Hi guys,

This post is quite off topic from my usual posts as you will soon see. It mainly stems from some stuff that’s been happening the last couple of weeks that I’ve wanted to get off my chest and I’m just wondering if anyone’s having the same experiences as me.

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned in my previous blogs but I’m the eldest of three kids and my whole family is pretty much super skinny. I’ve never fit in and my parents have always been worried about what I’m eating and how much I’m eating. I’ve never really stuck to a diet before Slimming World and it’s been quite novel to lose some weight instead of gaining it.

As you can see from my food photos that I eat quite often in the day. I’ve found that I’m more likely to stay on track when I’ve eat quite often and I’m less likely to binge. One of my Dad’s friends has been helping us out at work lately and he mentioned the other day that he always sees me eating (I tend to spread out my lunch over an hour having a bite here and there as I’m working) and asked me how many times I eat a day. As it happened to be a college day, I said I had planned 3 meals and 3 snacks and him and my Dad went on for around 15 minutes on how I’m eating too much and there’s no way I would lose weight.

I can be quite pedantic when it comes to little jibes like this and so (although SW is not calorie counting, I just wanted to make a point) I went on MyFitnessPal and logged my planned food for the day. It came to around 1800 calories. Both him and my Dad tend to have 2 meals a day, with one being a pot noodle. I tried telling them it’s not the amount but the quality. The pot noodle came to just under 600 calories whereas my lunch (which I was eating at the time) came to about 275 (4 ryvita, Philadelphia lightest, ham slices & cherry tomatoes).

Anyhow, it wasn’t this that really upset me. Yesterday, as you know if you caught up on my blogs, I weighed in at 3lbs less and I was really happy as it was what I was aiming for. When I told them and that’s what worked for my body, I was greeted with the words “3lbs? That’s wrong – your scales must be broken”. There was a lot of eye rolling on my part – but what hurt me the most is what my Mum said as she walked past (knowing how difficult I’ve found this journey and the struggles I’ve grown up with) “3lbs is nothing – I can p*ss 3lbs! It can’t be that hard!”

It just made me think how ignorant people who are close to us can be. I briefly chatted about it to my sister and she was like “oh, she probably just doesn’t realise it – no need to get all upset”. I think if it was anyone else, like my Dad or his friend, I wouldn’t of given a toss. It was the fact it was my Mum who knows my journey almost better than myself. She is fully aware I’m an emotional eater as she is one as well. She has been struggling with a recent weight gain and I’ve been trying to get her to come with me to class (though she’s having none of it) and so it does hurt when I feel like she should know where I’m coming from.

I’m very lucky to have a very supportive OH. I can’t imagine how difficult it can be when you don’t have someone there behind you and those close to you (probably not deliberately) have jibes about you and your weight loss. I know if I didn’t have that support, it would have probably set me back a couple of weeks. I would have binged and spent my evening thinking how my weight’s coming off so slow I shouldn’t bother and clearly it’s not making a difference by the way people are talking to me. That’s not to say I didn’t have a little more chocolate than I should have today but baby steps, right?

So I am more determined than ever to shift this weight. As my sister and OH said – these 3lbs add up and hopefully I’ll be half my size by the end of this year and I’m going to make sure I have a good week. I’m sorry for the long post and the dreariness. If you’re reading this and not actually in need of losing weight, if you do have a loved one who is, encourage them on their journey. Give them a compliment and it will make them more motivated that what they’re doing is working.

Until next time.. x