I'm terrified.

I am scared shitless.

Today I proudly announced on Facebook that I am 12 pounds from my ultimate goal weight. Then I proceeded to eat like crap for the rest of the day, because I am scared to death.

What if I fail?
What if I lose all of this weight and then can't maintain it?
What if I lose all of this weight and still feel fat?
What if I stop running and get mushy?
What if I don't look as good as I feel?

In my mind, I might as well just eat whatever because it's hopeless. I don't know if any amount of Zoloft will ever change that for me. In my mind, I still have three chins and should only fit into sweats. I can't imagine looking pretty in a dress. I'm just a fat girl. Nothing is going to change that.

I really don't like ending my day feeling this way.

An Overwhelming Sense of Goal.

Lately I have hated school. I have to force myself to do my work. I feel like I should have been done a long time ago (because I will be 26 by the time I finish, and I should have). I am just burnt out. I love my major and have always had the intention of getting my master's degree immediately after I finished my bachelor's. But lately I just keep thinking of getting my teaching license and going straight to work.

I just have this overwhelming sense of goal. I feel like I need to get to the finish line. I cannot wait to hold my degree in my hands and tell people that I am a college graduate. Dave is a junior enlisted sailor in the Navy, and his paycheck is ridiculously small. I should really go straight to work and get my master's simultaneously. They would be the best decision. But the fact is that I just don't want to.

What I want to do is this:
-Find a job that allows me to use my knowledge and love of history.
-Make good money at this job.
-Work a reasonable , flexible schedule that enables me to spend time with my family.
-Never write another paper again in my life.
-Be normal, smart, and not constantly working.
-Read books that I enjoy as opposed to books that I am required to read.


Seriously, that is what I want to do. Unfortunately, I think that in order to lead the life that I want I am going to need a master's degree. I am going to have to keep going to school for another two years. That means that I will probably have senioritis for another two years of my master's. Life.is.so.unfair.

So instead of asking myself what I want to do, I have been asking myself what would be best. Should I get my master's in Education or should I stick with History? I just don't know. Should I work as a substitute teacher while I get my master's or should I just go full steam on the master's and try to finish in a year?

I have been having this debate with myself for over a year. I have less than a year until I finish my bachelor's and I really need to make a decision. I just want to be happy. I just want to find success and feel good about what I am doing. Why do goals have to be so ridiculously hard to accomplish?

Thankful Thursday- only not.

Yesterday was supposed to be Thankful Thursday, however I really wanted a 4-day weekend from school so I put my nose to the grindstone and got a lot done yesterday and forgot to blog. Also, my friend Sarah, who I was thankful for in last Thursday's post, is leaving town for a week or so and I wanted to hang out with her. So you lovely folks get Thankful Thursday on Friday morning. That's me for ya, a day late.

What I was thankful for yesterday is a little bit different and may strike you all as a little bit odd. Yesterday I walked my three-year-old to day camp in a dress. I knew it was sunny, but didn't realize how hot it was so it was a strapless, floor-length dress made out of something synthetic. It was freaking hot, but the dress is super cute and I felt pretty in it. Walking in it may not have been the best decision, considering I was dripping sweat by the time that I got home, but that aside I was glad that it was sunny and I was glad to get in the extra, light cardio.

As I walked him to school, I had to pass through all of the construction going on in my neighborhood right now. It is a pain in the butt, but yesterday it paid off (for me). One of the construction workers whistled at me. My husband might not be thrilled that this made me swell with pride and gratitude, but it did. I've been overweight since 2007. I have felt disgusting for over four years. I have also felt a little bit invisible.

I have felt like just another overweight Navy wife, in her sweats, with a shopping cart full of unhealthy, budget-friendly foods. Hearing that whistle made me feel like I was visible again. It made me feel visible in a way that doesn't cause people to awkwardly turn away from me and talk to my feet instead of my face. I fully recognize that this skeevy construction worker would probably talk to my rack instead of my face, and that he wouldn't have given a damn about the interesting, intelligent things that I have to say (and which I am very proud of). My knowledge of these facts does not change the feeling I have of gratitude for that whistle. Someone saw me and didn't turn away.

I am grateful to be alive and to be seen. I am also thankful to have realized that I have no desire to be whistled at by anyone other than the B-Man. Though it felt good to be seen, I walked a little bit faster after I heard that whistle.

Shower Epiphanies.

I love the fact that when I am in the midst of my shower routine, singing "Single Ladies (Put a Ring on it)" I have some of my best thoughts. Often they are about my life and the immeasurable blessings that fill it. Tonight's shower epiphany was no different. In this case, something that a friend said to me the other night suddenly became crystal clear and took on a new meaning.

On Sunday night, we had dinner with friends that we enjoy immensely. Throughout the conversation of the evening, I complimented my friend on her daughter's cute face, pretty hair, and infectious voice and she mentioned her beautiful, baby-soft skin. I don't remember her words well enough to quote her directly, but they were something along the lines of, "Her skin is so soft, I often wonder how skin goes from the beautiful soft stuff she has to what I have." I think that at that point we started a conversation about skin care and also relating to the fact that my skin looks terrible from all of the running and working out that I have been doing in the last six months.
I didn't realize that over forty-eight hours later, that conversation would cause me to have a revelation.

This evening I ran a 10k on my treadmill, Facebooked a little, and then came upstairs to shower and hit the hay (and watch Dexter with the hottie I married). After my shower, I was washing my face and putting on my night cream. As I was doing this, I was thinking about how I have spent a fortune on skin care in the last year and none of it seems to be doing the trick. Then I reminded myself, yet again, that it is probably not a short-coming of the products so much as a result of the fact that having babies changes one's body chemistry and working out six days per week makes for a sweaty, greasy person.

It was at this point that I looked up from my counter and caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror and it dawned on me, "I have earned this face." My face has changed remarkably in the last few years. First it got really fat, then it got even fatter, now it is getting skinny again, and it has gotten somewhat pimply lately. I also noticed (amidst my epiphany) that it looks harder. That's right, harder. My face looks tired some nights and I think it looks like the face of an adult.

There are some lines in certain places and I have gotten freckles in the places where I get a tan. My skin is not as firm and I don't think that I will ever look as fresh-faced as I do in some pictures I have seen of myself. But, I earned my face. I earned it as an adult who worries about making it from paycheck to paycheck. I earned it as an adult who has carried and borne children, then stayed up with them all night and worried about them falling off of swing sets. I earned it having to talk about and face adult things. I earned it by getting fat and then fighting my way back to being healthy.

I'm not saying I won't have to remind myself of that from time to time. I'm not saying that baby soft skin isn't loverly. I just think that babies don't have weathered skin because they haven't had experiences. I've always been determined to be proud of my experiences, so I think that I should start being proud of the ways that they have changed me as well.

This is a Test.

I feel like I am being tested. We are currently at the end of our first week of the first (and only) sea duty that Dave will experience before he separates from the Navy in November 2012. Tomorrow Dave has to work. He will be working 6 days (or more) per week until he leaves on deployment. I knew that this was what sea duty would be like, but the reality of it is depressing.

It depresses me that I won't have "back-up" two days per week. It depresses me that my husband is going to miss out on all of the fun we try and have on the weekends. It makes me sad for all of us. I love him, I want him to be home. Eventually, I won't even get a few hours in the evening and two days per week, he will be gone. He will be completely gone for a long time, he will miss birthdays, holidays, and milestones. Our youngest son may not even really know him when he returns.

I should be grateful. I should be happy that we have a steady income, a roof over our heads, food in our bellies, and an all-around nice life. I am grateful for those things. I just wish that they came with a husband who got to enjoy them too (and I wouldn't mind a better paycheck for all of his hard work, either). It's weighed on me heavily that lately I have seen my adult friends and Facebook acquaintances saying that they sleep til noon and "struggle" to find ways to entertain themselves all day.

I ask myself, "are these people kidding??" We struggle from paycheck to paycheck to make it. My husband's heart is absolutely broken at the thought of missing Puff's first birthday. It must be nice to do nothing and get paid for it. I wish that we could sleep til noon and wake up and go and play at the park as a family.

It's even worse on days like today. I fought with my three-year-old for most of the day. We had a forty minute fight over an apple and the apple is still on my table, turning brown. My dog threw up seven times on the way to the dog park. I had to miss out on a picnic for my husband's new command that I really wanted to go to because he couldn't leave work for a work function.

Today was not a barrel of laughs and I think that I have more of these days headed my direction. On days like today, I have to remind myself that this is a test. This is only a test. I have a habit of dominating tests. I wreck them and make them my own. I will do the same with this test. I can handle anything that the Navy gives me. My husband is my favorite person on this planet, and deployment will only make us stronger. Perhaps some people will be better rested, but they certainly aren't building character. I have what I have because I can pass these tests.

Happiness, Hear it Comin', Like a Train on a Track...

Today is thankful Thursday and I decided to do a morning post instead of an evening post because it's only 9:15 a.m. and I already have SO much that I am thankful for, that I wanted to document it.

First, I am BEYOND thankful that Puff slept eight whole hours in his crib last night. I have been a little under the weather and I really needed that full night of sleep.




Second, I am proud and thankful that my husband is on his way home to change into his dress whites because the water is off for the day and I wouldn't have been able to have coffee without him coming home.




Also, I am thankful that my husband is nominated for PC of the Wing (which is why he is coming home to change). I am so grateful that he has a job that he excels at and enjoys. He performed so well in his job the last couple of years that he got a lot of acknowledgment for it. I am thankful that there are others out there who recognize how amazing he is.



Finally, I am SO grateful for my friend Sarah. She comes over a lot and keeps me company. She works out with me, eats with me, and is just all around awesome. In the Navy world, it can be kind of challenging to find friends. You meet some awesome people, but also some not so awesome ones. It's hard to find that "good fit" in friendship and I feel like I have found it with her. That is something for which I am exceptionally grateful.

Angry, Lonely, and Drunk.

I was watching Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew just now (I love Dr. Drew, I wish he was single and I was his type) and someone on the show was talking and said, "if we don't, we will be angry, lonely, and drunk." It made me think of my mom, right away. I love my mom, and my mom is nowhere near the person she was a decade and a half ago. She has come a long way, but she was angry, lonely, and drunk for a long time.

It made me wonder about something that I often wonder. I wonder if I could have helped my mom with her anger and loneliness and if that would have led to her not being drunk as much. The rational, healthy part of me knows that this is not the case. My mom was my mom because she is my mom, period. Her drinking and drug use was not my fault and never will be. Then my train of thought kept on rolling and I went a different direction.

I began to wonder if my mom thought that motherhood would ease her loneliness. If she did, what would make her think that having a baby would accomplish that? Did having a baby who was a baby (and therefore not good company) make her feel more angry and lonely, and drive her to get more drunk? My answer? Probably. And then I started thinking even more and wondered how many other people that I know have unreasonable expectations of their children.

How many of us think that our kids are meant to be our companions? How many people think, "this kid is going to be my best friend," and how many people think that their kids will be their eternal companions? Probably a lot of us. It's something that I have to talk to myself about. I want to raise little people who will love their lives, who will grow to be successful, wonderful adults. In order for my kids to do so, they are going to have to leave me. My kids are going to live off of me for eighteen years, and then they will strike out on their own. If they do this, I will have been successful as a parent.

That is kind of hard to swallow, as a mom. Especially as the mom of an infant. I can't imagine my sweet, squishy baby leaving me. I cannot imagine not being the one who illicits the most brilliant smile from him. But the fact is that some day, he will leave. Someday, he will not really care about what I have to say. Someday, he will be a man and that man will not be my responsibility. And that is the way that it should be.

Ultimately, that is where my train of thought led me. My train of thought led me to where I decided that I don't want to be angry, lonely, and drunk. I want to have reasonable expectations for my kids. I want to encourage them to grow and do great things. My greatest success will likely be tinged with heartbreak, because my kids will leave me in their dust. But is that not the way that many great successes work? That's parenthood. Parenthood hurts a little from time to time, if you do it well.

Gratitude.

The friend with whom I run when I run with another human started a blog about gratitude. It can be found here. Today she "featured" me on her blog and I was beyond flattered. I was flattered for two reasons:

1. being blogged about makes me feel edgy and cool.
2. being blogged about as something that is a positive in some one's life makes me feel like I am doing something right.

Before my big, blog debut my friend asked me if she could use one of my pictures and I told her that she could. I also expressed to her that I loved the idea of a blog that was all about gratitude. It was at that point that she told me that stealing her idea was totally legit.

Unfortunately for you, dearest readers (all 1 of you), I have decided NOT to steal her idea. I have, however, decided to give it a place on my blog. I will be doing a gratitude blog at least once per week.

I think that it is obvious that I am grateful for certain things in my life. I am grateful for losing weight, running, and my family and I say it a lot. The fact is that those things are at the top of my list, but I have so, infinitely much more to be grateful for.

Today I am grateful for:
1. Camp- which gives me a 3 hour break from my three year old, three times per week.
2. Beer- which is delicious and an indulgence that I think that I deserve.
3. Cake Batter Pancakes- which I will eat tomorrow and NOT feel guilty about, because I deserve them and I ran 6 miles today, AND I will be carb loading for a race on Saturday.
4. Friends- who motivate me to go out and do things I would normally shy away from (Brooks) and who hang out with me despite my weirdness (all the rest of you).
5. Distance- which separates me from things that I need to be separated from. Being isolated has its perks from time to time.

What are you grateful for?

Bliss.

Bliss is only having one pair of pants that fit, because all of the rest are too big.

Bliss is waking up next to a milky baby, with a half smile on his face.

Bliss is Dave.

Bliss is the memory of my Papa on what would have been his 78th birthday.

Bliss is being able to run 6 miles, at a decent pace.

Bliss is the sound of a tantrum occurring downstairs.

Bliss is not feeling guilty about eating a slice of cake.

Bliss is pumping 4 ounces after a feeding.

Bliss is feeling beautiful.

Bliss is the thought of seeing my mom in a couple of weeks.

Bliss is inhaling when I hug my grandma.

Bliss is the thought of a meeting with my father, who I haven't seen in almost a decade.

My life is blissful. I am blessed beyond measure.

A Run with a Friend.

The day before yesterday, I ran with a friend.
We kept a good pace. We talked the whole time.
We ran on grass, we ran on pavement.
We ran past the body of a small bird.

We talked about people, places, and things.
We talked about our pace,
We talked about our route,
We spoke of God and Faith.

There were lots of trees,
More than a few cars passed us by,
The people in one yelled something out the window.
We couldn't hear them.
We were too busy, conquering and talking.

We both had on headphones,
But I know that I didn't use mine.
She sweats less than I do and
I think she runs with more grace,
But she still wants to run with me.

We finished our run
and we realized
we had gone farther than we thought.
We beat the roads and the trails and the cars.
We beat our goals.
I'm very lucky to have run with a friend.

Regarding the Ownership of Lefty and Righty.

There are very few things in this world that are all mine. I have to share pretty much everything, and that is even more true now that I am a mom. Nothing is my own, everything is ours. I spent a long time thoroughly convinced that my breasts were my own. They are, after all, attached to my body. Three and a half years ago, when Archer was born, I found out that I was wrong.

My breasts belonged to him for twenty six months. He pulled them, pushed them, pinched them, laid on them, held them, snuggled them, and made basically every decision regarding my breasts. He decided if and when they should be whipped out in public for a feeding. He decided the duration of their exposure. The only thing he didn't decide was to name them Lefty and Righty, but that's only because he didn't know how to talk. There is nothing in the world that Archer loved as much as he loved Lefty and Righty. For twenty six long months, he knew that he could count on them to help him out if he was hungry, thirsty, tired, hurt, sick, crabby, or just plain lonely.

Then, as he got older, he fell in love with our dog and began to make friends who were people, rather than breasts. He started seeing less and less of Lefty and Righty. Eventually, he decided to forfeit ownership completely. I was thrilled. After twenty six beautiful months of breastfeeding, I was ecstatic to have my body to myself again. I figured that I would really enjoy actually owning myself for a little while. Imagine my surprise when a mere two weeks after Archer fully weaned, two little pink lines populated a screen in my bathroom.


Once again, I had to forfeit ownership of myself. I knew by then, that I would not regain my body after forty weeks, sure I would have my uterus back, but Lefty and Righty would not be returned to me until the new little fetus decided that he or she was done with them. I also knew that Lefty and Righty were a little bit concerned about being used and then discarded. They hadn't weathered the storm too well the last time. But, they were also excited to have a new little friend that they could count on.

Forty-one weeks later, along came Olwyn. My brown eyed baby boy immediately loved his new friends. He's been with us for six months and he has spent the vast majority of his time building a relationship with Lefty and Righty. He is not even remotely shy about asserting his ownership of his favorite duo. He pinches, pulls, hugs, loves, and cares about his boobies. They are 100% his, and he always likes to be within range of them in case he needs a snack. Lefty and Righty bring him comfort when disaster strikes (getting stepped on by a two legged or four legged sibling is the most common calamity) and they fill his belly morning, noon, and night. He knows that he can always count on the contents to be both nourishing and refreshing.

As for me, I have surrendered. I know that Lefty and Righty were never truly meant to be mine. They were always destined for greater things than a casual relationship with the woman whose chest they call home. If I love Lefty and Righty, I will let them achieve their destiny. They're in their prime now, livin' the dream.