Blog

I’ve fluctuated between 150lbs and 160lbs this year – currently at 156lbs. I haven’t dieted or really watched what I’ve been eating. Lots of blood sugar fluctuations. Lots of excuses. But let’s face it, I’m way past menopause now… there are no more excuses.

Let the midlife crisis and delusions begin. The more insane the vision, the more the little wins will count.

• I will be 110lbs. Yes. I will lose 45lb between now and 1st October 2027
• I will undertake the surgery required to go glasses free.
• I will get my teeth fixed

Basically, I want to be passing as 40 when I’m 55.

I’ve said this 100x before you can see on this blog. Three (ok four) aims, and even if I get part way there, or one out of three, I’ve done well.

I want to be fit and healthy to offer my dogs the best life they can have.

Transformation period begins.

Somehow in the last three weeks I’ve gained 10lbs. I’ve been exercising like a maniac (not gym, just walking miles every day) so not sure if this is my muscles trying to use up the water that’s meant to be flushing me out – my blood sugar is off the charts too (clocking in at a 12 after a good night’s sleep).

Aim is 5L water a day, and for a change, I’ll allow myself coffee too. Going to take IM8 for the spermadine and a small dose of creatine.

I’m out of practise, it’s been over a year, so I may try a short 48 hours first before attempting something a bit more ambitious in a couple of weeks. Will keep monitoring weight and bloods throughout! (Starting at 160lbs)

150lbs.
More to follow.

Doctor’s confirmed today: my diabetes is now under control. I’m down to 153lbs with the help of 1 x Dapagliflozin pill a day. The three things I did:

• Stopped having rice dishes, stopped having baked potatoes.
• Gave up soft drinks: occasionally I’ll still have a can, and more than occasionally I’ll have a sweet coffee now (a few times a week), but instead I’m drinking around 3l of water a day.
• Walked – a little. Not every day. But with the dogs, I get about a mile a day in anyway.

I’m not obsessively checking my blood sugar anymore. I haven’t fasted for a while now – the problem is rebound glucose spikes when you eat afterwards (although I am bound to at some point, and will just have to account for that, and reintroduce food slowly). Oddly, I don’t feel any different in myself, it’s not like I’ve suddenly got boundless energy or anything, but at least I know “I’m safe” for now. And that’s worth celebrating, I’m back to where I started all those years ago.

Here’s what I’ve learned about my blood glucose. Initially before the fast after Christmas it was in high and dangerous double figures mmol/l – 18s and 19s. Since the fast, if I eat something sugary, my levels will go up to 12 or 14, but will come down slowly over the course of the next 12 hours or so to a baseline level of around 7.5-7.8. Some days I’m getting 6s and 5s. I have no doubt that the fast after Christmas is what helped me get there.

I am fasting again this weekend in an attempt to bring my baseline levels into the 6s. I also need to lose 10% of my body weight which – given I was 170lbs when I was diagnosed, means I am aiming for 153lbs. I am at 159lbs at the moment. Hoping to get into ketosis soon, and drop some more weight. Then soup and bone broth for the rest of the week. Will check back in soon!

I wanted to attempt a 5 day water fast, but started to feel a little off balance around 90 hours in, so broke at 92 hours with some vegetable broth and a handful of nuts. Strangely, I started to feel actual hunger around 88 hours, which isn’t meant to happen, but anyway.

This was my longest fast to date, and I was in heavy ketosis that even the urine strips picked up on by 60 hours. It was pretty easy going, the first 24 hours were nothing, a little irritable by 36 hours, but the rest went by without incident. I think my main problem was intense boredom, nothing I did seemed to keep me interested for long – every TV show seemed to drag, every game seemed pointless, every book seemed like word salad.

It’s strange to break a fast so late in the evening when I’d normally have just powered through until waking up the next day. Will be weighing in tomorrow. It has rapidly decreased my blood glucose but not to any normal level (6.7 mmol/l pre-meal, 9.5 directly post-meal). Update on vitals first thing tomorrow.

Getting diagnosed as diabetic just before Christmas (and receiving my medication on Christmas Eve) was a bit of a shock as my blood glucose levels have never been anything but normal.

I think switching to a diet that consisted mainly of takeaway fried rice and baked potatoes (in the naive belief I was eating healthier) pushed me over the limit. I refused to start taking my medication over Christmas (metformin) due to the reported side effects, took it on Boxing Day with very few side effects, but started a fast on the 27th and you’re not meant to take metformin whilst fasting (is what I read on the internet).

Dropped a couple of pounds during the fast but as always, that will be water weight. 162lbs at the moment. Which is still 18lbs down on last year so I should be happy with myself. Blood glucose dropped to 8 mmol/l at 40 hours, and oddly back up to 9.6 mmol/l at 44 hours despite not eating anything, so I have some research to do!

Want to control this through diet and not through medication if we can. May well be checking in here more frequently!

The good news is, through diet and exercise, I got down to 12st this year (168lbs).

The bad news is, my blood sugar level is off the charts. An HbA1c of 88 mmol/mol.

Lots of lifestyle changes to be made, most importantly, off to see the doctor on Tuesday.

9 months later and still steady at 180lbs, which is still a lot more than I should weigh. But I’m post-menopause now, so the hormones that were messing me around and making me feed my face have settled down somewhat.

They say it’s harder to lose weight post-menopause, so that sucks. Kicking off with a fast (36 hours in, wiill finish when I finish) then onto soup diet until I get fed up of soup diet.

I’m not a fan of soup at all really, but after a fast, it tastes like the most delicious thing in the world.

I wouldn’t say fasting has got any more difficult. I still get that crippling hunger pang around 18 hours in, but provided I go to bed pretty soon after, I wake up not-hungry the next day.

Doing some mild exercise walking the dog every day. This is of course what I call my ‘pre-Christmas weight loss’ which is immediately regained at Christmas, but better to be the right side of the scales going in.

What I’d love is to get down to 10st for my 50th birthday, and that’s doable, at a sensible rate. 26 weeks, even at 1 pound a week, I can get down to 11st. So that’s an action plan. If I can get down to what I was when I started this blog – bonus! As the kids say without punctuation these days “Lets goooo!”