miss_nat's Diary

[lil_doll]

Hey Miss_Nat!

Hmph to your BF's mum... although I think some people just say stuff that they think it wouldn't upset them, so why would it upset you... but often it does! I used to work at like an RSL, but for a certain nationality of people (although anyone was welcome) and one of the reasons I left was the peoples' comments... I just I hated that they were noticing anything... pretty much every customer would comment on me putting on weight and asking me if I was expecting (I should have said YES and gotten some presents out of it! or just taken it easy at work LOL).

Wont be long until you can parade yourself around your BF's mum, without any comments! Woo

LOL Knickerless... Mmmm cheese! (it's cheese day today for me, so YAYAYAY!)

Oh also Miss_Nat... I am going to try that detox bath you wrote in my diary!

Catch up soon!

xoxo
Missy

[miss_nat]

Hi Missy, hi knickerless! I didn't try the bath last night after all. I realised that Survivor was on and watched two hours of that instead. I don't normally watch it but have gotten in to it over the last few weeks, so now it's actually interesting as I know who's who and am up to date with all the intrigue. I'm out tonight, so maybe tomorrow?

Missy, you're totally right. Some people just don't have enough empathy to be able to put themselves in someone else's shoes and consider how their comments could affect them. Vince and I have been together for over 5 years now, so I am quite used to her and these days generally let her know when she's said something out of line but she's getting a lot better. I think Vince had a word to her too - how sweet! As far as mothers-in-law go, I think she'll be a pretty good one.

Was the RSL-type place the one that you visited the other day? It's a bit too little too late, but hopefully the positive comments you recieved from them the other day goes some way to healing the hurt from the past.

So I mentioned at the start of this post that I am going out tonight. I bought tickets to Warriors of Brazil for part of Vince's xmas present which is on in the city at 7.30pm. I was going to go home first, have dinner and then bring the car back in but I think I'll be really pushed for time, so have decided that we'll go out to dinner first instead. Dum da dum dum... my first restuarant meal since restarting cohens. I'm thinking we'll go for Japanese and I can have tuna sashimi and a salad. Am planning on doing a ring around of resturants to find one who'll weigh out my meal for me, which I haven't done before. I almost brought my scales in with me today but thought that finding a resturant who will weigh it for me is better than trying to covertly weigh my order at the table!!

Ok, time to make those calls....

[lil_doll]

Hey Miss_Nat!

Have fun tonight! I found when I called a restaurant to help me out, they were really accommodating. I can't wait to find out how you go! I must say though, I have no idea what Warriors of Brazil is... hehe... but have FUN!

5 years, huh?! Wowee! And that is sweet of Vince to have a word with her! Awww.

Oh and yes it was the same place and the comments from them this time did kinda balance it out... you know what they say?... 'time heals all wounds' and it has been a LONG time since I was there... and it felt nice to go and show em, even though there weren't many people there

I might try and do the bath either tonight or tomorrow! Ooh la la

Speak soon!

(enjoy checking your pins out in the reflections in your work mirror! LOL!)

xoxo
Missy

[miss_nat]

Hey Missy, thanks for stopping by. I don't have anything to report regarding dinner and resuarants last night as I ate at home. Vince had an issue at work that he needed to resolve, so we just met at the theatre before the show started. I went home and had fakejitas - yum yum yum!

And I still need to try out the bath... I almost did it when I got home last night but I've been using this palmers coco butter with tanning solution all week to build my colour for Big Day Out tomorrow. I am REALLY pale normally and whilst I won't allow myself to tan naturally, I do feel more confident in skimpy clothes when I have a bit of colour! I was a bit concerned that the bath would strip all my carefully built colour, so once again the bath was deferred!

Yes, 5 years... it feels like we've been together forever but at the same time, only a short time since we met! Something that I haven't mentioned here before now, is that Vince and I plan to get enagaged this year. I've asked him to surprise me with the proposal and to do it after I reach goal weight but before my 30th (in October)!! He very cheekily asked, "but what if you don't hit goal before your birthday!" Umm I think I've got enough motivation to ensure it happens! My friends think I'm crazy... they tell me "you don't need to lose weight for the engagement, just the wedding" but I want to be gorgeous in all my photos AND consistent! Plus if I'm off plan then I get to drink Veuve to celebrate

Oh, I have a new self-check out obsession... cheekbones and collarbones! They're back baby, they're so back! I checked my measurements this morning and since Jan 4th I've lost 55.5cm from all over. Pretty happy witht that More from bust and waist than from hips, because the fat seems to drain from the top. But even on my legs I've lost more than 10cm off each.

In 1.5kg I will be back to the weight I was when I stopped Cohens last year, so hopefully that will happen next week. Oh how exciting to be treading new ground in a week's time.

Hope everyone is having a fantastic day

Cheers,
miss_nat
xx

[maria1969yellow]

Hey your doing great guns that 1.5kg will be off before you know it!

Your going to look fabulous at both your engagement and wedding. What a great feeling hey. Keep up the great work!

[lil_doll]

Hey Nat!!

Oooh engagement in the works!!! How exciting! That is definately something to aspire to be ready for!!! And why not go for Gold and be slim and fab for both the engagement and the wedding?! And to enjoy the veuve too!

And treading into new territory?! Yay for that!! And in only 1.5 kilos, that'll happen in no time!

I think you were right not having the bath yet! Definitely the best plan is to save that tan!! Have fun at Big Day Out tomorrow!!! Which I am sure you will

Keep nice and hydrated!!! (we want pics, we want pics!!!)

Speak soon!!

xoxo
Missy

[lil_doll]

Hey Miss_Nat!

I can't wait to hear how everything went for the Big Day Out!!

xoxo
Missy

[miss_nat]

Hi Missy! I feel like I've been away for ages which I have really as I've not been on the forum for six days!!!

BDO was fantastic! I got to music festivals fairly regularly (e.g. good vibrations, we love sounds etc) but had never been to the big day out. I LOVED that there was so much variety in the music... for example we were watched Dizzee Rascal (hip hop), followed by Lilly Allen (pop?) and then went over to Calvin Harris who's a house DJ. Just awesome! It was really hot though and we felt hot, sweaty and slimy from the sunscreen all day. They had fire hoses sprinkling water mist over everyone at the main stage - very nice and also slightly magical!

I wasn't very good in the cohens department though. Actually I was bl**dy terrible. It was so hot I decided to drink to cope with the heat and settled on jager with sugar free V. Must have had 5 or 6, half of which I found out yesterday weren't sugar free. Apparently whenever the boys went to get drinks, they figured we wouldn't notice the difference so just got us the normal V. Buggers!

I didn't take my camera but my girlfriend did (not that we took many photos of ourselves as we looked terrible!) so I'll get hold of one or two and post them here.

The rest of my five days off were fantastic despite not being very well for one day (which caused another deviation). I went to the beach with two of my girlfriends on Monday and felt quite good in my bikini - not as much hanging over the top of the bottoms as last time I had it on! I also went to the beach yesterday with Vince, where we went for a short snorkel and then swim. Felt good to be active.

So, as I've posted in the 6 week challenge forum, my weight went the wrong way this week. I'm back to 65.2kg and not very happy with myself. At least I haven't put enough weight on that I've gone back past the halfway mark and I am still in normal BMI range - just! I doubt I'll hit refeed before March now though.

Anyway enough of the whining. From here on its a new attitude and new level of committment. I'm going to take off that 700g this week plus more and it's only up, up, up or rather down, down, down from there

Hope everyone's having a great day!

Cheers,
Nat xx

[lil_doll]

Welcome back Nat! Yes, 6 days is a LOONG time in forum land!

Bummer about the deviation, but I can imagine how hard it would be being a hot day and all! Sounds like you had a blast though!

Glad to hear you are back into it! Bring on Refeed! And yay to feeling good in a bikini!!!!

xoxo
Missy

[miss_nat]

Well to be honest, it didn't go so well getting back on plan the past two days. I had the sad news that my Grandma passed away, so food became a non-concern. I am back on the wagon as of today though... egg and tomoto for breakfast, apple for morning tea and am now eagerly awaiting 1.15pm so I can have some lovely cheese and crackers with salad!!

It looks as though I will be making a quick trip to the UK for the funeral next week. It's so sad, apparently there has been a bit of a backlog at the funeral homes as so many oldies have passed away during the cold snap. On the plus side it does give us international relatives more time to get there and get organised.

I will be pestering Missy for tips on how to stay on plan on the plane!!!

[miss_nat]

Oh and I should have mentioned that I have a headache and am starving!!!! Can't quite figure out why I have a headache? Usually it's part of the detoxing but I can't think what I'm THAT deprived of already. I can cope with the headache and being hungry (I almost welcome it as in its own way its a positive thing as it means I'm being good and getting back on the wagon) but I AM FREEZING and being hungry, cold and headachy is NOT good. I am so sick of my office tower attempting to freeze its occupants. It's 30 degrees outside and honestly about 16 in here

[MissNix]

So sorry to hear of your sad news. Take care of yourself. x

[lil_doll]

Oh sooo sorry to hear about your grandma!

Be gentle with yourself, Nat!

I hope the detox is quick for you... just remember to flush it all out with water and use nurofen if neeeded. Headaches suck.

xoxo
Missy

[lil_doll]

Hey Nat,

How's it all going??

xoxo
Missy

[miss_nat]

Hey Missy, thanks for rescuing my diary! It must have taken some time to find it, I haven't written in here for aaaaggges!

I am really well, thanks. I had a rather massive deviation on the weekend for Vince's Mum's 60th but it was planned and I am recovering the small amount of damage reasonably quickly - hopefully just another two days and I will be back to Friday's weight of 63.2kg (I haven't changed my ticker - pretending that it's not really happened!). We hosted nine people for pre-dinner drinks for Liz's birthday and then everyone came back to our place again after dinner for birthday cake and champagne. I'd made the cake (and a couple of other deserts), so I made the decision last week that I was going to have to have a night off Cohens. To tell the truth, I was more excited about drinking wine than I was about eating off plan - oh red wine, my friend, it was so good to see you again!! That'll be the last deviation now until I hit goal weight. Otherwise I will never get there!! It was so exciting to be able to say "I only have 5kg to go" at the end of last week... deviations aren't worth the damage.

Liz had a fabulous night though, as did her friends which is the main thing. Apparently they've been raving about what a fabulous job I did organising the whole night. One of the ladies wants to know where she can get "one of me" for her son! I've certainly earned my brownie points for the year! Liz rang yesterday to thank me again and pass on all the praise. She also told me how slim I looked and asked about the diet - things she'd not said on satruday night when everyone was there. She's learning!! This is the woman who once told me in front of everyone that she "could tell I had lost weight becasue my fat rolls were better!" I'm so proud of her!

Missy, I'm so pleased that you want to catch up when I am in Melbourne. I don't know exactly when it'll be - probably between July and September. We will both be finished Cohens and maintenance by then and be looking HOT, HOT, HOT!! My friend's due in June, but I haven't discussed this visit with her as her husband's step-father just passed away, so its not really the right time.

I thought of you when I packed my lunch this morning - yes, it is CHEESE!! Only another haf an hour before I can have it - yay! I'm not exactly hungry, just impatient

Cheers,
Nat-xx

[miss_nat]

Hi Missy and Kat,

I’ve been giving some thought to what I/we can do to maximise losses during this last stage but also to help us keep going mentally and how to link them together. Here goes….

Weight loss:

Methods to keep the losses as big as possible:

- We need to be super strict and not deviate at all. No extra crackers, fruit or soft drink. Obviously!!!
- Ensure we're taking our vitamins every day
- Get 8 hours sleep per night at the same time each night and not go to bed late (e.g. 8 hours from 2am to 10am on the weekends is not as good as 11am - 7am).
- Put more than 5.5 hours between meals. Just to be sure that the earlier protein is completely digested.
- Ensure we're drinking the right amount of water every day - I say "right amount" as I know this varies for people. My body responds when I drink between 3-4L but for some people that's too much and they retain water.
- Do some form of gentle exercise for 20 mins first thing in the morning to get our metabolisms moving.

"Extreme" measure to implement if losses are shrinking

- Stop eating cheese for meals. Missy, I know you love your cheese and this will sound horrible to you but the one week that I didn't have cheese at all, my loss was bigger than I've ever experienced except in the first week. I think it has the highest fat content of all the options.
- Eat the same protein at lunch as at dinner.
- Reverse the lunch and dinner meals, so we're eating more earlier in the day.
- Don't eat crackers after 5pm. Similar reasoning to the above - eating carbs earlier in the day gives us more opportunity to burn them.


Measures to keep us going mentally:

Ok, I'm planning to implement a dual rewards system - one short term reward and one long term reward. Each week I will have one short term reward and one long term reward that I am working towards.

The short term rewards are easy to explain... "if I stick to plan 100% this week and do everything in the list of 'Methods to keep the losses as big as possible', I will reward myself with XXXX". (the “extreme measures” don’t need to be followed to earn rewards, I think they’re best kept up our sleeves if the losses are slowing down – to be implemented at our own discretion)

So, with 7kg to lose I've set myself the following weekly short term rewards (hopefully it doesn't take longer than 7 weeks!):

Week 1 - subscription to gourmet traveller
Week 2 - something cool to wear to the lady gaga concert
Week 3 - massage
Week 4 - pedicure
Week 5 - new wallet
Week 6 - facial
Week 7 - haircut and colour (hopefully week 7 should be goal weight as the haircut and colour is my goal weight reward!)

The long term rewards aren't rewards as such and not redeemable at the end of the week, rather they’re the reasons we want to lose weight or things we are looking forward to about being at goal weight or being slim. Each week we can focus on one of these things to help keep front of mind what we're fighting for (fighting? you know what I mean).

So, seven things that I'm really looking forward to about being slim and off plan are:

1. Being slim and fabulous when Vince proposes
2. Being able to walking in to a shop and knowing that I am a size 8 and everything will look great on me.
3. Being able to wear a bikini with confidence
4. Being able to eat out in restaurants AND enjoy a glass of wine
5. Cooking all my favourite healthy recipes
6. Demonstrating that the program works to my sister-in-law who really needs it
7. Feeling confident enough to go back to my pole dancing lessons.

How does it come together

So, say we were to start week one from tomorrow (because I know Thursday is Missy’s weigh in day) I would be doing everything in the list “Methods to keep the losses as big as possible” and provided that I stuck to it all for the whole first week, I would reward myself with a subscription to gourmet traveller. Anytime I felt like caving and deviating, or not exercising, or staying up late "just because", I would remind myself that I won’t get my magazine subscription BUT ALSO remind myself of the long term rewards and think about just how much I want to be sliim and fabulous when Vince's proposes sometime this year!! In addition to that, we can share our rewards with each other so you can support me on the forum and remind me how good it will be to be skinny AND have sparkly diamond on my finger! And I can support you and tell you how good it will be when you can [insert long term goal here].

Does that make sense? Have a think about it and let me know whether you think this will work for you. We can be “close to reefed buddies” and work towards our rewards together. In fact, I’m relying on you guys helping me with this

Cheers,
Nat

[mcpsych]

yeh right, cant see missy giving up the cheese , can you hehe

[lil_doll]

Hey Nat...

Well, you certainly have had your thinking cap on! haha

It all sounds really good to me... except for ONE little bit, but luckily it is the optional measure! hahahahah... I am sure you can guess the one rule I am not too fond of!

If my losses do slow down, I will really truly consider the extreme measure... but until then, I just can't bear the thought!

You have pretty much set me some Cohen's homework, Nat! haha, now I have to sit and think about my long term goals... for me it has always been 'get skinny, get skinny, GET SKINNY'... but that is well underway, so I need some real 'inner' ones... mmm *puts on thinking cap*

But seriously, thanks so much for putting that together, it really sounds like a good plan to me!

Oh and don't beat yourself up too much about your recent deviations... it's almost as though you have been doing pre-maintenance already, and you are showing that you have the ability to rein yourself in... but NO MORE till we get to refeed. young lady!!

Bring on the sparkly diamond for your skinny little finger

xoxo
Missy

[lil_doll]

hahaha, you got me, Mark... hahaha.

[miss_nat]

Hmm... would it be THE CHEESE!!!!!!!!

I hope it does get you thinking about the long term benefits of why you're losing weight. Its those things that really motivate me, much more than short term rewards (because I usually end up eventually buying myself whatever it is I wanted anway!), I just needed to think of a way to bring them to front of mind. I think focusing on one per week might just work!

It's your weigh in day tomorrow right? I'll weigh in too and we can compare what we have left to go. We should start week 1 of our "7 weeks to refeed" program tomorrow, so think about your first week's short term and long term reward.

I'm going with:

short term: gourmet traveller magazine subscription (big-ish reward because the first week is always the hardest.
long term: being skinny for the proposal!

Watch out for pictures of rings coming your way!! And whinghy sms'es in the morning when I don't want to do my exercise!

BTW.. if there's anything you don't like or really have a problem with in the "non-optional" list of methods to maximise losses, just take it out of your personal list. At the end of the day it's more important that we're doing what is right for us personally, so (for example) if exercise in the morning doens't work for you, then change it to using your wii-fit every evening.

Looking forward to it!!

Cheers,
Nat-xx