Taking the Challenge!

At the start of the year I undertook to participate in the Readers Digest Health Smart Magazine, Health Smart Challenge (try saying that 6 times over and fast!).

The idea of the challenge being to take a health related issue, i.e quit smoking, lose some weight, give up caffeine (NO WAY) and embark on the challenge for a period of 6 weeks. During the 6 weeks entrants were required to journal some of their experiences and essentially write about our outcome at the end of the 6 weeks. How we found the challenge, the strengths, weaknesses, results and so forth.

Well, I decided that my personal challenge would be surrounding "mental health" and focus specifically on what was, and has been, my biggest health challenge for some time now. Body Image.

Much to my absolute shock, I WON!! And trust me, I was shocked. I can list the things I have won in my life on 1 hand. A paper back book when I was 10 called "Ip-dip-sky-Blue' (Yep, it was as good as the title ;o) ), and a $2 scratchie. Oh, I can also add the one occasion I won a meat tray at the local club's raffle!

To win this competition is the creme De Le creme! I won it for being me! I'm not even going to try and filter the arrogance that comment exudes! I did. There was no luck, no lack of entrants, and no bribing the judges (I've never done that with success by the way). I won for honestly sharing my struggles, thoughts, emotions and feelings. YAY ME!

Next months magazine will have an excerpt from my entry but I also wanted to share my entry on here, in full, for anyone who may be struggling with body image as I did/have/do.

It's quite long, so I shall include it in installments :) Enjoy.

My Health Smart Challenge

Start: Wednesday 21st January 2009

OK, so I’ve decided to take part in the ‘Health Smart’ challenge. I must admit I hadn’t given the idea much thought when I sent an email requesting an entry form. All I know is I quite like the Health Smart magazine, and heck, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that the idea of a week at a health spa is so incredibly appealing right now.

So, where do I begin? Well perhaps I should start this online diary (if I can call it that) with a little about myself and perhaps what my goals are during this next 6 or so weeks.

My name is ALFIE, I am a 26 year old mother of two boys, JIM who is 4 and BOB who is 1. I have been married (mostly happily) to MUSCLE MAN for 6 years in March and like most Canberran’s I am a dutiful Public Servant. I am also a self-confessed weight loss junky and the bearer of what can only be called ‘low self-esteem’. The frustration with this is that I have over the past 2.5 yrs lost and maintained a weight loss of 20+ kilos. I have kept an online blog of my achievements (fitandfabmamma@blogspot.com ) and tried as honestly as possible to share and learn from my own experiences in relation to weight loss and body image. More recently (from around December) I’ve felt myself sliding backwards in terms of my own body image and what I call my ‘self-talk’.

I have without doubt changed my lifestyle considerably and yet I simply cannot deny the fact that my mind and I guess my ‘minds-eye’, have not changed to the extent I would like. Rather, I am for the most part trapped seeing myself as the ‘fat-girl’ I was. I must confess there is also another facet to these feelings – I am an identical twin. Therein lies what I would personally deem to be the most significant issue for me. The term ‘identical’ is almost redundant in the case of my twin and I. You see, she is and always has been the ‘skinny’ twin. A fact that I not only note with lingering resentment but that others have at times felt the need to highlight.

Growing up it was not uncommon for SEXY TWIN and I to hear comments to the effect of “So Alfie is the prettier of the two, and Sexy Twin is the slender one”. The word 'pretty' was completely lost on me and instead the only word my brain seemed to compute was the word ‘slender’. My logic at the time was to analyse the comment and assume the deliverer of this statement was calling me fat!

Without going into the finer details of my weight loss I’ll simply state that despite losing weight and gaining a level of fitness, I never in my wildest dreams believed was attainable, I am still in my mind stuck in the rut I was for the majority of my life, the fat mind.

So with that said, I guess my own desires for undertaking the Health Smart challenge are not specific to weight loss or fitness, but rather my own personal desire to change the way I see myself. The way I talk to myself. The constant stream of negative thoughts and commentary I play over and over again and the personal comparisons I make between my twin sister and I. My goal is to be healthy in mind, and body.

I cannot deny that even as I type this I am questioning my own commitment to the task. I sit here already berating myself for past failures and allowing the self doubt and negativity to make itself known, again! In this light my first challenge is to try and go one day (to start) without doubting my ability. Starting tomorrow I’m going to bolster my self-belief and challenge myself to be smart about my health, specifically my mental health. I am going to make an effort to compliment myself tomorrow and banish, or change, the negative thoughts which may creep
(more like seep) into my day.

(Names changed to fit the blog) :)

Stay tuned for more....