Cate's Diary

Hi Derrick- That's funny because I don't even think that I am exercising my butt off really although I must say it has become a regular part of my day. It may sound like a lot but it averages 60 mins a day.FYI-
My journey- ( a precis)
Jan 2007- I started Cohen's & I lost 36kgs in 28 weeks, doing virtually no exercise.
I maintained my weight for a year & a half & gradually added a little exercise, mainly short walks. Sometimes my weight would creep up a bit too much & then I would go back on Cohen's for a week or so & get it down again.
Jan 2009- I started Tai Chi.
I was still maintaining but about 3-5kgs over my lowest weight but didn't feel fit or strong. I asked my doctor if she knew of anyone that I could see to improve my strength & general fitness.
July 2009 I saw an Exercise Physio (free-as part of a gov't funded health program.)
She taught me how to do weights exercises & we came up with a personal fitness program between us, which included the Tai Chi. She said my Core strength was very good. I saw her once a month for 6 months & by then 60 mins daily was my routine & I am really happy doing what I'm doing. It has been the best thing for my mood & general well-being. I now feel quite fit & yes, you are right, I have lots more energy than I have had since my early 20's. I can really recommend exercise as one of the best ways of fighting depression or mood swings. I have not had a down day since I started having regular exercise last July. Don't get me wrong. Some days I have felt down but have pushed myself out the door for a walk or done my weights & the mood lifts very quickly. I absolutely love doing weights! I love swimming & walking. I move around the house quicker. I walk instead of driving often. I go up the stairs instead of using the lift. I am consciously moving more. It's a snowballing effect. The more I do the more I want to do! I can see muscle developing & I love the look of it. It's not big muscle but yay, it's muscle & I love seeing some definition. I am not skinny either & I love not being skinny but also love not being fat.
I still eat mostly Cohen's food. It's mostly lean protein, fresh fruit & vegetables. I often share a bottle of dry wine with my husband but not every night. We have chocolate once a week. I don't eat bread or potatoes. Rice or pasta I only eat a little of occasionally. I don't feel deprived & love my food.
So much for the precis! For me it's almost impossible! Thanks for the visit Derrick. Cheers, Cate.

Yesterday-
Swimming from 8-9.45am with my LH, DIL & the 3 GK's. It was lovely, especially having my husband there as he just loved swimming with the littlies. Pop was very popular! Nan took a back step.:)
My LH then went off to golf & I watched the littlies while my DIL did some shopping. OGS & I then went for a 30 minute walk around town. We called into the MIL's briefly. Then we came home & had lunch with my YS who had come for an surprise visit from Hobart the day before. Spent the afternoon with them & then the 3 of us went to my grandson's Taekwondo. My son was very impressed with his nephew & loved watching Tae. He then headed off to go to an 8-ball calcutta up the coast with my LH & his brother. After Taekwondo OGS & I came home & ended up having an early night-10'ish. I woke at 1am & they still weren't home.
Exercise yesterday-120 mins. No wonder I was so tired last night!
Today-I am waiting for our YS to wake & then I will take him in to see his grandmother as she knows he's here. He's headed back to Hobart at lunch-time. I still have my grandson here too. My LH is at work-poor thing. He'll be very tired by the end of the day. I cooked him bacon, eggs & tomato on toast, juice & a big coffee before he left. He didn't have a hangover thank goodness.

Time to get a move on. I have done the dishes/washing etc but am not dressed yet!
Cheers Cate

 
I feel sick! I bought a new car today! Please let it be a really good car. I wish I hadn't as I'm so nervous!! I pick it up Monday! I spent all day test-driving them & then bought a Kia Rio. Don't anyone say they think they're rubbish please as it's done & dusted! I got a good deal & liked the feel of it but I still wish I hadn't as the nerves are shattered. Aaaarrggghhhh!
 
Heya Cate!

Kia Rio's are nice little cars! I think you have made a good choice. Its always hard making big decisions like that but just let it sink in and I'm sure you'll feel much better. You say you spent all day out there test driving etc so obviously the Kia had a good feel about it and you made the decision for a reason! Trust in your choice and all will be good =o)

Stay smiling!
K xo
 
wohooo to new cars! I agree the Kias are cute! :)

I like the idea of learning Tai Chi too.. looking forward to be done with the programme so I can incorporate exercise in my daily routine!
 
Major purchases-
You probably don't know many people my age who have never had a new car before. It has not been a big priority. The thing that really shocked me is that I had not done any homework on the Kias at all. A guy I know that owns a car yard came with me for a couple of hours & I road-tested a few with him & then he pushed a deal & I decided to snaffle it rather than go away & think about it. I think that was the biggest shock. I may have ended up buying a car that was over $20,000 on my own that I had researched more but instead I have gone for something cheap, but still new, that I bought on the spur of the moment. That frightened me! I didn't have a good night's sleep at all & have an upset stomach. I hope that I love this car!

It feels like the calm before a storm today. Hopefully we may get some rain.

I think that today I will have to exercise out my anxiety!
Bye for now, Cate
 
Car-
The more people I tell about the car the better I feel about it all. I'm starting to get excited about getting it now! Everyone seems to think that I got an especially good deal so that's good.

I rang my mum to tell her about it & she told me that she had a cheque already written out to send me to help towards me buying a car. Nice!

I have arranged to meet a friend tomorrow & she is going to go with me to the car yard where I will leave mine to sell & then I am shouting her lunch & we will go to pick up the new one together & then go back to her place for a while, go for a walk together & just catch up. That will be lovely.

I will buy some accessories with mum's money like car seat covers I think & protective mats etc. to try to keep it nice & clean.
I have had a bit of a lazy bones day today but have de-stressed. I won't say that I feel marvellous or anything but I sure feel a lot better. At least I don't have chest pains any more. I tell you, I was stressed out!:chillpill:

OK- I might go hop on the bike & do my weights after confessing that I have been so lazy. LOL! Cheers, Cate :seeya:
 
Im so glad that your feeling better about your purchase Cate. Sometimes these things take awhile to sink in!! Im sure once you have the car and your zipping around in it, you will KNOW that you made the right decision :D

Your day tomorrow sounds lovely! I hope you and your friend have a great time.

Have fun doing your exercise, no doubt it always makes you feel better when ever your not feeling 100%.

Ciao for now and take care.
K xo
 
& right! I called in at my friend's place & she followed me, sold my old car (did well & got cash)took her out for lunch, went to the car yard & paid for & picked up the Rio, drove back to Devonport & bought some sheepskin seat covers for the front seats, a tray mat for the back & some floor mats (they didn't have mine in at the car yard & are ordering them in) that my LH will end up with in his car.
I'm too tired to go for a walk & may do my weights later on tonight. We had a late night last night as our OS, DIL & the 2 littlies stayed the night to watch the tennis final (Yay Roger Federer!!!!) & our GD had nightmares & kept us all awake for ages.
I'll say bye for now, Cate.
 
I feel so much better now. The last month has gone by in a whirl! I'm going to settle down I think & just take it easy for a while & take stock. I do have to get right back into my exercise though as I feel really slack. I think that has added to my stress. I think most of us do it. I have set myself a standard & then if I don't meet my own standards I feel that I'm letting myself down. 2 days of little exercise does not make me a bad person. I'm telling myself this.

Tomorrow-
I will exercise more than 1 hour but not much more...... Baby steps.
I won't try to make up today's hour( not done) in 1 day & exhaust myself! Cate tells herself!

We were meant to be going down to Hobart in a couple of weeks to stay with our YS, but he, apparently, will now be working the night we were going to arrive (good!) but said he will be coming up our way on the Sat to participate in a sporting event in Launceston. Unfortunately he never thinks about what might be convenient for us. He was surprised when I said that there's no point in us going down to see him then & that we will go another time.

About an hour later I got a call inviting us to a 60th on the Sunday.

New car-
I just worked out why my car was exceptionally cheap. Doh! 2009 plates, not 2010! I think I have done very well & saved myself about $3,000 plus. 60km = $3,000 less. Good saving! Selling my car was good too & getting cash. It fits in my garage so much better as well. I am not going to have any trouble getting used to it. It will slow me down too & that won't hurt. I like the look of it!

My LH should be home soon I hope. He hasn't even seen it yet!

I'll say goodnight as no-one is about tonight. I am enjoying the company of my fellow Cohenites in the forum atm.
Kristy- You especially!
xo Cate
 
Hi Cate,

Congratulations on your new car, yay :) Was so excited when i read your diary this morning and saw that you had gotten it!!

Haven't been around for a couple of days, was out with a tummy bug and feeling so terrible didn't even log on at home, just lay in bed and slept and watched movies, sounds blissful other than me feeling absolutely awful!!!

I'm glad you don't have any reservations about your car now that you have it and having a new car is such a great feeling and the smell of a new car.

Don't be too hard on yourself regarding the exercise i really think you have made up time and time again for missing 1 or 2 sessions.

Enjoy the rest of your evening and chat soon.

xxx
 
Hi Angela-
and thanks for your visit to my diary. I'm glad you are feeling better. You did the right thing by resting, you poor thing. It sounds awful! Tummy bugs are hell. Touch wood, I haven't have one for years!
It is nice having a new car. It's the first time for me but I can see that I would like to keep getting new cars, rather than 2nd hand. I am going to try to keep it looking nice. The silver colour will be so much easier to keep clean, rather than the dark green that I had. I'll have to learn how to use everything though. I prefer to teach myself, rather than read the book but I had better actually try to read through it, bit by bit. Maybe later! LOL. Cheers, xo Cate

Today-
I'm not going to go anywhere in my car. I will be in & out of town for the next few days so will potter about & take it easy today I think, with some exercise included. Day 2 & I'm already an hour down. :( Only kidding! I'll catch up. Thursday will help as I will be in the pool for almost 2 hours!

One thing, while I think of it. I think when you get to maintenance weighing only once a week, but also measuring, is a really good idea. Weighing more often than that can set you up for sabotage eating & obsession. My weight varies about 2-3 kgs every week. It's crazy I know but that''s how it is. Because I have not been exercising as much the last week I also have not been anywhere near as hungry.
I have eaten while stressed though & that is really bad for you. Saturday night, after signing the contract for the car, I ate fairly badly at the bbq & really suffered that night. I didn't eat any bread at all ( there was garlic bread) but ate things I would never normally eat just because I felt stessed. I also ate sweets rather than offend the hostess. I didn't enjoy them one tiny bit & felt awful afterwards. After saying all that I didn't eat any potato crisps or other junk but still I am so unhappy when I give in to pressure from people who are really unhealthy themselves. I disappoint myself. I am my own worst critic. I have resisted weighing myself since. Friday is the day.

Next Christmas-
Can you believe it but I have booked a friend's beach house, for a week, starting next Christmas eve! I asked her at the bbq on Sat night if anyone has booked it yet or if they will be staying in it then & she said whoever asks first gets to book it so that's us! There is room for us, our OS, DIL, the 3 GK's & our YS & a friend. We will have C day together & no-one else. I am opting out of the big family do next C'mas. Our OS seemed very excited at the prospect. He & my LH can go off to work any time in that week if they wish, while my DIL & I stay the whole week. It's only about a 30 min drive from home. I'll take our dog & maybe theirs to the kennels for the week. I might even pay for it soon while I have some money. I must ring tonight & tell her def. yes!

OK- dishes time & then on the bike & weights!
Cheers, Cate

 
Exercise today-
2 & 1/2 hours of extreme gardening!!!!!!
I have done the entire drive up to our place.
500 metres of blackberries, bracken ferns & overhanging branches!
30 minutes in credit- Wee Hoo!!!!!
:party:
 
Nicole-
Weight goes back on me very, very easily. I have a very low tolerance to starchy carbs. I watched a show on SBS last night which made it clearer why. When you have been very overweight your fat cells grow & grow & when they get as big as they can they then multiply. Once this happens you have them for life & they are very efficient at storing fat. Also it seems we have a weight that our body stabilises at easily, regardless of what we eat. Even as a very fit & slim teenager I always weighed about a stone heavier than anyone ever thought I did.

I can work at upping my metabolism through exercise but being slim will not be easy to maintain. I'll have to work at it forever! I am finding this out for myself all the time. I go back on Cohen's, get back down to my lowest weight, but then it settles back up again to a higher weight (exactly the same each time) & then stabilises again at that weight. I can make it go down a kg or 2 by eating no starchy carbs at all but as soon as I add anything much, but still eating very healthily & less than almost everyone I know, I put that kg back on again. I never eat bread or have milk. I haven't eaten rice for months. I have a tiny portion of pasta about once a month. Crackers I limit as well but sometimes have 3 at a time, rather than just 2. I couldn't do much more about my weight except go back to Cohen's weights 100% & then I would have to stop exercising & I really don't want to do that. It would feel like a backwards step.

It gets a little frustrating but I don't think there's any point getting down about it as that doesn't alter anything. I have my days when I think it's not fair but it's just how it is. It is a bugger though.
I'm going to try to start trying to think along the lines of me having a disease like heart disease or diabetes & that may change my perspective a little. If I had either of those diseases I wouldn't think twice about saying no to sweet or fatty or unhealthy foods.When I did Cohen's I didn't consider eating anything that wasn't on my plan. Sat night, at our friends' bbq I ate much more than I wanted or needed (reaction to the stress of buying a car?) & I also ate sweets when I was really full, just so our friend was not offended. I didn't enjoy the food at all & felt horrible all night & had trouble sleeping.

Obesity-
It makes you realise just how important it is to never let your children become obese as then they will battle with it for the rest of their lives. Then we have that balance thing where you don't want them to be obsessive either & end up with an eating disorder. It is one of the toughest jobs in the world being a parent.

Today-
Watching the show last night has shaken me up a little. Knowing that you will always struggle to maintain a low weight when you have been obese (I do so hate that word but I try to use it so that I think similarly to the AA thing "Hello my name is Cate & I was obese".......) but I will fight being fat again with all my might, even if I have to do so for the rest of my life! Exercise will have to be the key for me I think. That & eating very healthily & really limiting sweet things. Forever!Sugar makes me feel really bad anyway.

Tai Chi today-
I am so looking forward to it. I never, ever wake up & think that I don't want to go. I don't think I could say that about anything else I have ever done. I look forward so much to their company but also love the exercise. It really chills me out. Moving meditation......

New car-
I can't believe I didn't take it out anywhere yesterday. It's funny though as almost everything I buy I usually tuck away somewhere & bring it out later. A funny little quirk in my character!

8-ball tonight-
and then swimming in the morning first thing so I may not be back until tomorrow sometime.

I may sound down today but I'm not. I feel good and am really looking forward to driving my new car & going to Tai Chi. I had better get going though as I have to go pick up my MIL's oysters (4 dozen!) beforehand so that she can have some for lunch.Cheers for now, Cate

 
hi cate,

interesting note about very easy weight gain. I had a 'preview' of this in December when I was on pre-Cohen's (i.e. following the programme as best as I could without the scales - I had to wait till January to buy them). Was following the programme for about two weeks, and then I got malaria and was knocked out for about another two weeks, etc.. I was back on carbs by then but it was porridge. I was surprised to find out that nevertheless I lost 8 kg. When I got better, I tried to follow the programme again but I did indulge in during the holidays. In less than a week, I put back on 5 kg.

Sobering as it was, I am grateful for this experience because I then realized that once I am on maintenance, I really can't go back to the old ways and expect to not gain weight. I am actually looking forward to refeed to see what my body can tolerate or not!

Thanks for sharing:)
 
p/s cate, out of curiosity how many kilos do your body usually stabilizes to from your lowest/Cohen body weight?
 
It will vary with everyone as we all have different stable weights but mine is 5kg above.
 
Thanks so much for your post cate!! I had no idea how fat cells work.

I tell you mine have been working like crazy! I am really glad to be back on plan now and it took a while for me to try and get in the right head space. I was on and off for a while but that's because I wasn't sure what was happening. We decided to go to Paris for a week and only came back on Saturday evening so there wasn't much point for me being on cohen's. In saying that I didnt really eat THAT badly, I dont really find carbs that interesting? I like my sweet things though so that's my down-fall. I think your right, I will just have to avoid, avoid, avoid for the rest of my days. I dont want this to be a problem for me as I feel I deserve to be normal.

So excited for you that you got a new car! I have missed really your diary and being on the forum, in all honesty I have been SO busy with my new full-time job that I haven't had much time to do much else but sleep.

Take care and be kind to yourself
xx nicky
 
Hello London darling! It always sounds a little bit silly saying welcome back to the weight-loss forum because you probably think it's for the wrong reason that you're back but hey-
Welcome back my friend!
I think we'll all be learning what we can & cannot tolerate forever. One thing I do know is that I don't ever know enough & are constantly learning. Rotten little fat cells. I might give my extended family of them a name. I have to name my car too. I think "honey" or "bee" because I jokingly say it's a little buzz box. It only has a 1.4 litre engine & needs a little encouragement up hills. Don't get me wrong. I like it but after driving 6 cylinder cars for over 30 years I have to seriously adjust my driving! My grandson likes, especially the sheepskin covers I bought to go in it.

Exercise yesterday-
Tai Chi, followed by lunch with them. Very nice day. 8-ball last night was late & I had trouble sleeping again.

Exercise today-
1.5 hours of swimming. I am really tired today. I'm about to go back into town to take my grandson to Taekwondo. He's then being picked up & going to see the Moscow circus with his Aunt & I will come home to eye fillet steak with salad for dinner & an early night I think. I have had a "Nanna nap" briefly this afternoon on my chair which will get me through.

That was the last swimming session for the year as Tassie schools go back next week. I will miss it but not miss having to get up early for it.

Bye for now as it's almost time to go. Cheers,Cate

 
Hiya Cate,

Wow that programme you watched sounds extremely interesting, i love watching shows on stuff like that!

Sounds like you are absolutely loving your car and i think Honey or Bee would be a really good name for it :)

I look so forward to getting into work in the morning and catching up on everyone's days think it keeps me motivated!!

Take it easy
xxx
 
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