Writer's Workshop

So, here are my chooses of subjects....

1.) What is your life's anthem? You know...that song that is ALWAYS in your head. The one you'd go to sing first if someone told you to sing a song right NOW. What is it and what does it mean to you?

2.) We love telemarketers don't we!?! Describe a memorable experience you had with one.

3.) How much does focusing on weight affect your daily life?

4.) Describe in what ways you expect too much from your significant other. Do they deserve an apology?

5.) List ten things that make you HAPPY.

6.) Share a sleep walking story of your own!!

As for #1 I guess it would be "Summer Breeze" because it is a song I remember from childhood and it seems to make me feel so peaceful.

#2, OMG....I am not evn going there, I used to be one of those bothersome people.

#3, I focus on my weight all the time right now. I have lost 27 pounds so it is working, I just need to focus a little more. :)

#4, Sometimes I am snappy with my husband and I don't apoligize as much for it as I should...I just take it forgranted that he knows how I feel. I hate that I do that to him.

#5, hmmmm.....ten things that make me happy

1. running, especially with Emma

2. phone calls or visits from my children3. when I hear my Daddy tell me he loves me

4. holding a newborn baby

5. losing weight

6. seeing my garden grow

7. ronnie holding me close

8. feeling grass on my bare feet9. rock hunting

10. my all-time high (happy) is when I see a rainbow in the sky

#6, Hmmmm....here's one for you to figure out. I sleep-eat instead of just sleep-walking. I honestly do not even know anything about it until I get up in the morning and discover dirty dishes. My husband can sleep through a tornado so he is no help for me. I think that is how I gained all this extra weight. I don't do it unless I am really stressed out but it happens.

Happy to be Daddy's Girl

Emma and I went jogging yesterday. She ran my bootie off....but I did keep up with her. Not bad for 40yr. old vs. 7yr. old. I was proud of myself....but I will admit I am sore this morning. We will be going again today. She loves it and that is what I was hoping for. I think she gets the same rush I do with it. She is so cute out there running with her little mp3 player. :) I didn't realize how different it would be to actually run outside. Until yesterday I had only ran/jogged on my treadmill. It is so exhilerating to be out in the wide open just free and running. It was an amazing experience. I won't want to use the treadmill anymore now that I now how good it is. The first thing Emma ask this morning is "when are we going to run?". I may be creating a monster. I am secretly hoping that this whole running thing becomes a family thing. Ronnie (my husband) came to the park yesterday and actually ran a little with us. He didn't run far but I really think he liked it. I am loving this.

Daddy, Logan (my nephew), me and Emma

I talked to my Daddy last night. Him and my mother divorced when I was 6 and I didn't see him again until I was 17. That wasn't really his fault, she just refused to let him see us (those control issues she thrives on). We have had a hard time keeping a relationship going because we didn't really know eachother after being apart for 11 years. But we are okay now and we keep in touch more lately. He is unfortunatley not in good health and it is very sad to think that so many years that could have been spent with him were just tossed away. At this point all I can do is make good use of the time I have left and build memories. When we got off the phone last night I said "I love you Daddy" and he said "I love you too sweety" and I could hear/feel the love. There is a difference in someone saying it just to say it and when someone is saying because they are really wanting you to know. I know it comes from his heart because I can feel it and that is one of my favorite things in this world is knowing that my Daddy LOVES me. Hey, one out of two parents that love me is a good thing. And I do LOVE my Daddy, unconditionally and forever.

Okay, this one is going to be short because if I don't take Emma running soon she will explode. :)

The last day of school....finally!

I am so excited because after today Emma will be home with me until August. I miss her so bad when she s in school. I am not wasting this summer. We are planning so many fun things for us to go and do. She is too cool, so much fun. I am picking her up early from school today and we are going treasure hunting, well everyone else calls it yard selling but treasure hunting just sounds like more fun.

We never do anything on memorial day, to us it is just another day. I know that sounds bad but neither of us have ever really celebrated it. Kala will be with us Sunday. We will go to church, dinner and then go to a movie. It is suppossed to rain anyway so planning on cooking out would not be a good thing.

It should be a bigger deal for me seeing-how my son is a Marine but since I hardly ever even see or talk to him.....oh well--you get it. I will just celebrate my Marine right here with some pictures. He is my heart, I wish everyone could have a chance to know him like I do. He is such a good hearted (I want to say boy but he is truly a MAN now) man. He used to run around wearing fatigues (camo) when he was as little as 3 years old until...well, he still does. :) He is going to Iraq in August and it is ripping my heart out but he is so phsyced up to go. I really believe he is excited about it....he is living his lifelong dream and that is something that alot of people never have enough courage to do. That is the only thing that gives me peace about it--I know he is happy. My little man that used to hang onto my leg when I tried to leave him with a sitter. If you have ever had a 2 yr. old holding onto you like that with crocodile tears streaming down their little precious face....then you understand the heartbreak. Oh, for one more day.........

Isn't he so handsome? My little man-marine:)

My weight didn't change this week and that is fine with me. I am just happy not to gain at this point. I haven't been able to fit in my workouts lately so I need to get back on track. Eating has been good, no problems there, still counting every calorie. I guess I need to re-evaluate at this point and change some things a little. I will do that after the busy weekend.


Well, I guess that is all for now. No grand bits of wisdom or anything to share....it's still just me. :) I hope everyone has a great weekend!!! And happy Memorial Day!!!

Writer's Workshop

Share a Love Letter:

I Love You

I love you for reasons

That you would never think of.

I love...

When you touch me for no reason,

When I catch you looking at me when I am doing something,

When you thank me for doing things for you,

When you say I LOVE YOU before I say it,

When we say it at the same time.

I love...

To see you smile,

To hear you laugh,

When you say I am pretty

Even though I just got out of bed.

I love...

The way you smell,

The way your face feels after you shave,

Seeing you checking yourself out in the mirror,

Your self confidence

I love...

The noises you make when you sleep,

The peacefulness on your face,

The safety you give me,

When you hold me close at night

I love...

The way you love me-

I love...

You needing me

I love knowing that we will spend the rest of our lives together.

List ten things you are currently sick of.(inspired by Jenny)

1)I am sick of paying so much for tv programming and never being able to find something good to watch!

2)I am sick of trying to watch movies that have been rated pg with my 7 year old and right in the middle of it they start saying curse words! Who rates movies nowadays anyway, chimps????

3)I am sick of the adoption process taking so long. It must be the same people working there as the ones rating movies.


4)This is only #4 and I am sick of sounding like I am whining. I hate to hear whining....but who never whines, right?

5)I am sick of grocery stores taking advantage of people because there are no other stores close enough for people to go to.

6)I am sick of everyone speeding down the highway like maniacs and I am the one that gets pulled over for doing ten over. To make it worse, the officer was young enough to be my son so now I refer to him as Doogie Houser (Doogie may be before your time).

7)I am sick of having to go pee 10 times a night...can't I just sleep like everybody else in this house!!!!!

8)I am sick of the weeds in my garden. I pull the weeds in one section and go to another but when I look back to admire the section I have already done....the weeds are already growing back!!!! Can this ground really be that rich and hearty- come on- please!!!

9)I am sick of fleas on my dogs. Digging digging digging all the time even after I bathe them and apply flea meds they still act like crazy things digging and rolling around like they are insane. I think the dogs know this drives me insane and they think it is funny.

Look at him trying to act all innocent!

10)I am sick of rising gas prices every time it comes to a holiday. I understand people trying to make money but this is rediculous!!! Stop taking advantage of people you greedy thieves!!!

Okay, that was a good time to get some deep aggression out in the open...I am good for another day now.

This is a beautiful journey of discovering ones inner self...

Yesterday was weigh-in day but I have decided to change my weigh-in to fridays instead. Tuesday is just not a good day for me. I think it will work better on fridays.

I have been sitting here for a very long time reading blogs. I have come to conclusion. This weight loss journey, that so many of us are on, is a beautiful thing. It is the point in our lives when we are discovering just how much we are worth, how good it feels to take care of our body, the great feeling of pride, and how good it feels to love ourselves even though we are far from perfect. It is when we discover that what is on the outside doesn't have to make us less than anyone else. We are just as good as the models in the magazines, we are just shaped different. We soon find out that we have more power over ourselves than we ever thought. We also find out that we are not on this journey alone. And as an adult I have realized that it is okay to let go of this weight that, as a child, became my security.... I am able to protect myself now so no one else is ever going to hurt me whether I am a size 24 or a size 6, it won't matter. I truly believe the old saying "no one can love you until you love yourself". If we are not worth our own love why would we be worth someone else's love? Nobody wants to love us if they are constantly having to convince us that we are worth it, that becomes a burden for them and we don't want to cause that. This makes us so very vulnerable to abusive relationships. I had never thought about it like that before. It really makes sense though.

This is a beautiful journey of discovering ones inner self. Our inner self is really who we are anyway. All this outside stuff won't matter in the end, but it sure can hold us now back if we let it. It is amazing, what's inside- the power just waiting to be discovering, recongnized and put to use. Have you found yours?

I want to say that I really appreciatte the support I get from everyone who reads my blog. I know I am not real popular on here but it means alot to me that I know I do have a few of you that are in the same place I am. I was about pathetic when I discovered that I had 2 followers, you would have thought I had won the lottery. And getting comments is like getting a birthday present. :) See, I told ya I was pathetic. :) It means alot to know someone is out there listening to this voice that I have found and I love reading your blogs too. Thanks guys!!!

Yesterday, Today...& some deep reflections

I seem to never have time to sit down long enough to write anything. I have all these things I really want to write about but it just never happens.

Okay, for yesterday I ate careful all day even more so than normal. I made myself do more chores than I really wanted to do. Who wants to do housework and errands? I hate going to the grocery store and my husband even offered to go. I went anyway because in reality he don't know what's good for you and what's not. I made myself go even though I didn't want to. :)

This morning for breakfast I ate strawberries, banana, and 1/2 of an orange. I usually eat pancakes w/sugar free syrup, cold cereal, or eggs and dry toast. I know the fruit was much healthier.

Tomorrow we pick Kala (whom we are adopting) up and get to spend up to 10 hours with her. We are going to take her to church with us and then go skating. I wish this process didn't take so long. She wants to come home with us so bad and we haven't even got an over-night visit yet. I really feel like the agencies could do things quicker. She is already 13 and she needs to get adjusted into a normal life. I feel like alot of time has been wasted already. But how do you express this to the people that have so much control over the outcome? I can't take a chance on making them mad and stopping the whole thing. I can't even imagine how Kala would react at this point if they told her it wasn't going to happen. We have already bonded bigtime. I am getting very impatient and sometimes I want to scream.

I miss my children that are grown (21, 19, 17). Only one of them ever calls me and he only calls every 6 or 8 weeks. They have just totally drifted away from me. Long story short....when they were 5, 3, and 1 my very controlling, manipulative, know-it-all, abusive mother decided she could control me if she got custody of my children. (If someone wants to talk about control issues I can jump right in on that conversation.) Me being too young and ignorant of the laws, didn't know how to keep this from happening especially with all the high-up connections she had. She worked with the court system therefore I thought there was no chance for me. So in signing custody over to her she finally agreed to let me see them 1 hour a week (some kinda mom, right?). Of course when she got tired of them she would bring them and drop them of at my house, or have me come to stay at her house and she would leave me there with the children sometimes for 3 and 4 days at a time. She become very close to my children's father. When he got married a year after she took my children she was even trying to make them call his wife "Mom". That is how much she hates me. Over time it became very obvious that she had become best friends with his new wife. She had replaced me with her and she was trying to erase me completely.

I want to make it clear that I never neglected or abused my children. I would never hurt a child nor ever let anyone else hurt one. This was something she did to try to control me (or maybe even torture me, I still haven't figured out which). This woman never protected me from anything while I was growing up. I was sexually abused by her father, brother and several other people and when I went to her (the first time it happened it was her father) she slapped me across the face and told me never t talk about it again. Her brother was the next one that did it. Only he was sicker...he raped me, and ofcourse again I was threatened to never talk about it again. After that I realized that it was just something I was going to have to live with because in my mind "if your own mom don't help you when you get hurt...who will?". So all I lived with this stuff until I was seventeen and I got married to get away from it. Ofcourse the marriage didn't last, when I was 20 we divorced.

I just never was able to get out from under her control no matter how for away from her I went. When she seen that I was getting a little too far away she decided taking my children would again give her complete control of me. She did gain some control back and at the same time I came to hate her with a vengeance. It has been a battle ever since. My children don't see that she is controlling them now the same way she wanted to control me. My daughter (21) still lives with her because my mom makes her feel guilty for even thinking of moving out. Jonathon (19) joined the marines right out of highschool last year but he is still mentally under her control. Jordan (17) has signed up with the marines but I really don't even think he will make it through bootcamp because she has him so wrapped up he thinks he can't do anything without her approval and assistance. I hope he does make it and hope he learns that there is a world out there besides hers. She has made them think I am the worst person alive, and this trash has been drilled into there heads for 16 years so it isn't easy to change it. The thing I don't understand is that I have been there the whole time and they still don't see the real me... they see me through her eyes. I don't think they will ever understand that I truly love them with everything in me. It kills me that they are now old enough to make the decision to have a real relationship with me and they act like it doesn't matter one way or the other, whatever makes her happy is what they feel they need to do.

So, anyway they are off living their lives without me being even a passing thought while I sit here and can't get them off my mind. I am doing better than I used to. I don't sit around crying over them anymore and I have come to the realization that I can't keep my life on hold for them anymore. I have really just started living within the last year and it feels good. I still have these days when they are on my mind because I did give birth to them and I will always be their mom. They will know one day...probably when they have their own children.

Right now is the best time to start. What's your first step?

Right now is the best time to start. What's your first step?

Hmmm...my first step? Today I took my first step in getting back on track to losing weight and pulling myself up out of this state of depression.

I made myself, and believe me it took alot of effort, work in the garden two different times today. I figure that is hard work so it must have burned a few calories plus my veggies will appreciate those weeds not being there to take all their water. :) I am still bummed and I just can't pick myself back up. I hate this!!! I do suffer from depression (and have for years) but I never can get used to these low periods. I should be on top of the world right now with my weight loss and all. Omg, I hope I wake up tomorrow feeling back to normal. I just don't function good like this. Sorry....I know this post is enough to bum everybody else out too. On the bright side though...God is still right here with me and I know he is going to bring me out of it. I have to go through it for a reason...everything has a reason as does everyone. :) I will do something else tomorrow and try again and again and again and again.....well, you get it.

GOAL: I am going to try my best to do something everyday that is productive for my health.

Sadly Nothing

Wow, I was just reading another blog (Angie's) and I was so ashamed of myself for slacking so much lately. The title of her post was "What have you done today". For probably a week and a half my answer would be really nothing. :( I believe I am depressed because Mathew McNutt's weightloss competition is over. I am just lost...and I seen this coming before it was over. I know it only ended tuesday but I am really feeling lost just knowing that I don't have to report my weight every week, there is no message boards to go to for motivation, and I really didn't know how dependent on all that I had become. Lol, I sound like a mental case here this morning. I am going to have to find another challenge to enter. I need to know there are other people having the same struggles as I am. If I don't jump back in really soon I am afraid I will get sidetracked and all my efforts will be wasted. God is good and I know he will show me the way. I am no longer going to stress about it...I am going to fix it. :)

Before and After

Wow, yesterday was the last day of the challenge. I can't believe how fast the time passed. I started strong but kept hitting plateaus and slowed down some toward the end. The first picture is my "AFTER" and the next one is my "BEFORE". I look at the before picture and I think about how I was wearing those baggy clothes to cover up my fat....I was making it so much worse. I am so glad to be where I am now and I don't feel the need to do that anymore. Over-all I think I done good considering this is the longest I have ever been able to stick with the decision to lose weight. I definitly made a lifestyle change and the challenge may be over but the weightloss journey is still going for me. I am 27 pounds from my goal, woo hoo!!! In 2008 I weighed 230 and lost 15 pounds. In January of 2009 I started the challenge at 215, lost 28 pounds, and now I weigh 187. It has been so long since I have seen numbers under 200 on the scale...it just amazes me to see it now. Although I know there is no chance of being the winner of the challenge...I know I have won anyway. I wasn't doing it for a prize- I was doing it for exactly what I got...a healthier me. I am proud of myself and I am loving me right now.

Another Day

Someone said they tried to comment on one of my blogs and couldn't. I am hoping someone could try it to see if something is wrong so I can try to fix it. I don't know a whole lot about blogger and I went into my settings to try to find out what the problem could be. Maybe it is working now. If someone could try it for me I would greatly appreciatte it.

I am trying to get back on track with my exercise this week but haven't done to good. It is friday and I have only had 2 workouts so far. Maybe I can get one it today. I feel like lately my life has just gotten turned upside down and I can't seem to get it back. I hope things calm down soon...but I have a feeling I am just going to adjust to the way it is now. It may take a few weeks but I will do it.

We left our church so now we are looking for another one. I can't go without church more than a week. Where we live there is a church everywhere you turn but it is hard to find the "one". I know that might sound crazy but I believe there is a certain place for everyone to be. Maybe when we find ours everything will fall back into place. Church is a very important part of our lives. God has done so much for us...that is the least we can do for him. Our pastor resigned the same night we left and we are so close to his wife and him. My daughter calls them Mamaw and Pappaw and they couldn't treat her any better if they really were. They spend so much time with her, taking her fishing, hiking, shopping...really whatever she wants to do. I am really hoping that God will lead us all to a church where we can be together. I miss hearing him preach and I miss really just miss being in church with them. I don't have any family outside of my husband and children so they have really filled that void for me. Isn't it funny how strangers can take you in and show more love and concern than your own blood relatives ever did? That has always been amazing to me but then again- that is how sweet God's love is. I can't even fathom how much he loves us. I look at my children and think about how deeply I love them and then I think about how God's love is stronger than even a mother's love for her children. That is some awesome LOVE!!! I am so glad I am His child. :)

Well, I could write a book on that subject this morning but I am going to stop before I get started. I have so many other things to do. I pray that everyone has a very blessed day!!!