...about this weekend...

This weekend the weather here was nothing short of spectacular.  We get about five of these kinds of days a year and we spent three of them this weekend.  Glorious.

I took the opportunity to walk the dogs and do my circuit every day.  Bill found me a knee brace that my son wore when he was playing baseball and it worked great!  If I wore it and then iced the knee when I got done, my pain was minimal and my knee feels better than it has since it did whatever it was it did on Friday.  Of course I modified some of the exercises in the circuit so I didn't do more damage.  It was great.

As I was working out on Sunday, I began thinking about when in the hell I was going to have time to workout after tomorrow.  Tomorrow is the start of our insane time at work.  We run 350-400 new hires through our doors from the end of May until late September.  It means very early mornings and many late nights.  I spend most of the summer exhausted.  Plus, I have always worked out in the evening.  I'm not a morning person and evenings seem to be best for me.  No way that's happening with any consistency this summer and what I need now, above anything else, is consistency.  That's the only way to form new, and healthier habits.

Just about the time I was thinking that I might as well give up, something clicked (no...not in my knee...in my head).  THIS IS A BATTLE!!!  It's a challenge.  I'm competitive and I like to win and most of all...I am one stubborn, bull-headed bitch.  If I approach this the way I approached quitting drinking or smoking or any other really, really hard thing I've ever done...namely...head down and plow on through, then I will win!  I always win...I will again.

That means I'm getting up at 5:00 am this summer and, depending on how much light I have, I will walk the dogs and then come home and do my circuit.  If I can't walk them then I will just do my circuit and maybe some yoga.  This is not my favorite option but I am so sick of hearing myself whine about the way I look .  I am on my own last nerve so I will take my own advice, if you don't like something...CHANGE IT you ninny!

On a different note...

We celebrated Brian and Matt's 18th birthday this weekend.  I baked and decorated their cake and not only did it look pretty cool.  It tasted great.  When they were little, I used to dress Brian in blue so that their preschool teachers could tell them apart ("b" for blue; "b" for Brian).  William was too uninterested to learn their real names (he was only 27 months when they were born and I ruined his life forever) so he called them the Blue Brother and the Red Brother.  The names stuck. 

The yin and yang symbol is an idea for a tattoo that they want (but can't afford yet thank God).  To me it reminds me of how they must have looked while I was carrying them.  The saying on the cake is a riff on Harry Potter which they used as their quote in their yearbook.  Under Brian's name it said, "One cannot survive..." and under Matthew's name (right next to Brian) it said, "...without the other".  Pretty clever...and sweet. (And yes I am well aware that I got it backwards on the cake...deal with it.)

A great time was had by all and Bill and I were left with the thought...where in the hell did the time go?

Namaste

That was then...





This is now...

Here We Go Again

I am at that point with sugar (specifically chocolate) that I was when I gave up cigarettes and then, finally, alcohol.  I am powerless over it.  I have tried to moderate with no success.  I start each day saying, "I'm not going to eat any chocolate or sugar today," only to cave after lunch or dinner when I feel the need "for something sweet".  Then I eat too much of it and I end up feeling like shit...emotionally and physically.

Sound familiar?

Fuck.

I know that, once again, I've just traded one addiction for another. I have to quit but I have no idea how to do it.  Okay, that not entirely true...I know HOW to do it...I'm just not sure I have the balls to get it done.

Excuse number one - there is sugar in the house for the kids and we're coming into catering season at work which means cookies and brownies the size of my head will be arriving at least twice a week.  I can't possibly give up sugar right now.  I'll do it in the Fall.  But then it will be the "holiday season" which will make it impossible to give up sugar so I'll start in January.

I call bullshit.  I gave up cigarettes while my mother, who was living with us, not only continued to smoke on my back deck, but SMOKED MY BRAND.  Didn't matter.  I had made up my mind.  I can be one stubborn bitch.

I also gave up drinking with a wine rack full of wine, a garage refrigerator filled with beer and a cabinet above the sink filled with liquor.  Didn't matter.  I had made up my mind.  Like I said...stubborn.

Excuse number two.  I can't possibly go without sugar forever. Forever is so long - it's too much to think about. Um...aren't I the one always responding to posts and freely giving advice by saying, "You don't have to think about forever...you only have to think about today."  Yeah, that's me.

I hate it when my words come back to bite me in the ass.  I think I just called bullshit for the second time.

Excuse number three...what's left?  I gave up cigarettes and hit the booze harder.  Gave up booze and hit the chocolate like a fiend.  Give up sugar and...what?  Take stock in Starbucks for the caffeine? Move to Vegas so I can gamble?  Join a swingers network for the kinky sex?  Not bloody likely (especially the last one) but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried.  Do I really have the tools I need to move away from needing "things" to help me cope in life?  I really don't know.  And that scares me a little.

Can't call bullshit on that one yet - I'll get back to you.

So now I just have to do it.  I have no idea how or when but it needs to be done.  So to all of my lovely readers (if you're out there), I have a couple of minor requests.

Please excuse the whining and bitching and moaning that may occur in this blog regarding the giving up of the "S" word.

If you know me in "real" life, please do not ask me "how it's going" when you see me.  I'll be grumpy and likely to say, "None of your fucking business" which really isn't very nice.

Please do not judge me if I'm back here writing about this same damn thing in three weeks, three months or three years because I've relapsed.  Be patient with me - this addiction shit is a bitch.

Sometimes I really hate my genes.

Namaste

Strength is the capacity to break a chocolate bar into four pieces with your bare hands -- and then eat just one of the pieces.  ~ Judith Viorst