The change in the weather* and the change in the clocks is making a difference. I think.
Being away in Brighton overnight on Thursday for work, I did grab the opportunity for a swim in the hotel pool. It's not ideal, being half the length of the standard local authority pool. But it's convenient,and it's there. And I went dancing later on, which is not exactly exercise, but I suppose compensates for the sugar contained in the large quantities of alcohol consumed!
Yesterday and today was cycling. Yesterday, Tooting Common; today Wandsworth Common. We have rather got into the habit of cycling there, having a coffee, sitting around for a while, and then cycling back. There is a part of me that thinks it's sort of cheating, it's not real exercise.
I then tell myself to get a sense of perspective. I couldn't have cycled to Wandsworth Common and back this time last year. Objectively, that is good. I measure myself against my Autumn performance, and feel that, even though I slacked off over the winter, I am able to get to the top of certain hills, without getting off, in second gear (or gears 8-14, depending on how you see it). I don't feel that my pulse rate is so severely raised after exertion as it was, say, six months ago. I think I recover more quickly from stiffness in my leg muscles.
I said from the outset that this was not about losing weight in the strict sense. I said I was not going to be ruled and depressed by what my scales say. Which is a good thing, because my weight isn't shifting. I'm about half a stone less than I was at my heaviest, and I suspect that if I go to my GP's I'm going to get another lecture about losing weight, so I don't want to go, because they are obsessed by the discredited BMI (Body Mass Index).
My major motivation in changing my life was all about clothes. Seriously. When you go shopping for nice things and realise that you can no longer get into sizes that used to be right, that as you go up the sizes, the choice becomes less. When you try on clothes that were bought to last and you just look like someone squeezing into a size too small.
When I set out doing this, I read up a little and discovered that one of the measures better than BMI is waist-hip ratios, but I couldn't work out where my waist was. I can now, that's cool. I moaned about my enormous, bloated stomach. Now, I can't work out what I should think about it. Like so many people I am confronted by images on a daily basis of malnourished models with photoshopped figures, so when I see that my stomach isn't flat, I despair. And yet, I know it's firmer, it doesn't hang down as it did.
As for clothes, I am now in the ridiculous situation that some of my trousers and skirts, and not just the ones I bought at my fattest last summer, are either slipping down past my hips or looking baggy and unsightly.
And yet, my tops size has got bigger. My boobs are definitely firmer and less droopy, which is good, but I think my back has become more muscular. I've been avoiding buying clothes, fearing that my size will go up again, and hoping that it will go down. It's kind of frustrating not really knowing what will happen in the next six months, maybe in the long term I won't change size or weight very much, but just replace the fabby fat with nicely toned muscles. But the simple fact is, I have to continue with regular exercise for ever.
It's good to know that I have been able to pick up again after the winter go-slow. And it's good that I enjoy the experience, going out to a local park or Common, enjoying the fresh air, seeing the change in seasons. I know that they say that it takes two years to lose weight in a way that makes it permanent. But I was never aiming at losing weight.
* I mean, the general upwards trend, irrespective of the occasional cold blitz
