from somewhere in my imagination

The Skinny

By definition skinny literally means looking like skin and bones.  Last time I looked in the mirror, which wasn’t long ago, because I like looking at myself in the mirror, I’m pretty sure what I saw was not resemblant of skin and bones.

Two years ago I weighed about 5kg more than I do now and I know that my chest resembled skin and bones a whole lot more than it does today.  Today my chest is covered with muscle.  I have visible abdominal muscles, some say my back is quite impressive.

I am strong.

I am fit.

I am healthy.

I am physically the healthiest I have been in my adult life because I want it to be that way. 

It doesn’t stop there though because there is an element of mental health to this to.

I am strong.

I am healthy.

I am focused.

I am mentally the healthiest I have been in my adult life.

Why is it then, that because a Size 6 is not a squeeze for my ass, that people feel it is okay to tell me that I am too skinny/too thin/too muscly/need more meat on my bones,  whatever.  Why is that okay to say that to me when it would be considered rude to tell someone squeezed into a size 24 that they were too fat?

Yes I did just say that.  I needed to get it off my chest.

Why is it okay to imply that maybe I have a problem, when I am actually in amazing physical condition, when it’s socially unacceptable to tell someone who is actually unhealthy that they are unhealthy?  It’s a bit of a double standard don’t you think?

I train like an athlete because I love it, not exclusively to make my body look a certain way, I can assure you that I eat like one too.  I don’t deprive myself of foods.  I eat exactly what I feel like eating and what I feel like eating is good, nutritious stuff.  When I get hungry it’s not the empty belly growling hunger you get from a nutrient poor carbohydrate induced low, my arms and legs get hungry.

If my physique makes you uncomfortable perhaps you should be asking yourself why.

Call me skinny if you want, it’s an easy term to use although I personally think lean is more appropriate to me just leave the too bit out of it.

If you are not a regular reader here I would suggest that you don’t read this post in isolation because it will possibly give you the wrong impression of what I stand for.  I believe in leading a healthy lifestyle and I strongly believe that we are fed all sorts of body image bullshit by the media so our impression of what is healthy has become severely distorted.  To me a healthy person looks a whole range of different ways and what t right for one person is possibly not right for the next person.  I don’t compare myself to others or vice versa, I’m just focused on me and achieving the things I want out of life.

I Ran a Marathon

Before I took my hiatus from blogging last year I was on the countdown to the Melbourne Marathon.  Last week I started my 8-week preseason training for the Gold Coast marathon in July, I decided it was about time I wrote about Melbourne.

We drove to Melbourne on the Thursday before the marathon.  Initially it hadn’t occurred to Steven that I might want them all there waiting for me at the finish line.  It was the only race I ran all year where all five of them saw me cross the finish line.  Running 42.195km is a pretty momentous kind of thing, having them all there was pretty important to me.

Friday morning we headed to Brighton so I could have a massage.  I was a bit hesitant booking with a male masseuse at Endota but I was very thankful that I did because he had a lot of sports massage experience. 

The weather on the Friday was my idea of nightmare conditions, wintery with a howling wind.  After my massage we had some brunch and drove the course.  The Beaconsfield parade section just kept going and going and going, and that was in the car.  I might have hyperventilated a little.  We spent the afternoon at the Melbourne museum, we love museums and this one didn’t disappoint.

Saturday was spent riding Puffing Billy, having lunch at a Yarra Valley winery and finishing the day with an hour at the Healesville Sanctuary.  One of the best benefits to being zoo members is the reciprocal rights you get at zoos in other states.  It was broccoli and chicken for dinner followed by stretching and bed.  It took forever for me to get to sleep with a mix of nerves and excitement.

Sunday morning, Steven dropped me off, I had enough time for a last nervous wee in port-a-loos with no running water and some dynamic stretching before it was time.  Just writing this is giving me a surge of adrenaline.  Steve Monaghetti was our starter, we stood to attention for the national anthem, I was amazed to be standing next to a bloke who was wearing no shoes (Steven counted 3 that he saw during the race), the atmosphere was friendly and the weather was perfect.

It felt so good to start and finally be running the race I had spent 9 months preparing for.  There were times when I didn’t know if my body would make it to that point and plenty of times when I wasn’t sure if my head could do it.  However, my body honestly felt as well prepared as it possibly could be.

The first 10km passed quickly, Steven and the kids were waiting near the circuit around Albert Park Lake and it was a little boost to see them.  I had worked out that if I wanted to see the front runners I would have to be on Beaconsfield parade before they passed the intersection on their way east, I knew that it would be a pretty closely run thing whether I got to see them or not.  It was very nearly an ugly cry moment when I saw them, I had just made it.

I passed through the halfway mark in great time, if I had only been doing a half that day I am confident that I would have had a sub 1:35 in me, it was a PB on my Adelaide half time by nearly 5 minutes.

Things got tough on the second half of Beaconsfield parade.  I knew that the 25-35km would be tough mentally but turning the corner off Beaconsfield parade and heading back in to town gave me a boost and I powered on until I got to the section through the botanic gardens where we came together with some of the slower half runners.  This section of the course was narrower than the rest and for this short section that I had to weave my way through slower runners, and often walkers in groups. 

After I had cleared the half marathoners I hit the uphill section in the botanic gardens, getting through this part and back out on to the main road was tough.  In my head I was likening it to childbirth, reminding myself that it would be over soon and I would never have to do it again (if I didn’t want to).

Somehow I completely missed the 38km mark, I had seen it from the other side of the road before the botanic gardens section but as I came up the hill to Fed Square I knew I was closer than 3km, I hit the 39km mark and I went for it.  Somehow I managed to run the last 2 and a bit kilometres in about 10 minutes.  Just before I turned to head down, around and in to the MCG someone called my name and waved.  Someone I hadn’t actually met yet but had started to form a friendship with on Instagram of all places.  Having Chantel call out to me gave me the biggest surge of adrenaline, the feeling of it flushing through my muscles was unreal and just what I needed to get me through that last little bit.

I always thought that I would ugly cry coming in to the G.  But, I didn’t.  Not when I saw Steven and the kids and not when I crossed the finish line.  I’d done it.  In 3:33:18 I had done it, nearly 30 minutes faster than the time I had set my hopes on nine months earlier I had done it.

I was handed my finishers medal and grabbed some drinks and fruit and stumbled back outside to try and find my family.  I wasn’t capable of going very far.  When you give birth the pain pretty much stops instantly.  When you run a marathon the opposite happens.  I was shivering and crying on and off and my body was cramping and eventually they found me, two phone calls from borrowed phones and messages left, about an hour after I finished they found me.

We slowly made our way back to the car and back to where we were staying.  I was thankful for the very large spa bath before I passed out on the couch.

We celebrated with an awesome dinner at St Katherine’s.  Within 48 hours I was contemplating my next marathon.  By the time I had finished my self-enforced 6 week rest from running I had set my sights on the Gold Coast.

Yes, I am a little bit crazy.

If you are keen to know a bit more about my marathon training programs I'm more than happy to share.

Tatum xx

Really? Did You Really Say That Sonia Kruger?

There are many things in this world I do not understand.  This double page glossy magazine advertisement is one of them.

I do not understand why Sonia Kruger, as brand ambassador for Swisse, was happy to be paid money to pose for a National print media advertising campaign and be quoted as having said:

"When friends tell me they are having trouble controlling their appetite, I recommend they try Swisse Ultiboost Appetite Suppresant."

Did she really, seriously say that?

She was recently referred to as a 'highly intelligent woman' on Mamamia with reference to a recent story about her still being open to having kids at 48.  I honestly have to question the intelligence of any high profile person who would allow themselves to be quoted as having said such a thing.

I do not understand why Australian Gourmet Traveller was happy to take Swisse's advertising dollars and actually print such bullshit.  The irony of which magazine I found the ad in is not lost on me.

I do not understand what kind of society we live in when a company makes these 'magic pills' and gets a celebrity to promote them with such a bullshit statement.  It all leaves a very bad taste in my mouth.  Enough to not bother renewing my subscription to AGT next year.  Enough to choose a different brand when I replenish my supply or Magnesium this week.

When did it become okay to advertise implying that it is okay not to eat?  Here take this supplement instead and you won't feel hungry. 

Have these people visited a hospital paediatric ward recently?  I have a few times this year and one constant, aside from the nurses and crying babies, were the young skeletal girls perched like baby birds on their beds being tube fed through their noses.  Refusing to eat from their trays.  Being told they can go home because they have gained 800g. The images are burned in my brain.  With 3 girls of my own they are images that haunt me.

Young girls, who through some twist of fate starve themselves in an act of control.  Starving themselves to be skinny.  Young girls who are influenced by this sort of shit in the media.

As a mother of 3 girls I can tell you I was quietly terrified seeing these shadows of girls with their bones sticking out and tubes up their noses.  As a mother of 3 girls I am very careful about the words I choose when talking about food and diet.  As a mother of 3 girls I try to be the best role model that I can be in the food and fitness department.  Food is one of my passions and I want to share that with them without ever making them feel guilty about food.

Despite my best attempts to educate them, my girls will undoubtedly be exposed to media bullshit like this.  They will still spend time with other girls who may come from homes where certain foods are considered 'naughty' or 'bad' or are told 'that such and such food will make them fat', or worse. 

I can't even begin to imagine why any woman, let along a high profile one, would feel comfortable promoting an appetite suppressant essentially saying 'here girls, take these you won't feel like eating, they will help make you skinny'. As a parent I don't even know how to explain to my young girls why a person might want to take such a thing and why this lady they see on the TV says it's okay.

Get your act together media.  I know that you need your advertising dollars to survive but surely you can be a little more selective about what you put in front of your audience.

Swisse, you need to get some morals, why do you make these magic pills anyway?  A magic pill with the made up chemical Slimaluma, so made up you've registered it as your own.  A pill that I doubt is much more than a placebo making a person think they arent hungry because they took a magic pill. 

You do of course disclaim your ad for the magic pill with the statement 'best used as part of a balanced diet and combined with regular exercise'.  Of course it does because that is generally accepted as being the best way to achieve and maintain a healthy weight range.  Not by suppressing your freaking appetite and not eating properly.  Long term that will do your body more harm than good.

My next bottle of Magnesium will be Blackmores.  They have a far more sensible take on the subject of appetite suppression

"Foods that can help with appetite control are low GI carbohydrates, high fibre foods and good quality protein. If you would like some personalised suggestions on how to include these types of food in your diet you can speak to one of Blackmores naturopaths by phoning 1800 803 760"

Far Out.

Does this ad get your goat as much as it got mine?  How do you tackle the slippery slope of weight and weight management with teenage girls?  I know I am going to need some serious hand holding when the time comes.

Tatum xx