On My Way

Wow! Where to start??

I guess I sort of forgot about this journal until they threatened to suspend my account.  I went back to read some of my old posts and I realized that I have documented such an important period in my life that I can't let it disappear forever.  So I'm back.  It's kind of odd that I stopped writing right around the time that I started getting to know this guy at work who is now my best friend in the world.  There is so much to tell about him that I'll save it for a separate post (or two or three.)  So what else is new?

1. To date, I have lost 96 lbs on WW, 114 lbs total (from my highest weight.)  I'm only 5 lbs away from the lowest weight I've ever been since my sophomore year of college (when I was gaining weight.)
2. I did get my house clean before the annual beach trip in April, but two or three rooms have slid backwards again.  But I do have some new (to me) couches that really add a lot to the living room.
3. I have a great group of friends at my new job.  We walk during breaks together and play cards on our lunch break together and take each other out to lunch for birthdays and stuff. 
4. I am friends again with the girl who stopped talking to me around December or January.  She is about to marry the guy who she was spending so much time with that I never saw or heard from her.
5. I seem to have plans to do stuff all the time!  I used to be home alone every evening and weekend and I didn't really mind it all that much.  I don't remember the last evening that I didn't have plans of some sort!
6. I am attending a new church and starting to get involved.  I feel very comfortable there.
7. I am making a major effort to start dating... online, trying to meet people, trying to get set up by friends... this is very new territory for me!
8. I have pretty much decided that I do not want to go back to a career in youth ministry.  I don't know what I want to do, but that's not it.
9. I have given up on the idea of having a baby on my own.  It's just not financially possible with my job.
10. I have a part time job working for a great friend that brings in some much needed extra money (although I'm still spending more money than I'm taking in...).

So... that about sums it up!  I'll write more soon, I promise!

Progress?

Considering it's been a month since my last post, I'm thinking I should have a lot of progress to report.  Well, in some ways, I do... but overall, I'm not sure if I'm moving forward fast enough.  I'm getting pretty close to the "enough is enough" point.  I'm hoping that my post to follow this one will be more significant.  But for now, here's what I've been up to:

CORE (i.e. Weight Watchers): 
CORE is going awesome!  I'm most pleased about this area of my life.  This is officially day 55 of CORE.  I've lost 38 lbs total at this point.  I've been walking everyday at work for 30 minutes (two 15 minute breaks are built in to the day) and I get an extra 3 workouts in a week on top of that!  I've reintroduced some sugar and flour products, with no disastrous results.  I am completely sure that I will be successful this time.  I am much closer to understanding that eating for emotional reasons is a need that can't ever be filled.  I am much further from needing to binge than I ever have been.  All I have to think about is my health scare and I literally am afraid to pig out for fear of destroying my health.  Do I splurge once in a while?  Yes.  Do I think I can safely work in trips to the pizza buffet?  No.

Career:
Hmmm... Don't know how to sum this up... I am liking my new job for the most part.  But, I can only see myself staying long enough to learn what I can and then move on.  Of course, that's what it seems that most people do.  Will I look for a similar position with different challenges?  I don't know.  I'm really thinking a total career change (i.e. going back to school) may be in order.  I did have a phone interview for a youth ministry job--remember those resumes I sent out way back in the fall?  Well, despite my lack of conviction about returning to youth ministry (I've been totally up front with them) one church is still interested.  How do I feel about this?  I have no idea.  I loved so many things about youth ministry.  And I know know that most of my unhappiness came from my particular church.  But maybe, it was the push I needed to get out when I did and move on?

Everything Else:
My house and my dogs are still a source of frustration and guilt.  This is totally my fault and it's up to me to fix it.  I know that I let the house get in the way of moving forward with my life.  Same as I did with the weight.  When your major goals are to lose weight and clean your house (and you REALLY have to lose a LOT of WEIGHT and do a LOT of CLEANING) you are unable to focus on anything beyond those goals.  They are how I avoid the next step.  I sit around and watch TV and feel guilty for not doing more.  This is not me.  I've been wasting a lot of time.  No more.  What will my next goals be?  Life.  My life.  It's out there, and I'm going to find it.

More Realizations...

I had an interesting discussion with my mom last night.  It started off with me complaining about my dogs... I should know better than to mention them to her.  She immediately starts in with pushing me to find them new homes.  Less mess for me, more fair to them, etc. etc.  I just want the chance to be the one to give them a good home!  I know they don't get enough attention or exercise, and they do sometimes drive me crazy.  But I worry so much about how they will feel about being sent away... I know that's probably silly.  I also hate to think of my life without them.  Yes, I won't have to worry about coming home after a reasonable amount of time, I'll save money, and I won't have to clean up after them.  BUT it will be so lonely!  And it's a lot of comfort to have them here (as a single woman living alone.)  I do love them.  And I don't know if I would ever forgive myself for giving them up.

We talked a lot about changes that I can make to my lifestyle to make things better for them.  Much of it boils down to getting my house clean!  Once that happens, they can have more freedom in my house because I won't be worried about them getting into things all the time.

So... on to my point... I realized when she was talking that she doesn't seem to really believe that I will be able to accomplish all of my major life changes/goals.  She thinks I already have more than I can handle with a new job and Weight Watchers.  But, more importantly, I realized that I DO BELIEVE THAT I CAN ACCOMPLISH MY GOALS!  I mean, I know I have been trying to lose weight, get my house clean, overcome depression, find a satisfying career, take charge of my finances, and provide a good home for my dogs for a long time.  And very often I would wonder if I would really be able to do any of it! But it turns out that I have already achieved many of these goals (or at least made great strides.)  And I actually believe that the rest is coming.

My spiritual director and I have talked a lot about the person I used to be... and I've been thinking about her a lot.  I know she would be able to accomplish anything she wanted.  Whatever has happened these past 17 years to turn me into the person I have become will ultimately help me help others.  I truly believe that.  I just have to overcome a few more obstacles first. 

And now I know that I will.

PS: Today is day 24 of Core!

Cardiologist and Clarification

First, the clarification.  I don't know how much sense my last ramblings made to anyone else.  When I read it now I don't feel like it's what was in my head.  I guess what I'm saying is eating emotionally is like scratching a terrible itchy mosquito bite.  Once you start, there is temporary relief.  Unfortunately, the itch just gets more persistent and you want to scratch again and again, harder and harder until you break the skin.  It's like scratching just encourages the itch!  If you don't scratch at all, it's almost possible to ignore.  And after awhile, the bite will be gone.  I just feel the need to fully explain this feeling to make it easier for me to recall later when all I really want is a cookie minus the self-analysis.

Now, onto the cardiologist (stress echo today).  Peace of mind, my ass.  That's what my doctor said it was for.  Nothing to worry about.  No?  How about an enlarged heart, exercise induced tachycardia and my heart muscle not being as "contractile" as the cardiologist would like?  Fuck.  It makes me feel especially stupid to think that, less than a year ago, I was wishing my doctor would give me at least a little bad news at my physical to motivate me to lose weight.  What an idiot I am.  Let's see, other than stupid, I'm feeling pretty shocked, scared, relieved, inspired, and stupid again.  Shocked that I had no idea.  Scared because he basically said, "Well, it's not exactly cancer but the end result could be the same."  Relieved because I finally have something medical as an extra excuse/reason/motivation to stick with the program (I'm just being honest.)  Inspired because he did say that everything is totally reversible.  And stupid again because I did this to myself.

He did threaten medication for the tachycardia.  Which seems weird to me because nobody has ever told me that my resting heart rate is too high (and I have my vitals checked often, not just for regular physicals, but for platelet donation.)  It's just that it got higher faster than it should have while I was on the treadmill.  For how hard I was working, it should have been lower.  But I do know that this kind of thing improves with regular exercise.  I'm not sure why the meds would be necessary.  He said something about me feeling a lot better with the meds, but I told him that I don't feel bad now.  He's going to pass the results and his recommendations back to my doctor and she'll talk to me about my options.  I'm anxious to hear what she has to say.

Oh, and this is day 10 on Core!  And I start my new job tomorrow!  And I had another appointment with my spiritual director yesterday and we talked about me exploring the possibility of med school!  Could I have more going on right now?  Don't answer that.  I'm knocking wood this very moment.

What's Working For Me (Barely)

It's funny that one day after I post here extolling the virtues of Core, I find myself barely hanging on... of course, not funny "ha ha."  So as I sit here at work surrounded by holiday goodies, right next to the break room where I can smell everyone's yummy lunch, what's helping me stay on program?  I keep asking myself if there is any limit to how much junk I'll have to eat before it will be enough.  See, I have this thing where I feel like I don't want to miss my chance to eat something that I won't have a chance to eat again.  Like a coworker's homemade chocolate chip cookies (when I won't be working with this person after Wednesday.)  And I have this other thing where once I start eating junk, I begin to imagine all of the other foods I want to eat while I have the "chance."  If I just let myself eat and eat and eat, would there ever be enough?  Or would I just keep finding more that I wanted to eat while I had the "chance"?  Granted, I would get temporarily stuffed enough to stop eating, but I would be ready to start again before you know it. 

See, that's the problem with emotional eating.  "If hunger isn't the problem, then food isn't the answer" no matter how much food you eat.  Nothing will ever be enough because I'm trying to fix something that can't be fixed by food.  This may sound obvious, but to some people, it really isn't.  This actually feels like a revelation.  And it's significant enough to help me say "no" a hundred times more today if necessary.

CORE and Caffeine

It's been a significant week for a lot of reasons:
1. It was my last full week at my temp job answering phones and getting the mail
2. My house is yet again one giant step closer to being clean
3. I was diagnosed with an arrhythmia and mild PVCs
4. I weaned myself off of caffeine (believe it or not, I began this before #3 happened)
5. It was my first week of CORE

#1 and #2 are kind of old news.  Now when I start my new job and actually have my house clean AND decorated for Christmas, then we'll talk.  So, on to the rest... the first thing you need to know is I LOVE Coke (the yummy, dark, bubbly, clean your toilets with it, sickeningly sweet stuff--not the other kind.)  But if I'm going to try to commit to Weight Watchers, I can't be using all of those points for Coke.  And I really don't enjoy diet sodas.  Partially for the icky taste, and partially because I feel icky ingesting all of those chemicals (yes, forget about all the chemicals in regular Coke and all the fast food I was eating... it's only the nutrasweet that puts me over the edge--I know, I'm crazy.)  Unfortunately I get horrible headaches (migraines?) when I cut out caffeine.  But it seemed silly to keep trying to drink those diet sodas just for the caffeine.  On top of that, I was starting to get headaches anyway.  I think because my caffeine consumption schedule was thrown off over Thanksgiving.  And I was trying to get back on WW after Thanksgiving, so everything was a little off.  So I decided to wean myself off. 

From what I found on the internet, cutting back the equivalent of 1/2 cup of coffee a day will help avoid withdrawal symptoms.  Then I went looking for how much caffeine was in the sodas I was drinking and the diet sodas I was willing to drink (not to mention the Excedrin I was taking for the headaches) and found The American Beverage Association which lists the caffeine content of various soft drinks.  Cool!  So my anal, list-making self, calculated everything out and figured out how to cut back about 50 mg a day.  And my last caffeine was on Friday!  And, yes, I still ended up with a headache, but not nearly as bad as it would have been.  Tylenol knocked it out quickly.

It was two days into this extravaganza that I went to try to donate platelets.  In the vitals check they heard an irregular heartbeat.  Now, I've been deferred for this once before (over a year ago) but there were extenuating circumstances at the time (I had just stayed up all night for a lock-in with the youth.)  They didn't seem particularly concerned then since I get regular physicals and donate blood products regularly and nobody ever noticed anything.  But this time, they told me to see my doctor and that I couldn't donate until I was cleared medically.  So two days later I'm in my doctor's office getting an EKG and they tell me I'm having PVCs.  Although my doc's not concerned, especially considering I'm having no shortness of breath or chest pains (and she says it's quite possibly due to the caffeine or stress anyway) she's still sending me to a cardiologist for a stress echo.  This is partially due to my family history of heart disease as well as, I'm assuming, my weight (even though she didn't say that.)  But it's mostly for peace of mind.

Now I'm finding this all pretty scary but also ironic, considering that I was in the middle of the best week on Weight Watchers ever!  I've finally decided to try CORE.  For those of you not in the know--CORE is Weight Watchers' no-counting plan.  You eat off of a certain list of foods until satisfied.  Which means, if you are hungry, you are allowed to eat!  And then you stop once you are satisfied (not stuffed!).  But it's ok to stop because you haven't already allotted those points or anything so you don't feel compelled to finish.  Plus you know that if you get hungry again you are allowed to EAT.  The list of CORE foods is basically all whole foods: fruits, veggies, beans, eggs, lean meat, fat free dairy products, whole grains, and healthy fats.  Plus you get 35 points a week to do with what you'd like.  Right now I'm using them for nuts and low fat dairy.  After several weeks, I may splurge a little more, but I'm hoping to actually lose my taste (and cravings) for sugary/fatty food.  That's what they say happens.  I'm finding the WW CORE board very helpful (not to mention that they are missing much of the drama found in some of the other boards.)  I weigh-in in about 2 hours, and I can't wait.  But even if it doesn't show a huge number, I already know how much better I feel.  This is truly something I can do for the rest of my life.

Stream of Consciousness

Thoughts jumbled.  Listening to John Denver on PBS--feel good music.  Do you use punctuation with stream of consciousness writing?  I'm not going to the Single Mothers by Choice support group anymore.  Just makes me realize how long I'm going to have to wait to be a mother--first no job, now no money.  Maybe I'll have to wait just long enough to lose the weight, and maybe, just maybe find a husband too.  I'm a little jealous of my BF who's found a great guy.  They (and everyone around them) are sure that this is the one.  She's only 25.  I'm 32.  WTF have I been doing with my life for all these years?  Time is running out.  I know it's not really unless I have a symptom-free tumor hiding somewhere (ok, so I'm a hypochondriac) but the years are just flying by.  I don't want to wake up another 8 years from now and say WTF have I been doing?  Not that everything about what I'll call the youth ministry years was a waste... those were also the therapy years and the I-don't-have-to-be-depressed-forever years.  And there were many wonderful moments with the kids.  But they were also the fat-and-lonely years.  Actually that's been going on even longer.  Lonely since relationship with Mike #2 ended senior year of college.  (My idea, definitely a good thing--but if I had known that this many years later I would still be alone...)  Fat since sophomore year of college.  Actually went on WW freshman year with not much to lose (40-something pounds I think--that's not much relative to every pound since then...) and then proceded to gain that weight back plus another hundred during sophomore year.  Must have scared everyone around me!  Like that Violet girl in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Finally running out of things to say... well not really... just need to take a brain blink... I started seeing a spiritual advisor about discerning the direction of my life (job/vocation/church participation.)  Very interesting.  I talked most of the time but she was very perceptive and insightful right away.  I don't know if I'll explain this right, but she basically said that she believes that God lives within us as well as there being a transcendent God.  We are closer to the God within us the closer we become to the person we were created to be... and we are closer to the God within us the more we know ourselves (which I do, thanks to the years of therapy--but this is different than therapy, sort of, I think.)  I began moving away from the God within me when I began giving away pieces of me--giving up things that were important to me for the sake of my relationship with Mike #2.  My task is to try to get to know the girl I was before that relationship began.

Just got off the phone with guy from Eharmony.  Weird conversation.  I found myself telling him all the things that I worry will turn someone off about me.  Just didn't feel like wasting time.  Get everything out in the open so there are no surprises later.  This probably isn't the best way to go about dating.  Maybe I'm just not ready.

I think I've lost my stream of consciousness... my paragraphs are getting too planned out.  But it was helpful for me to get everything out.  Thanks for reading.

Relief!

I have a job! 

Yes, yes... Thanksgiving was relaxing, it was good to see family, but... I have a job!

I can't say that I'm all that excited about this particular job or that I now know what my future holds, but at least I can pay my freaking bills (well, barely.)  It could be the start of something great, or it could be a good temporary fix while I get the rest of my life together.  It is in the science field and it relates to my education, so it might be a good fit.

P.S. It's ok you didn't feel like commenting (but thanks to "Bev" for being my first!).  I'm just glad there are a few people out there reading.  I don't actually comment on most of the blogs that I read.  I'd link to some of them here, but wouldn't that be shameless self-promotion?  It's basically like telling all of them that, "HEY!  I HAVE A BLOG NOW TOO!  COME VISIT ME!"  I don't really know proper blog etiquette.  Of course, when have I ever really worried about what was proper?

Can I ask?

I was checking out my stats, which I rarely do since I assume nobody's reading... But I'm thrilled (and a little nervous) to see that I was wrong!  I know nobody's commenting, so I just have to ask: will you tell me a little about yourself?  Who you are or how you found me or why you are reading or if you'll come back or whatever.  Thanks!

But I'm feeling much better now...

Wow, more than a month before I even felt like saying I don't actually hate my life.  I guess it's good that it wasn't more than a month!

Top 10 reasons why my life doesn't suck as much as it did a month ago:

10. I finally made a decision to stop attending my old church.  Decisions are good.

9. Best friend and I are back to normal and actually talked about a lot of the old and current issues.

8. My parents and I have stopped discussing my moving in with them--it's not completely off the table, but it's not an ongoing debate.  Sometimes it is better to just avoid an issue.

7. I started applying for youth ministry jobs.  Not sure where this is going, but it feels like a good thing.

6. My house is actually almost clean.  I finally just asked my mom to come help.  And I'm working on the finishing touches myself.

5. Christmas is coming.  I think this is my favorite time of year.  Not Christmas itself, because that's always a little bit of a letdown.  It's the anticipation and preparation that I love.

4. I've finally started getting responses to my resumes and applications.  Positive and negative responses, mind you, but at least I feel a little less crazy.  I was starting to wonder if every application I sent out disappeared into the ether.

3. We have family coming into town for Thanksgiving.  I loved the big family Thanksgivings we had when I was a kid, but for the last several years it was usually just immediate family (or I spent it at a friend's house.)

2. I gave my dogs a bath.  I don't know why, but it's made a difference.

1. I saw the Harry Potter movie yesterday!  What more can a girl ask for?