Overcoming tiredness

I am utterly knackered! Our fifth day in Mexico City and I purposefully didn't book us any tours today which meant we could sleep in and have a really chilled morning without any pressure.

Unfortunately the day didn't start off that we'll as I burst into tears on my boyfriend after having a shower, seeing my reflection in the mirror and realising that in a few months, it will change and I'll get bigger. It might be totally shallow and selfish,  but I don't want to get bigger - I'm really trying hard to be healthy and lose weight and obviously being pregnant won't exactly help with that. Cue me hysterically crying, asking him if he will still find me attractive when I'm bigger....

Thankfully, he knew exactly what to say and suggested that we find a personal trainer who specialises in supporting pregnant women - I may not be able to lose weight per se, but doing exercise throughout and eating healthy means I'm still working towards my goal but not 'dieting' or putting anything at risk.

After I stopped resembling a red faced puff-ball, we headed out and found a lovely cafe for breakfast - A bowl of fruit, yoghurt and granola later and I felt tons  better. We decided to go to the big shopping centre nearby and do a general bit of 'mooching'.

The shopping centre was huge and in the shop called 'Liverpool' (In the UK, think John Lewis / Peter Jones) there was the most amazing sweet section I've ever seen. I managed to buy lots of presents for people but not get anything for myself - Not bad going considering how amazing the chocolate section looked!

We stopped for a cup of tea and headed back after that - It was only 1.30pm but I was knackered! We decided on a local Japanese restaurant for lunch but ordered way too much food as the portion sizes were about 4 times the size of that in the UK - The vegetable tempura plate, whilst being absolutely delicious, was huge! In the end, I didn't finish anything as I was feeling uncomfortably full.

We went back to the hotel and I just wanted to sleep - A feeling of worry came over me as I wasn't sure if I felt tired because of the fact I'd just eaten food, my sleep pattern still isn't great or because I'm growing something inside of me - a lot of women say they are incredibly tired in their first trimester and my body changing and feeling different things just scares me.

So, after I browsed the Internet for a bit, my Boyfriend and I decided to go for a walk around the local area... we grabbed a drink from the local Starbucks and aimed in a general direction. We found a random department store and spent a good 45 minutes just browsing through and finding it funny that all the Christmas decorations were already on display. It's now 18.40ish and I'm back in the hotel not feeling too bad - I think fresh air helped a lot.

An added bonus is I've walked for over 90 minutes today and done over 10k steps so my target has been achieved :-)

Best holiday ever

I had the BEST holiday with my friend

Although I am not exactly 'famous', working in I.T means I'm ultra paranoid, so I didn't exactly mention where I was going on holiday - Well, now I'm back, I can.. I went to Brighton with my friend and stayed at 'The Grand' which was just.... brilliant. Life has changed a lot for my friend and I - She divorced her husband a year or so ago, has been back in the dating scene (and is now head over heels in love with someone!) had a gastric bypass last December and has lost over 7 stone - in fact, she told me that she has now lost 78% of her excess weight... and anything over 70% and the surgery is deemed 'successful' Honestly - she looks great :-)

We're both very crazy people, so we had an absolutely brilliant holiday - we went to the Brighton Pavilion (It's so beautiful inside, I had no idea..) The Brighton Museum, Preston park... we walked up and down the Pier and here's the thing - I've got photos of me! Actual photos of me! On holiday! This is such a big thing for me as I look back over the other holidays I've had - Las Vegas, New York, Thailand...even UK breaks... and I have very few, if any photographs that have me in them. Yet despite not being happy with how I look, I think I look OK - I actually even think there are a couple, where I look nice in them :-)

The biggest thing was my friend and I, dressing up in the 'old style' costumes and having our photo taken... I'm smoking a cigar... she's got a bottle of whiskey... they're brilliant and it's a great reminder of a fantastic holiday. 

As holidays go... We ate.. a lot. There's no denying it. Both nights we went to fish restaurants and both nights we didn't have a starter or a main - whilst the first night we got horrendously drunk, the second night, we didn't touch alcohol and just had a really nice fish dinner. I had crab and despite getting incredibly messy... now know how to dissect a whole crab, which was.... interesting :-)

Also, we walked LOADS... The first day, we did 23,000 steps, the second day, we did 27,000 steps and yesterday, despite leaving at midday, we did over 17,000 steps as we walked to Preston Manor and had a quick look around before walking the 1.2 miles back to the car. So yeah.. even though we didn't eat overly healthily (I won't lie.. I had a cooked breakfast on both days in the hotel), we did do a lot of walking and my body felt absolutely fine. 

After getting back yesterday, I stopped off quickly at the supermarket and bought some fresh bread. I don't really eat a lot of bread at all... but for some reason, was craving it. So, rather than have ham.. or even cheese. I decided to have an open fish finger sandwich... it was lovely :-) This morning, as I still have most of the loaf left, I decided to have scrambled eggs on two slices of toast. It's funny, as some people whip the eggs up before putting them into the pan, however as I'm lazy in regards to washing up, I just scramble them in the pan, before they get too hot... No butter or spread on my bread and now both slices are in my tummy :-)

It was an absolutely brilliant, brilliant holiday and now I'm back, I still feel really tired, it's like it's 'in my bones' at the moment (I know, that sounds dramatic) and I'm kicking myself that the next 2 days aren't as chilled as I would like them to be as one of my sisters is driving to see me at the moment and tomorrow I've got an early dentists appointment, then am seeing my Mother, then am driving back and seeing a friend for dinner and she's coming over to my house.... Even writing that makes me 'Urghh..'

I know it will be fun, but I'm really tired and at the moment, all I want to do is veg out in front of my sofa... watch TV and just.... chiiiiill, However, I appreciate my sister making the effort, so will try and energise myself in the next hour ... Thankfully, Friday is pretty quiet and I've decided I am making absolutely no plans at all.

I'm not sure what I'll do for lunch for my sister... we may go out, but after 3 days of no routine / no healthy eating and 'holiday food'... I really like the sound of a nice salad at the moment...

Eating healthy without a fridge or cooker - HELP!

A total brain puzzler

So, I’m on this ‘work thing’ overnight and from lunch time today until about 7pm tomorrow (Friday) I’ll be in a very remote location, limited WIFI and only a ‘snack shop’ for food. I’m one of the few people staying in a local hotel as the rest of my colleagues (approx. 100 men and about 10 women) will be sleeping on the floor and wherever they can find a space (Yes, it really is an ‘interesting’ company….). I’m such a light sleeper, the prospect of sleeping on the floor with people I don’t necessarily know very well, drunkenly talking, laughing and crying until early hours of the morning.

It also poses the question of food – what am I going to eat?

Well, for breakfast this morning was the obligatory porridge and as I’m trying not to waste as much food, I actually made myself a chicken fajita for lunch from the leftover bits I had last night after my friend left. I also have a pot of porridge for tomorrow and called into Marks and Spencers this morning to grab some grapes and strawberries and some packs of low fat crisps.

The one thing I’ve realised is: Most of the low fat food needs to be refrigerated or cooked before eating – Think about it, low fat sandwiches, yogurts, ready meals, vegetables – you can’t just leave them in your car overnight and expect them to be edible. Even my beloved houmous needs to be kept in a fridge (and I know that to be true after ‘Houmousgate’ a few weeks ago when it had been in a hot car for 2 hours and tasted pretty awful).

So what could I bring that's:

1. Healthy

2. Doesn't require a fridge to be kept in

3. Doesn't require cooking.

4. Fills me up

Honestly, I've been racking my brains for the last 2 days and haven't come up with a lot of things.

Unfortunately, I'm still rather stumped and I'm writing this at 23:30, having been on my feet for the last 6 hours, solid! After I got to the venue, I helped lift chairs into a van, drive the van, stick duct tape over errant cables for health and safety reasons and really got 'stuck in' to the event.... my usual dinner time came and went and by 8:00pm, I was feeling ravenous, not to mention, really thirsty as I'd got dehydrated doing all the lifting, moving and taping in the 25 degree heat.

All my colleagues were eating the food provided to them - nachos with chili and

cheese and I went to my car and ate a small handful of grapes, a bag of M&S 'Moroccan Spiced chick pea shells' and drank a whole litre of water. I think the whole lot came to about 130 calories which is dangerously low and not something I want to repeat. I managed to leave the venue at 22:50 and am now back in my hotel, utterly knackered.

If this was a regular event, I'd really need to plan better - On the one hand, I'm proud of myself as I didn't eat the unhealthy option, on the other hand, I'm kicking myself for not eating enough healthy stuff and worrying my body will go into starvation. I think I'm going to visit the local supermarket tomorrow (I found one quite close!) and buy a healthy and filling lunch tomorrow - maybe pasta salad? something that releases energy quite slowly but should fill me up. I'll also find something I can nibble on a few hours later as I don't think I'll be getting back home until after 21:00 and I don't want to make the same mistake again.

Knackered... Bed... Urgh.

But seriously, what can you eat that's healthy and doesn't need putting in the fridge or cooking?