Bring on the Haters!

You’re late!

I went to the gym this morning… It took me six minutes of laying in bed and debating with myself but I eventually got up and went. I dilly dallied getting my clothes on and forgot to put my gym bag together last night so I only left the house at 4:55. I sped over the bridge and careened into the parking lot at 5:03 only to find that every other 5am gymgoer was standing outside. I got out of my car thinking that maybe they were waiting for some sort of special event bus to come and pick them up and that I would just slip past them into the building. Ya, no. The girl that opens the gym ended up coming at 5:28… 28 min late! It was damn cold outside and waiting outside for 30 min to do half a workout was a bit of a slap in the face.

Now, do I wish I’d stayed in bed? No. That’s a good sign, since normally I would say yes, had I known that this would happen, I would have just slept in.

What I realized as I was doing my 28 min on the elliptical was that this has stopped being ‘kill you hard’. I ramped up the resistance and crossramp on the thing for the 2nd half of my workout so that I wasn’t just coasting along, but I wasn’t counting down every second as wanting to vomit or die… that’s a good sign… right? I recovered quicker and felt better than any other day I’ve been to the gym in the last two weeks so I was very happy. Altho I would have been happier if I could have gone and treadmilled for a few min.

Community

The one good thing about getting locked out of the gym at 5am is that because I chose to get out of bed this morning, chose to wait to get into the gym and then chose to work out as hard as I could for that measly 28 min, I felt part of a club. I chatted with the guys (cause I was the only girl there) and we commiserated about getting out of bed at that time, why we had to leave at a certain time (some of us have the science of am workouts down to the minute) and why this was ‘so stupid’. I missed being a part of a community like that. It’s a special group of people (my sister included.. of course it’s special!) who get up when everyone else is still snuggling and go put some sweat on the machines. I always liked being part of that group of people… and now I’m part of it again… It gives me a little bump up in drive and determination!

You’re no fun!

So it seems that my muscle memory for working out is coming back and with it, it’s bringing memories of other things. Like people being assholes about my personal changes. Now, I realize and learned this lesson many years ago that when YOU make changes, it’s your responsibility to help other people adapt. That seems weird to say right? Why do you have to manage other people’s reactions? Because it’s in your own best interest. When you make any sort of massive change, it rocks the boat of your world and those waves affect people around you. Normally I would say that everyone can deal with their own reactions to things outside their control but I know from experience that unless you want to just wash your life of all your friends and family that are feeling uncomfortable with the changes you’re making, you need to do a little management.

Of course by managing other people’s interaction with you, that doesn’t mean stop doing something for yourself because it makes others feel uncomfortable. But it does mean that you can help them adapt by adapting your own behavior to make the change less difficult for loved ones to deal with.

For instance, let’s pretend you’re getting married and your single friends are having a hard time dealing with it. You can help yourself by managing how the change is being presented. You can book girls nights, make sure that wedding talk doesn’t monopolize every single conversation and invite them to participate in a way that is both helpful to you and fulfilling for them etc… You’re not going to NOT get married because your single friends are upset but you can manage the change to make life easier for everyone, including yourself.

You're getting married??

Now, I’m not getting married, but the changes I’m making in my own life are starting to affect the people in my circle. I’m getting a lot of negativity and pushback from people I would have expected to be some of the biggest cheerleaders. And I’ve been declared un-fun for declining to go for cake and cookies and bottles of wine and beer. I’m still a lot of fun if you ask me but the ‘club’ I used to belong to (as opposed to the sports club I now belong to) is being shaken up. The security and security blanket of my participation being removed is rocking the boat big time!

People have other people in their lives for various reasons. Oftentimes it works for both parties. When one party changes the pieces around, the other party has now had a component of their life changed and sometimes removed. Often people do get over it in time and the change takes hold and the relationship evolves to continue to reward both parties.....but in reality, if you have friends who saw you only as a junk food eating, wine drinking, lazing about participant who potentially made them feel OK about that part of their own personality, it's possible that they will go elsewhere to fill their need for that. The part about managing this is the difficult thing. I don’t want to scrub clean my small circle of friends right off the bat without allowing a chance for the change to take hold and the relationship to evolve, so I will try to help them become more comfortable with the new me. What I will not do is work diligently on myself all the while consciously helping them adapt only to continue to get beaten up for it. A time will come when decisions have to be made about how people will fit into my new life.

Sisterly Love

There are few things I count on in life more than my relationship with my sister. I sent her a portion of this post that sounded like it was written by someone for whom English is their third language. She understood what I was trying to say and was able to put it into words. It’s incredibly comforting for me to know that she’s been down this road… I’ve been down this road in the past too, but I was young then and things important then are certainly not important now. She knows the hurdles and boulders that will be in my path and even tho I know I’m equipped to deal with them, having travelled this path before, she walked it more recently. I’m incredibly thankful for having someone in the world that can make my own thoughts sound coherent and who will cheer me on for every life circumstance, regardless if it potentially makes her feel uncomfortable for a minute. And I do the same for her!

Credit goes to my beautiful sister at  FittyvsFatty for writing portions of the ‘You’re No Fun!’ section!

Goodbye for Now

I have a weird confession to make… I hope you don’t think any less of me when you read this and I hope you see it as the harbinger of a new chapter like I do.

I’m breaking up with knitting.

Yup… you heard it here first.

I’ve found myself not knitting very much lately and instead of letting it just gradually slide away, I thought it would be better to look at it, figure out why and then put a proper closure to it.

If you’re not a knitter and/or you don’t know me very well, it would seem kind of crazy why I feel the need to forensically identify why I’ve not been knitting lately. I get that. If you are a knitter and/or you do know me, this may make a little bit more sense to you.

You see, I’ve been knitting non stop for almost four years to the day. March 23rd, 2009 was the birth of what can only be considered an obsession. Knitting was with me and on me everywhere I went. I’ve compiled a ludacris collection of handknits that I may never see enough cold weather in this life time to wear. I have items that went directly in to my heirloom knitting box to be saved… for what I’m not sure… but they are works of art in every sense of the word. I have items I made with yarn purchased on holiday, on a whim and on a bad day. I’ve spent HOURS scouring Ravelry for patterns, projects and inspiration. I’ve knit things for a selected few other people and taken great pleasure in seeing them in action!

So what’s changed? Well me of course.

Knitting was around when my life was falling apart… when I wanted nothing more to than to run as far away as I could (which ended up being the coffee shop down the street). Knitting was around when everything came crashing down around me. It was around when I was picking up the pieces and when I thought I was ‘better’. Then it was there when I wasn’t ‘better’ at all. I spent many a lovely cozy day with my knitting… slowly building up a wool armor around myself. Every stitch was a piece of protection that kept me safe. My sister once said that she liked wearing my handknits when she was having a bad sad or difficult day because it felt like she was wrapped in my love and protection. And that’s what I was doing for myself. Knitting was a shield I used to protect me from the outside world and in part, myself. I received what can only be considered superficial attention from my finished handknits and knitting in public.

But now I feel like exposing myself a little bit… taking down the walls stitch by stitch (oh don’t get crazy, I’m not unraveling all my finished knitting!). For the first time in years I feel like I can stand up, on my own two feet without being draped/wrapped or smothered in handknits. It’s an interestingly unique feeling. Like going outside in spring without a jacket on. A bit scary but surprisingly ok.

So, because I relied on knitting as somewhat of a crutch, I need to take a purposeful break from it. I need it to sit in the background and be less important than it once was.

I can already tell you without a bit of doubt that I will miss it and that I will come back to it in time. My life is in a state of transformation and knitting has to transform too. What I want to do is come back to it when I’ve reached a goal I’ve set for myself and knit a sweater. I want knitting to be purposeful when I come back to it. The sheer volume of items that I have knit in the last four years speaks to the incredible pain I was trying to heal. When next I pick up my knitting I want it to reflect who I am transforming to become… Purposeful, driven and focussed. We can’t stay friends if we both don’t change so knitting is going to go away for a while.

It’s pretty freeing to have scrutinized this and then written it out… Tonight I’m going to put everything away… All neat and tidy like so when it’s time to reunite, it will be a calm and orderly reintroduction.

Assess... and Re-assess

Thank you to both my sister and my friend for the nice comments last night... I didn't eat a single one of those things... in fact I ate a roasted chicken breast with sundried tomatoes on it over a salad of mixed greens and a bit of avocado, tomato and mushrooms.

Then I took two Advil Cold and Sinus and told the cat 'lets go lay on the bed for a minute until mommy's headache goes away'. Well, two guesses how that turned out!

I think I've figured out what the problem is... or what A problem is.

I'm bored.  I've never been a good cook or chef altho I can whip up yummy things to eat.  I'm not imaginative or inspired in the kitchen... Pattypan squashes stuffed with bacon and spinach? Sounds divine... probably wouldn't make it.

Butter Chicken over Spagetti squash?  LOOKS divine and yet, there's a good chance I'm not making that either... altho it has a better chance cause it's two of my favorite foods.

I'm bored of putting stuff on salad... I'm bored of trying to think up things to make for dinner... I'm bored of smoothies for breakfast... altho every morning they are my favorite thing, I'm bored of making them and buying the ingredients for them and thinking about them.

I know what I need to do... I need to nest... I need to pull out the crockpot and make things... Mexican Pasta Sauce (it's basically chili without the beans), chunky pasta sauce for pouring over squash.  Cabbage roll soup and Curry Chicken Soup.

I need to be able to pull something out of the freezer and not have to think about it.  I want to go back to a time when I didn't constantly think about food.  That was one of the biggest reasons why I didn't want to join the Zone or Weight Watchers... I don't like to be and don't want to be obsessed with food...even so far as not wanting to have to 'dream up' dinner.

The last sentance in my last post was And I want to not care when I eat it....

I do not want to care... Not in the way that I don't care what I eat and how I feel... just that I don't want to give food so much attention.  Giving it this much attention for me gives it an awful lot of power... and that power turns into obsession...

So, now that I know what A PART of the problem is, how do I fix it?

I go back to that which I know... if food is easy, I stop caring about it in an active way.  A bagel and cheddar cheese was the easiest meal I ever made.  Not the best or most healthy, but I knew what I was having when I was on the bus on the way home, I knew it took little effort, it tasted good and when I was done, I was done.  I believe I should be able to translate those requirements to actual food and putting a bunch of stuff in the freezer will be very helpful.

I also think that even with all the stuff in the freezer, I'm going to start making a weekly meal plan. That way I only need to think about food the one time.

I hope this helps... any suggestions in this vein of not wanting to have to think about food are welcome!

And I won't be eating cupcakes anytime soon... I promise!