Learning the art of saying no

I wrote earlier this year in April about losing over 3 stone and improving my health which included curing my IBS. See http://www.oreilly.ie/losing-3-stone-curing-ibs/

Lots of people have asked me “whats the secret” since I wrote that blog post and my answer has always been what I said in that post, hard work and careful diet. At the end of that post I was 10 stone 10 pounds (68KG) and I had started back Bootcamp again.

So fast forward to the end of 2019 and the burning question for many is “have you kept the weight off?”, the answer thankfully is yes! But I haven’t just kept it off I have lost more weight and currently weigh just 9 stone 12 pounds (62.5KG).

That is 4 stone or 26KG from my heaviest which is hard to imagine, it is the average weight of a 7 or 8 year old child, try carrying one of them on your back and go for a walk!

Two photos here give an idea of the change I have gone through, the first was taken in June 2017 when I decided I needed to lose weight and the second was taken a couple of weeks ago.

I don’t feel overly comfortable sharing the images but perhaps it may help inspire someone.

I’ve learnt a lot along the way to losing 4 stone and getting fit, the main one is just how little food we actually need to eat to sustain ourselves. I don’t think I’ve ever eaten so little but yet I’m doing more exercise and have more energy.

I’ve learnt the art of saying NO! No to chocolate, no to cake, no to big plates of food and most importantly no to late evening snacks. You can eat well and train all you want but if you sit down on the couch after dinner and start snacking then you can’t expect to lose weight. That includes the so called protein bars that are low carb etc etc, they still have calories and some have rather a lot of calories!

My previous post outlined my diet changes and also the bootcamp training I used to lose the weight and it is pretty much the same now, I just eat a little more when I do more exercising but I still avoid the junk food and keep the amount of carbs down. The bootcamp I go to is tough but inspiring and Paul Ward is a master of driving you to succeed, see https://www.facebook.com/PauliesBootcamp/ for more on the bootcamp.

I’ve done more running in the last few months too and ran my quickest 5km and 10km in recent days, completing 5km in 20 minutes and 14 seconds and 10km in 42 minutes and 25 seconds. Times that I would never have thought possible 2 years ago and for 2020 I am going to try break the 20 minute mark for 5km and 41 minutes for 10km.

I had stopped taking the Aflorex for my IBS as I thought with my good eating habits maybe I didn’t need them anymore, well I soon found out that wasn’t the case and my IBS began to flare up so I’ve gone back to taking Alforex and I won’t be stopping again any time soon!

If you are sitting on your couch reading this after Christmas and thinking the new year will be your time to get fit and lose weight then I say go for it. It isn’t easy but it is worth it and it does get easier with each pound you lose and every kilometer you walk or run. Once you get fit you can do a 5km run in under 30 minutes and that is all it takes to stay fit and keep the weight off if you eat right.

Big things always start with small steps, get moving more and eating less and I might see you at the starting line of a 5km in Carlow next year 🙂