That’s it. I give up. I’m back.

Le Sigh.

Hello. I’m back. I’m back and I’m on a mission. I’m back because I give up. And when I say “I give up” I mean “I give up pretending that this blubbery mass is going to go away on its own: I might as well talk about it while I try and make it go away.

And so the story goes: I was doing so well. So, so well. See, when we started talking about this blog, it was when I was just starting on a fitness and thinness journey. By the time we actually got around to DOING it, a year or so later – and at a time compelled by new enthusiastic spirit that soon sadly disappeared – I was already more than half the way to the goals I had set myself -perhaps closer.

And then … oh, and then. Things unravel a lot quicker than they … Um … ravel. Don’t they?

So what happened, you ask, if everything was going so gosh-darned brilliantly? Well, sit down, and I’ll tell you aaaaaaall about it.

So everything was going very well. Lots of exercise, a healthy and balanced attitude toward eating, and then.

Sigh.

Then I went to the wedding I’d named as my goal, and spent the rest of the two week holiday enjoying local specialities of the areas I visited – including deep dish pizza, barbequed ribs, mighty burgers, cheese steak, non-cheese steak, steak-steak, doughnuts, chilli-dogs, chilli-cheese-fries, and christ, I don’t know, buttered lard on a sugar roll.

Miraculously, I didn’t gain any weight – or only a pound or two – due to the fact that I was doing my favourite thing, and walking through new cities, every day; walking, and walking and walking. So yay for miracles. Boo for getting the taste back for big food in big portions again, though.

Three weeks after I got back, however, my gym burnt down. I swear, officer, I was nowhere near at the time. But it WAS a great excuse for not going. Especially because, soon after that, I heard we were moving house (and country) and had plenty more on my mind – sorting, packing, emigrating, storage containers, taxes, goodbye meals, drinks, parties etc. You get the idea

I was given a new medication that multiplied my appetite to unbelievable, elephantine levels, especially for carbs (well DONE those pharmaceutical geniuses, because we all know nothing could be better for depression than rapid weight gain and the resulting crash in self esteem THAT brings about, could it?). I stopped taking it after a while, after finding it didn’t suit me but sadly not before reaping the rewards of it as an incredible appetite-enhancer.

Then a move to the US, where I’ve eaten more red meat than in years and discovered that there’s sugar (or high fructose corn syrup, more often) hidden in everything. Which has made me sick, and leaden and Bleurgh. Enough. Just: ENOUGH.

Don’t get me wrong. I have had fun too. I have tried out all the greatest food places in my new home town, and eaten their signature dishes when I have felt like it because – seriously – what would I know without trying?

Which would be fine, if it wasn’t on top of everything else. But it was. Quite literally. Layer upon layer upon layer: right on top of everything else.

I feel like an enormous flesh balloon, expanding at a ridiculous rate and ever more shy and ashamed and unhappy because of it.

So here I am. Again. Hello.
I’m back.

And this time, I’m totally counting. I’m weighing, I’m counting, and from the moment I step into my new gym tomorrow until the very day it burns down, I’m going to be ON THIS FUTHERMUCKER until I’m just TINY.

Or not tiny.
Until, at least, I can get into the jeans I wore on the plane over here.
Right now, that would be enough.

So there we are.
At Weight = WTM (way too much) lbs. And on a fucking mission.

Hello, again.
Hello.