My personal experience with weight loss, food and body hatred and how my life has changed since
Height: 5″3 Age: 18 Eating: around 2500 calories a day. Drinking: 4 units a week and maybe half a pint of water a day.
Weight: 158lbs. (11st 4)
January 2011 and my 19th birthday.
So you want to be a size 6? Don’t we all, but it doesn’t just come over night, and sometimes its more damaging then you know. I always told myself i loved my body and i loved what i saw in the mirror. Hiding the fact that i hated myself and hated the fact i couldn’t say no to food, i couldn’t do anything about it thought as i didn’t want to i was lazy and disgusted at myself for ruining my academic life and my childhoods ‘romantic’ life. I believed that it was important to have friends and family and not to care about what i looked like until i got so depressed about seeing myself in a photo, realising id looked that way my whole 16 years of depressed life, i decided. Enough is enough i’m not going to sit at weddings with cake in front of me slumped over because i can’t sit straight out of my unhealthy habits. So, January 2011 after a bout of flu and not eating properly for 2 weeks i lost 4lbs.
“ I can do this” was my moto and programmes like “Snog marry avoid” “how to look good naked” “super size vs super skinny” “ 10 years younger”, and I’m not blaming them for why I chose to lose weight, I’m thanking them, without the influence of health risks I would never have shifted from 1st6lbs overweight (11st.2) to a healthy weight of 9st11. Yes, I should be 9st 2, but we’ll get to that.
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“So, i know i’m one of those on-off excersizers.
I wanted to share with you my journey so far ( its now 5 months in, i’ll update it weekly.)
December 28th: No excersize weekly,I drank alot i ate alot and i complained alot, everything depressed me and my weight was just constantly on my mind, so 2010 was ending and i wanted to try and stick to my new years resolution…I wrote down daily my food intake and my weight per day, i got to a point where i was weighing myself 3 times a day.. until about the 3rd week i was doing fine, then i would weigh myself only after 2 hours after i’ve drank something, and i’d eat under 1000 calories a day.”
“January total:
Weight lost: -13lbs
There was alot of ups and downs and alot of stress but that’s not bad weight loss, however it may have just been water weight, the first month is always the hardest.”
2011 October speaking about january.: Looking back on it I feel like shouting at myself “HOW CAN YOU THINK 13lbs is bad??! What is wrong with you Amy?” It is really upsetting to see the thoughts and memories of this time.. it was 10 months ago.. and I’m still feeling the same, and I know my journey is just starting and you have to really want to stop purging to be able to, but..i don’t know If I’m ready for it yet.
January is when I started to think about moving into a relationship, I had known a guy for around a year and a half and I loved him so much he was a great friend and felt so much closer but I couldn’t find myself able to commit to him, I thought that by pushing myself into a more confident and mature relationship would help me, so by February I entered into the dark part of the year and I went into the relationship with this new older maturer guy, not realising how it would effect me.
After being on an emotional roller coaster lasting 7 weeks I had found myself so low and hating myself, I’d excersize to points where I was ill and unable to move for days on end, my calories were cut drastically. From a healthy 2000 to a sickening 900 calories, the less I ate the happier and healthier I felt, I was feeling energised and would exercise more, and this new ‘love’ I thought I’d found would tell me I was lazy for not being in work and for not doing anything all day, so I’d get angry and binge eat. Realising I wasn’t going to lose weight binge eating on toast and ketchup ( because it was sugary and I needed the boost) I started to purge.. only once a month..sometimes going months on end.. or twice daily. It really depended.
February 2011:
I’d just started a relationship and completely skipped doing exercise, however i stuck to eating healthily so it gets hazy from now on.
February Total:
Weight lost: – 1lb
Inches Gained: + 0.1
Definitely a difficult month, i went away to an all you can eat place, i drank alot of alcohol, i started a new relationship and its always a struggle to be around booze/boyfriends”
March 2011:
was the ending of my dark months I really think, I was still upset from losing my best friends from august of 2009 ( I know, a lot of time had past but most of them I’d known for a few years, one of them for 7 years and she was like a sister to me.. I loved her so much) I’d also never gotten over an ex and he’d at this point been in a relationship with a girl for around 7 months, and it killed me. I know, I was coming out of a relationship, but it still felt so difficult for me.
“March 2011:
3rd month, yes I’m not doing FANTASTIC, but I’m doing pretty well for someone who loses a pound and then gains 3, I’ve never stuck to a diet and never stuck to an exercise plan, so lets see…
Okay, this month i was in my relationship, that was flagging, we were strugglin’ and so was i, i had flu and he had operations on his eye, it was difficult.
March 31st Thursday:
I have no information on my measurements as i stopped writing them down, and i stopped watching my food, i got so depressed around this time, it was my ‘bad’ week, i regularly started throwing up half of my meals, i’d drink water before i ate and after so it came up easier and when i got tothrowing up the second lot of water i knew it was all out of my system. I did this for a week, until i thought it was a habit, and i needed to stop. I finally stopped after reading it didn’t help with weight loss, you digest 65% of the calories within 35 mins of the food entering your body.
Definitely a difficult month, i went away to an all you can eat place *2014: I remember mid meal excusing myself to sneak upstairs and throw up pink ice cream, the worst thing to throw up,then i shuffled back to my seat like nothing happened*, I drank this month.. only around 14 units for the whole month but I hadn’t drank in such a long time.. and I wasn’t a big drinker before that,, i started a new relationship and its always a struggle to be around booze/boyfriends.”
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May 2011:
Again, i was less concerned about my weight and more about how i was going to pay my way, and about boyfriends and family issues, so this month wasn’t measured plus I’d lost my trusty diary over a month ago, so it was difficult to keep track, however I’ve done my best, this month i noticed I’d put on a lot of weight around my face.
So on the 23rd i saw body rockers, and started trying to work out with them, I’ve done a food and exercise thing at the bottom of this!:
I only started focusing back on my weight mid-month, so i didn’t do to well, but i stuck to my diet at the end of the month and cut my calories back from 2200 to around 1500 and started doing cardio and low cardio work outs to burn some fat and add muscle, so i’m not expecting a lot of inches to come off this month, but the last week should help.”
2012: Reading this and remembering this point of the year I know it was the time I was focused on everything being portioned out, I MUST eat carbohydrates, protein, dairy, vitamins, wheat etc everyday as a balanced meal and I’d REALLY upped my exercise, you’ll see it on these links.
*2014 :compared to what i thought the exercise burned, i was well off..it was about 140 calories compared to the 500 i burn now doing insanity, i realise now that i had tried so hard, every opportunity to burn calories, the ads say “take the stairs” but i needed more then that and this year has shown what i can do.
June-September in summary: Bolemia
After this point I’d really gotten over my dark point, I’d gone back to devoting my time to the guy from school a year and a half ago, we were seeing each other regularly and he really boosted my confidence, I’d stopped being upset about the friends I’d lost and the boy I never really had.
I then focused on being apart of someone’s life who really wanted me, he’d put in so much effort and so much love it made me feel worthy of love I then focused on being apart of someone’s life who really wanted me, he’d put in so much effort and so much love it made me feel worthy of love and by late June we were seeing each other by-weekly (which was rare for me, as I really got nervous about leaving the house..) I was still unable to commit to him in a relationship but I was telling friends I was ‘seeing someone’ which was a big step for me after such a bad experience just 2 months ago.
July had came around, I had finally convinced myself he deserves to have love in his life and I didn’t want anyone else to be the one to give that to him so we started our dating relationship. I had started not watching my weight but watching my measurements as I felt they were more reliable I’d do it daily-weekly, but I’d go through patches of feeling sick after eating my food, my portions had picked up and were nearly normal ( not large normal, but appropriate for someone of my height to be eating), I was purging 3-4 days in a row after dinner meals because I felt so disgusted that I’d managed to eat it all and that it wasn’t right, if I was to lose weight I shouldn’t eat It all, so I’d go to the bathroom a few minutes later with a glass of juice, I’d throw up at a guess of half of the dinner so I didn’t feel an empty stomach then go upstairs and exercise. After a few days I’d stick with the exercise and quit purging until I had a large meal again ( once a week).
By September I’d stopped purging 12-14 times a month and cut it down to maybe 4-5 times a month, mine and my boyfriends relationship was relaxed and natural and I felt so safe, we were seeing each other anywhere between 4-6 days a week and enjoying every second of it, whether it was just going out to town, or staying in and watching a film. He knew about my food problems and mentioned them but still supported me, so I felt happy talking about my weight with him and he helped me in a healthy way to eat in front of him, since I never had before. I now feel comfortable eating in public.
It is now October (2011) and my weight has stayed the same-ish for around a month and a half however its 5 days into this month and I have just been binging and purging for 3 out of the 5 days and my weight is gradually increasing, I feel it could be from stresses of the upcoming holidays, stresses of being in a new relationship and stresses of my upcoming hospital appointments ( due to kidneys) but I feel myself losing control of my body and eating habits, and even to put on 2lbs and to go into the 10st category would be devastating to me.
2014:
….2 years and 6 months later… I never stumbled with my purging, i stayed around 9st.8 fluxing up to 9.11 and down to 9.5.
I have been eating healthily (with treats), and i exercised daily, doing Jillian Michaels DVD’s and practising my own workouts. Since January i have been keen on pursuing a fitness career however i know there are no jobs available for it in britain at this time.
I recently purchased insanity and my body has changed like never before and i love it, i’m stronger faster and happier.
