History Part 3 - Young adulthood

 So, I'd bought a house, I was working ridiculous hours of the day in order to do both college and pay for having a house and I haven't mentioned boys yet.  I've rarely been without boyfriends, if only because I have a tendency towards a 'male' brain.  I like playing with engines, I'm scientific in my work, I have an interest in motorsports and I've always followed rugby and cricket.  Many of my teenage romances involved helping boys to work on their cars, going out to loud music bars (not discos, but hot sweaty live music venues, playing punk, metal or rhythm and blues bands), playing pool in local pubs or watching the aforementioned sports.  

Until I met Kevin.  The same sort of things were in play - he was a self-employed motor mechanic, he had a passion for classic cars, but he also liked real ale and good food.  And my housemate had also met a new man and we decided to part company.  I sold my half of the house to her and her separated, but at the time married, boyfriend.  I made a tidy profit, we'd bought together in 1988 and house prices had rocketed upwards - I sold out to her in 1989, just before they crashed again.  And I moved in with Kevin and bought an E-Type Jag at age 21.  However, all the active things that I'd been doing ceased.  I still worked behind a bar, but I was in a new to me pub, a much more staid village inn and I was living right out on the east coast of Essex, a good hour's drive if I wanted to go to the old clubs where I'd danced all night.

I was eating lots of dishes prepared with cream and butter, I ate lots of chocolate and I was doing way less exercise again.  It didn't take too long before my weight had crept up to 13 stone.  I wasn't happy with Kevin, he was earning way more money than I was and he used that to control me.  He didn't like me inviting my friends to the house, he didn't like me riding motorcycles, he wanted to dictate the way I dressed.  Eventually the camel's back broke and I told him to get stuffed and moved out.  I moved back to my parents, but all the control issues were still there in the form of my father.  Fortunately, I got chatting to a lady called Jenny, who'd separated from her husband after twenty years and was also attempting to live with her father.  She was twice my age, but she had the same issues that I did and we got on really well.  So we rented a house together, in a larger town, called Maldon.  And I went to WeightWatchers for the first time.  It was held in a local town hall and I enjoyed going every week, I'd started to go out to music venues again and dancing.  I started going to the gym opposite the laboratory where I worked my fulltime job, at lunchtime.  I lost weight rapidly, due to both activity and WeightWatchers.

Weightwatchers at the time consisted of various boxes that you ticked off during the day.  Each box represented a controlled size portion of various food groups.  This is a long time ago, but I vaguely remember there being two portions of dairy (milk or cheese or yogurt), three portions of fruit, a minimum of three portions of vegetables (you've always been able to eat as many vegetables as you liked), two of protein rich foods (eggs, meat, fish), three of carbohydrate (rice, pasta, bread) and two of healthy oils or fats (olive oil etc).  I actually found this quite easy and got into eating small portions, grilling all of my meat, using skimmed milk, virtually fat free yogurts etc.  It was the first time that I took photos of my body and how it changed through weightloss too.   At some point, I'll go and find them all and scan them in, but not right now.

I did really well at Weightwatchers and dropped down from that level to 10 stone, in a relatively short time (I think it was about five months, although I don't truthfully remember.how long it actually was.  And I got bitten by the exercise bug, I started going regularly to the gym across the playing fields from work and worked out most lunchtimes.  It was easy to do, I was working flexitime, so getting in early and going home about half an hour later made time for at least 45 minutes workout, sometimes an hour.  I did cardio and alternated weight training between arms and legs.

Update

 I've lost weight much more slowly since the last post, and when I weighed myself this morning, I was 12 stone 10 lb.  But this still means that I've lost four more pounds and I feel very happy that it's the case.  I haven't been particularly careful about dieting since my birthday, which was back on the 27th of February and was the one week this year so far that I've put weight on, a whole 1lb!  I have got into a routine during the working week.  I have a yogurt and some fruit for breakfast and lunch is normally rice cakes or wholemeal crackerbread with either very light cheese spread, tuna in tomato sauce with herbs, tuna in light mayonnaise with sweetcorn or reduced fat houmous.  I have a fruit bowl on my desk for when I want to pick and there are normally at least four or five different types of fruit in there.  I occasionally add a low fat chocolate mousse for dessert.  

In the evenings and at weekends, there've been no particular patterns.  I'm making leek and potato soup this evening, I'm still fairly likely to make soup, although we're now moving towards spring and I guess that it'll be salad season soon :).  I have chocolate and crisps in the house for when my partner's daughters are here and I'll occasionally treat myself, but not too often.  I continue to make bread in the breadmaker and it's not unusual to have comfort meals like scrambled egg on toast, or roast beef sandwiches.  There are low calorie treats in the form of reduced calorie icecream and frozen yogurt, should I be craving sweet things, but the cravings don't visit often.  There are instant risottos in the cupboard, for when I'm too tired or lazy to cook for myself - the job has been very busy recently, as has my partner's, so it's not always in us to cook.

Work, despite being very busy, is going really really well.  I had a sort-of appraisal with my group manager (the annual round was being done and I was included, despite only having been employed for five months) and she was glowing with praise for the amount of skills that I've brought to the post.  So much so that at the first opportunity (which will be in October) I will be regraded up to the next grade, so a promotion.  I'm really enjoying myself too, the work is varied and there's just the right amount of pressure for me to make the days fly past, without feeling that I'm buckling under the quantity of work.  I'm establishing a good reputation amongst other work groups too, as I've been able to field all sorts of different enquiries and in a couple of cases turn round failing projects into successes.

I did fall off the dieting wagon when I went to a EU meeting in Brussels, primarily because an entire plate of macarons was left next to me and I just *had* to try all of the flavours.  I'll move them away from myself next time, having proved to myself that I have no will power around them.  Their sandwiches were delicious too, I'm going to have to be much better behaved at next week's meeting and also in Paris at the end of this week.  However, the fact that I've been less than good over the last five weeks and my weight has still drifted downwards has put me in a really positive frame of mind again and reminded me that I have another 17lb to try and lose in the next nine weeks if I'm to get to my next goal.  Doable, but definitely challenging.  I really won't beat myself up about it if I miss it though, I'm still well within my graph area which told me I was doing ok providing I was losing an average of 1lb per week :)