Botticelli, George Burns and the Cupcake That Was.

Gwash!  Two weeks since my last post and what has happened?  Not a lot, to be honest.  But update you I shall! The first week following weigh in was ridiculously uneventful.  I trained. I ate. I trained. I slept. I trained.  I also decided that Divine is not my favourite person anymore.  He has upped the cardio portion of training big time, and is now all about "burn, burn, burn"! So burning, sweating and burning some more were the flavour of the past two weeks.  The weekend following weigh-in involved nothing.  Zilch.  Not a jump was jumped, not a squat was squatted, not a lunge was lunged and most of all not a skip was skup (yeah I know it's not a real word, but too bad). ;)

I got into a very interesting conversation with Olwethu, one of my colleagues.  She is a beautiful black woman with voluptuous curves and a proudly African bum, who does not subscribe to the whole skinny thing that white woman generally aspire to.  According to her culture, a woman with lovely curves and a good round bum is what is considered desirable.  I like that belief.  Botticelli, too, celebrated curves on a woman - and was not at all keen on painting emaciated sacks of skin and bones.  Give that man a Bell's, I say!  One can't, after all, be blessed with everything in life- that would just be wrong!

Having said all that, I still ate fruit salad, rice cakes and steamed veggies through the week because although it is extremely unlikely that I will end up being a skinny malinky, being a fatty is no longer an option either!

Last Friday was pretty encouraging because not only was I stopped mid-skip (skup) and told by a fellow gym-goer that she could really see the difference in my figure, but another gym regular commented, mid-crunch (me, not him), that I was looking much more "streamlined" (which of course is polite for "less fat"!).

This past week has been pretty good.  I have even decided to forgive Divine for almost killing me over the past two weeks!  I do have to own up to the fact that I have become somewhat obsessed.  Following the birth of each of my kids, months passed where I literally could only speak about sleeping habits, formula, baby shit, rashes and the like.  This seems to have happened again.  I can have long, in-depth conversations about detox, eating plans, training sessions, skipping, Divine, this blog, my butt, my tummy, all my measurements, the whole shoot shebang, but I have no clue what else is happening in the world or even my city!  I truly need to make a plan!  I can practically feel the eyes rolling when I start talking!  And to make matters worse, on Wednesday (which is my off day from gym) I went to gym - upping my training to 5 days a week.  It's difficult though. I  am very focused on my goal, on getting to the point where I feel confident about my shape - but, as with everything and as we all know, there has to be a healthy balance. (I am a Libran after all).  Oh well.

On Thursday we started boxing.  I wont lie - I thought it was going to be hard and shitty and that it would give me reams of worthwhile material for the blog. Such. Much. Fun. It was brilliant!  No session has flown past as quickly.  I actually enjoyed the skipping (even though Mr Volontiya sneakily tricked me into skipping for longer than I had planned).  I jabbed, did curl punch thingies (highly technical term) and hurled out a gazillion upper cuts.  We then put them all together in hectic combos and bounced, and jumped, and smacked the hell out of the bag (and Divine's hands).  I was completely soaked afterwards, the balls of my feet were on fire and my fingers cramping but the exhilaration and energy levels carried through for most of the day.  Flipping great! I reckon it is also a super therapeutic exercise - punching your way through all your frustrations and irritations. Until it wasn't so much fun anymore.  Late on Thursday afternoon everything kind of got tight and creaky.  Holy shitole!  My ankles, my wrists, my "wings", even my elbows for heaven's sake - all aching and stiff!  Bloody boxing is deceptive.  You think you've nailed it, strutting around with moves like Jagger, until mere hours later your entire body seizes up and you have moves like George Burns!

Friday was a brilliant day.  I put myself through a hectic cardio session, saw a beautifully inspiring show in the morning (twice) which made me sob (twice) and I ate a cupcake.  Yip.  Afraid so.  I had a cupcake.  And even worse - I enjoyed it. Every last delicious crumb. And no, this was not instead of lunch - this was AS WELL AS lunch!  :)

The Evidence

With a week to go before we weigh in, I am not feeling hugely confident regarding actual weight loss, I must be honest.  I think that we might have some changes in measurement but I feel as though I have pretty much stayed the same weight and whatnot as I was at the previous weigh-in . Clearly  I hope this isn't the case because we have been working really, really hard - but I know that there will be some weeks when no changes take place.  At all.  I am not relishing this experience though.

Divine seems to have some sort of an issue with Mondays. I think he figures that everyone goes completely off program over the weekend and binges (not entirely untrue sometimes) and therefore approaches every Monday in punisher mode - and today was no exception.  However this morning he trained alongside me through some of the really shitty stuff, which was brilliant and it became almost a matter of pride for me to keep up! I know I go on a bit sometimes about Divine and how good he is, but he really, really is amazing.  I wish everyone had a Divine. Truly.  He is always cheerful, is focussed 100% on you during your session (as opposed to some of the other trainers I have seen who either eat breakfast or play on their phones when their clients train!), he is able to see right through my bullshit and know when I am just being lazy or when I really can't go anymore, he constantly praises and encourages and I really think this is a calling for him.  Every session is an achievement, every kilo or centimetre lost is personal. Enough said!

And to end off this blog I thought I would share two more pics with you.  Just to put them into perspective - the shirt I am wearing is one which you are supposed to twist and tie into a knot and wear all crinkly.  A few months ago I used to iron the shirt to make it bigger so that it would fit. I know right?!  Now it is quite roomy!  And the jeans - well this is actually kind of bittersweet.  My favourite pair of Levi's really should be packed away in my fat box by now, but I am not quite ready! In the meantime I will scrunch and fold them up at the waist and use a belt to keep them from falling off.  Not the most flattering way to wear them, but did I mention that they are my favourite pair?

Divine reckons he can put together a 7 or 10 second kick arse video of one of our boxing sessions.  In the spirit of partnership and whatnot I have agreed that, if next Monday's weigh in is not a huge disappointment, we can film on the Tuesday.  Let's wait and see.

And that, my beautiful feathered friends, is all I have for you for now.  Once again, thank you so very, very much for the brilliant support.  I am so very blessed.  As at posting this morning, there have been 600 views of the blog. What?  Insane!
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