Breakfast Alone

My husband went to breakfast with his best friend this morning. They haven’t seen each other in 6 months, so I was glad that they did. Being the introvert that I am, I was also glad for the time alone. But then it occurred to me, what am I going to eat for breakfast? I could go grab take out or to the local breakfast fast food place. My husband texted me that our favorite bakery/cafe had a key lime pie doughnuts on special. Key lime is my favorite. This place is about 15 minutes away from my house, so driving there and driving home to eat seemed silly, since the rest of my breakfast would be cold by the time I got home. There was one problem. Eating alone somewhere triggers my anxiety hardcore. I thought this might not be a good idea. Then I reminded myself that I’ve been working on my anxiety. If I stayed home, the anxiety won. If I didn’t, it could bring on an anxiety attack.

So I did the scary thing. I checked to make sure my anxiety meds were in my bag and brought a book. I drove there, took a deep breath, and walked in. I got the last doughnut. The girl at the pastry counter was a tad bit judgemental (and this is not me being anxious). When I go with my husband, they ask if we want our pastries for there or to go, but she saw me alone and packed it up in a to go container and told me I was all set. I looked at that doughnut in its to go container and considered paying and leaving. Maybe I should just take my shame and go. Then I remembered this was an exercise in challenging my anxiety. I smiled and said I’d like to order more please. She waved me on down the line toward the cash register, where you order your hot food and drinks. I ordered myself a latte and some fancy toast. I thought about sitting at the bar and hiding amongst the other people eating alone. I decided to sit at a table instead. It was right in the middle, in a high traffic area. I sat there waiting for my order and read. I’d look up every so often and no one was staring. The rude girl from the beginning was off working. When they called my name for my order, I got my food and ate. I continued to read my book.

I can’t say I was 100% comfortable. When I felt really uncomfortable, I dug my head deeper into my book. Ultimately, there was no anxiety attack, but I think I need to do this a few more times before it becomes enjoyable. But for me, it was a big step. It’s a step that I will take again. I’ve spent a lot of time allowing my anxiety to rule my life. I’m ready for that to be less of a thing.

This is the Best It’s Going to Be

I don’t have any pictures from my
honeymoon that I’m not hiding my
tummy in.

“It’s just downhill from here, you know. This is the best it’s going to be,” my therapist told me not too long ago. She was relaying something a therapist had told her when she was a teenager when discussing body issues. Out of context, this sounds odd, so let me put it in context. I have some pretty bad self image, weight, and food related issues. My therapist was trying to get me to appreciate the body I have and pointing out all the things my body allows me to do. I kept going back to all the things it couldn’t do and the many ways it had betrayed me over the years. I couldn’t see one positive thing. Finally, she said, “I would recommend moving toward embracing your body. You’ve spent so much time fighting against it, why not embrace it now?” I shrugged, knowing she was right, but not quite sure how to get out of my own way. That’s when she said, “Our bodies age. No one can escape it. Mine does, yours does, everyone’s does. It’s just a fact of life. It’s all downhill from here, you know. This is the best it’s going to be at any point, going forward in your life.” I nodded in agreement. We couldn’t stop time’s march forward. I could work toward embracing my body that I have in the here and now or I can always like back to the body I didn’t embrace, but should have. I’ve done that my whole life.

My honeymoon was coming up and I needed new bathing suits. I bought a safe one piece and then I bought a high-waisted bikini. Nothing crazy, but 100% out of my comfort zone. I hadn’t worn a bikini since I was a preteen. It was terrifying and exhilarating all at the same time. I went back to therapy and told her what I’d done. She was proud of me for taking that step toward embracing my body. I left her office feeling empowered. I proudly packed my bikini into my suitcase until my honeymoon came.

I pulled it out of the suitcase and put it on and immediately started to second guess myself. I’m fat. I should be wearing a tent, not a bikini. This isn’t me. What was I thinking? Even though it doesn’t show a ton of skin, it shows more skin than I’m comfortable showing or should be showing. Everyone will stare and whisper about me. This is a mistake. My husband saw me dancing nervously in front of the mirror and inspecting every inch of myself. I told him I thought buying it was a mistake. He asked,  “do you love the bathing suit.” I said, “yes.” He asked, do you feel good in it.” I told him, “ I did when I bought it, but now I think that was a mistake. I don’t think I belong wearing a bikini.” He said, “if you love it, wear it. We don’t know anyone here, so who cares? Wear your bikini.”

Here you can see it is indeed a bikini. Please excuse the
messy guest room behind it. This was right after my wedding.

I put it on and walked to the beach. When I took off my cover up, no one stared. No one whispered. No one called animal control thinking I was a beached whale. No one even looked in my direction. No one cared about what I was wearing. I didn’t even do that thing where I hear people talking and laughing and assuming it’s about me. I just enjoyed my time on the beach with my husband. That bikini brought so much fear for no reason. I alternated it with my other bathing suit throughout the week for utilitarian reasons, more than self esteem reasons. Was I just laying on the beach? Bikini! Was I snorkeling and didn’t want to worry about the ruffles on my bikini floating in my line of sight or having to much of my fair skin exposed to the sun? One piece. Back and forth it went like that, all week. I felt great!

I started to notice other women with “less than perfect bodies” also wearing bikinis on the beach, some more revealing than my own. Where I used to judge them, I began to feel camaraderie. We didn’t meet society’s expectations for what a body should look like; we had curves. We had large thighs, a butt, boobs, no sculpted muscles, cellulite. We were not the classic image of beauty… or were we? I majored in art and spent many hours looking at sculptures and paintings. Many of them, especially ancient artworks, featured curvaceous women with wide hips, squishy tummies, full breasts, and thick thighs. Through the 1700s, 1800s, and 1900s, the women became less curvaceous and and and more angular; more man-like. The outfits of the 1920s illustrate this particularly well. I can’t blame it all on this glamorous fashion era. I know there are other steps along the way that ultimately got us to an ideal that is mostly unattainable. There are many other places and people that can detail our arrival at this ideal. That’s not really what I’m getting at.

My point is that while I have the more robust shape that has been considered feminine and beautiful in the past, I am utterly disconnected from it. I know that I must continue to lose weight for health reasons, I must do it for those reasons and not some ideal that is unattainable for MY body. Even at my skinniest, I was curvaceous. That’s just the natural shape of me. I need to connect with those curves and this body if I’m ever going to be truly healthy. I need to embrace this body, because this really is the best it will be. And so although it terrifies me, every time I go swimming, I pack both bathing suits. I take a deep breath and put my bikini on. I run through the things others might say about me wearing it and then steel myself up for it. All the self doubt plays across my face as I consider taking it off and stuffing it in a place where it will never see the light of day again. I look to my husband for assurance. Putting it on is an emotional battle with myself. I feel exposed and vulnerable. Every time I wear it is an act of defiance, and so I wear my bikini.

I Suck At Blogging

I want to regularly share my thoughts, but I'm bad at sitting down and doing it.  I know I always say that I'm going to get better at it and then I start a million posts, only for them to be left abandoned in my drafts folder.  I want this year to be different.  I want to start updating more.  I need to be self-aware and in order to do that, I need to be accountable to something.  This is my way of being accountable.  Maybe whoever reads this, if anyone is, can help keep me accountable.  Ask what's going on with me.  Why haven't I updated in a month?  Am I still accountable for my mental health and physical health?  I think so long I've been only worried about my physical health and mental health separately, when in reality, they need to go together.

For the past two and a half years, I was planning a wedding.  It was a great undertaking and it's finally over.  I've been married for almost four months.  I think it was easy to push myself to the background because I had to meet a deadline.  My wedding was coming, come hell or high water.  I needed vendors.  I needed place cards.  I needed invitations.  I spent hours on Pinterest, worrying about seating charts, comparing pricing on decor, on message boards.  I basically ate, slept, and breathed my wedding planning.  Now that's all over and in many ways, I'm alone with my own thoughts.  It's not a bad thing.  It allows me to take stock of myself.  I've been trying to take stock of myself since I turned 30, two years ago, but allowed wedding planning to be my excuse to continue living an unexamined life.  Now it is time to examine and take stock.  So where am I at?

A year and a half ago, I was informed I was pre-diabetic.  Diabetes runs rampant on one side of my family and I wanted nothing to do with that.  I knew I had to make changes.  I was told I should consider weight loss surgery.  I'm not against weight loss surgery, but at that time, I couldn't say I'd made an honest effort.  I told my doctor that I needed to make an honest effort and he connected me with a nutritionist.  She tried to help me, but I wasn't getting a lot out of it.  She was giving me a list of products to buy, but not what kind of recipes I could be making at home.  That wasn't helping me.  I was making a half-hearted attempt at going to the gym, but it wasn't really working for me.  She did the best thing she could have done for me and told me that she didn't have anything else to offer me and referred me to the weight management center.  She said I could go back for a follow up after I met with the team there... I never went back.  I found a partner in my nurse practitioner.  She coached me through summer barbecues, my wedding, the holidays.  And now she's there for me through the setback of enjoying baking in the winter.  She never puts me down, but helps me find solutions.  Right now I'm kind of stuck, but I'm sorting through that... so that's where I'm at with my physical health.

As far as my emotional health... when I was a kid, I grew up in a state of chaos.  As an adult, that chaos has manifested as physical clutter.  I'm currently sorting through the emotional chaos and physical chaos.  It's hard and scary in a way that I struggle to put into words.  The truth is, when I donate things or trash things, it's like I have separation anxiety.  I know I don't need the things anymore, but not having those things is terrifying.  What if I need them?  I probably won't... but what if I do?  It's not like on Marie Kondo where there's a little struggle, but then they part with the things they don't need.  There are full on tears and it takes all day to sort through A box.  If you say anything that feels a little like an attack, I go on the defensive.  I will puff up and retaliate to protect that horribly vulnerable part of me.  It's not exactly productive, but it feels so much more personal to me than those around me and I don't really know how to do deal with those kind of feelings.  Don't worry, I'm in therapy and we're working on it.

Emotional Eating

I realized I haven't posted in about a year and am going to try to post more regularly.  I recently joined a fitness group on Facebook to help keep me accountable.  I'm supposed to be posting pictures of healthy food choices and exercise daily.  Admittedly, I don't do well at either all the time.  I've started going to yoga once a week (most weeks, but not every week).  My goal is to go to that every single week.  When I do that, I will add more exercise in.  For the time being, that's a secondary priority.

My primary priority right now, are my food choices.  Since joining this fitness group, I've been forced to pay attention to my food choices at every meal.  While I refuse to beat myself up when I slip up, accountability is necessary to keep me on track, especially since I don't consistently update food trackers (much like this blog that I haven't updated in some time).  Last month was a draining month, both physically and emotionally.  I found myself saying I deserve to eat "horrible food A" because I don't feel good; I deserve "unhealthy food B" because something awful happened.  Because I was actually paying attention to what I was eating, I realized I am an emotional eater.  Realizing this is a huge step for me.  I think I've been in denial about this most of my life.  Finally realizing it has allowed me to look at myself overall and that is a very good thing.

Cilantro Lime Dressing

In my early twenties, I had a friend who told me if I named my inner fat kid, I would be able to acknowledge and release it.  Her name is Prudence and I am now 28 and she has not gone anywhere.  I've tried to tell her to be quiet, but she makes demands.  She screams to be satisfied.  She particularly enjoys the taco salads from Q'Doba and the dressing they put on it.  Fortunately, there is only one of these in my area and it is twenty minutes from my house, so I do not go there very often.  It's near a beach that I frequent, so occasionally, we'll stop on the way and then swim all day (I don't lay on the beach, I do actually swim ALL day).  On more than one occasion, Prudence asks for taco salad with this dressing when we are not going to the beach.  In my attempt to eat healthier, I try to reason with her that we are trying to eat healthy.  She doesn't care, she has needs.  I looked at a number of recipes and tried to find the elements that I could taste in Q'Doba's dressing, while it is not a perfect replica, it is certainly tasty and reminiscent of their dressing and most importantly, satisfies Prudence.

Full Disclosure: This is not my picture.  I forgot to take one.  I will try to remember to take food pictures for tasty recipes.  This one happens to look a lot like my dressing AND my food processor, so I have borrowed it from: https://ifindrecipes.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/cafe-rio-dressing-done-kalynskitchen.jpg

Cilantro Lime Dressing

• 2 tbsp Lime Juice (or half of a lime)
• 1/4 cup Olive Oil
• 1 1/2 tsp Balsamic Vinegar
• 1/2 tbsp Honey
• 1 tbsp Chili Garlic Cholula Hot Sauce (or 1-2 jalopenos chopped and seeded, I've done it both ways, just depends what you have in the house)
• 1/2 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce
• 1 cup Plain Nonfat Yogurt (Can use Greek Yogurt if you prefer it thicker)
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 cup of cilantro
• 1/8 tsp salt

Put everything in a food processor and run until pureed.  Serve on any salad you like.  I made healthy taco salads with chicken for dinner when I made this and then I just made garden salads that I brought to work and put it on those too.

Nutrition Facts:

Serving Size: 2 tbsp

Calories: 80

Fat (g): 6.8

Saturated: 0.9

Polyunsaturated: 0.7

Monounsaturated: 5

Trans: 0

Cholesterol (mg): 0.6

Sodium (mg): 101.1

Potassium (mg): 78.6

Carbs (g): 4

Fiber: 0.1

Sugar: 3.3

Protein (g) 1.5

Vitamin A (%): 1.6

Vitamin C (%): 3.1

Calcium (%): 5.2

Iron (%): 0.7 

A Bad Food Choice

I made a bad choice today.  I didn't make my breakfast last night, I overslept, and had to be at work early for training.  Thank the Gods I had the forethought to put my lunch together last night.  That allowed me to make my coffee, get ready, and run out the door.  I resigned myself to the fact that in order to eat breakfast (skipping breakfast is not an option for me, totally separate from the fact that skipping meals isn't health.  Low blood sugar can and has caused seizures for me), I would have to stop at Dunkin Donuts.  I know, I know, I can hear you groaning already.  Hear me out.

I used to go to Dunkin Donuts several times each week, just for coffee and would eat there once in a week at most.  When I left waitressing and started my current job at a bank, I realized I would need coffee daily to function, but I couldn't afford Dunkin Donuts every day of every week, so I switched to making my coffee at home and only went to Dunkin once in a blue moon, like when the milk at home went bad and I NEEDED coffee or the rare occasion that I overslept and didn't have time to eat.  This devolved into only stopping there when I opened my branch at the ungodly hour of 7:45 am (can you tell I'm not a morning person), which of course devolved even further... to every single day that I worked, and even some days that I had off.  After a while, they knew my order and I felt terrible about myself.  Most people like this, but I admitted to myself that this meant I went there too often and I didn't like that.

I think I always knew how unhealthy and expensive this became, but I pushed it to the back of my mind.  When I started looking at my life to make healthy changes, I had to be honest with myself about my habits.  My Dunkin habit had to go.  I decided to only allow myself to go to there if I overslept and didn't make my breakfast the night before.  When I do go there, I decided to lay off the donuts and muffins.  I'm not a breakfast sandwich girl, so I decided to stick to bagels and go light on the cream cheese.  I know this is still not the best choice, but I figured it was the lesser of evils and I feel full afterward.

This morning, as previously mentioned, I overslept.  That meant it was a Dunkin morning.  I intended to get my cinnamon raisin bagel, but when I got there, everyone and their mother was there.  We got 2 feet of snow, a few days ago, so this was the first day that everyone in the city left their houses.  Apparently, they all needed to go to Dunkin at 7:15 am, when there's normally next to no one on the roads that early.  There was no time to wait for a bagel to toast by the time I got to the front of the line.  I resigned myself to donuts.  I bit into the first one and felt the sugar overload.  By the end of the second one, I was still hungry.  This set the tone for the rest of my day.

I entered them into my food diary on My Fitness Pal and felt my heart sink.  They made up a third of my calorie intake for the day and the nutritional stats were abysmal.  Worst of all I was still hungry and totally unsatisfied.  This led me to eat more at lunch and left me less calories and better nutrition to make up for, the rest of the day.  It was just a downward spiral.

At this point, donuts cannot be a regular meal.  They can't even be once in a while.  These are literally once in a blue moon treat.  Furthermore, I'm currently eating at Dunkin once or twice a week and will be phasing it out even more.  I'm going to start making my breakfast at night, before work so that I can keep making better choices

Introduction

If you've found your way here, then you probably know that my original blog was meant  to focus on both health and spirituality.  It certainly started like that and I meant to continue that way, but I let my health fall to the wayside.  Various aspects of my life were colliding and converging into a HUGE mess that ultimately led to me to not be mindful.  All at once, I found myself in the midst of a purification, removing the old and making room for the new.  I felt like my life had derailed and I was attempting to reassemble it.

I'm not big on New Year's Resolutions, but this year felt like the right time to get my shit together.  Something clicked in my head and I knew this was the time.  It wasn't so much about the new year, but that I felt like this was a good starting point.  So here I am now, attempting to become truly mindful.  I'm not always awesome at and I make some bad choices, but everyday I learn something new and I make better choices.  I'll never be on a strict diet.  I LOVE food.  Food is a 5 sense experience that I enjoy.  My parents always seemed to have odd feelings about food when I was growing up.  I can't quite pinpoint where they come from, except for the fact that my mother is a recovering bulimic who had a complicated relationship with food.  Me, on the other hand?  I don't have those problems.  I tend to have a more hedonistic view of food.  If it satisfies my senses, then I'm game.  I just love food.  Unfortunately, that is also not healthy and so I am trying to curb that and find balance.  What I really want, is to make a lifestyle change that I can enjoy and stick to permanently.

I will most likely write about food an diet changes and recipes for a while.  I was a waitress for most of my adult life and literally ran for 32 hours each week.  That was my cardio and I was often able to lose weight with very little effort.  After hurting my back a few years ago and not seeing my friends and family due to the work schedule, I changed my career.  Since starting a more sedentary job, I have found it difficult to get into a good exercise routine.  Eight years of my life was spent in a very active job and I'm still struggling to find a routine in my current lifestyle.

This blog is my attempt to hold myself accountable in my journey of health and wellness.