I have always tried hard with a daughter in the house not to say the ‘F’ word around her. I have always tried to mention her brain, her heart or her effort rather than something she cannot really help – how beautiful or thin she is…
Anya is journaling her journey in weightloss. Read part one here and part two below…
Well, OK then, that was a good start to the whole ‘watching what I eat thing’. I lost 1.2kgs in my first week! You gotta be pleased with that…
It has been an interesting week. On Jenny Craig they supply all your meals, and you just supplement that with veges and fruit – it’s all quite specific. And for that reason – very easy! I just don’t have to worry about it. I just consult my planner, grab it from the freezer – defrost it and eat it.
Two things have become very apparent to me this week though. Firstly, I appear to be eating way more than I was eating before I started this. I am an ‘undereater’.
I manage as a rule to have breakfast (but not always), then I rush around all day and then start getting a headache about 2ish and cram whatever I can find into my mouth. It may often be junk food or chocolate. I like to pretend that I don’t do that, that I eat well, but I don’t. Then I am OK in the evening as I don’t like big meals, but then I wander around at night (insomniac that I am) and always end up near the fridge. Hmmmm.
The other thing I forget to do is drink. I HATE water – really I do, so I would rather drink anything but that. So this week I have been drinking a glass of water before every meal. Interestingly my skin is better for it. Who knew? Well I did, I just was too lazy to do anything about it.
I think I often confuse being thirsty with actually being hungry… So this week I have eaten exactly what they have told me to eat, and drink about 10 times more than I normally do. And I have lost weight. It has made me realise that I can actually manage it, and that sitting on my butt pretending that I am fine with it, isn’t the way to go.
I have always tried hard with a daughter in the house not to say the ‘F’ word around her. She is remarkable skinny, and tall (at nearly 14) – and I have always tried to mention her brain, her heart or her effort rather than something she cannot really help – how beautiful or thin she is. I have let her dress herself since she was little – always quirky, always herself. She appears to be reasonably comfortable in her own skin, and very OK with being a Doc Marten’s-wearing tomboy.
I try as much as possible not to mention food, other than to let her know when her eating habits might be construed as a little lobsided. She can eat half a loaf of bread after school if I let her… now she has a banana and homemade yoghurt instead. I want so much for her relationship with food to be a healthy one, that she keep being the active soul that she is, and that she finds her ‘sweet spot’ in terms of her own feelings about herself.
She came home from school the other day to tell me in a quiet voice that one of the boys at school used the ‘F’ word. She told him she didn’t think that was a kind word to use with anyone, even in fun. She told him that he might not mean it seriously, but you never know how a girl might ‘hear’ it. The wisdom of a nearly 14 year old. Maybe we all need to think about being a little ‘kinder’ with the use of the ‘F’ word. Even with ourselves.
By Anya Brighouse 12 July 2011.
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