Day 53--There is great joy to opportunities....

There is an amazing thing that happens when you have been focusing on something that you have wanted for a long time and suddenly an opportunity that MAY bring you close to it enters your life.   The same thing that brings apprehension and fear, along with joy and anticipation, excitement and amazement.  If this potential opportunity does come to fruition in my life, it will be bigger than the biggest dream that I have had for this aspect of my life, and also come with great responsibility.  Transformation....changing the experience that I have here, the way I view and interact with the world, that is what hopes and dreams are about.  So why is it so nerve wracking when a potential opportunity presents itself?

I have an interview on Sunday (I know it sounds like an odd day for an interview, but it works out perfectly).  If the interview goes well and they like me and I like them, and we can negotiate an agreement that is useful for both sides, then I could potentially become the live on manager/farmer of a very large 950 acre organic sustainable farm.  They are ready to make the farm into a working farm that can financially sustain itself and everyone working on the farm.  And, as they have other obligations and do not need the farm to support them, they would like someone with vision, ideas, some experience with agriculture, and a desire to farm.  I replied to their ad on a whim and told them about my background and desire to farm )in a professionally written way, not like this exactly), but that I had not done any large scale farming and our little family farm growing up was just to support us, though it was organic.  I did work in agricultural research at Cornell for over 7 years, but it was not organic farming, it was commercial and basic research, not practical application.  I also talked about my wonderful time at ECHO (www.echonet.org) where I volunteered on a working demonstration farm for 7 months.  It was that time at ECHO that reawakened my desire to have living/working farm.  They are interested in meeting with me--this Sunday. 

I never expected a response, not that I did not want one, on the contrary, this is an amazing gift even to be considered.  It makes me so excited, and such a high energy good feeling is never detrimental.  I have so many ideas for taking a farm forward--farmers markets, u-pick operations, potential contacts with NYC restaurants (via the owners who used to co-own a restaurant in NYC), pasture raised poultry for egg production and sale, a section of the farm set up as a public demonstration farm for sustainable backyard farming, possible retreat opportunities, etc...  there is so much that I can envision with a farm so large.  So while it is extremely exciting, it is also a daunting, and scary in some ways....

There is a part of me that relishes this time that I have right now, where I really do little of impact on the world, have responsibility really only to my own children, and really am just surviving.  To step forward and even entertain this idea, it would mean a life of meaning and purpose, risks and successes,  things that work and things that do not, and multiple responsibilities to self, family, and many others.  I think my greatest apprehension is in the fear of failure, the fear of letting others down.  But in that also lies the greatest possibility for creating something great, something that can help others and be amazing for me and my family.

The idea of raising my children on a farm, eating mostly food that we have grown ourselves, the health aspects of living that lifestyle, the amazing adventures we can have just in our daily lives....well that is the most wonderful anticipation possible.  I have in depth understanding of how much work it takes to farm, and the idea is both exhilarating and terrifying at the same time.

So that is where I am this week.  Preparing mentally for this interview on Sunday, and enjoying the up part of the whirlwind of emotions.  I have enjoyed walking around the ponds this week (did I mention that the farm that I hope to manage has many ponds...so I would have new ponds to enjoy on my morning walks), and am enjoying the beautiful  flowers that have been blooming all over.  Today is chilly (around 30 degrees this morning, now up to 37 and a drizzly cloudy day), but it was a nice walk around the ponds at the big park.  The ducks are always beautiful.  The willow trees are really setting leaves now, and with a mix of yellow and green, they look really cool right now.

I know I have not been writing every day....

Wow, once you get out of the habit of blogging everyday, it is hard to get back into it.  Today was a good day.  While I have feeling very tired these past two weeks, I am concentrating on everything improving as each day goes by. 

I have been unsure what to write about.  This blog has not gone as I had planned.  I fund that I have been more just myself, letting it all hang out, rather than being just positive or just sharing what I feel is useful to others.  It truly has been more of a journal.  however, I found myself posting more and more negative things.  All I have focused on studying over the past couple of years points to the idea that focusing on the negative brings negative experiences into our life.  And focusing on the positive brings positive experiences into life.  I have experienced this many times even before I had really starting reading about it.  Most people have.

The idea that our attitude shapes our life is well taught in many psychological and philosophical ideologies.  As I have read more books lately, the spiritual perspective of this is amazingly powerful. Christ often referenced this idea, that what we focus on is what we get.  As I have been trying to apply this more and more to my daily life, I find it being more and more evident.  When I focus on what I am truly thankful for, I am abl3e to see more clearly a greater number of things to be thankful for.  And circumstances, people, and events takes place more often that make me want to say thank you.  And when I focus on what I lack or what is going wrong, it seems to me that more and more things appear to go wrong or I can find more and more wrong with my life.  The more I focus on what I love, appreciate, and am grateful for, the more experiences that I am aware of that make me feel love, gratitude, joy, and appreciation.  Pray continually, as St. Paul states, and you will find that you see/hear/feel God more often in your life.  It is truly an amazing thing.

So I found that as I blogged, and I let whatever I was thinking about just plop out, that I have a lot of negativity under the surface, much of which I have allowed myself to be blind to.  So i am going to work more on learning where my negative blind spots are, and changing those experiences, those feelings about particular situation or event or person into a new frame, reframing it to something that is real and positive, or at the very least neutral.

Sometimes that things we experience are not bad, but we perceive them as such.  A quote I love by Wayne Dyer is "Change the way you look at something and what you look at changes."  I have heard this sentiment in many teachings, but I like that phrasing the best. Blogging is helping me see my blind spot I guess you could say. 

I look forward to blogging daily again.  And starting tomorrow i will get back to doing my daily food journal, as I have been out of practice lately....thanks for reading!

Well, Spring Break isw over, and we are back in the swing of things...

So here we are, nearing the end of April, and the kids spring break from school is over.  They headed back this morning, so we are back on our routine.  Or rather we are adjusting back to our routine.

I went for a very nice walk this morning at the big park (the one with trails through the woods) instead of around the pond.  Most of the trails are dry now, and the ducks have returned.  I even saw a couple of turtles today too, which made me happy.  It is in teh 50's today, which is marvelous.  Three or four days of april break we snowy up home, so it is nice to get back down here to the fresh greeen grass growing and the flowers.  This week we are actually getting into the 60's and possbily might hit 70 for the first time this year. Maybe those stubborn snowbacks that still take up half the driveway and block our access to the yard will finally melt away.

I have been thinking a lot about what I want for my life and today really nailed down the five things that I want...

1) Paid in Full--all debts, loans, people, etc... paid in full
2) Good health and habits (mental, physical, and spiritual)  for me and my children
3) A Farm, even a small one, where I can raise pasture raised chicken eggs and vegetabes, to be self susstaining and to sell for meetin our other needs.  The time has come for my farm.
4) Healing the relationships with my family members
5) Friends, that I can connect with, have a cup of coffee with, a conversation with, and just share life with...

And Some days you need to just breathe, and today  is a day for breathing.....so that is what I am doing.  I will post again soon....

"When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change."  --Dr. Wayne Dyer

Another day, another new start

Each day is a new start.  No matter how bad the day before was, there is always something new in a new day.  It is a new chance to realize that THIS day is the first day of the rest of your life.

"Why is my life filled with all this stuff I don't want?!?"  "Because you're insane!"  From an audio program with Wayne Dyer.  It was exactly what I needed.  He was making the point that we have the choice, we have to ability to focus on what we want or what we don't want.  When we focus on what we don't want we bring that into our lives and the more we focus on what we don't want, the more we bring more and more of that reality into our lives.  So if we are looking around seeing that our lives are not as we know they should be, then we need to start looking at life differently.  We need to start looking at our blessings, focus on the things we have that we do want, that are blessing for us.  As we do, more and more of those things will grow.  To focus on what you do not want, and thus bring more of that focus into your life, that IS insane.

As I have been working with a number of these ideas of focusing on blessings, focus on what I want and appreciate in my life.  It definite spirals, either up or down, depending on what I focus on.  As I focus on the things that make me miserable, I become more miserable.  As I focus on what happened in the past, it just repeats itself again.  That means that I have the power, I have the God given ability, to create my reality, to create a reality I like or a reality I don't like.  It is my choice, it is my focus.  So after letting myself get bogged down in anger, fear, self pity, and regret for the past couple of weeks, it is taking me time to break out of this negative mode.

A was fired form the convenience store yesterday.  The cycle continues, and perhaps it is my focus that has contributed to it, as with A out of work,  I end up dealing more with A, A can't move out of my father's house now, A can't see what role they played in this.  "I was fired for no reason".  When A gets into one of those modes I know that verbal yelling and emotional abuse about how everyone else has ruined A's life, and I am primary target of that.  SO when A came over after being fired, I was supportive and then asked A to leave as I was not in a space where I could deal with this right now.  Which of course set off a tirade about how I had no reason to feel badly about my life and how I had ruined A's life and on and on.  A doesn't get it, it is the verbal and emotional abuse whenever anything goes wrong in A's life that is one of the primary reason I left (especially as it is worse, so much worse when A is drinking).  So anyway, it was not an easy evening, but it made me realize that I am again drawing negative experiences into my life.  It is time, and I am ready to turn that back around.  I have been focusing too much on the negative.  I have focused too little on the positive.  I have focused on what I don't want rather than looking forward and focusing on what I do want.  Each day is a new day to decide to look forward, to move forward.  Each moment you can change your mind.

I am enjoying this Healing with the Master's series, it's free and it is ongoing, and it is amazing.  It is exactly what I need to help myself focus on the person I am becoming.  On the person I really am.  It helps greatly in my transformation.  My body truly is a reflection of my interal life, my mind, my spirit.  It is the visible, physical manifestation of how I Am on a deeper level.  It is the transformation of who I AM on the inside that is affecting the who I am on the outside. It is good...change is good...life is good...I chose today to focus on the positive.

Food journalling--yesterday, as I did not write.  I had a sausage egg and cheese on a croissant, some tater tots, coffee, and orange juice, and water.  I had yogurt and dried fruit for lunch.  For dinner we had spaghetti and then I had raisin bran with milk for a late snack.

Today I have had sausage egg and cheese and tater tots and coffee and water.

I also walked at the other park today.  As differs from the pond with its level gravel path, the park has all sorts of trails through the woods, uneven ground, rocks and roots, up and down.  So instead of walking the level path today, I spent 45 minutes walking some of the trails at the other park today.   I'll write again later...

Day 26--What a glorious day!!

The sun is shining, the snow is melting, the pond is over half way clear of ice, and I had a WONDERFUL time walking around the pond this morning (5 laps again so over a 1.3 miles).  I was able to do a walking meditation, some prayer, and repeated, life building affirmations.  So I started out well.

I then came to the library and have worked on filing an application for a bio/phar freelance writer (which will hopefully give me a somewhat steady work flow for writing assignments if I get accepted).  Now I am just updating this blog. 

I have actually not eaten anything yet today.  That is very odd since I am always a breakfast eater, and here it is nearly lunch time and I have only had water.  So I need to go remedy that.  I had to use my computer to check bank balances as I was out of yogurt and stuff to bring with me, and with my normal large monthly check arriving today, I am eeking out the last of the month's money until I can get the mail and put it in the bank.  Also G's CSE meeting is this afternoon, and a is picking up the kids.  I was actually going to try to take the afternoon and evening for myself, but I have to go home to the post office and the bank in order to get the money in.  So I won't be finding some event down here in the city, oh well...

Day 23--Good Grief!!

Good Grief!!  I forgot to do my weigh in again.  I know you are probably thinking that I am afraid of my weigh in given the emotional eating pattern I have had over the past few days.  I have actually made it to almost noon and have not cried today, so that is good.  I did spend a lot of time with my feelings last night and this morning, I have done some exercises to let things go.  I was actually able to sleep last night and meditate a bit this morning.  So, slowly the fog is clearing, and I am moving back up the emotional ladder.  Acceptance is sometimes a very  hard thing, but it is part of letting go and moving forward.  So i have accepted this situation, forgiven myself and my family member for each of the roles we have played.  I let my sister know that when she is ready to talk, that I am ready to as well.  And that she can take whatever time she needs.  So, I am at a better place with all this.  No, the situation itself has not changed, and there is still a lot of work to do no both of our parts to heal this rift that has opened between us, but I am finally okay with the rift, I am okay with the situation.  It is what it is, and in time all wounds heal.  So I am taking some steps up the emotional ladder, and waking up my life again after a few days where I have been separate from it. 

As for my title and the expression "Good Grief"  yes, grief can be good sometimes, as it can awaken us to areas in our past that are hidden and embedded and may be causing trouble without us realizing it.  While the past 4-5 days have been emotionally horrible for me, without the grief that I felt, I never would have discovered the lurking lack of forgiveness in an older situation that I had left behind.  So as long as you don't get trapped by it, grief can be good when you look at the big picture.

I still have not quite gotten my eating under control again as I went to McDonald's for a Sausage McMuffin with Egg, hash browns, and a medium coffee with cream and sugar this morning.  While that is neither good for my health or my finances, I am at a better place within myself now.  Tomorrow I will be back to my yogurt and oatmeal, and back to breathing more freely. 

If you are wondering about the Emotional Ladder, it is a concept from the writings for Esther and Jerry Hicks.  It is well detailed in their book "Ask & It Is Given".  The 22 rungs of the ladder (levels of emotion) are from 22--Depression/Grief/Despair up to level 1--Joy, appreciation, love.  I seem to have left the book in the car, as I was reading it by the pond this morning.  I have read it before and actual have to book on CD as well, so it is one that I find extremely helpful to read again and again. I will provide a link to the book in the right hand column, and by next week will move it to my website page specifically designed for my readers of this blog who want to know more about things that I mention here.  That page is forever a work in progress and will be updated regularly.  It can be found here.

Day 22-evening and sleepy

Okay so eating wise it has been a very uncontrolled day.  I just keep telling myself "it will get better it will get better"  I am trying to let it go, as that is the only thing than can help.  So breathing, meditating, finding better feeling thoughts, etc....Letting It Go.

Okay food journal since my last post
I stopped at Taco bell/LJS and had a piece of fish, a soft taco supreme and my favorite, a 7-layer burrito
I also had a medium brewed tea (unsweetened)
At some point this after noon I had a handful of goldfish crackers (maybe 10 max, I was giving J a snack)
For dinner we had egg noodles with beef bullion, pinto beans and corn (all together)
I also had 2 pieces of wheat toast with butter
Late this evening I had a bowl of corn flakes with milk.
And I drank at least 8 glasses of water throughout the day.

Well, I am going to go to bed soon.  If I can get sleep, I think I will have a better day tomorrow.  What a sucky blog this is becoming, I have spent like the last 4 days with sad, blue, grumpy rambling about my yucky feelings.  So, well it is a real life.  It is time to move forward and find a better attitude.

236000

That is my intention, my prayer, mediditation tonight
236000

I send it out to the universe
236000

I am allowing whatever comes to flow to and through me
236000

Weekly Weigh in Week 2

Okay, so I know you all wanted a picture of my feet on the scale, but alas my camera batteries were dead this morning when I went to take the picture.  I WILL buy batteries today and take a pic tomorrow morning to show how incredible just journaling my food intake has been (without being super strict with what I eat--yes I think about what I eat, but as you have seen, I have not really been "dieting").

So dadada, this morning the scale said 291lbs.  That is 8 pounds lost from last Monday's weigh in and 14 pounds down from my initial weigh in on March 14th.

So a Total of 14 pounds in 14 days!

So technically I am right on track for my 80 lbs in 80 days.
However, I do know that most of this weight loss is the first stage, which is loss of my stored glycogen.  I have written an article (warnign I did not proffread well before submitting it so there are a LOT of typos) on this which you can rad by clicking this title:
Glycogen: The Reason to Rejoice in Losing "Water Weight"

So, as I am probably just about out of stored glycogen (well I know I store new every day, but I am talking the massive amounts I have been hanging on to for a while), now I can start burning stored fat.   As fat is more than twice as energetic as glycogen, AND is not stored with massive amounts of water, it is actually going to take more actual effort on my part to keep the numbers going down. 

I am just so happy that I am off to a great start.  That Journaling my food intake honestly has actually STOPPED me from eating some things when I really was not hungry.  These two weeks where I have been focusing more on why I eat and just observing what I eat have been very helpful to me in determining what my negative food habits and negative food relationships are.  Because I am now clear that I eat to bury anger, I eat more than I want to even when I am not hungry because I hate to "waste" food, and I have this "because it was there" eating habit going on, now I know three of the primary mental/emotional/spiritual places that I can start from. 

I truly believe that aside from those few extra pounds that people tend to gain and lose and gain and lose, if you are overweight, the root of your problem is NOT that you are eating too much--THAT IS A SYMPTOM of a much larger issue in your life.  Just focusing on eating less or dieting is not going to bring the lasting change you are seeking.  There are underlying feelings, traumas, and buried ingrained ideas and habits that you are carrying that may not be in your best interest.  The key to becoming healthy is to recognize that it is ALL parts of you that need to work together.

So I am solidly in a good feeling place, having lost 4.6% of my overall body weight in two weeks.  I have a clear set of three non-physical areas that I can consciously work on to support my goal of achieving a healthy body, mind, and spirit.  And I have a handful of tools that I can use to work on those areas including:
Prayer and meditation; EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique); Breathing exercises; and Letting Go (I have added a few links on the side to some books and stuff that I find helpful to me in these). UPDATE:  I am adding a page to my website so that I don't have a ton of stuff in the margin of this blog.  So check out this page Useful Resources to explore futher. (note: I'll take the links down later when I have more time as I have to leave now and have not finished adding links ot the website page.)

I also have spent time researching what vitamins and herbal supplements can help support my body and help control my blood sugar while I go through this transformation process.  Supporting Mind, Body, Spirit, and emotions is vital to effecting true change.  I am so glad that I have committed to this journey.  And I am glad that you have chosen to walk beside me as I go forward!  Welcome to my world.

Day 14--enjoying my weekend

It has been a good weekend with the kids.  We have been taking it very easy as we are all still a little under the weather, but improving.  Today I spent some time creating a second blog that is connected to my website powerfulconsciousness.weebly.com .  I have been working on creating more of an attitude of gratitude to overide some of the negativity in my life, and I decided I would do that publicly now, but on a seperate blog as the focus is very specific.  So I will be blogging a daily gratitude list on my blog called Daily Gratitude.  You go to my website and click on the Daily Gratitude link at the top.

The kids are napping, well J is napping and G is in bed watching a video and resting. I am going to be listening to one of the Healing with the Masters audio call that I missed earlier this week.  If you are interested in healing you should check out this teleseminar series, it is completely free, and I am loving that I can go back and listen to it even if I can't be on the call itself each week. 

Okay so food journal for today so far:
breakfast at 7:30am--bowl of All Bran Strawberry medley with skim milk, and a cup of tea
mid-morning snack 10:00am--2 pieces of toast with PB and honey and a cup of tea and glass of water (well 3rd glass of water for today)
lunch at 1:30pm--refried beans with cheese and taco sauce on a tortilla (x2), and water, then some whole wheat crackers with the remaining refried beans and cheese after everyone was done with lunch.
snack 3:15pm--bowl of corn flakes with skim milk and cup of tea

I'll write more later as I want to listen to the teleseminar call I missed before the boys wake up.

Day 10--reaching a new level of healing

I have been listening to a variety of philosophical and spiritual teaching lately on healing.  While one of my goals is to lose weight, it is more of a sub-goal to the much larger goal of becoming healthy.  And not just physically healthy, but spiritually healthy, emotionally healthy, mentally healthy, financially healthy, and socially healthy.  There are so many aspects to the human life, and being healthy in all areas is truly the primary state I want my being to be in.  So I was listening to someone I had never heard of before, named Jennifer McLean (I think that is how you spell it), and her work on body dialoging was very freeing, as it focuses in a meditative state on your body and helps you work through an area where you feel tense or stuck due to various issues from the past and present.  It really was quite an eye-opening experience in how I view certain people in my life and how I can change my attitude and forgive myself for the things that I have done that have contributed to the bad situations in my life.

Well, time is running short, so I'll have to write more on that another time.  J is still home recovering today, though from what A has said he has been pretty active and much better than yesterday.  A is sick as well, and is at my house with J, though not getting much rest as J is being fairly active.  I'll be home soon and A can go back home and rest and recoup. 

Okay, before I have to get  going to pick up G--for Breakfast I had a large cup of coffee with half and half and a little sugar, and an everything bagel with cream cheese (from Stewart's as I as fueling up this morning).

For lunch, I have a can of vegetable beef soup in the car which will be my lunch in a few minutes, probably cold....oh well.  See you later...

Day 9--Night is slipping by and so is my wakefulness

Okay, so tonight I am just going to mention what I ate, as that has been my promise to myself, and it is a promise I intend to honor.  Usually I like to write more, because losing weight is not just about dropping pounds, it is about how you relate to your world, including food, and how your body uses it, in relation to your mental, emotional and spiritual states as well as your physical one.  If weight were truly just about calories in and calories out, no one would be fat, because they would only eat what their body told them it needed.  So, I blog about my life, my thoughts and my feelings.  Usually.  Tonight, I just honor my promise and then go hit the sack as I just spent 4 hours writing a short (450-550 word) article on Little League starting again around the country.  Why it took me so long to find what I wanted and then write a coherent piece about it I will never know.  For an $11 article, it sure took a lot of time.  I hope I'm not coming down with whatever J and A have (A is sick too, was sent home from work early...).  A went to the health center as the boss required, and was told it was contagious viral bronchitis.  So, for J that means a lot of nebulizer treatments, rest, and fluids, and hopefully he will come through this without too much trouble.

Okay, so now I am rambling as usual--I already told breakfast thru lunch, so I will start with the afternoon.  I had Light & Fit Vanilla Yogurt for a snack at 4:30pm, then we had ziti for dinner.  A had brought some Ginger Ale for J, so we all had a little with dinner (which I really should not do--its like drinking sugar).  J decided not to have his fruit roll up so I ate that after they went to bed (I really am trying to work on this "don't throw food away" mindset that was drilled into me as a child).  I also had some microwave popcorn, and then had a small piece of cake.  Why I had the cake I don't know, I was not hungry for it, I did not actually enjoy it, and I am puzzled over the unconcious way that I got a piece of cake and ate 3/4 of it.  When I search my brain, the only answer it gives me is "it was there".  So, yup, a victory, I found another deeply ingrained brain pattern that is stalling my ability to attain complete health.  So its time to write an EFT script and work on it.  I promise i will write an article introducing EFT soon, as I know I have referred to it often in the blog and some of you are like "what the heck is EFT?". I have it on my list of articles for the week, so stay tuned. 

Well, I am off to bed now.  Why the little league article consumed my evening I am not sure, though actually it maybe was because I was also listening to a broadcast of Healing with The Masters, which is going on every Tuesday and Thursday night from March 8-May 26.  I missed the actual broadcast but since I was signed up (for free) I have access to the taped version.  I was listening to James Redfield talk tonight (author of the Celestine Prophecy, which I first read over 15 years ago, and reread about 5 years ago--GREAT book).  If you are interested, check it out at http://www.healingwiththemasters.com/

Too much of an attempt to multitask I presume.  No more audio programs when writing articles.  Multitasking is one thing, but being mindful is often necessary as well, and writing about little league while listening to a spiritually enhancing audio file do not mesh well.  Multitasking is best when done with similar tasks....

Day 7--It is a NEW day...

"Today is a new day.  I am starting over today."
I take that quote from one of the visualization tools from the secret (www.thesecret.tv).  During the week I usually try to focus myself each morning after getting the kids to school by using the visualization tools.  They are essentially visual affirmations to help focus thought and intention in a positive direction, to increase your feel good feelings and to help you begin your day in a better frame of mind. 

I was thinking about those two affirmations this morning.  Today IS a NEW day--it is fresh, it is the chance to start over again, to let go of what happened yesterday, or last week, or last year, or even 20 years ago.  It doesn't matter what has happened before, what has been done to you or what you have done that brings you shame.  Today, right now, you have the power to make choices--choices about how you are going to feel, choices about what you are going to focus your thoughts and energy on, choices about what actions you take.  Even if you are bedridden by disease, housebound due to infirmity or mental issues, incarcerated due to bad choices made on a different day;  Even if you are sitting there looking at a stack of debt, losing your house, and wondering how you are going to get back on your feet;  Even is you are enjoying a cup of coffee on a beautiful deck surrounded by a gorgeous view and a loving and stable family, and everything is going great in your life--- Today is a NEW day, a day  that you can choose, by changing your perspective (or keeping the good perspective you already have had) to focus on positive things in your life or about yourself.  A new day to start over and start walk TOWARDS what you want instead of spending so much time and energy focusing on what you do NOT want. 

So, as with the gift we are given every day--I am STARTING OVER today...starting over with my attitude, starting over with where I focus my energy, starting over with my relationship with my children, starting over with my relationship with money, starting over with my relationship with food, and starting over in my journey to a more healthy life--body, mind, and spirit.

So before I go to my gratitude journal (maybe I will do that as a blog at some point, but for now it is in a paper journal, there is a totally different experience in writing with pen and paper as opposed to typing), I will journal my eating habit today...

I have had one bowl of raisin bran with milk, and 2 cups of black tea.

I'll blog again after lunch....

Day 1--Off to an odd start....

Well, here it is Monday March 14th, and Day 1 of my 80 pounds in 80 days endeavour. I am off to an odd start, as between the time change (and thus my brain screaming for the snooze bar when I needed to get up) and an overall lifestyle of disorganization, I can not say I have had a healthy start.

It is almost 11:00am as I write this (no 10am, 10am--stupid time change, my brain is not yeat ready for it to be an hour later). As part of my journey, I have dedicated myself to writing down every thing I eat each day. So for the first post of the day:

At 7:15 am, I had a graham cracker in the car while driving the boys to school (I normally don't eat their morning snack, but for some reason I was particularly hungry this morning). I also drank about 8 oz of water on the hour long drive to school

At 9:00am after having dropped off each boy at their respective school (and called our school district to try to get their CSE meetings scheduled this month so that I know if either one will be back home, or if I am just going to MOVE closer to the current programs) I went to Dunkin Donuts, which I really should not have as both health wise and money wise it is not good, but I did not bring my breakfast like I had been planning (see above referenced disorganization). So I ordered a sausage, egg, and cheese on a multigrain bagel (no I didn't think that made it healthy, they were just out of the sesame bagels that I like, and most other bagels as well, and the multigrain bagel is REALLY tasty) and a medium coffee with cream and 1 sugar.

Now, since most readers don't know me, one of the reasons I am as large as I am is that I am an emotional eater (ie I eat to stuff down uncomfortable emotions). Had I not called the school and brought up all sorts of old fears, frustration, and just outright anger, I would have perhaps made a more healthy choice. But alas, I ams till working on finding a more healthy coping skill for those uncomfortable emotions. I know some of you are wondering why I don't just express them. Well in this case, expressing my emotions about the challenges in finding an agreeable compromise to schooling my children BEFORE the meeting even has taken place would have been counterproductive at best and extremely destructive at the worst. I do have to actually work together with the school administration to make sure we are all keeping the best interest of my boys and thier potetial classmates in mind. I am not one of those paretns that only looks at what my child needs, but I also try to look at what the other kids in the class may need and how my child's needs affect their needs.   G is the hardest as autism and behavioral issues are at the center of his issues, and for J it is mainly physical challenges--but both boths have the cognitive potential to go on to be fully independent and fully functional contributing members of society as adults (college, career, family, make the world a better place, etc...).  Its just the challenges of working with a system that is not truly set up to accomadate thier extra needs in an educational environment so that they can reach that point that is frustrating at times. 

On a different note,  I do actaully have a handful of more healthy methods of dealing with my old, pent up emotions from last year's school decisions (long story). So after I scarfed down my breakfast sandwich, I did go walk around a store for a while (the snow is still WAY too deep to find an outside area to walk--Come On Spring), and then watched my visualizations tool (Planet Earth Forever, Secret to You, & Secret to Riches from www.thesecret.tv), I had to watch them twice as my brain kept wandering back to negativity, which is always counterproductive to a happy and healthy life.  I tried to do some deeep breathign exercises, which always help reduce stress.  But meditation was out of the question today as my mind is WAY to wired to calm down enough to enter an alpha or theta brain wave state.  Its one of those days that I feel like I am superman with underwear made of green kryptonite...  So much potentail....

Anyway, I need to get some work done before I have to go get groceries, pick up the kids, and drive home, so I should get off this blog, and do some actual for pay writing. I will post again later with my food journaling for my other meals. In the meantime, have a glorious day...(and don't eat your anger like I do, nothing easy or healing can come from it...)

A history of how I got to where I am (and why a new beginning is so important)

So now that you know my goal for the near future, let me tell you a bit about who I am and how I got to where I am today--ready to share with a whole world of strangers the next phase of my journey in life.

I grew up in the Adirondacks, then went to college in the greater Boston area at a small Christian College. It took me 8 years to do my 4-year degree in biology. Why so long? Well, as the second of five children in a family who never made more than the poverty line cut off, I paid my own way through college, so I would go for a while, then stop and work for a while, then go for a couple semester, then stop and work for a year or two, etc... Over those eight years I was a nanny, worked in day care, became a preschool teacher, slung coffee at a couple of coffee shops, worked in a convenience store, worked in the cafeteria, did general housekeeping at hotels, and was a janitor, in addition to working while at school as a teaching assistant and departmental assistant (laboratory cleaning and upkeep, and making sure all the TA's had what they needed for labs and such). Once I finished my BS in Biology I went into the workforce and had a great life. I was a biological research assistant at Cornell University, ordained elder in the Presbyterian church, and had numerous friends and colleagues. In 2003 I volunteered for 7 months at ECHO (Educational Concerns for Hunger Org) and then returned to my work at Cornell.

In 2004 I met my significant other, and we lived together (had a ceremony but not an actual marriage--one of my sisters did the same though now she is actually going to marry him this year, but for the past 5 years they have been married by ceremony but not by law--odd I know...anyway...). Prior to meeting I had begun inquiring about adoption, which we put on hold for a year so that we could establish our own relationship. Then in January 2006 we adopted our first son from foster care. G was just turning 3 at the time and had bounced through 5 different foster homes. He was and is a challenging kid to parent, but he is also an amazing kid to parent. He changed our lives (I know all parents say that about their first child, AND ITS ALL TRUE, which is why all parents say it), and we adjusted to a new normal, without having to actually change our jobs, as we were able to adjust to a new normal that included all of the aspects of parenting our new son with special needs.

We decided that we should start looking for our second child at the end of summer 2006, as it often takes 9-18 months to find a match and get chosen by the committees, and to jump through all of the bureaucratic hoops. So we figured there would be at least 12-24 months between adoptions. However, 2 months after we redid our home study we were directed to an agency that has an infant with special needs about to be released from the hospital who needed a family right now, and when they reviewed our information, we were chosen quickly. We first heard our son existed on a Tuesday in late October, and were on our way to Philadelphia that same Friday to meet him, learn about his issues from the doctors, and on Monday had him released into our care. It was a whirl wind, and he was a 2 1/2 month old baby out of the hospital for the first time with multiple medical issues. Needless to say, J changed our lives even further than we ever imagine. I often say he was a bomb that exploded our lives in so many way, and shook my beliefs in myself, in God, in humanity, in medical science (definitely showed me that doctors do not know as much as we think they do) and in everything else you can hold on to. But he is also the balm that continues to heal all. So my J is a bomb and a balm.

Life for G stayed quite steady for the beginning, even with J in and out of the hospital, going through heart surgery then brain surgery, we managed to keep G's schedule steady, with him going to preschool then day care, and being picked up by one of us, going home and having his normal home routine, while the other one of us stayed at the hospital with J, and we switched each day. After my parental leave was over, I returned to my job at Cornell, and my other half changed jobs to a night shift position so that one of us was always home for J. In April 2007 we decided that with his many, many doctor appointments and specialist followups, and the fact that my other half was not able to handle taking him, so I had to take days off from work to take him, that my other half should find a higher paying day job, and give up the overnight. We hired a babysitter, and the era of the car sales money began. After one month, and two babysitters, and a lot of issues (G has never been the same since as one sitter was particularly harsh and lacked understanding of his background and issues, and treated him very badly), we realized that with J and G's special needs, they really needed to have me home all the time, especially since I was entering the summer where I had to work 9-5 (where before I could work a varied schedule and get my hours in even if I had to take J to the doctor). In the Summer (June-Aug) I oversaw a team of undergraduate students doing research, so i needed to be there regular hours, which would not have worked with J's needs. So I gave a month's notice and helped find and train my replacement.

In June 2007 I became a stay at home mom, and my other half was well on the way to a successful career in car sales (was second in sales by the 2nd month on the job--a truly good match). For the next year plus, I was a stay at home mom, medical and appointment manager for my sons, advocate, liaison, and therapy assistant to his therapists who came to the house a few days each week. It was actually as much if not more work than my job at Cornell had been. Even though A ( my significant other--I'm just getting tired of writing it out) was doing well in car sales, there was this idea that since A was earning the money that A should be able to spend it however A wanted. So while A's pay did support the household, I picked up a babysitting job on the side to bring in a little extra money so we could try to make ends meet as J's medical bills took a toll on our finances. We did finally get medicaid to supplement our insurance, but the early medical bills are still on my credit report. I spent time with the financial advisor at the bank, as well as a couple of independent debt counselors, all of whom after hours of crunching numbers and looking at possibilities, declared that my only choice really was to declare bankruptcy, as between medical bills and credit cards that got run up with the numerous hospital stays (gas to and from the hospital (over an hour away), meals at the hospital, basic needs, etc...), that our current income and future income projection just could not handle the past bills and the current expenses. However it costs a good chunk of money to pay for a bankruptcy, and I have yet to have enough spare money to cover the cost of the lawyer. So, I am 4 years buried in old debts, but that is a whole other project.

By August of 2008, it became clear to me that A was not able to be reasonable with money, spending as A saw fit rather than living by the budget we made in order to meet the household needs first and my babysitting on the side was not enough to cover our household needs. So as J was older and G was going into Kindergarten, I started looking at a way to go back to work. It took a lot to find a babysitter, but in the end I did go back to work full time in September 2008 at Cornell, but a different department and different kind of lab work. Soon after i returned to work, A (who was an alcoholic in recovery) relapsed, though tried hard to hide it. My boss was a very difficult person to work for and had VERY high turnover in her lab group. I was very used to demanding bosses who expected an extremely high quality and quantity of work. I had worked for 2 of the biggest biological labs at Cornell prior to having kids, and they do not abide slackers. But this woman I was working for was very difficult, tried to control everyone through put downs and underhanded and condescending remarks. How she ever got tenure at Cornell is beyond me, as even though she was a brilliant scientist, and fairly high up in her specific field, she was not the kind of person that most professors at an Ivy league university usually are (open-minded, driven, wanting to encourage the growth of their lab members, self confident, encouraging open exchange of ideas and theories, etc...). So while I liked the work, the work environment was very stressful and degrading. At the same time Josiah, being still only 2 and with medical issues in addition to his physical issues, was often sick, so unable to go to the day care provider (whom was paid by the week regardless of how often he was there), so we had our backup sitter being called often (at $12 an hour). Those things coupled with A's drinking and lying (which got worse and worse as the car industry tanked, and car sales (being commission based) really dried up--meaning A was working long hours for no or very low pay each week), things were really becoming too much for me to handle.

By January 2009, I had confronted A about the alcohol, and A agreed to go back to counseling, re-enter recovery, and go to AA. As we were paying on average $1200 a MONTH on childcare (due to Josiah's frequent illnesses, and the need to pay the at home sitter on a very regular basis while still being contracted for the weekly fee at the day care center and G's before and after school care), it was getting ridiculous. So we decided that A would stay home (as car sales were dwindling) and that would give more time to focus on recovery, as well as take out the cost of day care. A was supposed to takeover doctor appointments and therapy stuff as well so that I could be free to focus on work. I wish I could say this is what happened.

To make a long story short (well, a long story shorter than if I told EVERYTHING, short stories are not my forte), while certain things in our relationship improved, the stress in my life continued to rise, to the point that I had to make a choice between meeting the day to day needs of my family or meeting the demands of my belligerent boss. I looked around for other opportunities and applied for a few. One was verbally offered, complete with planning out a schedule, so I quit my job at Cornell in mid-April 2009. A week after that, the new job pulled out its offer, as it had been verbal and not on paper, they were able to do that without providing a reason. So we were both without active employment. It was not as bad as it sounds as over the spring we had joined a company doing network marketing, and while slow it get started we were beginning to pick up in customers as well as people who were contemplating joining our team. However on May 5th a very close friend of A's was killed in a car accident, and A relapsed into drinking again, but briefly. By late May A was beginning to get excited about our business and to focus on that again. Then on Memorial Day, A's mother died while we were visiting my sister. A always had trouble dealing with loss, and dealing with one of the most major losses a person can experience, A fell apart. Unable to get out of bed except to go the the store to buy alcohol (as I refused to by it), unable to take care of the kids, unable to function due to the debilitating grief, it became clear to me that we needed to make some big changes quickly. I needed more support to be able to handle the kids needs as well as A's needs. We were quickly getting behind on all of our bills, and given that I had a lot of old debt due to medical related bills for J, we had no credit with which to borrow. Utilities were beginning to be shut off, we got behind in the mortgage, and something had to be done right away, as my babysitting (which I had taken back up in May) was not enough even with SSI for the boys to cover the bills. And I was unable to return to a regular job because I still needed the flexibility to meet all the kids medical and therapy appointments, and A was unable to function even to watch the kids at home.

So in August 2009, we moved back to the Adirondacks so that I could have the help of my family around. We found people to rent our house. We spent the first few weeks at my mother's house while A tried to go back to work selling cars (which lasted about a week--too much pressure while still under so much grief), and while we fixed up a trailer that my mother owned that had not been lived in for about 6 months due to the need for a lot of repairs. We got it livable, and moved in there in September, with the agreement to continue to work on the place in exchange for rent. I took on a babysitting job, and a couple of weeks later A took a job at a local convience store. A's grief was still very raw, as was to be expected so soon after such a loss, and A's drinking was constant, but A was able to function more than before. J was in a special needs preschool program and G was in first grade. While there were mounting trust issues between A and I, particularly due to active alcoholism, which is NOT how I wanted my children to be raised, things did seem to be starting to improve.

Then in October A's niece passed away. And the cycle of grief, heavy drinking and lack of functionality began again. A quit the store job, and took a job as a substitute bus aid. However, when called, A would either not answer the phone or would make up some reason that it was not doable. Finally in mid-December I confronted A about the drinking and the lies, and what it was doing to ALL of us. A went into a detox program, promising to quit drinking. It was a rough Christmas that year as A was newly sober and the first Christmas without Mom. I was still over stressed and emotionally raw from the long stress of the last year and a half, and it was just overall a bad holiday time, though we tried to make it good for the kids. I ended up throwing A out for a week, as it was just too much. We talked about it, and decided on going to counseling both individually and as a couple (which I had been asking for for over a year). We went to one couples counseling session, A stayed with individual counseling for about 6 weeks, and I stayed with it for another 5 months.

A wanted to start fresh, to make a new life for our family. There was an opportunity for me out in Rhode Island, and we worked hard to make arrangements to move out there and make a fresh start. The clincher was that A would have to move before us to get started with a job so we would have the money to really make a new start. So after a few trips out and back, we chose a house to rent, used what we had saved up to pay our first and security and in the last week of April 2010, we moved A out to RI to the new house. A's job began that week, and we had decided to go out every weekend to see A and to let the kids get used tot he new house, and that the kids and I would move after the school year ended since we were so close to the end of the year anyway. When it was Mother's Day weekend 2010, A called and said they had scheduled a double at work on Saturday, in addition to the normal Friday overnight and Sunday overnight hours, and so to not come out that weekend as it was going to be back to back work. I got this call Friday while the kids were at school and had been planning on going when they got home. So I agreed not to come, but when the kids did get home they were very disappointed, as was A because it was a holiday weekend. So we decided to surprise A and went out anyway, arriving an hour before A was needing to leave for the overnight shift.

However, when we got there it was obvious that A was drinking again (booze bottles all over the house) and A started lyng saying that the neighbors had thrown a welcome party and that A did not drink. I pretended to believe the story and for the sake of not trhowing away everything, decided to wait and ask the neighbors in question in the morning while A was at work. needless to say, the neighbors did not know what A was talking about. So after a weekend of arguing and lies, A having spent all of the funds we had reserved for the next few weeks, and a realization that nothing was going to change any time soon, the kids and I headed back home. On the way home, I had a lot of time to think and pray about things. I really realized that there was no way to make a new start in a new place when we brought all of the old stuff with us. With A drinking again, knowing that I had said i can not raise the kids with an active alcoholic, and the blatant lies, and same old manipulative crap that goes along with being an active alcoholic, I was done. I was not living a life of chaos and hell, and I was not having my children endure that type of hell. They needed stability and security even more than I did.

Leaving A was a hard decision, and one that took me a long time to make. Leaving A only a year after A's mother's death was very difficult for me, as I know it takes many years to process through the grief of such a profound loss and really find your new normal, a life without your mother in it. But I could not live with the problems that were so obviously not going away, and could not raise my children that way anymore. Deciding to become a single mom with two children with special needs was very scary to me. As A had really not been able to be there for the kids in a parental way (A was there and loved the kids but was not really preforming a caregiver role) since the drinking had resurfaced in 2008, I held out no hope that A would be a help after I left. We did do custody through the courts, and we luckily worked out things on our own, so court was really just a formality, not a fight. I have primary physical custody of the kids, A has visitation.

We have been slowly building a friendship and working relationship which will benefit the kids. We had talked around the holidays of reconciling as A had seemed to have stopped drinking, had been self supporting for over 5 months, and held down a job and place to live. Due to layoffs, A was looking for a new job, and decided to move closer to the kids (as 4 hours is a LONG way to be from your kids). A moved back here to be closer to the kids and is currently renting a room at my father's house (weird I know), and has been working a job at a local convenience store (not the same one as before) since early January. Within a couple of weeks of trying to consider reconciling, we had so many arguments and fights, that it became obvious to me that there is too much hurt, resentment, anger, and other issues for us to reconcile to a healthy relationship. I really loved being single, but had thought that for the kids it would be good to have both parents together. Alas I have learned that we are all healthier and happier living apart. It is more secure and stable for the kids for us not to be fighting and tense all the time. So A is looking for a better job and an apartment, and I am enjoying staying single. And the kids are enjoying having A living close enough for them to see almost every day, even if for just an hour at a time.

So that is where I am now. Working from home doing child transport by contract and freelance writing on the side. Trying to deal with the old house that we had been renting out as the renters decided to stop paying rent (and with my current financial situation I couldn't pay the mortgage AND our current living expenses) and it took 6 months to evict them (as I could not afford to hire a lawyer) and during that time they completely trashed the house, which was then unrentable and could not sell for what was owed on it due to the damage--so while it is on the market as is, it is also in foreclosure proceedings and will probably go to the bank, as it is unlikely that I will find a buyer in time who can pay what the bank requires. I can't move back into it because my primary income (with the right flexibility that allows me to properly meet my kids' needs) is here (4 hours away). So here I am, evaluating what my next steps are in life. Looking at the solutions to the issues that I have created for myself over the extreme stress of the past few years--excessive weight, high blood sugar, out of shape body, debt out the wahzoo, a foreclosure looming, a loss of connection with friends, a disconnect with my Spirutal life and God, and just overall loss of who I am.

So today is a new day. And I start this blog to help me maintain focus on my goals, including losing 80 pounds in the next 80 days in a healthy way. Along the way I plan to regain or build new much of what I have lost, particularly connections with God, other people, and myself. And to rebuild my finacial security so that the future is less unsure. May the Law of Attraction begin working for me instead of against me as I start to change my attitude and wake up from the nightmare that I have lived and helped to create over these past few years. I hope you will join me on this journey...Welcome To My World!

The new beginning

Okay, so you may be wondering why someone would detail their weight loss, documenting first how large I REALLY am and my struggle to lose weight. Why wouldn't I just wait until I have actually LOST the weight and then come back and tell you all about it. Well, the journey up to this grand weight was not quick or walked alone, and the journey back down should not be either.

First I should share with you where I am starting from, a little bit about this crazy lady who will be blogging about what I eat daily and both my successes and my failures. I am 36 years old at the start of this blog. I weight a grand total of 305 pounds (weight will be checked later today so i can change this to a more accurate exact weight). I am 5'9" tall. My ultimate weight goal is 150lbs, which would be an ideal weight for me. But they all say you should break down your weight loss goals, so I have chosen 80 pounds as my first BIG milestone. Yes, I know I should have chosen a smaller goal, or a longer time frame. My sister, who is a registered dietitian, has a PhD in nutrition, and is a researcher and college professor in nutrition would probably flay me for setting a goal of a pound a day. But I doubt she will read this blog, so I think I am safe from her sisterly (and scholarly) tongue lashing (gotta duck and cover sometimes).

So, why now? Why this way? Well, one reason is that I have 2 sons, amazing little boys they are. My youngest will be turning 5 this summer (my oldest just turned 8 this week), and my little guy has cerebral palsy. Other than being physically challenged, he is a normal, active, social, bright 4 year old. I want him to be able to experience all of the things I loved as a child in addition to all of his other experiences. I want him to know what it is like to climb a mountain, and my first memories of going up Chimney Mountain (in the Adirondacks) is from when I was about the age he is now. So my goal is to carry him on my back up that mountain this summer (with my other son of course and probably my father and my sister and her kids, and maybe the whole extended fam damily. To do this, I need to drop around 80 pounds so that I can be fit enough to climb the mountain with a 40 pound kid on my back.

So I am starting this blog to keep a running record of this journey, this goal. It is about so much more than achieving a healthy weight. I also want to stabilize my blood sugar, increase my overall health, rebuild a healthy sense of community connections, rebuild friendships, and reconnect with God and the Spiritual path that I seem to have lost along the way. I hope you will find inspiration and enjoyment through reading this story as it unfolds...