Next to raising a child, losing weight is the hardest thing I’ve ever done.  One thing I’ve come to realize is that it’s never going to happen if I’m not really ready for it.

Over the last week, it clicked.  Of course, this isn’t the first time.  I actually went through the trouble of rearranging my entire work schedule to make it easier for me to get to the gym.  A friend encouraged me to join MyFitnessPal and I finally did (Angelasue79 if you need a friend on there).  It has been 5 days of tracking.  Not every day has included a workout, but this week was still an improvement.

Starting again isn’t easy.  Admitting that I gained back almost 20 pounds isn’t easy. Calorie counting isn’t very easy, either.  There have been moments of shame… I won’t lie.  How … how did I do all that work before and let it all go down the drain?  Sure, the herniated disc didn’t help, but I quit eating right, too.  Apparently I’m an all or nothing kind of gal but I’m not proud of that either.

My goals right now are consistency, persistence and finding a happy median.  On days I can’t be perfect, it’s still okay to just be okay.

So here I go. I’m off to a great start.  Maybe I’ll get back into blogging on a more regular basis, too.

We are our own worst critic. Always. Especially women. TV and magazines, blah blah blah. Yes we know they don’t help. I wanted to get real with you. Many days I have a TERRIBLE body image, my outter-self image, so to speak. I’m overweight, I’m a grown ass adult and I still get zits (what’s up with that?), and .. well yeah. I have a lazy eye sometimes. That’s kind of annoying when I notice it in pictures. And did I mention that I’m overweight?

SO WHAT!?!?! I hit one of those mirrors recently where there’s a mirror behind you and you can see your back. Damn, my hair is pretty. And it got me to thinking . o O ( Can I spend a little more time focusing on what I do like about myself? ) Yes. Yes, I can. It is so important to find a few positive things about yourself and focus on those for a while. Then work on the things you don’t like, if you can. I mean after a nine pound child, can I ever have a perfect, flat, smooth stomach? Nope. Not without the help of surgery. But is there something I can do about it? Sure.

For those of you who don’t know, I’m going to be the Best Woman in a wedding in December. Right now, I’m not focused on losing weight. I already have my dress and it can’t be altered a whole lot. But I am working on being healthier, and that starts with the way I think about myself.

 My hair. It’s kind of awesome. If it weren’t my hair, I’d be pretty jealous ofme. I’m not saying you should think that my hair is amazing, all that really matters is I find something to love about my appearance. My hair is first. I love the natural waves. I love the color. I love the way the layers work with my face.

So that’s a good start, right? Let’s examine a little further. There’s got to be something more than just my hair. Oh duh. I, personally, think my dimples are cute. I inherited those from my dad, so they are also rather sentimental to me. I got what I wanted an awful lot as a child thanks to those dimples! Things might not be so different now.

While we’re staring at my face, and please ignore the shiny skin. This is Keeping it Real, no make-up, nothing. Just me….. how about those eyes? They sure are dark! Not too bad looking. I can be pretty happy with my eyes. I like dark eyes (also from my dad). And I’d never want a nose-job. I have a good nose. Not too small, not too round, not too flat.

My next favorite asset would be my legs. For a girl my size (14-16), I have damn nice legs (I think, and that’s what we’re discussing here.

Okay… Please ignore the background. Please ignore that little dust bunny under my bed. What I see here are pretty muscular and toned legs. Not much for cellulite going on there, no cottage cheese, so to speak. I um.. didn’t take a picture of the unflattering part where my thighs rub together when I walk.. no. I didn’t do that because I’m focusing on what I like. I am not embarrassed to wear shorts in the summer.

Check me out. I have some assets. I’m not fishing for compliments. I already like these things about me. The question is: How about you? I want you to comment on this blog and tell me only something positive that you like about the way you look. I want you to promise me that if you can’t think of anything right now, you’ll spend a little time over the next week finding something to love when you look in the mirror. Promise?

A healthy body starts with a healthy mind. Oohhh I like that.

Life is getting hectic! Oh wait, it’s been hectic. In case you didn’t know, I have a part-time job that pays money but my full-time job is stay-at-home Mom. Of course, now that my son is in 6th grade, staying at home is something I don’t get to do a whole lot.

My schedule at work is Monday and Wednesday with some Fridays (depending on the workload). My employer and I are flexible with each other like that. It’s pretty cool. Works for both of us. Monday and Wednesday, Li’l C has his First Lego League meetings after school. Tuesday and Thursday I usually do the grocery shopping and cleaning, and social visits with my friends. In the evenings Li’l C has his Tae Kwon Do classes. It’s almost getting difficult to remember what day I have to pick him up from school at what time and what’s going on after school. These are reasons I am thrilled to only have a part-time job.

Now how do I keep it all straight? It’s getting easier. Here are some ideas I want to share that have worked for me.

We have a week-over-week calendar on the fridge. It is a magnetic calendar where each week is a separate magnet. Pretty cool. You can get them from Amazon if you like. We have the trash and recycling pick-up schedule on the fridge calendar. Fun things like concerts, holidays, and family gatherings also go on there. This is more for our son to use than anything else.

I also have an Android phone and use my Google Calendar extensively. I even managed to convince my boss to switch over to using a Google Calendar so I can keep track of the work schedule of events, fun things, pack walks, appointments, etc easily. And this is not a joke, I put everything in my calendar. Lunch dates. Visits with family. Every. Single. Appointment. My husband and I share our calendars with each other so we know what is going on from day-to-day. It may seem silly but he has regular outings with his friends and so do I.

Another major problem I that I face is forgetfulness. No kidding? If I didn’t, I wouldn’t need all these tools to help me keep my life straight. But you know you visit mom and she sends food home with you in a container. You gotta get that container back to her. A friend asks if they can borrow something, or you trade kids clothes. You show up.. “crap.. I forgot to bring you that book I borrowed.” I could just add it to the “appointment” on my Google Calendar but I usually just glance at the widget on my home screen and it doesn’t show those kinds of details. So all the back to school supplies have gone on clearance and it hit me. I picked up a dry erase board that I attached to the door from the laundry room to the garage. In big, bold letters I wrote “Don’t Forget” at the top. Now when I’m running around the house and I see something I need to take somewhere, I go put it on the dry erase board. It’s at eye level on my way to the car. There’s no way I can miss it! I feel so clever. I’m sure I’m not the first person to think of this, but I feel good about it. It’s only been about a week and a half, but I haven’t forgotten anything!

Do you have some organizational tips that you would like to share? I’d love to hear them!

Saturday was HORRIBLE. H O R R I B L E. Why? I don’t know. It just was. I mean a few things didn’t quite go according to plan, but they weren’t things that should ruin my whole day. My son had a promotion test for Tae Kwon Do and I had to work. It would be the first time he had to do sparring (person to person fighting) for his test. I asked my husband to take video with his phone so I could see it later and his phone video crashed. Go figure. That didn’t ruin my day. After that I came home and had some lunch, then headed out to the park for a social dog walk, or Pack Walk, as we call it. That was nice. Exercise is good, right? Wrong. I just wanted to come home and crash. Hubs went out with some dudes to drink some beer. The kid was out playing. I was … blah. I didn’t want to clean. I didn’t want to cook. That’s lame, I love cooking. I did NOT want to stand in the kitchen and chop food and make food and cook food. Just BLAH. BLAH. I felt Blah. Have you ever been depressed? You know how it makes you feel physically? I felt that way. My brain was not depressed, Emotions not depressed, but my body felt depressed. I hope that makes sense, because it was weird. I did not enjoy it. The kid and I ended up going out to eat. It wasn’t healthy. But it was delicious. And it made me feel better.

That was Saturday. This is now. I don’t feel like that now. I feel fine and normal. My blood was drawn yesterday for my T4 thyroid test. Now I’m waiting to hear back on that to find out if it is my thyroid causing me to feel blah. I guess in a way I kind of hope that it is off so that the doctor can fix it and make me feel better. I don’t want to be blah and I really have no reason to feel that way. So. Make it go away. Now for the waiting game. I can’t wait to find out what my blood says.

This morning I knew I wanted to write a blog post, but I wasn’t sure on a topic. Rain canceled my plans with my dad today, so I decided to do a yoga DVD from Rodney Yee and Gaiam. Just after completing the workout, it hit me. Yoga is my topic.

The Beginning

Yoga for me began in 2009 when I visited my brother and sister-in-law in Boulder. At the time, my sis was still working on obtaining her teacher certificate. I had said that I would like to do a yoga session with her during my visit, and thus began my journey. What I loved, other than having a bonding moment with my brother’s wife, was how I felt energize and yet relaxed at the same time. I was sore for days. Proof of a great workout!

Upon returning to Indiana, I signed up for a Hatha Yoga class at my local YMCA and loved it. I loved it so much, I went on a quest for a DVD so I could practice at home. My decision was a Gaiam DVD featuring Rodney Yee. It provided me with the detailed instruction that I needed as well as two short workouts on one DVD to keep me interested.

And then I began having trouble with pain in my arms, and sort of set yoga aside. That was a mistake.

The Injury

In October of 2011 (almost a year ago), I’d begun to have a little pain in my back and didn’t think much of it until I sneezed one day. This was garage cleaning day for me. I wasn’t lifting anything. I wasn’t carrying anything. I was just standing, and I sneezed. It felt like a nuclear bomb went off in my mid-lower back. If you’ve been there, you know where this is heading. The next day I was sitting in the chiropractor’s office hearing him tell me about a disc problem. A herniated disc problem. My world came slightly crashing down around me. Okay, that’s a little dramatic. All my workouts stopped. Walking practically stopped. Sitting hut. Laying hurt. Standing hurt. I was miserable and feeling sorry for myself. Guess what? I’m an emotional eater. I gained back 20 pounds.

The Recovery

My chiropractor made a lot of money off of me over the months following my nuclear explosion, I mean herniated disc. He had me doing therapy at home on top of my regular visits. It began to hit me that many of the exercises he had me doing were yoga. Why don’t I get back into yoga? I’d heard of something called Restorative Yoga before. I didn’t know much about it, but it sounded like something that might be right for me. I was sort of right. After a bit of searching around, I located my yoga teacher from the YMCA and we began to have some one-on-one sessions following the regular class. She gave a lot of attention to my back during class to make sure I didn’t hurt myself further. So the injury was in October, and now in May I really started to feel great again. My daily pain was manageable before that, but adding in the personalized yoga instruction made the pain disappear. For the first time in months I was finally pain free.

Now I find myself wanting to dive a little further into yoga. Not just my practice, but my education, the philosophy. What exactly are the Chakras? What is the meaning behind this word Namaste. And how the heck to you pronounce all that stuff? A good friend of mine gave me a great gift for my birthday! A little book called “Yoga Chick – A Hip Guide to Everything Om”, which I am starting to read today. I think this will be a good read for me as it sounds like it is from a beginner’s perspective. She also gave me a three-pack of DVDs from Gaiam. It’s a great set with three separate 30 minute workouts: Abs, Upper Body, and Lower Body. I did the abs this morning, because that is also good for my back. I am looking forward to trying the other two DVDs over the next couple of days!

How has yoga helped you with your fitness, health, or injury rehabilitation? What are your favorite DVDs or books that you recommend?

A couple of weeks ago, I wasn’t feeling well. Nothing major, it was just some digestive issues (I’ll spare you the details) that persisted for more than 48 hours. My logic was, “if my son was having these problems for over 48 hours, I would take him to the doctor. I should offer myself the same care and concern.” So I went to the doctor. She wanted to do a blood test. And another test. I thought the other was …. not something I wanted to do. I did let her do the blood test and she gave me a prescription which cleared up the problem.

After two and a half weeks you start thinking . o O (No news is good news. Everything must be fine. I sure would have heard from the doctor by now if there was a problem a with my blood test. Groovy.) Written off. Everything is fine. Then the doctor’s office called yesterday, “we received your blood test results. Your thyroid levels are low. We’d like to do a more extensive blood test to examine your levels.” Oh. Well. That’s. Sure. Unexpected news. It could be worse.

Thyroid problems, in general, are easily diagnosed and remedied.  I don’t mind needles. It’s really not a big deal, but damn, I just had got it in my mind they weren’t going to call! And then they call! I’m frustrated! It’s also frustrating because I have been through thyroid testing before. Now my memory is foggy but it was either 2004 or 2005 (I think). We’d gotten a gym membership and I was working out and eating great and didn’t lose a single pound. So I asked the doctor about it, and he did the blood test. It came back abnormal. We did another test. It was also abnormal. It showed that I had both an overactive and underactive thyroid, which is pretty confusing. So then we moved on to the radioactive pill and uptake scan. Very expensive. And it showed a normal functioning thyroid. The specialist said, “I can tell you with confidence that when your blood test was done, something was wrong with your thyroid. I can also tell you with confidence that it is not wrong right now. I’m sorry I don’t have any answers for you. Sometimes the thyroid gets out of line and self-corrects. If it’s been off before, it will probably happen again, so call me if you notice any symptoms.”

I’m not interested in going through all that BS again. However, if the thyroid isn’t functioning properly, it can really screw up your body. So here we go again. But hey.. it could be worse.

No, I didn’t go back to middle school. My son started 6th grade a couple of weeks ago, and I tell ya what it’s a heck of an adjustment for both of us.  There are so many classes to keep track of compared to last year, so many papers, so many activities, and then his Tae Kwon Do on top of it all.

I applaud you mothers who work full-time, go to school yourself, and still pull this off.  I’m only employed part-time and I feel like it’s a struggle to keep up.

So my son has mild ADHD, which of course had me worrying about how he would adjust. Perhaps he’s made the adjustment better than I have. Perhaps changing classes every 45 minutes is what he is more suited for doing. There’s no need to focus for too long on anything. His brain gets to switch gears frequently throughout the day. It helps that his school is pretty awesome. They have a homework list available right on their website which the kid and I go over every day before we leave the school parking lot. The decision was made for him to be driven to school and picked up after so that he is less likely to forget something important. So far, it’s been worth it.

Now comes the first school dance of the year. The first school dance of his life. My first school dance as a mother. I’m not prepared for this. He’s talking about girls and wanting to wear body spray! My little boy is a small man now. Surely this happened overnight, right?

He sure does look good in yellow.

Did I mention how I’m not ready for this?

I promised this year that I would do better. With his heavier work load, I feel like I’m even more obligated (I don’t mean that in a bad way) to be there for him every day. So when he’s sitting at the table doing homework, I’m sitting right there with him. I go over his planner with him every single day. We set goals every week. We practice his spelling tests together every week. I can even check his grades online now, so we are doing that regularly, too. We also invested in a nice zipper binder for him to carry all day; he says it really does help him stay organized.

How did you and your child adjust to middle school? Do you have any tips or advice to help me or other parents who are making this transition?

This week’s plan was to get back on track with a workout schedule. Then I woke up Monday morning not feeling well. It lasted all day. It continued on Tuesday. It lingers yet today. I sucked it up and went to the doctor only for them to tell me that they have no answers as to what is ailing me.

I guess the “good” news is that I lost 4 pounds, but this really was NOT how I wanted to do it! Well I felt the need to vent a little and I’ve been wanting to blog more regularly. Here it is!

As soon as I’m feeling better, there’s no waiting for “next week” to get back on track. It’s going to happen now. Things are coming together in my life, so really this is the best time to get myself on a good workout schedule and work on my eating habits. Whatever it is that I’m sick with has me drinking a lot of water, so at least I can be working on that habit again!

I’m going to work on that planning and scheduling thing more. I know how important it is, and I’m going to be in a wedding here in a few moths. Since the dress is already in my possession, I actually can’t lose too much weight. Yes, they can alter it to a degree, but overly altered dresses aren’t proportionate. I still want it to look good. This means that I can really take my time and focus on making better habits rather than specifically losing weight. The goal, really, is to be more healthy anyway. I want these changes not just right now, but for the rest of my life.

It is important to stay focused on the real goal: a healthy lifestyle.

I have not blogged in a rather long time. Call it writer’s block, I’m too embarrassed to talk about my [lack of] weight loss, I don’t know what to say, I have too much to say and don’t know where to start. Call it whatever you want, procrastination. Time to get over it.

In a nutshell: I haven’t lost weight, we got a third dog, and my son started 6th grade. Work is good. Home is good. Marriage is good. The dogs are good. The boy is better than he’s been in a long, long time. I don’t think I can recall a time in my life where I’ve been happier.

My life has been challenging. It’s never really just been easy. It’s not been terrible either, but there’s always one thing or another. Here’s the highly condensed version.  Grew up with alcoholism all around me, got picked on and teased all the way through school, married a closet alcoholic and dealt with him for far too long, and then struggled through the financial and emotional burden of being a single mom for several years. Yeah. Things were never easy. Then I had a great guy who didn’t want to be a dad. That was pretty heartbreaking. He changed his mind but then struggled with a long term commitment. Then the ex took off and broke the kid. Finally got married to that great guy. Still had a lot of financial struggles. Then the ex came back and threw everything out of alignment. Then the Great Guy adopted the kid [very expensive]. A year after that the ex took off again and threw everything even further out of alignment for the kid. Then I royally hurt my back [no surgery required, but lots of chiropractic and physical therapy]. Then the kid made some tough choices. The end of his 5th grade was very tough for him, both emotionally and academically. Mom worried.

Then the good. A lot of the financial problems began to resolve. The boy started smiling more. Yoga helped my back. The boy worried less. He played more. I felt good. Hubs & I actually went on a short vacation. The summer went on and things kept improving. Then I worried about the boy starting 6th grade. Now over a week into it, the boy is doing exceptionally well. And he’s still happy. Happier than we’ve seen him in a long time. His sadness, anxiety, and worry are gone. He’s.. a pretty normal 6th grade boy.

And life is Just Good. Is everything perfect? Nah. Still a few loose ends to tie up with the financials. But there’s no more worry about making ends meet. House is a little small for three people and three dogs. Wouldn’t mind an upgrade. But the house we have is nice. Comfortable. In good repair. Carpet is a little.. meh.. Did I mention three dogs? Oh well. My heart is happy and content. And I did get a shiny new car for my birthday. My old car was becoming its very own financial burden! So that is resolved. Now I don’t need to worry about my car starting anymore. That’s really nice. And then I was asked to be in a wedding in England. That was very flattering and exciting, but presented its own stack of worries. Paying for three passports and three plane tickets.. that’s pretty expensive! But it’s all taken care of now. Plane tickets are purchased, and passports should be here soon.

I really can’t say that I’ve ever been happier on an overall sustained level than I am right now. I am so blessed. Now, at the age of 32, I finally feel like my struggles are over. I’ve always been grateful, knowing things always could have been worse for me. I’m sure many of my readers have had more difficult times, so don’t misunderstand me. There is also no fooling, I know things won’t always be great.  There will be more struggles ahead, I’m sure. But right now, there are virtually none, which is the least amount I can remember in my life. And it is Wonderful. And I am Happy.

Alright so I made it to the gym yesterday, which is a little bit of a miracle. We are heading out of town on Friday and I really have a lot to do to get ready. Hopefully I will also go this evening and maybe tomorrow morning, but that’s a little up in the air. I have to be flexible with my schedule this week, and allergy headaches have been BAD.

Back to my point… I went to the gym yesterday. I have been avoiding the scales as I really didn’t want to know the damage I’ve done, but then again it’s sort of impossible to track my progress if I don’t know where I am. So I stepped on them ready to walk away with determined tears. Instead it turned out to be, “Oh! That’s not as bad as I thought.”

It’s bad, but I expected worse. I’ve gained back 12 pounds. That’s a lot but manageable. I can do this. The weekend will be rough with the trip and all; there will be eating out. And probably some drinking. So I’m not going to weigh in again for about 2 weeks. I’m not thrilled about the idea of bringing home smelly gym clothes, but our hotel claims to have an exercise room, I might use it. We shall see how brave I am.

Here’s the sad thing, I don’t plan to eat well on the trip. I don’t… want to. Honestly we are heading to Buffalo, NY and I keep hearing about this restaurant or that restaurant with the amazing food and I want to enjoy it. And that’s all. I’ll eat great today and tomorrow, packing good food for the actual 8 hour car ride, and I’ll just get right back at it on Tuesday. That’s my plan.

What do you do when you go on vacation to somewhere you’ve never been? Do you plan to indulge or make a great effort to continue your regular healthy eating plan? Or do you mix it up and do a little of both?