David Hurst

Man I love food. I mean I really, really love food. Cheese is my biggest weakness - I’ll eat it with everything. Beans on toast? Only with a couple of slices of Cathedral City thanks. Pizza? Sure, just pop a bit of extra mozzarella on it first. Fried egg? Better with some melted mature cheddar. And so it goes on. It’s an addiction. Some people need their chocolate. I need my cheese.

Frankly, I love all fatty foods - especially McDonalds. I know, I know. Despite the fact that every time I finish eating my quarterpounder I feel so filthy I need a shower, I still go back for more.

The ultimate result of my cheese and junk food habit is, naturally, a growing waistline and an increasingly unhealthy fear of the scales! Despite my reservations, I conquered my personal demons and went to Boots to weigh myself on their super-duper scales this morning. I punched in some numbers, shed as much clothing as modesty and public decency would allow, and nervously waited for the printer to spell out the sad results of my gluttony…

17 stones 9 pounds

Actually, I wasn’t that upset about it. I thought I had piled on the pounds over Chrimbo, but in actual fact I’m only two pounds up on my last weigh-in. Towards the end of 2006 I weighed 18 stones and managed to lose 2 stones in 4 weeks by crash dieting (read: eating nothing). This was, as I have since realised, completely unsustainable, and I have been uhm-ing and ah-ing for the past year about a more long-term plan.

My problem is that I have a desk job. A quite stressful desk job. So, when I am not lazing behind my desk tapping away, I’m at home on the sofa in a state of horizontal relaxation. Neither position is conducive to calorie burning. I control the weight and maintain a barely passable level of fitness by half killing myself on the football field every Monday night. All in all, a less than satisfactory lifestyle in need of attention. So, here’s my plan:

I’m going to keep it simple. Lower the calories, lower the fat and do more exercise. This needs to be manageable though. The food has to taste good and I don’t want to be feeling hungry all the time. I’ll diarise what I eat each day and hopefully see what works. I’ll keep up my Monday night football and add a night of swimming each week. I’m also going to ban two of my favourite foodstuffs: cheese (aaaaaaaaaagh!) and bread. I guess the McDonalds will be banned too, but I can always go to Subway for a treat if I need one.

I need to adjust my eating schedule too, and this will be the hardest thing. I don’t eat breakfast, and love eating rounds of cheese on toast just before I go to bed (and no, I don’t get nightmares - that’s an old wives’ tale). This, I am told, is very bad as I am starting my metabolism later in the day. Apparently, eating breakfast can help you lose weight as you kickstart your metabolism earlier in the day and start burning those calories. I guess I’ll soon find out, but I reckon there’s some truth in it as I always get hungry earlier in the day if I eat breakfast.

So, today’s menu so far…

Breakfast:

A clementine - this is pretty feeble I know, but it’s a start for someone who hasn’t eaten breakfast in the best part of two decades.
Lunch:

Difficult one this. I wandered around Tesco for far too long, breathing in the delicious bakery and rotisserie odours, and finally settled on some Finnish Rye Crispbreads (smaller than Ryvita, but very tasty), some Tesco own-brand extra light soft cheese with garlic and herbs (OK, slight backtrack on the cheese ban, but it boasted less fat and calories than Philadelphia Light, so I figured I would give it a go) and a tin of mackerel fillets.

This worked out just fine - great flavour, ticks the healthy boxes and I feel satisfied. I have to say I was really surprised with the cheese, which tasted really good. I really like tinned oily fish, and it’s good for you, so a pretty good result really. And here’s an added bonus: all that cost me £2.00. I ate all the fish, but I have at least enough crispbreads and cheese to get me through another 3 or 4 days. Bargain! Not only will I lose weight, but I’ll save money too!

I have a few sachets of thick cup-a-soup in case of hunger emergency this afternoon. My wife is preparing dinner, so I don’t know what that will be yet. And, I have an intensive hour of calorie burning football to look forward to tonight. I’m feeling very positive.