Dyson's suck. So does life sometimes.

I have opinions.  I know, real shocker.  I also like to write.  I have two blogs that are painfully neglected and don't see the light of day more than once a year, if that.  I journal, by hand, because I just like to write. And pens.  I have a small addiction.  Never mind that.

So, for whatever reason, I am feeling creative today and thought, I'll blog something.  I have so much insight and wisdom, it's a shame to not share it.

You back there!  Stop snickering!!

.....Before I was so rudely interrupted....I cracked open the laptop and went to Blogger.  I have two blogs that I've started.  I think I intended to make one of them a reflection of my weight loss journey (hence the name Life is a journey) and the other, I wanted to have fun, try to be humorous, be the class clown that I always wanted to be (A Kick in the Pants).

Life happens, you know.  Sometimes when you least expect it, life happens and then shit happens and then shitty life happens.  You see where I'm going there.  So, I did have a couple of things written up and saved as drafts.  I'm reading them this afternoon and, if I say so myself, they are pretty decent.  Without further ado, I am posting one of those.  I think I wrote this in 2016, like February.  I know exactly what was going on at that time and I generally know what motivated the blog.  And funny how, life continued to suck even after such an award winning post.  And then, it didn't suck, as much.  The post really sums up how I felt and have felt over the past couple of years.  I'm not sure I would change a whole lot about the past two years.  What's the point!?  I don't have a time machine.



So here is a forgotten blog dated February, 2016.



Wow.  This has been a rough year.  I know that it's just a little past mid February.  I get that.  But it's been rough already.  Rough like a pot hole riddled street.  Or rough like wooden roller coasters.  Or rough like a canker sore in the corner of your mouth that breaks open every time you talk.  Rough. 

I'm not a religious type who gets much from the old adage that "God never gives you more than you can handle".  I believe that humans are very resilient.  I've seen kids rebound after incredible illness and adversity while working as a bedside nurse.    I don't really believe in Karma either.  You know, "Karma will come back and get ya".  That again suggests some kind of judgmental, superior higher power that monitors our actions and then doles out corresponding consequences.  That suggests that people deserve the adversity that they experience.  

I think rough years, rough months, rough days are a product of life, a product of behavior and decisions, a product of our perception, the sense of entitlement, the environment and sometimes a product of genetics (in some ways).  Having said that, rough days, months and weeks, whatever they are the product of, suck.  Like a Dyson.  They suck.

I think in the end,  our mentality, our personality and our support system is the real teller of how much life can suck.  If you believe that you are a victim, more things will suck and it's not your fault.  If you are stubborn, chances are, lots of things will end up sucking but it's your way or the hi way.  If you're down to earth, even keeled, things suck but you pretty much take it in stride.  If you are upbeat, life sucks but tomorrow WILL be better.  If you're rich, you just buy yourself the Hope Diamond or a baseball team when you're having a sucky day. 

I think we all just try to power through, do what we have to do and move on.  When the situation is over or not over but we have a little break, it is then that we look at the situation, our life and review our options.  Some of us will have a little adult beverage, some are lucky enough to be able to take a break or time out.  Some will find themselves consumed and broken by adversity.  The result really is up to you.

The Bumpy Part of the Journey

I don't know if it's the persistent rain, "April Showers Bring May Flowers" or if I just am at a low emotional time or what.  I have been plagued with feeling tired and low and my energy level is in the shitter.  I am feeling overwhelmed and grumpy, sad and frustrated.  Joy is hard to find right now. 

There was a time in my life when this episodic depression was inescapable and sometimes too difficult to handle.  Thanks to maturity and wisdom (and the power of medication), congnitively, I know that this will pass.  I know from experience that this down in the dumps feeling will pass, just as the spring showers will subside to bring flowers and greenness.  I will wake up some morning and feel refreshed and energized; I'll be chipper and joyful.  It will come.  I will get there. 

Right now, though, I am on a bumpy part of life's journey.  It's a gravel road with some pot holes and that grated pile of rock that keeps pulling your wheels off the path (only country folk will understand that reference.)  There's a washout crater running along side my road that keeps making the ride bumpy as hell.  I feel guilty for putting "my car" through this rough road, but it's the only path available to get back on the journey.  I must persist and slow the car down to keep safe and stay on track.  I have to focus and be patient, diligently hanging on to the familiar stearing wheel, having faith in my vehicle, myself.

I just have to remind myself that I don't have do this thing called life perfectly.  I'm imperfect in my humanness and mistakes are a given.  I won't always be the attentive parent that I think I should be. I won't always make the best decisions or be on time.  I won't always respond perfectly or say the right words.  I won't always have the patience and I certainly won't always keep on the path.  But, it's a journey.  It's a process.  In that process, things change and evolve.  What I think I know now, what I think I can do now can change.  And I don't always have to be brave about it.  I don't always have to put on a front.  I can be human. 

This is my life and it's a journey.....every single minute of every single day...

The weight loss journey...

Lemme tell ya a little about my weight loss journey.  In all fairness, I think I need to go back a few years.  Let's say...39.75 years.

When someone asks how much I weighed when I was born, most people have the same reaction.  Most women look at me with huge eyes and mouths gaping, waxing on about the suffering that my mother endured.  I was born into this world at 9lbs and 4ozs.  Now, in my defense, I was three weeks overdue.  I would have been a normal sized infant but I didn't want to come out, apparently.  That begins my journey with weight.

Later in my first year of life, I diverged from pudgy baby to a malnurished, skinnier frame due to constant spitting up and vomiting.  My mom tells a story of my dad during this time.  Apparently, they were feeding me rice water and yogurt (an interesting diet probably not recommended in this day and age).  My dad was buying the yogurt and found that the yogurt in the dairy case was expired.  Per my mom's story, my dad became very upset with the market and gave them a good tongue lashing because his baby girl would not be getting the nutrients she needed due to their oversight in dairy dates.

I outgrew the issue that required yogurt and rice water and lived a healthy childhood.  In retrospect and through pictures, I was not an obese child like obese children are today.  I was a little pudgy, mostly vertically challenged.  But I remember a fellow school age girl making a comment to me, one day in the bathroom.  It went something like, "you'll grow out of your baby fat, someday."  Thanks, little girl.  I appreciate the vote of confidence.

Through my early teen years, I felt like I was fat but in truth, I was a little over weight.  Looking back, I would KILL for the weight and body that I had in my teens.  I do remember specifically being 125 lbs when I turned 16.  The unfortunate part was that I experienced a prolonged intestinal illness the summer before I turned 16 and I think that is why I was able to claim 125 lbs on my driver's license.  The closer to graduation I came, the farther from 125 I became.

I do recall my weight at various times in my life, key points.  But I also know that between those key points there may have been higher highs and lower lows than that point.  I remember barely nipping 150 lbs in July 1996, after graduating nursing school and starting my first nursing job (and ending my first marriage).  Of course, that was with the aid of a stressful and  anorexic kind of summer in 1995 and additional pharmacological help in July 1996 from Phen-Fen.  I was looking at relief from an all time high of 211 the few years before.  I know for sure that I was around 170 lbs when I got pregnant, just after my second marriage.  I know that I gained 17 lbs with my pregnancy and did well at keeping the weight off after my baby was born while she nursed.  After she abandoned nursing, of course, the weight came back.  I know that when my second marriage ended, I was pretty heavy, but I can't quantify it specifically. I think I was over my "all time high" by that point.  I'm not real sure, but I think I was around 220 when my third (and final) husband and I met.  After that, the scale was not my friend.  I believe I topped out at near 250 lbs.  WOW!  That is a lot of weight for a 5 foot 1 inch gal.

I started this year, 2012 at around 240.  At that time, I began my plan to have surgery, in earnest.  I started following Weight Watchers as my "physician monitored" diet required by my insurance to be considered for surgery.  I lost nearly 20 lbs over 4-5 months.  It was tough but not impossible.  What I really needed, at that point in my journey, was to see that I could make a change and see results.  Up to that point, I didn't diet much because I always felt so low about myself and I feared the failure.  My significant weight losses had been the result of illness, medication and lies and deceit.  And my weight gains were a result of happiness, unhappiness, divorce, marriage, baby, job changes, life changes and windy days.  I just didn't feel like I could do it.  I was resigned to be fat, forever.

But the ugly truth was that I was unhealthy, developing diabetes, requiring more and more medication to control my cholesterol and I just felt terrible about myself.  I wasn't a good example for my daughter, I wasn't a good example for myself.  I wanted more but I was so scared to fail.

After much consideration, research and soul searching, I decided that I needed another, more permanent tool.  I elected to have a vertical sleeve gastrectomy.  Now, I know this isn't a cure for obesity.  And, I always hear (only in my head) that life changes should be accomplishable without such a severe measure.  But I felt like my life depended on it, my health and well being depended on making a change that I couldn't back out of, couldn't cheat and couldn't ignore.

That's what the sleeve gastrectomy has done for me.  It has given me a tool for success.  A tool that I can't back out of and one that is ever present.  On Weight Watchers, I did well but I could sure cheat if I wanted. And more importantly, I could still over indulge.  The VSG doesn't really let me over indulge.  Let me rephrase that.  I dare not over indulge.  It is simply uncomfortable and painful.  It's a loud reminder of portion control every time I put something in my mouth.

Am I happy that I had the surgery?  I am happy that there was a tool that I found that could help me achieve weight loss.  I'm not so happy that it required surgery, scaring and pain.  Would I do it again?  In a New York minute!  Is it going to be a lasting cure?  That all depends on me.  It has been a tool that has lead me to some real success.  I feel so much better about myself, not just because of the number of pounds that I have lost so far but because of the fact that I am successfully losing weight, successfully making changes in my life, both in my eating and in my activity that has heightened my success.  Do I recommend the VSG to others?  Yes but with a huge caveat.  It is not "the magic bullet".  You aren't absolved of your emotional eating and self esteem baggage just because you have surgery.  You aren't free to eat whatever you want in whatever quantity.  To make this a success, to really glean from surgery what you need to glean, you have to do some work.  Some hard, emotional, soul searching work.  You have to recognize why you overeat, what makes you put the food in your mouth especially when you don't need it.  Most importantly, you have to recognize why you don't feel worthy enough to be healthy, to be a healthy weight.  For me, I am working on being worthy of that, being worth that effort.

It doesn't all get better because of VSG.  There are some tougher issues that come up after the surgery.  I certainly don't enjoy eating like I used to, and I haven't been through a holiday season yet.  I suffer reflux on more occasions than I used to.  My stomach hurts if I don't pay attention to how fast and how much I eat.  There are real differences.  But I guess if there weren't, I'd be in the same boat, huh?!

To date, I have lost about 39 lbs since the two weeks before surgery, a total of 46 lbs this year alone.  I'm not where I want to be, just yet but I am well on my way.  I am happy with the weight loss and I'm happy that I made the decision.  My next goal is to work on getting away from these diabetes and high cholesterol medications and continue to increase my physical activity.  It's a journey, every single day.

When did this journey begin?

Well, the obvious and smart ass answer to when my journey began would be with my birth, nearly 40 (**chokes and gags**) years ago.  The truth is, this concept of "a journey" kind of kicked me in the head around July 24th, 2012.  That would be the day that I underwent surgery to have a sleeve gastrectomy.  Before going under the knife, I was compelled to do a lot of research (as one should before going under the knife), and I found several blogs related to the weight loss journey that people had embarked on.  I liked the idea of blogs but I wasn't so keen on just writing about my weight loss journey.  What occurred to me, though, was that this decision was only one of many journeys that I have taken in my nearly 40 (**coughing and gagging**) years.  That losing weight is not the sum total of who I am.  My depression is not the sum total of who I am.  My child and my experience as a parent is not the sum total of who I am.  It is everything put together that makes this my journey.  EVERYTHING!

Sure, there are plenty of blogs about nurses being nurses and moms being moms.  There are craft blogs and diy blogs.  There are beauty blogs and blogs completely dedicated to a life altering disease process.  Frankly, I just don't have enough to say about one particular topic like that.  If anyone reading this knows me at all, you know that I have a whole lot of opinions about a whole lot of things.  And I've had a few experiences in this journey called life.

So, read on if you wish.  This is about life's journey every day.  It's about my life and the lives of people I care about.  It's about my journey through weight loss (which is going along smashingly, by the way) and my journey through parenting and depression and the world of crafting and foster parenting and nursing and well, a whole lotta shit.

Hope you enjoy, at least a little bit.