The Journey From Here

My journey to finding health and happiness. 

[thejourneyfromhere]

More Than A Few Footprints

Living in Washington, D.C., we’re supposed to have mild winters, whatever that means. Since we moved here in 2013, we’ve been inundated with huge amounts of snow every winter, including our Snowmageddon blizzard this year that dumped about 3 feet of snow on us in 24 hours.

In March of 2015 we received one these epic snowstorms which blanketed our neighborhood, and my woods, in over a foot of beautiful white powder. Naturally, I had to go for a walk in it.

Being a native Georgian, a SoCal transplant, and devoted Brooklyn-Coney Island beach bum, I can’t exactly state that I’m a fan of cold weather. However, I LOVE snow. I love how it softens bitter temps and brings beauty to an otherwise bleak landscape. Then there’s the fun of skiing, sledding, and building snowmen. In my world, life would be perfect if we could have snow when it was warm. Physics doesn’t agree with me though. 

However, there IS something ridiculously satisfying about clomping through fresh fallen snow and knowing that the tracks you are creating are the very first ones. That you are stepping somewhere no one else has yet. It’s also an insanely fantastic cardio workout! I was left panting and sweating, even though I probably walked no more than a half mile out.

My view looking up... You can’t tell from the photo, but it was snowing right then and snowflakes were drifting lazily on to my nose and eyelashes. It was a romantic and poetic moment. 

A friend once told me that I live in a fantasy world. That made me laugh because as a writer I do make up entire worlds in my head. But if you ever get the chance to walk in a snow-covered woods, you do get a feeling of being elsewhere. Maybe it’s the silence or maybe it’s that everything looks different, so you take it in with different eyes. Whatever the case, it’s easy to let your mind wander... and your feet for that matter.

Unfortunately, the light began to fade before I was ready to go home. There were still many miles of trail I wanted to cover, but I was afraid of being out in the dark by myself. I didn’t have a flashlight and landmarks I use to navigate  had been covered. I am an adventurer at heart, but I am also a safety nut. It’s one thing to get lost in the woods by day, it’s another to get lost in the snow at night. Especially, as I could feel the temperature dropping rapidly while I retraced my tracks. Hypothermia and frostbite were nothing I wanted to mess with. 

On my way back I did pause to catch my breath. I took one final look around me and, on a total whim, collapsed into the snowbank beside me. I had blazed trails, but I wanted to leave more than just a few footprints.

It was hard to get back up after making that snow angel. I really wanted to just lie there and enjoy the silence, but as Robert Frost so elegantly stated:

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep,               And miles to go before I sleep.

I smiled the rest of the way home though. I had gone where no one else had that day and I had left more behind than my footprints...

Which made me think is the whole point of a journey. When we start out, the starting is difficult enough, so we’re satisfied to just make tracks of any kind. It’s enough to be able to look back and see that we’ve made progress of any sort. But after a while, making tracks and progress isn’t enough. There forms a need to leave something behind so that those who follow know it wasn’t some random nameless person who passed this way. We want to leave a mark so that afterward people will know without a doubt that “I“ was here.

“I“ came to the woods alone. “I“ left a snow angel.

[thejourneyfromhere]

Pride Goes Before The Gain...

Last January, moving into February, I was riding the high that comes from achieving a major weight loss breakthrough. I had broken my 180lbs barrier and had made the 170s. I had changed my diet (way I eat) and gone from sendentary to actively working out 4-5 times a week. It seemed like I was on the right track and my goal of reaching the 150s wasn’t too far away. Inevitable actually. And I was really starting to like the newer, slender me I saw in the mirror. 

Heck, I even started embracing my romantic, girly side... which might be more a sign I’m possessed by an alien than proof of change, but whatever! I was happy and confident.

And therein is maybe where I made my first mistake. I’m not saying it’s wrong to be happy or wrong to be confident, God knows we have way too many issues stemming from insecurity in this world, but my confidence wasn’t just in my success. My confidence was that I wouldn’t fail to reach my goal. That I would continue to progress the way I had been. Slow and steadily. Without major hangups or setbacks.

When I look back at this photo I took at the beginning of February I really want to smack myself until that smug look is gone. Why? Well, for starters I am far from kind to myself and secondly because hindsight is unfairly 20-20. I want to grab myself by the shoulders and say “Wake up! In three months you’re going to start a death-spiral. Everything you’ve worked so hard for is going to disappear, don’t get cocky!”  

I’m not sure if I would have listened or gone into panic mode, but it’s pointless to contemplate it. I don’t have a flux capacitor or know any nutty professors with a time-traveling Delorean.

The real point is that major hangups and setbacks are inevitable in any life-changing journey. Putting on blinders and plowing forward only guarantees failure and even a few epically spectacular ones just for kicks.

I’m not a weight loss expert, but I’m starting to think that it’s this kind of blinders-on confidence that actually causes people to do the whole yo-yo dieting thing we hear and read so much about. We start out hell-bent-for-leather on a new program, determined to be successful and follow our marching orders like good little soldiers. When we achieve our goals, we rightly celebrate our success. Then comes the failure and the regaining of weight, or going back to smoking and drinking, or that guy/girl we swore off... or whatever it is we have fought so hard to cut from our lives.

The experts will tell you that failure in weight loss is either because the rules for achieving success were impossible to maintain long-term or because we’re biologically, genetically, and socially programmed to fail. Bollocks. If I subscribe to that line of thinking it means that no matter what I do I will always fail. I don’t buy that. But I will buy into the idea that if we get cocky or overconfident in our success, if we let our guard down, then we’ll revert back to our old bad habits and completely miscalculate the number of backward leaps we’ll take. 

Then, if you’re like me, you’ll find yourself staring at ‘square one’ wondering what the heck happened. Sans the smug grin and sans any confidence you might once have fought tooth and nail to earn.

It’s an ugly place to be. But it’s a place nevertheless and one we can all start from. Again.

[thejourneyfromhere]

No Resolutions, Just A New Start... Again

Okay, I realize we’re well into the middle of February, but I feel like tackling an idea one of my favorite trainers @blogilates​ blogged about not too long. I liked it so much that I decided/resolved to follow it myself: to never diet again.

Now by diet I do not mean I will revert back to my unhealthy eating habits and couch potato way of life. By “diet” I mean any weight loss plan that dramatically restricts my food intake and promotes itself with skinny women who magically went from a size 16 to a size 2... If you’re one of those magic, super disciplined women, then good on you! But if you’re like me you know what those commercials and diets promise looks a lot like this:

It’s not going to happen, no matter what kind of delusional state of motivation I try to put myself in.

Healthy change takes time, not just desire. Most of all it takes a lot of stubbornness, something a gimmicky diet or the latest exercise craze can’t give you. So for this year, and hopefully all the ones to come, I am rejecting the idea of ever again going on a diet.

Now some of you may be wondering “Okay, what are you going on about? Didn’t you do a year’s journey (hence the name of this blog) to transform yourself and become healthier? Didn’t you figure this out like a year ago? What’s going on?”

Well, yeah. In a way I did. And let’s just say that the year I took to transform my life did just that. I’m totally not the person I was a year ago, two years ago, and definitely not five years ago. More on that later though...

When I finished up my journey at the beginning of last year, I finished here:

And I really believed I had made it. That I was d-o-n-e! But I wasn’t. Not even close. What I thought was the successful end of my journey, the absolute proof I had “it” figured out, whatever that “it” was, actually turned out to be the beginning of something bigger.

In the year since I ended my blog about my weight loss journey, I took a 5-week road trip across America, disappeared into a 5-month long bout of severe depression that led to a brief stint with prescription drug abuse, suffered a debilitating ACL injury that I’m still recovering from, and gained back nearly all the weight I worked so hard to lose. All of these things have forced me to rethink what it means to be healthy and active. My injury and all those other factors have forced me to do some serious thinking about who I am as well. As a result, I can say with a modicum of confidence that I am not the person I was a year ago.

When I said there would be more later, I meant it!

So here I go. Round two of blogging about a year long journey that has taught me all new lessons and given me a brand new understanding on life. As usual I’ll provide the snark and/or dry humor, pictures of the A-MAZ-ING food I’ve been trying out, and of course, the life lessons I’ve learned a long the way. I hope you’ll join me and provide the company because some journeys are just better with friends.

And nope, there won’t be a single diet in the mix.

xoxo! ~ Asheley

[thejourneyfromhere]

Grateful for the Small Things

After fighting my depression in October, the start of the holiday season (aka November) was a welcome change. Thanksgiving was a few weeks away and finally I was able to think clearly enough to be grateful and thankful for all the good things in my life, for the little things, and the pudge.

November is a major birthday month in our family and I especially look forward to Thanksgiving, where we are with family for the holiday. This time my birthday coincidentally landed on Turkey Day (which happens about every six years or so). It was the first time I had been with my entire family for my birthday since I turned 27. 

I’m big on family time, not on giant family gatherings. Similarly, I don’t really do birthday parties. In thirty-three years, I can only remember having three birthday parties, one of which was an epic fail (my 16th, go figure). The rest of the time I have enjoyed nice quiet dinners at home and my mom making me some sort of cake. For decades she made me a German-chocolate cake because she thought it was my favorite. Finally, I told her what I really wanted was a cheesecake. That was a funny moment.

Thanksgiving birthdays are special though, mostly because it means as a family we’re going all out on the food and I know we’ll all be together. I also quit counting calories, putting my attention on portions instead. This Thanksgiving I finally mastered the ability to take small helpings of everything and still keep my food mostly inside that inner ring of my plate. I did take seconds of my favorites, but did not over-stuff myself.

Just because my birthday was on Thanksgiving did not mean I had to be like the stuffed turkey on the table. Also, I had been sick most of the day with my evil stress-related vomiting illness, so being careful of what I ate was not really a problem. I was actually ‘thankful’ just to be sitting at the table with my family, eating anything.

My Thanksgiving birthday also meant I got serious time with my sister and brother (10 and 15 years younger respectively) who are the coolest things since sliced bread in my not-humble-opinion. Did I care that my tummy pudged out in our photos, making me look preggers? Yah, a bit. But I was more thankful that I was up, not puking, and hanging out with my sibs. Having a blast.

And it’s those awesome moments that matter: the tickle fights, the death-match card games, the piled-all-on-one-couch-cushion Dr. Who and Food Network-watching marathon extravaganzas, the arguments over the best version of Mario Brothers.

You can’t weigh moments like those on a scale or be sorry that you had too much. You can only be Thankful and ask for second helpings. Then thirds and fourths... and keep on taking until you’re full to bursting and pass out in a happy dopamine-saturated coma.

[thejourneyfromhere]

Mexico Happens

Once again I’m breaking my chronological timeline here. The reason for it is that I just recently went on a long-anticipated, much-desired and needed, trip to Mexico with my husband. The kind of vacation where there are no children and you can actually relax because you don’t have to worry if Thing 3 is drowning in the pool because he thinks he’s a fish, that Thing 1 is bored without his DS, or if Thing 2 is wearing enough SPF 80 to keep her porcelain complexion from burning.

The kind of vacation where this is your all-inclusive, private beach-side resort and the only thing you worry about is if you packed enough barrettes and ponytail holders to restrain your hair because the humidity is doing just totally awesome things to it. (Seriously. I have fairly straight hair to start with and it was curly while I was down there. The kind of curly I spend hours trying to achieve with my freaking curling iron here in the non-humid-by-comparison-South United States.) 

Yeah, THAT kind of vacation! 

I can’t begin to tell you how excited I was to take this vacation. I am a gypsy at heart and I L-O-V-E to travel. But the big deal was that I was going with my husband! It was the first time we had ever taken a trip out of country together and it was our first major vacation away from our kids since #1 was born. To add to the excitement, it was our 10 year anniversary so this felt like the ultimate anniversary date. We may also have been there for the wedding of a very good friend, but details, details.

This was our room. Let’s just say there was some SQUEE! happening here when the Bellhop opened the door and I saw our room for the first time. For the uniformed, SQUEE! means that high-pitched giggle/scream of delight when a full-grown woman reverts to a 6 year-old version of herself and shrieks with absolute glee over a very cool present she’s just received.

And there was even more SQUEE! happening when I pulled back the curtains to discover THIS was our view!! Yeah, that’s the Gulf of Mexico RIGHT THERE!!! SERIOUS SQUEE!!

So excited was I over being this close to the ocean that I tossed all self-image cares out the proverbial window and donned the first bathing suit I could find (a bikini because I CAN and will wear one) and hauled tush down to the beach.

I paused long enough to take a photo proving my feet actually made contact with the sand, haha. No actually, it was longer than a pause because the sand was so soft, white, and warm I wanted to just stand there and shuffle my feet back-and-forth through it. It was almost like finding foot nirvana, but not quiet.

I did manage to make my way over to the beach chairs and appropriately dropped myself in a non-shaded one for maximum sun exposure. For those of you freaking out over my skin and skin cancer, let me just say that this was about 4 o’clock in the afternoon and the sun set by 6 o’clock. It was way past the highest intensity of the day and I was slathered in sunscreen. I am a true beach baby, I know how to avoid sunburns. I even brought a hat! Granted it stayed on my head all of five minutes because it was so windy, but I DID bring it with me to the beach.

My husband, who goes POOF! in direct sunlight took a shaded beach chair. And then he discovered the gazebo by the pool served pizza.

Yes, we went all the way to Mexico just so he could eat pizza...

And for me to indulge in all the soy cappuccinos the wait staff could bring me... 

But we were on vacation! In Mexico! Alone! And for 4 amazing days we got to spoil ourselves with beautiful views, amazing food, and someone else to clean our room. It was perfect.

So I stopped worrying about my size and whether I had met my exercise goals for the day. For four fabulous days I shut off my nagging inner voice and let Mexico (and life) happen!

[thejourneyfromhere]

I’m Not Okay, But I AM Here

In October I hit some major weight loss, lifestyle change milestones. I dropped to 176lbs, about 25lbs down from my starting weight. Shirts and dresses that were sized “large” were too big and ended up being donated or given away. I had to go out and buy all new shirts in a “medium.” It was a huge moment for me and I was ecstatic over my progress. 

Then the depression hit. I was not in a funk, nor was I having a bad day or bad week. I had real, honest and true depression. I’m not sure if there was an event that triggered it or if it was just the fact there were fewer hours of daylight. Whatever it was, I became depressed. The kind of depressed that makes you want to curl in a basket and spend the day sleeping.

For those who don’t experience depression on a large scale, being depressed is difficult to understand. It’s not like I’m in a funky mood that will change if I go outside for a walk or play some reggae on my laptop. It’s more like a switch got flipped to the “off” position in my brain and all the happy I normally experience slowly drains away.

It starts with a lack of energy, waking up and feeling tired in the morning. I know something is not right, but I can’t put my finger on what exactly. I go through the day kind of on autopilot because I have three kids to take care of, two I have to make sure get to school and a third who is home with me.

By the second or third day the negative thoughts start invading my mind. Thoughts about every failure I have ever had, every moment I have let someone down, and every time I have ever felt like I would never be good enough. I have a really good visual memory, so for me it’s like someone has the movie reel of my life and is hitting replay on every bad moment I have ever lived through.

There’s a spiritual battle that rages too, and it’s even worse than the emotional one. It’s like having Satan sitting on my shoulder, personally reminding me that I’m a horrible human being. The list of my sins is presented to me, along with every failure I’ve made in my Christian walk. By the end of the day, I’m convinced God can’t be bothered with me because I’m just too much of a screw up and I’m never going to improve.

And it’s not like I can turn off the thoughts in my head and just reject everything bombarding me. It’s there, ever present, and far more persistent than the rational thoughts I try to form. As the negative thoughts increase, my energy wanes. I’ve had people tell me to go for a walk or try to exercise because it will help, the same advice I try to give my mental health clients when they are battling depression. It’s sound advice because it really can help. But that would require me having the energy and the will to peel myself off the bed and actually stand up.

By the end of the first week, I live on autopilot. I’m not a person anymore. There are TV shows and movies where characters “lose themselves” and become these evil monsters. I disagree. I’ve lost myself many times. I don’t turn into a monster. I just exist. I get up, I feed my kids, I use the bathroom, I put cartoons on for my youngest and return to bed. I may feed myself or even answer the phone if I have to. Rinse, repeat. 

Who I am and what makes me the crazy, fun, introverted, creative, hopeless romantic that I am is gone. I’m just an empty shell and I feel every bit that way.

Somewhere suicide becomes an actual option. It’s not rational. It doesn’t make sense and when I’m not depressed, the idea of willingly dying would NEVER enter my head. I enjoy life too much and I have way too many things I want to accomplish before I die. So I know when I start thinking about dying that I’ve entered a really bad place.

As a licensed mental health counselor I know this is the time I need to put my emergency plans into place. But that requires wanting to tell someone you’re in a bad place and I rarely want to discuss what’s happening. People tend to freak out if you tell them you’re feeling suicidal (and usually for good reason). For me, suicidal thoughts are more of a desire to go to sleep and not wake up anymore. A wish that I could just stop breathing or that my heart would no longer beat. I’m so exhausted trying to battle my way through life that death seems like a mercy. 

Thankfully I never get my wish and after a while that switch in my brain gets flipped back to the “on” position. I find my happy again and everything that make me “me” comes back, along with my energy and desire to experience life as fully as I possibly can.

Why do I bring this up? Well to start with, it’s part of my journey. Coping with depression is part of my life. I never know when I’m going to get slammed and it’s honestly not that often. But it does happen and sometimes depression eats up an entire month of my life. In this case it was the month of October. It sucked mightily, but I survived which is what counts. 

And I bring it up because every person on a journey, whether it’s weight loss, a lifestyle change, a spiritual change, etc. is going to hit a slump too. Not everyone will experience depression, but there will be those times (days, weeks, or even months and years) where you feel like you’re just coasting along and you are just a shell of the human being you want to be. It happens and it sucks.

The important thing to remember is that even if you are NOT okay, you are still here. You WILL get through whatever it is you are going through. You WILL survive it. You just have to keep holding on.

PS If you do experience depression, or know someone that is experiencing severe depression, with suicidal thoughts, let someone know immediately! Even if you or they have no actual plans of dying, it’s important to let someone know so they can help. In case of an emergency, always call 911 (United States only).

In the United States the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is:

1 [phone].

[thejourneyfromhere]

Accepting a New Me

Today I’m going to depart from my chronological narrative because I am celebrating. Normally, I would save this post for the very last, but I can’t wait. Today marks the 1 year anniversary of my weight loss journey. 

365 days ago I saw this photo of me and the journey to becoming a thinner, healthier me began. 365 days ago, I hated what I saw in my photos and committed to making some major changes. 

Now, one year later, I have lost 25 pounds, am 3-4 dress sizes smaller (from a 14/16 to a 6/8), and nearly 12 inches are gone off my body!! That’s a huge accomplishment! 

I went from this: 

To this:

I’m pretty damn proud of these abs by the way. I used to have a perfectly flat stomach, but I’ve never had anything close to a six-pack. This is a first in my world. I credit countless minutes in plank position, hundreds of knee tucks, mountain climbers, and side planks for what I have right now (following the expert advice of Yogi Ali Kamenova, who is just phenomenal, and doing strength-training workouts with Fitness Blender’s Daniel & Kelli). That doesn’t mean I’m slacking off though. I am still working hard for the body I want because I know I can get even better!

As amazing as the change is, accepting it has been it’s own challenge. This is what I look like today. I still have trouble believing that is me in the mirror.

I keep expecting to see my former fat self staring back at me whenever I step in front of a mirror. Maybe that’s because I spent so many years seeing someone else in my reflection, so that’s what I’m accustomed to seeing. But the change was gradual, so it’s not like I’m exactly shocked by my appearance either. It’s just hard to register that I look this good. 

Or maybe it’s that I like what I see and that it’s real, which makes acceptance difficult. There were so many years where I was convinced I wasn’t pretty, attractive, beautiful, funny, smart enough, or worth being with. (Insert your favorite negative statement you make about your own self-worth right here). So when I finally see what I have always wanted to see it’s too much for my brain to compute. My mind just can’t accept that what I want most is real. But it is. It is very real. I AM pretty, attractive, beautiful, funny, smart, and worth being with.

I think the acceptance is also difficult because I’m afraid of losing what I’ve gained. I can’t count the number of times I have gotten so excited over something, allowed myself to get my hopes up, over receiving something I desired: a trip, a job, a special date, a visit, or a writing contract... only to have it yanked away from me. I’ve gotten to the point where I no longer allow myself to get excited about really awesome things because I’ve got this fear that if I want something too much it will be taken from me. So because I really, really have wanted to lose weight, my fear said it wouldn’t happen because I wanted it too much.

Yet, as we can all see, that fear is totally and completely irrational. I have lost weight and with hard work, it will stay off. My brain is just going to have to learn to accept that sometimes I can get what I want. Especially if I want it badly enough.

[thejourneyfromhere]

Winter Is Coming

In September, I officially bade farewell to our camping gear. The days were getting cooler and shorter, so I started doing a lot more hiking around the woods by my house. My dread of the coming winter, when I would be house-bound, always disappeared the moment my feet hit the trail head. Even if the first snowflakes were already on their way, I was out hiking (read: burning calories) and discovering new things.

For example, I can’t begin to tell you the number of times I have hiked passed this stump. It has always been just a stump. A plain boring, grey stump. Then one day, Surprise!! Jack O’ Lantern fungi everywhere!! And I do mean everywhere. The smell was quite something. 

Another hike through the Patapsco State Park took me by some local graffiti artwork. I’m not sure what enterprising person had the bright idea to haul several cans of spray paint all the way up the 10% grade hill to deface this cliff, but they did. And since it was there, and so was I, I took a picture.

That same hike afforded me this gorgeous view of the Patapsco Valley State Park dam and falls.

Another trip out to Patapsco State Park, to try out a new-to-us woodland trail set, resulted in us cooling our heels at this stunning waterfall. 

By the time summer officially ended at the end of September, I had hiked nearly every trail in a 10 mile radius and at least half of the parks in 20 mile radius, totally more than 100 miles hiked.

(In truth, it was a good start. I hadn’t even touched half of what was available to me. People don’t really think of D.C. as being an outdoorsy area, but it is. It really truly is. This part of Maryland is an outdoors man’s paradise.)

I had also lost enough weight my face registered the change.

I was so excited about the new slimmer me, I almost felt miserable hauling my box of sweaters out from the back of my closet. I was making progress, I didn’t want to cover all that up with a big, frumpy sweater. But it was getting cooler and if I wanted to continue hiking or walking outdoors, I needed warmer clothes. So out the sweaters came, along with my boxes of tea, flannel sheets, and crocheted afghan blankets.

Winter was coming, but I still had Fall to enjoy.

[thejourneyfromhere]

My Give-A-Damn’s Busted or Find Your North And Never Look Back

Pardon me while I hop up on my soapbox and preach a bit...

Somewhere around the age of the 30 my Give-a-Damn got busted. In a serious way. I’ve always heard that your 30s are amazing because you figure out who you are and if you’re lucky, where you’re heading in life. I can honestly say that in my case, this has been very true. I turned 30 a few years ago and somewhere around that time my Give-a-Damn broke.

Not in the “I will wear red and purple, spend all my money on pickles and learn how to spit” kind of broke. This is more along the lines of confidence, in a “I know what I’m worth and what I want from life, so I’m going to take it!” type of way. I don’t work for free, unless I want to, and I don’t jump at every job that comes along because I’m so desperate to do something in the writing field. Best of all, I’ve learned to tell potential employers that I don’t work for peanuts!!! And they hire me anyway because they know I’m going to give them quality work.

But just because I woke up one morning to discover I didn’t give a damn anymore doesn’t mean it was an over-night miracle. The realization might have been overnight, but there were 30 some-odd years where I did give a damn. There were 30+ years of having “lots of potential” without the ability to deliver.   Years of insecurity, missteps, and failures that I had to experience in order to know what was the right way to go. To find my ‘North,’ if you will.

This is not a real tattoo, but something I was trying out to see how I liked the look. FYI - I love it! So if you don’t, not my problem.

Knowing who you are and finding your way are big themes with me. They feature a lot in my writing. The reason is that for so much of my life I have just wandered around, somewhat directionless. This will probably surprise anyone who actually knows me because I’ve always had great insight into who I am at any given time and where I want to go in life. But knowing where you want to go is not the same as knowing how to find your way. And for a long time I was lost. Really, really, really lost. Like never finding my way out of the woods kind of lost.

How did I find my North? God. I don’t meant that in some caricature of Christianity type of way, but in a serious way. I was lost and God was the only one who knew where I needed to go, so I trusted him to lead. I’ve been following his map ever since and the outcome has been pretty amazing.

If you’re not Christian or don’t believe in God, I may have just lost your attention, but stick with me anyway. I’m a Christian, so finding my north means I stop reprogramming the stupid GPS all the time and let God do the navigating. It means that I stop burying who I am beneath a well-polished veneer and let the world see my scars. For better or for worse. It means that I point myself North and never look back. And because my Give-a-Damn’s busted the only opinions that matter are mine and God’s.  

But that may not be your life and where you’re at. I’m not equating finding your north with finding God. I’m talking about finding the path you’re meant to be on. That may mean making a career change because you hate your lousy job, deciding that you’re underpaid and deserve more. That your family needs you and it’s time they were a priority in your life; that there is a vast world to explore and you’re going to go out and see it. Or that you’re done making excuses about the weight you’ve put on and will finally commit to that lifestyle change you know you should have made years ago when it would have been easier.

Whatever! It just means that you get out of the freakin’ Doldrums and get on the right course. And when you do, you may find that your Give-a-Damn gets a little busted too and you no longer give-a-damn about the things that have been holding you back. That’s what happened to me anyway and I’ve never been happier.  

[thejourneyfromhere]

Time to Weigh-In

I have a scale and I use it. Periodically. Daily. Weekly. Multiple times a day. If it occurs to me. I think you get the picture.

I’m not a fan of my scale, but I am (like many women) transfixed by that stupid fluctuating number that indicates how much force I am exerting in a downward gravitational motion at any given moment. And I always want it to be less than it is.

Even when I was in basic training in the Air Force and shedding pounds like nobody’s business, I still felt like I was the overweight, unfit fatty of my flight. A concept not helped by my TI jumping down my throat and threatening to have me put in remedial training if I didn’t lose the weight to meet the military’s standards for my height (130-145lbs) within two weeks.

So yah, I’m a bit obsessed with numbers on scales and measuring tapes and on the tags of my clothes. I’m especially obsessed with this number:

No, this is not my scale. But yes, this was my starting weight. I didn’t remember to take a picture of my starting weight, so I had to go steal one off the internet. That number right there, that “199.8 lbs,” that number was mine. As much as I hate it, I will own it. 

I can’t begin to tell you the amount of loathing I have for that number. I honestly hate that “THAT number” ever made its appearance on my scale. I hate that it had the nerve to appear and I especially hate that at one time I was delighted to see I was finally below 200 lbs. Yeah, you read that right. I was once excited to be less than 200 lbs.

But you had kids. Three of them! Yes, I did. And they are adorable so I will keep them. However, that doesn’t change the fact that once I was done bearing children, I allowed myself to sit at 200lbs for a very long time. That 199.8 lbs was my stasis number. I didn’t have to do anything to hold 199.8 lbs. The amount of energy I exerted was equal to what I took in.

It’s the number I saw on my scale after I came back from my fabulous Caribbean cruise. It’s the one I have become obsessed with, but in a good way because it’s the one I’m determined I will never ever see on my scale again. And I know I won’t because I’ve changed. Mentally and emotionally, I am my own TI pushing myself to make the weight loss happen... and it is happening!

This photo is from my second weigh-in. Those are my painted toes on my Weight Watchers scale in my bathroom. No I am NOT on the Weight Watchers plan. I just bought their scale from Bed, Bath & Beyond. The glowing display is reading out my actual weight (as it was when I remembered to do my official weigh-in on August 26, 2014). 

So from May 2, 2014 to August 26, 2014, I had managed to drop a whopping 16.1 lbs. It doesn’t sound like a lot and if I go by all the weight loss success stories of people losing 60, 70, and 80 pounds in a year, it’s pretty dismal. But it’s 16 FREAKING POUNDS! And what’s even more amazing to me is that when I took this photo, I was only 3 pounds away from my pre-baby weight! Three pounds is nothing!

So while I’m now obsessing about being less than 183.7lbs, I’m also ecstatic. My scale is painfully honest and never lies about my weight. So when I look down, I know that other number is gone! I’m not in stasis anymore. There’s a different person standing on that scale now and in my opinion she’s starting to look pretty good.

[thejourneyfromhere]

A Regression to Normal

After our epic AT trek, Brad and I decided to scale back our outdoor activities a bit. In psychobabble and statistics this is referred to as a “regression to the mean.” We had done something crazy, now it was time to revert back to normal behavior.

A NORMAL family camping trip was overdue and the kids were itchy to spend a few nights in “Woodruff Lodge.” So two weeks after hiking across New Jersey, we loaded up the car again and headed south to Virginia.

One of the blessings of living near Washington, D.C. is that there are amazing camping areas all around you. You just have to know where to look. Or in my case, how to Google search. This campsite was an awesome find as it was on a lake, there were options for fishing, hiking, bathrooms on site, AND a spot large enough for our tent!

For those who have never experienced Woodruff Lodge in person, it’s a 10-man tent and about 100 sq ft inside. My husband who is 6 feet tall can stand up inside without his head touching the peak.

For three days we hovered around a campfire toasting vegan hot dogs, drinking cocoa, eating s’mores, and thoroughly saturating our clothes with wood smoke.

And to the delight of the kids, the mosquitoes were not the only things biting that weekend. No we did not eat them. All of the fish were returned to the lake, once photo evidence of their capture had been documented for posterity.

On our last day camping, I decided I had been lazy long enough. I started doing my yoga planks and for an added challenge, I did them while rolling up the air mattresses and sleeping bags.

However, I wasn’t satisfied with simply doing my planks. While the kids and Brad went for one last fishing trip, I took myself for a four mile run/walk around the lake.

It was a gorgeous and slightly humid day. I think I made it a half-mile before the heat got to me.

However, I was not willing to give up so easily. I had just hiked the AT after all! I kept going, meandering through overgrown brambles when I lost the trail and breaking out into a run again when I finally stumbled on it down by the dam.

By the time I was in the home stretch, I was pretty tired. I had used up all of my water and despite the humidity level, I hadn’t discovered a way to transfer the moisture from the air to the inside of my water bottle.

To add insult to injury, my legs were complaining they were tired of walking. I couldn’t believe it. I had just hiked up and down mountains in New Jersey, on some seriously rough terrain, and my body was complaining about a flat groomed trail of all things!

In the two weeks I had been home from the AT my body had taken the whole “regression to the norm” a little too seriously. While I hadn’t exactly been lying around doing nothing, I hadn’t been pushing myself either. And because I hadn’t pushed myself, my body was regressing to the norm it had formed over the last decade. I might as well have told my muscles they could take my fat cells out for a Mardi Gras celebration. 

Instead of getting discouraged, I decided to be stubborn. Just because my body had quickly forgotten the feel of real exertion didn’t mean it would always be so. I told the irritating voice in my head, the one that tells me I’m fat and lazy, to shut the hell up. I had worked out. I had done something. And I was going to do something again tomorrow.

One day, exertion and exercise would be my normal. One day, my body would realize this was the way things were going to be and it would accept its fate. One day, the only thing “regressing” would be my dress size.

[thejourneyfromhere]

There’s Never Just One Mountain

I learned several hard lessons that weekend I was on the Appalachian Trail. The first was that having the right gear and clothing makes all the difference. Whether it’s having shoes with the right soles for hiking on sharp rocks, matches to light a fire to cook your food, or having a bandana to keep the sweat out of your eyes, the smallest details can be the difference between misery and comfort.

Two: the old adage “no pain, no gain” is totally bogus on a backpacking trip. Sore muscles may be the result of a strenuous workout, but pain is bad. Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad. Twisted ankles, broken toes, and wrenched muscles are not minor inconveniences on a wilderness trail. They are serious injuries. 

Thirdly, bears are awesome, rattlesnakes are bad, and a hole in the ground is not the same as indoor plumbing. Nuff said. Fourth, as in life, there are two options you can take: the wide easy road that is kind to your feet and requires no effort, but will not get you where you need to go, OR the narrow difficult path that is murder to tread, but is the only true route to your destination. Guess which one the AT follows!!

And finally, there will never be just one mountain to climb. Ever. The hike back up the mountain from the MOC, although discouraging, was not the only one I had to make that day. There were about four other points where we came down the mountain only to have to climb back up to the ridge line.

(I realize the photo is blurry, but it’s hard to balance a camera when you’re hanging onto a rock ledge by your fingertips. Or so my husband claims.)

This was the part of the AT where the trail went from a nice flat piece of ground to an actual vertical climb. It was the last major obstacle on our route before we hit the lake area and headed for our rendezvous point with my mom. Not going up was not an option. To go around this wall of granite required a detour of several miles and we didn’t have time for that. So up it was!

Now I love rock climbing. Seriously. But with a pack on my back throwing off my center of gravity, this was a serious chore. I nearly fell backward several times, but I kept climbing, taking my time to find my hand and footholds. There were “steps” sort of cut into the rock to aid climbers, but over the years they had worn smooth and were not always the easiest to navigate. 

I can honestly tell you that when we made the rendezvous point I was relieved. The journey was over and I had survived. I had climbed mountains, pooped in the woods, used filtered water from some dubious looking sources, and had encountered both a bear and a rattlesnake at 20 feet and 10 feet respectively. And there were no more mountains to climb!! At least for a very long while.

I wish I could convey in words what it was like being done with the challenge of the AT. Incredible is the best I can come come up with. It was an incredible feeling to know I had done something entirely new and outside my comfort zone. It was incredible to believe I had spent three days alone with my thoughts, because you don’t really talk much on the trail, and I had not run out of things to say to myself. It was incredible to realize I had done so much and yet it felt like so little. There were still 2,160 miles of the AT I had not hiked. 

Most incredible of all was the sight of my baby boy running from the car to bear-hug his sweaty, dirty, stinky mom. He didn’t care that I hadn’t showered in days, all that mattered was that he had found me! For a mother, that is the Best. Moment. Ever! 

Which was followed closely by the incredible feeling I had when I dropped my backpack into the trunk of my mother’s car, slid into the backseat, and rediscovered the miracle of air conditioning. (It’s really sad, but each night we had been on the trail I had dreamed of being in a hotel with toilets, showers, and air conditioners).

And while I’m abusing the word incredible, I’ll leave you with one last image from my hike...

This is the incredible difference I saw in myself when I got back home and could finally see what I looked like in the mirror. Three days of 1600-calorie burning hikes had left their impact. Gone was the puffiness in my face and the bloated look of my middle. For the first time, I actually liked what I was seeing in the mirror.

But... Because there’s always a but...

I was no longer hiking the AT. So if I wanted this amazing transformation to continue happening, I was going to have to seek out other challenges to take, other mountains to climb. The journey wasn’t over. Not by half.

[thejourneyfromhere]

It’s Not Mount Everest, It’s The Appalachian Trail (Part  3)

Even on the trail, a writer’s gotta write! (Here I’m journaling my morning’s devotions.)

Day 2 dawned and after a quick breakfast, we broke camp. I had slept fitfully, waking up to every snuffle, snort, and paw tap around our tent. Victim to my wild imagination and the anonymous sounds outside our tent, I had lain awake in my sleeping bag for a short eternity. Whether we were being investigated by a bear, a lynx, a squirrel, or skunk I couldn’t tell. It all sounded “big.” So I was just a bit weary. However, I was pleased to discover my muscles were not sore the way I had expected. 

It was an incredibly overcast and chilly morning. We shouldered our packs and marched off into mist-shrouded woods. By ten the fog was just lifting off the mountain tops.

As the sky cleared and the sun came out, we got a better idea of our surroundings. The terrain reminded me of my rambles around the Irish countryside.

The open and rocky ridge line gave way to dense woods and we came across another official AT sign. We had passed many of them and when we saw this one we decided it was time for a “proof of adventure” photo. I haven’t found any information stating so, but I’ve since wondered if they were spaced as mile markers. There were just that many of them.

Downhill! I can’t begin to tell you how thrilled I was to be hiking downhill. After spending so many hours the day before hiking up the mountain, hiking down was awesome. For the first time I kept pace with Brad, stopping only when I wanted photos.

One of the best parts of that trail section. It was so incredibly GREEN. This photo honestly does not do any justice to how beautiful the trees were. About the time we entered this part of the woods the heat kicked up and the humidity increased a notch. Brad and I joked we had our own wild jungle to trek through, complete with our own private population of mosquitoes.

Stairmaster - My calves got quite the workout climbing down this hillside. By the time we reached the bottom I was glad we had stopped at our campsite and had not tried to navigate these “stairs” in the dark.

At the bottom of the mountain the AT merges with the Coppermine Trail. We met a group of campers belonging to the Urban Mountain Adventurers. UMA takes at-risk urban youth on adventures in the outdoors, teaches them leadership skills, teamwork, and gets them to “turn off their cell phones and computers, step out of their comfort zones, and engage in real adventures” (Urban Mountain Adventures, 2015). Both Brad and I were impressed by what we saw.

To learn more about this awesome group and what they do, visit www.urbanmountainadventures.com

Brad and I briefly detoured off the AT to visit the Mohican Outdoor Center Lodge. Another hiker, “Pockets,” had told us about this place and as we hiked up the road, we met her coming back. Pockets had just finished breakfast and told us if we hurried we could catch the tail-end of the meal.

The MOC is an “oasis” or way-station for AT hikers and campers alike. As far as hospitality goes, they are #1 in my book. They have camping sites, showers and toilets (such a luxury!!), and provide meals for guests for a small fee. There is also a supply shop where you can grab necessary items, such as trail food, first aid kits, clothing, or repair kits for your gear. 

After catching up with Pockets, who was thru-hiking with a group of friends, we hurried to the MOC. Pockets was right, breakfast was just about over and we were offered the leftovers for free because otherwise the food would simply be tossed. We were delighted! Without matches, we had only had a cold meal of apples and protein bars. At the MOC we were gifted a hot breakfast of waffles, veggie sausage links, hot coffee, and orange juice. Hands down, it was one of the best meals I have EVER enjoyed.

After finishing such a wonderful meal, Brad and I hit the shop. It was Sabbath, but we needed matches if we hoped to eat any of the other food we packed. While in the store I located a bandana, a “need” I had not thought to buy when we left. I had spent Friday wiping sweat, sunscreen, and mosquito repellant out of my eyes and was not keen to repeat the process. Matches and bandana in hand we sadly left the MOC and it’s pristine toilets behind.

Much to my dismay, when we rejoined the AT down the road, I realized that having hiked “down” the mountain to the MOC, we were now going to have to hike back “up” the mountain to the next ridge line. The incline was steep, with “stairs” cut into the ground. The idea of climbing all the way back up, with my heavy load made me want to cry.

I honestly wanted to give up. With each step up my quads screamed and my back throbbed. I stopped several times to catch my breath, much to the frustration of my husband. He had a pace he wanted to keep and I was really slowing us down. During that climb I felt every inch the fat blob I knew myself to be. It didn’t matter that I had been walking, hiking, trail running, or doing yoga the past four months. This was true, this was real, this was hard. But I kept going because I couldn’t stop. Not on the side of the mountain.

And that’s the truth of every journey. At some point, you’re going to have to climb a freaking mountain and it is going to suck every step of the way. You’re going to hate it, whether you paste a smile on your face or complain the whole way. The truth is that you hate it, but you can’t stop. You have to keep going forward if you ever want to reach the top, no matter how painful the climb. Even if you decide you’re going to give up, you can’t stop on the side of a mountain because you have to get back down. 

For me, retreat wasn’t an option. Hiking the AT was my husband’s bucket-list item and I was NOT going to be the one to throw in the towel. Somehow, I was going to make it to the top. Blood, sweat, and frustrated tears over my unfit body included. So I pushed on. I stopped to catch my breath often. I dropped my pack to stretch my back. I stopped to drink water, eat a protein bar, or whatever procrastination device I could come up with to not climb one more step.

But finally, FINALLY, we reached the top. And let me tell you, when you finally, finally, achieve the top of your mountain... it is the most beautiful thing. Because only at the top can you look down and see how far you’ve come and realize how strong you really are.

[thejourneyfromhere]

It’s Not Mount Everest, It’s The Appalachian Trail (Part  2)

The double white blaze, shown here, marks the Appalachian Trail all the way from it’s southern terminus at Mount Springer in Georgia to its northern terminus at Mount Katahdin in Maine. This bridge, just a few feet from the parking lot from the Delaware Water Gap on I-80, was our entry point to the AT.

According to multiple sources, this bridge is “the lowest point of the trail in New Jersey runs next to this bridge,” at 286 feet above sea level. I can personally attest to this being true, as it felt like we spent the entire day climbing ‘up.’ However, the scenery was completely breath-taking and successfully distracted me from the fact I was hiking on a perpetual incline. 

At one point the ground actually leveled out and we came across a “troll bed.” We decided this was the home of the AT trolls, cousins to the famous Arendelle trolls depicted in ‘Frozen.’

As delighted as I was to be hiking on level ground for a while, I was less than pleased with the path. I’m really not sure what idiot decided half-buried rocks and stones would be a good idea for the NJ section of the AT, but they should be required to walk this path in sneakers for a few miles.

It really is one thing to be out of shape when setting out on a crazy hike challenge, but it’s another to have to pick your way across sharp stones, mile after mile after mile. Even though I enjoyed the scenery, I spent a lot of time concerned I would misstep and twist an ankle. Not to mention that I was incredibly foot-sore by the time we ended for the day.

Two words: wild raspberries!!

Honestly, when I thought about all the pros to hiking the AT, finding wild berries never entered my mind. So when we came across this bumper crop I was totally ecstatic. Brad and I spent a good thirty minutes plucking and eating our fill of raspberries. I had never tasted berries so sweet and they were such a great reward after the upward climb and stoney path we had endured on the way to the top of the mountain ridge.

Now most weight loss experts will tell you not to use food as a reward, as it is counterproductive. However, this is one of those times I really don’t care what the experts think. Seriously. I was hiking at a 3.0 mph pace, carrying around 35-40 lbs. of backpacking gear, and weighing around 190lbs myself, which meant I was burning around 400-600 calories per hour. No joke!! So if I’m out doing a killer workout, killing my feet in the process, and I stumble across WILD RASPBERRIES, I’m darn tootin’ going to call it a reward and reward myself until I find my happy again!

A plaque near Sunfish Pond reads: Sunfish Pond has been designated a registered natural landmark. Under the provisions of the historic sites AGT of August 21,1935 this site possesses exceptional value in illustrating the natural history of the United States. - U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service, 1970

It really is a beautiful place to stop and relax, resupply on water and eat a snack, but I would not go wading. Brad and I used our time here to repack our packs and stretch our lower backs. I actually did a few downward dogs to relieve the tightness in my calves. By the time we reached Sunfish Pond we had hiked approximately six miles. With the added weight of my pack, I had officially pushed my body beyond anything it had endured before. I wasn’t 20 anymore and I knew I had to stretch out my muscles or I would pay for it the next day. 

Rested and stretched we headed off around the pond. And this is where I met trouble.

This section of the AT runs across a field of large boulders, many of which are loose and shift beneath you. Normally, I’m a bit a of a mountain goat. I have twisted ankles and dislocated knee caps walking on perfectly flat, paved sidewalks, yet on uneven surfaces I hop around like it’s the most natural thing for me to do. Despite my agility, I knew the likelihood I would get injured was high. Shifting rocks + misplaced center of gravity + heavy backpack + 1 right ankle that likes to roll = Nothing good.

And I was right. Halfway through the boulder field I stepped out on a rock only to have it shift away from me. I lurched right and my ankle obediently rolled. I dropped like a sack of potatoes, one foot wedged between two heavy rocks and my other screaming insults at me. For a moment I was afraid our hike was over before it had really begun.

Unable to stand with my pack on, I dropped my pack and tried to signal my husband. Mr. Slim-and-Fit had bounded on ahead of me, well out of sight, and had not seen me fall. I wasn’t sure how far he would go before he realized I wasn’t behind him and I was in no mood to be found where I was. I am stubborn if anything and a bit proud. Mountain goats do not sit in crumpled heaps with their feet wedged between rocks.    

Without my pack on I was able to get into a better position and free my trapped foot. A quick inspection of my rolled ankle tolled me there was no serious damage, that it would only be tender for a while. I stupidly/stubbornly hoisted my pack again and set off after Brad, hoping he had stopped to wait for me.

After my mishap in the boulder field, I took a far more cautious pace on the trail. The other side of the boulder field was incredibly stoney and I was not interested in rolling my ankle a second time. Much to my dismay, the AT once again took an incline and I found myself huffing and puffing my way up the trail, wondering if there really was a top to the mountain or if we had found topographical equivalent to Schrodinger’s cat.

The trail passes the scenic Sunfish Pond then continues through Stokes State Forest and the spectacular views from Sunrise Mountain (CNYHiking.com, 2015.

By the time we reached ridge line I was beat and soaked in sweat. However, the stunning views of the Delaware River valley and the cool breeze that greeted us at the top greatly boosted my morale. We stopped for a long drink, another stretch, and photos. This is me grinning like an idiot because I’m so happy to be done climbing up.

This shot was taken right before we set off down the trail again. During our break we had heard thunder and were concerned a storm was moving in, even though the weather experts had never mentioned rain in their forecasts. Exhaustion and sore ankles are pretty much forgotten when faced with the possibility of lightning occurring at the top of a mountain. 

A few miles down the trail we finally camped. Ha. Ha. Ha. Let me try that again.

A couple miles hiking ‘down’ the mountain and then back ‘up’ the mountain we found a good camping location. Although it was near the ridge line of the mountain, it was not near the top and it was mostly sheltered from the elements.

After a cold dinner (because we forgot to pack matches somehow), Brad and I turned in for the night. I was dirty, sweaty, and wreaked of bug spray. BUT I had survived my VERY FIRST day backpacking and I was thrilled. We took this photo as evidence that we had survived the trail, feet still attached. The brown legs are mine. 

I have no idea what time it was when we fell asleep, maybe around 9pm but it didn’t matter. Nothing in the world was going to come between me and sleep.

Nothing except some wildlife...

[thejourneyfromhere]

It’s Not Mount Everest, It’s The Appalachian Trail (Part 1)

At the beginning of August, just four months into lifestyle overhaul, I took on one of my biggest challenges ever. The Appalachian Trail, aka “The A.T.” in hiking lingo. After four months, I had pretty good stamina for hiking 7-10 mile trails. But hiking the AT after four months of hiking is kind of like deciding to climb Mount Everest after spending a few months mountaineering. You really don’t know what you’re in for and you’re really not prepared for that kind of challenge. 

Yet on August 1st, I found myself standing at Delaware Water Gap access to the AT, backpack at my feet, waving goodbye to my brother. After reorganizing our packs, my husband and I set off north, into New Jersey, for a 3-day trek through the wilderness. No cell phone coverage, no roads, no hotels. No running water. No bathrooms! I was about to find out what I was really made of.

It has always been a dream of my husband’s to backpack the entire Appalachian Trail. Me - not so much. In all fairness, I had never been backpacking before so I honestly did not know what I was missing.

Having lived in Nebraska and Idaho for most of our adult lives, hiking the AT seemed like a pipe dream. When we moved to Maryland we found ourselves living only a couple hours east of the trail. There was no excuse. We had to hike it! Or at the very least, Brad had to. So in order to help Brad prepare we followed a friend’s suggestion and bought an audio copy of Bill Bryson’s “A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail.”

Between fits of laughter and sheer amazement that the author had managed to survive hiking the trail with his idiot companion, we were able to cobble together a good list of “what not to do.” And somewhere in listening to Bryson talk about his experiences, hiking the AT went from a “Brad-only” thing to a “we” thing. I don’t know what changed my mind, but I distinctly recall thinking “Oh why not, you’ve never been backpacking before. Why not go with him? You’ll probably burn off fifty pounds in the process.”

So before I knew it, I was seriously pouring over issues of the Editor’s Choice selections in Backpacker magazines and circling items, spending hours interrogating the poor clerks at REI, and bargain hunting online through Craigslist, Sierra Trading Post, REI, Ebay, and Amazon for the items we wanted. Brad had a good set of backpacking equipment, but it was old, clunky, and heavy. If we were going to do the AT, we were going to do it right and go ultralight. 

This meant we were not going haul our 8-man, 20+ lbs. tent, which we have dubbed “Woodruff Lodge,” with us.

We opted instead for the much more reasonable 4lb 14oz. Kelty Salida 2, 2-person, 3-season tent, (pictured here):

We also purchased ultralight down-filled sleeping bags, weighing in at roughly 1-pound each, inflatable air pads (a few ounces each), and a small burner stove. The goal was not to carry more than thirty to forty pounds each, with water being the main bulk of our cargo. Brad, being the wonderfully thin and fit man that he is, estimated his lumpy wife could handle about 35 lbs. worth of camping gear. I didn’t balk. I carry a toddler around all day, how different could it be? Ha ha. Ha ha. Ha.

The crack I’m smoking must be good because that thought is just pure lunacy.

Let me be clear! It is one thing to haul a child around on your hips for a few hours a day, especially when you can put them down periodically. It’s a whole other animal carrying up to forty pounds on your back, day after day, hour after hour, for the VERY FIRST time in your life!

But by heaven I was NOT going to complain. I had said I wanted to go, that I was up for this challenge, and I was going to do it. Even if it killed me!

[thejourneyfromhere]

Time To Care

As I continued my battle of the bulge and the right to feel comfortable in my own skin, I took on the challenge of yoga. It's not that I am after inner peace, although being able to clear my mind for 5 minutes before a child interrupts with some emergency is quite nice.

It's a bit more vanity-based. My whole life I have been insanely flexible. "Built for sports," is the way my doctors describe me, even though I look anything but athletic. As I've gotten older, I've started to notice I have to stretch a bit more to maintain my high level of flexibility. And I've been practicing yoga since I was 18, but not with the same degree of dedication that I have found since turning 32.

One morning I woke up and could not touch my toes. I realize this sounds crazy to most people who have never been able to touch their toes, but for someone who has always been able to easily hinge forward at the waist and lay her palms flat on the floor, it was a crisis. Was this what everyone meant when they said "one day you'll wake up and feel old?” The idea made me break out in a cold sweat.

In a tizzy, I called up my chiropractor and scheduled an appointment. Sure enough, my hips were out of alignment. A few good tweeks and I was back to forward bends, palms flat on the floor again. But the experience shook me up and I decided it was time to get serious about my yoga practice.

So here's a picture of me re-establishing my flexibility through my yoga practice. I say re-establishing because you'll notice I'm not in a true split. I'm having to work to get that back.

I like using the wall for a stabilizer because I can stretch my muscles without the stress of my weight pushing me farther than my body is ready to go. I am vain, but I am not stupid. I know that, like weight loss, flexibility takes time. I also know from experience that pushing too hard, too fast only leads to injuries and that’s not something I want to do again. Ever.

In addition to rebuilding my flexibility, I'm also having to work hard to build up my strength and balance again. Hence the reason I’m not holding on to my foot with both hands in this picture. (Cliche warning!) Becoming strong and balanced doesn’t happen overnight or after one yoga session. It’s a process you have to repeat over and over and over and over.

But this is all fine and good. Really. I have three kids and I spent ten years not trying to be fit or even active really. It's going to take time to regain what I threw out the window and it certainly won't be a piece of cake.

The point is that I'm doing something and I’m doing it now. Because now I care about how I feel and what I look like. Especially, from this angle:

It goes back to that whole vanity thing. The older I get, the more I care about my looks and the more I care about what I'm losing. Before I didn't really care if I was unfit because I was busy chasing around toddlers. Who has time to care about looks when you're busy cleaning poop off a crib, the walls, the carpet, and a crying toddler whose diaper just completed the most epic fail in all diaper history?

But now my children are fully toilet-trained and two are in school. I have time to look in the mirror. I have time to notice things don’t come so easily as they once did. I have time to care.

I care about being flexible. I care about being fit. I care about what I look like from the back. I care about me again. And I care that I have to work so hard to recover what “not caring” has done to my body after so many years.

[thejourneyfromhere]

Happiness Is Not My Jean Size

I fully believe that at some point during every person’s weight loss journey there is a need to reaffirm that you are more than your weight. You already know you’re out of shape, but you’re working on getting better. And if you’re like me, you need a reminder that you are a whole person; not just a body made entirely of gelatinous pudge. You need something to make you feel happy with who you are.

In psychology, this falls under the category of positive reinforcement. It’s not a reward in the sense of buying a new outfit or going on a vacation; I’m rewarding myself with proof that I’m making progress and that regardless of my weight, I’m a pretty awesome person. So I decided to take photos whenever I felt really good.

Before following a YouTube video on cutting my own hair...

After successfully following a YouTube video on cutting my own bangs (no it was not a cry for help!)...

During workouts with my posse of fierce Xena warrior-princess ladies...

And when I finally discovered the motivation to wear makeup... and totally got photo-bombed by my 4-year-old.

As you can see, the photos are me just living my everyday life. Yet, they have served as positive reinforcers because in each photo I was doing something that made me happy. Whenever I see these photos I’m reminded of those moments of happiness and I’m reminded that who I am is not tied to my dress size.

Yeah, okay, I’m overweight and I’m not happy about that. But I am also this really cool person, who’s friends with a bunch of ladies who ought to be listed on the Super list of Super Women. I have crazy awesome kids who make me laugh almost every day and for whatever reason they think I’m pretty rad too. AND I can actually cut my own hair without it looking like I handed the 4 year-old the scissors. That’s a self-esteem and confidence booster I could never get from fitting into a size 2 pair of jeans. 

I’ll conclude with a quote by Matthieu Ricard which reads: “Authentic happiness is not linked to an activity, it is a state of being.” I liked this statement so much I have added it as part of my signature on the bottom of my emails. When I see it, I’m reminded that my happiness is not tied down to externals. Happiness only occurs when I choose to live that way.