Urgh, today is one of THOSE days. You know the ones, where you’ve had a visit from Bilious even though you’ve done nothing to deserve it. It’s 09:00 and I’m onto my third coffee (with a side-order of paracetamol).
You would write the whole day off but your husband just sent you a picture of your daughters out for a walk with the dog before it gets too hot, and they’re ultra-cute 🥰
Your diary is full of back-to-back meetings and you’ve got loads to do in between times, but you’ve already had to check if/when/where one of them is after you missed the last one due to general confusion.
I really need to wake up and crack on. I have so much to do it’s overwhelming and I feel like I’m procrastinating.
And then of course, comes the curveball…
There’s a buffet going begging upstairs, not the leftovers, the whole buffet, there goes my willpower!
It’s ok though!
I was looking for excuses not to go to the gym, but now I have a reason to go 😀
Overall, I’m doing really well. Let me explain…
About five months ago, I began to suffer with sciatica. This reduced my mobility even further. I couldn’t get an appointment with my GP to discuss pain management, so I was recommended to the Nurse Practitioner. I’m a big fan of nurse and pharmacist practitioners, they have a huge wealth of holistic knowledge that can be utilised, to your advantage, they also tend to have more time per appointment so there’s an opportunity to foster a relationship and get to the heart of the problem.
At this point, my BMI was 41. I don’t believe BMI is a particularly good indicator for anyone even vaguely outside of the norm, but in certain circumstances it can be useful.
In this case, I was beyond the obese range, which was quite an eye-opener. I was actually on the cusp of qualifying for bariatric surgery.
Now, I can wax lyrical about obesogenic environments, but in my case, a little knowledge makes very good excuses…
My lovely NP pointed out that there was a good chance my weight was affecting my sciatica, and had I considered losing weight? Of course I had, I’d been on various diets for years, I was a classic yo-yo dieter. I am on several medications which are known to make weight loss more difficult. The vast proportion of my work is desk-based.
I can’t get public transport to work, it’s not possible, so I get in the car drive, clock in, and barely move after that. The site I work on is so big we have a fleet of vans to get us round… and so on, and so on… The last four years (including the COVID year I literally sat on my backside and ate) have been so stressful, sticking to anything has been a Herculean task, my side gig of sewing has virtually disappeared, my get up and go, got up and went.
I’m getting bigger and bigger, and I don’t know what to do…
And NP, bless her, listened to all this and provided a shoulder to cry on.
When we got all that out of the way, she had some solutions for me ‘to think about’.
Firstly, a pain management solution that might work for me – a long term nerve pain treatment.
Secondly, had I considered Orlistat?
Well, no, I hadn’t. I’ve never considered anything medical to help me lose weight. I’m not THAT big, am I?
Yes, actually I am THAT big. And that was when it hit me like a sledgehammer. I was HUGE.
So what to do? In a daze I accepted the prescription and the review for four weeks time. I wasn’t sure I was going to take them even, but as I don’t pay for prescriptions, I got it filled and took it home.
That was 16 weeks and 2 stone ago (wow), ahem, I mean
And I really do mean it 😊
It’s not been easy, Orlistat has some pretty interesting side effects, but don’t worry, I’ll tell you all about them later!
In the meantime, if you enjoy my work, please consider buying me a coffee, I’d be most grateful and after the last few years, it might just motivate me to start growing my crafts again 🙂 Thank you so much xxx
Lentil weaving for beginners 