It’s not a secret that I like food. I can pick at my children’s leftovers or even just to check if the temperature is right. If I could get away with it, I would graze all day. I like food. I like to eat. But here’s the thing, I can’t get away with it. I…
Healthy living for the past 18 months has had some unintended (and unexpected) consequences. I have changed from being someone who seeks instant gratification (eating tasty, desirable junk) regardless of the natural consequences (getting fat, low self-esteem and depression) into someone who thinks long-term about her own health and well-being. I try to make decisions…
I ran last night. It was an after kids’ bedtime run. I hate those. I was lying in bed next to my sleeping toddler, feeling a bit dozy myself, and all I could think was how it easy and how nice it would be to stay in bed. But then it hit me, how many…
I’ve signed up for my next race. It’s a 5-mile road race at the end of August which I hope to complete in under 1 hour. I also hope to not be last! But that doesn’t matter as much. I’m racing me. I remember weighing about 18 stone towards the end of my first pregnancy. That’s the…
I completed my 10k without walking in under 80 minutes (78:14). And I came last. It became evident quite early on that I was going to be last. A very fit man kept pace beside me and after a couple of minutes introduced himself as the sweeper. He’d volunteered to run with the slowest person…
11 days until my first 10k race. My in-laws are coming to cheer me on and they’ve invited a friend. My 5 year-old has made banners to hold and has been requesting sticks to glue them onto. I’ve told her to ask Daddy because I can just imagine eyes getting poked out. They’re excited and…
I work with some amazing, kind, fun people. Some of them are my age, some younger and some 20-25 years older than me. One of my colleagues, C, a funny (in both senses), irreverent, kind man is going to have a triple bypass. He told all of us in the office and then went outside…
This post was almost titled “Healthy Eating Isn’t An Accident” because, well, I’ve never accidentally eaten enough fruit and veg, or accidentally stuck within my calorie limits. For me, these things take planning and simply making it easy to eat well. I don’t know why it’s taken 20 years to realize, finally, that I need…
I ran in the park this past week without my colleague. I was worried about running on my own outside. Several years ago, I ran in the residential streets near my home taunted by children yelling, “Run, fat girl, run.” Other less printable, and less memorable things had been shouted at me on different occasions.…
I was thinking about how you get out of things what you put into them–except with running. I ran 96 times in 2013 (falling short of my goal of 100 runs), and the dividends far outweigh my investment of time and energy. My weight loss is (if you’ll pardon the expression) a big thing but…
On Fridays, I run with an awesome colleague in the park near work. We run 5k together. When I told him I was thinking about running a 10k, he offered to train with me. I demurred. I am, as I have mentioned, quite slow. But he told me it didn’t matter how slow I am,…
Getting fit isn’t just about exercise. I must feed myself healthfully too. My current food obsession is with Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s new cookbook Isa Does it Every Day. It is an awesome vegan cookbook filled with luscious plant-based meals. Her website can be found here: http://www.theppk.com/about/ Not vegan? Neither am I. I’ve been vegetarian for years but…
If you asked me this time last year if I could run 10 km or if I would enter a 10k race, I would have said no. But it’s not 2013 (when I started getting fit) any more, and I’m training for a 10k race in May. I ran 10k, for the first time, on…
Sugar has been in the news a lot lately. It dawned on me that I didn’t need any help with the “hidden” sugar in my diet because there is already too much completely obvious sugar in it. I love sugar. I have always had a sweet tooth, and I don’t particularly want to give it…
Weight-loss, for me, has been motivated by the idea of staying healthy and living a long time. I knew I was going to have to become more active. Like most people, I am chronically short on time. But if I wanted to get fit and stay healthy, I knew that I would have to take…
byebyefat,hellofit 