Get ill…look sick!
I remember the evening well, many years ago a friend of mine had just got out of hospital after suffering from a nasty bug (actually appendicitis…ouch). At the time a group of myself and best buds rented 3 flats in sunny Manchester all in the same building, and all next door to each other (a bit like in friends!). We engineered this over a couple of years until we had three flats! They were great times…times where we played darts for fun, ate rubbish, smoked things we shouldn’t have, made make shift bars in our flats and drank like fish! But too many baked bean pizzas and relaxing duvels whilst watching the BDO eventually caught up on my mate Dave!

Dave developed appendicitis! He was in hospital for a while and we were all worried (not really that worried…we knew the lad had alternative motives to being ill). When Dave eventually got out of hospital and returned back to the flats, we couldn’t believe it…Dave looked incredible! He looked like he’d been on a two week break with Mr Motivator and The Body Coach! Back to his slightly more ripped self and where had all Daves tub and excess timber gone?! We asked Dave the secret to his success and he responded…lads…”Get ill…look sick!”

  
We couldn’t believe it. Dave continued to explain this life long theory he had where a mild spot of illness (ideally mild food poisoning or a tummy bug) was something he’d considered a viable technique to shredding those late night kebabs and Big Macs! In Daves case this time his theory was essentially doused in petrol and set ablaze nearly putting the lad in a critical position (I will point out at this point that Dave didn’t actually try and put himself in hospital with the potentially very dangerous illness). Dave had just reaped the rewards of a close call and went from moonface Dave to ripped Dave!

Years have gone by when I think of this story! I think to myself…does it really wash. All the nonsense I’ve put in my body over the years seems to make it fairly resilient to tummy bugs or mild food poisoning so I can’t say I’ve ever known what happens…especially from a weight loss perspective…until now!!!

No shit (not literally obviously) last night I started with what you might describe as a mild tummy bug and may have been “ill” (we all know what this means but I don’t want to be gross!) through the night! Anyway…the net result of said tummy bug/mild poisoning was a…wait for it…4LB LOSS!!! 4lb in 24 hours!!! Insane! I know insanity was tough yesterday but that’s ridiculous!

So all my theory’s on #eatlikeaking are in fact not as solid a theory as my mate Daves age old theory of…”Get ill…look sick!”

Actually wouldn’t recommend this as feel a bit nuts today but thought I’d share none the less! 1 stone 4lb down! Bosh!

January…done! 1 stone down in under 4 weeks on my very own #eatlikeakingplan
Well…I’m not going to lie Jan was a bit of a wild one! I had a birthday weekend away in Southwold (which was incredible if you were wondering and the good folk at Adnams make awesome Gin…and beer obvs), a weekend at the nags (Peter Marsh Chase at Haydock), a weekend for no particular reason going on a local pub crawl and 6 media lunches…in a month I was trying to hold back (granted two of the lunches were in Chicken Shop…so don’t really count)!

  
Now do remember in the #eatlikeaking plan (my very own made up plan to shift that excess timber) I employ one of my golden rules…I can drink beer, and eat bread and pasta on stags (stag dos) and nags (trips to watch horses race). I’ve banned those three things ordinarily and I can honestly say it’s been fine. The birthday weekend and the nag weekend at Haydock I made special exception and tucked through more real ales/lagers and sandwiches than Andy Fordham would have done in a BDO warm up event! I did manage to pop on 2 pounds after each weekend but all in all in under 4 weeks I shifted slightly over a stone!

Now the question I hear you all asking is…is this sustainable? Abso blinking lutely! The plan has remained to have a protein heavy diet, making sure I have breakfast (think this bit is key!), lunch and dinner (or tea if your from Lancashire like me). I’ve snacked in between on anything ranging from biltong, fruit, raw veg, nuts, packets of chicken…generally high protein treats!

 

 
I’ve been in the gym 2 or three times a week doing Spin classes or Insanity workouts and getting my step count up where poss by not getting public transport everywhere, less taxis and generally been having a stroll and listening to a few tunes (re discovered my love for Stornoway, found out I liked a Justin Bieber song and even a couple of One Direction hits…slapped between the usual Ian Brown, Oasis, Chris Rea, Leonard Cohen and…Tina Arena!). So basically even when I’ve been super busy I’ve made some time to get myself to the gym or just do some walking.

 

 
I’ve been putting my food into MyFitnessPal and exercise (it manually pulls in your steps from Apple health!) and think this is where I’ve been most motivated. I’ve noticed that when I was #eattinglikeaking previously I might have gone slightly over board with double portions or trying to eat more than I would normally. I’ve been motivated to come under my calorie allowance every day and just played it like a game against myself. The fun bit is the weekends…granted I’ve not put everything in of a weekend as I’m too busy having a blinking mega time, but just for sh*ts and giggles I’ve smashed some of the beer and butties I’ve been having in. Rather depressing but makes sense that real ale has a couple of hundred cals per pint so my 15 pint session was approx 3000 cals! Oops! That might have been part of the problem to those weekends putting on a few pounds! Surprisingly Guinness only has 125 cals…but the old friend Gin and Slimline Tonic is a hero at about 60-80 cals! Also I had consumed a fair bit of prosecco on these weekends which seemed to be not too bad!

MyFitnessPal has been the thing that’s kept me focussed especially mid week and when out for lunch or dinner with clients or friends. It’s made me have an ever so slightly less carby, higher protein meal and keep my boozing to strictly gin (or just to try and avoid drinking…which is a lot easier in Jan than the rest of the year!). I’d highly recommend it just to give you a bit of focus…although I do have a friend who makes me chortle a lot when she tells me of the dominoes, chips and sherbet dib dabs she’s been putting into her myfitnesspal app whilst smashing out “Barry’s Bootcamps”…which sounds a bit too intense for me. Net result is that myfitnesspal pal doesn’t love chips, pizza and sherbet dib dabs…but the girls a hero none the less!

So one month down and now the hard work starts! Hello Feb you beautiful beast…roll on the Insanity class at lunchtime and where are my eggs for breakfast…I’m flipping starving!!!

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