Musings

Life's moved on a bit in the last month. I've been offered a job as a library assistant, something I've always wanted to do. My previous employers have also asked me to do a little bit of work so I'm going to be a busy girl!

I'm in a good place food-wise. I'm eating quite intuitively, not really craving sweet stuff, I've just been 'forgetting' to buy chocolate in the same way I eventually 'forgot' to buy liquorice torpedoes (except for occasionally). I'm just not as bothered by it as I was. I'm less fussed about cake too.

I've accidentally lost a bit of weight again, I'm a stone less than I was when I got pregnant. I could tell I'd lost a little weight as my trousers have got loose and wondered what the numbers were so I checked this morning.

The weird thing is I'm not that excited about it. It's only a number and I'm just curious about what the number is doing, it doesn't define me. I'm pleased obviously as my weight is enough that I could potentially have health problems but not joyous.

My weight seems to have oscillated up and down over the past 9 months since Rosie was born. Hopefully it'll start to settle down and maybe even go a bit lower. I'm still expressing, but not as much and am therefore less hungry. I'm assuming this has something to do with the accidental weightloss. Perhaps the other contributing factor is that I'm trying to eat more fruit for Rosie's sake as we're not a big fruit eating family. I don't really know!

Uphill struggle

I had a minor success yesterday, I kind of missed lunch and got to about 5pm and realised I was starving whilst in Sainsbury's. Obviously our cupboards are now particularly full of nice things, but I managed to talk to myself and ask if I really wanted sweet food or something a little more filling.

When I tuned in, I realised that actually, a spring roll, an onion bhaji and a chicken thigh were what my body wanted as well as a sugar rush. So I had two pieces of toblerone (my current food I like) plus the above. And oh, they were tasty and I felt good! Then later on, I didn't really want much for dinner and I happily left half of what was on my plate. I need more days like that, but it was good.

Generally I still struggle, I oscillate between thinking it's better not to buy sweets and that I like to have something sweet in the house for when I want it. I can now eat a few pieces of chocolate rather than the whole bar, what I'm doing when I remember is tuning into see whether it's what I really want.

We probably drink too much wine too, which doesn't help. My consumption has decreased (well it went to almost zero whilst pregnant) but it is slowly increasing and I'm aware that wine has calories too. I don't drink until late in the evening as I'm still expressing milk full time and don't want to give Rosie boozy milk (except when she's a complete nightmare sleeper!). But still, I know they're wasted calories whilst tasting good.

BC stuff

I've stepped down as forum fairy on the BC forum. I was feeling increasingly guilty as I haven't had time to check all the posts and it's become so popular that I kept getting really behind. It's ironic that now I'm not working I've had less time to check on all the posts than when I was skiiving at work.

But I suppose since I'm no longer a fairy at all I can just ask for help as it's needed. ;)

I'm still hoping to go on the fairy training next year but it's dependent on a few things. If I get a job at the library it may involve saturday work, so I'd need to check it's ok for me to pick the saturdays off. The good news is I'd have the money if I get a job soon as the redundancy money could pay for the training. If I don't get a job soon that may also put a spanner in the works as the redundancy money would just have to pay for 'life.'

I'm hoping to go to the interview day or have a really good chat with BC to find out why the training has changed to just be for the drop ins and how their numbers add up as I've only seen the figures for the full training and would like to run BC as a business.

How did that happen?

Whoops, didn't mean it to be so long since I posted.

So what's been happening? Well, Rosie has been growing ridiculously fast (7.5 months old now!). She's on solids and we're having lots of fun feeding her new things.
I'm being made redundant on the 16th August and am trying to find a new job in a library. This isn't such a bad thing as they're giving me about 4.5k redundancy money so I can stay at home with Rosie for a while longer.

I've had a few interviews, one my local council library which went really well but I didn't get as I don't have library experience and one at an educational library (in a nearby town) which I'm still waiting to hear about. The good news about the first interview was that they're keeping me on file and may have a job for me in a couple of months. I'm really excited about this prospect as I've always fancied working in a library but without a librarian qualification was concerned about the wage. Since I'm now planning on working just to get out of the house and earn a little extra for 'nice stuff' this is less of an issue.

The educational library would be good too, but would involve a bit of travel and I have to admit I'm slightly less excited at the prospect as you don't get to be involved in some of the aspects that attract me to a library like reading groups and visiting people to talk about books. On the other hand, the hours are quite good and it would get me that crucial library experience.

Day 6 I am not a dustbin & Day 7 Enjoy

I threw away the sad cake (after picking off the icing!). I also brought the remainder of the cake to my breastfeeding clinic and shared it with the other ladies there. This not only stops it going off, but prevents me from pigging out on it.

Day 7 (today) is supposed to be about eating something I really love and enjoying my food - mood food I suppose. At the moment I have a sleeping baby so I think the next task is to go into the kitchen and pick something for dinner. And tonight I fancy butternut squash chips with lamb mince chilli and oven roasted vegetables. http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/butternutchipswithro_87033.shtml Mmm. I'm hungry already.

Day 5 - stop when you are satisfied

I've become quite good at this most of the time but was better before I had Rosie. Now I have a tendency to overeat a little because I'm unsure when I'll have another really good meal.

I'm more likely to go back for seconds at the moment because of breastfeeding, I've found that I am more hungry and have a larger appetite than is usual for me. Currently I can eat the same amount as Rich before I'm satisfied whereas previously I was leaving some on the plate.

Tomorrow is along similar lines - I am not a dustbin, throw away what I don't need to eat. I'm happy doing this with savoury foods but less so with sweet. So I have a little challenge as I've got a chocolate cake left over from my birthday last weekend (ie just over a week ago) that is starting to go a little hard. I'll be throwing it away, icing and all!

The chocolate cake that I made is still okay I think (I never did get around to eating any). I'm going to cut one slice off to enjoy at some point tomorrow and send Rich in with the rest to his work. I don't really need to eat it and it's a shame for it to be wasted! If it's a bit sad too, it'll just have to go in the bin.

Day 4 -put it on a plate and focus

Hmm, I'm good at doing this at mealtimes, less so when I'm snacking and I'm sorry to say that I didn't eat my snacks last night mindfully and really ate more than I enjoyed.

I need to come back to this. At this rate I'll be doing the fornight again immediately afterwards!

Today I'm supposed to be stopping when I'm satisfied. We're having roast lamb for dinner (one of my faves, especially roast potatoes) so I'm committing to both tuning in and eating mindfully for that meal.