How I lost four stone - without trying

There is so much to say, so much that is mad and magical and sheer fecking fun!  Really. Not really. There is nothing and there is everything. There is reality and unreality. There is sorcery and alchemy and dancing and music and and and…  But I know what you want, what you really really want… (well, so many of you).  Midlifesinglemum said it yesterday:

Could we have the how to lose four stone post quite soon please. Ta

Weight loss eh?  The holy grail of Western society.  It will come of course – mechanically, chemically – at some point. Scientists will develop food that provides taste and bulk and mouth feel with zero calories.  Nanobots will scurry away fat. In the meantime, of course, you can cut it away or you can have a band or a balloon inserted that will make it nigh-on impossible to stuff yourself.   But if you don’t want to wait and you don’t want or can’t afford surgery?  

Okay, so you want to know how I lost weight, right?  Well, there’s good news and bad news.

Good news?  It was really easy.

Bad news? You probably wouldn’t want to do it. 

You really really want to know how I lost weight? How I dropped, what? About three stone in four months, or somewhere about that...(I forget, to be honest) and then another one after that. Easily. Effortlessly.
I stopped eating. 

Okay, I did eat…but not much. Because, simply put, I was eating WAY too much.

But honestly, that was it.  Calories in; calories out. 

But... but... but... but... BUT... BUT!!!…..  

It’s okay, I can hear you. J  I understand.  Cos that was me shouting but but but – for pretty well all my life.  Read back through my old blog posts if you don’t believe me.

What did my ‘buts’ used to say?  I love food! I eat barely anything and still put on weight! It’s my hormones; my metabolism; my bone structure, my ayurvedic prakruti for pity's sake!  I have to cook for other people. Other people cook for me. I take medication which makes me fat. I have a condition which makes me fat.  Etc etc etc.

Yes, there are conditions and foods that will make it harder to lose weight (and we’ll talk about that later) and there are the odd exceptions *flurry of hands waving*.  But, let’s just accept for now that if you have a lot of weight to lose (I'm not talking about the odd few pounds) the vast majority of us could lose it by eating less - if we choose?  If I've lost you here, then that's fine - there are a gazillion sites out there that will talk about hidden reasons and the fine-tuning. I went looking for a good one that would give you all the science and wotnot without charging you for the privilege but that proved tricky. Feel free to post any links in the comments... 

For those still here, shall we assume it’s mental?  That it’s our minds telling our bodies they need too much food (actually I’d say the two are pretty entangled, but let’s keep it simple right now eh?). So what do you do? 

I have no idea! 

Because I’m not you. And I’m not a diet guru, thank feck!  I can tell you what I did and I will, and - if you’re interested - you're welcome to listen.  But please, it’s what I did. It’s what I thought or didn’t think.  It is different for you. I can’t take responsibility for your body.  Nobody can.  Just you. 

I spent years making excuses for not having a slim healthy fit body. YEARS. DECADES. I blamed my mother. I blamed my childhood. I blamed my school. I blamed my job. I blamed my first father. I blamed my second father. I blamed my friends. I blamed my boss. I blamed my husband. I blamed my child. I blamed boredom. I blamed fear. I blamed magazines. I blamed TV. I blamed celebrities. I blamed my lack of will-power. I blamed..oh shit, I’m bored of listing what and whom I blamed. You get the picture.

One thing I would just say at this point.  Not losing weight takes a lot of energy. A lot. Not losing weight occupies the mind.  It can be another form of distraction. It can be a way of stopping yourself from focusing on other things that May Be Scary.  Sooo… one thing that could be interesting might be possibly, if you like, if you want, to ask yourself – If I weren’t fat, what might I think, what might I have to confront?  Or not. J

I’ll carry on with this tomorrow.  I would like to make one thing really REALLY clear. In fact, preface any comment you make on this with 'Jane, I understand this is you talking about you. You are not talking about me, and I take full responsibility for my own mind, my own body and my own health.'  

Cos this is not me being the responsible journalist or health writer or whatever. This is just me telling you about my madcap trip.  That’s all.  I am NOT saying do what I did. Let's be honest, it really isn’t the best or safest or most sensible way to lose weight. There are a million people out there who will tell you how to do that, if you want to be told.  If you really want a guru for this, then Pete Cohen ain’t bad…(hey, he even calls himself a guru! What was I saying yesterday about how I hate gurus?  J  Marek talks about it in Symphonic Bridges too of course. Obliquely of course. And you have to dig around a bit - but it is there, somewhen or other.  ;) 

If my secretary (I kept misspelling that as secretally…lol!) turns up for work, he may choose to take questions on this.  I dunno.  J  Or maybe not. 

Don't give up...

Appearances can be deceptive. Always remember that. When I first pitched up at Lifehouse, I confess my heart sank. It had a wonderful setting (planted in 130 acres, including twelve acres of historic listed gardens) but the building looks like a series of white concrete boxes. The layout is a bit wonky and the decor is decidedly airport – striped carpets, blond wood and colour blocks.

Also, it all seemed a bit fluffy. A bit unfocused. But I figured this was probably me. I’m a bit old school with spas – I like the rough tough ones where you see the doctor as soon as you land and s/he tells you what you need, rather than you saying what you want. But nowadays spa is commodity, it’s all about pampering, about the whole ‘you’re worth it’ malarkey. Which kind of grates with me, though why it should I really don’t know. Spartan upbringing maybe? Underlying belief that I’m not worth it? Hell, who knows?

I puzzle as it sits weirdly with my belief that you should be gentle with people. I have always believed that you can’t force people into things. And that if someone makes a tiny change, tries something slightly new, it might just nudge them into making another change, and another. People used to ask me why I worked for the Daily Mail; how I could have sold out in such a cavalier fashion. But really it was the best way to reach people. To show them what was out there in the world of natural health and wellbeing. Why preach to the converted? People also say I dumb things down – well of course I do! Make it easy. Don’t put people off straightaway. Coax them in.

And, hmm...actually that’s what Lifehouse does, rather cleverly. Scratch under the surface and there is some pretty amazing stuff going on.

I wasn’t sure what I’d make of Pete Cohen, the man who was apparently going to ‘sort out my life’. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be ‘sorted’. I’m not a parcel. And, actually, I have a pretty clear idea of where I want to go (workwise at any rate).  But, bless him, he just asked sensible, pertinent questions and he listened to my answers. And we laughed a lot and swapped stories about big-headed bores and talked movies and got all excited about a lot of spiritual stuff.
‘You know where you’re going, don’t you?’ he said. ‘And you’re very nearly there.’
Interestingly, en route to our meeting, I had pretty much made the decision that rewriting my YA book, Samael, was making me miserable and that I should just call it a day.  Pete suggested I reconsider. ‘Get the bastard out the way,’ he said. ‘Just do it. Then you can move on to the next book. Don’t give up.’

Hmm. Interesting.

My health consultation was with a naturopath who used to work at Chiva Som. Sue Davis didn’t just take my blood pressure (‘absolutely perfect’) and go through my diet and lifestyle (‘sickeningly virtuous’) but she offered to give me an Australian Bush Flower remedy reading and treatment.

I had to pick out the flower images that I loved and those I loathed. The results were fascinating: about finding self-approval and acceptance; about releasing deep fears; about being willing to try new concepts, new ways of living, about unblocking creativity. The bottom line? ‘Don’t give up,’ she said. ‘Never give up.’

Sensing a theme here?

And as I wandered into the juice bar I found a woman in a bright purple top in front of me. ‘Hello,’ she said. ‘I’m Moon.’
Well, of course she was.
‘Shall we sit down and have a chat?’

Of course we should. A totally unscheduled chat.

Moon is a healer, a shaman and so naturally we were off and away. Talking the deep stuff. And I won’t bore you with that. Except that, as we parted, she turned and said (you know what’s coming, don’t you?’

Yeah.

‘Don’t give up.’

So I won't.  :)

The problem with oracles

The trouble with oracles is that they often aren’t clear-cut. The fatal flaw in believing that the universe is sending you messages is that you might not be reading them right. Know what I mean? Ask the ancient Greeks – that Delphic ditz regularly did their heads in.  I mean, look at her - you can almost hear her thinking, "Hmm, how can I make it really really confusing? Is there a more complicated way I can say that?"  She ought to write technical manuals.


Last night (yup, my usual 2.30am (not)friend) I was reading In The Dark Places of Wisdom about the Phocaeans who asked said oracle where they should go, having been booted out of their home by the Persians. They thought the oracle was telling them to go to build a town on Cyrnus (Corsica) so off they sailed only to get their asses royally whooped by the Corsicans. Eh what? They had done exactly what Apollo said and been almost totally destroyed. No wonder the poor bastards were confused. Then along came a stranger (as they tend to) and said, ‘You got everything wrong.’ Which is why you usually want to fecking thump the stranger. ‘That’s only what you thought. What he was really saying was to build a place for Cyrnus.’

Eh what (again)? Well, Cyrnus did mean Corsica but it was also the name of the son of Hercules. Anyhow, it doesn’t really matter. Though it did to the Phocaeans of course. ‘Everything had seemed so hopeless. But all they had done was interpret the oracle too narrowly, understood it on the physical level instead of at the level of myth.’ Stupid fecking Phocaeans.

Sorry. This is really long-winded. But bear with me. I try to follow the clues, I really do, but I’m beginning to wonder if I get it all wrong; if I’m blindly following a string when the end has been untied (sorry, mythical metaphors really getting tied up in (Gordian?) knots now). Shit. *smites brow*

Last night though (earlier, before the 2.30am interlude), at least, it all seemed pretty clear-cut. I had fed and watered James, watched a few sky burials with him and then sat down to go on the Internet. The screen started to swim. Migraine alert. Weird. I get, what, maybe one a year? But there was no arguing with it: darkened room, eyes shut, no choice whatsoever. The idle though ran through my head, unbidden, that the Louise Hay prescription for migraine is masturbation. Shit, Louise, have you ever tried it when the whole room is pulsating and the lights are flashing (but not in a remotely orgasmic way?). Anyhow, I reckoned that this (the migraine, not the non-masturbation) was a pretty clear message: stay OFF the internet.

But then, today. I was halfway through an email to the Daily Mail (yes, yes, I know) when Everything Died. Power cut. Sooooo? Is the message ‘Don’t go back! Don’t sell your soul to the devil?’ or is it more a case of ‘Hey, you sad loser, the sun is shining and you’re sitting in front of the fecking PC. Grab the moment! Walk the SP!’

See what I mean? You don't? Do I think too much? Don’t answer that. Just a power cut? Ah, whatever. You’re probably right.

Anyhow. We walked and I saw one person in the distance walking towards us over the big field and, instead of veering off the way I usually would, I headed on a collision course. And the person turned out to be my friend Maggie. And she turned around and walked with us again. And the big field worked its magic in its usual way. And it was good.

And...this will make you laugh. I came back to find the power was back on and that I’d been invited, nay summoned, to a four-day course called Sort Your Life Out. With this guy.  Here. This Sunday. Sort out my life in four days? Bring it on, sunshine.

Saved! At the very last minute

Wow, so there really are such things as last-minute rescue plans and fairy godmothers? There I was, contemplating WeightWatchers, like a doomed prisoner in her (thickly padded) cell. I was desperate but my hopes for success were not high. WW worked a treat the first time but second time round was an unmitigated disaster. Maybe it was something to do with our ‘leader’ (always love that phrase) – a solid girl with a Tango tan and anklets (no value judgments there, btw).

‘You know what?’ she told us, very seriously. ‘These points are amazing. This diet is SO flexible. You know what I did yesterday? I had four pints of lager and a bag of chips. I did! And all within points.’

But anyhow. I was thinking about the lager and chips diet and about how WeightWatchers makes me feel like a naughty schoolgirl when my friend Sheena got in touch. ‘Don’t do it!’ she wailed. ‘You’ve got to try Pete’s thing.’

Pete turned out to be Pete Cohen, the GMTV life coach and general gung-ho guru and his ‘thing’ turned out to be an online weight loss course. Sheena, in her usual irrepressible way, had chatted him up on Twitter and made friends. She’d been doing the programme for a month and lost “tons”. ‘I told Pete all about your problem,’ she said. My problem? Oh yes, the four stone I need to shed and the total lack of willpower that prevents me from doing it. That problem. ‘And he’s going to get you on his programme.’ He is? He did.

Ten minutes later I got an email saying I was signed up and then another one the next day telling me it was time to start. But hang on!!! Help!! I wasn’t ready. I’d just taken ownership of four boxes of Fudges’ biscuits for cheese (total utter foodie heaven). I needed...ooooh....at least four days to get through them (a packet a day? Hmm, maybe make that two days.

But no. Seems it’s okay to eat whatever you like really (within reason). And Fudges aren’t stuffed with sugar so really they could be considered a pretty healthy snack (maybe with hummus rather than that gorgeous oozing Stilton).

I’m now on Day Three and have to say it’s really rather clever. No lists of forbidden foods (though he does try to nudge you away from sweets and alcohol), no wagging fingers, no points, no prescriptions. The visualisation is really rather lovely too. I don’t have an MP3 player so had to listen to it on my PC in my office (hardly ideal). ‘Make sure you won’t be disturbed,’ said Pete, so I came up with the bright idea of doling out pigs’ ears to the dogs. Hence I spent the next twenty minutes with the sound of vigorous chewing and the slow release of aroma de pigs’ ear. By the time Pete’s dulcet tones were bringing me back to reality I had both dogs squirming on my feet, soggy pigs’ ears being dragged over my ankles.

Anyhow, it’s early days and I shall keep you posted.

By the way, I know that, for many of you, the main point of interest in this post will be the Fudges’ biscuits. So, for your delectation...  We tested four new flavours – cheese and black pepper flatbreads; stilton and walnut buttery flatbreads; oat and thyme squares and mature cheddar cheese and buttery flatbreads. I'm a bit of a fervent fan of their Cheddar wafers so my first thought was that these weren't cheesy or melty in the mouth enough for me (but then, as Adrian pointed out, they are intended as a complementary canvas for cheese).  Interestingly James was the number one fan – eschewing cheese and eating them totally nude. Adrian said he wasn’t entirely convinced (yet ate his way through two packets in a disgustingly short period of time). And my final thought? Very nice  – particularly when nibbled twenty times (to get the digestion going in the mouth).

Look here – and drool....