Slapping down the Chimp.

Week 4

It's been a different one this week. it's important for me to remember this is the 12 Week Transformation Program, not the 3 Week Transformation Program.  Here's your blog reading music for this week, new Devin Townsend double album out next week.   Sweeeeet.

Still loving getting in the gym 3 mornings a week.  Getting a workout in early on a Monday morning is a great way to feel superior to all the mouthbreathers going to work on the Waterloo & City line. The diet has mostly been super clean too, Kat (check out her blog too) set us a theme of 'Green

Mostly green

Week', lots of green tea as much green in our meals as possible, quite a lot of my weeks prior to starting the program tended to be 'Brown Week' and I certainly feel better doing it this way.  For the first time since we started I had alcohol this week and framing that in my mind was important.

Also green

Couple of nights out this week, one to a screening of a very silly b-movie by the name of Wolfcop (it's about a cop who's a werewolf, obviously, which you should definitely check out if like me you're a fan of cheesy, gory, b-movies) and another to the Whitechapel Gallery where a friend works and kindly invites me along to exhibition openings.  The problem here is that both of these events provide plenty of free booze which I avoided a Wolfcop but at Whitchapel I literally had a beer pressed into my hand before I could refuse by my boy Luke.

Green breakfast

 Now, drinking too much was one of the main reasons I put on a tonne of weight while I was festering at home unable to get in the gym so this needed to be dealt with properly.  One beer down and Luke and I had had enough of pretending we understood art and I retreated to the pub where I made a sensible choice,  Luke's always been my drinking buddy so I wanted to enjoy a night in the pub talking crap but without the traditional million calories and a weeks worth of carbohydrates that beer provides so I looked at the beer tap and ordered a vodka and tonic.

Includes green

A few of those down and a good night was had, although plans were made for a weekend get together which as usual ended with our girlfriends heading to bed and Luke and I sitting up 'till the early hours drinking rum and watching this awesome amateur Robocop remake. I cooked for the four of us and sticky toffee pudding was had (I made it, I had to have a piece!).  The following day I was off to a child's 3rd birthday party.  Surrounded my tiny sandwiches, bowls of crisps, marshmallows and cake and there was me drinking water and scanning the room for gluten free party snacks.




The important part of all this is to remember this

Worth it

is an anomaly, not a regression.  I'm NOT going back to boozing apart from these 2 nights and I'm NOT making a habit of making pudding even if the ones I make are spectacular.  So I was feeling great when I jumped on the scales after my workout Monday morning.  7lbs loss last week and this week and they reported no further loss at all.

Fuck it.

No weight lost this week after all that (mostly) good eating and exercise and yoga. 7lbs pounds last week wasn't really that big a deal as I have plenty more than that to lose than that but everyone does say "oh well done, that's really good" and for a miserable git such as myself a little positive reinforcement goes a long way, so getting off the scale in the gym and heading to the shower I was pissed off and disappointed.  Part of this 12 week program is taming what Kat calls 'The Chimp', the base part of our brain that controls our fight or flight response, the part that's kicking in with the emotional behaviour defensively or with anger and recognising when we are reacting to things using this response rather than our logic.  So in the shower I started to think about The Chimp and why I was so pissed off.  I know I'm feeling happier generally on this program, I know my clothes are starting to fit better, I know my stamina is improving and my back pain is lessening off so why was I pissed off at the number not moving?  I even know that the body reacts in different ways when you start making changes to it and slowing down of the weight loss on a diet is totally normal. That number doesn't really matter beyond me reporting it here. By the time I got out of the shower I'd slapped that Chimp down.  You're not the boss of me Cheetah.

This isn't the time to be discouraged, this is one third of the way into my 12 week commitment and it's time to double down and refocus.

Thanks for reading.  This week's cute cat is my own cat Bambo who was helping me work from home.

Adorable, right?

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