1st Month

Okay, so it's a little longer than one month but it's a rough estimate.

I have lost 7lb in weight so far and have changed the way I eat to something more sustainable. I have also started the Couch to 5k plan for running / training and am up to week 5, with my first big run tomorrow - 20 minutes non stop (and yes, I'm nervous).

I use the 'My FitnessPal' Android app to track my calories in the foods I eat and weigh out the amounts for breakfast cereal and pasta. After using it for a few weeks I started to get the idea and don't track on the app anymore, but still use it once in a while to look something up. It looks at your weight & advises you how many calories you should have a day, and also when you are slightly under it tells you what weight you'll be if you keep it up - which so far has been pretty accurate! It's also helped me to stop drinking cider during the week as once you know the calorie cost you can make a decision - for example last night I chose to have 2 drinks and enjoyed them. Before starting this I'd have 2 drinks most nights and many more at weekends.

I've not stopped eating anything in particular, just in moderation. I had fish & chips from the takeaway once and also a chinese takeaway, - in fact the day after the chinese I'd lost 2lb that week! As long as you control portion sizes and avoid the deep fried rubbish, it's still possible to do it. I also eat biscuits at my mums house twice a week and have had one cadbury's cream egg so far - with many more planned (what? It's a weakness!). We eat a lot of salads for evening meals but rather than the salards we used to have with all the fattening bits, we have lettuce, cucumber, tomato, watercress, seeds, flaked nuts, dried fruit, avocado etc - enough so it's filling and they are all good sources of good fats rather than crappy empty fats. Also? Really tasty ;) We eat fruit for pudding, and bananas on run days.

The Couch to 5k plan is amazing. In the first week you run for 60 seconds and walk for 90, and repeat for 20 minutes (with 5 minutes walking either end to warm up and cool down). Next week the run is 90 seconds. By week 3 you're running for 3 minutes, and now at week 5 my last run was 8 minutes twice, with a 5 minute walk in between. You run every other day, with a rest day in between, and once a week we have 2 days off. My husband Justin is doing it too and is noticeably thinner and fitter - he's also lost 7lb since we started, and didn't have as far to go as me ;) My mum also runs with me and although she's a uk size 10 & healthy weight, she is 72, so is doing well!

The things we want to eat have changed. I think we now associate good=healthy. The day after our chinese, my mum talked about needing to go buy a cucmber and some tomatoes and we both said 'mmmmm!' - we were craving healthy foods. It's such a nice feeling to be satisfied but not stuffed and heavy. The foods we used to eat made us sluggish and we both have lots more energy now we're eating lighter foods. It's exciting to eat this way, and we don't feel worse afterwards!

Looking forward, I'm excited to weigh myself tomorrow - if I haven't lost weight, I kknow I've lost inches, and my clothes are looking better. I'm apprehensive about the 20 minute run but know that in the next few weeks, I'll be running for 30 - it's a 9 week program so I'm more than half-way through. I want to start introducing a weight lifting / yoga gentle routine for my rest days from running to help tone up the upper body a bit more - I want my saggy arms to go! - and at the moment I walk to my mums twice a week which is 20 minutes each way - although it already appears to be 15 minutes each way already. As the weather gets warmer & sunnier we'll be spending more weekends digging in the allotment and going out for walks by the river so it'll be easy to get more 'accidental' exercise. What will be tricky will be not eating out at every pub we pass - but it'll be an interesting challenge to go for healthy vegetarian options with smaller portion sizes. I'm excited to think that before long I'll be able to go running by the river like you see 'real' runners do - at the moment I run slower than I walk, I think! :D