I've never felt the need to go on a diet. I'm average height of an average build - not especially thin but not overweight. Just average. Until almost 4 years ago when I gave birth to my first child (I say first, so far he is my only child). During pregnancy I felt I had a licence to eat much more food, unfortunately this increased appetite never faded and I continued to eat more than I had before. I wouldn't say now that I'm fat, but I am noticeably heavier. It wasn't until I happened to weight myself last autumn that I noticed I was approaching 10 stone. This signalled alarm bells - not immediately but I thought to myself I don't want to tip 10 stone.
So its now February and I thought I would try watching what I eat. Well this has to be one of the most difficult self inflicted challenges I've ever undertaken. I have literally become obsessed with what I eat. I downloaded an app for my phone which decided, based on the information I put in, that I should restrict my calorie intake to just 1200 per day, equating to shedding 1 lb per week. Its only day 5! I've had very little in the way of unhealthy snacks and I'm certainly eating more fruit and vegetables. But going from eating whatever I liked whenever I liked regardless of how good it was, to just 1200 calories per day is hard work.
This is a chart of my current progress after 5 days with calories on the side and days along the bottom In terms of how I feel:
- I seem to have developed backache
- I feel generally irritable (this maybe because I've opted to cut out coffee)
- Hungry!
Wish me luck - any tips, encouragement or advice would be welcome.
