So in a nutshell I have been struggling to blog due to training, studying, working and generally life. But I am back on it as it helps me sort out my head and take stock of what I have done and need to do.

The past week saw a change in my plans for this year, and although it was hard to accept it is the right thing to do. So after surgery in July I did in fact turn into a slob and didn’t exercise (purely because I couldn’t) but also just ate crap and quite a bit of it. Around 5 weeks post surgery I decided I was ready to get back into training and if I am honest that was way too soon. I did struggle training and was in pain but didn’t admit it to anyone (apart from now in this blog). It was a silly thing to do and although I haven’t done any damage I should have left it another 3-4 weeks at least. But I felt lost and like I was spiralling out of control with my diet and focus. I suppose I am comfortable writing about this now as I feel like I am at this point again but in a random kind of way I know what is happening to me and how I will feel in a few days time and that this feeling doesn’t last forever. The reason why I am going through this again is that I stupidly thought I could go back into prep and come out and compete again this year even though I had quite a bit of weigh to lose and had lost a bit of muscle. I like a challenge and thought there was no harm in trying, which to be fair there wasn’t at the start. It all came to ahead for me last week when my weight loss had dramatically slowed and for the amount of cardio, weigh training and calorie intake I was on, I should have weighed about two stones! I had a feeling that something wasn’t right as my body wasn’t responding to the changes and it was probably because the changes were so dramatic and frequent as to why everything stalled. I couldn’t reduce my food intake any lower as it was too low anyway so really had no other options but to up my cardio from 2 hours to 3 hours a day and I was still 6 weeks out from the comp I wanted to do. So at the weekend, Steph (England’s 4th Strongest woman) and I took some pictures of me in my competition bikini and compared them to my last prep – not good at all. I was way more than 6 weeks out, I thought around 12 weeks. The next morning I got up and weighed myself and I had put on weight, so still in my pj’s (because getting changed might have put some weight on – Jesus I have some stupid thoughts) I drove to the gym at 6am on a Sunday morning and weighed myself there on the fancy machine. My weight was the same but I had grown! It is possible that I am 5’4″ which Phil (who could be 1 foot taller than me) refuses to accept and I have to go back on the machine. I then did a video of my compulsories in the changing rooms and watched it back (this totally freaked two girls out in the changing rooms). I looked bloody awful, nowhere near ready for stage. So I got dressed and climbed on to the stairway to heaven and in between the sweat my tears flowed for a full hour. When I had finished I knew that I had to stop this prep purely because I would never be ready for stage but that also because I would end up dragging myself through hell for something that I couldn’t achieve.

After speaking to a couple of friends training at a different gym later on that day I had made up my mind and was out of prep. On Monday morning my true love Porridge was returned to me and I even went up market and added a banana.

So now I am in off-season and feel lost because at this point in time I have nothing to aim for. I must keep my head and not let myself fall victim to eating crap. So I have composed a diet plan which will see my calories slowly increase so that I start my next prep in a better position and Steph (England’s 4th Strongest woman) has created some tough training plans so that I can get building some muscle.

The next two months will be the biggest test so far, managing my own diet and training and making sure I am in a good starting place to start prep ready for next year.