now and after having a big healthy dinner tonight with them now I am sat up watching downstairs and they are asleep I have the worst urge to go eat. I'm not hungry. I don't need food but yet I need to eat.

Why is it that being in these surroundings bring back all these old memories and make me want to eat for no reason???

I often look back and really regret moving out at such a young age and I do in some ways, but at the same time I'm glad I did or how big would I be now?

Andy x

First workout today...and a bizarre change of events

Had my first workout today, no matter how muscle bound and gorgeous my personal trainer may be, he is still Satan in my eyes right now.

I ache. Oh dear lord do I ache. Only a 30 minute workout, but needed gas and air straight after! 30 sit-ups, 30 press ups, 30 arm pullyupy thingys. But you know what, no matter how much pain I was in, and how much I wanted to give in- I didn't. I just pictured all those bullies of the past and pictured the gorgeous body I wanted (I also thought of Hugh Jackman briefly) and I got through it and I have never ever felt so good in all my life.

Now for the bizarre change of events....me and my housemate had a massive argument today, won't bore you with the tiny details but long and short of it is that she owes me money, and I haven't had it yet. Now this isn't so bizarre, but what is bizarre is that for only the second time in my life I haven't turned to food for comfort. Instead I couldn't actually eat a thing! The only other time this has happened was when I broke up with my fiance a few months ago, and I found it equally unnerving then...why do I no longer stuff myself when in extreme emotional torment or in extreme anger?

I'm not quite sure why this change has happened, but i'm bloody glad it has- maybe I am finally breaking my addiction to food!

Andy x

one more thing...

People keep saying, "oh you don't need to lose weight", "there is nothing on you", "you're not fat".

Well there is, trust me, my BMI says so, Trainer says so and I say so.

I hide it well with what I wear, spend a day not eating before I go out so I don't look bloated or take photos at a certain angle to look thin.

So yes, I am fat...like I said at the beginning of this, not morbidly obese, but fat nevertheless. This isn't a vanity thing, this is the truth. I hate the way I am now, and how I live is giving me health problems. I am aware there are people bigger than me but if I don't turn things around now I will end up like that, I know it.

So why did i get fat?

I decided to write this after reading http://101reasonsihatebeingfat.blogspot.com/

Although my story of weight gain isn't awful as the one above, I think we all gain weight for different reasons and sometimes because of different people...our stories are all relative to ourselves, ie. whilst one situation could be worse, it depends on how we deal with and how we see the situation ourselves.

I cannot blame my immediate family. Simple as. A large part of my immediate family are overweight and have been for different reasons (I know these and it is not my place to speak about them here). But they never encouraged me to be, it was always drilled into me that I eat my vegetables, I eat plenty of fruit and I don't eat too many crisps or sweets.

I think the main time that I became conscious of my weight was when I was at my biggest as a child, this was in primary school. All the other children could run, jump and liked exercise. I couldn't. I would get out of breath quickly and just had too much weight to carry to be able to do the sports properly. Again, my mum gave me a healthy breakfast in the morning and a healthy dinner at night, but it was school dinners. Full of fat, salt, sugar and just general crap, I would eat and eat to hide myself from all the other kids, truth is I had no friends. I was always the weird kid who was an outsider to everybody else, of course now I recognise that the reason I felt like such an outsider was probably because I was different- I was gay even if i didn't realize it yet.

Being an outsider turns you to things you find true comfort in, at that age I didn't understand the concept of fat and calories, and food made me happy. It tasted good, made me feel comforted, and again gave me a reason to still be inside, alone- I was just eating my lunch, I didn't need to talk to people whilst eating so I didn't feel as lonely as I would when I sat outside along, playing by myself.

Naturally as I moved through Primary School I made friends, but it was too late to pull me away from my addiction to food. I could now have friends but over-eat at the same time. As mum and dad worked later and when getting back from school I would have an hour to myself, I would eat and eat before they got back, before I had dinner. I would eat dinner. Then before bedtime secretly hide food and take it upstairs to eat when nobody was around. I knew it was wrong and I felt guilty, god did I feel guilty, but I ate to hide my guilt.

I ate and ate to hide my pain. The pain of moving up to high school, sticking out like a sore thumb. I was bullied, oh yes. Bullied not just for now being fat but for being camper than Christmas! Everyday I would have the taunts and the beatings, things thrown at me. On one occasion when things got really bad I was threatened with a knife (the boy later got thrown out of the school)....all this time instead of making a positive step at dealing with all this pain I would continue to take negative ones and keep eating. Eating until I would be sick, sick but content and happy.

So I guess my reasons for being fat was down to old fashioned school bullying, and old fashioned school dinners didn't help much either!

I know I am nowhere near the size I was back then and I am eternally grateful that I managed to turn that around, but I still have a long way to go until I am happy, and I guess when I am happy I can finally stop looking at food as a comfort mechanism, stop being addicted to it and be free to experience a longer, healthier life.

Andy x

Two new mantras....

Although I haven't started the diet yet, after stuffing myself with pizza tonight I realized i need to at least attempt to cut down on food first (my good friend Dan suggested this)

I must remember!! :

"Eat to live, don't live to eat"

and

(this isn't so much a mantra, more just a fact) "Your stomach is the size of a fist, so it only needs that much food to fill it"

ahhhhhh the power of the mind!

Welcome one and all...

Well, this is it. My Big Fat Diet!

For the majority of my life I have been overweight. Simple fact. Apart from the years of dancing I did in between when I actually had some muscle and didn't quite wobble as much, either side of those few years I have been fat.

I mean, i'm not morbidly obese...but i'm not healthy either, my weight is in the very verge of average/overweight as is my BMI but my waist-size isn't.

I have spent the majority of my bonus this month on a personal trainer and here are the rules of my weight loss programme:

1. Train 2-3 times per week
2. follow diet plan to the letter
3. Be honest and don't cheat!

Three simple rules. The honesty part is really why I have created this blog, it's a way of sharing my ups and most probably downs with you guys and also a way of me being able to keep a record of how I am doing more easily.

So here we go, enjoy reading this and I appreciate any mail, hints, tips or even insults you may throw at me!

One thing I need to point out now is that I start my workouts tomorrow, but due to a holiday, Mr Personal Trainer told me not to start diet plan until after that (thank god!)

Andy x