Just Say "NO"...and Push Away

It's official! After nearly 7 months, I'm nearly fixed.....

The SAD (seasonal affective disorder, which I PROMISE is a real medical abnormality) is leaving to make room for the longer, sunnier days of the never-ending-Utah-winter. Hubby has a job that he doesn't hate, thus improving the constant need for medication just to get me out of bed in the mornings, which in turn has come full circle with my GAD being miraculously mended thanks to iPhone apps that have helped me rock the 5 am workouts. All of my internal organs have seemed to settle back into their original placement pre-surgery, and I can almost feel my lower abs gaining some strength again and staying put instead of popping out of my abdomen like an alien baby. So, as it turns out, the brilliant doc was right. Also, as a tiny bit of frosting on my cake of life, I am cancelling next week's appointment with said doctor because I am only willing to pay a copay when I'm feeling suckish - not when I feel fabulous. And, I do....I really do. Apparently he knew what he was talking about when he literally ordered me back to the gym. It's my daily dose of happy, even when I hate it.

I am narcissistic enough to think that any of you actually care that I've conquered this year's bout of SAD before I tear away the February calendar page. I feel compelled to update because I don't want a blog that just bitches about how crappy I feel. It's all about the good, the bad, and the ugly here, so you're getting every ounce of all of it. I don't keep a journal...never really have. (Unless you count the spiral notebook with some sappy daisy-covered meadow with a litter of adorable, fluffy puppies on it that I finally shredded and disposed of in my mid 20's in an effort to remove the proof of my idiotic teen fantasies. Pathetic...)  So, this is the only journal I'm likely to keep with any kind of consistency until such time technology is available that can read my every thought and archive them for future reference. As I can hardly remember anything at all anymore, the "iMEMBERnow" should come in handy someday. Can't wait for Apple to invent it. (That is probably a gajillion dollar idea, by the way - think of me in 2020 when you see it on the market.)

Anyhoooooo...... I am setting some goals to keep the GAD in check and I'm selfishly using you to help keep me on track. So, here it goes......

1) I'm saying "NO" to anything containing the gooey goodness of caramel (which in my house is darn near anything really worth eating) - I can only promise this Monday - Friday; the weekends don't count
2) I'm pushing away from the table after dinner, served only on a small dinner plate and not rerounding, no matter how long it will be before it's on the menu again
3) I'm swapping Wednesday's AM school car pool with hubby so I can get my enlarged ass to spin class (ok, honey?)
4) I'm not skipping any more strength training workouts on the schedule just because I know I'll hurt so bad the following day that I cry out loud in pain while walking down the stairs; 4 days a week - minimum!
5) I'm hitting the open road on the bike on every sunny Saturday possible (well, except if it's too windy because I hate feeling like the wind is stronger than I am)
6) I'm doing a Century in June with sista and don't want to allow her to smoke me - it's embarrassing

There you have it.....what will you Just Say "No" to?

As a side note, I'm saying "YES, ABSOLUTELY YES!!" to having this girl's abs......even if I have to buy them.

Surprise #5

My fifth surprise arrived exactly one week before the surprise deadline. For a summary of the previous 4 surprises, you'll have to humor me and actually read the previous blog entries. I'd also LOVE for you to follow my blog so it looks like more than just me and Steven actually read it.

Surprise #5: whew, it's a doosie. One I've waited on for quite a while.  How can I say this politely.........there is no way to say it nicely and without sounding like a total beyotch, so I'm just gonna come out with it....I have neighbors who have successfully sold their home. Now this could mean alot of things. It could mean that I'm thrilled that they weren't a short sale or a foreclosure, thus further plummeting the fair market value of my own home. It could mean that I'm excited for them to move on to bigger and better residential opportunities. It could mean that they profited from the economic and housing market downturn and got a house twice as big for half the mortgage. It could mean that maybe they owe less on their home than the actual selling price and maybe even turned a little profit for themselves. All of those things would be great, and I hope for some or all of them for my sweet neighbors.

Or, hypothetically speaking, I might be happy that I won't hear the annoying, systematic, continual sound of a basketball hitting the pavement at 7:30 AM on a perfectly wonderful morning in which I might choose to sleep in. Or perhaps I might be thrilled that the kids can stop instigating a verbal confrontation with one another which inevitably involves their respective parents having to smooth things over before things get really ugly. It could quite possibly even be that I won't ever again come home only to see every single wood chip from my flower beds spread throughout my entire sidewalk, stairs, and landing leading up to the front door. And, I don't know, since we are talking hypotethicals, by the ending of said children (both mine and theirs) bringing out the absolute worst in each other by intentionally slinging dog crap at each other across the fence. Hypothetically.........

Surprises 2, 3 and 4

I don't want to lose count of my 5 surprises, so I will itemize them as they arrive. Surprise #1, the desire to go back to the gym, is still a work in progress. I did make it to the gym a few times last week, but wasn't feeling 100% thanks to a cough due to cold, and I didn't make it as many days as I'd originally hoped. I'll keep pushing through though, and am committing to 5 days of workouts this week. Already I'm at 3. And not just the "I show up, give my fingerprint, put my crap in the locker room, stretch, pretending I'm really pushing through that elliptical workout" workout. Seriously, my muscles are in a state of rebellious confusion, not knowing whether to stretch or snap, and they are revolting. I'm still trying to remember what "hurts so good" feels like...

Speaking of this week, our schedules are in a temporary state of influx. Thanks to Martin Luther King, the girls were home from school for a long weekend on Monday and Tuesday. I opted to take Monday off as both an excuse to stay home with the girls, as well as a mental-health, get myself together day. A day off is like Chicken Soup for the Soul. I didn't even spend it in bed watching bad reality TV and catching up on the DVR full of more bad reality TV (which is about all I've done for 5 months). After a trip to the gym, a morning of total house cleaning, laundry, lunch out with my girls, a trip to Target, making dinner for the family, and baking a surprise for Daddy, I felt INCREDIBLE. Thus.....Surprise #2. Seriously, I felt better and more like my hardly existent, not-so-old self. It was both exhilarating and liberating. The feeling that I am finally pulling myself out of the SAD doldrums and "two-step forward, one-step backward" post-op recovery - I think its almost safe to say that it feels like it's all behind me (and I'm totally not talking about how big my butt is right now). It's good to start feeling more like myself, before all of this hormonal and menopausal upheaval occurred. I'd almost forgotten.

The doctor gave me a few "absolutely no......" items for what should have been an 8-week waiting period. Without giving you enough details to draw yourself a mental picture, suffice it say that 8 weeks is a VERY long time. Why is it that when someone tells me "absolutely no.....you can't", I'm all the more eager to do it? Literally???  Although my official 8 weeks isn't technically over until tomorrow........you get the picture. Surprise #3 - NONE of my fears from surgery, hormones, etc. has been manifested and you have no idea what a relief that is. YAY ME! (It WAS a surprise after all, which is the only reason I'm torturing you with TMI.)

Surprise #4 - I sent my handsome hubby off to work this week. You have no idea how timely Surprise #4 really is. No idea......  Someone wise (me) once said, "Everything happens for a reason". It's been difficult to imagine the reason behind this particular everything. Several things I do know - no matter the difficulty placed before him, I have never doubted my hubby's love for me and our kids; no matter the financial complexities this "recession" may have caused, I appreciate all that we still have and have somehow managed to hold onto with more humble thankfulness; no matter where we live or the jobs we choose, I appreciate every sacrifice  and difficult decision we've had to make over the last 13 years; and I am lucky to have my husband, my kids, my family, my friends, my job, my health......all of it! Because not everyone I know has made it through with all of those things still intact. But we have, and as a bonus, I am still completely twiterpated by my marital bestie. So for all of those times I verbally asked where MY blessings were through the trials.....finally.....I can now consider it all one, big, all-encompassing blessing. In retrospect - although that is definately hard to realize when you think your life is going to hell in a handbasket.

There just might be something to this "waiting on a surprise" thing. Every day I am anticipating something fantastic. Maybe I'm turning into an eternal optimist. Now, that WOULD be a surprise! Until then, I await Surprise #5. Stay tuned......

5 Surprises...

As much as I was looking forward to tearing away that last 2010 calendar page, I’m a little disheartened that 2011 hasn't started off with as much fabulosity as I’d hoped for. By the 1^st, we’d managed to not only contract the stomach flu, but we also smuggled it across the Idaho/Utah state border to share with everyone in our household. Mikayla, Brooklyn, and Steven (all in that order and also in order of severity) shared a sick bed, while I went to work praying I wasn’t contaminated and spreading icky flu  germs to everyone I know. By the 5^th we were on our way to meeting the new insurance deductible that kicked in only shortly after meeting it for the 2010 plan year. Is that tax deductible?  Also on the 5^th or 6^th, I was met with the disappointment of hitting neither the winning MegaMillions or Powerball numbers that were purchased in Idaho, probably at the very Maverick where we stopped to buy our own tickets and fill up with gas to make said journey home carrying the flu. Crap!  On the 7^th, I received an email forward promising all manner of surprises and good fortune by merely forwarding it on. So, before I tear off a single page of the 2011 calendar, I’m going to start counting the 5 surprises I was promised by forwarding along the email. Let me digress……

As any of the 8 people who actually follow my blog know, this year has been nothing short of a struggle. I’m not going to bother going into all the reasons why…that would defeat the entire purpose of my 2011 goals from my December 2010 blog article (see below). What I will admit again is that I am still trying to overcome some issues from 2010: a tiny bout of depression, a more than tiny weight gain from said tiny bout of depression, a broken give-a-damn which helped bring about the tiny bout of depression, a medical diagnosis that scared the living daylights out of me, thus requiring a medically necessary surgery, and a 6-8 week recovery time of which I am only at week 6. (But, I’m back to being nearly perfect now, so no need to worry! I’m cured!) At my last doctor’s follow-up I was complaining about all of my post-surgical “differences”, despite feeling physically healed. The doctor went through my list of prescribed medications, including all the new menopausal hormones I have the privilege of taking now, and together we tried to identify all of the differences and what is realistic to expect in upcoming weeks/months post-op. At the end of what seemed like a long list of “differences”, the topic of exercise was raised. Would you believe there is no pill for him to prescribe that will make me want to go back to 5 am workouts? I expressed my displeasure in the pharmaceutical industry. The good doctor basically said (and I paraphrase), “SUCK IT UP, BUTTERCUP!” At the conclusion of his peptalk, he rescheduled me for 6 weeks out (February 16^th), and told me to get back to the gym pronto and that I had the next 6 weeks to figure something out on my own. If not, we’d start tweeking the meds, adding this…decreasing that…and I would perhaps need the next several months to get it figured out, or I would likely be taking enough testerosterone to turn me into a man. OK…..several more days of doing nothing  would put me back in a size that I’m not that interested in returning to. Honestly, I’ve got 5 more pounds before I don’t have a single article of clothing that fits. And, although my boss was quite understanding when I showed up in sweats for 4 weeks in a row because nothing fit post-op, I’m quite sure it’s not a very flattering office wardrobe. Honestly, why is it easier to do nothing and bitch about it than it is to do something and feel good about it?

Well, I am officially done bitching (only about this, of course). Thanks to a friend who called last night and said, “What’s the deal? Are you going back to the gym or not?” Apparently, she was in a similar quandary of having a broken give-a-damn too. So, we promised each other we’d be there at 5 am and I was excited that together we could bitch about hormones and weight gain, and the skinny biotches with incredibly perky new boobs who wear a only bra to workout in, and whatever else we wanted to. So there….I went back to the gym today. Apparently, when you don’t go to the gym for 4 months, gym management sees fit to make changes without consulting you. What……….? Now I have to bring my own lock? And who thought removing the paper towel dispenser was a good idea? Now I have to blow-dry? No membership card scanner? Now 24-Hour Fitness uses finger print technology? You’ve got to be kidding me….

Whatever. The point is that I am trying to find my give-a-damn. The one that helped me lose 60 lbs. The one that got me into those skinny jeans with an ass that looked like it did before age and gravity stole it away from me. The one that took me to the gym every day, made me sweat, got me through spin class, and made me proud to be an almost forty-something. Well, now I AM forty-something and want to look and feel thirty-something again.

So, back to the surprises………I forwarded that stupid email (from paragraph 1, in case you forgot) to 20+ people and my 5 surprises and good fortune are due by January 28^th. I can’t wait to tell you about each and every one of them, as I am certain they will come.

Surprise #1 (took exactly 3 days to arrive): the desire to go back to the gym

Stay tuned…..

Happy Holidays 2010

2010 is over…finally! I’m not gonna lie... 2010 has not been a banner year. I don’t recall ever wanting a year to wrap up as much as I do this one. Although 2009 certainly had its share of challenges, I could have never imagined where 2010 would take us. Unemployment, financial setbacks, and health concerns plagued our family this past year. While I am thankful to be on the road to recovery, I would have happily skipped October thru December and all of the insurance co-pays that came along with it. The up side is that at least I am lucky enough to have health insurance and although I hate paying that premium every month, we finally reaped the benefits this year, having never previously met a yearly deductible.
So, now that we are looking onward and upward to 2011, I’m not going to bother to complain about what we don’t have, didn’t get, and can’t afford. What I hope this year brings to us is not only an employment opportunity for Steven in his chosen field, but one that offers him challenge and personal satisfaction at the same time. I definitely would like to work a little less and be with my kids a little more. I want my kids to remain the happy, healthy, hopeful girls that they have continued to be over this last year. At times they have asked difficult questions that I didn’t always have answers for, but they continue to be non-bratty, non-entitled children, never verbally asking for more than they already have, willing to sacrifice for the greater good of our family.
I look forward to 2011 to be filled with more love, more compassion, more gratitude, and more resilience (not that I am asking for any more reasons to BE resilient, of course). 2011 will contain more gratitude for good health, and living life more fully; less stress and juggling to complete the things that don’t really matter; more listening to the frivolous chatter of my children after school; more walks outside (hopefully runs soon), taking full advantage of every blue sky; more acts of service to those less fortunate; less idle time and more quality time with my family and a greater appreciation for my sisters, parents, and extended family members. I want to give more love to those that I love, doing more for them than they do for me. To the one who knows me best, has made me laugh until I cry, wiped away my tears, and loved me at my worst, I want to make happier every day and count each day we are together as a blessing. Most importantly, I want to enjoy every single day of 2011 with the people I love most.

This free photo collage personalized with Smilebox

A New Partner to keep me going

September 1st? Seriously? My goal for September is to run 6 miles, non-stop. What is your goal for the month?

This morning, I had a new running partner. Not knowing much about my new partner’s running style, I was at first suspicious if she could even keep up with my pace. Not that my pace is super fast, but is more of a casual, very short distance runner. So, after my ritual routine of stretching, we start out at exactly 5:05 am. I have been incredibly frustrated lately with my lack of endurance and haven’t been able to run more than a mile or 2 without stopping…at least since July, before my GAD was rendered entirely useless. (See previous post for acronym definition – I’m thinking of trademarking it.) It’s been so frustrating to be going (what seems like) backwards with my running…meaning I’m getting slower and able to run less distance. With our Love Your Body 5/10K looming in less than 6 weeks, I’ve been feeling more than a little bit of stress and anxiety about it. Well, that and about a hundred other things. Usually, I warm-up, do a little running and am often sidelined with side cramps, shin splints, and toes and feet that are so numb, they feel like cinder blocks in my running shoes. Usually, my self affirmations sound something like this: “I can’t make it….I know I can’t get as far as I want to, so I might as well stop here…Damn my feet hurt….Why is it again that I torture myself?” Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t say this in a self-loathing tone. It’s more of self doubt that creeps in and distracts me from my goal, because after all, it’s easier to quit running with some sort of physical ailment than it is to just keep on going. After taking my usual fistful of essential vitamins, minerals, and supplements (it’s impressive how many I can swallow at a time) and a 5-Hour Energy Shot (which I haven’t been taking), my partner and I were well into our .5 mile warm-up and out of our subdivision. And at that, our jog started with no discussion, no inner self-doubt. I just announced, “We’re going to run now, and we’re not going to stop until we hit the traffic light.” And that we did. She managed to keep up with me and we paced each other the entire stretch to the first traffic light. Ironically, we caught the traffic light (which NEVER happens), so we kept on running. Past the telephone pole which is usually my first resting interval, over the first cross street, up the first of 3 small rolling hills, over the next cross street. Impressed with both of us, we kept pushing through all the way to the first turning corner. Instead of self doubt, I heard “You totally have this, girl. You are not stopping and you are NOT going to let her outrun you.”

Down the hill we went, which stretches approximately a mile to the next traffic light. My standard operating procedure is to turn the corner and walk until I am on the far side of the little strip of stores across the street. Today, we kept running. This was some seriously good stuff! Usually when I run in the early mornings, I leave around 5 AM and by the time I get two-thirds through my route, the sun is just rising above the Wasatch Mountains to the east. I take this route specifically to see this spectacular view – it’s one of my favorite things about living here – it’s so beautiful. Today, I hit my usual spot for the best vantage point, and guess what? It was still dark! Ha! I beat the freaking sun, which ultimately means that I am killing it for a personal record speed, although my partner didn't seem impressed in the least. She is really bringing out my competitive nature. Finally, it occurs to me that it is now September, the days are shorter, and the sun comes up later (and will continue to) than it did in July and I curse out loud to my partner. She is now starting to struggle a little bit and can’t keep my pace, which I’m thinking was probably about a 6 or 6.5 mph pace. (My fabulous FREE running shoes are not NikeFit compatible so I’ll never really know for sure.) My breath is slow and steady, yet hers is getting a little shallower with every few steps. A guy runs past us on the other side of the street and she expresses her distain, apparently of other early morning runners. But I am nearly oblivious to her complaints and we keep pushing through. Basically, by now, I’m in shock at how far I’ve run, so I’m just in it to win it at this point. I tell her we just need to get to the next corner and we’ll walk from there. At that moment, I realize the guy who ran past us on the other side of the street is now running behind us on the same side that we are on, but not faster than our pace. It was weird and still dark outside and if he’d attacked us I wouldn’t have been able to tell you what color his shirt was, let alone give a physical description. Seriously, not to toot my horn, but we ran and we ran fast. I never looked around again to see if he was still behind us. Creepy Running Guy in the Dark was as scary in my own mind as the Random Residential Roaming Mountain Lion I always think is going to attack me from behind, drag me into a revine (of which there are NONE on my route) and eat me on one of these early mornings. (Thanks, Dad, for telling me about the cougar you saw on Canyon Road in Springville. Now I’m neurotic!)
We’re at Harmon’s. Again, because we really want to take a break, we ironically catch the traffic light and continue to run past Harmon’s, past Taco Time, past H&R block…..you’ve got to be kidding me…..now I’m running up the Harmon’s hill. I feel fabulous, but my partner desperately needes to catch her breath. So I concede and we walk up the .5 miles of the Harmon’s hill and turn the corner back into our subdivision. Revived, although only briefly, we run down to the last street and our goal is only to get past the park and to the stop sign. Only then would I submit to stopping. We did it! I’m certain she hates me, although she never verbalizes it. She doesn’t know it, but she’s running that route again on Friday, only this time, she’s going to have to try to keep up. She’s also going to have to crap in my yard BEFORE we leave the house because I will never again carry a doggie-poop bag in each hand for a 5 mile run. Lay off the fiber bars, Daisy – you’re killing me!

Simulataneous "fix" of my GAD and SAD...

For two days in a row, the last two days of August mind you, I've been forced by the low temperatures to reconsider my standard summer footwear. Flip-flops. Not "thongs" - that would be an entirely different article of apparel. This sudden change in weather pattern, including 50 degree weather, hail that covered my grass, looking too much like an early snow, really messes up my mojo. Even more so then it already was......
You see...for much of the Fall/Winter/Spring of 2009-2010, my "give-a-damn" has been broken. If I think long enough about it, I can probably trace the exact moment that my GAD expired. I'm pretty sure it was at 3:29 into my first olympic triathlon....when I crossed the finish line. I'd done it! At 39 (one month before turning 40), I completed my year-long goal of completing a triathlon. Notice I used the term "complete" in lieu of "compete". If you don't know, they are entirely different words. I earned and deserved a self-inflicted rest period of exactly 6 months, give or take (mostly give) 3 additional months. In about March or April, I had temporarily found my GAD, after the cloudy, over-cast, inversion-filled skies of the Wasatch Front had made their way to depress people in a different geographic location. And then I remembered......not only do I suffer from a broken GAD, but I apparently temporarily forgot I also suffer from SAD. Seriously.....it's a real thing. "Season Affective Disorder". It basically gives me a medical excuse to hate winter and be a bitch during any of the seasonally cold months, particularly at home to the people who I love most. It makes me want to cry at the silliest little things, makes me yell (almost) like a Real Housewife of New Jersey (which is funny only to those of you know I am FROM New Jersey), and I'm not even going to go into how it seriously messes with my libido (sorry, honey.....now the world knows - well, at least all 4 people who actually read this blog anyway).

Interestingly enough, the GAD and SAD have both been helped by a social experiment powered thru FaceBook. In an effort to be accountable to more than the growing numerical size of my pants, I decided to send out a call for people who wanted to make a physical change to their bodies and to help me, in turn, fix mine. Let's face it, gaining weight can't be treated with a broken GAD, and I need to put a stop to both the GAD and the SAD. I remember all too clearly what 220 lbs of Stacy looks like - it ain't pretty - and I definitely don't want to go back to a Size 20. So, a group of 27 of my FB peeps and some of their peeps have banned together and formed a group called Tru Body Challenge. We share the same goal of wanting to change the status quo that we've each been experiencing, be accountable to one another, and help each other along the way. We range from just under 280 lbs to 124 lbs. Our goals include running a 5K (which some of us are doing together in October), decreasing body fat percentages, losing the "baby" tummy (even though some of the "babies" are in junior high), setting up a regular exercise regime, establishing a nutritional diet, being able to tie one's own shoes.....you get it. We represent Utah, Idaho, Alaska, Nebraska, Colorado, West Virginia, New Jersey, and Alberta, Canada (without me looking at our info).

Well, I can't even begin to tell you how, after less than one week, this "little" group of mine has accomplished "big" things. No, we haven't gone from a combined 4,700 lbs to 2,000. We haven't lost 8 dress sizes. Probably, no one has lost more than a pound or 2 (not that they'd know, because I'm certain none have gotten on the scale after me telling them to shove it in the closet). But, most everyone has stepped out of their comfort zone, offered advice or encouragement, posted a tip that has worked for them, shared a link of helpful information, and put themselves out there to be accountable to someone else. This group of people, both the men and the women, have inspired me and helped me to see the potential in not only each one of them, but myself too. We can do this! And we are experiencing it together.

Thank you, Team Tru, for helping to fix my GAD. My SAD isn't fixed yet, but I know it will be by the time I'm trying to dig out of my garage with 12+inches of snow behind me. Well....you and my beautiful HONDA Pilot with 4WD. You have been like the magic pill I've been waiting for and EVERYONE wants to get their hands on! I am so lucky to have each one of you and am so proud that you are taking this journey with me!



Now....to focus on finding just the right "magic" pill for my SAD!