- It has been 17 months since the end of my (follow up) WildFit programme.
- Ever since then I have struggled to keep on track and to get back into living WildFit.
The reasons for not staying WildFit are valid explanations and lousy excuses. Once again (like always) we traveled a lot even while I was still in the follow up programme. Right after the end of my first programme round we went to Budapest. It was bloody freezing (-8C !), I couldn’t find vegetables to put into my travel blender, and though we love Budapest for its vibrant scene of vegan and raw food restaurants, I had carbs. Didn’t make me feel good, but at times I ran out of options. A trip to Naples and Rome (nice buffett breakfast – I cannot resist croissants!, Italian coffee, Italien sweets..) two months later bent my rules.
Then I went to India for a few weeks to look for our future home. I actually did really well there. Knowing the place and its food options and having had the hard core practice of being there 4 months earlier while in deep spring during the first WF challenge made things easy.
The trip to Romania thereafter didn’t help. There it was not the temptation (God no!), it was the opposite: I couldn’t find food. Carbs, carbs, carbs everywhere and only. I managed pretty well though sticking mainly to raw vegetables from supermarkets and fish in restaurants. Maybe a few crepes and one or two cakes sneaked in…
In May I shot myself in the foot by taking the girls to London. Well aware that I have a supersoft spot for British junk sweets I readily gave in and indulged. Plus bagels (and cream cheese). Plus cheddar. It was bad. I’m also an avid buyer of marked down food items (so nothing goes to waste!). London supermarkets are pretty much 70% off the last hours before closure. Not good.
In addition to all this traveling we had been forced to leave our home due to water leakage caused by our building getting a major (MAJOR!) overhaul. With our apartment being very close to destruction we moved around Vienna living out of bag, taking refuge first at a friends’ who very generously took us in, had the best coffee in town and a cupboard full of sweets she wasn’t going to eat. Bad habits, welcome back! I suppose I fell back overwhelmed by the stress of being sort of on the street without a home and no plan of where to stay next or when we would be able to go back. Daily I dealt with the construction company, the project director and a plethora of not very pleasant men in order to get our place fixed up again. The girls were coping great as always, but were also stressed and a bit desperate. It was not a good situation. The deadline of the move to India was approaching and a new life plus all the preparations and negotiations regarding our future home happening. Looking back I’m surprised I didn’t break down. Probably didn’t have the energy for it.
The move to Goa then was a relief in many ways and was supposed to be a turning point for me to be a WF warrior again. Didn’t quite work that way. Now that I was finally where I wanted to be I had to have some of the typical food I love here: paratha, bel puri, curries…and of course there is no shortage of cakes in this part of the world either. So I kept on lying to myself: just a bite, only today, I’ve been so good, I’ll get on track soon and then won’t be able to have that anymore, it’ll go to waste if I don’t eat it (ha, which mother doesn’t have that one?!)- whatever.
Of course I had been back on coffee ever since the trip to Budapest- and struggled as I was well aware that coffee was my main drug. Still, there were significant changes to pre-WF: no alcohol, no cooked carbs, no cigarettes. I kept up the deep breathing. I kept up the awareness and the intention of what to choose to eat and accordingly set clear priorities.
When we went back home for a vacation I “allowed” myself to indulge in what I hadn’t had in many months: croissants, cakes, and most of all: tons of butter and hectolitres of cream. I drank that stuff. And I got fat. I didn’t fit into my clothes anymore. I had a huge blown-up belly hard as a rock and didn’t feel too well. Knowing and having experienced how wonderful life on WF feels, I had no choice. This had to stop. And I had to get back on the waggon.