Ooh what a lovely day it was today. Managed to swing a nice day out with the kids to the swing park then visiting some family. Interrupted only by O deciding to dive head first into the step on the slide & burst his lip >_< And alas, I've failed in my responsible parent role yet again by letting myself get sunburnt. IN FRONT OF THE CHILDREN!!! Rather gloriously I must add. Bright red upper arms, red shoulders, a fantastic scarlet collar across my clavicle & a nice shiny burnt face to go with it. This, kids, is *not* responsible suncare!! I knew the fairly peaceful, fun, enjoyable day was too good to be true!
Aside from the agony inflicted by the sun today, I have other problems. Potentially more serious ones than a bit of sting on my shoulders.
I'm getting fat. There, I said it. Now, I'm not saying I don't like what I see in the mirror. I look at myself now & compare it to what I looked like before the children & I must say, apart from the muffin top (utterly preventable by wearing the right sized jeans, I have to add), I probably look better now than I did then. Pre-children I was a size 6, teeny tiny little thing so I was. Post-children I now wear up to a size 16 depending on where I'm buying from. Which is fair enough, that doesn't bother me, although having to buy & sew new clothes isn't exactly a selling point. My concern is my health & the health of my family.
Looking in the mirror, I'm fairly happy with what I see. As long as I wear the right sort of clothes, I manage to hide the extra weight pretty well. Come out looking not too bad. But I became increasingly aware of just how many items of clothing I was throwing away, how breathless I was becoming here & there, how some activities I was finding a bit harder to do. So one day, out of curiosity, I decided to check what my BMI was. After entering my height, weight, age & sex, I sat horrified as the word OBESE stared at me from my computer screen & the little pointer showing my BMI hovered there in the red section. After recovering from the initial shock of realising that according to the NHS I was obese, I posted about it on Facebook. I wasn't obese, no way, I was "fair putting the weight on" as some would say, but not obese! Thankfully, some friends came to my rescue. Spamming me with information from places about how BMIs are outdated & they're not an accurate representation of yourself. So that was great, although I'm overweight, I'm not THAT overweight. I felt better.
But it niggled away at me still, in the back of my mind. Then, thinking about my life realistically, I realised that no matter how much I love what I look like on the outside (whether slim, average or overweight), I probably wasn't looking good on the inside. Becoming complacent with how I've been living just because I look OK was pretty irresponsible. Eating far too much of the wrong things & not getting as much exercise as I should,, am I really setting the right example for my children? Overlooking the chaffing thighs & extra stretch marks just because I look nice & curvy in my jeans? Eating as much cake as I can possibly manage, ignoring the fact that we already have diabetes & heart disease in the family? Foolishly letting my children, MY CHILDREN (!) fall into bad food habits? What the hell went wrong there then?
So, I sucked it up & admitted to myself that I'd skewed off the right path somewhere. I was in shape & healthy once before, my kids both had very healthy diets as babies & young toddlers, we all used to get plenty of exercise together then gradually, somehow, things changed direction. But I've realised the error of my ways & now it's time to get back on track again.
I've started monitoring my food intake again, going to keep a closer eye on what the boys are eating, get myself more active, particularly with the kids. Do something about it. I just need the motivation. And what better motivation than this:
High blood pressure, infertility, diabetes, various cancers, heart disease, stroke, asthma, arthritis, back pain, depression, back pain, liver disease, kidney disease, sleep apnoea, GERD, gestational diabetes & pre-eclampsia (in pregnancy). Risk of all of the above is increased by being overweight/obese. And that's scary. Scared me for my own sake, but also for my children's sake if I don't do something about it.
I will keep you updated with my progress. I'm only looking at losing maybe 2 stone to get back to "ideal" weight but I like my grabby bits, my jiggly bum, my boobs, my hips. So my focus on getting us all healthier again. From a few dietary tweaks (I'M NOT GIVING UP MY CAKES AND PASTRIES!!!!!) to getting us all away from the screens & gadgets, we can do this! I'll update my progress when I can.
Ladies, this isn't about losing weight or looking like what we're "supposed" to look like according to society. This is about being happy with yourself but making sure we're taking care of ourselves at the same time. Whether you're a size 4 or a size 28, you ARE beautiful & don't let anyone tell you otherwise. But be good to yourself, take care of yourself & let's try & live as long as we can, know what I'm saying??
- M
PS, if you *are* looking to make changes to your lifestyle, avoid faddy (potentially dangerous) diets & food replacements, do it the right way. Here's a few links to help do it right.
NHS Choices - Healthy Eating - Totally sensible information on losing weight/getting healthy.
My Fitness Pal (look, it's me!) - A valuable tool to help keep track of your diet & exercise, with forums to get support from others in the same position as you.
Change4Life Great site helping you & your family make changes to benefit you all.
And don't forget about the cake ;)
Do you follow the Analytical Armadillo on FB? You would probably enjoy alot of her posts. Here's one about the so-called good advice about changing to low-fat everything - http://armadillokerfuffle.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/why-we-will-continue-to-eat-full-fat.html
ReplyDeleteI'm glad you took notice of everyone's comments on BMIs, it is more about how you feel about yourself than some random number. It is easy to slip into poor eating habits, from pureeing fresh fruit and veg for the babies it's a slow slide into processed foods as they grow into their faddy stages!
Though having read some of the traumas my fellow ASD Mums have with eating habits I feel quite grateful that my two aren't as bad as many!!
And from my end of the scale - UK size 4 isn't beautiful, it's skeletal and scary. The worst thing is that no-one will say anything in case you have some terrible disease! It's only now I'm back up to an 8 that people are saying how bad I looked.
Off to eat a Thorntons chocolate now, have a box left from Easter, yummy!!