looking inward

First, a brief report on The Color Run:  I had a terrible cold, but decided to race anyway!  It was Stacey's first official 5K, and he rocked it, finishing in 30 minutes.  The race course was only 2.83 miles, and I finished in 39.  I ran a lot of it, and really enjoyed myself.  The color didn't feel good in my sick lungs, though, so I stayed away from it as much as possible.  My team was called "Mopey Zoo Lion" and this was our second run together.  We all decorate our own T-Shirts with mopey lions, and here is the back of Stacey's:

Now on to today's topic, which is looking inward.

Knowing my body as well as I know it these days, I have noticed that I have gotten a little bit bigger lately.  My size 18's are a little snug, and my stomach is a bit pouchier than it was last month.  In several of the professional racing pictures of me, I noticed that my hips and thighs have gotten quite large again.

My hips don't lie!

I'm not freaking out and hopping back on the diet bandwagon.  Instead I am looking inward to figure out why I have been turning to food for reasons other than hunger so much lately.

Some of it is emotional eating.

Sadness: The "holidays" are here again, which is a sad reminder of how different life is without Mom.
Stress: This semester is stressful as I try to improve my GPA and study to retake the LSAT and prepare my law school applications.  My life is in transition right now, as I am so close to the next step in my life, which will include planning a wedding (not officially engaged, but Stacey and I have discussed getting married before law school) and planning a move, along with planning for law school (hopefully!).

So I know the triggers for my emotional eating, and I'm glad that I've come to know my body so well that I have caught this emotional eating before it got too out of hand.

So what am I going to do, now that I've noticed this unwelcome change in my body?

I'm going to stay away from the scale and the diet books.

I'm going to take care of myself as I recover from a terrible cold.

I'm going to browse the Intuitive Eating community forums.

I'm going to work on eating more vegetables and fruits to give my body the natural medicine it needs to get well.

I'm not going to weigh myself, google the best way to lose weight quickly, sign up for Weight Watchers for the 10,000th time, make a hardcore cardio exercise plan and force myself to stick to it NO MATTER WHAT, or feel badly about myself in any way.

I love myself, and that includes my body.  I even love myself and my body when I am heavier than I'd like to be.  How revolutionary!

I will get back to a more comfortable (for me) size as soon as I am supposed to.  There is no rush.  I will be an intuitive eater who does not eat her emotions one day.

Today I have learned that I have made progress towards that goal, by simply being in tune with my body more than I used to be.  As I said in an earlier post, I am no longer avoiding mirrors or posing for full body pictures.  I am no longer scared of my body, nor do I  hate it.  This is progress.  So I'm proud.

I'm not blogging about this to admit to a failure, and to hang my head in shame at having gained weight, to give a report on how I'm going to fix it.  No siree.  That is not what this blog is about anymore.  It's about getting healthy and happy.

I am blogging about this to share an interesting part of this recovery journey with you all.

10/30/2013 - feeling encouraged!
(and rocking my half marathon tee!)

Camp for Good Grief 5K

First of all, TODAY IS MY BIRTHDAY!!!  YAY for being born 29 years ago!  Now to the actual point of this entry:

Yesterday I ran another 5K!  It was a very special race, too.  The folks at Camp Good Grief are the same folks who run the Center for Good Grief, which is where I go for grief counseling.  It's a wonderful organization, and I fully intend to be a donor to them some day.  The work that they do is important.

Anyway, this was a great run for me!  The course itself was very hilly, so I took quite a few walk breaks, but I still managed to beat my last official 5K time according to my Garmin.  Yes, that's right, I have a Garmin now, thanks to my wonderful boyfriend and my birthday.  :-)

PINK!

I'm hopeful that this new gadget will inspire me to run outdoors more the next couple of weeks...

The run was special for many reasons.  Everyone running had lost someone special to them.  I was literally surrounded by people who understand what I'm going through.  It was magical.  It was wonderful to see  how not alone I am, and also it was such strong symbolism for what all of us who lose someone have to do every day:  Keep going.

Each bib had a spot for you to write the name of who you are running in memory of.

MOM

Like I said, a very special race.

Plus, Stacey took this extremely flattering shot of me, pre-race.

HOTTIE.

And, Stacey even decided to (illegally!) run the 5K himself.  Here he is, about to cross the finish line, sans bib.

I'm so proud of him!  It was his first 5K.  His first official one will be in a couple of weeks at The Color Run!!!  Now he knows that he can do it.  :-)

I placed #245

So the good news is that I ran a 5K, and I actually did run the majority of it.  The bad news is that I cannot imagine doing a 20.5K (a.k.a "half marathon") in just a couple of weeks...

I think that I will have to do a couple of short runs this week, one half marathon attempt next weekend, a couple of short runs next week, and....  Then again, I don't want to overtrain.

Anyway, Stacey is about to take me out to brunch for my birthday, so I have to go!

Wearing my Grief

I had an epiphany about the extra weight that I just can't seem to get or keep off since Mom died 13 months ago and I quickly gained 40 then slowly several more pounds...

I figured out a while back that I was eating my grief.  So many uncomfortable emotions were easily pushed away for minutes at a time with a binge.  And sometimes even minutes of relief were enough to justify my actions.  Seriously, some days I couldn't breathe, I was in so much pain.

Figuring out why I was eating too  much, and eating the wrong things in general, was pretty easy to do.  But figuring out why it's been such a struggle to lose any of it?  Why every time I lost some inches around my middle only to quickly gain them back?  This was more difficult for me.

The answer is that I'm simply not ready to be done with the initial grieving.  Grieving is different for everyone, it seems.  Despite how much I would love to be able to figure out my life without Mom in it, to be able to feel "normal" again, to be able to get back to a healthy lifestyle that includes eating mostly healthy foods and exercising most days...  I'm not quite there yet.

I still cry nearly every day.  I am still figuring out how to survive without Mom.  I was in shock for a long time, and am just now starting to really allow myself to feel the loss and accept it.

This extra weight represents what I've been through the last year.  It is almost like a badge of courage that I made it through the most difficult thing I've ever been through.  I am wearing my grief.

I turned to some coping mechanisms that I was familiar with, and I gained a lot of weight as a side effect.  This is not like the times I've gained weight in the past, where it was all about low self esteem and wanting control of my life.  This was pure emotion.  Pure grief.  Pure love for my mom.  Real stuff.  Powerful stuff.

I'm not recommending this coping mechanism for anyone.  Obviously, I wish that I could have coped with this sudden and devastating loss in another way.  Like, why oh why didn't I just go for a walk to clear my head every time the pain got to be too much?  Why didn't I throw myself into some creative outlet, like painting or collage, as a way to express my feelings?

The fact is that I have issues with food for most of my life.  Specifically, I have issues with using food for things that food is not meant to be used for.  In the past, I used it as a punishment.  I thought that I deserved to be fat (or, during the bout of undereating in my early 20's, that I didn't deserve to eat).  This time, it was about comforting myself.

Some days eating was the only thing that kept me from contemplating suicide.  Seriously.  And I'm glad that out of those options, I chose food.  So in that big way, comfort eating helped me to survive.  I think that many people focus on weight gain, and how to lose the weight, but forget that sometimes overeating serves a need.  I'm not saying that it's a healthy way to cope, or that there wasn't a better way to serve that need, but I am saying that a need was met, and it's okay to stop beating myself up about comfort eating.

Because I never truly recovered from my EDNOS, it was only natural that I turned to food as a coping mechanism to help myself stay afloat.  People who knew me before Mom died don't need to wonder about why I am so much bigger than I was in May 2012.  They know that this has been a rough year for me.

So I am starting to look at my current bigger size as a badge of grief.  I am wearing my grief.  And when I'm ready to shed the grief a bit, I will lose the weight.  I am slowly but surely beginning to feel like myself again.  I believe that as I explore further EDNOS recovery and grief counseling, one day I will not need to carry this extra weight around anymore.  One day I won't want to (need to) wear my grief around.

But that day is not today.  And that's okay.

Thanks for reading.

wearing my grief, but also wearing a genuine
smile thanks to my amazing bellydancing cousins!

Mom.

I have survived this week.  

This was a week that I have been dreading for awhile.

Sunday was Mothers Day.  Tuesday would have been Mom's 53rd birthday.

at her 50th birthday party!

Mothers Day and Mom's birthday being so close together was so much fun when she was alive.  It was fun to spoil her so much at once, and she was so easy to please.  Just give her a little of attention and she would eat it up with a spoon.  Mom was such a sweet lady, and didn't do enough for herself.  She never expected anyone to do anything for her, either.  She seemed to live for others.

I tried several times to get her to do more things just for her.  And sometimes she would listen.  We had lots of fun together, but the last year or so we mostly sat around watching TV together.  That was our bonding time.  We watched The Young and the Restless, Buffy, Charmed, Pretty Little Liars, The Gilmore Girls, and more.  I think that this is why I've become more of a TV addict the last year, because it makes me feel close to her.

She desperately wanted to feel pretty again.  She hated what her medications did to her appearance (they caused some weight gain and also a general puffiness to her face and neck).  I thought (and told her) that nothing could make her NOT beautiful.  She was a beautiful person, inside AND out.  

Anyway... it's been almost a year since I've had a conversation with my mother.  It was May 23rd when she had surgery.  It was June 18th when her body died.  The last conversation that I had with her was on the phone as she was wheeled away for her second surgery in the middle of the night on May 24/25th.  I last spoke to her with her being conscious but unable to talk a couple of days later...  

All of those dates are coming up.  I'm not past all of these terrible anniversaries yet.  June 18th will be the last first anniversary for this stuff.  So please keep me and my family in  your thoughts and prayers for awhile, because if the rest of my family is struggling as much as I am with this one year mark, then there are a lot of people in a severe amount of pain.

I'm not ready for the one year mark.  I'm just not.  But I wasn't ready for Mothers Day or her birthday, either... and here I am on the other side of those.  Still going.

I am very depressed.  I am extremely emotional most of the time.  I think that my "fake it till you make it" face has broken down, because I am unable to just hang out and seem happy right now.  I feel like I'm oozing with sadness.

I've had 4 days of emotional eating and only exercised once this week.  I'm scared (on top of everything else) that I'm about to regain the 20 pounds that I lost this year.  

I'm not going to let that fear drag me into another diet, though.  Nope.  Instead, I'm going to focus on Mom.  I'm going to treat myself the way that Mom would treat me if she were here, witnessing my pain.  

me, Mom, and Joel

She would tell me to baby myself, to take care of myself, and to love myself.  She would remind me of all of my accomplishments, and about how proud she is of me.  She would remind me that I want to be an intuitive eater, and that it's  okay to have had one bad week.  She would tell me to focus  on the good things.  She would give me a big hug and remind me that I am loved.

I am loved.  

If you are feeling overwhelmed with life, even if you really don't think you would ever hurt yourself, please call the crisis hotline for  help: 1-800-784-2433.  I called them last night and they helped me very much.  It's okay to ask for help.

"Emotional Eating" - I'm done with it.

It feels amazing to say the following words:

I'm done with

emotional eating.

Seriously, I am done with it.

I finally got sick and tired of tying food with my emotions.

So I quit cold turkey.

Actually, it wasn't as easy to quit as I'm probably making it sound.

It took YEARS.  Almost decades, really...about 18 years.  That right, a child has been born, grown up, and can now vote and get charged as an adult for crimes in the time that it took me to overcome this issue. I have been eating for emotional reasons since puberty. 

So believe me, this is no small feat.

How did I get over it?

Unfortunately, I'm not entirely sure.  That's why I hesitated to blog about it, because I know that many are looking for a cure to this problem, and I don't think that I can provide that for you.  :-(

The only tip that I can muster is to "act as if".  By that, I mean to act as if you no longer eat for emotional reasons, even if you do...  Like, when you realize that you are eating for emotional reasons, say OUT LOUD "Nope.  I don't do this shit anymore" (or something nicer, whatever works for you, but I think that cursing emotional eating is A-Okay).

I don't think that I can adequately explain to you how awesome it feels to say goodbye to something that has controlled way too big a piece of my life.

It's amazing.

I'm not eating perfectly or anything (far from it right now) but I know for a fact that none of the foods that I have consumed the last couple of weeks have been because of emotions.

That being said, I do still have some issues with overeating.

But because I no longer emotionally eat, that has gotten so much better too. 

I did really think that if I stopped my emotional eating that I could stop my overeating, too.  I hate that that hasn't happened yet.  But I'm getting closer.

The differences between emotional overeating and regular overeating?

Once I realize that I'm not hungry anymore,  I have no problem stopping.  There is no more "woe is me, I ate half the bag of chips, I'm pathetic, life sucks, may as well eat the other half plus a hole pizza and some cake" self-talk.  I simply recognize that I overate, and am able to put the fork (or whatever) down immediately. 

The only reasons that I'm still overeating sometimes is when either I waited too long to eat and am therefore extremely hungry, or something tastes REALLY good and I don't want eat slowly enough to be able to listen to my hunger signals, or when I eat while distracted. 

Again though, once I realize that I'm overeating, I can easily stop.  That is a HUGE improvement for me.

I think that one of the reasons that I'm overeating is that in my quest to stop obsessing about food, calories, and exercise, I have developed a pretty substantial junk food habit.

On one hand, I'm thrilled that I am eating my favorite snack foods almost daily, and am doing so in a non-emotional, non-ED, non-judgey, non-bingey way.  On the other hand, I know that my favorite junky snack foods are not healthy and/or filling options.  It's very easy to overeat on chips or oreos, even if I'm not eating them for emotional reasons.

Instead of focusing on removing those foods out of my diet (NOT gonna happen right now, I've worked way too hard to be able to enjoy these in a non-ED way to start making rules about what I can or cannot eat), I think that I am going to focus on ADDING healthy foods to each meal and snack.

And continue my quest towards listening to my hunger signals.

But for now, I am rejoicing in the fact that my emotions no longer control my eating.  One less thing to worry about.  :-)

I honestly think that Mom has helped with this from the Afterlife, looking down on me and giving me that extra boost to get rid of this problem after all of these years.  Thanks, Mom, for helping me out.

P.S.  Sorry for the long, picture-less post.  Posting from work!  Will add photos later.

The good parts of 2012...

Since writing my 2012 recap post, which was very depressing and negative,  I have thought of a couple of good things about 2012.  Here are the good parts of 2012:

Mom was alive and well for almost 5 whole months.  Many happy memories with Mom from 2012, including watching the  Young and the Restless every weekday with her and looking through all of my NYC vacation pictures with her.  She loved ALL of them, especially the ones with me and Joel in them.  :-)

Rose was alive and well for two whole months.  Mom was unfortunately not the only family member that I lost in 2012.  But I enjoyed January and February with my best friend, Rose.  She was a member of the New clan since 1997, and it brings me a lot of comfort to think of Mom being with Rose now.

Diva and Jacques moved back in with me.  They are my chihuahuas, who I raised from babies to 5-6 years or so, then they moved in with my parents when I moved to a place that didn't allow dogs.  Then when I found a place that allowed dogs, Mom refused to let me have them back because she had fallen in love.  And I knew that they were better off there, with her home all day to play with and let them outside than with me.  But I decided that they belonged back with me once Mom was gone.  And they have been such a blessing to have back.  They are now 9 and 10 years old.

I ran my first 5K!!!  Okay, I walked/ran it (walked all the uphills), but still.  Accomplishment!  And it definitely gave me the racing bug.

Alright, there you have it.  Even though 2012 will forever be remembered as the year that my life was ruined, a few good things did happen.  And I'm grateful for that.  Up next:  2013 plans!

2012 recap...

Okay, as most of you know, 2012 has been a whirlwind year for me, full of many changes, most of them terrible.  Okay, all of them terrible.  I cannot think of one positive thing to say about the year, honestly...  It seems like every good memory of 2012 that I have has an equal and opposite bad memory to correspond. 

Anyway...  I decided to look at my posts from the first few months of the year, to honestly see how I was doing with health (weight, exercise, etc.) before my life went ape shit. 

And here's what I found out:  Even before all of these terrible life events happened, my weight was slowly rising.  I had gained a bit back since my low in May 2011 of 144... about 20 pounds to be exact.  There was some fluctuation going on.

May 2011 - me at 144

I was back up to 165 by the time that I took my New York trip in May of 2012.

May 2012 - me at 165

I was still feeling pretty good about my size at that point.  I really didn't like to be overweight by BMI's standards, but felt like I pulled off the size 14s pretty well.  I look at this picture now and wish that I could  have stopped there instead of what came next...

What came next was that my Mom was hospitalized in May and died in June of this year.  What followed was that I quickly gained 40 pounds with a mixture of extreme emotional eating binges and a ton of sitting around all day. 

Since then, I've been wavering around the 200 pound mark.  I got up to 209, down to 197, and have stayed around there.  It's been 6 months now, and that's still where I'm at. 

September 2012 - me at 209.2

But I'm finally starting to turn my eating and exercising around.  The grief is still very much there, but I'm working on FEELING those feelings instead of stuffing them down with cookie dough, Ruffles, pizza, and toaster pastries.

It turns out that what I was doing to feel better (binge eating on junk food and moving as little as possible) are actually making me feel worse.  My mind tricked me into thinking that junk food and inactivity would help me to feel less depressed and pathetic, but the truth is that two of the best ways to naturally improve my mood are healthy eating and exercise.  What a vicious cycle depression eating has been.  Feel crappy, so eat crappy, then feel crappier, only to eat crappy again... 

So in summation, 2012 has SUCKED.  It has sucked personally, emotionally, and physically.  I've never been more ready for a new year than I am right now.  2012 can suck it.   2013 has to be a better year.

I will be back within a few days for a much more uplifting post about my healthy plans for 2013!!!

30 Days of Blogging - Day 9 - Mom's Tree

As you all know, I'm always looking for new ways to honor my mom.  My grief counselor gave me a really great idea a few weeks ago, and I was able to impliment it (with help from my dad and brother) a few nights ago.

The idea is this:  A Memorial Ornament Party.  What is that, exactly?

It's when a bunch of people who lost a loved one gather at the home of the family of said loved one, each person bringing a Christmas ornament that reminds them of the person lost.  Everyonoe explains their choice, maybe tells a story or two to go with it, then takes turns hanging their ornaments on the tree. 

When I heard this idea, I immediately knew that it was perfect for our family.  Mom loved Christmas so much.  Her favorite part was always decorating the tree with my brother and me.  This year, I was dreading that part, and considered skipping it entirely.  But when I heard about the memorial ornament party, I knew Mom would love it.

So my brother and I gathered a bunch of family and friends to Dad's house, and we had our party.  Everyone who attended took it seriously; no one was just humoring me.  I think that this activity helped everyone involved to feel closer to Mom.

Here's the finished product:

Of course, ornaments are still on their way via snail mail from relatives who could not make it to the party, so it's not complete quite yet, but it's beautifully gaudy, just like Mom always liked her tree to be. 

After we each hung our ornaments, we all put the icicles (tinsel) on, which was Mom's favorite part of decorating the tree every year.  I really felt her presence at that moment, surrounded by people who she loved so much, doing something that she loved so much.  It was magical.

The next day, we found her beloved JCPenney snow globe collection and displayed those as well.  Unfortunately those jerks at JCP discontinued the tradition this year (I'm so upset about the timing.  Please sign my petition to get them to bring them back in 2013).

I'm feeling pretty good about the decorations being out!  They remind me of Mom. 

after decorating the tree December 2011

30 Days of Blogging - Day 3 - Mom with dogs

This is a picture only blog entry!  I will probably do that on the weekends, since no one really reads the weekend posts.

My three angels: Mom (1960-2012) with Rose (1997-2012) and Stuffy (1987- 2004)

I hope that you have enjoyed seeing these pictures!  I love how I had a mom who truly loved dogs, and I know that she is with Stuffy and Rose now.  I want no part of an afterlife without my dogs, and neither did Mom!  We talked about it plenty when she was alive, and it gives me comfort to know that not only were plenty of human family members waiting to greet Mom, but there were also several beloved dogs.

One thing at a time, Self.

I had several breakdowns related to Mom over the weekend. Like sobbing uncontrollably breakdowns. I think that I really needed to get that out, and had been holding the sadness inside. Thankfully Stacey was there for me during these breakdowns. Most of the time when I bawl my eyes out over Mom, I'm alone, because I feel weird doing it in front of others. It's important that I let my loved ones comfort me.

Two of my favorite loved ones:  Stacey and Joel

I am still working on getting there with my family members... I struggle being weak in front of them, don't know why.

Anyway, after those cleansing tears, I felt better. Especially about my weight loss journey.

I had so many thoughts on Saturday, between sobs, that I should just give up on this weight loss stuff. At least postpone it until the worst of my grief is over.

But I had a moment of clarity: Mom would not want me to put my health on hold. She especially would hate it if SHE was the reason that I gained all the weight back. She knew how important this was to me, and was my biggest cheerleader for everything, weight loss included. (Though she also would start saying "You look too thin!" when I get down to about 175 pounds, which is still 20 pounds overweight, LOL)

"Leah, are you getting TOO THIN????" - Mom

So instead of giving up, I'm going to be kind to myself and take this stuff in baby steps.

I was getting angry with myself for not cooking enough, for not exercising enough, for eating too much processed stuff, and for not eating enough of the healthy stuff in general.

One thing at a time, Self.

This week, my focus will be to track everything on Weight Watchers and to not go into the hole. Stacey's birthday is on Wednesday, and there will be eating out and drinking going on, so I need to save some points for that. And I will.

If I'm still eating processed stuff, not cooking much, not exercising as much as I did before, and not eating tons of fresh produce... that's okay for now. This is not an all-or-nothing journey.

I will get back to where I was a year ago, Weight Watchers-wise. It will take some time. It will take some therapy. And it will take me being gentle with myself.

where I was a year ago... (144 pounds in late May 2011)

But I'm feeling pretty optimistic about the future of my weight loss and health, for the first time in a long while. So I thought that I would share.

I'm still writing that new challenge that I spoke of last post!  It is in fact a "calendar goal" but it's a pretty realistic one, and I promise to not be too hard on myself while I reach it.

I miss my cheerleader!

Mom was not just a mom to me.  She was also my best friend!  Despite the facts that she wasn't single, and that I wasn't an only child, and she waited until she was married and already had a two year old boy and was in fact a woman in her mid-twenties before she carefully planned my existence, Mom and I were very much like the Gilmore Girls. 

We could (and would) talk about ANYTHING.  There were a couple of limits to this rule, which I'll let you guess, but for the most part we were quite candid about every little details of our lives to each other.

This was usually a great thing, because I had a mom who was so freakin' cool.  She just understood me, and really took the time to listen to my problems and share in my joys. 

Sometimes it was a bad thing, because I would confide things to her, like a fight I had with my boyfriend, and then would forgive the boyfriend, only to have Mom NEVER forget what the fight was about.  ("Are you sure about this guy, Leah?  Remember when he...")

And in return, I would share in her problems and joys, too.  But to be honest, usually it was me doing the talking and Mom hanging on to every word as if I were the most interesting person on the planet.

She made me feel like I was the center of her universe.

And her family really WAS the center of her world!  She loved us so incredibly much.

Dad, Mom, me and Joel - 1984

And something that I hope she knew:  She was the center of my world, too. 

I am still struggling every day to accept this terrible loss.  I may be a 27-yr-old now, but my life still very much revolved around my mom.  And I'm trying to figure stuff out. 

What does this mean for this blog?

Well, there may be more "dear diary" type entries sometimes, like this one.

Because sometimes I just need to vent.  And sometimes I just need to talk about Mom.

It also means that I need to start another weight loss challenge for myself, to help motivate me.

My biggest cheerleader is gone, and now I have to find the inner strength to keep going.

I will be back soon with the details of my new challenge, which I'm still working on...

A Dedication

At the end of May, my world came crashing down when my wonderful mom didn't wake up after a surgery.  On June 18th, she died after two weeks of hospice care.

My mom. 

The most wonderful person that I know.

The most supportive, honest, kind, loving, best person in the world.

A beautiful woman in every sense of the word. 

Mom was kind to everyone, even to those who did not deserve it.

A woman who I hope to take after in many ways.  Mostly, I hope to have inherited her kind heart and her beautiful smile.  :-)  Also, I hope to one day be as amazing a mother.  I can only hope that I was as wonderful a daughter as she was.  For better or worse, both of her parents have outlived her, and she was a truly amazing daughter to them, taking care of both of them often.

I have spent the month freaking out emotionally, as  you may imagine.  For me, this included a lot of emotional eating, as well as a step down from veganism (for now, I'm "only" vegetarian...).

Anyway, I stepped on the scale yesterday morning, and it was a very ugly number.

BUT...  here's my first (there are sure to be MANY) dedication to Mom:  I dedicate this weight loss journey to my mom.  She always wanted the best for me, and that includes health and happiness.  She also always wanted me to be kind to myself, which is something that I have always struggled with.

So, I vow that I will not be mean to myself or unhealthy in any way to lose this weight. 

I rejoined Weight Watchers Online, and will be tracking on there for the time being.  Also, I will be getting back into regular exercise.  I will not be setting any unrealistic time table goals for this weight loss.  I will not beat myself up if I mess up or gain weight along the way.

I am going to live up to what my blog is called, and I will be KIND to myself during this journey.

It's time to start living life again, and I'm not exactly sure how to go about doing that, since so much of my life and my routine revolved around Mom (I live 2 minutes away from my parents' house).  I'm not as close to my dad as I was to Mom, but I'm working hard on that relationship as well. 

For now, I will start with going to work tomorrow for the first time in June.  And tracking on Weight Watchers Online.  And exercising.

I am going to try to update the blog weekly for a bit, telling you all how I've done with Weight Watchers and with being kind.  :-)

Mom

Please pray for a miracle of healing for my mom, Kathy.  She is in the ICU with complications from a surgery that went terribly wrong.  There is no one on this earth more deserving of a miracle than my mother!!!

I normally keep religion out of this blog, but because my mom is a devout Catholic, it feels appropriate to put a bible verse in at this time. 


“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding… Do not be wise in your own eyes; fear the Lord and shun evil.  This will bring health to your body and nourishment in your bones” (Proverbs 3:5-8). 

If anyone deserves good health and a long life, it's Mom.