An eventful week ladies, an eventful week indeed!

Lemme start from the beginning, eh? Okay, well I was given a whole mountain of work by my boss at the beginning of the work and so running around like a mental at work. I got a bee in my bonnet about busting the hell outta this mountain and threw myself into getting the work done. At the same time an assignment had been set by the people who run my lawyer-study-course-thing (don't worry, this does get lighterlifey in a minute, I promise. Stick with it.). Now, I knew about this and was expecting it but what I wasn't expecting was for the assignment to have four freaking parts. Not only that but these four freaking parts all had separate parts. So I didn't have one assignment, I had, like, twelve. Oh ffs.

Now, while all this was going out I was drinking bucketfuls of decaff coffee and this was making me get up to pee in the night, like, four or five times. Yeah, it was pretty annoying.

So by Tuesday evening I was a bloody mess. I had a pounding stress headache, I'd done double the work I normally do, I was freaking out about my assignments, I was so fucking tired it was untrue and I'd left my phone at home. ARGH!! I can't survive without my phone. So anyway, I went to group and I said to my counsellor basically "I'm really stressed, I have a massive assignment - please can I just get my foodpacks and go home and study?" and she very courteously said yes and tried to make me feel happier.

So I went home and pretty much tore my dad to shreds for saying hello to me and my mum said to me "God, what's wrong with you? You look awful." And I said something along the lines of "work, assignment, not sleeping, tired, no energy, stress, forgot phone". She said I looked really pale and like something was wrong but she couldn't put her finger on it. I told her I was just incredibly tired and that it was probably from rushing around.

Anyway, another night of crap sleep and then oh my days - Wednesday afternoon I was like a corpse. So, so, so tired. Not just sleepy tired but that sunken-eyed, drag-yourself-about-but-your-limbs-don't-want-to-work tired. I kept putting my icey fingers (remember I am always ALWAYS cold at work) over my eyes and just sitting there. I felt so tired I wanted to cry. It came on at about 3.30 and just didn't go. I perked up around home time and I managed to take my sorry ass to boxecise but I did slack off quite a lot. Then in the evening it kicked in again and I lost all my patience, bickered with A the entire night, then cried, cried some more and eventually slept. God knows how he put up with that actually. I tried to explain it to him but "All I ever am is tired and cold. I am so fed up with being tired and cold." didn't really cut it. (Did I mention my parents had gone away and turned the heating off? So even though I put it on constant and whacked up the thermostat it still wasn't coming on and so we were just living in an ice box?)

Thursday and more of the same. I decided to take Friday afternoon off as holiday. I couldn't take the whole day off because A was still staying over and would be relying on me for a lift. I figured I could just slob out and try to rest - go to bed, watch some telly, nap. By this stage I thought it was getting ridiculous. Who takes time off work because they are so tired? I did twig something though on Thursday. I seemed to be getting tired about two hours after I'd eaten something. So the 3.30 tiredness was from my lunch and then the evening tiredness was after dinner. That's why I managed to pull myself through boxecise - because it's an hour after eating and so I still had some energy.

Now, I'm no nutritionist but I decided it was something to do with my blood sugar levels or something like that and so in bleary-eyed, zombified, miserable state I got out my foundation book and started reading about Milk Week. A lady in my group told me she'd done one the other week because she felt awful and it really helped her. I wasn' t sure if it was worth it seeing as I'm gonna finish in two weeks time but I thought I'd just get the low-down on it anyway. You have to drink two litres of soymilk a day on Milk Week. It's way less for cow milk but you guys should know by now I'm not putting that stinky cow protein in my belly.

Two litres seemed like an awful lot. The book assured me though that the flavour would not be 'watered down' though. (Oh how I'm trying to stifle a snicker here...read on, you'll see what I mean.)

So, Thursday night. A was still over but basically I just fell asleep super early. No coupley naughtiness going on. I think he understood though because I totally wasn't being myself at all.

Friday rolled around and I was tired by about 11.00. Fucking absurd. Tired is too weak a word. It was like mind-crippling, soul-wrenching, tear-inducing exhaustion. That's what it was. I was exhausted. Devoid of energy. I'd totally had enough. I was sat at my desk thinking about going to Asda on the way home to buy herbal sleeping tablets so I could get home, knock myself out and just sleep all weekend.

Fuck it. I thought. I don't care if I only have a week and a bit to go. I can't spend another week like this. This is misery. I'll just do Milk Week. I don't care if I put weight on or get kicked out of ketosis. This is stupid. This is unbearable. I'm a fucking zombie.

12.00 rolled around and I jumped in my car and bought two litres of Smartprice soy milk. I nixed the sleeping pills idea. Too expensive.

So anyway, that's where I made my first mistake. The first time you try something you don't wanna be trying the pikey version. Smartprice soymilk tastes like shit. Had a taste, grimaced, sighed, had another taste, gagged, kicked myself for spouting all this vegan shite. Saying that I did end up drinking about a litre in an hour. Really stupid idea by the way. Made my belly feel like it was going to explode. After that I went to bed and tried to nap for a few hours but couldn't. I had the awful beany aftertaste of Smartprice soymilk in my mouth and I was dispairing at my actions. I considered nipping Milk Week in the bud right there and then because the Smartprice stuff tasted so bad but for the sake of my health I decided to carry on.

I made a batch of my own soymilk, figuring I could just use that instead of the Smartprice shit but fucking hell, it's a lot of effort. My soymilk had a a more earthy bitty taste but luckily no beany after taste.

Anyway, I made a strawberry milkshake with the Lighterlife prescribed 500ml of soymilk feeling safe in the knowledge that that amount of milk wouldn't impaire the flavour. Lighterlife lied. I couldn't even taste the goddamn foodpack. It was just a soymilk chugfest. No food flavour at all. Urgh, I thought, so basically I'm gonna just not eat for a week. I'm just gonna be swilling milk constantly.

Now, Saturday morning comes around and I'm soldiering on. Like I said, I made a batch of my own soymilk but it took bloody forever. I went out with my dad and didn't get home until the afternoon and so had missed two foodpacks. I decided to eat them together with 500ml of milk and just down the other 500ml that I should have drunk. I had two chocolate foodpacks with the 500ml and whoa, that was delicious. My soymilk was infinitely better than Smartprice's (no shit) and two foodpacks was just heaven. Seriously, I could eat two chocolate foodpacks and 500ml of my soymilk forever. That made me feel better about my choice and to be honest I was starting to perk up energy-wise as well.

The whole drinking-lots-of-milk thing did make going out all day a bit of a military operation though involving lots of flasks and cups with millilitres marked on the side. It was worth it though, I got through.

My dad bought me some Alpro Soya soymilk while we were out in the morning after I exclaimed that making two litres of soymilk a day was ridiculous and the promotional claim of five minutes cleaning time of my soymilk maker was "clearly false advertising" and "a fucking joke". Alpro Soya soymilk tastes good. SO MUCH BETTER THAN SMARTPRICE. Don't drink Smartprice soymilk, seriously.

Alpro Soya soymilk in coffee is delicious.

Sat here now on Sunday, having had shit soymilk, good soymilk, homemade soymilk, disappointing foodpacks and delicious foodpacks I can tell you that I feel so much better. I went for a run this morning for the first time in ages and I felt energised and happy...not run down, deathly and miserable. I had another of my 500ml homemade soymilk with two choc foodpacks this afternoon and it was fantastic. Alpro Soya milky coffee really is devine. I'm gonna carry on with my Milk Week until Wednesday, when I will resume normal service. I'm glad I decided to do it and stuck with it even when it seemed like a belly-bloating challenge.

So, if you are thinking of embarking on a soymilk Milk Week, here's my advice to you:

1. DON'T BUY SMARTPRICE SOY MILK. It has an awful beany aftertaste that is revolting.

2. Yes, you have to drink 2 litres a day but ignore Lighterlife's suggestion of 500ml with each foodpack. You can't taste the foodpack at all and you feel like you're not eating anything.

Instead, use about 200ml with the foodpack and use a good electric hand blender. It will taste all yummy and creamy.

I would suggest putting the left over 300ml in hot drinks between that foodpack and your next one. (*coughs* Alpro Soya *coughs* coffee *coughs*) Or just drink it on it's own - which isn't a problem if you're soymilk is decent but if it's Smartprice, you're fucked!

3. Strawberry foodpacks aren't great for mixing with milk because they are quite weakly flavored (even if you only use 200ml of milk). Banana and chocolate work well.

4. If you combine two foodpacks you can get away with 500ml of soymilk.

5. If you're making a hot drink with soymilk, put the milk in first and slowly add the hot water while stirring the drink. Don't use boiling water, let a cool a wee bit first. It's de-lish.

You will feel better though! It will give you the pep you've been missing.

To be honest I guess it's not surprising that after eight months of what is basically starvation my body crapped out on me. I'm only 10st something now and I'm jogging, boxecising etc - I guess there's just not much more fat for my body to eat away at. Eight months is a long time.

I'm glad I'm doing Milk Week and I do feel better for it. It was a bit of a hassle to start with but I'm in the swing of things now! =)