Notes by Nectar

My week 5 update was posted at the end of August – I was away for almost 3 weeks after that, and now it’s time to get back on the wagon. I’m saying this is week 6 because the last 3-4 weeks have been a blip. I was in Lagos, and I was incredibly lazy. Not intentionally though – I did take my gym stuff thinking that I’d get to work out at least a couple of times a week, but it never happened. Now I’ve decided that unless I’m training for a marathon, I’m never taking my gym stuff on holiday with me! So my routine on holiday was: wake up, move from my bed, to my sister’s bed, to the sofa, to the car, and then back again in reverse order, sleep. Not good. And that doesn’t even include all the eating I did – Lebanese, Japanese, Chinese, Mexican, Italian, Indian – you name it, I ate it.

So. Back to reality.

Last week was… interesting.

A few weeks ago I’d bought a Groupon deal for three sessions of gastric band hypnotherapy. I made my appointments for the three sessions and had my first session on Tuesday. I had no idea what to expect.

The hypnotherapist is young – she must be in her mid 30s. I expected to be hypnotised, told never to eat again, and be sent on my way – three times. Instead, she asked me about my eating habits, what meals were like when I was a child, what my relationship with my mother was like, how stressed I was, and any other issues going on in my life. I felt like I was in actual therapy. Let me say that I woke up on Tuesday feeling a little… cranky. I was tired and just felt upset for no apparent reason. And then having this person ask me all these questions about my childhood and relationship with my parents and food made me more upset. She must be used to her clients shedding a few tears in their sessions because she didn’t seem surprised. At all. After I felt a bit more ‘normal’ (if that’s possible), she made me sit in the most comfortable chair in the world. I lay back, closed my eyes and listened to her talking, telling me what to visualise, and to count back from 500. It wasn’t a full session – it was more for her to figure out what my trance level is – how long it would take me to fall into the trance, etc. When we were finished she said I had a great trance level. To be honest, I didn’t feel any different while I was in the trance – she asked me questions, I answered them. I felt like I could have gotten up and walked out of her office if I’d wanted to. She said the real hypnosis sessions would start the following week. I still don’t know what to expect.

The second interesting thing was that I got a call from LA Fitness offering me a free session with a personal trainer as part of my membership deal – would I be interested? Oh, yes please. They said one of their trainers would call me within the next couple of days to arrange a date and time. The trainer, Gus, did call and we did set up a time – and I had my first session on Friday morning before work.

I met him at the gym at 8am – we spent the first 30 minutes in the office, talking about what I wanted to achieve, my eating habits, my non-existent exercise habits, my sleeping habits and work. He said he could guarantee I’d lose 10 kilos by Christmas if I had two sessions with him each week and changed my diet. That’s great – but I don’t have that kind of money to spend each week on a trainer – so he said I could probably do it with one session a week but did three other sessions at the gym on my own. Yes, I can do that. The changes to my diet: no bread, have a banana and a teaspoon of almond butter for breakfast, nuts as a mid-morning snack, protein for lunch, no carbs at night. Hmm. No carbs at night, trainer’s delight. OK. Get 8 hours of sleep each night. Does anyone get 8 hours of sleep a night? I’m lucky if I get more than 6 hours. ‘Let’s hit the gym,’ he said. ‘Wait,’ I said. ‘We haven’t talked about alcohol.’ (If I’m going to do this, I’m going to do it properly.) He asked me what I normally drink when I go out – usually white wine or vodka with soda. ‘Ditch the wine.’ Dammit.

We went into one of the studios where I spent the next 15 minutes alternating between sets of 20 lunges and 20 squats, with weights. Then walking lunges across the room – forwards and backwards. We then went out to the weights area in the gym where we did some upper body work (incorporating more lunges and squats). And then the session was over. Did I want to train with him again? I made an appointment for the following Tuesday. By the time I got to the office my legs felt like jelly and I knew I was going to be in serious trouble this weekend. Each time I sat down or stood up it felt like I was doing another squat. My body was in shock.

But the pain on Friday was nothing compared to the pain on Saturday. It’s always worse the day after, isn’t it? On Saturday my thighs were on fire. And not in a good way. I wanted to weep each time I moved – I felt like my thigh muscles had turned into razor blades inside my body. I could barely walk. I felt like Bambi – shaky and unsteady. It was horrible. Looking back at what Gus said – how am I supposed to fit in three sessions on my own at the gym if I can’t even get there? On the positive side, I stayed away from carbs on Saturday night – almost unheard of for me.

I woke up on Sunday still in pain – but nothing like the pain of Saturday. And the pain was reduced further when my cousin gave me a couple of Nurofen capsules on Sunday night when we were at the pub. God bless her.

Hopefully this will get easier!!

Read more updates here.