Today is 12 weeks since I started my mega health kick. I have been exercising well, eating really well, haven’t had an alcoholic drink in over 5 weeks and have managed to drop 7lbs; finally dropping under the weight I was before I started taking quetiapine. In fact the last time I weighed what I did this morning was 5 years ago, so I feel great about that. I feel I’m finally back in my normal body again. Not the one taken by mental illness and that was transformed into someone I didn’t recognise or even like.
People are noticing the change and ask how I have done it, and I am honest in saying I have completely changed how I live. I’ve been vegan coming up to 4 years, I’m not drinking, I exercise several times a week. It isn’t what people would necessarily want to have to do to see a change, but for me the weight wasn’t just fat. It was also the weight of the person I was. the one who didn’t want to be kind to herself and make sure she was exercising and being healthy. Of someone weighed down by the guilt of harming animals for my food and the person drinking to escape. This last 12 weeks have really ramped things up a gear and I actually feel good in my body for the first time in living memory.
In other news I am celebrating 10 years since my first ever Bikram yoga class which I did on 9th March 2009. I did a 10-day challenge, throwing myself in the deep end, but as I wasn’t living in London I had to pop by the studio after work on my drive home from Hertfordshire when I was living in Kent. Quite the commute. I didn’t really start regular practice until March the following year when I moved to London. Nevertheless 10 years since my first class seems like such an achievement. I remember my first class, my first teacher and that feeling when I got through that hot-as-hell 90 minutes.
In many ways Bikram yoga saved me when life was pretty bad and it was the first major step I took towards my recovery. The first act of self-care. It really only takes one.
my happy life project 