The Last Nine Months: A Retrospective

Back at the start of August, I started a hardcore post-pregnancy diet. I weighed ten stone, and aimed to lose two by setting the goal very publicly, eating food fit only for a small rodent, and posting up a picture of my scales each week as proof of my weight loss. To motivate myself, I used a pre-pregnancy picture of myself in my favourite dress:


However, I was unsure that I'd ever be able to get back into it. I had an embarrassing vision of having to post up the same weight (or more) on the scales every week. During the first week of the diet, I almost quit, and was thinking of giving you the spurious line "my doctor says I shouldn't be on a diet" as a get-out.

I'm glad I didn't though, as this is what I looked like at 34 weeks pregnant, weighing over 12 stone, in a photoshoot in March for Pregnancy & Birth magazine:


It's ironic that I'm (coincidentally) holding a cupcake, as this photo is evidence of what too much cake will do to you. (I had massive cravings for chocolate, and was eating virtually a whole cake a day!). I don't even recognise myself here. People kept saying I looked like Ugly Betty.

This is what I looked like in May, soon after giving birth, weighing over 11 stone:






It's fair to say that I was a big girl.

Now, this isn't going to be a very good retrospective, as I spent most of the year studiously avoiding cameras, so you can't really see the transition from plump to unplump (sorry). But by the start of August, I'd lost a stone and a half just by cutting out chocolate and eating sensibly.

I needed an incentive to lose another two stone though - hence the blog. So I created the diet outlined in my last post. It wasn't easy or fun, and it took nearly four months, but to my relief I'm now 8 stone and a size 8 again (US size 4), and here I am (yesterday) back in the same dress:




Since April 24th, I've lost a third of my body weight, and feel much more confident, healthy and happy having done so. I don't know if I'll ever have another baby - if I do, it won't be until Lily's much older - but if I get pregnant again, I'll be very careful with my eating, so I don't have to go through this process again.

This will be my last blog post for a while. Thanks for all your support and encouragement over the last four months - it meant a lot. I genuinely couldn't have done it without you.

The Oatcake Diet

The end is nigh! Not for mankind (hopefully), but for my infernal dratted diet. After nearly four months of oatcakes and houmous, I can't wait to start eating normally again (internal monologue: "That's the way you put it all back on, Ariane").

Anyhow: back on August 1st, I weighed ten stone, and set myself a target weight of eight stone, to be reached by October 25th. Shedding 20% of my body weight was harder than I'd anticipated, and the goal proved harder to meet than Barack Obama.

So I redoubled my efforts: fast forward four weeks, and I'm almost at my target weight. The weight loss has been so gradual, I haven't been able to see any kind of transformation in the mirror, but I opened the door to a friend who hadn't seen me since July, and she exclaimed, "Hello - and what have you done with the rest of you?!"

I'd like to claim that I've discovered some kind of marketable, saleable weight loss solution which will rake in the pounds, leaving me able to buy my dream house in Regent's Park. Alas, my newfound thinness is due to a combination of vanity, folly and eating a diet no one else would ever want to eat, so I can safely say that this isn't the case.

Nevertheless, I shall share my diet plan with you. If anyone actually tries it I will be amazed. You will lose weight on it - if I can, anyone can - but it's not much fun. I shall call it 'The Oatcake Diet'. Here goes:

THE OATCAKE DIET

10am: Two oatcakes. (You know, those dry cracker-like spheres made from oats and palm oil.)

11am: One date. (Nothing to do with romance, but a big dried fruit from the Middle East. I ate the variety called 'Medjool', because they're far bigger and nicer than standard dates.)

12 noon: Two more oatcakes. (A pattern emerges.)

1pm: A heaped tablespoon of houmous. (Made from chickpeas, looks like sick. Yum.)

2pm: Two more oatcakes. (If you try this diet, you will never want to see another oatcake again.)

3pm: One boiled egg (either hard-boiled or runny, it doesn't matter).

4pm: Can you guess? Yes, it's two more oatcakes!

5pm: One Medjool date. (Marks & Spencer sell them in fancy cupcake cases for an extortionate amount. I didn't buy them from Marks & Spencer.)

6pm: One small apple.

7pm: A proper meal! Well, a piece of steamed fish, lots of vegetables (carrots, broccoli, asparagus, mushrooms, etc) and a small amount of good carbs (either sweet potato, wholewheat pasta or bulgur wheat). I didn't eat anything after 7.30pm.

DRINKS

Only water (and herbal tea, but mostly water).

EXERCISE

If you have a small baby, strap it to your front in a carrier and walk around with it for at least an hour a day. If you don't have a small baby, you can use a heavy doll but you may get some funny looks.

And that's how I did it. Next Sunday, I shall put up some before and after pictures to prove that the feet on the photos of scales have indeed been mine, and that I wasn't strategically holding onto a nearby object while standing on them. See you then, and do let me know if you decide to try the Oatcake Diet. Anyone? No one?

Baby Love

If you ever need proof of human kindness, spend a day outdoors with a baby. The baby is basically a conduit to all the goodwill in existence. If you're carrying it on your front in a carrier, people immediately give up their seats on buses for you, or in bus shelters, or on trains. If you're pushing it in a pram, they help lift the pram on and off public transport, give you their seat so you can sit near the baby, move out of the way for you.

Every time you go out, a stranger will strike up a conversation with you. "How old is she?" (Or 'he', if you've dressed her in blue or neutral colours.) "What's her name? Hasn't she got a lot of hair? Is she sleeping through the night? Does she have any teeth yet? What a smiley little thing." They'll coo at her, laugh at her, stroke her cheeks and hair, point her out to their friends. It's as though the baby gives them a reason to connect with you.

This is particularly prevalent with older ladies, perhaps women whose children have grown up but have yet to have grandchildren. I came across this babygro:



And though it's perhaps not the most classy pun, it's definitely true.

Last week, I was waiting at a bus stop and Lily was crying, so I took her out of the pram. Then the bus pulled up, so I was about to put her back in the pram, when the middle-aged woman next to me kindly said, "Don't do that - you take her on and I'll wheel your pram on for you." So I got on while holding Lily, and was immediately offered a seat at the front, while the nice lady held my pram at the back the whole way (it was laden down with shopping bags) and gave Lily a cuddle before we got off.

I wasn't expecting this at all when I was pregnant, but when you have a baby, it feels like the whole world's your friend. It's quite wonderful, and ample compensation for the sleepless nights. It's like you've somehow connected yourself to the rest of the human race - everyone's either had a baby, or knows someone who has one - and people suddenly want to be around you both. I used to think people in London weren't friendly or warm, but now I know that's not the case at all. At least, it isn't when you have a baby.

Feet First

I used to have tiny feet. They were size 3, and looked like little mouse paws. They weren't much bigger than Lily's. I liked them: they were feminine and dainty, even if they were so small I frequently fell over.

Then I put on five stone during pregnancy, and my feet grew too. They swelled up and morphed into giant hippo feet, till I could no longer get into any of my shoes and had to wear flip-flops everywhere.

"It's just water retention," friends and midwives reassured me. "They'll go back to their original size after you give birth."

Relieved, I plodded around in the flip-flops, certain they were only temporary. After giving birth, I waited for my feet to shrink, gazing hopefully at the swollen arches and bulbous toes. But they didn't.

When, two months after the birth, I was invited to a party on a rainy day, I knew flip-flops weren't appropriate. My feet were approximately twice the size of all my old shoes, so I went out to buy some new ones.

I reached the shop and found a pair of suitable shoes. "Would you like me to get those for you in your size?" the shop assistant asked.

"That'd be great," I replied. But what on earth was my size? "I'll try a size four," I said hopefully.

The fours came. I couldn't even get the tops of my feet into them.

"A size five?" I guessed.

The fives came. This time I could wedge the tops of my feet in, but my heels wouldn't fit inside.

"Sorry, I think I need a six," I apologised.

When the sixes came, I could just about get them on, but they were too tight.

And so, from a lifelong starting point of size three, I ended up taking a size seven. "How is that even possible?!" I hear you ask. (You may not be asking this at all. You may be thinking, "When is this woman going to stop banging on about her feet?!" (Not for a while yet, sorry.))

As I'm only five foot two, having huge feet felt all masculine and wrong. I tried to console myself with the thought "Now I can buy lots of new shoes,", but my brain retorted, "Yeah, transvestite-size shoes! Maybe you should get your feet bound instead?"

I did some research, and found a site which said (from memory): "Ligaments in your feet can often stretch during pregnancy, and if they haven't shrunk two months after giving birth, your feet will never go back to their original size."

So I went out and bought two pairs of black knee-high boots, feeling like Bigfoot. They were quite stylish, but they looked long and clompy on me. Knowing I would never again fit into my old dainty little shoes, I sold them all on eBay, feeling wistful and sad.

I clomped around in the boots for a few months, and all that walking might have contributed to my losing nearly three stone. During that time, a funny thing happened: the boots started to feel a bit loose.

Last week, I had a work meeting for which I didn't think boots were appropriate, so I went out to buy some court shoes. I found some I liked, then sighed to a sales assistant, "Could I have these in size seven, please?"

The shoes arrived, and I put them on... only to realise that my feet were slipping out of the heels as I walked.

"Could I try a six?" I asked.

The size sixes were tighter, but still a bit slippy.

"Maybe I'm a five?" I guessed.

Sadly, this story isn't heading back to "and then I tried size three, and like Cinderella, they fit!"

I was indeed a size five. I'm now left with lots of surplus size seven shoes, and a reluctance to buy any more shoes, in case my feet shrink further as my body does. I have no idea why my feet are being so erratic, but found this on a pregnancy site:

"Can my shoe size change permanently? The short answer is 'yes'. There are so many changes the body undergoes during pregnancy that it becomes easy to ignore the changes in your feet. Most women’s feet grow at least a half-size during the second half of pregnancy. After childbirth, it can take up to six months for changes in your feet to reverse themselves and for your feet to return to their normal size and shape. However, foot enlargement caused by looser ligaments can be permanent, and at least 15% of women permanently need a larger shoe."

So there you have it. Still, gigantic feet or no gigantic feet, it was all worth it:

Happy Snaps

My friend Graham is the best photographer I've ever met in real life, and I've met a few. He also happens to be my best mate, but that's an academic fact you shouldn't take into consideration when appraising my opinion. Just look at this beautiful photo:


(This also happens to be my daughter, but that's another academic fact you shouldn't take into consideration.)

Graham came down to London this weekend to take some photos of Lily. She turned six months last Tuesday, so I thought it would be nice to document her half-birthday. Graham made Lily feel so relaxed, she even showed him her favourite toy:


And, even though I haven't been feeling great about my baby weight, he made me feel so relaxed I was happy for him to take this photo:


I think he should turn professional, but he thinks I'm just saying that because I'm his friend. So if you agree, do leave a comment below.