Yes ssure. ..someone else put it on previously. I’d never heard of it. I also am never happier than in on or beside water. Must get our kayak out for a paddle too.
Autocorrect can be very mischievous H 🙂
P

In which case, Respect and congratulations!

Wow, SSure

I am so impressed with your long term commitment to fasting and sticking to it through your menopause changes. Congratulations, and super well done. 😆 Regarding hot flushes, I haven’t experienced anything like what you describe. It may be the luck of the genetic lottery.

Many years ago, I discovered that reducing fat, sugar, and chocolate intake each month had a positive impact on PMT. So, I carried on during the change.

I noticed that every time I ate something sugary, I broke out in a sweat. This may just be my addictive response to sugar and how it played out during the time of change. Have you noticed any correlation between type of food eaten, and hot flushes?

Bay 🙂

Congratulations SSure, that is amazing!

BTW re menopausal symptoms – . I am 64 and don’t have anything now except the occasional nights difficulty sleeping when I ger anxious about something. Light at the end of the tunnel!

Hi Carolann
I’ll give you permission to take care of yourself. If fasting will ultimately make you feel better, then do it, but if you can’t that’s ok too. Just choose really low cal soups or salads without carbs. It is hard to avoid food with few distractions, so just choose wisely 😉 You need to drink plenty too as you don’t want to be constipated post op.

I hope the recovery is speedy and painless. You’ll soon be up and moving again. All the best. P

@Well done Ssure. 4 winters… So far I have only been a “fair weather faster” ie been fasting since 2012 but always stopped in the winter due to feeling too cold. This year I want to keep going through the cold season as I find maintaining soooo much easier than having to lose weight. I will just have to deal with the cold. I am still experimenting with maintaining.

I’m off to sleep – fast day tomorrow. :-))

Thanks PVE and Lichtle – I have decided to stick with the fast. It’s 11.30am now and I am really struggling but have told myself to wait until at least 12.30 before I eat. Amazing how quickly our bodies adapt to that constant intake of food! Haven’t struggled like this for so long. Cheers all.

Morning (here at least, although it’s so dark still you wouldn’t know it!) All,

Ssure, I hadn’t realised you were such a veteran faster. Proof, if anyone needed it, that this is sustainable! A role model for us all.

Carol, you’ve just had major surgery, I’m not sure you should worry about fasting. If your body says feed me, or fasting’s too hard, I’d go with the flow. It wouldn’t be the end of the world if you gained a few lbs anyway, as you could always lose them again when you’re feeling stronger. Like the others say, make good food choices and you will hopefully maintain without fasting anyway. All the best for a speedy recovery.

P, I don’t think I have any immediately pre 5:2 pictures (friends and family will I’m sure, but I haven’t yet asked if anyone has pictures of me as a heffalump..). If I’d known 5:2 was going to work so well, I’d have bared all (well nearly!) for a true ‘before’ photo. Are you back on line now?

Lichtle, my new favourite things are a pair of sheepskin house boots. Very toasty, although they haven’t been truly tested yet! I’m hoping not to get chilblains this winter now….

On the subject of winter, I notice that my food preferences are definitely changing. There’s no getting away from the evolutionary urge to carb load and lay down fat in advance of the hard times…!

Thanks everyone, I didn’t eat til about 2pm and have just had an egg on toast followed by a small blood orange for tea so feeling pretty pleased with myself. It was hard this morning though after 9 days of non fasting. I did get peckish later in the afternoon and had a small carrot. I didn’t bother to calculate calories. So all in all I’m Happy!

Your cat issues sound like ours PVE except we have to keep the dog away from the possums.

Hi all
I am fasting today and looking forward to it / enjoying it at the moment. I have had far too much sweet food this weekend, hence feeling the need to fastcleanse.

I have noticed that when eating sugary stuff now that I get a sensation of “too sweet” at the back of the throat, which I have never ever experienced. I used to be able to eat a box of 250g Belgian chocolates in one sitting – now I manage about a quarter. I am certain this is the result of fasting since June and I am hoping the trend continues. I am going to purchase the book: ‘Fat Chance, The Hidden Truth about Sugar’, which I have seen mentioned and has great reviews on amazon. I am hoping this will assist me in being put off sugar. I have to say that on fasting days I never have any sugar craving but definitely at the weekend when I still regard them as “treats”.

So far we have not really had a bad cold spell – today sunny 16 degrees – so fasting no problem – and yes @happy, I also possess a pair of sheep skin booties as slippers. Three years ago I had chillblanes and no idea what it was until I saw a doctor. I was shocked that this was possible in our centrally heated houses. Now I am ultra vigilant to not let it get to that state. I even have a secret hot water bottle under my desk at work and when I can’t feel my feet any more I make a stealth journey to the kitchen with hot water bottle hidden in cardigan to be filled with hot water from kettle. Somehow I manage to get it back to under my desk without being noticed (not wholly successful all the time) and boy is it great when my feet warm up. Well, a reputation of excentricity has never done anybody any harm, has it?

@purple, definitely a good motivator to look at old pictures and good idea to maybe fix on fridge on fast days only. Oh and pineapple juice works excellent to speed up the process – well done with Charlie 2.

@carolannfud be kind to yourself fasting – semifasting – or not!!!

Thank you all for the 4th Winter congratulations – the realisation was prompted by a combination of writing about the clock change and because DH and I had been sorting through which work/social Christmas Dinners we’d like to accept/decline.

Before I had the regular heat episodes that I now have, I used to stash microwavable hot bottles in various locales so that I’d always have access to one. Not that one was ever enough, I always wanted one for my back, another for my feet, and a muff-refuge one for my hands that I could pop them into in-between tasks or for a brief respite when typing.

NB – sheepskin booties as slippers have their cosy place but
Glerups dk
range of footwear has to be worn to be believed. Outstanding. I can’t recommend it highly enough for people who can barely feel their feet for much of the year because they’re so icy.

PVE – 🙂 Even with electric blankets, the temperature drop I used to experience in the vanishingly brief period between undressing and diving into bed had to be experienced to be believed (I’m sure that other people on this thread know what I’m talking about).

As for heating, we’ve always pitched it at a temperature to suit DH (and our budget). Much of the UK is so humid and damp that it costs a small fortune to heat most homes.

Plus, I use public transport for most of my commute/activities (aside from kayaking) and it’s not unusual for that to be cold, damp, or to strand you somewhere without shelter for several hours. (3 nights out of 5 in a spectacularly unlucky week.)

I see other women travel to work with statement handbags. I travel with a kitbag or rucksack – both to contain the papers I normally need and to tote my changes of clothing, additional fleece and a full kit of waterproofs (in addition to the ‘in case of being stranded’ bottle of water and snack).

Sorry Ssure and Lichtle 😉
I was being facetious 😉
I have been in the UK in winter. My aunt’s home in London was SO overheated (costs her a fortune, ruins the planet) I was getting around in short sleeves. My cousin’s was bitterly cold.
I have also lived in cold places here and know all about chillblanes!
We don’t believe in aircon, so live with the full force of whatever the weather throws at us. I agree, I like to experience the changes of seasons too.
Warmth and cheers to ky MC mates P 🙂

Hi Bay,

On the basis that I’m not going to get larger again, and realistically probably won’t get significantly smaller, I’m also faced with the same expensive problem! To be honest I could do without the expense, but I’m not prepared to put the weight back on to fit the old wardrobe!

Yes, I mentally committed myself to my current size, buying new Sculpt and (bum?) Lift Skinny Jeans, two tops (and new lingerie:-)) whilst getting rid of quite a few items in my wardrobe. I don’t like to have anything in my wardrobe (or elsewhere) that is not used/worn/read within a year (pictures and a few decorative items are allowed.) Am possibly slightly obsessive wanting to become a minimalist. Not really achievable because.DH does not share my obsession.

Ah, well I have to fight hoarding tendencies thanks to my Mum! She never let us get rid of anything (except clothes that we’d grown out of), and when I got my own home brought endless boxes of stuff I’d tried to throw out 20 years previously… Helpful!

Anyway, for me, the prospect of incarceration in an OP home, being force fed and having to wear a dead fat old lady’s dresses (because I threw mine out 30 years previously) thankfully seems somewhat remote 🙂 So I can’t use that as an excuse to hang on to outsize clothes!

Also, subject to still being able to make my own food choices and continue intermittent fasting, there should be no reason for me to get fat again. So why not be brave and downsize the wardrobe…?

But wait! I’ve not reached menopause yet and I understand that my middle will thicken. Ah ha! So I will need bigger waistbands in the future? A reason to hold on to the outsize trousers at least!

Thank you – you’re all brilliant – and actually saying more or less the same as me. I too have a basic wardrobe which doesn’t vary much – black trousers, material according to season, plus tops, t shirts and lots of scarves (one size fits all) cost this year has been mainly in trousers, (Yes, ‘lift and sculpt’ for me too!) pants and bras, and a couple of jackets – lovely to have but still feels extravagant.
Mainly you’ve put my OP home paranoia into perspective – thanks! So I shall continue to hang onto 2 pairs of trousers and 1 skirt (never wear them but feel I should own one!)one size up, but shall edit ruthlessly and ditch any extras. Should be a good brake on those odd days when you just want to say blow it all and comfort eat…

Oh, and good job I’m quite small now as the man next to me is really quite large. Still, I will have a sore back by the end of the journey, for not being able to sit squarely in my seat. Perhaps I should but a paper copy of the Fast Diet and casually leave it cover up while I pfaff with my phone…

@happy my parents are horders so are my inlaws. Even visiting I find difficult – I get a kind of suffocating sensation which makes me think I have a problem. After visiting them I get home and do (yet another) clear out even though there is hardly anything left. My wardrobe has to be half full at any time so that hangers can move around and all clothes are easily visible. My mother sees belongings as a safety blanket – I see them as baggage to be carried through life.
We are all affected by our upbringing in different ways as Hermaj so aptly pointed to a poem a few months back.

Was that a Larkin poem, Lichtle?

Still baking the Christmas Cakes 🙂 I’ve fewer than 20 left to bake off so I’m definitely on the downward slope now.

During November, I’ll be preparing the fruit for the Keep Cakes and Figgy Loaves that can’t be baked until December. I should also take a look at which cookie batters I can freeze to bake off nearer the time.

A propos the Old People’s Home discussion 🙂 In my family, you either die early or you remain remarkably healthy until you die at an advanced age so I have no particular plans to be warehoused and fretting about whether I shall have clothes that fit me. I may be wrong and recall this conversation in a rueful manner as I’m attempting to staple a bed sheet into a day toga.

@ssure, well done – the end is nigh (Christmas cake baking of course). Very good idea to freeze cookie batters to make as and when needed. I did like the Dan Lepard Orange Stollen recipe you suggested and will definitely make this year.

I am with you not to fret over care home situation as yet, don’t think any clothes I have now would be suitable then/there anyway.

Hope you don’t mind me butting in, Lichtle.

Indeed it was Larkin’s This Be the Verse, Ssure.

And this be the great man himself reading it. Enjoy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rjRYSfCJvM

Go for it, JIP, knock ’em dead with your lovely pink chinos. They obviously make you look and feel great. Do you by any chance team them with a darker top for extra dramatic effect?

I bet there’s no way you look like mutton dressed up. The MDU look is usually the result not so much of what a woman wears – although mini-mini-skirts, known in some parts of the country as ‘pussy pelmets’ should be off limits to anyone aged much more than 17 🙂 – it’s more about applying make-up with a trowel, having monstrously back-combed hair, and continuing to wear the same make-up they used when they were teenagers, e.g. women who were young in the 60s still wearing Cleopatra eyes with masses of black eye-liner.

I wouldn’t wear pink pants myself, but only because my round bum would look the back end of a piglet. Oink oink!

Happy, there was an unhappy period in my life when I was porcine at both ends. Considerably larger pig’s bum one end, big fat face with little piggy eyes caused by 2 1/2 years on steroids at the other. It was a low and ever-decreasing dose but it still made me look like s***t.

BTW, I genuinely do like pigs. I think they are beautiful, intelligent creatures. Winston Churchill reportedly said: “I am fond of pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals.”

JIP, you’ve made my head hurt with how old you do/ did/ will look…! Hats off as you are also one of our veteran maintainers.

Ssure, not sure they’d let you have a stapler. You’d best practice fixing your toga with toe nails and hair…
🙂

Hermaj, sorry to hear about your steroid period. That won’t have done much for your body confidence.

On the subject of pigs though, do you even extend warm feelings to NaNapoleon? 🙂

P, hope there’s no lasting damage from your day as a lady? I’m very much a sensible shoe person, never really got the hang of tottering around in heels.