Currently India is going through a worst phase with pandemic. There is a lot of negativity in the air. People are scared and living in fear of COVID. There is bad news everywhere. I personally got to know about six deaths in a matter of 12 hours. It upset me no end.
There are people who are really working very hard to make the situation better. They are going out of their way to help needy and make things tolerable. And then there are people who are being very irresponsible and doing and saying things which is adding misery to people. Especially our politicians!
The second wave of COVID was emerging and still our politicians held election campaign rallies which was attended by hundred thousands of people. Every big name in the country held an election rally.
A huge religious gathering which required mammoth administrative support was carried out. The government could have put a stop to it as in no way they were not aware of it as the administrative staff is sanctioned from their end. It was when people criticised it severely, our Prime Minister “requested” the religious saints to close the gathering. This was not a situation where requests should have been made but an order should have been given. it shouldn’t have taken place in the first place. Our Prime Minister is well capable and mighty to do that but he preferred to bow down to religious sects as that is aligned with his political ideology.
Instead of coming together and fighting for people our politicians are busy fighting each other and trying to oust opponents. They are busy saving their administrations and not helping people.
This was a golden opportunity for our politicians to shine and prove and do something for our nation. Sadly, not a single politician chose to do so and the India as a nation have no choice but fight for our own survival and just say how can they stoop so low?
The first thought that came to my mind when I saw “Difference” as this week’s prompt was about the feeling of freedom that I am experiencing today compared to yesterday. Our decisions make huge difference to our life.
Like millions in the world, I decided to lose weight in the new year and joined a weight loss program. For a week or two on the plan, I was really high on motivation but it started to wither down by week three or four. It was not because of the diet but mainly because of lack of results. I started to lose patience.
The program had a week of strict program and then a 10 days of comparatively relaxed eating. I had been on this nutritionist’s program few years back and saw great results. However this time around my views regarding food have changed and that “difference” made it difficult for me to accept this plan. One thing that always kept lurking in my mind was this is all coming back once I am off the program. I would get great results in week of strict plan and then I would find a gain in relaxed plan.
The last week I was again on a stricter plan and I followed it to the T . I checked my weight and I saw a loss of 1.1 kilo of fat loss . I sent my results and diet log to my nutritionist. She wrote me back I am doing so well but you have had 15 grapes on Tuesday and that should be avoided. That moment I decided to stop and discontinue the program.
I did see the results but I wasn’t particularly happy or kicked about it as by now I know very well it is not sustainable. Grapes will never figure in my favourite foods list but if I cant have a few of them then it is not worth it. I cant keep adding new items to foods to fear as this fear stays on even if your plan gets over and you are always eating these foods feeling guilty. You should feel happy about what you eat and not guilty.
I wont be exactly going on a binge. I will continue to eat healthy but allowing myself to little treat. I have had a year where I couldn’t eat because I was too sick and then I had a lot of dietary restrictions. There is no point or restricting my food when I am in pink of health now and can eat. Life has become very unpredictable and we must respect what is available to us. You may not see tomorrow, you may not have anything to eat or food will be there but you won’t be able to eat for health reasons. So respect what you have. Treat your body with respect and take care of what goes in it.
I can feel the difference that my decision made today. I feel relaxed. I had my coffee with sugar and enjoyed without thinking oh! I am going to get a red remark for this.
I am genetically pleasantly plump and so a chronic dieter. I don’t remember being thin ever in my life. I was a stick when I fell sick but I was in no position to enjoy my thinness, in fact I hated looking at myself like that.
After my kidney transplant, my health improved and so did my size. Now I had no dietary restrictions and eat whatever I could and I devoured every bite and every sip. I am on steroids and will be taking them for life to keep my transplanted kidney safe from rejection. Steroids give you what they call a moon face , basically your face blows up and also make you gain weight faster than you would like. I am just giving reasons. I actually ate to my hearts content and all the medicines have added their bit and now I find myself on a weight loss program.
As per my new year resolution I enrolled myself for a weight loss program, with a nutritionist. I have worked with her in the past and had success with weight loss so she was a natural choice.
As we started with my plan, after a week or two she put me on GM Diet to get my system working. GM diet is a popular diet developed by General Motors Corporations for their employees. There is a lot of material on internet for GM diet. You can read more about it from this link
I have done GM diet previously and I was ok to do it one more time as I had seen good results. I decided to start the GM diet on Saturday and bought all the stuff needed.
Day 1 – You have to eat only fruits on Day 1. It was quite easy actually. I was given a list of preferred fruits and I obliged. Barring evening I didn’t feel any weakness or cravings. I was all right. I slept peacefully but around 1:30 in the night I woke up with bad acidity. I threw up once or twice and felt better. It lasted for 20 minutes and then it got worse. I had bad case of diarrhoea. For next two hours I was continuously throwing up and had loose motions. It became so bad that I wanted my husband to take me to the hospital. By 4:30 in the morning I was so exhausted I just fell asleep.
Day 2 : I woke up feeling tired and was wondering if I should continue with the GM plan. Then I weighed myself and I saw a loss of 1 kg. The diarrhoea was worth it 🙂 I had tea and few biscuits and called my Nutritionist , she told me to continue if feeling better as the day 1 is normally the toughest and I was already done with it. I decided to continue. On day 2 you can eat only vegetables. As she said it was an easier day. It went pretty smoothly.
Day 3 : I saw a gain. It was disappointing. It was all water weight loss thanks to diarrhoea. Day 3 was fruits and vegetables and I enjoyed it. It was not a very difficult day
Day 4 : No change in the weight. Day 4 you can have 600 ML cow milk and maximum of 8 bananas. Its a torturous day for people who hate bananas. Luckily I like bananas but still found this a hard day. It was monotonous taste wise and having so much milk and banana is not really appetising. I really wanted to cheat but I didn’t. I was looking forward for Day 5 which is a feast
Day 5 : Slight change in the weight but nothing great. Day 5 is feast as you can have proteins and milk but the worst part is having 8 tomatoes. I don’t like tomatoes. I rarely eat them raw. I made a really thick soup and added few in my omelettes and chicken preparations. This was a good day overall. No cravings as you have a lot of options to eat.
Day 6 : You can have fruit in addition of Day 5 options and thankfully no tomatoes. I had slight change in the weight. I was bit disappointed with weight loss as it was not as what I had in my previous attempts. I was hoping for a better fat loss. My nutritionist has a really good body fat monitor and I was hoping to see a good fat loss.
Day 7 : Judgement Day: you can have rice on this day. Party time!!!! I went to my nutritionist’s clinic with great hope and anticipation. I did my body fat composition and was heartbroken! I lost 500 grams of fat and only 800 grams of weight. I felt like Kate from This is Us, who works hard on her diet and sees a less than expected results. The actor has nailed the exasperation of a person on a weighing day!
This result was no where near my previous attempts where I had lost 2 to 3 kilos in weight and around 1 kilo of fat. This wasn’t bad but not good either. My sincere suggestion to all nutritionist to keep a punching bag and boxing gloves in their office so clients like me can take out their frustrations then and there.
I still feel GM Diet is a good plan and can be done for a good detox. It helps to kick start your body in fat burning zone. Results may vary person to person as every body reacts differently depending on age, metabolic rate and other health factors.
If I have to dissect my attempt, I gave my best effort but now I am 5 years older from my last weight loss effort and have gone through terrible physical traumas. I have certain medications and physical limitations. Considering all these factors my body has really cooperated and achieve the best it could! After few months I would definitely try again!
If you like this post you will also like to read about my 10000 steps a day challenge for a month. here is the link for the same:
Today April 1, marks the beginning of new academic year for my daughter. She is in 9th grade now. She didn’t attend the physical school for a single day in 2020 thanks to corona. It has spread over in 2021 too.
When I was in school, our academic year would start on June 13, every year. My parents would buy us new school uniform, new books , shoes, raincoats and stationary. I was particularly interested in the stationary. It was compulsory for us to put brown covers on our text books and label them. It was a family event with all three siblings and our dad sitting and put covers on text book and label.
What a joy it was to go back to school after summer holidays . It is monsoon time in India and it would invariably rain on our first day of the school. Getting wet on school reopening would add to the magic of the day. Meeting friends and enjoy their company was so exciting. We didn’t have mobile phones or WhatsApp so all the more excitement of meeting friends.
I have absolutely enjoyed prepping for new academic session for my daughter. Moms get particularly excited at schools reopening as they run out of their patience with long summer holidays. Kids getting busy in their routine is much needed.
Since last year moms are not getting that breather. I wasn’t really excited with schools reopening as she still continues being home and sitting in front of the computer. The school has started classes with no text books. They simply said refer online books. I don’t need to buy new school stuff. No chance of meeting school friends, Sharing tiffins and having a laugh.
Kids are really having it hard. These are their formative years and their interactions with their friends, teachers have huge impact on how they will turn out as adults and they are missing it. Some parents have done a great job keeping their child motivated and engage them in various things and their children have also responded positively.
My daughter has managed well. She has kept herself busy mostly in her room owing to her teenage need of “privacy” and indulging in baking. She managed to do a successful bake sale too. However now she is feeling the boredom. She is craving for live group energy of her dance classes. The new normal doesn’t feel like normal for her. I am increasingly having frictions with her on how she spends her day and organises herself. She is clearly having hard time and missing normalcy of life. I cannot blame her.
As a mom I am too running out of patience having to deal with all this. All I can do is pray for things to return to as carefree as it can get!
I thought it would be interesting to see not just how everyone has coped, in last year or not, over the last year, but to share our common experiences as a way to connect, to feel a little less alone, perhaps. Basically, talk about your last year is what I’m saying, whether stream-of-consciousness style or not. Or, if you’d rather not, talk about any time period your heart desires. Without further ado, here’s your prompt for this week:
Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “day/week/month/year.” Use one, use them all, use them any way you’d like. Enjoy!
Yesterday was that day for me!
I am toying with a business ides in the area of learning & development for sometime and was doing some research around it. I have a gut feeling it may work well.
I spent my morning creating a feasibility survey about it and while doing so I got a text from my friend. She had a requirement for content creation. I offered to do it but the timelines were aggressive for submission.
When I looked at the kind of offerings they were trying to provide I knew it was not a good product. I was in no way capable of delivering everything in a week and offered to do a part of the job. I knew this wasn’t working but I really enjoyed creating outlines on what I will do and how I will so this project. It felt like back at work. I felt this was a good omen that we were discussing this project on a day I was ready to send out my survey.
It didn’t work out and my friend informed me she isn’t going ahead with the project. I didn’t react much in fact I was totally normal and relieved.
Our mind works very different though. Our mind controls our emotional responses and the timing of the same. There are multiple things that am working on. I am on a weight loss program and I really worked hard this week and was expecting a good weigh in. I went to my nutritionist and I found a gain on the scale. I was angry and in fact I was in tears. I was taken aback with my emotions. This wasn’t a normal reaction for sure. I have had worse weigh in than that day but I was extremely upset.
After some emotional scanning I realised it wasn’t about a bad weigh in, but it was about the opportunity that didn’t materialise. There have been many days like this for many of us as we are still struggling with pandemic. Fear of catching virus, isolation, feeling stuck. Things that didn’t materialised. Did you experience such emotional state in the last year where your reactions really didn’t make sense and continue to do so?
I started my day with high hopes and ambition but ended with frustration and binge eating.
Today, however is a new day and I am back on track! We should enjoy our success and go through the failures and come back on track! Happy weekend!
Miracle Moments 