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DOG, a New Years resolution;

CrashCoyote
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member

Hi everyone,

I have made many new years resolutions over the years, I think I've resolved to lose weight for the last twenty odd! My target this year is alcohol, so I am seeing how many Days Off Grog I can have. I started on NYE day so will have completed sixteen by the end of the fifteenth. Is anyone doing this? If you want to do it with me, just post your number of days. Anything else is optional.

Kind regards, John.

75 Replies 75

John

24 DOG's gone so far.

Today will obviously be 25 - it's good.  The tally is adding up nicely.

Hope you're going along the same as well.

Cheers (with water)

Neil

 

CrashCoyote
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member

Hi Neil,

Yes, sir. Day 27 for me today. Had my sister's 50th at Port Macquarie on the weekend. Drank water all night!

I think this is under control more. Next (additional) challenge starts on first of Feb. Weight loss. Yikes. (I'm cutting out anything with processed sugar in it and reducing carb intake.)

Cheers.

Hey,

Am I able to join this challenge thing?  Getting too used to eating comfort food (pretty much any form of chocolate) and would like to not eat it in Feb.  It will help health-wise and all I suppose, but mainly I want to do it just to know that I can show some sort of self control.  And having support would be great for it.

 Joelle

Neil_1
Community Member

Hi there all;

 

Firstly to John (and other viewers/readers) – “OUCH”, which is in response to me falling off the wagon – it was a controlled falling though and completed it with a nice hip-roll and not too much damage was done.  In other words, I caved on Australia Day – so I got myself a ‘snack pack’ (6 pack) and that was all very nice.   But up I climbed on again yesterday and another one was chalked up yesterday, so 25 for me now.

 

Mega kudos to you John – you’re putting yourself in situations that really require major self control and you’re nailing it day after day.  Just brilliant stuff.   Yes, sugar isn’t good with regard for losing weight.  The other thing about carbs, as you no doubt know;  there’s good carbs and bad carbs – trying to get off the white carbs (ie:   potatoes, pastas, white bread – actually most breads, etc) aren’t so good.   The really good ones are sweet potato, brown rice, oats and also basmati rice are good carbs;   and the other thing with carb intake is that if you’re not exercising in the late arve or early evening, try to not take any carbs in from say mid-arve.  Get the carbs in earlier in the day where they can be more effective in being used.

 

Dear Joelle, YES YES YES – come on board and join in.   Doesn’t have to be the start of the month;  just whenever is great.  But commencing in a couple of days time, that also is good cause it gives you a few days to prepare.  And as you know, we’ll be here to support and encourage – and hopefully be able to provide some tips to help out as well.  

 

For instance, any urges to consume things you’re not wanting too, can be met with firstly drinking a glass of water or say a cup of green tea (green tea is hellishly healthy for you in so many aspects).  I’ve got others, but I’ll send this off for now before I ramble on too much more.

 

Neil

CrashCoyote
Blue Voices Member
Blue Voices Member

Hi Neil,

Don't be too hard on yourself. Any DOG is a good day. I'm still on target, day 29 today.

Your advice re the food is spot on. I know the rules, just need to follow them. I'll be posting my weight on the 1/2 and every week after.

Joelle, welcome aboard. No need to post more than you want, just take what strength you can from the thread!

Cheers, John.

Hi all,

Thanks for the welcome. 

This has so far felt like a safe place to share, so I thought I could share my want to cut out the comfort food, if that’s okay. 

I have a history of self-harming.  And at 23, I managed to stop.  I’m not entirely sure how I did it, but in hindsight it feels like I did it more for other people than for myself; because they were pressuring me to stop.  I stopped for 2 years.  During that time though, I think I started getting into this whole ‘comfort food’ thing.  But with comfort food, I could counter-balance with exercise, should I choose to.  And I tried but I always ended up with it again and again.  Last August, things got pretty upsetting in my life that I started self-harming again.  At that point, I remember, I asked myself, “What should I care about everyone else not wanting me to do this if I wanted to do it?”  I convinced myself I didn’t care, and so I did it.  For a while I actually didn’t care.  It was guilt free, shame free; but afterward I started fighting those feelings.  Now, it feels like a sobriety issue, it feels like an addiction, one that I’ll be fighting for the rest of my life possibly, and I’m not going to say that right now I’m on top of it.  I haven’t done anything since November but I’m not actively trying not to.

 

On top of that, I have this food problem.  Every time I get an urge for

self- harm, I get an urge for food, and eating chocolate or junk all the time disgusts me, I start hating myself.  I exercise from time to time but I have injuries and random other things getting in the way.  I want to control it.  I want to prove to myself that I can do this smaller thing, so that maybe I can get confidence to control that bigger thing.  This time, I’m not listening to anyone else’s disapproval, I’m doing it for myself, and I hope that can make the difference.  And along the way, reduce the amount of self-loathing that comes with indulging in food to cover up indulging in the self- harm.  I understand that controlling self- harm is a lot more involved than will power because the urges and actually fighting them are more maddening than the actual act, and I’m working on that aspect too. 

 

Basically, I’m trying to work on being a better version of me, and that will take a lot of work because I don’t have the best opinion of myself, but I thought I could start with baby steps.

 

And yes Neil, I know I can start on any day but I thought I’d get a bit of a running start.

Thanks guys

Joelle

beyondblue's clinically-trained moderators often work offline (invisible to you) on issues relating to suicide or self-harm. At the same time, general supportive comments from the community are encouraged. If you have concerns around suicide or self-harm, please phone our support service on 1300 22 4636.

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Hi Joelle,

Please don't be too hard on yourself. All those big fast food companies must spend millions on R & D to find the prefect combination of addictive substances. Sugar, salt, fat and carbs all designed to make very unhealthy food a joy to eat.

Did you ever watch a show called "Supersize Me". The whole show is on Youtube and is absolutely fascinating for people that struggle with comfort eating, like me.

On Sunday I start phase two of my life changing strategies, as mentioned, and will be focusing on cutting out processed sugars and greatly reducing carbs, which are basically the empty box cars that carry larger quantities of the bad things so you can eat more of them. For example, Imagine trying to eat a dip without some crackers. You'd only eat so much. Add the carbs and you can really load them in.

But despite diet advice availability ad nauseum the real rule is energy in vs energy out. You can lose weight eating Mars bars and exercising, but a 55g Mars bar has 242 calories. For an average woman to maintain their healthy weight (See BMI charts) she needs to eat about 1500 calories per day. You can see that a Mars bar is about 16 % of that. If you choose 2 x Weet Bix with 1 cup of Skim Milk (147 + 42) you will be eating about 12 % of the calories you may have set yourself for the day.

I think it is fair to say that the cereal and milk is much better for you on just about every level than the chocolate. I'll stick with you on this and we can support each other, if you want.

By midnight tonight I will have completed a full calendar month without alcohol. I haven't done that for years. That is 31 days, or 4.4 weeks or even 744 hours! I am pretty stoked.

Keep posting and remember that it takes a long time to put on weight so progress will be a little slow - but worth it. Watch the show I recommended!! (If you haven't already seen it.)

Kind regards, John.

 

Hi John,

 Congratulations on your 31 days, that's great 🙂

I have already seen supersize me, a while ago, but thanks for reminding me about it.  It's never so much that kind of junk food than it is chocolate, and anything to do with it.  But I agree, cereal and milk is definitely the better way to go.  

Yes, I don't mind the support at all.  I have mentally prepared for this exercise so we'll see where that takes me.  My situation hasn't changed much so it'll be a good mental exercise and a healthier one as well, physically.

 Thanks for the support you have already shown me,

Joelle

Hi Joelle,

You know that chocolate releases dopamine and it is normal to crave it on a biological level. The problem is that we are no longer cave dwellers and the energy it used to take to get sugar (such as raiding a beehive) is not necessary to access large quantities of chocolate or sugary items. (Energy in vs energy out!) I have been urged to go for the higher cocoa content chocolate by a support person and I think that if you can develop a taste for it and get into the high levels (85-90% cocoa) you won't go back!

I am over a month off the booze now so will only periodically report on that. That is stage one down. Today is day one of the very little processed sugars and low carb diet.

I had 3 x weetbix for breakfast with a cup of low fat milk. Tinned salmon with cucumber, tomato, beetroot, spring onion and cottage cheese for lunch and tonight is poached smoked cod, fresh asparagus, fresh mushrooms (sans butter) and some baked sweet potato. I am hoping that just avoiding the carbs and chockies alone will be enough but if I can kick start the weight loss it will inspire me to keep going. My other big plan is to try to avoid carbs as much as possible after 3.00pm.

Have you started your journey yet? I know it will be much harder for you for a lot of physiological and psychological reasons, but I think you can do it!

My friend has suggested I not post my weight online because it will add undue pressure and she may be right. I will post my T-shirt size and add other measurements in as I progress. I am currently a 4X tee shirt (or 3X if I don't mind looking like it is spray painted on) and my target in coming months is to get to XL.

Kind regards, John.