The Road to 40: Month 2

Well let's cut to the chase. As of today, the following is true:

Weight: Exactly the same as last time. Down to the .4 kg.
Pants size: Same. Belt notch: Same. Body shape: Mostly the same.

I've decided there are many possible explanations for this.

1) The scale is wrong and shows 76.4 kg for every person who stands on it, including the lithe and curvy Brazilians and the even more diminutive 5ft Korean girls.

2) My body, having been used to living in tropical climes, is hording fat in fear that winter will never end and I may starve. A kind body, that.

3)  Fat, that light fluffy stuff creating tiny dimples under the skin, is being converted to that heavy, hard stuff called muscle.

4) I am somehow magically eating the exact same number of calories I am burning, therefore not gaining or losing any weight.

5) I totally suck at this.

The explanation that I'm going with is a combination of 3 and 4. I've been mostly consistent with the regime of alternating morning runs and afternoons of cardio, free weight exercises, and planking. I may be completely deluding myself, but the jiggly areas do seem a bit less jiggly. I can see the top of my rib cage and I can tell a bit better where muscles in my arms begin and end.

Ah, food. My muse and my monkey. On the positive side, I've cut out a lot of garbage like biscuits (cookies in American English), chocolate bars, pastries, and cake. For snacks, I eat more nuts, hummus, fruit, etc. I cook dinner 6 days a week, using all fresh ingredients. But what can you do when your sweet Korean student offers you a chocolate moon pie at the bus stop?? Or when you've had too many pints and the only thing open is the chipper? Or your husband feels like he can't face the next day if he doesn't have pizza?

I was reminiscing today about my weight loss attempts in my 20s. How many of those disgusting, non-filling Lean Cuisine meals did I eat? Will I get cancer from all those medallions of mystery meat? There is absolutely no way that I'm going to stop cooking (and eating) natural, quality food. But as I said in my post last month, I need to do better with portion control. So I think in general I'm eating better calories but still too many. Some food scientists say that eating 800 calories worth of salad and nuts is better than 800 calories of crisps because your body uses more energy to process the salad and nuts than the crisps. But it probably doesn't really matter if really you should only be taking in 300 calories.

One thing I've realized is that any lifestyle change must be maintainable and sustainable. This is why I no longer dye my hair or pluck my eyebrows. There's no way I can keep up with the maintenance. So I was a bit wary when I joined the gym. I actually hate the free weights part of my health regime. Oh God, is it boring. Lift your arm 10 times. Squat 10 times. Rest. Repeat 3 times. Try not to make eye contact with any other people doing the same thing. But I can maintain this because it is only 30 minutes out of my day. 30 minutes less reading or watching TV. And I save my most interesting podcasts just for this bit of torture. Or I daydream about my next life. Or whatever. It's doable.

So my mood today is "feck what the scale says" because after a session of 40 minute cardio and sets of free weight exercises or a 10k fun, I feel freaking fantastic. And that's the real point.

Typed after a decadent meal of Chinese take out..........