Let's start with the main, most important topic - which is weight of course.
Tears spring into my eyes when I realize I never write here the extent of the damage - but this has always been my place for confession so to the truth I shall stick.
In Spring 2025 I hit 80kg, or 176lbs a MBI of 27.7.
I know. Just reading this on the screen makes me have a hard time breathing.
Last year I did restrict for a couple months and dropped 5kg, bringing me to 75kg or 165lbs by summer 25 - I basically did this with some help from ChatGPT. I then remained stable until February 2026.
In February 2026, right before the week in Mountain View (more later on this), I started again a ChatGPT project and lost 4kg in a couple months, despite spending almost 1 month travelling for work (which makes it very hard to restrict, trust me) between the week in California, one week in the Netherlands and a couple short trips to Germany.
What happened in Mountain View? I was there for a training, and it was a great one - I had actually won it as an internal corporate award (and trust me I did compete hard because I wanted it) and the topics were super interesting. HOWEVER, right before leaving I got hit by anxiety - feeling akward, fat, and out of place. To partly explain: i) my English is poor (French is my second language) and I had just started aligners which do not improve my articulation and ii) you may think it was an event with colleagues and it's true, but even in my organization I do something that is extremely niche both in terms of activity (financial due diligence) and sectors (Media & Tech), while ppl usually do audit or consulting for private equity or manufacturing - add that I have no kids and I do not watch sports...
Anyways, I flew in, got super jet lagged, and when the even started I stumbled to the table I was assigned to (men only, of course! and not even a French!) and 5 minutes into the kick-off someone sighted and dropped into the empty chair next to me. I quickly looked and judged him American - from his teeth (don't get me wrong lovelies - only Americans have such shiny perfect white teeth that look like they were polished with a blue laser sword!).
Jay introduced himself as a cybersecurity person, working for the Media sector. I instantly felt better.
The training was even above my expectations, and I spent the week waking up at 2 (hello jet lag), doing work with Europe until 5:30, hitting the gym (why so full so early?), showering, more work, training all day followed by dinner and drinks which I always had with Carlos, a cool guy from Spain, Jay, Kevin and Alex. Despite the horrible weather, I had a blast and always felt super good. At least one week of full immersion improved my English.
On the last evening Jay sneaked me out of dinner with the promise of bringing me and Carlos to a "real Palo Alto place" and Alex joined as well. He had already hauled an Uber when I suddenly shivered and almost chickened out. He seemed sad and I changed my mind again but stared at him and said "Promise me I will not regret this in any way". He looked at me and said "I promise".
More in another post tomorrow, I promise!
Song for this post: "California Dreaming" - the version sung by Sia
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