Who do you think you are?

* I have no effing clue!

* I can tick off the obvious... wife, mother, daughter, sister, friend. I just turned 38, am dreadfully overweight, newly diagnose with Type II Diabetes, and 2 weeks away from my 20th HS reunion. Where did the last 20 years of my life go? How did I get to a place where I am looking back on that 18 year old girl... in the white dress holding a yellow rose as she received her HS diploma, full of hope, dreaming of the future... and wonder how did this happen?

* Somewhere on this crazy road I lost myself. There must have been a time when I felt whole, solid, human, yet for the life of me I can't find that place. I think and think, I therapy and therapy, I cry and cry but nothing... it feels like looking for something I may never find.

* The longing for self runs so deep it hurts. For as long as I can remember I have been in and out of depression, fighting the dark demons with sleep, sexual deprivation, procrastination, gluttony of all types, and most consistently with the magic pill Zoloft. These feelings starve my family and friends of the real me because I can not give them 100%.

* How do I let go and let "God"? How do I forgive myself so I can move past the feelings that have haunted me since I was a child? I need to get my life together. I need to start living, take back control of my actions. There has to be more to my life then feeling incomplete, the hole in my soul never really being full except with the blessed Zoloft. To be honest with myself I have put much of this looking on hold as much as I can. I have known for years that there is hard work to be done. The 100lbs I need to lose in the end may be the easiest part.

* I desperately need to change. I need to get off my ass, move, think, play, relax, and love. Love my be the key to this whole crazy puzzle, loving myself, falling in love again with my husband, kissing & hugging the kids every chance I get, and reconnecting with friends who have been missing from my life while establishing new relationships.

* So much to do, so much sleep needed!

post a day... oops!

* Ok... so I want to get the swing of this blogging thing by posting each day in May. The artsy-crafts Jenny B over at Allsorts got the ball rolling... just took me three days to get things moving. I think all day long of things to write, blood-letting of my brain, but never end up putting fingertip's to keys and getting the words out.


*It is getting late, tomorrow is a new day & there will be much more to post, but for now let me share my favorite new picture of JackJack. Can't you just eat those dirty little boy feet for dinner?

38 years

*So it is 1:11am, my 38th Birthday has now officially ended. What to do now. My husband had a tooth pulled this week, his 5th this year. I have a raging cold, with stuffed head, sore throat, and super clogged ears. Hubby forgot to wish me Happy Birthday until the day was half over. Jerk! :-) It always feels weird having to tell people that it is your birthday, as if they should see it on your face, feel the cake and party vibes radiating from your smile. I did however have many nice phone calls and a few sweet emails. My 3 year old daughter fought me saying it was HER Birthday today not mine. Silly one she is!

*We went to dinner, which was stupid given us both feeling like crap, but it was better then sitting at home. I was not 100% in the mood for a huge deal, so the quiet local restaurant was perfect. Now it is VERY late, I feel like dirt, and can't sleep. I want a do-over! I want a FUN day, not a sick day. Yes, I did get my toes done... an amazing shade from OPI called Ink. It is a shimmery dark blue. Very sexy in a "stay-at-home-mom meets goth" kinda way, but it makes me smile so there!

*I have added a counter to the blog. I am 730 days away from my 40th Birthday. I plan to wake up that morning in a hotel @ the Grand Canyon. It has been a dream of mine to see, feel, taste, and experience all that is Grand in this Canyon. The counter will remind me each day that I am one step closer to this amazing milestone in my life. I plan to ride a donkey, ride a rapid, and walk until my feet bleed. I need this goal... I need this place... it is my Atlantis, rising up like a miracle out of the ground. A place to feel so small, so completely engulfed in the splendor of nature.

*The goal has been set. All I need to go now is make the plan. There are over 100lbs that need to be lost, shape that needs to be gotten into, and all of this had a deadline of 730 days. My life is shifting, the motivation is there, all I need it the faith. Faith in myself, the process, and the goal. As a huge part of reaching this dream, I plan to blog just about everyday. At the end there will be an amazing memory of the work it took to get to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and back.

*Happy Day to me...

enough

*Do you ever get the feeling like you are sitting on the edge of change, on the verge of over coming? I had my Dr's appointment this past week and it is official, I have Type II Diabetes. She thinks with an huge change in the way I eat, exercising, and losing weight I may be able to avoid having insulin. I am relieved to know there is something wrong with me. I told my Husband that if the blood work came back normal, then I would be back to being a big cow not a woman with Diabetes. In my mind it is a huge difference, being forced to change everything for your health rather then wanting to lose weight to fit in smaller jeans.

*I am trying hard not to feel sorry for myself, as it will get my no place fast. The more I get upset the more i want to eat and make the circle repeat itself all over again. I have been reading the most amazing book Broken by William Moyers. So much of what he feels and describes as he is going though recovery from drugs and alcohol feel like me and food. I have always wondered if I need OA, and in reading the list of questions to see of you need help, I can answer yes to 95% of them.

*I need help. I am losing my mind in the house all day with the kids, the dogs, the husband. I need a space for me and maybe that is OA. Weight Watchers meetings never worked and I fail at doing this on my own. I need to do this for my kids. It feels like my life depends on me losing the weight, getting my sugars in control, and becoming more active. I have been given the gift of Diabetes, now the real work begins.

all fine...

*Well we made it... I did not think it was going to happen but we got here... no screaming babies on the plane, no dead workers at the rental car agency, all luggage accounted for!

*It is nice to be here, in the arms of family. My folks are so good with the kids, they love them so deeply. Today at the pool, my mother had more fun watching my 3 year old daughter get in and out of the "baby" pool like she owned the place. The baby was right there behind her, trying to do everything she did, yet ending up with a face full of water most times.

*I am eating good... for 1.5 days I think I have been sticking to the plan. I know I feel tons better then I did just a few weeks ago. My sugar is more stable and I feel like I have more energy. Now if I can just lose some of this evil belly fat we may be getting someplace. This is vacation... one can only hope to stay the same and not add to the problem.

*Ok, off to bed... on the pull-out couch mattress... on the floor.

can't breath

ok panic...

packed too much...

nothing to cross of list...

need to leave for the airport in 1.5 hours and the fear is building...

i want to cry, to scream, to go back to bed... this was such a bad idea!

so i packed 3 weeks in advance... i am still as freaked out as if i just started packing last night.  what was my point?

i am shaking... my head is spinning... i feel like it is hard to breath...

must calm down... pray

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panic

*I suffer with depression. I take medication so I can live with my depression. When I go off the meds, I lose my mind. I can't see reality, I am super moody, and end up wanting to kill myself. So thanks to 300mlgs of Zoloft daily, I am able to deal. I get out of bed and live a more or less typical life.

*But when it comes to travel, to packing up our lives and leaving town for days or even weeks, I freak! A few summers ago, I could not leave the house with out the crock pot being shinny clean. While packing to go see my family at the holidays, i was reduced to a babbling idiot on the floor of my daughters room because her laundry was not put away. I was 99% sure I could not go if this was not fixed. I needed to have everything "just right" so I could leave knowing my home was in order. I walked in circles and was unable to do the very tasks I needed to have done in the first place.

*I don't traditionally have panic attacks, but that is what this felt like. The overwhelming irrational fear that everything is not as it should be, that I need to have months world of disorder ordered before we can drive off for a week in Michigan. I feel like a nut while it is going on, but I am helpless to stop these feelings, until now!

*Tomorrow we get on a plane for the first time as a family of FOUR! We are spending the spring holiday week with my parents in paradise. So to get out of the house on time and without a freak out, I have been packing and readying things for 3 weeks now. The kids items have been triple packed, their clothing weeded out and their cary on crap well sorted. My husbands things have been washed and triple sorted and my clothing is well on the way to being "in the bag".

*All is not totally perfect... However when I felt like I was about to lose it, I went out... walked the aisles of Marshall's and got magazine's from Barnes & Noble. I even think tomorrow before we go I may get my own laptop!

*I have yet to feel the overpowering panic like I have in the past. I have a list of things to do for tomorrow, a realistic idea of what I can really get accomplished, and I forbid myself to feel like the world is gonna crazy down because i did not pack enough _______ for the trip.

**We will make it! Florida here we come!

the knot on the back of my head

*Today was one of the hardest days of my life. The man I call my husband raged all day, at everything and everyone. It seems that every few months he has a day or three where he falls off the deep end, leaving only an angry hurtful shell of a man behind. This is a man I don't know, a man I don't want to know. A man who with every breath he takes and every word out of his ugly mouth cuts me like a hot sword. I can't say or do anything to end this anger yet I become it's target, it's destination. Today's big topic was his doubt that I can lose the weight I need and get my diet under control to stave off serious health issues looming in the not so distant future. He fears I will dead in less then two years because I am incapable of getting my s**t together and taking control of my health.

*The biggest challenge I have to face is the fact I am either in the pre-stages of Type II Diabetes or have a nice little case of it already wreaking havoc on my system. When I was in the final weeks of my second pregnancy with my son, I was given the dreaded diagnosis of Gestational Diabetes. This meant blood testing, huge dietary changes and in the end, nightly shots of insulin. When JJ was born, his blood levels were low. In the 18 hours after his birth, they tested him with painful heel pricks to make sure he was gaining blood sugar. As is with newborns and boobs, it took a few days to get in the groove of the whole feeding thing, so this first night we surrendered (not playing hero were hubby's words) and give him formula so he woudl not end up int the NICU. But the next morning JJ was right on track and my levels seemed to get back to normal as well.

*I never lost the baby weight. I am the heaviest I have ever been, just shy of 290. I am horrified to even admit that to myself let alone hubby. I look at the woman on the weight-loss reality shows and feel so delusional... i don't look like THEY do... I carry my weight better... My arms are not as BIG as theirs. PLEASE! I had a huge V-8 moment a few weeks ago when I realized that yes Virginia you are fat, you are JUST like those TV women who need a camp or a club to kick their asses into losing big, I too need to get myself motivated to drop weight.

*My whole life i have identified myself as an outsider, as not the same. I have always been the heavy pimple face girl who people like but never truly fit in.. I don't know what it would be/could be like to walk into any store in the mall and shop, to look in the mirror and not hate the image i see. But now the vanity is stripped away and this is a life changing moment.

*For my to amazing kids I need to get this under control fast. I need to prove the mean nasty troll that I can change, that i do love life and want to be healthy for our kids and our marriage. Hubby almost walked out today as a result of his anger and anxiety about life, my health, my weight, my survival.

*Blah Blah Blah... We all make excuse... but those are a luxury I can't afford. I can beat this, I can and WILL turn this around...

**I can lose 100lbs.

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First off...

*So here is my first post. Not as grand as I would have hoped, but exciting none the less. I am in a totally state of self-change. I need to lose over 100lbs, my house in an ever evolving state of disorganization, and my mind spins faster then I can think. Recently I have begun getting a grasp on what I need to do to create a life for myself. I need to become a separate being from my role as a mother and a wife.

*The road to getting ME back is going to be complex, full of hard work, scrimping, finger pricks, and depravity. But I have been thinking lately the reward is not in the cookie or the new hand bag but in the lack of indulging, the not spending, the reward IS the deprivation. This is going to be what saves my sanity, realizing I can be happy with less, be content without, find success through sacrifice.

*I had Gestational Diabetes at the end of my second pregnancy. Knowing this could lead to full fledged Type II Diabetes, I did nothing to change my gluttony or my sloth. A few days ago, I came across my glucose testing kit with strips that were about to expire. So feeling like gambling, I tested for two days and was amazed at how out of control my body had become. And the hard truth is I did it to myself! I knew being lazy and overeating could get me in trouble, but being stubborn I did nothing. Now I have a world of health issues needing to be addressed.

*I am at least 100lbs overweight. I have numbness and odd pains in my joints and extremities. I am exhausted all the time. My brain spins so crazy I can't think straight. I am irritable regardless of how much Zoloft I ingest. I want to sleep in the day but end up awake until 1am. I am suffering.

*The fact that I know what to do and have yet to even think about change is what is saddest. I know how to turn all this around. I know how to fix so many of these issues with out even going to the doctor. But I sit on my big old butt and do nothing, not one little thing to make my life "better."

*Well that all stops! We are going on a family vacation in a week and the day after we return, I face the music. I am excited to be given the chance to grow up and get right with my body. I am excited to lose the weight once and for all. I am excited to become the woman I need to be for my children and for my husband.

*So it begins...

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