Lauren- Hearing about your night out just made my day! You have every reason to feel very proud of yourself, xo Cate

Thank you Cate. It's nice to know that I was of help!

Well today for some reason I had an extra spring in my step out of bed. I was up, had breakfast, dishes done, showered and dressed all by 6.30am! Amazing. I was going to head into work early but thought I would do a quick tidy around the place to give me one less thing to do tonight. I kicked LB out of bed, made the bed, got him is lunch, made my lunch and snacks, put a load of washing on delayed start and folded what I did yesterday. Then I put my face on and headed out the door. Amazingly still earlier than needed! I really do surprise myself more and more each day!

Had a flat out day at work and then popped to my sisters for a coffee (well tea) and catch up. Miss K was just ever so happy to see me and I got my biggest kisses and cuddles yet. Since seeing her only a few days back her vocabulary is broader again and much clearer. She really does just make me giggle. She's just such a cool kid. I was saying to my sister that this weekend I might do a bit of baking which would have to be a favourite past time. For some reason 'old fashioned keeping house' type things missed everyone else in my immediate and extended families on both sides and landed with me. I could think of nothing better than spending a day in the kitchen cooking and baking and then sitting down to a cup of tea and my knitting and crocheting. For a 27 year old some people just dont understand it and I have become what everyone else has a laugh at but when they eat what I bake I dont seem to her that ridicule. Anyway, because of my love of baking things I was saying to my sister I still want to do it often and at the moment I dont feel tempted to taste or eat any of it but I am still a little frightened for when I finish. I've had to cut back also because LB is put on about 10kg in the first 3 months of me on this program as what I used to bake and both of us gorge on was now only him! So I told her that I have decided to join the Country Women's Association and start baking to go into the state and country shows and fairs. She cracked up but then saw my point. I still get to enjoy the baking but because it's going into the show / competition then neither of us can eat it! Plus I told her that they are trying to recruit younger people and there are actually a lot of people in their 20's who enjoy these things like I do.

I did a bit of research on it tonight and am very excited. We are heading to the Royal Show tomorrow so I will go through the pavillion where they are and see if they have more info there!

She also said I can bake for them and the kids any time and asked if I could make some more cheesymite scrolls for Miss K. I make them a little smaller and she freezes them and just takes one out and heats it up when she needs a quick meal for her. I will make some up for her on Sunday along with some pretty cup cakes too!

Well tomorrow is going to be an exciting day for me as at 10.30am I am going in to get all my hair chopped off. I do this every 3-4 years. I cut my hair short, like really short, and then leave it short for about 2 years and then start to grow it. As soon as it reaches my waist I leave it long for about 1 year and then go get the chop again! I love my hair short for summer and it's the perfect time since as soon as I have completed my refeed I will be back following that black line up and down the pool and shorter hair is so much easier if you have to wash it everyday! I wanted to wait until I had actually finished but my hair has been starting to irritate me and I really want to give it a chance to thicken up and fill out before summer because I also want to try being a blonde! Because I pull my hair out with my OCD I have a number of bald patches which at the moment I can cover with a special hair crayon type thing but when it's blonde I wont be able to. I always seem to pull less when my hair's short plus since being on Cohen's and cutting out all the processed foods which make it ten times worse I now pull about 5% compared to what I did before. When it grows back because the hair is more fragile it breaks off easily and because there are a lot of short sections of hair I always where it up so I have half a head of hair that is about 3 inches long because the hair ties everyday make them break off there. So wearing my hair down short it will all be pretty much unnoticeable! I like my hair around my face so I think from tomorrow morning I will feel another sense of self. I do like my hair long also but hopefully it I can get pull free and stay that way when it's time to start to grow it out again it can all grow together!

Then later in the afternoon we are going to head down to the show. It should be a lot cheaper than last time since there wont be so much money just wasted on horrid show junk food. We just want to go and wonder around, go through the pavillions etc. Just nice and easy!

Sunday we are having my mum's Birthday lunch which should be nice. Just as easy meal. Dad is putting some prawns aside for me so I can do some salt and pepper prawns Cohen style when I get there. It makes him so much happier to at least provide my food for me even if he cant cook it. They are trying to 'be good' at the moment too so I wont be making my Oma's Dobosh Torte for birthday cake but instead I told mum I would make the really low fat and sugar cheesecake I make out of light Philly and light and creamy evaporated milk. I still haven't had the chance to taste it yet but apparently it's delicious. I'll swirl some mixed berries through the mix and it should be just delightful!

Well it's late. I better get to bed. I have a big day tomorrow and want to make sure I schedule my food right so that I can eat my lunch before we head out for the show!

Have a great weekend everyone.

Lauren

Hi Lauren

Hope you have a lovely day tomorrow. Would you be interested in posting some of your recipes here I am looking for different but healthy recipes to give for the kids lunches and just to get some new ideas.

Have a lovely weekend
Sam

Well my weekend was just fantastic.

It started with my haircut on Saturday morning at 10.30am. It turned out fantastic and exactly how I wanted it and it just looks and feels so wonderful – I can’t explain it. I was going to get it done once I had completed the program but really felt it was time. When I walked in the house LB was so stoked with it too. He said it looks 100 times better than what he even expected. Now when I look in the mirror, which I didn’t stop doing all weekend – ha ha, I actually see the slim, healthy, vibrant 27 year old I am. Before I was still looking at the frumpy Lauren but not feeling like her. As I said to LB I now feel like ME. The person my mind, body, emotions, feeling, senses tell me I am but now I feel I look like ME to, not just feel like that’s who I am. I feel the best I have in my life and I’m starting to exude that too! I have always been very confident and when I look back over my overseas photos I am always front and centre of every group shot. I will talk to anyone and frequently make new friends and then in the last 3 years I could count the number of photos I’ve been in on two hands, could count on one hand how many times I’ve been out to a public social place, i.e. pub club etc. I have just been hiding and I no longer want to.

To all of those struggling with their programs out there stick with it. This feeling of being in control of your own destiny and feeling and looking and portraying the person you really are hiding away under those layers is so worth the fight. Yeah this weight loss stage can be hard, tiring, frustrating at times but to be at a place that makes the rest of your world so much brighter it’s worth it. And from there, yes we still have to maintain it but surely that must be worth feeling like this everyday. This feelings I have had this weekend I will make sure I remember for when I have those bad days or when struggling at times, because that will surely happen too, but to have emotions to remember and call upon must be able to help us through those tough time!
After my haircut we headed into the Royal Show. It was easier than expected to resist all of that show food etc. We just strolled through the pavilions and had a really enjoyable afternoon. We stopped on the way home for a couple of drinks at the pub and then settled in for the night in front of the TV as we were both knackered.

I was up early on Sunday to prepare the blueberry cheesecake to take to my folks house for mum’s birthday and then also made up some a batch of cheesymite scrolls and a batch of ham, cheese and mayo one’s for my sister to put in her freezer for Miss K to have. We headed off to my parents house and I got to blow my mum and dad away with my new chic look which was good. When we walked in they had a slideshow of photos going on the TV and one popped up of me from 8 weeks before I started. I have been looking everywhere for a before photo and as much as this one is sitting down I think all of our jaws dropped at just how unhealthy, pasty and disgusting I looked. We all said isn’t it amazing how at the time you think yeah I (or she) could lose some weight but I’m (she’s) not that bad and then look at how far I’ve come and look again at the photo and finally I think I really really saw myself how I was. It was actually quite emotional!

Through my fathers persistence I allowed him to prepare my food for me. I told him to just leave some prawns aside and I will do it when I get there but he asked me what weight and how to do them etc and I gave it. It however ended up a disaster and I had to say to both parents please please can you just be ok with me bringing my own food. Please take this experience and just see that it’s easier and less stressful for all if I just bring my stuff along. It’s such a short time so can I just do my thing without you getting offended. Dad had cut pieces off added pieces on to get my exact 120g. I said to him prior that it had to be JUST the prawn meat. I could have stressed it anymore. I got there and he got them out for me to do my crumbing and he left the tails on. I maintained my frustration and proceeded to rip them off and reweigh them. He looked at me and said I left them on especially for you so that they would look nicer. I repeated again and said my weights have to be specifically just the raw meat. His response was the tails don’t weigh anything. Well the tails were going to cost me a 12g difference on my allowance. I asked where the other seafood was so I could make up the 12g and he had already marinated it all. So I took out some squid from the marinade and washed it off and eventually made up the 12g. THEN I walked inside and asked my mum where the salad that she said she had left out for me to weight was. She said she ended up using it all but I could take what I wanted out – she was just about to had dressed it and took a handful of tossed salad out and put it in a bowl and said is that enough and started to dress the bowl. By this time I was nearly in tears of frustration. We had discussed everything nearly every day for the last week of what they would need to do if they were insisting on doing it. I weighed the lettuce chucked the not allowed vegies back in her salad and then got out mushrooms and another tomato from the fridge to make up the difference. This is when I snapped and just said this is why I just need to do it. I told them I greatly appreciated their efforts etc but please just let me do this. When it’s over I will eat whatever you put in front of me like everyone else. It’s just weeks now… if I just went along with it because it wasn’t spot on it would have added another week to just how many it’s going to be. I think now they can appreciate the reasons behind me bringing my own food and it’s not because they cant provide for me!

Tonight I have shorthand class straight from work so it’s another late one. I just brought in an extra salad as the hot food was getting to painful to eat when I got there. I have to go out in my lunch break and get some fruit as we didn’t get around to doing the shopping on the weekend – EEK – and I had none but at least that means I will still have some for when I get home from shorthand. I find I’m often peckish on my way home from there – it must be all that concentration!

Sam – I would be more than happy to share some of my recipes but the bulk of the one’s I’m starting to collect for when I’m finished i.e. low carb, low fat etc are all from a website. I will PM you the web address as I’m not sure if I can post it. If anyone else wants to know just let me know and I will PM it through to you! Also with the scrolls I just make up a scone mix, without any sugar for savoury and with the standard amount for sweet one. Then I roll out spread / sprinkle flavours, roll and cut with a serrated knife saw like so not to squish the scroll and then put them on a baking sheet so that join up and bake in 180 oven for 15 mins. I made mini ones and ended up with about 50 scrolls in total all in under an hour from preparation to cooling.

Easy pesy – and great for lunch boxes – especially if you use organic wholegrain flours!

Have a great week everyone!

Lauren

Wow Lauren what a stressful day the birthday turned out to be. I was expecting the blueberry cheesecake to tempt you. Isn't it funny how the ones we love just can't understand what we are doing? I remembered when I first started cohens I had done a grocery shop and specifcally weighed out my meat for the next day with the rest to go in freezer for later in the week. My Hubby decided to put it in the freezer so when I got home from work the next night I didn't have any protein available for dinner. Boy was I mad, neurotic at that! I got changed out of my PJ's into some clothes, raced down to Coles, grabbed some meat and came home and made dinner. I was fretting about eating after 9pm so it was even more stressful. I can sit back and laugh now but I just remember how mad I was.

My dad is much like your mum and dad together, they ask me over for dinner, ask me what I can eat and I tell them precisely what and I get something completely different. Again I have to improvise like you pulling things out of here and there, washing and rewashing just so I don't get any extra kj / carbs / fat which may sabotage my diet. Mabye I have OCD?.......mmmmm

Have a good night.

Faithie

Lauren I loved your last post. I can relate to your seeing that image as "this is ME". I have been forgetting a little lately & am slipping back to hiding again. Thank you for reminding me! I would love to know that web-site address for the recipes if you don't mind please. I need some new ideas for healthy recipes & it would be great do get some things into the freezer. It would be nice to help out my DIL with some healthy snacks for my grandkids. Also I am not enjoying my cooking any more. You are doing so well & your positive attitude is well & truly inspiring. Keep up the good work, xo Cate.

WOW - This place was a hive of activity last night!!! It's great to see... Some old, some new - we all know how good it feels to come in and read new stuff and it really does help! Very exciting!

Faithie - Thanks for your post! It's good to know I'm not alone! I totally know and understand that they just want to be able to cook for me too since they are for everyone else and that's why I thought if I gave them all the info it would be fine, at worst no major deviation but I do really just think it's easier to keep on doing my thing and then when I've finished if they want to have a celebration dinner for the purpose of everyone eating the same meal then that is fine - great even because my father is such a wonderful cook! P.S. I do have OCDs but I think regarding the plan I am just super anally retentive! ha ha

Cate - Your posts always leave me with a smile. Thank you for your kind words and ability to appreciate exactly where I am coming from at the moment and the stage of self discovery I am going through. You are like everyone's master in here and we are the apprentices! We're ploughing through the learning and development stage (weight loss part of program) to become the master of our 'trade' (health and body) which you have achieved!!! You keep us grounding by showing us that once we get our trade it's not all smooth sailing, we still have to grow, learn, develop and master the skills of survival in that trade! You are a true inspiration!

I made things difficult for myself last night as when I left work I forgot to take my dinner from the fridge with me. Half way into the city I thought where's my salad - then it clicked. I was so frustrated at myself and thankful that I hadn't already eaten my second piece of fruit as I had already had my crackers! I had lunch yesterday at 12 noon so was due for dinner at 5.30pm and my class starts at 6pm. I dont get home from there until 8pm but I also had to do a quick shop to have something in the fridge for breakfast today. I had my orange at 5.30pm and it did a good enough job to tide me over but by the time I had done the shopping I was pretty hungry and couldn't get dinner cooked fast enough. I was also pretty tired so was frustrated about having to stay up another 2 hours too. That's when I jumped online to help pass the time and saw some many people buzzing around in here! I really enjoyed having the time to actually read through so many diaries too. It's been a couple of weeks since I've been able to catch up properly!

Shorthand was great. I am really enjoying and am glad I finally went through with trying to learn it. I really think it's going to provide some benefit other than just knowing that I can do it! Every week I surprise myself more and more and get more confidence with it!

Anyway... I started this post at like 8.30am this morning have been in and out of meetings and have forgotten what else I wanted to post!

I might drop back in later in the day!

Have a great day everyone.

Lauren

Hi Lauren

I would appreciate that website. I need all the help I can get at the moment. I find planning the family meals very mundine and tedious..Inspiration is what I need.
Have a great night.......You sound like you need some time out after your tumulatous weekend and busy work day.

Take Care
Sam

Lauren- Wow. That is so sweet! Thank you for your PM's also. I will email you tomorrow re the menu plan. Thanks to your gentle, but firm (I needed it!) nudge I went for my wacky walk & it was wonderful! I am so absolutely exhausted & haven't typed in my diary yet so had better do that before I seize up, xo Cate

Hey there Lauren, Congrat's on the size 12 what a feat, 15 years ago!! Hooray!!!!

Also congrat's on a stranger telling you that your looked good. Its a nice feeling to be told by someone you don't know what has nothing vested in you to be upfront and offer a compliment, especially a girl!! Yeah!!!

Congrat's on being a good girl too, I find that I either have the determination of steel or I'm a push over, nothing in between. What a great feat 4.5 months to loose so much weight and drop so many dress sizes. That has got to put a spring in your step!!

Faithie

Sam – I private messaged you on Monday with the website. Let me know if you didn’t get it and I will send again! Thanks for your post!

Cate – No thank you! I wouldn’t have said any of it if it wasn’t true! YAY – about wacky walkers… I left you a post in your diary!

Faithie – YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH I NEEDED THAT TODAY!!! When I read your post you reaffirmed what I have been saying to myself since yesterday afternoon but I get sick of hearing it from myself sometimes so THANK YOU!!!

Well yesterday I had a frustrating day at work in the afternoon. Everything was going swimmingly as usual and then I went out and had lunch with a friend which was just lovely and then I came back to a message on my voicemail which just made my blood boil!!! I went down to sort out the issue and probably went a little overboard but think I defiantly got my point across. I told the manager and supervisor in question not to apologise to me but to apologise to the State Manager. He’s the one who has just forked out a heap of money that they have just wasted. It was just my time that they have wasted and that again is the State Manager’s time. They went in to apologise to him and he told them that their behaviour was completely irresponsible and not acceptable but his not the one they have to worry about… he told them it’s me they have to worry about and they better do something nice to make it up to me! Ha ha… my State Manager is so supportive of me and my role and it’s just great!

But from then on I just felt really agitated. Nothing was going to change that except for my excitement of having my weigh in at my Cohen’s clinic. This is the first full two week period after discovering the unintentional deviations I was having that was slowing my loss down, plus I just feel like I had a big loss this fortnight. Haven’t weighed once so it was going to be a complete surprise and I was just yearning to see that 7 in the first position. I did everything as usual for a weigh day through the day and then stood on the scales and saw 80.72. I was gutted. I hadn’t taken my measurements that morning, and that reminds me I didn’t this morning either (note to self – must do them tomorrow), but nothing anyone could say to me would make me less disappointed! We looked at my chart, and the one I do myself, and the whole way through since starting every 6 weeks I have a really low 2 week loss and a massive loss of cm. 6 weeks ago when this happened leading up to it I had totals of around 20cm per fortnight and then on this particular fortnight I had a 70cm loss. But even looking at that and seeing that it was dead on accurate to ‘my weight loss cycle’ didn’t help. I’m premenstrual, agitated, frustrated and in a mood that at the end of the day I wasn’t even sure seeing that 7 was going to change. At least I broke the 30kg... I must keep focusing on what I did do and not didn't!!! My consultant was concerned and just kept saying go home, measure yourself, don’t stress about it, keep doing what your doing etc etc. I think she was concerned that I was going to walk straight to the next building (which ironically is Hungry Jacks) and order a whopper with cheese value meal or something. As I said to her again deviating intentionally is still not an option and this is actually a good thing because it’s teaching me to skills to avoid emotional eating in the future. If anything I actually didn’t want to eat anything at all. I just wanted to go home and sit in a nice hot bath with a cuddle cup of camomile tea! I have to be thankful that my old ways of dealing with stresses, especially PMS as it’s always been a HUGE issue with me, no longer appeal to me. I just have the taste for it anymore, which was also a bonus because then I had to go and meet LB to do the grocery shopping. In the past grocery shopping when feeling like this just meant going to the confectionary isle, putting my hand on a shelf and emptying the contents into the trolley and then doing the same at the coke display! Ha

I said to Luke I have been talking to myself about how far I have come in such a short period of time and if I am still on the program into the new year then so be it… but I wasn’t wanting to listen to myself. He expressed some wonderful, supportive, caring and cherished words to me and we had a big hug at the car when about to head home. I asked him what the people coming out of the shops must think and his reply was ‘that we are saying goodbye, not actually going to the same house and by the way thanks for the groceries!’ ha ha… it was very sweet.

When we got home I unpacked, made dinner, did the dishes, ran a hot bath, put in lavender essential oil and bubble bath, some Epsom salts and just distressed. When I got out I made a cuddle cup of camomile tea, watched TV with LB while I drank it and went to bed. He said that only minutes after I went to bed he came in to ask me something, expecting I would be reading and I was already fast asleep and didn’t even stir when he came to bed later.

I woke up this morning – still foul, maybe even fouler! Got to work, within 5 minutes of sitting down had to deal with some more stupidity that just wasted another hour of my time unnecessarily so popped online to have a bit of a regroup! Read the posts from everyone, my day is now brighter than what it was and thought I would put my bit down while I was here. It always helps so much once I’ve put it down on paper so to say. It makes me realise how silly it all is but that I still have to deal with feeling like this for 2-3 days every month so I may as well learn from what was silly last month to make next month easier!

Well there we go… I feel much calmer now and am looking forward to my conference tomorrow as it will give me a day out of the office. Looking forward to trying out some of my shorthand skills too!

I hope everyone is having a better few days than me!

Take care

Lauren

Lauren-
I think there are gremlins about trying to sabotage us this week! We'll survive, stronger, fitter, healthier & happier. We'll have to tough it out! Thinking of you and sending you lots of hugs, xoxo Cate.

Hey Lauren, I'm sorry to hear you didn't see the 7 yesterday as you wanted but like you said PMS has a lot to answer for!

The good things are that ;

even though you had a disappointment that you didn't race to the nearest food outlet (conveniently next door) but you took it in your stride. BIG pat on the back for that.

that you have a caring partner who is supportive of you and there to help you

that even though you work with stupid people that they have served as a distraction on an otherwise possibly seriously bad day...lol, it could have been worse and their stupiditiy could have driven you to the confectionary and coke isles

I hope you have a good day at your meeting tomorrow. Relax, unwind, if you can in a meeting... lol but most of all don't give up, you've come so far and have so little to go, don't let the evil PMS or stupid office people be the ones who push you over the edge...

just think it could have been much worse with a gain... now that would have made me suicidal! only joking, ups and downs are a part of life, no matter how anal we are about following the diet, our body will do what our body wants. Have you ever thought that your body just loves that little bit of fat, and knows your trying to take it away... now I'm sounding crazy... rationalising why the fat wont budge... well I hope if anything my post made you laugh.

Night

Faithie

Hi Faithie

Thank you and yes your post has given me a giggle - well a few!

Today was great! Lots of networking and tea! As usual when I'm not at work we did have a major incident but it seems it has been the result of a non-work related condition so it might not end up being too bad!

While in the city I stopped into my favourite tea shop and got some Sencha and Camomile plus a couple of their house bends for Activi-T and Immuni-T! I have just popped on while sipping some gorgeous camomile before bed!

I will write more tomorrow but just wanted to say thanks!

Lauren x

Hi lauren

Recieved the website thanks for that. Sorry the scales didn't read the way you wanted but like faithie said at least you didn't gain there is a positive to a negative.

And yes those damn PMT's I have it as well this week and feeling very agitiated and the gravings are hitting me big time. Tomorrow is weigh in day for me I don't expect a weight loss like last week and I am definitely not going to stress about it (which is difficult when you're going through the PMT's).

Hope you have a much better day tomorrow.

Sam