EDS – Live Well with Lisa Proctor

When I started this blog, I was really enthusiastic about writing about health and nutrition and finishing my Level 4 Nutrition qualification. Unfortunately, various parts of my body have been conspiring against me and my own health and nutrition has taken a bit of a nosedive. I finally got Covid 3 years after the first lockdown and it wiped me out for months. I already suffered from chronic pain and fatigue due to hyperactive Ehlers Danlos syndrome (hEDS) so, as you can imagine, they were both ramped up several notches and haven’t quite gone back to pre-pandemic level.

My hand/wrist a couple of days ago. Pretty standard.

On top of that, perimenopause has hit me like a freight train. The pain in my hands and feet was off the scale and, as a result, my activity level dropped off a cliff. Add to that the effect on my IBS and GORD (GERD for the Americans!), leading me to only be able stomach certain foods that aren’t necessarily the healthiest, and my weight has ballooned. I am now significantly fatter than when I thought I was really fat and needed to join WeightWatchers! I know I need to lose weight but it’s so hard when your body doesn’t do what you want or expect it to do.

My HRT and some of my supplements. My iron is chronically low and, apparently, my ldl cholesterol is low too.

All has this has made me not want to write about nutrition. I feel like a fraud. I mean, who wants to take nutrition advice from someone who’s so overweight that when they fall out of bed they rock themselves back to sleep? However, I’ve realised that I’m trying. There are lots of people out there who are struggling because the “Calories in, calories out”, “we all have the same 24 hours in a day” gym bros don’t understand middle aged, menopausal, chronically ill women and their advice and judgement is not going to help them. I’m going to talk about my experiences and share any tips I can, and if I never lose a pound, so be it!

Well, I’m trying but, as usual, my body has other ideas!

When I’ve lost weight before I did it with WeightWatchers and obsessively tracked every morsel that passed my lips. I don’t recommend WW for a variety of reasons but I do think tracking can be a good idea if you want to lose weight or just improve your diet. Not as a permanent measure but accurately tracking your food for a few weeks can help you understand where your excess calories are coming from or where you might have gaps in your diet that might require changes or supplements.

Anyway, I started tracking last Monday using MyFitnessPal. I really like this app for tracking but the default calorie goal is very low so if you use it – or any other tracking app – please set your own healthy, achievable goals.

As well as eating healthily I walked my dog every day after I’d dropped my daughter off at school. She can be quite a reluctant walker but she is usually happy to do a lap of the school if it’s not too cold, and there is quite a lot of incline so, even though it’s not a super long walk, it’s quite a good workout for us both (she has recently recovered from a hip injury too).

Unfortunately, my new regime only lasted until Wednesday, when I pulled a hip muscle getting out of my car.

It was phenomenally painful and put me out of action for a few days, and also led to me eating chocolate etc to cheer myself up. A couple of bars of chocolate are not the end of the world, but it wasn’t the best start to the year, and I was a bit worried that I was heading for a repeat of last year’s IT band injury. Luckily, after a few days of rest and an Epsom salt bath, my hip feels much better. I managed to walk the dog and take her to agility yesterday, though she is (quite understandably) hibernating today!