Try something new today

I've been trying something of a different approach this weekend. Since not-eating-and-crying-lots isn't getting me anywhere apart from a bit thinner, I thought I'd try the opposite. Well, not the polar opposite, as that'd involve bingeing-and-laughing-lots, neither of which are all that practical to achieve on a daily basis - but you get the idea.

My basic theory is that I need to be kinder to my body - to try to work with it rather than being at war with it. I reckon this should involve equal measures of being good to myself and treating myself - basically acknowledging that right now everything's pretty shit, and trying to compensate in other ways, but also trying to be healthier, both mentally and physically.

So. Out goes the "no food" diet and in comes the "extremely healthy superfood" diet. My fridge is currently groaning with broccoli, bean-crammed soups and blueberries, none of which are a million miles away from the type of fare I consume normally, but this time the idea is I'll put the effort into whipping them into nutritious lunches.

I'm also going for the burn at the gym. This is partly because even though I recognise the risks of the "no food" diet (the chief one being "death"), I DO still want to lose weight. I read in the paper that infertile women who lose 5% of their body weight can improve their chances of conceiving. At nine-and-a-half stone, 5% of my body weight is around six pounds. I've already dropped more than that over the past few weeks, so my goal is to maintain at the same time as toning up and boosting fitness.

The gym makes me feel better, anyway. Must be the endorphins. Today I did a very good cardio and weights workout, followed by the stretching exercises I used to do religiously when I was young and skinny whilst listening to chill-out tunes on my iPod. It was quite therapeutic, and I caught myself enjoying it - actually feeling like I was doing something positive with my body for once, as opposed to glugging wine in the bath and staring at it hatefully.

I also indulged in some retail therapy yesterday, investing in a new red coat and boots to go with the skinny jeans my newly svelte frame has made possible. I do like shopping, though hubby pissed me off by claiming I looked "very red" - a compliment, surely, only if one is a tomato - and then, later, "like Little Red Riding Hood".

All this attempted positivity hasn't completely removed thoughts of babies from my mind, though. This evening we went to see Derren Brown at the theatre. He was really cool - extremely entertaining and infuriatingly bamboozling in equal measure. Just before the interval, he explained he'd be re-enacting the old Oracle-style medium acts from the 1920s and 1930s during the second half. He invited audience members to ask a question - any question - on a piece of card, seal it in a black envelope and drop it into a bowl on the stage.

I couldn't resist. "Will I get pregnant this month, my 23rd of trying?" I wrote. However, 1,300 other people also had burning questions - many of which, IMHO, were fatuous and inane compared with mine - and he didn't get to it. At one point he started picking people at random and guessing stuff about them (with an astounding degree of accuracy), and he instructed us to think hard and thus direct our questions to him.

Well, I can tell you that I had a headache from thinking so hard, but it didn't work. But then, I suppose it'd spoil the show to end on a conversation with an infertile woman who desperately wants to be told it'll all get better, wouldn't it?

See. The old negative me hasn't gone far.

Confessions of a control freak

I was really pleased to discover that I'd lost weight when I ventured onto the bathroom scales earlier today. I was so inspired, in fact, that I compounded my virtuousness with a trip to the gym, figuring that lunchtime on Mother's Day would be a good opportunity to visit the place while it was empty of its usual harem of smug yummy mummies.

Some people comfort eat and actually balloon in difficult times, but whenever I'm upset about something I don't eat; don't even feel hungry. Right now I'm very rarely eating lunch, and am subsisting most days on my morning routine of juice, cereal and folic acid, followed by nothing until dinner. I do always have a decent evening meal with hubby, but my current state of mind means I just don't have an appetite most days. Hence the half-stone drop which the doctor would argue I can ill afford (my BMI is 20) but which has left me curiously pleased with myself.

Part of me knows this is stupid. In order to conceive and sustain a pregnancy, I need to be fit and well myself, and not eating isn't exactly conducive to that. Plus my periods are irregular enough on their own without a drop in body weight making things worse.

So another part of me wonders if I'm subconsciously trying to punish my body in a stupid "you won't conceive so I won't bloody feed you" stand-off - in which the only loser is going to be me.

But the deepest part of me fears this is a return of the flirtation with eating disorder that I experienced once before, at 18. I'd just arrived at uni but hadn't yet met the friends who'd make my second-to-fifth years there the best of my life. I was homesick and unnerved, and in a stormy relationship with a not-nice bloke who told me I was fat. I responded by going through a six-month spell where I made myself sick after every meal. I eventually controlled this idiotic behaviour myself, without medical intervention, confessing all to my mum during a trip home in which she commented on my plummeting weight. I promised her I'd never do it again. To this day, I haven't.

Older and wiser, I now recognise this as a desperate attempt to gain the driving seat in a situation that I didn't feel I was in control of. I hadn't settled at uni, wasn't happy with the boyf, and didn't really know what to do about either of those issues, so I picked something that I could control, and went for broke.

The same could be said of the current situation. I'm not in the driving seat in any way - we are at the mercy of the NHS and of biology - and I completely feel like everything is spiralling out of control. When you add in the fact that I just feel so bloody sad most of the time - I know that sounds pathetic, but there it is - it's quite easy to see where the cracks are starting to form.

But like I say, I'm older now, and wiser. In point of fact, I've just had an oat and raisin cookie and given myself a good talking to. It's not much, but it's a start.