What Came First...

The chicken or the egg???

That's pretty much how I'm feeling about the current state of affairs known as my life. Am I not taking care of myself because everything else is a mess or is everything else a mess because I'm not taking care of myself???

Something is wrong with ME. Why am I so sure of this?

The ME who is usually super organized with every detail of every event planned to the finest detail has more or less been floating at loose ends for the last several weeks. My meals haven't been planned in so long its embarrassing. Remember ME who usually measures all of her food out ahead of time and labels the packages with nutrition info? She has vanished, replaced by someone who is back to eating straight out of the package. My great kill myself at the gym plan has COMPLETELY gone down the tubes. Even outdoor physical activity has been nonexistent the last couple weeks.

Then there is the other part of my life - the Mom, wife, daughter, housekeeper part - and its not faring much better. Rather than keeping The Boy One on a schedule that helps him with his behavior etc, he has been getting away with way too much video game, tv and computer time. This is happening because I'm not getting his schedule figured out ahead of time & I don't have the mental energy to follow through with it even if I did get it done. While I try to pick up the phone every time The Husband calls, I miss it a lot (partly because he calls in the middle of the night) and I find myself "playing" on the computer for hours and "forgetting" to email him. Worse yet, here we are a little over halfway through deployment and I haven't sent him a single package or letter. (Insert side note: I got the first email from him today that said it was from ADC - guess that means he's really a Chief now lol). My Mom has to constantly remind me of stuff she needs me to do. Its so bad that I very nearly forgot the date of her court appointment, I never got in my phone and had totally spaced it. Well not totally true, I knew the date but didn't realize it was already pretty much here until the day before. Then there is the house... while its not nearly as bad as I've let it be in the past it is no where near the level of clean it was when deployment started. More than that though is all of the "projects" around the house I was planning to get to during deployment and I haven't even started the first one.

This past week especially there have been days when I literally would lie on the couch and couldn't motivate myself to do anything. Even the thought of going to my favorite little clothing store in town couldn't get my butt off the couch. I'm sad... my heart is heavy... my limbs feel heavy... my head feels on the verge of a migraine all the time... my chest wall pain is surfacing almost daily. I am not ME and I want ME back!

I think I know the cause... someone (well a couple of someones) hurt me very deeply... to the core of my soul... over a few week period immediately preceding the loss of ME. Even typing that makes me cry all over again. These were people that I considered friends and went way out of my way to help when they needed it. But, no matter how much I did or how I tried it was never enough or I was doing it for the wrong reasons or it was a crime when I wanted it to be my turn to get a little consideration... and worse than that they did everything in their power to alienate me from mutual friends. Its hard and it hurts me more than words can possibly express... it makes me want to close myself off from people so I don't have to feel pain anymore... but that is not ME and I want to be ME again.

I think I've written before about how hard it is for me to let go of hurt once it has happened and how it will plague me for a very long time. I need to learn to let go... of this hurt and a world of other hurts... so that I can be ME again. The million dollar question is HOW? How do I get out of this huge funk? Where do I start? Do I start with taking care of myself? Do I take care of everything and everyone else first (which is my usual pattern of behavior)? How do I get back to being ME????

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On a happier note: The Boy One continues with his healthy ways. The were having a case lot sale at the Commissary and he chose a case of plain Cheerios over Cocoa Puffs! Bargain happy Mom was pleased... they ended up being $1.15 a box and we won't need cereal again til Christmas. :-)

Stop Being a Victim!

Just an observation from my personal experience here: As I've been losing weight and people have talked with me about it, one common thing always creeps into the conversations. They all have excuses or reasons why they "can't do it." Have you noticed this? Sometimes it things like "I don't have time for exercise" or "its too hard to eat healthy." Those seem like the excuses of someone who isn't ready for a change or someone who hasn't had that critical some thing's gotta give moment yet. Then there's the reasons that give me a moment of pause, such as "I had a really bad childhood" or "my divorce almost killed me."


Now before I go on I want to share a little of me with all of you. I don't want anyone to think I'm some cold, heartless person... because I'm not. I have great compassion for people & it breaks my heart every time I hear about someone who is suffering in some way. This is me, who still tears up if I think about the people in the WTC and more recently those people trapped in earthquake rubble (ya know the people that survived, but couldn't be rescued in time).


Beyond the challenges of my daily life... being a military wife, raising a special needs child, my own health issues, living with an alcoholic... I have been a victim.


I have been a victim of sexual abuse. Not a subject I care to go into graphic details about... but I will say it was at the hands of a "trusted" youth group leader from Church (not a Catholic one) and went on for years.


I have been a victim of abandonment. Someone whom I believed would ALWAYS be there chose to walk away with no warning & no explanation. That damages in a way that even the death of a loved one can't.


I have been a victim of domestic violence. This too went on for years. Everything from yelling, screaming & name calling to choking (more times than I can count). I actually have permanent damage in my back from this.


I was very nearly the victim of rape. Thank God for a random motion-sensor light that scared the guy off. This man was the husband of a family member, so its a secret I keep.

My family has suffered the effects of senseless murders... something we are each victims of in our own ways.

So you see... while I know there are others that have experienced tragedies far greater than anything I've dealt with... I have had my share of painful life events.

This is where I say to myself - and to anyone who will listen - STOP BEING A VICTIM! Bad things happen to all of us. Yes, these things cause us pain & can change us in profound ways. Yes, its easy to see how these things can make taking good care of ourselves feel like one task too many when we are carrying the burdens of these painful life events around with us. After awhile, its easy to fall into the "I'm a victim & this is who I am" mentality. Trust me, I know, I did it for years.

For the longest time I refused to believe that any of these life events were a factor in my weight struggles. I mean really what does something that happened 15 years ago have to do with the chocolate bar I'm putting in my mouth today? But its more than that... its when you're feeling emotionally icky because you can't get the memory of something out of your head... and emotionally icky leads to low energy... and NO trip to the gym... the drive-thru for dinner because it would take too much energy to prepare a meal. Put this cycle on repeat day in and day out & it becomes easy enough to see how it can impact an attempt at a healthy lifestyle.

Then one day I was talking to my nephew & I realized that the very things I was telling him I needed to apply to my own life. He's only 18 months younger than me & his Mom passed away when he was five. Things happened to him after that that he uses as his "excuse" for all of the poor decisions he makes now. We were talking & I told him that even though I knew all of the bad stuff he had to deal with growing up that in my mind he could only use that as an "excuse" for so long. At some point, he had to realize he was an adult & responsible for his own life... and he could CHOOSE a better life for himself despite all of the bad things that happened to him as a child.

These are the things that can directly - or indirectly - impact our efforts to take care of ourselves and they must be dealt with. These are the things that you have to deal with or they will eat you alive. These are the things that we so often let become the "excuses" for not living our lives to the best of our abilities.

I said it the other day and I'll say it one more time... nothing in my past is worth sacrificing my future!

If you have things in your past that have become your "excuses" or "crutches" for not taking care of yourself and not living the life you deserve, I encourage you to take some time to explore ways of coming to terms with them & putting them to rest. A little thing called closure can go a long way toward a happier, healthier life. It can be a painful process, but its so worth it... in ways that can be more profound that you would dream possible.

For myself, most of the things I had to put to rest, I chose to do without confronting any of the people involved. I wrote lots... journal-like entries... letters to the individuals (that were later burned). I went for walks and talked to the "air"... yeah I probably looked funny, but voicing my thoughts, hearing the words spoken aloud helped. Doing this took time & caused many tears (I probably could have kept Kleenex in business)... but doing the emotional work left me with a sense of freedom that is hard to explain. Freedom to take care of my family.... Freedom to take care of myself & focus on my health... Freedom to be me! Freedom to enjoy all that life has to offer... without all of the baggage.

Someone near and dear to my heart told me once:

"As long as you feel like a victim, the person who hurt you is still victimizing you. How long are you going to be their victim?"

I care for you all so much & I really hope that sharing the less than pleasant details of my life will give someone the courage to face the things that are "secretly" or not-so-secretly holding them back from living the lives they deserve.

So I guess that is my question to you today... how long are you going to let yourself remain a victim?