What's the Plan, Man?

I'm no stranger to all things health related, weight loss related, exercise related, diet related, and so on and so forth.  Just the fact that I used to be a trainer give me somewhat of a knowledge base.  I've been a bit of a yo-yo dieter; low carb, low fat, low calorie, South Beach, Adkins, Zone, diet pills, well, you get the idea.  I've always gained back what I lost, and it's certainly no mystery why!  I'm kind of extreme when it comes to this type of thing.  I'm either eating everything in sight in portion sizes fit for a giant, along with being completely sedentary, or I'm barely eating and over-exercising.  As Dr. Phil would say "And how's that workin' for ya?".  Well, it's not, and never has (b-t-dubs I think Dr. Phil is so douchey, so is saying b-t-dubs, but I can't help it). 

So this time I have decided to pay a lot of attention to my attitude towards things; change my misconceptions, and do this in a healthy way so it can be maintained once I get to my goal.  I've fallen into a terrible pattern of either losing or gaining, but never maintaining, which is not only unhealthy, but takes a toll on one's mentality.

Diet wise - My plan (for now) is to count calories.  This is something I have to do in order to hold myself accountable, and while I've gotten extreme with it in the past, it has worked for me, and as long as I do not fall below where I need to be I think it will be useful, at least in the short term.

Exercise wise - Strength training 2 to 3 times a week, having my husband, Jason, train me until I am able to push myself alone.  Running 2 to 3 times a week, for 20 minutes to start with.

Weight loss wise - Well, I'm a scale addict, which for me works too.  When I stop weighing is when I start gaining, it's like if I don't see the number it isn't happening.  I hope to lose 2 to 3 pounds a week for a while, then 1 to 2.  I know the closer I get to my goal the slower it will come off.  This is where I usually lose it mentally.  I figure if 2 to 3 lbs is good, 3 to 4 is better, and so on.  It doesn't work that way, and logically I know that.  I'd like to be at my goal weight by around Halloween.

The main reason I will be blogging this journey is to keep me in check.  I typically hide these issues from everyone except perhaps a couple people, and when it gets bad I do tend to hide it from everyone, which is bad.  So here it all is.

Starting Over

We all have our struggles.  Mine is my weight.  I've been fit, fat, fit, fatter, pregnant, fat, semi-fit, fat, pregnant again, and once again still fat (and probably a few more fits and fats in between).  Not like it's a secret, anyone who can see me can see it.  I miss being fit very much.  Guess what though?  It's hard, and I'm kind of lazy, and that's just the truth.  I'm sick of it though; sick of feeling self conscious and unhappy with myself, sick of wearing baggy clothes and never feeling I look nice, sick of feeling so incredibly out of shape, sick of not being able to keep up with my (almost) 3 year old. 

I decided, about a week ago, this just simply has to stop.  I have decades ahead of me, if I'm lucky, I don't want to spend them miserable in my own body.  I want to live a long life, I don't want my last years of life to be spent sick because of the choices I've made.  There are only a few things we have control of in our lives, our body (uncontrollable illness, and disease aside, of course) is one of them, and our mind (mental illness, etc., aside) is the other.  When I really think about it, it makes little sense that I ensure I stay miserable.  To hell with that!  So I decided I'd put it out there, to hold myself accountable, and to share my journey with anyone that it might help.

So, here we go!

The Things We Do For Our Kids

Every Tuesday I take Emma to Story Time (sponsored by First Things First) at our local library.  This particular one is specifically for kids ages 2 to 3, but there are always kids younger and older than that.  Parents (or whoever the kid is with) are required to stay in there with their kid. There is a different letter of focus every week, and there are stories that revolve around subjects that begin with the letter of the week (today was L and the stories were about Lady Bugs).  There are little songs and dances in between the stories, then at the end they blow bubbles for the kids to run around a pop.  Emma loves it!  For me it's a half hour of pure unadulterated HELL!  Oh dear GOD how I HATE it.  I dread it, I dread it alllll week long.  Tuesdays when I wake up I think to myself, oh shit it's story time day.  The best time of the whole week is right after it's over because I know it's the furthest away from the next story time that I will ever get.

Why do I hate it so much?  I'm sure you are wondering how bad could it really be!?  It's bad.  First of all, bless her heart, the story time lady's voice is nerve grinding!  She sort of condescending too; whatever story time lady, you think you're better than me!?!?!  But that's not even really what's so bad, it's just the cherry on top of the horribly annoying and worst 30 minutes of my entire week.  It's the other parents, and it's the other "children".  Yes children is in quotations because sometimes I wonder if they are children or Satan incarnate.  I know that these types of things are just beginning in my life, and that I'm in for many years to come of crap like this, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.  This is one of those things I'm going to keep in my arsenal and remind her of when she doesn't want to take me in when I'm old and senile.

Waste Not, Want Not

I've been on a DIY kick lately (obvs) (I find things like "obvs", "totes", and "adorbs" so totally obnoxious that I have decided I must use them); partially it's because it's kind of fun, but a lot of it is to save some money.  With my attempt at making Coconut Milk Shampoo I bought some ingredients I do not want to go to waste (there has been a Revised Coconut Milk Shampoo posted that I want to try soon since I have all the ingredients already).  One of the things I bought is Jojoba Oil, another Castile Soap.  Since I'd never even heard of Castile Soap until this past week (although once I looked for it and found it I realized that I had indeed seen it before), I decided to have a go at the Jojoba Oil first, since I'd least heard of that before.

The first thing I did was add some Jojoba to my conditioner, just a few drops into the glob of my Joico conditioner I had in my hand.  I noticed my hair was substantially softer and more, well, flowy.  I must add, however, that I also sprayed my hair with my new homemade detangler.  It most likely was the combo of the two, and I was very please with the results.  My hair tends to be dry, so I am thrilled.

My next attempt at utilizing this expensive ($12.99, and yes, I realize now I overpaid by like double) was to use it as a face wash.  I have extremely sensitive skin, especially on my face.  I decided to use some babywash and mix it with a couple drops of Jojoba right in my hand.  The results were wonderful.  I am going to mix this in a batch so I have it ready to use.  My face was well cleansed but very gently.  It felt refreshed and soft and smooth!

My last venture last night was to use it for my lips.  I'm a severe (and I mean severe) chap stick addict.  For years I used Carmex, but switched to Vaseline Lip Therepy (which is basically just Vaseline in a tube).  I decided that I would melt some petroleum jelly (which has the same ingredient: White Petrolatum) and add some Jojoba Oil to it.  I used a little container that my I.D. Bare Minerals sample size bronzer came in to put it in.  I nuked the jelly for like a minute, stirred and added a 1/4 tsp of Jojoba, then poured it into the little container (which holds about 3/4 - 1 tbsp total).  I like it, I think the Jojoba adds some suppleness to my lips and of course the jelly coats my lips and makes them all slippery (which is what I need in anything for my lips).

Overall I have to say that I LOVE Jojoba Oil, and even though the original reason I bought it was a bust, I'm glad it happened!  I'm loving trying out new things and even though I never intended this blog to be about anything like this (mostly because I never intended on doing any of these things), I actually think it's more interesting than talking about how many times I've been spit up on today (three, in case you DO find that interesting).

A DIY Success

I wanted to come back today and share real quickly a DIY success I failed to mention among all my failures.  I have been looking for a laundry bag type thing to hang on the back of my hall bathroom door for a while now.  It's not a very big bathroom and the laundry basket in there really just blocked the linen closet door and always was getting in the way.  I saw a laundry hamper on Pinterest that inspired me, but I didn't want to have to go buy anything, so I decided to use 2 hangers and an old extra large pillow case.  I used an wreath hanger I had to hang it:

I am pleased to say it is working very well.  It may not be the most attractive thing, but it is full of laundry and doing its job!  SUCCESS.  Hey, I'll take what I can get!

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DIY Fail

Pinterest has inspired me a lot to think about making more things myself, rather than buying them.  I have plans to make my own Laundry Detergent (after my current enormous bottle runs out), this is a recipe I've found everywhere and from the research I've done it seems great.  I ran across some home made shampoo recipes and in the mean time I found something called No-Poo that seemed so amazing.  I thought to myself, wow how awesome would I be if I could do this and save tons of money and also be so eco-friendly and low maintenance.  FIRST FAIL.  My hair was like, well, it was like, just awful!  Not for me at all, couldn't get a comb through it.  So I thought, ok fine, I had found another awesome sounding Coconut Shampoo recipe that sounded just lovely, tons of great reviews for it, and yes a few it didn't work for too.  I made it and used it.  SECOND FAIL!  O-M-G, my hair looked like it was in dreadlocks after it dried.  Just clumps of hair, it felt as though I had put a ton of wax in it.  Again, couldn't get a comb through it, not even my widest tooth comb.

THEN, one of my other DIY ventures, a closet ceiling wrapping paper storage (here's a pic for ya):

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I hear a CRASH, so I walk down the hall and see both cats on our bed all puffed up looking at the closet.  I look over to the closet and it looked as though the closet had thrown up Christmas.  THIRD FAIL.  Now yes, this one indeed was user error 100%, and it can be fixed, I just thought it was funny that within a 24 hour period just about everything I tried to DIY totally failed.  I am a little discouraged, but I am going to keep trying different things.  As far as the shampoo though, that I will just stick to store bought!

Schooling the Kids

It doesn't take much but to watch the news to see how horrifying the world is, it's probably always been horrifying, it's just broadcasted more now.  I try to avoid it really, I already know there are monsters out there, contrary to what I tell Emma all the time. "No honey there are no such things as monsters."  I feel like a monster myself telling her this since I know it's a lie; but then again she believes in Santa, so I guess it isn't the only reality she will one day come to find mommy has be dishonest about.

I have decided I would like to home school.  I know that most teachers are fine; my brother in law, and one of my closest friends, are teachers. My mom has been in education for years as a teacher and now as a principal, so I know that it is not common for a teacher to be a predator.  I know even more teachers than that, and the ones I know are great, passionate teachers.  What is common, though, is apathy among teachers.  And you know, I don't blame them!  It's ridiculous the hoops that teachers have to jump through these days, and it's at the expense of our children's education.  Teaching to these absurd standardized tests, classroom overcrowding, and the parents they have to deal with, there's not enough money in the world for me to do that!  And on top of that they don't make much for what they have to put up with.

I don't know, at this point, if I will home school their whole education through high school, but I do know for sure for the first several years I will.  I'm so relieved!  I've been having anxiety about taking Emma to her first day of Kindergarten since she was still in the womb.  I don't trust many people with my babies!  And I really can't imagine dropping her off and leaving her somewhere with some person and a group of obnoxious children I don't know (I admittedly do not like the vast majority of other people's children, certainly not ALL, but yes, a vast majority!).  I can see myself showing up on the playground after learning someone called Emma a name and giving some 5 year old a piece of my mind.  I know I can't protect them forever, but I can protect them for longer than the first 5 years!  I was teased in school, and I don't feel like I learned anything from it.  I am still sensitive and get my feelings hurt easily, so it certainly didn't thicken my skin any, it just taught me that people are mean, and it gave me lots of anxiety.

When I look back at my education in elementary, middle, and high school, you know what I remember?  I remember trying to talk my mom into letting me stay home just about every day.  I hated school, hated it with every fiber of my being.  Sure, I have some good memories, and made a couple friends that I still have to this day, but it was never something I loved, or even tolerated well.  I will ensure my kids have the same opportunities to join sports and go to events and socialize with other kids their age.  If they want to go to dances and proms and all that stupid crap, I'll make sure they get to.  I've never met a well adjusted adult who went to school their whole lives who loved it (it's mainly those people who are still acting like teenagers in their 30s who say high school was awesome).  Even now my mom and I talk about it and she always says she wishes she'd have known more about home schooling when we were all in school, but she just didn't know the resources to look into.

I remember in 2nd grade I went to a Catholic school that year.  I had spent Kindergarten and 1st grade at a regular ol' public school and I was way behind those private school kids.  We had reading groups according to color, and the chart was in the back of the classroom, so it was no secret what colors were associated with what reading level.  Well I was an Olive (ya, ugly color for the low level readers), and Aqua was the highest one, there was like maybe 5 colors in between the 2 but I don't remember those.  I specifically remember a boy named Peter, cute blonde hair blue eyed little boy, that I had a crush on.  He was an Aqua.  Even at the young age of 7 I remember thinking that I was dumb, and that someone in the Aqua reading group wouldn't like someone in the Olive reading group.  I hate that memory.  I hate it for more than the fact that I felt dumb at such a young age, I hate it because I don't think it's fair to compare kids at that age and basically have them know, among themselves, who is ahead and who is behind.  It sets kids up to have low expectation of themselves if they are lower level, and I believe (even though I have no proof) that it sets the higher level kids up to be more judgmental.  Now, when we moved that summer and I ended up back in public school in 3rd grade I was WAY ahead of my peers, especially in reading, so it worked out ok after my year of hell (even though they still split the class up into reading levels and every kid still knew who was high and who was low).  I ended up going on to graduate high school at 16 years old, but my motivation to do so was my intense hatred for school, not any sort of motivation stemming from being an overachiever, because that I am not.