And so once again I find myself dieting and thus food is an
even bigger part of my life than it usually is.
I like food. I like good food and
deplore bad food, despite being British (as apparently all of our food tastes
like poo and we have bad teeth). Being
on a diet changes my attitude to cooking as I still want to eat nice food but I
am more concerned about how it is prepared.
I watch cookery programmes on TV, I own cookery books and I do most of
the cooking at home so there is no doubt I am a bit of a “foody”. As I sat here wondering what to blog about I
was also thinking about breakfast so eventually I decided to write about food,
about dieting and about being naked.
Hang on, I hear you ask, how has being naked got anything to
do with any of this? Well, it’s no
secret that I am a naturist; a fair-weather naturist perhaps but a naturist all
the same. I like to partake in social activities with others whilst undressed. And though naturism is all about body acceptance
and respecting a person no matter what they look like, that’s all very well for
others but I am a complete hypocrite in that I want to look good in the
buff. Back in August I went to Eastney
beach and got my nude on. A couple of
photos were taken and I was appalled.
From the waist down I’m fine… well, more than fine if you know what I mean
ladies (tee hee) but the main trunk of my body, my torso, was not good. My nicely honed legs, pert bum and
magnificent manly bits were supporting a blob of flesh that was out of
proportion. I didn’t just look fat,
which I did, I looked weird.
I decided that day to diet and I have gone down from 15
stone 6lbs, 216 lbs, 98 kg to 14 stone, 196 lbs, 84.4 kg so far. This is not over. I want to weigh another 2 stone or 28 lbs less
than I do now (168 lbs or 76.2 kg).
The first 6lbs or so I
lost all by myself but I was struggling, I was not motivated, it felt like something
I was doing on my own and no amount of support from friends or family made up
for not eating a cream cake when they were.
And so it came to pass that on my walk home one day I saw a banner that advertised
a slimming group starting up in my village, namely Slimming World. I had actually been part of a slimming group
before, Weight Watchers in Emsworth which I’d done on-line for about two months
but had dropped out when I couldn't afford the subs. The problem with Weight Watchers is that I’d done
it all on-line by myself, going to a meeting once a week, getting weighed and
walking home. I was not involved in the
group at all and let my own prejudices make it that way. You see; any slimming group will be largely
made up of ladies of various ages; the male mind does not (apparently) work in
the same way as that of the ladies so if we need to lose weight we don’t admit
to it in front of others and suffer in silence. I don’t work that way. I am not a manly male at all and apart from
wanting to look good naked I don’t have much in the way of ego. I did however form the opinion that I wouldn't be accepted by the ladies of the group so didn't hang around. I was probably wrong, we shall never know.
Whatever opinions you may have of diets, slimming plans and
slimming groups in general I can honestly say that in Slimming World I have never been made to feel anything other than welcome. I do stay for the meetings
after the weigh in and am glad to say at least one other bloke does as well and
sometimes I think our male take on things is sometimes of amusement to the ladies
in the group. Much as I hate the idea
that men and women act and think completely differently from each other it is
clearly true that there are physiological differences that can affect weight
gain and loss. For example, ladies often
talk about how if they eat a cake “it’s straight on my hips” whereas if I drink
a pint it’s straight on my tum. Men are
generally bigger and hence need more calories per day whereas ladies naturally have
a higher percentage of body fat which affects hormone levels, menstrual cycles
and the likes if it drops too low. But
no matter how we are different we are the same in that we all like to eat
things we shouldn't more than we like to eat things we should. I passed my
first stone (14 lbs) of weight loss at Slimming World this week and got a
certificate. I've added that to my
Slimmer of the Week and Slimmer of the Month certificates. I think they were
starting to get annoyed with me at one point. Next stop… the 10% club… an achievement of
having lost 10% of ones starting body weight.
I have another 6 lbs to lose before that one.
It all started very well for me at Slimming World, in my
first three weeks I lost 13 lbs and was SO close to that first Stone off. Then came my birthday and I am a social
creature, I like to spend time with my friends so I had to socialise… or at
least that was the excuse. I didn't have
a birthday, I had a birthday week. I had
two whole weeks off work but had started the celebrating the Thursday before I was
off, a full week before my birthday.
Over the next 10 days I consumed some or all of the following:
- · 2 x sharer combos at Wetherspoon's (shared so effectively I ate around 2/3 of one) which includes coated chicken wings, battered prawns, chips, onion rings, breaded chicken goujons and lots of mayo and sweet chilli dip.
- · A whole individual pizza with a cheesy prawn starter.
- · A Chinese that included a whole portion of lightly battered and fried squid with garlic and chilli, most of a king prawn chow mein, a tub of curry sauce, a deep-fried pancake roll and half a bag of prawn crackers.
- · Three buttered crumpets and around four slices of buttered toast.
- · More than 20 pints of lager or cider.
- · 5 bottles of white wine.
- · A litre bottle of vodka.
- · Six of the Slimming World chocolate bars which are supposed to be an occasional treat.
The first weigh in during this time I “maintained” my weight
from the week before, the second I gained 1.5 lbs. To be quite frank to have only gained 1.5 lbs
after all that is astonishing and possibly owes a lot to the walking and
swimming I did but still.
The other factor that should be fairly obvious is that I
spent a little too much of that time pissed.
Only once was this in a pub with other people, otherwise it was at home,
on my own, whilst on-line. I'm very lucky
now to still be in contact with a wonderful person who I managed to fall out
with because I was drunk and stupid but during that time one family relationship
hit a nadir, one from which I don’t think it will ever recover. I'm not exactly Oliver Reed (shame, he was a
very handsome man in his prime) but that is quite a lot of booze for one person
in ten days. So I started going to AA
meetings. I am now teetotal.
I still like my food and I still like to eat quite a lot of
it so dieting for me does not mean eating less, it means eating
differently. I rarely add sugar to
anything so that has not been an issue but that is not to say I don’t have a
sweet tooth; I like a pudding (or dessert for you posh folk) and Ice Cream is a
particular weakness. Pudding is pretty
much out; the “syn” value of even the most healthy sweet dish is just too high
to make it worthwhile. Bread has been
all but removed from my diet, as has any kind of added oil other than the 1 Cal spray I am now using if something needs shallow frying. High calorie food that is otherwise quite good
for one, avocado for example, does not sit well with a weight loss diet so two
avocados I was given ended up going manky and being thrown out. I am eating ACTUAL fruit, at least one piece
a day but often more like five different fruits in various quantities as well
as a lot of steamed vegetables. Even
things like gravy granules have a “syn” value so other methods of lubricating a
meal have been explored. Luckily I am
not big on bland food so I can make low fat and sugar food more tasty by use of
herbs and spices, particularly garlic, chilli, cayenne, smoked paprika, pepper
and reluctantly using a little more salt than I used to (which was virtually
none).
It is working. I have
noticeably diminished in mass, particularly on my torso to the extent that I'm starting to quite fancy myself (just as well as I am sexually involved with
myself on a regular basis). I bought myself a lot of new clothes and chucked
out a lot of old ones in a bid to both look better and to convince myself that
this is a lifestyle change and not just a short term vanity project. And I've set myself a target of being able to
seriously consider a slim fit suit in the new year.
Occasionally I torture myself… but enough of my sexual proclivities. No, seriously… I think of all the things I
can’t have now:
- · A well grilled English sausage, nicely seasoned, good quality minced pork, crispy on the outside… would anyone like to munch on my English sausage for me?
- · A bacon sandwich WITHOUT the fat cut off and in white bread and with butter.
- · An Uncle Sam’s Chilli burger, in a bun, with cheese and pineapple, fries, strawberry thick-shake.
- · Lamb Madras, pilau rice, onion bhaji, garlic nan bread, aloo gobi, tarkha dhal.
- · A nice bit of crumpet. I do like a nice bit of crumpet. Anyone?
- · A pork chop WITHOUT the fat cut off, smothered in apple sauce and Coleman’s mustard, with lovely buttery mashed potato…
I counter this by reminding myself of some of the times I
have suffered through “nice” food.
- · There was the time I went out for an Indian and got food poisoning. It started with farting of such prolificacy that I thought I was going to turn inside out. Later I vomited… the kind of vomiting that carries on after one's stomach is empty, desperate, dry retching. This was followed by the world falling out of my bottom for so long I suspected I was going to have a rectal prolapse. Despite the fact that it was almost certainly a prawn bhuna that did the damage, the onion bhaji flavoured sick meant I couldn’t entertain that particular hors d'oeuvre for some years after.
- · Then there was the time I was eating a doner kebab on a cold day and noticed that it was so full of fat that it was dripping through the pitta and the wrapper onto my fingers where it was forming little lard stalactites. I did not carry on eating for long after that and haven’t had a kebab since.
- · Or the time I was buying a burger from a van in the market on a hot day and noticed the rotund lady serving on me was a bit hot and bothered. A couple of beads of sweat fell from her brown on to my burger as it was frying on the griddle. Being too timid to protest I paid, walked around the corner and put it in the bin. The very smell of frying onions from a burger van makes me feel physically unwell to this day.
The diet is an on-going learning process regarding
cooking. For example, using a fat free
yoghurt or crème fresh to make a dish creamy instead of cream… if you add it
during the cooking it separates and looks like cottage cheese so the trick is
to turn off the heat and stir it in after it has cooled a little. Dieting has also made me more interested in cooking
again. Far too often I was getting home from
work pissed off and tired and bunging some chips in the fryer and grilling some
bangers. Now I have to think more, take
more care, plan. It can only be good.
I am incredibly vain and self-absorbed so I will keep you
posted on my weight loss including pictures of me with my shirt off as I have no
shame regarding nudity whatsoever. Watch
this space.
