Turning back the clock

[Mr.Six]

Great progress towards your central goal of finding your muchness Guzzi!  And that food looks awesome!!  And next year...get down with your Viking-self girl. 

 

[karinajean]

On 2/26/2017 at 3:59 PM, Guzzi said:

I also convinced Colin to help me make Kale, Feta and Filo Pie, against his better judgement apparently.  Which is super easy to make and really tasty, even for greenaphobics like Colin.   I didn't have any cherry tomatoes so I used sundried ones instead.  Like I said, well stocked cupboards. 

 

 

 

 

No. 3 - Be active on the forum

Meh, this one I've not been so hot on this last week or two, but that's just the way it goes sometimes.  You only get so many spoons a day, huh @karinajean?  **wiggles eyebrows**  It's not something that most people would think of as a "spoon" but writing this post has taken me since yesterday, I started writing it just after submitting my last post.  It takes a lot of brain power to write something like this (for me anyway) and I tend to just write small sections at a time.  It can take a while, lol!

 

MOST IMPORTANT, this filo dough concoction is just GORGEOUS, and you should be proud of it. I'll be over for lunch straightaway.

 

less important, yo, I'm glad the spoons thing was helpful. I have a friend with lupus and it's been really helpful for me to understand what she's going through. also, although I feel very physically fit, it's been helpful for me too, because I am kind of in a period of emotional exhaustion right now and it's good for me to give myself permission to pull back a little sometimes. (note, my very tardy response to you).

 

On 2/28/2017 at 10:37 PM, J3NN said:

Okay, I just read this too...  I read this trying to understand a new friend's plight, and I think it has given me a much broader understanding... working in a healthcare environment, we are surrounded by people everyday that need our help, this puts into perspective how it's not just clinical care that they need. Anything we can do to assist them could be the difference in the rest of their entire day. Thank you for sharing!

 

I'm so glad it was helpful!

[Guzzi]

Hi guys.

 

It's been a little while since my last post, huh?  I think I have a little more energy now and I'm taking advantage  a service offered by the local council to receive some one-on-one help to make better use of my laptop, including getting it set up to work from voice commands.  If it works it would help me a lot, but at the moment I'm really struggling with it.  It seems to have a sense of humour when translating what I've said into type.   

 

Today I was finally able to make something from the Thug Kitchen cookbook  that Colin gave me for my birthday last year.  In all fairness it was the recipe that only required cooking for a total of 6 minutes, but lets not dwell on that bit, eh?  We made Spiced chickpea wraps with tahini dressing, which kinda look like this...

 

 

...except mine were a little bit less artfully displayed, more along the lines of "frying pan in the middle of the table" kinda thing, and it included red jalapeños.  Just because.  But it was awesome non the less.  I was a little nervous about getting Colin to help me with this as I did think he might do a "Wtf...?" when I told him what it was but he barely batted an eye.  When it came time to eat the thing I put a packet of chopped chorizo on the table (along with the bag of spinach and the jar of jalapeños - no presentation what so ever!) in case he felt he needed some meat in there but the chorizo never even got a look in.  Colin even went as far as to say that he liked it, yay for vegetables

 

I'm not a vegan myself (the cookbook is all vegan recipes) but I am a huge fan of eating vegetables and I would love to have a go at a few more of the recipes.  I think the biggest restriction (next to me being a useless, floppy mess) is that they use ingredients that I've never even heard of let alone bought.  I mean, wtf is "nutritional yeast" anyway???  Credit where it's due, Colin has been brilliant about helping me in the kitchen whenever I feel like making something which, when you consider that he himself has absolutely ZERO interest in cooking or preparing food, it's just amazing.  Colin would happily survive on a diet of frozen, ready made food, served with chips, and no vegetables in sight.  Which pretty much sums up our diet while I've been unwell.   

 

I am considering ring to find my old battle log, if the bloody search function will play ball, and have a look at some of the things I used to eat, to give me some foodie ideas.  It's not very likely that I'll find it though,I typed "Guzzi" then "clock" then "turning back" into the search bar earlier when I was trying to find this thread.  Apparently no threads in the Battle Log section contained those words.  Hmmm.... 

 

 

[Guzzi]

Ok, so I eventually found my old battle log that I started back in 2014 when I was really starting to make big steps forward in terms of my recovery, and it was really funny reading back through it.  I mean, that girl was so full of confidence, so full of life!   It feels like I'm a long way from that right now. 

 

I'm going to share a few posts from there in this log, things like my long + short term goals, my progress pics, and anything else that I want a reminder of, just so I have them to hand and I can incorporate some of them into my journey here.   I feel like where I was back then is where I'm trying to aim for now, and it's kinda cool that I get to be my own role model/inspiration.   

 

One of the first posts that I wanted to share on here is the one where I admitted that I had fallen "in love" with Colin.  For anyone who doesn't know, I met Colin whilst on holiday at the Isle of Man TT with my father-in-law.  It was only about 7 months after I had lost my husband Peter in a car accident and I was really not in the market for a relationship!  I had never even kissed any man other than Peter so it was a real BIG DEAL to even be thinking about dating let alone actually doing it.

 

On ‎13‎/‎07‎/‎2014 at 6:55 PM, Guzzi said:

Oh God! It's embarrassing. I'm pathetic!

 

I haven't had time to get online, because I'm all "loved up" *hangs head in shame*

 

In my defence, can I just say that I'm normally so sensible. I don't get caught up in emotion, swept off my feet with romance, or anything like that. I'm Little Miss Sensible, Captain Common Sense, and Chief of the LetsNotOverreact tribe.  When I was hurt one of the nurses in hospital warned me that "This can't last you know. People just don't cope this well with being injured this badly. It's going to hit you one day and it'll be very hard." She was wrong.  When Peter died everyone constantly told me "It just hasn't hit you yet. People don't cope with things like this so well, you're going to break down at some point." But they were wrong. I never did "break down", because I just don't do that. I don't lose my head, I stay calm and rational, I don't let my heart rule my head.

 

Or so I thought...

 

I'm in trouble. All my attempts to rationalise and contain my feelings have failed spectacularly. Disaster!!!!

*whispers quietly* I think I've fallen in L.O.V.E.

 

How the Hell did THAT happen????? Shit!!! I shouldn't even say shit like that out loud. The men in white coats will be chapping at my door offering me a nice comfy room and a cosy jacket before the day is out!

 

It's only been 5 weeks, but I've never in my life been so at ease and comfortable with someone. I've never met anyone who just "gets" me so completely, and who I can talk to on this level, so openly. (Not even Peter, and I don't like admitting that)  I've tried rationalising it, eg "maybe the way we felt about each other on the boat was so strong because of a false sense of intimacy created by sharing our living space and spending so much time together" or "we've both just come out of long term relationships, maybe we're both just slipping into behaviour patterns that make things seem more intimate than they really are" and even "maybe we've built our perception of each other based on what we want the other person to be, rather than what that person really is like, and we've both fallen for an "idea" of someone rather than for who they are".

 

Yeah, I know. I think too much.

 

The trouble is, none of those really fit. I've given it a lot of thought, and the truth is that it isn't any of those things. The one thing that does fit, is that both of us have been completely honest and natural with each other since we met, we've got to know each other really well (talking on the phone for up to 4 hours a night. God, that's so embarrassing!) and our feelings have developed and deepened as we've got to know each other better. I really think this is real. Gulp!

 

The girl who never loses her head has completely and utterly fallen down the rabbit hole. I'm wandering around bouncing between being all dopey-eyed, daydreaming and being on cloud 9, to having my head up my arse, being totally unable to focus on ANYTHING and actually feeling physically sick. That's it, I'm done for! Help!

 

I'm telling you lot this, because I'm still not prepared to tell people in "real life". I think I need to take things very slowly with Peter's mum, I need to introduce the idea quite slowly to let her get used to it, rather than just *BAM* I've met someone. His dad and brother know all about it and have given me their blessing, but his mum is a difficult person even at the best of times. I just don't know how she'll react and I want to break it to her very gently.

 

God! This has taken me FOREVER to write, better get a move on and get my dinner on. After all, it's nearly time to phone my "boyfriend". Squeeeee!

 

 

 

It's so funny reading this because Colin and I have spent each and every day in each other's company for the last 7 months and we often ask one another "How come we aren't bored of each other by now?"  I can honestly say that taking the risk and moving out to Shetland was the best thing I've done in my life.  I can't believe that I've been so lucky as to have had two such amazing men in my life.  And to have made it to 34 and never dated a douchebag!   

 

[Guzzi]

This was my first post of my Log.  Interesting to see what my goals were, and hopefully I will be able to work towards them again one day.   

 

 

On ‎25‎/‎03‎/‎2014 at 9:12 AM, Guzzi said:

Ok, so this isn't really going to be a battle log.  My workouts/ exercise regime is waaayyyy too "bitsy" for that to work.  But I really want to have somewhere where I can record all of my achievements (and my struggles) so that further down the line I can look back and see just how far I've come.  This is going to be much more like a journal, where I can jot down all the positives in my life, anything that makes me feel happy, gives me a sense of accomplishment,  or stuff I just plain and simple want to brag about.  It will probably be peppered with highlights of my workouts, my Woot!'s any time I manage to do something new, things I've done that I want to remember, and a myriad of other seemingly random goings on from my life (including food, coz food makes me HAPPY!!!!). I also want to use this to write about my husband Peter, because I think I need that right now.  Just having somewhere that I can write down all those little things that I want to remember, the happy memories.  I really don't care that that's not what this is supposed to be for, this is MY thread and I can do what I want with it!

 

*note: Anyone reading this, you probably don't want to.  Seriously, I post way too much at the best of times and this could end up just plain old silly. You have been warned....

 

Goals

My problem is that I want everything, and I want it now God dammit! I want to be able to do crazy-ass bodyweight exercises like Frank Medrano (or at the very least pull-ups and handstand push-ups), I want to be an awesome Warrior with a brag-worthy overhead squat, I want to be ultra flexible and be able to hold some crazy yoga poses, and I want mind boggling endurance and be able to run marathons or swim the Channel.

 

Realistic?  Errrr... no!  Yes, if I dedicated myself to any one of those things I could reach a level of competency that I could be happy with in that discipline, but therein lies the rub.  I can't dedicate myself to any of them.  I have to focus on all of those things because I need to incorporate aspects of them all into my recovery, I just need to reset my mentality to accept the limitations of my poor body.

 

With that in mind, I thought I'd write out some goals for myself. They're definitely not of the "SMART" variety, just things that I want to incorporate into my life.  Some are short term, others are ideas for the future.  I can use the 6 week challenges to work towards achieving these things, and break them down into realistic and attainable goals.  For now, here's my list of things I want to do, improve or change:

 

Physical

This year I really want to get back some of the parts of my life that were taken away from me.  I still think that the only way to do that is to work on my physical fitness so I see these as having the most importance, hence why the come first.

• Walk out to a bothy carrying a full pack.
• Ride to Stormin' the Castle
• Do a pull-up
• Do a handstand
• Swim a mile
• Run 5k (April this year)
• Compete in the Tough Mudder (in 2015)
• Squat my bodyweight
• Deadlift 2x my bodyweight
• Lower my bodyfat% until I lose the Bingo Wings

 

Mental

• I learnt Spanish to a fairly "conversational" level before my accident, I will regain that level of competency, if not surpass it. Definitely.
• I have really bad self image - I've already started working on this one, but there's scope to do more.  There are virtually no photos of me on here, or anywhere else because I hate seeing myself in photos.  This is a simple fix.  I'm going to post up pictures of myself in here.  This is a really scary one for me, but I'm going to do this, I will not be beaten by my insecurities!
• I really beat myself up for my "perceived" failures - I need to start letting go of any remaining negativity about my physical and mental fitness, really recognise and celebrate the wins where and when I can. I think this thread will really help me to do that.

 

Life

Whoah, this one is difficult right now.  I need some time to think about what I really want to do. Hey! That can be my goal! To think about my life and where I want it to go from here.   I'll post up some real goals once I've done that.

 

 

 

[Guzzi]

Did this work?  Can anyone else see my (progress) pic here?

 

[Guzzi]

On ‎26‎/‎03‎/‎2014 at 8:37 AM, Guzzi said:

That's the bikini I want to wear on holiday. I felt quite self conscious in it, it's not one of those where you can "hide" any problem areas. It's all on display, so I really have a motivation to drop the bf%.

Right now is the slimmest I've ever been in my adult life, so I'm pretty pleased with how I'm looking anyway, (highfives please!) but..... I don't just want to be able to wear that bikini, I want to to ROCK that shit!

 

This is the reason for the gratuitous bikini pic  

[Guzzi]

 

On ‎12‎/‎04‎/‎2014 at 3:49 PM, Guzzi said:

Ha! I finally figured out how to post this picture.  This was taken last Christmas, that's me showing off my new telescope and another photo, taken a year later at New Year, so you can see the progress over the last year after ditching the "diet" and the scales, and focusing on eating right instead.

 

Yay! It worked.

 

These two photos were taken a year apart, the first is Christmas 2012 then New Year 2013 (or possibly very early 2014 ). 

 

The photo on the left shows just how much weight I put BACK ON after my terrible dieting to lose weight for my wedding (I was practically starving myself, it's no wonder I put half of it back on again).  Then I found NF, started eating properly and lost it for good.  You can see just what a difference you can make in a year without dieting if you just eat right and exercise.  I've kept the weight off despite all the health problems I've had over the last two years and I can't imagine ever going back to how I was before, my relationship with food has changed too much to ever let that happen again.  Thank God!

[J3NN]

Wow it's like watching your origins story unfold! It's so cool that you have all this to pull from, it inspires me to be better about posting too. I'm glad you looked back and are doing this, Woot!

 

Sent from my SM-G920V using Tapatalk

 

 

[Bookish Badger]

On March 24, 2017 at 1:49 PM, Guzzi said:

Apparently no threads in the Battle Log section contained those words.  Hmmm.... 

I'm so glad I'm not the only one who struggles with the search function! Going back to read now...

 

[Guzzi]

 

Pigtails! Sorry, I'm just having a laugh and thought I'd share.

[Guzzi]

Here's another pic rom my old log that I want to keep and work towards, you can see ACTUAL MUSCLES!!!!!!!  I had biceps!  Ok, so everyone has biceps but you can actually see them!  I never even noticed that when I originally posted the photo, it wasn't until @Twilight pointed it out that I though "Oh fuck, yeah!"   And then there's the photo of me wearing (men's) German army surplus trousers - with braces!  Because I am that girl  *facepalm*  It gave me a laugh anyway.   

 

       

 

 

A real rarity, a photo of me I actually like!  Woohoo!   And a pic showing how far I got with my weight loss back in 2014.  Holy Crap! 

    

 

 

[Guzzi]

   

[Guzzi]

Here is a comparison pic that I made.  I would point out that the "before" pic was taken in hospital so no comments about the dodgy pyjamas please!    It was the day that I had taken my first steps and I was allowed to sit in the chair for a few minutes.  That's basically how big I was at the time of the accident, I got a LOT bigger in the months that followed. 

 

[Guzzi]

And another pic that I want to use as my inspiration.  It's me on holiday at the Ilse of Man for the TT with my father-in-law and brother-in-law.  I LOVE how my shoulders look in this pic, there' real definition there.  Plus it's a pic that makes me happy!

 

[Guzzi]

This is a pic I took on holiday with my brother and my sister-in-law, again I'm just putting this here to use as a comparison/inspiration.

 

[Jittersthe.Clown]

17 hours ago, Guzzi said:

 

Pigtails! Sorry, I'm just having a laugh and thought I'd share.

Well.  My day is made.  Well done!

[Twilight]

Hey you!  Good luck with your challenge! I know you'll make great progress!

[Mr.Six]

Good luck and it's good to see you back!

[karinajean]

I love this trip down memory lane! you're so wonderful, and that loveliness is deep inside of you, regardless of the outside. it's still fun to see pics though

[Guzzi]

Arrrgh!@karinajean !!! Stop it, I'm blushing!

[Guzzi]

April Update

 

No. 1 - Post monthly progress pics

I'm going to use this as a kind of doodle pad for my thoughts.  There obviously won't be any workout logs but I plan to post my monthly weigh-in and progress pictures.  I gained around 10kg whilst I was ill so although I'm definitely not "dieting" I am trying to get back to eating better and cutting out the boredom eating, which should have an impact on my figure.  I will track these using the pictures rather than the scale number.  I'm deliberately weighing myself in kilos so that I can't get hung up on the number.  Kilos mean nothing to me.  

 

March weight = 68.3Kg  Body fat = 25.7%

April weight = 66.4Kg  Body fat = 24.5%

 

 

 

 

No. 2 - Post my food accomplishments

The last 2 years have been pretty poor in terms of diet and nutrition.  I couldn't cook because I was ill and Colin really couldn't cook because.... Well just because, apparently, so there has been a big reliance on food that goes from the freezer straight to the oven.  I plan to slowly work on getting back to eating better.  Of course this is totally dependant on my mobility and stamina so it's outwith my control to a certain extent but I'm hoping to see improvements in my health and mobility over the course of the year.  I plan to posting my food related accomplishments, whether that's sharing a recipe that I've managed to cook or just doing the usual "food porn" photos.  It's all about celebrating my successes in the kitchen and hopefully giving me the the confidence and incentive to cook again, when the mobility issues allow it.

 

There has been nothing over the last few weeks, I just wasn't up to it.  Hopefully now that I'm feeling a little better I might find some more energy towards this goal.

 

No. 3 - Be active on the forum

I also want to feel young and carefree again.  Now there's not much I can do about this one other than hope things improve and try to shift my focus away from the pain and mobility issues.  Anything that helps me to do that is invaluable.  One of the things I think was fundamental to my state of mind back in 2014 was the community here on NF.  The members friends I made and the support I received had such an important role in shaping my mindset but more than that, their encouragement gave me real self confidence for the first time in my life.  I was able to be myself, something I don't think I'd ever really been able to do before.  That's the real reason I felt so carefree, because I was actually happy in myself for the first time.  The last two years have kinda sucked the life outta me so I plan to find my confidence again.  I can't really engage with people in the Real WorldTM because I'm fairly house bound and all my friends and family are hundreds of mile away, but I can be an active member of the forum again and help other people to improve their lives too.

 

Nope, this hasn't really happened.   

 

 

No. 4 - Search out opportunities for fun

There's not a lot that I can take part in, I don't know from one day to the next what my mobility or ability is going to be so I need to try and make opportunities for fun as and when I can.  I will write about anything fun in here because I want to focus on the fun stuff and not the times when I can't do stuff.  "With out thoughts we make the world" is one of my favourite quotes and I truly believe it.  If I can keep my attention focused on the things that make me laugh or smile then my perception of myself will follow suit and I will start to feel like a happy, fun person again.  I already feel more optimistic just by writing this post.  Win!

 

We did have one day where the sun was shining and we took the kids up to the swing park and had some fun. While the sun was out I took some photos of the kids to put into a nice photo frame to give to their mum for Mothers Day.  Hopefully she liked it.  Of course I did waaaaaay to much and I was really ill the next day.  Oops!  Apart from that there's not really been much going on.  Colin and I have shared lots of silly moments and there's been a fair bit of laughter so that's been nice.

[Guzzi]

Oh gosh!  These pics are enormous when you see them on the laptop.    Sorry folks! 

 

This is the bikini that I wore on holiday in 2014 and its actually pretty good to use for progress pics, there's no "is the waistband higher this time, is it making my belly look larger/smaller?"   Everything is out there for everyone to see, which is why I'm going to "spoiler" them, lol!

 

 

 

I'll use these to really measure my progress since they give a better idea of what my figure really looks like than my shorts/crop top combo.

[Twilight]

Looking great! 

[Guzzi]

Tonight's dinner!

 

 

 

 

This was minute steak, with baked tattie and crispy fried courgette (or zucchini if you talk funny).  Miles better than the usual Freezer-oven-table crap.  The courgette was really good, much better than I was expecting, and so simple!  You just heat some (flavoured) oil in a frying pan, toss the sliced courgette in a bag with a tsp of seasoned flour and shake well to get the courgette coated.  Then just fry them in a single layer, flipping them after a couple of minutes. 

 

 

We used chilli oil, which I wasn't expecting to have much kick but boy did it ever.  It was goooood!