Weigh In, Syns & Easter

So if you read yesterday’s post, you might remember that I wasn’t feeling particularly confident about last night’s weigh in! Despite a good effort all week, where I stayed well within my syns, I had a relatively disastrous weekend filled with burgers, chips and chocolate…so I was dreading the scales to say the least! 

It turns out that, yet again, I managed to get away with it. I lost 1llb, which is hardly ground breaking but it’s still a loss and I’ll most definitely take it! It turns out that the hard work and effort I put in during the week to stay on plan must have paid off, so to say that I ‘got away with it’ is probably a bit negative. It’s not that I have tricked the scales, or I’ve got a loss that I don’t deserve, it’s simply that the lack of self control at the weekend wasn’t enough to entirely detract from the week’s successes, and that’s no bad thing! 

What it shows is that you can have a bit of both sides in your life and still loose weight. It doesn’t have to be all health food, and equally you don’t have to stuff your face full of McDonalds at every chance you get just because you’ve already had one that week. Balance, unsurprisingly, is key!

I think this is something that it takes a while to understand on the Slimming World plan, as we become very focused on what has syns in and what doesn’t. Whilst this helps lead to balance, because you know that you can have your syns, there is certainly (at the start at least) a tendency to deprive yourself of syns to try and lose more weight. Often people find themselves surprised that they’ve not lost a huge amount despite having next to no syns! Whenever this comment is made, at least one of the longer standing members will always point out that it’s probably because not enough syns have been consumed! As my consultant said last night, the syns are built into the plan for a reason! It’s important to remember that the ideal number of syns is between 5 and 8 every day, so when you’re having a seven day week with that many in in total, it’s unsurprising that your weight loss can actually slow down – your body goes into starvation mode, which leads to fat being stored at a much faster rate!

Having a balance of syns during the week last week is most likely what has saved me from a gain on the scales, because I was probably averaging about 8 syns a day Monday to Friday. Not only does this mean that I had a bit of a buffer for the weekend, but my weight loss would have been good during the week, so whatever I gained at the weekend only went some way to evening it out. Knowing and understanding this is good, but I’ve also got to be careful not to let it become a pattern, as recently I’ve noticed the weekends being a tricky area for me.

So, what’s in store for this week…well it’s Easter which doesn’t bode well! I’m away for four days with the family up in the Lake District, which comes with its own pros and cons. 

Pro…I’ll be doing lots of walking (weather dependent) and most of the food will be home cooked. I won’t be cooking every day, but I have done the food shop which means we’re stocked up on Fry Light, lean mince and plenty of eggs! 

Con…well Easter!

This was the main topic of conversation in group last night, and we have been armed with plenty of strategies to help us stay on plan next Sunday. I am well aware that one regular sized Easter egg contains upwards of 40 syns (oh dear!), there are lots of low syn alternatives and Easter absolutely doesn’t have to be a huge disaster. However, I have made the executive decision for my own sanity not to stress about eating chocolate on Easter Sunday. I will wholeheartedly take part in the Easter egg hunt that my mum has planned (and I’ll eat the chocolates I find) and I will have my Easter egg.

I’ll probably be wracked with guilt afterwards, because that’s who I am, but I am not going to deprive myself of one of my favourite family holidays! The reason for this is simple, Slimming World is for life as far as I’m concerned, it’s not just something I’m doing to lose a bit of weight, and I am not going to never have an Easter Egg again…it is something that has to be built into my plan for life because if I don’t do that I’ll probably go insane. 

I’ll do my best to level the playing field with fewer syns before I head off for my holiday, and I’ll try to do plenty of exercise when I’m there. But what I’m trying to get across is that next week will probably be the first week where I will not be entirely disappointed with a gain. A gain will simply be a physical representation of the fun I’ve had with my family, and that’s OK!