The day before the Big Day

Well D-day is almost here.  I am so excited to start JM’s Body Revolution. I have a feeling the next 90 days are going to be hard hell, and I’m going to get my butt well and truly handed to me .. that is what I need after all!

This first week will be the most extreme and the most intense, but thankfully, Jillian’s program includes a complete 7 day menu and a helpful grocery list (which I just finished printing off). Once the hubs is done in the shower we’ll head out and stock up for the week.

We did venture to the store yesterday .. but that was an entirely different kind of a trip! Basically I did a mad dash around the store, like one of those manic housewives on Supermarket Sweep who has a weird crush on Dale Winton (swiping whole shelves of food into the cart and stuffing cookie dough into my bra).  I came home with a bag full of everything I love .. all my lovely guilty pleasures.  We had chocolate, we had wine, we had sour cream and onion pringles .. Oh My!

Cover of Defending Your Life

It was the goody bag from Heaven (the way I imagine Heaven to be) .. a bit like that movie ‘Defending Your Life’ … if you haven’t seen it, you should! Everyone gets to eat whatever they like and however much they like and they NEVER gain weight!!! Sounds like Heaven to me! Boy, oh boy I really went to town. I could have charged people money to watch the spectacle that was me with my face covered in Fruit n’ Nut, a trail of Pringle’s crumbs leading the way to my secret shame (not forgetting the crumbs that always end up in your bra, the ones that you don’t notice until you take your bra off and ten Pringles fall out), one Hershey bar in each hand, and sucking rose wine through a straw (because, you know, no free hands).  At one point I did suggest tying a bag around my nose, like a horse, and just letting me go at it with gusto. We also treated ourselves to a curry from our favourite take out place. It was a-maze-ing .. admittedly, I did feel a little like a stuffed pig after I’d gorged on all my treats, but it was totally worth it. I wanted to go out with a bang (although going out with a ‘pop’ seemed more likely if I hadn’t stopped eating when I did!)

This morning was a brunch of warm, gooey cinnamon buns and hot, steamy coffee. It was delicious … mmmm warm toasty cinnamony goodness (badness, actually). I ate two buns and could have easily eaten a third but I (resentfully) let the hubs and kids have some too and they all got gobbled up. The plan tonight is to watch the Following (I LOVE that show) Kenny and I will burst open a bag of chocolate covered pretzels (chocolatey pretzely crack) and finish off the vino we popped last night .. then it’s adios, farewell, auf wiedersehen, adieu (is it just me or do I sound like a Von Trapp?) to my crappy diet of sugar, fat and all things bad! Don’t get me wrong .. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my weekend of binge eating and gorging and doing it all with a (relatively) clear conscience … but I can’t wait to get started tomorrow!

Who knew I’d be so excited to start a diet and exercise program?! …. Let’s just hope I still feel the same at 6am tomorrow!

Gooey gooey goodness!

PCOS and me

I’m really conscious of not making excuses here, so I won’t say that I’m fat because I suffer from PCOS, but I will say that it’s a factor.

For anyone who doesn’t know or hasn’t ever heard of PCOS .. I’m not surprised. There is more information and a growing awareness these days but it’s by no means well known to many outside the circle of sufferers and their long suffering family and friends.

PCOS stands for Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. It’s a hormonal disorder with side effects ranging from annoying to downright devastating.  For some women it’s little more than irregular periods and mood swings … for others it’s absent periods, hirsutism, infertility issues, weight gain, difficulty losing weight, depression and acne. It also puts sufferers at higher risk for adult onset diabetes, cardiovascular disease and uterine cancer.

I fall in the more severe category but count myself pretty lucky … as with everything in life, I have it easier than some and not as easy as others. Infertility issues haunted us for 7 years before I finally fell pregnant with our first son. Our second son followed soon after. PCOS isn’t necessarily a guarantee you won’t have kids, but it sure does make things difficult for a lot of us. When I was diagnosed 17 years ago there was very little known about the condition. A GP delivered the news and told me I had a less than 5% chance of ever bearing children .. my boys are my miracles in more ways than one.

I also suffer from hirsutism (excess hair on my face) .. it’s an embarrassing condition and one that’s caused me more than a few weepy moments over the years.  Again though, I consider myself pretty fortunate. It’s not overly noticeable because the hair is fair, and it’s pretty easy to ‘take care’ of … although, if I ever did leave it for a week I’d expect the local circus to show up at my door on a recruiting mission for their new ‘Bearded Lady’!

For me the biggie these days is the weight issue, I know that PCOS will make losing weight an uphill struggle, but it’s been done before.  In point of fact, 2 of my friends and fellow PCOS sufferers have had massive successes lately and they’ve really been my inspiration to get off my ass and do it too.

http://myfightwithmyflab.wordpress.com/

The link will take you to a fab blog by one of my girls, she’s a true inspiration and a force to be reckoned with!

It’s actually been proven that weight loss can help with some of the PCOS symptoms, a low GI diet is supposed to be particularly beneficial to PCOS sufferers, I have a friend who has had great success with a diet based on that theory.

So there you have it … everything you didn’t know, and didn’t care to know about the ugly world of PCOS and those of us who dwell there.

Many years ago I read an article online, I can’t for the life of me remember where or who wrote it although the last paragraph has always stuck with me:

“Fat, hairy, spotty and infertile … PCOS sufferers are the Cinderella’s of the gynecological world!” 

So what’s the plan?

I had an epiphany recently. I turned 35 and I realized that I’ve spent most of my adult life stressing about my weight, getting depressed about my weight, eating more because I’m depressed about my weight, and making excuses as to why I gained the weight, why I haven’t/can’t lose the weight .. it’s a pretty boring story, and one I know many have heard before …. well for me it stops here!
So now that I’ve finally made the decision to get rid of this weight once and for all, the question is … how to do it?
I plan on following Jillian Michaels’ Body Revolution. This is a 90 day diet and exercise program which includes 15 alternating workouts. The idea is the workouts get progressively harder as each week passes. Each workout is 30 minutes long .. even with my busy schedule it shouldn’t be too hard to find 30 minutes a day .. I pass that time on Facebook easily enough!
Along with the DVD’s, you’re provided with a rotation schedule which starts on Monday and finishes every Sunday, for this reason I’ve planned to start the program this coming Monday, 8th April … well, for that reason and because this way I get to indulge in the foods I love over the weekend … you know what I’m sayin’!
The diet looks to be pretty varied and appetizing .. obviously I’ll let you know if that is actually the case as I try the recipes. The first 7 days look to be the hardest, nixing ALL the sugar, including fruit. I gather the point of this is to detox your body and set you up for maximum weight loss results. The first 7 days exercise rotation is also a little different, she requires you to workout twice a day, 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes later in the day. Again the reason for this is to kick start your metabolism and set you up for better results in the long run.
I’m excited to start the program. I’m excited to see the results!
For any other PCOS sufferers out there you will know that weight gain is one of the most upsetting side effects of the syndrome and weight loss tends to be more difficult … difficult, though not impossible.
I’m ready for this and I’m ready to give it 100%, not just for the health benefits, the self esteem boost etc, etc, but for my boys, for my husband, for myself and for the rest of my life. Wish me luck!!