* Weekly update - Post Binge and Nominations *

Firstly I wanted to say a huge thank you to Lex  (please check her out, she has lost an amazing amount of weight) for nominating me for " The Versatile Blogger" award (I'm sorry it has taken me a while to post this but it really does mean a huge deal to me). It keeps me motivated knowing that people read and appreciate my blog. Thank you again!

So rules state that I had to share seven things about myself. And just because I love talking about myself this is pretty easy.

1. I love holidays! I don't mean the type were you go to Spain. No, I mean Easter, Christmas, Halloween, Bon-fire night etc.
2. I love anything scary - I love a good old scary movie and I love to read about crimes, mysteries and murders. Gore-tastic!
3. I work full-time with children and I am also a full-time student of a degree in Special Educational Needs and Inclusive Education. I adore what I do and wouldn't change it for the world.
4. I hate raw tomatoes with a passion
5. I'm growing my hair with the intentions to have it cut off and made into a wig for a child who has lost their hair as a result of cancer treatment.
6. I often get asked if I am of Italian or Mediterranean heritage - As far as I know I'm not. Put will keep you posted on this :)
7. I have a passion for music and anything Rock n' Roll - I <3 Buddy Holly!

So there are my seven things about me. Now for my nominations...

Now don't get me wrong, I really do read a lot of blogs but my favourites are the ones that I can identify with. I don't want to leave anyone out so I suggest that you check out my "blogs that I follow" bit on my profile. However I did want to do a shout out to a few ladies that keep me motivated and make me laugh when no one else can. For that I thank you.

• Miss Frangipani
• Liz
• Tricia
• Lindsay

Moving on to my weekly update...

This weekend has all been about getting back on track. If you read my previous post you will know that I had a binge that lasted four whole days. The first thing I needed to do and my least favourite thing I had to do was weigh-in and find out the damage. So, it shows a gain of 6lb. I know what I have to do to change it, and as Abby said on the Biggest Loser as a reason for wanting to shift the lbs "I was to live and not just exist". I know I can do this.

My goals for next week are:

• Track every single day - I've pre-tracked everything, setting myself a meal guide for the week. This should help to keep me on track
• Work-out - I haven't worked-out for a few days due to being in a lot of pain but I can walk now so if it means I walk as my means of exercise I will. There's nothing wrong with that.

Have a great week guys.

Roo xoxo

* "No One's in Control But Me" - Dealing With a Binge *

"No one's in control but me" - Shay

This quote couldn't be more useful to me than right now. I've had one of my lowest weeks in a long time in which I pretty much gorged on anything and everything I could find. I'm being honest when I say I binged so much that I was physically sick. Yes, that's right. I vomited due to eating so much junk. I ate and ate for a full four days straight. Admittedly this isn't the longest binge for me but I have never eaten so much that I vomited. Never. I felt pretty embarrassed of what I had done and shut myself off from everyone. After all who am I to say anything about weight-loss and fitness when I choose to eat such an substantial amount of food that I vomited.

But I'm over being ashamed of my actions and feeling like a failure! After all Jillian (Biggest Loser) said that to be successful you need to "redefine your view of failure. Its a learning process, you have to make a few mistakes to learn".

So logically the first thing I had to do was pin-point the reasons why I binged.

1. I was home alone for ten hours a day and decided to take advantage of the situation
2. I was in a lot of pain due to my chest and back and thought that the only thing that would make me feel better would be to feed my emotions (as you all have probably experienced this hardly ever works and you end up feeling worse, creating a never ending cycle).
3. Due to being in so much pain (to the point where I could hardly move) I was unable to workout and thought it best I give myself the week off - WTF?

So now that I was able to pin-point the reasons for my binge I had to tell myself to stop. I had to kept saying out loud to myself "The binge is over. Its behind me and I'm going to move on.".

So to sum my binge up - I have not failed. Nor do I believe that I have taken a step back. Yes I made a mistake but I have learned from what has happened because after all this is a learning process. And like another blogger recently wrote I don't believe that "I know or have heard of anyone that has got to goal without making a [mistake]", whatever the mistake may be. I'm happy and I'm ready to move forward.

Roo xoxo

*What am I eating for?*

This may seem like a strange topic at first but its one I've thought about for a while. It all started about 2 months ago when I had a huge binge as a result of poor planning and was stuffing item after item of food into my mouth. Half way through a biscuit I thought to myself, this really doesn't taste that good. Cramming a few more in I thought to myself, yea this really doesn't taste nice at all and after shoveling another two into my mouth I stopped and thought what the hell am I doing? At this point I had already eaten nearly 3/4 of the packet, yes your reading that right, 3/4 of a packet of biscuits that I didn't actually like!

This led me onto to thinking about food choices and binges. I admit now that I have a number of binges under my belt (of should I say hanging over my belt?) yet more often than not I'm actually consuming food that I don't even like. Why on earth would anyone in their right mind consume something they didn't like? On a simplistic level I wouldn't eat dogs food so what is it that's stopping me from eating it apart from knowing its socially unacceptable. With that I thought about when I was younger.

From the age of around 5 until the age of 14 I was very fussy with what I ate. I would never try anything new and lived off of eating pasta and jacket potatoes. So what was it that I possessed that enabled me to say no to so many foods. I know that since then I have tasted and tried a number of new foods and I have heard that your taste does change over time but I can't help but think that if I was able to tap into that part of me that stopped myself from eating foods I didn't like and used it now, not only for stopping myself from eating something I didn't like but also to say enough is enough I'm not eating vast amounts of a particular food anymore I would be much more successful in my journey.

Since my health scare I have definitely looked at food differently and have questioned is this good for my body, is it providing fuel and nutrients to me or is it something that is not doing either of these things and is just a "I like the taste of it so I will eat it" food. With that I can see my desire to restrict certain foods coming back. I am not stating that denying yourself of certain foods is healthy however I really do believe that moderation is the key here which is something I haven't always been able to get my head around.

As of today I will be tweeting what I eat on a Thursday, if you would like to follow me please do.

Have a fab day!

ROO xoxo