It is what it is

Life just is what it is. I need to take a page from Sookie Stackhouse's fictional life and just suck it up and get on with things. I know she's not real, but there's a truth to that element of her character. But then I ask myself, "Get on with what, exactly?"

Having been through about 8 year of depression, including meds on and off, my life has changed dramatically. My personality and ability to cope has been rearranged to such a degree I barely recognise myself any more. I'm afraid to make phone calls, I hate dealing with customer service people ( I can feel my false bravado cover me like a skin when I am forced to deal with this stuff), I have no faith in my ability to work in a job with any degree of competence. I don't like going out. Anywhere.

I've gotten so out of the loop of having to deal with day to day stuff that I can barely manage it now. The long game of life is off my radar and all I can see is day to day boringness and blah that leaves me utterly unmotivated. Yeah, I'm taking a couple of classes. I'd do anything to quit. Yeah I volunteer at the school, but I'd love an excuse to not be there feeling like I have no idea what I'm doing. I just want to sit around and read all day and wait for the kids to come home from school.

This is horribly depressing to think of. This lack of motivation- is it due to the depression or have I just gotten so used to life being that way? Everything seems so pointless. And, seriously, I'm not trying to be Debbie Downer here. These are questions I'm really asking myself because I don't want to live like this.

Here is where I'll say that, despite the crap that needs to be arranged so that we can move, I am really looking froward to the adventure. I'm not under any illusion that it'll be easy. I'll need to find a full-time job that will turn my children into latchkey kids. I'll be living as a single parent and taking care of everything myself. I'll seriously need to get out of whatever ditch this is that I'm finding myself in.

So, this is all the stuff I'm thinking about while trying to lose weight. Which isn't happening. I'm not bingeing or anything which is good, though I'm still not eat fewer calories than I burn. But, I did yoga today!

This is hard

Wow. It's pretty amazing what a little stress can do to make me totally compulsively overeat. I won't go into details here, but let's just say that I didn't realise how happy and relaxed I was until stress came along again and I felt it all in my stomach. That horrible tension that just makes me shove food in my mouth all day until my stomach hurts and then I shove in some more.

I'm tired of certain things affecting me like that. I lived like that for about 7 years (hence my weight now) and it's amazing what a happy outlook and the removal of stressors can to to make one see life in a whole new light.

But I'm here today to say that I'm not going to let those outside things control my reactions. I'm tired of those certain stressors keeping me fat. I DON'T WANT TO BE FAT.

I hate it.

I CAN control what is allowed to go  in my mouth. And I will. But I will remember to be gentle with myself when I screw up.

Onto another topic.

So, I've been taking both an English and a Maths course at the kids school. It free- yay! In the end I'll get 2 qualifications I don't really need, but I'll have refreshed myself in those subjects. My dilemma is this- It takes up my whole Wednesday and quite frankly, I'm really not enjoying the English class. I REALLY don't like the project we have to do- our coursework, the final draft of which is what we'll be graded on, is writing an essay called My Life. Quite frankly I'm not in a place right now where I want to write about my life and be graded upon how well I write about it. I'm also exhausted by the end of the two classes and therefore don't actually concentrate so well for maths.

The Maths coursework is so weird. I thought we'd be, you know, learning Maths. But the course work for that will result in a sort of project/report. It's more about applying Maths than learning stuff. I've chosen to do my report on Healthy Eating. I can't really even describe what we have to do right now because it's so far out of my realm of experience. But, I like Maths. As long as you enter the right number you always get the right answer. So, I think I'll enjoy what I have to do for the class.

On yet another note- I'm almost done redoing the kitchen! YAY! I think I have one more set of cabinets to paint then it's on to tidying up the old wall (just touching up the spots that got other paint on them and filling in holes) and painting over the ugly tiles at the far end. Finally I'll need to do the accent colour in a few places. I should be totally done by Friday.

I really want to get it done because I've got a meeting on Monday with a chick named AnnMarie who works for a project of Corrymeela. We're going to see if I can do some volunteer admin work for her because I want to get some experience working in a real office doing real admin stuff. I'm really excited about it! With the way my schedule is now I think I can fit in about 6 hours a week, maybe more if I'm so inclined.

Okay, that's all I can think of right now. Baby steps!

Done, but not finished.

Okay, I've done a lot of thinking and soul searching today. I thought about what I wanted from this cleanse and what I was getting.

What I wanted: My goal was to be able to control myself.
What I'm getting: I'm pretty sure I got that, but I also thought about how living on just a Lemonade concoction, to me, is not real. I can't live like that forever.

What I wanted: To kick start weight loss.
What I'm getting: I got that for sure. I also have had loads of time to think about how to approach my continued healthy eating. It helped my body adjust to the number of calories I should be eating to encourage weight loss. I was having a hard time with that previously.

What I wanted: To cleanse my system
What I'm getting: I don't know. Yeah, I'm pretty much just pooing coloured water, but I feel very bloated all the time. I don't feel cleansed, but rather starved and tired. And the sore in my mouth has started worrying me.

There's so much I want to say about how I've come to the conclusion to stop this cleanse, but my atrocious typing skills have limited that ability for me. I had a long talk about it with Jon and he seemed to see where I'm coming from. Like the title of this entry, I'm done with the cleanse, but not finished with the process that was started.

I'm going to continue with this blog. I like it. It will still be about my journey to wellness and health.

Maybe for fun some day I'll type it all out but not correct any of my errors and you can have fun deciphering it.

Keep on keepin' on

Yep, I'm back on the wagon today. Still cold, still a bit crabby, my butt hurts and I have a sore in my mouth that is annoying the hell out of me.

I'm sick to death of herbal tea. I thought that by not eating food my tastes buds would be so happy to have tea and I'd start to enjoy it. Nope, it still tastes like grass. If I were a cat I'd be coughing it up. I need to scrounge in our cupboards for some fruit tea. Maybe that will be nicer.

That said, when I weighed myself this morning I was at my lowest weight in 18 months. I finally broke past a barrier that's been eluding me for so long. I'm determined that if I get nothing else from this detox, I will cherish and hold on to that success. And I will NOT allow myself to go back up.

We had our boiler replaced today. It's already stopped working twice and I've harrassed our plumber at his house this evening. He's coming back Thursday anyway to clear out the old boiler and hopefully he can fix whatever's wrong. Sigh. Surely he will rue the day he ever got involved in our money trap of a house. Then again, he's probably enjoying the work.

Well, I'm tried and can't think of anything else to write. Off to bed and my Sookie book :)

ARGHHHHH!!!

I can't be left to my own devices. Friday was hard, but I got through it. Saturday morning I felt ill but got through it and was fine by Saturday afternoon. Sunday I morning I felt great. However, I was starting to get bored..

After managing to avoid all the amazing food I was serving others this weekend at the Silent Retreat- despite feeling so cold and desperately coveting the Padraig's amazing and warm comfort foods- I have fallen. Hard.

I got home, had some more of the Lemonade, drank water, drank hot tea. Then Jon put the pizza in the oven. Then he left to go to Ikon.

Oh dear. I cannot be left alone. I ate half a frozen pizza, and damn was it delish.

Now my stomach is doing all sorts of crazy stuff.

I talked to Jon earlier about how it was going to be really hard to continue with it being so boring and with having to make food for everybody. Welp, I guess I predicted my own downfall. 

But, I will say this- I made it over three whole days! I've never done that before! YAY ME!

Okay, now I have to figure out how to proceed....

I'm cold

That's really the most annoying thing about not eating actual food. Well, that and everything is sweet. Herbal teas, though warm, are sweet. My Lemonade drink is sweet & spicy. But, it's tastes fine so I'm happy.

Cost is becoming an issue, though. I had to buy 14 330ml bottles of pure maple syrup (£69.30) And it looks like I'll need about 12 lemons per day. To get a lemon that produces enough juice I buy them individually and they cost 30p each (£36). That's £10 a day! And juicing 12 lemons a day is TIRING! Phew!

But I've made it. I have one more glass of Lemonade for today and then I need to drink my herbal tea laxative. Ooo, fun.

I feel a bit cranky and I have a big zit on my forehead and my tummy is rumbling- just need to remember why I'm doing this- I need a change in my life. I want to break the cycle of eating from boredom and stress. I also want to clear out my body and start fresh. I know I'm getting enough calories because I figured out how many I need a day and have factored all that into how much I drink of the Lemonade. My tummy just isn't accustomed to being un-full.

Hopefully my crankiness will go away soon. I have to work on a Silent Retreat this weekend and I don't want to crabby with my co-worker. That reminds me- there won't be another entry until Sunday night since  there's no internet a Kilmore House.

Toodles!

Ease in today, Freak out tomoro!

Well, well, well. There is no effing way I am squeezing the bajillion oranges I need to make 2 litres of OJ. I managed about 200ml, it was delish, but unh-uh, nope. So, I drank much Innocent smoothie and had some tomato basil soup. And, lots of herbal tea (licorice, YUM!) and a mug of vegan stock because I needed something not sweet.

I made it through my english and maths classes without passing out, so I'll take that as a success. I mostly wanted to pass out because I did something to my back and didn't sleep well last night. Then I managed to make my back worse by....leaning over to pick a sock up off the floor. That's not so bad when you consider the first bit of damage was done shaking a shoe off my foot. Yeah.

I had my meetings today with the kids' teachers. Both kids are great. Mrs McClenaghan told me about the day Iain stood for election to the student council- he won by a very large majority! WOOT! I also found out that Eilis reads at an almost 10 year old level. Zowie.

Okay, so tomorrow the true cleansey bit of the cleanse starts. Special lemonade all day. Here's to me getting through it with out waging a full-force attack on Mickey D's.

Long Day

Ugh, I did something to my lower back again. It's made me tired and grumpy.

Buuuut...I drank smoothies (probably not enough) and some blended veggie soup (YUM!) and lots of hot herbal tea. I'm hungry and tired but the tired seems to be something cumulative from the previous week.

I did the second coat on two cabinets and the first coat on some side bits and base boards. Yay me!

Tomorrow is the big "2 litres of fresh squeezed OJ Day." Should be an experience.

Tomorrow is also my day for English and Maths class plus parent/teacher interviews at the kids' school.

I'm really tired so I'll sign off :)

Easing In To Change

I'm confident enough to say that, though it's not even 7 pm, this day is a success.

Today I was vegan and gluten free. I had gluten free cereal with rice milk and some psyllium husks sprinkled on; gluten free toast with dairy free spread; potato veggie soup with added quinoa; more toast; a couple of gluten and dairy free chocolate cookies; brown rice with broccoli and a celery onion cream sauce made from plain soy milk, arrowroot and vegan boullion. A few fruit smoothies were in there, too. My big treat was vanilla pudding. I don't usually do so much with soy but that happened to be what was on hand.

I feel really good, haven't been hungry and only had to remind myself once of this change in diet.

My head was a wee bit sore from the next step down from caffeine intake but it was easily handled.

The best part so far has been the lovely conversation this blog started between myself and my friend Julie :) We discussed the wonders of quinoa and smoothies of all kinds. YAY!

I also managed to get started repainting the cabinets in the kitchen. Didn't get far- need bigger paint brushes and a better plan for getting them done in the least life-disruptive way possible. One door is currently being left open and another is taking up all the space on the dining table. I don't mind it taking up the table but if I can get a good plan of attack the table will be misused for as little time as possible.

Mentally things are okay. I still find it very hard to focus when I'm at home. Hopefully the paint plan will occupy me enough to keep my mind from going blank as it tends to.

Tomorrow is Ease In Day 2- all smoothies and blended veggie soup. I'll still put psyllium in as I find it very helpful for my innards.

Woo Hoo!

My latest attempt at a blog

There are probably about 3 blogs out  there in cyberspace that are lifeless because of me. Yes, they are the blogs I started and never continued with. One probably doesn't have a single entry.

So, why am I trying this again? It's a new phase of my life and I need to process. I've left full-time missions (and am very happy, thnkuvrymch). I'm desperately needing to get healthy in both mind and body- and seriously, do any of us even know which is more important? They seems so inextricably linked, very Catch 22-ish...

Yep, that's what this is about.

My first step in this blog is to record the process of The Master Cleanse. No, it's not some sort of Jesus mandated fast. It's a detox/cleanse that's been around probably for decades and I came across a helpful website to get me going and which offers community support. I want a fresh start, to get out of my body all the ick that's holding me back. I need to get rid of the mental toxins that keep me from following through or believing I can't do something.

Tomorrow is Ease In Day 1 (of 3). For me that means a vegan diet for the day and lots of healthy food. I've already been preparing myself by cutting down caffeine so I'll have one less horrible side effect during the fast. I'm down to one cup of Green tea in the morning. Starting tomorrow I'll move down to one cup of White tea, finishing off my caffeine cull on Thursday morning when the REAL fasting begins!

Phew. I can do this. I WILL do this.