Richard Holliday – Author

I was recently challenged by my fellow blogger Chris to write a post in a similar vein to his recent post regarding physical health and, after giving it a little thought – sure, why not!

I’m pleased to finally be able to say that I am making steps to address a longstanding issue that has bugged me for years – that being my weight.

But before we talk about now, how did we arrive here?

I think for the last nine or ten years I’ve had an issue with my weight, and I know precisely where it began. While I was at school, this required a two-mile walk from the bus to my house to school, twice a day. And that four miles, plus walking around school, kept my weight in check.

Then I left school and did pretty much nothing for best part of a year.

Well, I did eat. But I didn’t burn it off and, well, I’ve been overweight since that time in 2009.

I’ve wanted to address it – nagging from parents aside; that doesn’t particularly help, but weight loss feels like such a specious and arcane thing… it’s as if results take so long to see it’s easy to be put off by no apparent progress, and therefore be victim to temptation.

I don’t drink alcohol, I don’t smoke – these are very unhealthy things – so, my mind tells me, what’s the real harm in this packet of Quavers. This blueberry muffin. This whole quiche. This Vienetta – it’s only £1.

In older posts I talked about my struggle throughout 2016 with my mental health problems and depression. I was by no means in the right frame of mind to address my weight; if anything, my depression took over and my physical health deteriorated quite badly.

And also, since 2009… I’ve gotten older. And I feel that age is creeping up on me.

Last year toward the end of the summer I did decide to take some action – I was talking to Chris about one specific thing that “triggered” my mental switch to take my weight seriously. I had to buy a pair of 40” jeans, and crossing that boundary seemed to trigger me into actually taking the issue seriously and not kicking it into the long grass. So I took myself out for a walk and tracked it. And it felt good.

I started calorie-counting from that point, setting a fairly aggressive total and I found I did start to lose weight – I went from 124Kg (19st 11lb) to 114Kg (17st 13lb) in the space of a couple of months or so. But then it got cold, it got near to Christmas and my resolve wavered. I was conscious of this but, doing what I do best – procrastination – I resolved to take the bull by the horns again in 2018.

But I did realise that calorie-counting on my own, while somewhat effective, is not the entire picture. And I am accountable only to me – and I am an unreliable judge.

So I’ve actually taken a fairly big, proactive step toward combatting this issue by joining Weight Watchers – because I feel being accountable to someone (in this case my coach) is going to greatly help my motivation. And I’m already feeling the mental switch in my attitude toward food – and that can only be seen as a positive. I’m more mindful now of what I’m eating – the Weight Watchers plan being focussed on “points” derived from a broader nutritional base, taking into account sugar and protein – and I’m actively interested in preparing my own food more and relying on ready-made meals less.

Already I feel I’m challenging myself – there’s a bit of a stigma that “Weight Watchers is for women” – though if it helps me achieve a more healthy lifestyle and goals in terms of my weight loss then I call that stigma bunkum, and as before with depression, I feel it’s a really unhelpful thing – best challenged!

And to keep myself accountable – which I feel is going to be the driving force behind this journey – I’m going to consider tweeting my weight loss progress out to my followers so it’s out there, in the public domain.

So let’s see how this goes! I can’t guarantee as regular updates as Chris but it’s certainly another journey I want to chronicle here on this site!

If you have a story or tip on losing weight then feel free to share it in the comments! Happy to read and reflect!