The first day of my second round of the 12 week body transformation program hasn’t quite gone as planned. And as it happens, some of the waywardness is my own fault, and some of it isn’t.

Of course I am reminding myself not too catastrophise too much, after all, it’s only three-quarters of the way through my first day of the program and the only thing I haven’t done that I was meant to do was my exercise. But… me being me, it’s playing on my mind.

As I have spent much of today at hospital with my father, it’d be easy to say that the events of the day have been out of my control. And that’s true – to an extent.

But we’ve all heard the excuses before – from people who believe they are time-poor. And I’ve been one of them on occasions. During those times I’ve done 12hr working days, plus the commute I’ve decided I don’t have time to allocate to exercising. But… I’ve come to agree that IF YOU REALLY WANT TO DO SOMETHING, YOU CAN.

I didn’t follow the exercise plan set out in my first round of this program. My level of unfitness was so great that even walking gave me shin-splints. As a result I hired an exercise bike with plans to do 20 minutes of interval training. And I have to admit I was shocked with how much I struggled through the 20 minutes over those first few weeks.

I’ve stepped up my exercise this time around and so have now included lunchtime gym classes into my routine. This is a bit of a struggle for me as I feel an irrational sense of guilt about taking a lunch break and allocating time during the working day. Insane, I know, but there you have it. Naturally no one else seems to care and – in fact – my work colleagues congratulate me on my efforts, rather than condemn me for leaving the office.

It’s freed up some of my evenings and I appreciate that because before, by the time I got home from work, did my exercise and bathed, it was well into the evening and led to many-a-post-9pm evening meal.

So, here I am, in my hometown. I came because I felt an obligation to be there for my parents and I think any child would understand this. My mother and father, in particular, sacrificed much for my brother and I and there’s nothing they wouldn’t have done for us. My father’s health has been deteriorating for some time and as his principal carer, we believe we need to ensure my mother has some respite and support, despite the fact that my brother and I live 300km away.

The last few weeks have been difficult ones for my parents as dad’s had a number of ailments. I came home during this week off to help out in any way I can – and be there for my mother.

But…. Despite all of this it occurs to me that I cannot use my father’s illness as an excuse to not focus on my diet and exercise.

Today, for example, my plan was to rise early and go for a walk – which would mean my exercise was out of the way in the event something came up (which it inevitably did). But.. as it happened, I started reading a novel last night and kept reading and reading until I’d read the entire bloody thing. By then it was after1amand I took some time to get to sleep making my early walk seem less of a reality.

Later in the day after my father was hospitalized, my mother sent me home to have a break. Perfect, wouldn’t you think for my daily exercise? But no… naturally I decided I needed to sleep and even when my alarm went off after 1.5hrs I wanted more and kept sleeping. Which, of course, meant I ran out of time for my walk before heading up to the hospital (where I am now writing this, possibly illicitly, on my laptop). We will be here until early evening and – so my plan is to walk home… thereby getting my exercise done in the most practical of ways.

Of course, if we stay later than planned it will be pitch black and ridiculously unsuitable (even here in my small hometown) to be traipsing about at night.

But, rather than sit here (tapping away when I should be entertaining my father) and wallow in guilt and stress about the day that was, I’m trying to keep a positive attitude and remind myself that all is not lost yet. I’ve had a very low calorie day…. So my food intake has been fine AND I’ve got fish out for later. In fact, unless I bulk up my dinner a bit I’ll have had about 700 calories for the day.

I may still get a walk in AND if I don’t today can be my rest day and I’ll fit my six days of exercise into the remaining days this week. ALL. IS. NOT. LOST.

Sorry this has been a bit of a mind-dump but I’m trying to remind myself not to worry about day one of this program. I’ve got a long way to go and I can’t start panicking yet!