sugar, sugar...

I read something terrifying today: according to this article, Britain spends more on obesity-related healthcare costs than on the police, the fire service, prisons and the criminal justice system combined, he says. Obesity-related conditions cost the NHS £6bn a year and rising. The diabetes bill is £9bn more. Type 2 diabetes now accounts for 10% of the entire budget of the NHS. More than 65% of all men in the UK aged 16 or over is now either overweight or obese.

Those are some frightening statistics.

I have a slightly different problem: I think I'm losing weight again.  I've written about this before, but I struggle to see myself as thin.  Since the age of about seven or eight, I've generally been big for my age.  I was tall, rather than particularly fat, but children tend to see things in absolutes, and if you have big feet and take a bigger size of shorts than they do, then you're fat.  I think this set my body-image fairly early, but it's also true that I have been about 40kg heavier than I am now. I lost that weight fairly steadily over a number of years, but I've never quite shaken that picture of myself as big.

Still, the fact remains that, by most people's estimation, I am pretty thin.  You can count my ribs and everything. I eat absolutely loads - especially bread - but I just can't put weight on.

It's probably all that running I do.

Anyway.  I'm about 4 weeks into marathon training -- sponsor us HERE -- I've upped my mileage and have covered about 120 miles so far this month.  And, well.... my trousers feel a bit loose.

I mentioned this to a colleague this afternoon, and she asked me if I'd started eating more to cover the extra calories I'm burning up in marathon training.
"Um.  Well, I eat loads"
"Yes, but have you started eating more?"
"No.  But I eat loads"
"And you're wondering why you might be losing weight? You need to look after yourself."

She's right, of course.  I've acted on her advice immediately and had sausages for tea.  I'm planning bacon and maybe black pudding for my breakfast.  That's a start (albeit absolutely no different to what I eat every week).  My mother-in-law is coming over for a visit next weekend too, and she's threatening to stock the freezer.  As she's an excellent cook, this is a most welcome development indeed.

I understand that there are also calories in beer?

I need to look into this.

bluffin' with my muffin....

Yesterday, I found myself in the slightly unusual position of being called fat. For a man of my body fat percentage who has spent much of the last six months training for a marathon, this was a somewhat unexpected turn of events. It happened at the interval training session when one of my running buddies grabbed me from behind – you’ll notice that she was finishing the interval behind me – and grappled with my love handles. My muffin top isn’t exactly extensive, but she found it and took great delight in pointing it out to everyone whilst emitting a proper belly laugh. Now what’s this if it’s not body shaming? I refuse to allow this bullying to dent the confidence I have in my beach-ready body.

As if this wasn’t enough, she also called me old.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but even though you’re only a couple of years older than my husband, I think of you much more like I think of my dad”

Charming.

She wants to run a half marathon with me later in the year AND asked for the details of the job in my team that I’m recruiting for at the moment.

Maybe this is just the way that people from North Derbyshire express their respect and admiration for someone?

The cheeky northern monkey.

smaller and smaller and smaller....

 
Over the years, I've lost quite a bit of weight.  I won't bore you with the story again because I've told it here many times.  Suffice it to say that, over the last fifteen years and without ever really trying, I've lost something in the region of 8 stone / 50kg / 112lbs.

Needless to say, over the years, this has necessitated some wardrobe changes.  Contrary to what you might imagine, this isn't just because I'm now a lot thinner than I used to be (although the last pair of jeans I bought have a 9" smaller waist than the ones I used to buy, which seems remarkable to me).  I also seem to have changed body shape too.  When I was a teenager, I played quite a lot of rugby and I played in the second row: it was the obvious place for someone of my height and general build.  If I was to start playing again now, I'm not sure where they'd put me, but I'm fairly certain I no longer have the heft required for the engine room of the pack.

Whenever I weigh myself, I often joke that I haven't been this light since I was coming up the other way, aged about 17.  I've just discovered that this isn't true either.

I bought a denim jacket when I was about fourteen years old.  It was a black Levi 501 jacket and I loved it to bits.  For years and years and years it had a little Iron Maiden "Powerslave" button badge on the breast pocket, and -- when I wasn't wearing my cheap leather biker jacket -- I wore it pretty much all the way through school and through University.  I was never quite able to bring myself to chuck it out, either... so, even though I haven't worn it in years, it's been kicking around the house in deep storage somewhere.

I dug it out the other day because it's a cool jacket and I thought I might start wearing it again.  Only it doesn't fit.  It's way, way too big and, when buttoned up, absolutely swamps me.

So, to recap: a jacket I bought when I was fourteen years old doesn't fit me because it's far too large for the forty-one year old me.

Is it meant to be this way around?