Have I been kidding myself?

When I look at myself in the mirror fully clothed in a dress, leggings & boots I think I look pretty good. A little overweight, perhaps, but mostly good. Yet the scales, tape measure & photos tell a completely different story. I'm two stone heavier than I was this time last year, my stomach is enormo & I look awful, awful, awful, totally rubbish in photos. 

Why is there such a huge disparity between what I see in the mirror & the actual reality?

Day 1/10 of the Mindful diet

Woke up feeling fab & rested after our cruise, full of energy & excited about the brand new 'diet' I'm starting today.

First off, we've been told absolutely nothing is banned- we can eat & drink absolutely whatever we want. Great! Except that's what I've pretty much been doing for the last 10 months, hence the 2 stone weight gain & why I'm here starting over again. Of course, there's a catch!

The catch is that before we put anything at all in our mouths we need to ask ourselves: 

~ Am I hungry?

~ What do I want to eat?

~ How is it going to make me feel?

~ What am I trying to achieve?

Not so easy after all but I can see where our lovely coach/ trainer is going with this. We need to step back and think about what we're doing, the consequences and the impact it will have on our goals. 

We also get a daily 10 minute exercise routine to do. My bum & hamstrings already feel stiff but it was fun, I pushed myself & my little boy joined in too.

At the end of Day 1 I'm feeling hopeful this could make a difference.

My day in food:

3* ryvitas topped with Philidelphia Lightest & banana

Home made vegetable soup (made using my souper duper soup maker).

Slice of wholemeal bread (fresh from bakery & nothing's banned, right) with olive spread.

2*  Haribo Starmix mini bags 

Home made vegetable curry with steamed jasmine rice.

Grapes & yoghurt.

Hello- my Slimming World journey

I'm following Slimming World on a mission to lose my baby weight by the end of the summer. I'm veggie so have green and extra easy days rather than red days. I started Slimming World about 6 weeks ago and have lost 9lbs so far. I love the diet as I get to eat stacks, am always full and it's easy to follow. It's more a lifestyle change than a diet. As a vegetarian I find this much, much easier to follow than Weight Watchers or any other diet.

Slimming World syn free veggie chilli

For dinner I made a Slimming World friendly Veggie Chilli which is syn free on a green or extra easy day. It's really easy to make, healthy and filling.

Fry an onion, 2 cloves of garlic and a red pepper using a few sprays of Frylite for 3 minutes. Add a tin each of chopped tomatoes, chickpeas and red kidney beans. Bring to the boil and add 2 teaspoons of chilli flakes, 2 teaspoons of dried ground coriander and 2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon. I served this with a large salad and Slimming World chips. It was luscious!

Slimming World: Today's meals

For breakfast I needed something quick, filling and, most importantly, syn free so I chose a Slimming World Hi Fi bar. I've counted this as my healthy extra B so it's syn free.

I also needed something quick and easy for lunch so I made up a tomato and herb Mug Shot and served it with an enormous superfree salad. It's kept me full all afternoon. The 1% fat Mug Shots are an absolute lifeline for anyone following Slimming World as they classed as a free food so also make a fantastic snack. You can find them in Asda by the packet food aisle.