Weight Loss Day 2; Well Sort of.

Once again I blew off exercise yesterday; have eating like crap again today. It furthers my disgust of myself and deepens whatever funk I am in ironically enough.  I am sick of this.  More sick of it than anyone can realize!  WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME!? 

I knew I was too busy to exercise today but I could atleast control what I put in my mouth!  Or not. 

Weight Loss Day #1... AGAIN!

I am an extreme type of person.  It took me until middle adulthood to realize this.  When I clean, I cannot relax until every nook and cranny is clean to my standards.  But when cleaning gets away from me... it REALLY gets away from me.  Even in my car I noticed that the heater or AC is either all the way up or completely off.  And when I diet and exercise I do so to the extreme as well.  I guess you could say, when I'm on I'm on... but when I'm not; I'm definitely not. 

Once I began to realize this, of course, I began to focus on finding a happy medium in everything that I could.  I hate to admit that I fail in more aspects than anything else; but I continue to try. I am hoping that realizing the fact is half the battle....

I have been in a slump all summer.  Last year from about August thru April I lost about 85 pounds by exercising almost daily (including training for my first half marathon) and by keeping my calories at around 1500 per day.  These calories were also the most nutritious calories my poor neglected body has consistently ever seen.  As a self proclaimed sugar addict I was so proud that for the first time in a LONG time I could turn away a cookie or chocolate bar when faced with the temptation; which is usually NOT an easy task for me. Normally when I know there is a candy bar in my drawer I literally cannot think of anything but that candy bar until I finally eat it.  Its almost as if the Candy Bar grows a voice and calls out to me.  So turning away sugar of any kind is a HUGE feat for me; yet I was doing it... for months on end!  But again... that was when I was "on". 

Remembering back, I recall how easy it is when I'm "on" to preach to people how there is "no big secret to weight loss" when someone noticed I was slimming down.  "Its just exercise and eating right," I simply stated.  "Its putting your mind to it and doing it." And IT IS indeed.  Once again... when I'm "on".

Because when I'm off... (sigh) I cannot seem to get a grip again.  I question over and over again "What is wrong with me?"  Every single day I wake up and tell myself that "today I will do better; even if its by a slight mark," and here it is 9:30 am and I've been sneaking into the kids' Halloween candy all morning while I try to get motivated to get on my treadmill.  "Just one more," I tell myself.

I also tell myself that if I would just begin doing it again that in a few weeks I will feel better.  I will not be so tired and lethargic; and may even get back to being able to turn away the bad foods. 

Mind over matter.  Right? However; the mind is a powerful, powerful tool that can be used either "for" or "against".  In this case my mind is working against me. 

Its not an excuse... It started out when my daughter graduated last spring. Organizing the graduation activities took a toll on my exercise and food planning time.  The first casualty on the list was my exercise routine. 

Over the course of a busy summer moving my mom (twice) and our cross country road/camping trip for 3 weeks my hard work and good habits began to reverse even more.  Trips to the gym became less and less frequent and I stopped counting calories... because hey!  Why bother if I'm not going to make it to the gym?  (Again my extreme thinking). Its all interconnected when you are an extreme personality.  Like Dominoes.  When one falls they all fall.

For a few weeks in September I was getting back on track.  I even was back to running 3 miles everyday.  But then I hurt my back cleaning my house; simply bending wrong.  I was couch ridden literally for almost a month. It couldn't have happened at a worse time; when I was teetering on the brink of breaking/making habits again....

So here I am...November 14th.  Trying to once again talk myself into going to the gym or at least getting back on my treadmill.  I have the cold and snow working against me because I like to run outdoors. I am battling letting that alone beat me right now.   I feel like crying because I have gained 20 pounds back; and feel like crap, literally.  And worse.  I can't seem to dig deep and find my motivation despite a wedding and class reunion I have in less than 9 months from now.  It feels like its never been this bad; but feelings can be deceiving because I am sure it has...

Even my house suffers because I'm depressed about it.  My kids suffer because I don't want to spend time thinking about food so they get quickly put together meals like macaroni and cheese for dinner. (I also have little energy to go out and play with them.) My social life suffers because I don't want to leave my house in fear that someone I know will see me.  I gauge people's reactions when they see me for the first time in a few weeks; and can almost hear their thoughts in my head by the expressions on their faces. 

If  you have ever had a weight problem you can relate to me.  I am disgusted with myself; yet I struggle daily, minute by minute to feel hopeful enough again to something about it.  It is a never ending battle that I feel helpless to ever win. 

Always thin while growing up I gained weight around 20 years old after going thru a series of extremely stressful events in my life.  Always able to eat what I wanted, and could literally exercise once and lose 5 pounds. I even had a baby at 18 and literally weighed 15 pounds LESS after having her than I was before my pregnancy. So when I gained 30 pounds literally overnight at 20 year old; I panicked.  Having zero experience with having to pay attention to food and exercising, I starved myself and of course lost it.  AND OF COURSE as soon I began eating again, I gained it back plus 10 pounds more.  Every time I lose weight I gain it back plus 10 pounds. Over the years my weight crept up and up before I finally figured out that I need to control my eating start to exercise; DUH!  This is my 3rd time losing a great amount of weight and the older I get; the harder it comes off.  I fear that if I wait much longer, I won't be able to get it off at all. 

As if it's not bad enough that I spent my entire adult life over weight...soon I will be forty.  The prime of my life is almost over and it was wasted away because of my fat and how I looked to other people.  I was too insecure about my body to really take chances.  I realize now that I have missed so much.  With the knowledge I have on weight loss now I wish I could go back and shake the 20 year old me. Tell her "IT ISN'T THAT HARD AT 20!  YOU STILL HAVE A HIGH METABOLISM!  MAKE A LIFE CHANGE NOW BEFORE ITS TOO LATE FOR YOU!"

I want to be thin not just because of how I look or how my children see me.  But because I want to quit wasting so much energy thinking about it.  I NEVER stop thinking about my weight.  Not EVER, do you understand?   Not for ONE SINGLE moment in an entire day no matter how focused I may become on a task... its always there; lingering like a shadow that does not go away when the sun goes behind a cloud.

So I am going to cry.  I am going to allow myself to feel sorry for myself for 15 more minutes.  Then I'm going to suck it up and get on my treadmill despite the fact that I don't want to because I have already shoved my mouth full of candy today and exercising after that feels pointless to me. 

I will let you know tomorrow how I did. 

PS.  The last time I checked I had gained 20 pounds back but I have been afraid to step back on the scale for a few weeks so it could be more.  It feels like more.  I am sickened by myself.

Yeah; I Got Preganat Just to Get Your Child Support....

Yes. I Got Preganant Just to Get Child Support From You...

Why do men think once you break up/get divorced that A. The only reason women wanted kids was to rake him over the coals for Child Support?  and B.  Why do most men go to all costs to try to get out of it? 

I mean... I just wanted to SCREAM for the past 18 years at my daughter's daddy (we were never married as we got pregnant right out of highschool).... that first of all I didn't get pregnant on purpose.  Why would I?  It was embarrassing for an 18 year old... it was hard on my body which has never been the same since... I put my dreams of college on hold which I still have yet to complete... I, in essense gave up my life so that I could give my little girl anything and everything I could by working at crappy dead end jobs for my entire adult life.  It was not about me anymore... she has been my first thought in everything I did since the day she was born.

And also that birth control was not just my responsibility and in sharing a sexual experience with me alone made him equally responsible in getting preganant.  (Most women do not get preganant on purpose although there may be an exception to that rule from time to time). 

Once last thing.... did he really think that $400 a month was soooooooo much money?  I mean doesn't he have a CLUE how much raising a child costs?  Yeah.  I got pregant on purpose, ending my social life (although her birth barely phased his), just so that I could get a measley $400 a month out of him.  Cuz how else would I be able to afford getting my hair done,  buying tons of clothes and shoes for myself, maybe throw in a little tanning, botox, vacations and heck even support my partying habits.  Jeez.

The preceeding attitude being thrown in my face continuously for 18 years... never once, mind you feeling guilty for the extent he would go to to hide his income from the governement...take voluntary lay off to get out of paying child support while working under the table doing other things. 

Although child support has stopped, being a mother obviously hasn't.  Except now he's off the hook... but I'm not... how can I be?  Now that she is in college and stuggling to make ends meet, I give her any extra money I have because I want more for her than I had.  She is good girl.  She deserves more.  But her father tells her "I paid over $80,000 to your mom in the past 18 years; she should have been putting some of that away for college."  REALLY? 

I know I'm not the only person to be going thru this and on the flip side I have seen dad's with custody where child support doesn't seem to be as strict for the mother as in the opposite situation.  But that would be a whole nother blog I guess....

When a Supernova Turns Black Hole; What's a Mom to Do?

I want to talk about my recent revelation I've had in my life.  Well... revelation is one way to put it I guess. Another might be "meltdown" or "midlife crisis".  I don't care what you want to call it.  Even I don't know which word is most appropriate.  I don't have any other words I can think of that would fully depict what happened to me.

I guess you could say I "broke".  I don't know what the final straw was, but yeah... this camel's back broke. 

I have always, always (did I mention always?) been the type of person that once dedicated to a position, job or expectation, I commited 1000%.  No, that's not a typo.  Just doing 100% was unacceptable to me.  If 1000% were a possible mathmatical term, that's what I was. Granted, sometimes I procrastinated.  Sometimes it took me awhile to get to the 1000% level of devotedness, but I always somehow found the place deep inside where I would reach in and no matter what it took to accomplish my goal -- no matter how daughntingly impossible the task seemed.  My friends knew this about me, my relatives as well as my coworkers...no one usually ever gave it a second thought that Stacy would accomplish it and usually accomplish it with flying colors, I might add. 

I did it all.  From raising my daughter alone while going to college and working full time simultaneously.  There were many days that the only time I got to spend with her was in the early mornings.  I would get up at 6 am to spend a few hours with her before dropping her off at school then going to classes myself.  Sometimes even having to go to work between classes... then picking her up from school and bringing her to her evening babysittter and going back to work. Most nights I didn't get off work til 10 or after.  I'd pick her up, carry her to her room while she slept, hit the books for 4 or 5 hours, sleep for 2 or 3 hours and start my day over again.  It was during this time that I first realized how lucky I was that I didn't have to study hard to maintain good grades.  Too bad I didn't realize it in high school.  Hind sight, huh?  But I digress...

When my daughter was 6, I met my husband.  It was a whirlwind for me... a dream come true.  Although I was in love with him I think a bigger part of me yearned for a family; a normal life with someone to share in the worries and responsibilities of parenthood.  We had 2 more children, a boy 8 months after we married, and another boy exactly 1 year later.  Having them close together was my idea.  Coming from a seriously disfunctional family that isn't close today, I wanted children that were close in age in hopes that they would be close in heart. 

Of course I planned to continue college, but one thing turned into another... one bill turned into another.  We just never had the money to send me to school.  And even if we did, my husband was an over the road truck driver. I worked full time. (At that point, it wasn't a choice; I HAD to). So when in the world would I find time for school?  I barely had time to sleep for goodness sake!

So I dove into motherhood with full force, alone mind you for weeks at a time while my my husband was out on the road, all while holding down a full time job in the process. With a one year old, and infant, and a full time job, I got my then 7 year old daughter involved in local highschool musicals (taken very seriously in our town).  As if getting her to and from practice 6 days a week wasn't enough, I somehow was recruited to help make costumes and props.  Somehow I managed.  Looking back today I don't know how I managed.  But with several sleepless nights, I somehow did.  I was supermom!  I was proud of my accomplishments.  I thought they were what proved to my family how important they were to me.

This continued for the next 10 years; through my boys being diagnosed with ADHD (finally) at the ages of 6 and 7, through my daughter's emotional rollercoaster teen years, through ballet classes and band, choir and orchestra concerts, through boy scouts consuming every weekend, through many a battle with my ex and my husband's ex, through my 13 year old step son moving in with us for a few years...supermom balanced it all.  I was so busy that I didn't even notice it happening.  That is why I can't pinpoint to you when it happened, or what particualar instance was the final straw... all I know is the wake I left in the aftermath. 

Not having any family to really depend on and my husband being gone for most of our marriage it was around our 10 year anniversary that I can look back and notice the first clues.  My frustration level was already almost full throttle the minute I put my feet on the floor in the morning so when something would happen that I normally would have been able to handle, my temper would go from zero to 20 in no time flat.  I was yelling all the time.  I was impatient with my kids and was slowing losing my hip mom status as I began to have a hard time relating to them for the first time ever. I felt bad for being this way so I was crying all the time, especially in the mornings on my way into work, while wondering where I was going to find it in me to give my usual 1000% because remember; 100% was just not acceptable to me.  Admitting that I was overwhelmed was like admitting defeat somehow.  "I can do this", I kept telling myself.  "Its just a state of mind."  I kept thinking that I needed to find the "right" job.  The job that would allow me to have more control over my life so that all my problems would go away once I could better balance my life.  But it seemed that every decision I was making was just digging the hole deeper and deeper.  At this point, I still didn't even ackowledge that my problem was that I was overwhelmed. Or for that matter that I even HAD a problem.  I was just your everyday typical mom, or so I thought.  So I jumped aboard the antidepressant train.  I blamed my job. I blamed my husband's job.  I blamed myself.  Because for obvious reasons, I couldn't blame my family. 

Although my husband's and my intial plan upon getting married was that he would come off the road as soon as he could find a normal everyday job that allowed him to be home everynight, it didn't work out that way because of.. eh hum.. well... lets just leave it at that for now because that is a whole blog all by itself. 

So I was alone; and trust me when I tell you I had never felt more alone in all my life. I held my own for like I said about 10 years...then my cup was suddenly empty.  That was when I started melting down.  It happened like a frog in a pot of boiling water.  You know how that goes... if you gradually turn up the heat the frog will never even know he is boiling to death?  Yeah, that was me alright.  Boiling to death.  I began to shut down, I stopped cooking dinners, I stopped doing laundry, I stopped interacting with my kids like I always did.  Instead, I watched TV.  For hours.  Endlessly divuldging in the pretend lives of the characters so that I didn't have to think of my own.  I began pondering my life and the failures and mistakse I had made; dwelling on the dreams I had abandoned and the things I had left undone. 

It became harder and harder to get up in the mornings.  It became harder and harder to get to work.  Harder and harder to care about work, my husband, my kids, my house...myself. 

I realized I had nothing left in me to care about those around me.  I had burnt out...burned too bright for too long and the supernova had collapsed into a black hole.   

I filed for divorce and, although I shamefully admit it now, even thought (maybe "dreamed" is a more fitting word) of running away, somewhere new and exotic...somewhere that for the first time in my entire adult life, I could care about just me.  

I'm not going to go into detail of the personal struggles I encountered for the next 2 to 3 years. But I will tell you, it was pure hell.  For me, for my husband and my kids. My doctor wanted to admit me to an inpatient mental health program so that I could take a deep emotional break from life and begin to regroup.  Of course my excuse was that I couldn't just leave work unattended; who would do my job?  Or heaven forbid my husband take a leave from work and we be out a month's salary...because THAT was more important than my life!  Psh.  So instead, I opted for weekly visists to my therapist for almost a year, and then semi monthly for a year after; on top of family therapy that my husband and I attended and still do. 

We are still married although there were casualties lost; like our beautiful house that we sold in the midst of the battle.  There are friends on both sides (and even family members) that will forever be lost from the contaminating poison of a pending divorce battle.  There's also things we have done and can never take back that will forever haunt our marriage.  But we are still an intact family and perhaps even a stronger one than before.  What that don't kill you..

My biggest saving grace was that I began exercising like crazy.  Exercise was not only theraputic for me and gave me confidence while losing weight,  but it also was my way of proving to myself that I could put myself first once in awhile.  Trust me, it was hard.  It still is.  I have to accept that my house is not always immaculate because I want to spend my "me" time at the gym rather than cleaning up after everyone.  I've had to let go of some responsibilities and let the weight fall on my husband or even in some cases my children.  (Still a work in progress).  I have quit my job and accepted that it is not failure to not live in the lap of luxury.  We've had to make sacrifices but on the flip side; they are material sacrifices.  What we were sacrifiing before were things we would never be able to take back.  I want to be here for my children and my childrens' children.  I want to be remembered as happy and full of life rather than stressed and frazzled.  I want to look back with no regrets.  And I do believe, finally, I am on the right path.  And everyone that is important to me will be the better for it. 

The message here is; don't fall into the never ending materialistic cycle.  My parents did it.  I never thought I would but there I was; up to my neck in the American way of life quicksand and sinking fast.  You don't have to be perfect.  You don't have to be a SuperNova.  This is your life.  No take backs.  No regrets.