When Stress Wins for a While, The Dark Place, Learning to Act Myself Out

Retrain The Brain, Frustrated With The Scales, Stepping Out Of My Comfort Zone

This week felt like a turning point. I've finally given what I'm doing a name: Retrain the Brain. It's no longer about another diet or another plan. It's about teaching myself to deal with stress, uncertainty and discomfort without automatically reaching for food, alcohol or other old comfort blankets. The frustrating part? Fourteen days in, the scales still haven't moved. But maybe that's not the biggest win this week. In this episode: • Retrain the Brain – why I've finally given my method a name and what I'm actually trying to change. • Frustrated with the scales – why I'm choosing to trust the process, even when I'm not seeing the results I hoped for. • Stepping out of my comfort zone – from posting on TikTok to finally taking this podcast seriously, and why this week's uncertainty has made me realise it's time to start building something of my own. If you're trying to change your habits, your relationship with food, or simply become a braver version of yourself, I hope this makes you feel a little less alone.

Potential Redundancy, My Future Is Unclear, I'm Still Not Eating The Biscuits

Three days ago I was talking about giving up sweets and learning to deal with stress without reaching for my usual comfort blankets. Then work turned everything upside down. The company I work for lost a major contract and, as things stand right now, my future employment is very much up in the air. My first thought? A large glass of red wine. What surprised me was what didn't happen next. No wine. No chocolate. No biscuits. No desperate raid of the sweet cupboard. In this episode I'm talking about uncertainty, potential redundancy, accountability, and what happens when life gets stressful right after you've decided to change some old habits. We also get into: * Why telling people your intentions can change your behaviour * The difference between wanting relief and wanting sweets * Being 55 and wondering what comes next * Finding my voice and taking this podcast more seriously * Trying not to panic when the future suddenly feels uncertain A very real-time update from the middle of a slightly chaotic week.

Stopping Sweets, The Panic Of Letting Go, What Smoking Taught Me, Learning To Cope Without A Crutch

I've made a decision. For now, I've stopped eating sweets completely. And honestly, it's making me a bit twitchy. In this episode I'm talking about why giving up chocolate, biscuits, cakes and all the other sugary comfort foods feels so much bigger than just changing what I eat. I've been comparing it a lot to stopping smoking and changing my relationship with alcohol, and finding a lot of parallels. I'm talking about: * Why I keep reaching for sweet stuff when life feels uncomfortable * The relief I get from eating it * Why I don't think it actually solves anything * The connection between procrastination and comfort eating * What smoking taught me about changing habits * Why I'm scared of letting this one go * The experiment I'm starting and where my head is at right now This is basically a real-time account of me trying to work out whether I can learn to deal with stress, pressure and uncomfortable feelings without reaching for sugary comfort foods.

The Panic Of Letting Go Comfort Eating, Sweets & Facing The Truth

⚠️ Trigger warning: This episode contains discussion of binge eating, self-induced vomiting, disordered eating behaviours, comfort eating and weight struggles. This is a very raw one. I don't have a solution. I don't have a plan. I don't have a neat ending where I've figured everything out. This is basically a real-time account of where my head is at right now. I've reached a point where I don't like what I see in photos and videos anymore, and I'm trying to work out what to do with that. The obvious answer is to lose some weight. The less obvious bit is that losing weight means looking honestly at my relationship with sweets, comfort eating and all the stories I've carried around food for most of my life. And honestly? The thought of changing that makes me feel a bit panicky. In this episode I talk about growing up around overeating, binge eating, using food for comfort, my complicated history with diets, and why I feel like I'm standing at a crossroads with all of this.

Creating Unnecessary Stress, Learning to Come Back Faster, Why AI Has Become Part of My Recovery

Why can something as simple as renewing a driver's licence feel completely overwhelming? In this episode, I talk about how I managed to create far more stress than the situation deserved, why the worrying was harder than the actual task, and what happened when my nervous system finally decided it had had enough. I also share one of the biggest changes I've made over the last year: learning how to come back faster when life knocks me off course. Instead of disappearing for weeks or months, I'm learning to understand what's happening and get back on track without turning every setback into a crisis. And yes, I talk openly about AI, why I still feel reluctant to mention it, the concerns I still have about it, but why the check-ins have become such a powerful tool in helping me understand my habits, my stress, and myself.