Mistakes Were Made. Motherhood Lessons Were Learned.

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I have been up since 3 a.m. and am utterly and completely exhausted. I should probably not be trying to write a coherent blog post. But when have I ever actually been coherent? So here goes.

Yesterday, I was a chaperone for the kindergarten field trip. It was the first time the stars aligned and the field trip happened on a day that I could leave Julian with a babysitter. Pippa was ecstatic. We have been talking about the field trip for weeks. We were going to have fun! So much fun! Hooray for mother-daughter bonding!

OMG it was awful.

Yesterday was school picture day. Because why just go on a field trip when you can combine a field trip with picture day, right? I let Pippa pick her outfit and hairstyle and then decided that the grey background would go best with her pink patterned dress. As the kids lined up to go to the auditorium for photos, I gave Pippa the slip with the background choice. She took a look. She saw what I had picked.

This is when all hell broke loose.

The lady protested. She did not want a boring grey background. She wanted the colorful background with little doodles and words and lots and lots of colors!

I said no. She started to cry. And then I made it personal and turned the question of the photo background into a power struggle. SHE WAS GOING TO LISTEN TO MY DECISION. Why did she have to be so difficult? Why couldn’t she let me pick her background? None of the other kids gave two shits about their photo background. Woe is me!

Pippa kept crying. My emotions escalated. I decided that she had to obey me in this decision, or how could I ever expect her to obey curfew? Or listen to me when I told her to avoid heroin and unprotected sex? I felt scales growing over my heart. My skin was getting hot and all my shame buttons were pushed. I felt like the other parents were judging me. Most of all, I wanted to WIN.

By the time we got to the auditorium, Pippa was having a full meltdown. I tried hugging her but I wasn’t in a very loving spot, so I don’t think my hug was comforting. Eventually, though, I “won,” and she took her photo with the grey background. But poor girl was miserable, so I don’t think I’ll be ordering a photo package this time.

By the time we got back to the kindergarten classroom, I was exhausted. I needed to step back and process what had happened. Maybe take a long walk, do some journaling, meditate… Except now it was time for the field trip.

Yay!

I’m going to spare you the blow by blow of the field trip. Suffice to say: it was sensory overload. Noisy kids on a school bus. A crowded bathroom with an overflowing toilet. Kids who would not listen to their adult chaperones. Good times.

But despite the discomforts of the field trip, by the time we got back to school, Pippa and I were good. Better than good. I took her to get ice cream and I apologized for being such an ass about the photo background. (Though not in those exact words!) I explained that I had thought about it and realized she is an artist and has strong opinions about things like photo backgrounds; that I know she is a good listener and is very good at being flexible when it’s important to her health and safety; but hey, a photo background is not about health and safety; so next time, I’ll let her decide.

Overall, I think this misadventure was a good experience. It made us closer and I feel like I have learned – and am still internalizing – an important lesson about being Pippa’s mom. She is a very visually oriented person with a lot of artistic and stylistic opinions. She has been this way since before she was two, when she started thrashing the moment I tried to dress her in an outfit that was not entirely pink. I am still learning how to be the mother she needs. But now I know that I need to let her have her way on these stylistic issues because they are important to her and don’t interfere with her well-being. I can let something like a photo background go. Deep breath! I am happy with all that I learned yesterday.

But damn, I’m tired today.

I learned that kindergarten field trips are exhausting. We had a play date scheduled for today that I cancelled. I can’t do play dates after field trips! Lesson learned.

And I learned that when I experience sensory overload, my body is going to make sure I get the rest I did. That’s why I was awake at 3 a.m. and could not get back to sleep. I think my body and subconscious conspired to make sure that today I had a Mellow AF day.

So that’s what I’m doing. I’m exhausted but grateful anyway for the lessons I learned yesterday. Motherhood is helping me become a better person.

I’m not suffering.

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I have dieted many, many times in many, many different ways. All of those times, I suffered. I drank shakes, counted points, ate prepackaged meals, met with nutritionists, forced myself to follow various regimens, and above all, I suffered. Yes, I lost weight on those diets, but I also felt deprived and hungry. I ached for the forbidden foods. I could not wait to be done with the diet so I could go back to my old ways.

This time, though, I am not dieting. I have made drastic changes to the foods I eat: no refined sugar in 2019; no wheat or dairy for the foreseeable future. But I have made those changes not because an expert told me to but because that is what I want.

I have lost over forty pounds, and I did not suffer over a single one of those pounds. I lost every one of those pounds because I was doing the things I wanted to do.

(I feel like I need to blog about my weight loss adventures to sort out the ideas in my head. I know it’s important to understand what I’m doing to make these changes on a permanent mind-soul-body level. But I have so much to say, that it’s infuriating to try to distill it in a single blog post. Still, my intuition says I need to slowly spin out my thoughts over blog posts and maybe eventually, I’ll know what I need to say in a book. In the meantime, I wish I could transfer everything I have learned into your mind, but I guess that’s the point. We are supposed to go on our own personal journeys and figure things out in our own way. I can share what I have learned, but I can’t get in your head and reset all your neural pathways. You have to do that for yourself.)

(Sorry. I’m rambling.)

(I love rambling!)

As I was saying: I have not suffered over the past forty pounds and I do not anticipate any suffering over the next sixty.

Why? Pain and pleasure.

I was starting to figure this out on my own last year when I eliminated refined sugar from my diet for one hour and managed to extend that hour again and again until I was sugar-free for nearly three months. I experienced the best menstrual cycles of my life. I realized that sugar was causing me the pain of awful PMS; and that living without sugar was giving me the pleasure of easy menstrual cycles. When I let myself eat sugar over the Christmas holidays, I experienced vile, miserable PMS and this cemented my new neural pathway: refined sugar = Painful PMS; no refined sugar = Pleasant Menstrual Cycles.

That’s why I decided to abstain from refined sugar for 2019. I wanted to give myself the gift of a year without PMS. I want to see just how healthy I can feel if I let my body truly reboot and rebuild without refined sugar.

Then I started reading Tony Robbins’ Awaken the Giant Within. Robbins writes a lot about pain and pleasure. Humans are motivated to do things that increase pleasure and avoid things that cause pain. We are that simple. If we associate food with pleasure, then we are going to eat food, even if we eat too much and gain weight. But if we associate pain with overeating and pleasure with eating moderate amounts of healthy foods, then we can lose weight.

I’m not even halfway through Awaken the Giant Within. It’s a hefty tome (over 500 pages!). But the points that Robbins makes about pain vs. pleasure have really resonated with me and my recent experiences with refined sugar.

I think this is why I have enjoyed losing the past forty pounds. I have learned to associate weight loss with the immense pleasure of good health. Something has changed within me. I used to look at a cookie or carton of ice cream and anticipate enormous pleasure. Now, I see those same desserts and just think about pain and terrible PMS. I don’t want to experience insomnia or violent mood swings at the end of my menstrual cycle, so I now recoil when I encounter sweets.

The same thing is happening with exercise. I am walking and stretching every day. I am spending more time exercising than I ever have in my entire life. Why? Because I have associated exercise and stretching with so many pleasurable things: weight loss; better moods; and more vibrant energy. In the past, I thought that any time I spent exercising was time stolen from writing. This caused me pain. Now, I see how my creativity is enhanced by exercise. I have also associated exercise with the absence of pain. I used to think that exercise caused pain, but now I see that the more I walk and stretch, the better my muscles feel.

I am exercising more and eating better than I ever have in my entire life, and it feels easy because I associate these new habits with enormous pleasure. I am loving my life. I am not suffering.

Declutter 10: Days 6-10

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Incredible. I’ve been doing this project for ten days, which means I have decluttered ONE HUNDRED different things, and still, I have a loooong way to go. At least, it feels that way. Maybe I’ll declutter for another week and discover I’m done. Sometimes I overestimate how long a job is going to take me to finish. But looking around my house, and garage, and basement, I have a feeling this project will carry me through February. At least.

But I don’t feel demoralized. On the contrary. I feel motivated! I’m making progress and building momentum. Instead of feeling as if I’ll never make a dent in all our clutter, I know I can reclaim our home, day by day, ten items at a time.

I really appreciate all the things I learned from Marie Kondo’s book (I still haven’t watched her Netflix show), but in a backwards way, her book paralyzed me. She recommended decluttering all at once. I took this suggestion too seriously. Since I couldn’t find an entire weekend to declutter my entire home, I just didn’t declutter.

So the clutter grew and grew and grew, but with a kindergartener and preschooler, I never have the time to declutter the entire house in one go. I could declutter a closet while Julian is at preschool, but then I wouldn’t have the time to exercise and write, and I really need to exercise and write to feel like myself.

I forgot my personal rule when it comes to self-help books: self-help books can inspire me, but no book gets to dictate how I live my life. I take what works for me and leave the rest, because I’m the only person who understands my life, my experiences and my circumstances. Not even the most inspired guru in the history of humanity can predict what will work for me. I have to figure that out for myself.

So that’s what I’m doing now with my Declutter 10 Project. Figuring out what works for me during this current stage of my life. And without further ado, here is what I have purged from the Novak household:

Day 6 of Decluttering:

  • An Elastigirl costume that Pippa convinced me to buy for Halloween. I fully intended to wear it but then Julian lost his shit when he saw mama getting into a costume. He thought I was going to stop being mama! It’s a plus size costume and I don’t intend to be a plus size come Halloween 2019. By sending the plus size costume to Goodwill, I’m giving myself a major vote of confidence. (I guess I could still wear the costume now, but I don’t make a habit of dressing up as a Disney super hero while running errands.)
  • A bunch of clothes that Julian outgrew: two tank tops; nine t-shirts; two pairs of shorts; and one pair of black leggings. This put me over the Declutter 10 daily quota but since I was hunting through Julian’s chest of drawers, it was easier to just finish going through the drawers in one go. I created the Declutter 10 Project to help me declutter. I’m certainly not going to adhere to its “rules” religiously if that sort of zealotry would undermine my decluttering efforts.

Day 7 of Decluttering:

  • A poncho that I bought a few years again because I thought it would help me take walks in the rain. It didn’t. The hood dripped water in my arms and the arms were awkward so I couldn’t listen to my iPhone. Still, I kept the damn thing because maybe I would use it eventually. Well, it has been raining A LOT in Pasadena and I have not felt the slightest inclination to use my poncho. I’d rather use an umbrella and wear my fleece. I think it’s safe to say that it’s time to let someone else have a crack at my poncho.
  • Two girl-sized belts, one brown and one white. Pippa begged me for a 3-pack of belts that she spotted at Target when we were shopping for her kindergarten school clothes. She really just wanted the pink belt. Pippa herself told me I could give the other two belts away. Proud mama!
  • Guess Who, the board game. This game is one of my favorites, but we could not get the new 2018 version to work. The cards would not fit in the damn slots. But I kept it? Because I thought the board game fairies would come and fix it?
  • A dress up wedding gown that Pippa never wears because she thinks its itchy.
  • A too-small Julian sweatshirt.
  • Some of Pippa’s old clothes: a summer dress, rain boots, an Easter dress, a pink tutu, and a purple sundress. Sometimes, I hold on to these things not because I think my kids will shrink and fit into them again, but because I want to give them to my brother’s daughters. Except whenever they visit, I forget to bring out the old clothes. So then the stockpile grows. And my guilt over the clutter. So fuck it. The clothes can go to Goodwill.
  • The pumpkin costume my children both wore for their first and second Halloweens. I love that pumpkin costume, and I smile whenever I see photos of my babies dressed up like a pumpkin. But I don’t need the costume as some keepsake taking up space in the back of a closet. The photos are enough.

Day 8 of Decluttering – A bunch of stuff that my mom convinced me to take a couple of months ago when she was decluttering. She thought my kids would like the old clothes for dress up. But my kids actually like to play dress-up with costumes that are their size. Or, if they want to try grownup clothes, they raid the master bedroom closet and try the clothes that mom and dad wear in real life. But I kept the hand-offs from my mom for a couple of months because what if my kids changed their minds and suddenly wanted a hoard of old adult clothes for dress up? Well, I don’t want to live with that sort of fear mentality. I live in a major city. If my kids suddenly adopt new dress up habits, I can raid a thrift store and get tons of clothes for cheap. In the meantime, I don’t need to trip over a trash bag of rejected clothes every time I get Julian’s pajamas. I let these specific items go:

  • a dress I wore in the 6th grade to an aunt’s wedding
  • another fancy dress that I wore as a kid
  • an embroidered shawl
  • several fancy dresses that belonged to my sister
  • a random belt
  • someone’s childhood plaid dress
  • my high school graduation dress (it’s white and shiny and I vaguely remember keeping it in case I wanted to dye it someday for a Halloween party. I haven’t dyed it in 22 years. Yeah. It’s never getting dyed.)

Day 9 of Decluttering:

  • Two little Halloween ghosts that get bigger when you put them in water. We put the tiny ghosts in water. And they did indeed get bigger. And then they just floated around in a glass on the counter for two months because the texture was slimy and gross and what else could we do with them? Oh, hey, I know: let’s put them in the trash because Halloween is over.
  • A Hello Kitty clock that makes an annoying ticking sound. I asked Pippa if she wants it in her room. She looked at me like I’m crazy.
  • A shoe box. Because I keep shoe boxes in case I need them for storage. But I have little people. And my little people are constantly growing. They need new shoes YESTERDAY TODAY AND EVERY TOMORROW. I don’t need to hoard shoe boxes. There’s always a new one coming into the house.
  • An empty plastic container that came with baby wipes. Again, I kept it because it could be used for storage. But it wasn’t. Hello, recycling bin!
  • An old Tupperware piece. See prior two items.
  • An orange metal flower pot that came with a grocery store plant. I liked the plant but never liked the pot. Why do I punish myself by keeping these things?
  • Some of Pippa’s old camp craft projects from last summer, like a corn husk doll. She’ll be back at camp again this summer, doing all the art projects she can. I can’t keep every project she keeps. Or we’d be buried alive.
  • Stale Halloween candy.
  • And about twenty little Halloween knick knacks like pencils and erasers and stickers which we will count as the final two entries for the Declutter 10. Because it’s my project, so I get to make these sort of declarations.

Day 10 of Decluttering (whew, I highly doubt anyone is reading this, but I enjoy writing it so there you go):

  • A bunch of Ralph’s receipts on the fridge. We have to submit $3000 of script to Julian’s preschool. (And if you don’t know what script is, consider yourself blessed.) We satisfy this obligation with receipts from our grocery store. But woot woot, we have hit the mark already! So we can stop sticking the receipts beneath a fridge magnet.
  • A bag of clothes that I packed up before I started this project but then left on the bedroom floor because that’s so helpful. I moved it to the official Goodwill/babysitter pile. (The babysitter gets first crack and then I take the rest to Goodwill.)
  • Several pounds of old, dried up play dough. We made a new batch of homemade play dough and the old stuff was getting rank. (By “getting rank,” I mean that there is probably a chemical warfare unit that would be interested in the stuff.)
  • All sorts of play dough tools (at least 15) that the kids never use. This put me over the Declutter 10 goal, but since Julian was busy with our fresh batch of play dough, I was happy to clean out our play dough bin.

This is such an adventure. I’m losing weight and losing clutter in the house. The two projects definitely feel related. Maybe emotionally?

194.6

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The numbers on the scale feel a little bit like highway markers on a road trip. I’ve been on this adventure for about thirteen months now and have seen the numbers decrease from 235 to 194.6. I’m really liking the change in scenery.

I was really happy this morning when I stepped on the scale and saw that I have reached 194.6. The 200s are really done. I am firmly in the 190s and well on my way to the 180s. Woot woot!

This is what is working for me right now:

  • No Refined Sugar: I’m off refined sugar for 2019. No cookies, no cake, no ice cream. Six months ago, I could not have decided to abstain from refined sugar for an entire year. No way, no how, way too daunting, thank you very much. Now, I feel relieved. I don’t have to think about whether I can have a cookie at Pippa’s kindergarten Valentine’s Day party or whether I allow myself some Red Vines the next time we see a movie. It’s just not happening. And for me, right now, this feels very, very right. I feel as if I’m listening to myself and following my intuition instead of obeying the Sugar Beast.
  • Detoxing from Food Sensitivities: I’m also about 10 days into a detox from all my food sensitivities. I’m sensitive to about 20 foods, but the big ones are black pepper, garlic, wheat and dairy. I will ease back into pepper and garlic 2x/week in another ten days. But I’m going to stay off wheat and dairy longer because that’s helping me lose weight. I lost thirty-five pounds in 2018 and I’m very proud of that. Damn proud. But I’d like to lose even more in 2019 because frankly, I’m just ready to be done with this weight.
  • Eating Healthier Foods: I’m eating lots of lentils, eggs, veggies and fruit. I’m trying to eat more veggies than fruit.
  • But I’m Far From Perfect: I’m also drinking a ton of Diet Coke. I love soda. I realize I need to drastically reduce my soda intake and increase my water, but not now. Not yet. I trust that I will when I’m ready.
  • Walking: I’m walking a ton and tracking it on my Fitbit. My goal is to average 10,000 steps a day for a total of at least 3.65 million steps in 2019. I’ve been enjoying this project so much, that I’m actually averaging closer to 12,000 steps each day.
  • Stretching: I do Classical Stretch, a stretching and strengthening program, every day.
  • Journaling: I journal every day. I journal about my eating habits. I journal about my feelings. I journal about how I have used food for years and years to numb and avoid my feelings. I journal about my food and diet memories. I journal about my body. I journal about how much I love myself. I journal about the reasons I maybe don’t love myself enough.
  • Reading: I love self-help books. Right now, I’m reading Tony Robbins’ Awaken the Giant Within. It is not a book about losing weight, but it is giving me a lot of insights on that front. Reading makes me think, and thinking prompts me to keep making progress on the Emotional Self-Improvement Front.
  • Blogging: I’ve been blogging more the past two weeks. Mostly about my Decluttering Efforts. But I want to keep blogging about my Weight Loss Adventures. Journaling is important and vital, but there’s something about blogging that kicks my journaling to the next level. It forces me to really figure out what I’m thinking. It also eliminates any shame I feel about my weight.

I’m excited to see how quickly I can lose the next sixty pounds!

Declutter 10: Day 5

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Yesterday was my fifth day in a row of decluttering – woot woot! And I finally had the emotional courage to purge some stuffed animals.

My kids have piles and piles of stuffed animals. Julian’s collection is actually acceptable. Pippa’s is insane.

I have thinned the herd several times. People just love to give my daughter stuffed animals. I do my best to keep the expensive ones. And the ones from grandparents. But holy crap, if I kept all the stuffed animals, we’d need a dedicated Stuffed Animal Room.

A few months ago, when I was feeling desperate, I stuffed about a dozen stuffed animals in a trash bag and hid the trash bag in a closet. I chose stuffed animals that Pippa never seemed to snuggle or cuddle. Then, I waited. If she noticed that a Hello Kitty stuffy was missing, I would have liberated it from the closet (and welcomed the hero’s parade.) But she did not complain that her stuffed animals were missing. She has so many, she did not notice the sudden absence of a dozen.

So yesterday, I asked my babysitter in hushed whispers if she wanted the stuffed animals. She did. I showed her the stuffed animals in the closet while the kids were playing on the other side of the house. We both felt like we were playing with fire. Then, while the kids were at school, the babysitter transferred them to the car.

I don’t have a list of the exact stuffed animals because this was a very furtive, top secret, highly dangerous mission. If Pippa had seen what I was doing … but she didn’t. I know we gave up a Minnie Mouse (she still has several Minnies) and the aforementioned Hello Kitty (she still has at least eight freaking Hello Kitties). But I feel relieved to have cleared some more clutter out of my house. It’s as if there is more air to breathe.

Now I just have to resist the urge to buy the kids more stuffed animals for Valentine’s Day! Agh, so many cute options at stores but they don’t need any more shit. I will leave stuffed animal purchases to the grandparents.

Declutter 10: Days 3 and 4

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I’m seeing some themes emerging as I continue with my decluttering project. The first object is never that hard to pick, but objects 2-5ish feel tough. I find myself wandering, staring at shelves, not quite certain where to start. Items 6-10 are much easier. I guess I’ve entered the decluttering zone by that point?

Ten items feels right for me. I can find the time to declutter ten items. After I have decluttered 10 items, I always start to notice things for the next day’s session. I like this. I like being able to say “I’ve done enough today, and I know where I’m starting tomorrow.”

So here are the objects that are leaving the Novak household!

Day 3:

  • One ball pit ball. I tried to create a ball pit in a cardboard box when Pippa was little. But did you know ball pits require hundreds and hundreds of balls to have any sort of satisfying depth? I got rid of the ball pit balls ages ago, but I keep finding survivors stashed in random spots of the house. Hopefully this one was the last? (Highly unlikely.)
  • Two little suction toys that just never amused my kids the way I hoped they would.
  • Old Mr. Potato Head pieces. I bought Mr. Potato Head thinking my kids would love him as much as I did. Nope. They are happy to encounter him occasionally at preschool. So I gave Mr. Potato Head away ages ago, but as with the ball pit, I keep finding odd pieces.
  • Old tinkertoy pieces. Again with the toys I thought would amuse my kids for hours but alas, they were not interested. Though I think the current Tinkertoys are not as fun as the ones they made when I was a kid.
  • Old piece from a toy I gave away. This was a wooden bear head. Not at all creepy to just find a random wooden bear head amongst your children’s toys.
  • Old toy mirror from a toddler purse set. Pippa got like three of these purses the year she was two with lipstick, mirror, etc. She has outgrown them. But I still find rogue pieces.
  • Old toy credit card.
  • Four containers of expired Pedialyte. My kids hate this stuff. They won’t drink it fresh, so I can’t expect them to drink it expired!
  • Two more tins of loose tea. (See Day 2’s decluttering.)
  • Vanilla flavored almond milk. I’m the only person in my house who drinks almond milk but since buying this box, I have learned I’m sensitive to vanilla. I’m not going to drink almond milk that might make me have diarrhea, thank you very much.

And Day 4:

  • A very nice humidifier that we inherited from my parents that is just two big for the spots where we use humidifiers.
  • A cache of Nose Frida filters. The Nose Frida is a snot sucker that I had to use when my kids were congested babies. I haven’t used the thing in over a year. Hello, trash!
  • Unused tube of Desitin. Our babysitter has a grandbaby that can use the stuff.
  • Baby nail files. Never used. Oh, the stuff they convince new parents to buy because, oh my god, babies are scary.
  • Three old medicine dispensers for liquid baby painkiller.
  • Pack of sample “tush wipes.” That were hidden amongst snot suckers and butt cream.
  • Two pieces of mystery pink plastic. Absolutely no fucking clue what they were ever used for or where they came from or how they found their way into my home. They were about the size and shape of rings but definitely not rings.
  • Two Hello Kitty hair brushes. Whenever we use these brushes, Pippa cries that they hurt her head. So I hid them amongst butt cream and tush wipes and can now safely move them to the donation zone.
  • A reusable water bottle that we never use.
  • A digital thermometer. I found three digital thermometers still in their packaging. I think our thermometer broke when someone had a fever and I was traumatized that I did not know if my child had a fever of 101.4 or 101.3. So I ordered a bunch, vowing to always have a backup for the backup’s backup. But now we use one of those fancy ear thermometers, so these simple digital thermometers are relics from an age past. I think we can safely live with a backup thermometer and a backup to the backup. But the backup’s backup does not need a backup!

Whew! On deck for tomorrow: The Elastigirl Halloween costume that Pippa convinced me to buy last October but that I actually have zero intention of ever wearing.

I Feel Lucky

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At the beginning of 2018, I weighed in at 235 pounds. Given my height (5’5″) and body type, I should weigh closer to 135. That means that in order to get back to a healthy body, I have to lose 100 pounds. I lost the first 35 pounds in 2018, and I have already lost 4 more pounds in 2019. As of today, I have approximately 61 pounds to lose.

And I feel lucky.

In the not so distant past, I felt a lot of things about my weight – annoyance, disappointment, shame, despair- and none of those feelings were positive. Today, though, I have gotten to a place where I can look at the numbers on the scale and feel lucky.

I am overweight because I ate too many of the wrong things and did not exercise enough. But I knew what I was doing wrong and kept doing it anyway. I kept looking for a magic bullet. Maybe if I added cucumber to my water… or gave up carbs … or tried Zumba … but I could not find a magic bullet.

That’s because for me and my body, there is no magic bullet. I’m overweight because I eat too much and I eat too much because I am burying my issues. That’s it.

Now I am addressing my issues and lo, I have suddenly found that I actually want to give up sugar and take longer walks.

I’m not trying to gloss over my issues by calling them “issues.” I want to write about all of this. I wrote a memoir about postpartum depression. There’s a very strong possibility that before this weight loss adventure is over, I’ll write a memoir about losing 100 pounds. But I can’t begin to summarize my feelings, thoughts and ideas about my various issues in a single blog post. I’ll have to write another post. And another and another, until the weight has been lost and I have gotten a handle on taking care of my magnificent body. And then I’ll keep writing until I have feel I have written everything I need to write about my weight.

For now, I just want to say this: I feel lucky. I am overweight and it’s hard to ignore that reality when I look in the mirror. The weight is the physical manifestation of my emotional, spiritual and psychological issues. It serves as a reminder that I still have work to do.

I think many (if not most) (or all) of us have issues that need to be addressed. That’s part of the human experience. But we handle our issues in different ways. That’s why I feel lucky: because I have numbed my issues in a way that has become impossible to ignore. My body is there in the mirror, and I have felt the self-loathing, and I have heard the call to action to adventure.

But other people numb their issues in different ways. I’m sure you can think of a few (alcohol, cigarettes, sex, work) but I want to focus on food. There are people who use food to numb their issues but in ways that appear healthy. Just because a person has a beautiful body does not mean she has a good relationship with food. She might spend her entire day agonizing over her caloric intake. Or she might be this close to an eating disorder. The point is: my issues with food are easy to see because I am obviously overweight; but someone else’s issues with food might not be so easy to see because her body fits society’s beauty standards; and that is why I feel lucky.

I feel lucky that I am overweight.

I feel lucky that I can see that I am overweight because I have been numbing my feelings and avoiding my issues.

I feel lucky that I have made the connection between my weight-issues and soul-issues.

And I feel lucky that I can see that even though I have conquered postpartum depression, I still have work to do.

Decluttering by Ten: Day Two

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I know that it’s only Day 2, but I just love this project so much. Here is what I decluttered this morning:

  • One bag of unwrapped (and presumably stale) chocolate kisses, leftover from Christmas baking – trash!
  • Reusable stickers from a lost sticker book – trash!
  • Three wooden mallets. I purchased a pack of these mallets off Amazon so that my kids could pound golf tees into pumpkins. But do we need a set of five for two kids? I think not.
  • A wooden box that says “Dan the Sausageman.” It arrived over the holidays, packed with meats and cheeses. Nathan thought I might want to keep it for storage. But damnit, the wood needs to be sanded and I’m just not getting to that anytime soon.
  • Four oversize tweezers for the kids. Again, these came in a large pack but how many pairs do I need for two children? I’m not running a day care! Ever!
  • Some cheap little puzzles I got from the Target dollar bins. I thought they would be good entertainment at restaurants. I learned that puzzles are not good entertainment at restaurants, unless you want your children throwing and retrieving pieces under the booth for the entire meal.
  • A small handful of random broken toys and beads.
  • One broken musical handbell. I love having lots of musical instruments for the kids, but I have discovered that three year olds are not ready for handbells. At least my three year old is not.
  • A set of salt and pepper shakers from our wedding registry. Which I filled with salt and pepper and then proceeded to use approximately never. We have been married nearly eight years. I think its time to end the salt and pepper shaker experiment.
  • One canister of fancy loose tea because every now and then, I think I should be the sort of person who brews a pot of fancy tea. But I’m not. I’m the sort of person who microwaves a mug of water and then plops in a grocery store bag of tea. Goodbye, fancy tea! (And there’s another canister up on a high high shelf in the kitchen that is also destined for the trash. But since this canister got me to ten, I stopped and ate breakfast instead.

Operation: Declutter 10 Things

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I have been feeling overwhelmed by The Amount of Stuff We Have. This has been going on for months and months, but I have procrastinated and procrastinated. I have not yet had a chance to watch Marie Kondo’s show on Netflix but my social media feed is now overflowing with people inspired to take action and declutter their homes. I read Kondo’s book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up years ago and know what I need to do to have a tidier home. Getting rid of things I do not use or need is not exactly rocket science. I just need to do it.

Yet I am overwhelmed.

There are toys, so many toys. And books, so many books. And clothes, so many clothes.

Plus, there are two children running around making more messes that any human being should have to manage. I am trying to teach them to clean up Mess A before making Messes B-Z, but it’s a work in progress. Which I assume will stay in progress until they leave for college. So I am trying to practice some patience and embrace the chaos.

But I’m sick of it.

Today, I finally realized what I should do: I should get rid of ten things every day, for as many days in a row that I can, and record my progress. This seems like a good plan for several reasons:

  • I love projects. They make me happy.
  • I’m feeling stuck and need to build some momentum on the decluttering front. By making this a daily practice, I will get the momentum started.
  • I’m a writer, so I’ll actually have fun recording my efforts.
  • If I get rid of ten things every day, I’ll see some results pretty quickly, without getting overwhelmed. Motherhood keeps me busy, so even though a single kitchen drawer might not seem like a big decluttering project, for me, it actually is.

Once I had the plan in mind, I could not wait to get started. Within five minutes, I had gathered ten items and put them in a large box on the front porch for Goodwill.

  • Item One: A full body toddler rain suit, never used, still in the plastic bag. What the eff was I thinking? We live in Southern California, a climate not exactly known for its rain. Did I really think I was going to wrangle a toddler into a full body rain suit on the few days it actually does rain? Goodbye, rain suit!
  • Item Two: Microphones for the Wii video game system. Still in box. Never used. Deep breath, I forgive myself.
  • Item Three: A big plastic tube used as child-proofing for power cords. It was just sitting on a shelf taking up tons of space. We are done with babies. Into the box!
  • Item Four: Old pair of Birkenstocks that I no longer wear.
  • Item Five: Old pair of tennis shoes that I no longer wear.
  • Item Six: A pair of red platform sandals that I bought for my honeymoon because I thought this was the sort of thing I was supposed to wear on my honeymoon. Except I’m not a platform sandals kind of girl. (See Item Four.)
  • Item Seven: A hardback YA novel that I read, enjoyed, but will never read again.
  • Items Eight, Nine and Ten: Three very thick paperback books that I got from a Little Free Library in my neighborhood. They are a fantasy trilogy. At the time, I honestly thought I was going to read them. That was six months ago and they have been clogging up floor space ever since. Fuck it. I have too many books on deck before I will even consider reading these books. Someone else will enjoy them. If I am meant to read this trilogy, the books will find their way back into my life at some later date.

By the time I was putting the books in the Goodwill box, I was feeling pretty good. I wanted to keep going. But I think the Daily Ten is the right amount for me.

Tomorrow morning, I may actually head into the basement and find a few things that have been tormenting me while the kids are at school…

Work in Progress

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When I recovered from postpartum depression, I felt as if I had reached the top of a summit and had done all the work I would ever need to do on the Personal Transformation Front.

I was wrong.

I was finished with cognitive behavioral. I did not need to meet with my psychologist every week to confirm that I had a handle on motherhood. And I had indeed conquered the beast that was postpartum depression. But I was no where close to finishing my work on the Personal Transformation Front.

And I never will be.

This is the thing I have learned the past few months: I am either actively transforming myself or stagnating. And by “stagnating,” I do not mean “staying the same.” I means “rotting and festering and turning into a pond that is so slimy, even the frogs are grossed out and seek out shinier puddles.”

I don’t want to turn into a stagnant lifeless pond, my water evaporating until I’m not much more than a mess of mucky leaves. I want to be a river, flowing and glittering and moving forwards and onwards, turning bends and crashing down the sides of mountains.

So I am accepting the fact that I am a Work in Progress and that I’ll never have some epiphany that turns me into a finished perfect manuscript. I’ll be forever working on me, myself, my issues, and the meaning of life. And that’s okay.

Actually, being a Work in Progress is better than okay. It’s amazing.