Looking in the mirror

Everyone else seems to lose weight so quickly. Gordon McClean (onemanblogs.co.uk) casually lost 11lbs in a couple of months and seems not to think that the weight is falling off quickly enough. I know that I can do that, or I could once, but on such an austere diet that I couldn't face it ever again, not at my age. If you're younger than I am (and I expect you are) then believe me, it's easier to lose weight at the age you are now than when you are older. And skin is more elastic. I'm distinctly worried about where all the spare skin is going to go.

I've been thinking about body image. I can't remember looking in the mirror and thinking I looked slender. Maybe when I weighed under 8 stone, when my second baby was a few months old. I couldn't keep weight on then and had jutting hipbones, though not unhealthily so. But even then, I still thought I had a fat arse and thighs.

The other side of this coin is that, if I always look a bit overweight, I can't see when I'm a bit more overweight. To me, I look much the same as I did thirteen years ago, before I put on the 2 1/2 stone. And I look the same now as I did seven months ago, when this whole dieting nonsense started, although I've dropped a size and the waist of my new trousers is already loose.

Blimey, Badgerdaddy, you've just left a comment on my last post. This happened before - when I was writing that one, you left a comment on my other blog. This is quite alarming synchronicity.