What To Do When Things Go 'Pear-Shaped' on your weight loss journey - Part Four

This is Part four of a four-part series focusing on what to do when things go a little pear-shaped on your weight loss or healthier lifestyle journey, told from the perspective of my personal experience. Check out last month's post HERE.

Let’s face it. Sometimes life gets in the way and unfortunate circumstances keep you from practicing your healthy living habits. If you’ve fallen off the wagon, you’re in the right place! This week I’m talking about my experience overworking myself and gaining half a stone (about 3Kg). I still work in stones!

Moving your body is so important for overall health and wellbeing

Keep Yourself Moving

During this challenging period of time, I knew that I couldn’t do my normal exercise four times a week. I was under such a time pressure that I actually had to choose between sleeping and exercising (hint: sleep always wins).

Instead of cutting out my exercise completely, I eased myself back into the swing of things by working out for 20 minutes at a time every other day. In addition to that, I started setting an alarm on my phone for every 30 minutes that I sat at my desk.

When the alarm went off, I would stand up and do some sort of movement. Either I would walk up and down the stairs for five minutes if the weather was awful, or walk out in to the garden and take a big breath of air, or just do a really short yoga stretch sequence in the lounge.

Setting a timer for getting up and moving around can be really helpful to make sure you don't end up sitting too long.

Taking movement breaks is really important, even if it’s not formal exercise.

(Can you tell I'm also a physiotherapist...ha ha!)

Something as simple as taking your phone calls standing up instead of sitting is hugely beneficial. My husband does this all the time as he is an office worker, and it makes all the difference to him. If I'm doing an hour webinar or an initial consultation, I'll put my desk in to stand mode and I can then move as much as I need to without stiffening up.

The time pressure is short term, but healthy living habits are there for life. Thankfully for me, this was short term, but even then, it made a significant impact on my mind, my body and my weight. It was amazing the effect it had. A couple of great quotes I remember reading in relation to this that I will never forget are:

"If you are too busy to exercise, you are too busy", and;

"If you don't take time for your wellness now, you'll be forced to take time for your illness later".

Relaxing with a cup of tea can be really grounding. What do you do to unwind of a few minutes?

Keep Yourself Centered

Usually in the morning I get up at 6.15am on a work day and 7am on a weekend. I spend 40 minutes walking, before sitting quietly with a cup of tea, or I take a flask on my walk. Predictably, when I felt overwhelmed the walking started to slip. I fell into an “all or nothing” mindset and started skipping my walks and 'quiet time' altogether.

At one point I realised that I had a short loop I could do from my house with an uphill and a downhill element with a sit in the garden for five minutes with a cup of tea afterwards, and just being (or with my cat indoors if the weather isn't that great). Instead of the “all or nothing” mentality (which is a real killer), I was able to adjust and continue practicing my healthy habits. Setting myself up for success each morning was a huge part of getting me back on track so I could eventually lose the weight and feel great again.

Remember to celebrate every success of the day, however small it may be or seem to you.

All Success is Not Created Equal

While technically it may have looked like I was succeeding in my learning and career during this crazily productive period of time, what was happening wasn’t actually healthy. I was letting my values and my good habits slide. My stress was going up, my happiness was going down, and I wasn’t celebrating my little successes of the day. Thankfully, I'm back on track and living healthy and happy once again and it feels good!

So...when have you slipped in to (or back in to) the all-or-nothing mindset? How did it serve you?

What healthy practices do you incorporate in to your daily life, however small?

Please do let me know. Email your answers to me at suzanna@motivatedhealth.co.uk as I'd love to hear what you're doing to look after your mind and / or your body!

I always love to get emails from my readers. Email me at suzanna@motivatedhealth.co.uk and share your healthy habits.

Please note: This article is intended to be for educational purposes only, and does not constitute medical advice or replace professional assessment or personalised advice.

I do not hold responsibility for the information on any links to external websites within this article and information within these links/websites may change at any time or no longer be accessible. Any website pages/links added are also for education purposes only.