Back in the groove

The holiday weekend is coming to an end....so sad. I had six lovely days off in a row. Four of those filled with family and fun...wait, can those two words be used in the same sentence???

Work is still bogging me down. We had another R.I.F. and I lost my manager. Actually we lost a lot of good people, but it's what the company has to do to survive. As I said before, my job was saved again. My job role will change but that's okay, I'm flexible. I just need that paycheck and insurance benefit.

My mother in-law and her husband, along with my brother in-law and his wife all flew in for turkey day. My MIL is up in Oregon and my BIL is from Los Angeles, on the border of Beverly Hills. For the latter it's like this: It's their world and we just live in it. Truly. My MIL and her husband stayed with us at the house and the BIL and his wife stayed down town at the Four Seasons. He works for a company that runs AV for the big hotel chains so he gets a semi-deal on hotel rates, but still...a deal at the Four Seasons has GOT to be $$$. Anyway, they all came in on Tuesday afternoon. Trainer picked them up and I took the day off to clean the house. I also stopped by the doctors office to get my blood tested and to get this rash on my leg looked at. I know, that sounds gross right?

Yeah, the rash on my leg is a blood rash. Remember all of that thick/thin blood crap and all that stuff about regulating my medication?? Riiiight...well, I haven't been as diligent as I should have been lately and it's a little out of hand. Apparently I haven't been eating enough salad, broccoli, spinach etc. and my activity has been a little off...so that threw my meds into the danger zone. Interpretation: if I get into an accident this week I'm toast, I'll bleed out. Dramatic, I know. I don't think about it that way. The "blood scale" is from 1-5. You, normal people, should be 0-1, meaning you're not on any medication. Me, blood clot girl, should be at 2.5 (right in the middle). Those people who have had heart valve replacement should be at 3.5. What was I at??

4.

Whooops. No wonder I haven't been able to get out of bed or keep myself warm. (that really does happen when it's too thin)

But onward, no time to think about those silly things. My in-laws were arriving!! Trainer was supposed to call me on his way home so I could vacuum at the last minute. He forgot. He called right as they were pulling into the driveway. I was still in my sweats and dinking around on the internet. Of course they didn't care, they were more concerned with getting through the door unscathed from the puppies that were jumping up and down from excitement. The week was pretty uneventful. No comments about my weight (yippee!) and they loved the house. Here are the highlights:

• We ate lots of yummy food out on the town
• I ran the Turkey Trot which is a FIVE MILE race here, in 56 minutes
• I came home after that and cooked a 22lb turkey
• I also prepared all the other fixings and served a dinner for 7, biggest ever for me
• I only drank 4 glasses of wine the whole time, all at once, but whatever
• I was the good daughter in-law, finally, for once!!!

That was it! Oh, and I got my perfume sampler from Sephora. It's 10 best sellers and they send you a gc for a full bottle once you've made your decision...still looking for that next scent... I miss blogging, I'm going to try and get better. I need it. And lastly, my things to be thankful for:

• Thank you, all of my bloggy friends and reader, for all of your comments and support
• Thanks to the higher power that keeps me employed
• And finally I'm thankful that I'm surviving this roller coaster that we call life

Being thankful

This has been an interesting week to say the least. I found out that a childhood friend of mine passed away. We had grown apart, quite a bit in fact, after high school. Well, to be honest we weren't even that close IN high school, but early childhood memories...she's apart of many of those. She went in for a routine surgery and then got a blood clot and it killer her. Very sad indeed, she is leaving behind six children varying in age from 18mos to 12 years.

This morning the company is doing another R.I.F. Great. My job is safe this time, however some really good people are being let go. After this is over our company will have been cut by 50%. Crazy times....

I'm so thankful for many things in my life, the biggest being that I'm just thankful to be alive. Having an old friend pass away makes you realize how precious life really is, and that we should be grateful and live life to the fullest. Hug those people close to you, share yourself and share your soul.

And that went downhill fast

Okay, so I'm not an extremist. I wanted to be, but I couldn't hack it. Even with the favorable comments from Sports Mama. *Sigh*... The no-sugar plan failed, of course I failed to plan...which is the first big mistake that people make when trying to lose weight on a whim. :) So, instead of sheer torture, must not have any sugar at all in my diet, I am instead going to do this the smart way. Well, smart is a relative term...I'm going to do it in the way that I can stick to it!

This week my goal is not to have any candy, no chocolate, no visiting the big ass candy bowl on the other side of my cube. AND my running partner is back so we're back to jogging three times a week and I'm doing my Core Class on the weekend. So far so good...no chocolate or any kind of candy, not even this weekend.

I wanted to "shock" my system and I ended up starving and not being able to make a rational decision. Won't do that again...well, I probably will knowing me. Later.

Friday - The 1st Day

This is the first day of my "get the sugar out of my system" eating plan. I know, it sounds like a diet, but really it's just an way of eating that will "cure" me of my sugar addiction. So, this is what I will eat today and THANK YOU Yoga Zen Babe for helping me with this!!

Breakfast - Oatmeal (tomorrow I will add blueberries)
Lunch - A can of tuna, straight up, and two eggs OR a salad with olive oil
Dinner - Chicken breast with veggies
Snacks - Veggies, plain yogurt, nuts (no peanuts though)

I'm going to do this a week at a time. I did my weigh in this morning, not pretty...I'm up to 161. Yikes. And I KNOW that I totally sabotaged myself this week in anticipation of my eating plan. For example: Yesterday I ate a bowl of cereal for breakfast, got to work, had a handful of mini-snickers, lunch was Pad Thai with chicken, then more candy bars, a nutty bar (BOTH OF THEM!), and dinner was a frozen pizza and two beers and a half of an apple...just thought I'd throw in the ONE good thing that I ate yesterday. Yep...PIG-O-SARUS Rex, that's me. I'm sure part of the reason that I gained 2.5 pounds this week was lack of drinking water and the amount of sodium that I INHALED yesterday.

I'm not being a very good weight loss buddy to FGF, but my goal is to still lose 5 by 12/12 and I need to find out the significance of that date!

Monday Madness

Why are Mondays so...."ugh"? Yesterday I rode my bike 15 miles, came home and ate lunch, prepped for my amazing home made Mac n' Cheese and read a book. Read the whole thing. Meanwhile Trainer did yard work....lots of it....and I didn't help. I felt semi-guilty so I vacuumed the carpets downstairs...and then went upstairs to read some more of my book. After all, if I wasn't watching him I could ignore the guilt.

When I was riding I had TONS of ideas for blogging. Of course once I get off the bike all I'm thinking about is a shower. Now I'm blank. NO ideas. Darn it...

I'm trying to lose 5 pounds by December 12th...I think that is when it is...I'm joining a bloggy friend on her journey. I'm a stow-away on her weight loss train. :) I need a plan, and one that doesn't involve a gym since I can't afford a membership right now. So...give me ideas people. How to lose 5 pounds in 7 weeks. Ready...set...go!

Sinful Sunday

This is going to be a short one. Kind of a quiz...comment away.

What is better than sex after getting your monthly wax? Seriously. Good stuff. Makes me want to do it again, in fact I think I will.

Later Gators.

Staying true to myself

Time for some insight I suppose...I haven't been super insightful lately. Mostly because things are okay, not perfect, but good.

Separation is difficult and Divorce can feel like a death.

Did you know that it is hard to make the choice to stay married and work through things? I've known this for years but have never given myself a pat on the back for it. I've never applauded myself for being level headed and "therapist" like in my marriage. When your marriage hits a bump, not a small 'he doesn't help around the house' bump, but a serious 'should I stay or should I go' bump it really throws you for a loop. Duh right? (I like how I start to sound intelligent and then I throw a 'duh' in there) Trainer and I have had bumpy years and this one tops them all.

At first I didn't want to talk to anyone about what happened this year. Something happens when you share with people the inner workings of your marriage. It leaves you open for judgement, even the silent kind of judgement. Once people find out that you are 'less than perfect' they see you that way for a long time. Not on the surface of course, but it's always in the back of their minds. I have been told that I have to stop protecting Trainer, but really I was protecting myself. I don't want people to see me as less than I am because I stayed in the marriage, less of a person because I love being married, less of a person because I believe in my marriage and believe that it can work. I'm not a traditionalist, meaning I don't believe that everyone should stay married because they recited some vows. Look, Trainer and I got married in Mexico, a very nontraditional ceremony....in Spanish.

But seriously some marriages cannot be worked out. If you are physically or emotionally abused or when your spouse refuses to get help for things that need to be addressed...a myriad of reasons to end things.

Did I lose myself in my marriage? Sure I did. Am I still lost in my marriage? No, I haven't been for a long time. Did I change, did Trainer change? Of course we did. We met when we were 21 and 22...if we didn't change that means that we didn't grow. However, I know who I married. I married a man with faults and he married a woman with faults. We've both made mistakes in our marriage, big mistakes...on both sides. But we've managed to weather through it all.

See, I'm babbling again. I had a point to this blog.

I think my original point was that I am a person who wants to be married, and I want to be married to Trainer. That is staying true to myself. I can't forget about what has transpired this year, but I CAN heal from it. I can't expect people to understand, but I don't have to care that they don't understand. I am okay. I will always be okay. As long as I stay true to myself.