Matilda please come home

I live with my family at the edge of an open space-style city park at the foothills of the Rocky Mountains. Just beyond our property line the park has 7.5 miles of dirt trails for walking/ biking/running but other than that there is no landscaping aside from what nature put there. Lots of rocks and bluffs.

Deer wander through our yard so frequently it's boring. I plant my garden with them and the rabbits in mind. At night we regularly hear coyotes howling. One night I saw a bobcat and a few years ago we saw a momma and her baby bear.

And therein lies the problem. We have 3 cats. I say that somewhat hesitantly right now because dear sweet Matlida, the baby of the bunch, didn't come home last night. We all know that this is a risk and try not to let them out after dark. There's not much we can do, though, if they are out already and we are going to bed. So far they have always returned in the morning. We have joked about Tillie's stellar speed-climbing skills being a protective factor against the night creatures. Well, the night creatures may have won out.

This is not good. I love that little kitty, and I really don't want to have to break it to my kids. I think they are starting to get it but are kind of in denial.

Today is Rosh Hashanah, the first day of the Jewish New Year. This isn't really how I had hoped it would start out.

Meme

I am: sore from lifting hard yesterday
I think: most of the time

I know: how little I know

I want: to be satisfied with myself on a more regular basis

I have: a great family—nuclear and extended

I wish: I could grant myself grace

I hate: the word pampered
I miss: the east coast fall season

I fear: alienating those I love

I feel: tired but content
I hear: a fly buzzing at the window

I smell: bread baking

I crave: chocolate chip cookies—not now but that is my general craving

I search: for truth (had to say that, right?)

I wonder: whether the good messages I try to send others will ever sink in for me. I regret: not realizing at the time what great shape I was in a few years ago

I love: my kids, my husband, my sister, my parents, the sunshine.

I ache: for my childrens’ future

I care: usually
I always: care about my family

I am not: tall

I believe: that I am getting better all the time

I dance: like a Deadhead

I sing: mostly on key

I cry: more and more as I get older

I don’t always: love myself

I fight: instead of being patient or taking responsibility

I write: skillfully, without having to try too hard to do so. I win: when I am happy with my performance

I lose: my patience way too often (but less than I used to)

I never: say never

I confuse: the digits in phone numbers fairly regularly

I listen: really well to my clients, less well to my family

I can usually be found: lsot somewhere in my head.

I am scared: to start internship

I need: to do a lot of homework with my daughter this weekend.

I am happy about: beginning to get in better shape, beginning internship and getting on with my life, the state of my relationship with my husband and where I am in my career.

Pass it on.

San Francisco here I come

Tomorrow I leave for a Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy level 1 training in Oakland, CA. I guess I am excited. Right now I just feel tired and like I don't want to pack.

Submitted an article version of my dissertation to the International Journal of Eating Disorders but they won't accept it because my n (sample size) was too small-- only 10 people. Oh well. I'll think about where else I can try to submit it. Any ideas?

Quite a week

Whew! Looking back at the last week there have been quite a few accomplishments.

1. Successfully defended my doctoral dissertation.
2. Appeared on a radio show.
3. Set a PR climbing the Manitou incline.
4. Found out my daughter's growth hormone shots are officially working.
5. Taught said daughter how to ride a bike.

Thursday I leave for a Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy level 1 training in Oakland. Before I leave I want to work on turning my dissertation into an article, which I'm going to submit to the International Journal of Eating Disorders. I don't see the editing as being too much work, because it is just a matter of chopping out a whole bunch of stuff and maybe cutting and pasting a bit. If they don't like it I'll figure out where to send it from there.

I'd also like to take advantage of what is supposed to be great weather all week and condition the soil in my garden. Usually this is a springtime job but since I'll be on internship this spring I might as well do it now while I have the time.

AND... I am meeting with Julie the yoga teacher to talk about getting another version of Finding Om up and running in the the November timeframe.

My life is truly blessed right now. I'm not sure what I did to deserve this but I am very, very grateful. I don't even mind so much that my revelry of 2 nights ago is still hanging around as unwanted bloat, or that I don't have a fall marathon coming up any day now.

Now, why did I have to end that on a negative note?

On a roll

I never did get around to partying last night. Instead I felt exhausted and indulged myself by climbing into bed with a book at 7:30 and turning the lights out at 8.

Today I met Scoop to do the Manitou incline, setting a PR of 34:48. Woo hoo! To the top only. Didn't time how long it took to get down.

Went straight from there to a local radio station where I was interviewed about Finding Om. Even got to plug my website (guess I'd better update it soon) and the class Julie the yoga teacher and I have been talking about running this fall. Which commits us to doing it, which is just fine. Nothing like announcing it in public to make something a reality. I will try to post the show once I get the CD copy I was promised. That is, if it didn't suck. I don't think it did, because even though I felt like I stumbled a few times the host invited me to come back in 6 months or so. Maybe he says that to everyone. Maybe he meant it.

So lots of good stuff has been going on. I think I'll do yesterday's celebrating today and then get back on the clean living bandwagon. As much as I hate admitting it, this no-drinking thing is actually making me feel better about myself. Not as bloated and all. And not as inclined to eat tons of cookies when I'm not sloshed. Well, back on the wagon tomorrow. Gotta go fall off now.

4 words

Pass with no revisions.

Oh, 4 more words: time to get shitfaced.

DIssertation Defense is TOMORROW

It's tomorrow. It's tomorrow. La la la.

I took 2 Tylenol PM last night so I could get some sleep, since I didn't sleep much at all Monday or Tuesday night. I'm a real meds lightweight and it makes me kind of groggy in the morning though, so I am going to take my chances tonight.

Today's plan:
*Make lunches, check homework, get the kids off to school.

*Meet Julie the yoga teacher for a run.

*Bake zucchini bread and cut up fruit for fruit salad and get together the various foodstuff I need to bring tomorrow. It sounds ridiculous but numbers of people (including my disseration chair, twice!) have mentioned that lots of people bring food to their defenses. On the menu: the aforementioned zucchini bread, banana bread, a loaf of challah, fruit salad, butter and peanut butter. It's at 10 so I'm going with morning food type things. I think I may also bake a batch of cookies. And I'm bringing drinks. Maybe bottles of water and one of those cartons of coffee Starbucks sells. Any other ideas?

*Buy salmon for dinner tonight. Salmon is brain food and I need all the brain cells I can muster up and ready and in fighting shape.

*Go with husband to buy a remote clicker thingie so I can walk around and still advance the slides while I do my PowerPoint. This was his idea. These are the little ways that I know he loves me.

*Staple the hard copies of the PowerPoint that I have to give out to people who attend. I have no idea how many people will be there and I made 15 copies.

*Make correction to said printout that I had already copied before my stats guy said I should says "sample group" not "sample population," which in statistical terms mean different things. So instead of wasting paper I'm going to white out the offending word and write in the other. Vaguely lame but I'm not getting graded on the handout, I know that for sure.

*Practice presentation one more time, this time with remote clicker thingie.

*Go to Dharma Mittra-style yoga class from 5-7:30.
*Make dinner.
*Try to sleep.

I need to be at school to set up my computer (and the food) by 9:30 in the morning. I can't decide what to do about my workout tomorrow. If I'm up early (by 6) and the weather is nice maybe I'll run. Or maybe I'll do my Gurmukh video, which always gets my energy nice and high in a balanced way. Or maybe I'll just run around yelling at people.

A little bit of everything.

I'm a little bit tired. I'm a little bit drunk. I'm a little bit depressed. I was invited to be a guest on a radio talk show talking about yoga and psychotherapy and eating disorders. I have three days until I defend my dissertation. I start a 4 week ashtanga yoga clinic tomorrow night. It's from 7-8:30 pm. I may have to sleep through it.

Above all else, be kind

And patient. With myself.

As the weather cools and I can no longer wear sundresses or loose cotton pants on a daily basis, I am appalled at how much weight I have gained. Or, more accurately, how much my body has changed. I am really only about a pound or 2 heavier than I'd like to be, but I used to be a lot more muscular. Meaning that the weight I carry is puddling a lot more around my waist, ass and thighs than sitting nicely on my shoulders, tris and biceps. And the well-defined abs I was so pround of... well. Ahem. They are kind of blobbing over the waistband of my jeans.

But I have decided that it's time to turn the corner and stop abusing myself by eating so poorly. I love to eat and I especially love eating sweets. It's okay to indulge at times. But not if those times are hourly every day for a few months.

I am frustrated (and I know I am the only person in the world who feels this way) that it takes time to lose the weight. Probably more time than it took to gain. And since I'm sure the gain has been happening progressively over the last year, it will not be an overnight miracle to get back to where I want to be. Although it would be nice to lose it as suddenly as I seemed to notice it.

I invented a miracle diet where you lose all the weight and get in the shape you want instantly and then need to diet and work out for the requisite time it would have taken you to get there. For example, I want to lose 2 pounds and be more muscular and toned. So that would happen instantly and I would look thinner and more musclar and toned. The catch is that if it took me 6 months of dieting and working out to get there the old fashioned way, I would still have to put in that time or else I would start reverting back to my fat flabby self. But the motivation to "keep it up" would be constant, since I'd look great from the start and the only motivation I would need would be a glance in the mirror at my hot self..

But I probably wouldn't notice I looked great, because every time I looked great in the past I forgot to notice.

So I am trying to be kind and patient with myself, since neither God nor science has gotten behind my miracle diet yet. This isn't easy. I am much more comfortable in a place of self-disgust (coupled with a closet arrogance that rears its ugly head every so often) than I am in a place of loving self-grace.

But then again, I'm also more comfortable feeling fit, filled with the secret knowledge that, even though I can take no pleasure in it, I am actually looking pretty good.

We'll see how this works out.

Stop the madness

You know how sometimes you let yourself go and use something else as an excuse? That's what I've been doing all summer. Writing my dissertation has taken all the mental energy that, over the last few summers, I have channeled into running marathons and riding my bike and generally getting super-fit. And that is okay. I wrote a good dissertation, I look forward to a successful defense one week from tomorrow and I am proud of what I have accomplished in that area. And I haven't exclusively been sitting around on my butt. I managed to run the Mt. Evans Ascent, train for a duathlon that I would have done if it hadn't been cancelled, and finish the Breck Crest half marathon. Sure my times were slow, but I am still proud of having trained for and done those races.

BUT... somehow I managed to use the writing and sitting and not marathoning as an excuse to not go to the gym practically ever and to eat WAY too much bad stuff. Not like fast food. More like cookies that I bake with flax seeds and wheat germ and walnuts and then pretend they are health food and eat, like, 15 of them. All the while typing and writing and thinking about binge eating. How lame is that? So today I sit here feeling like a blob monster with a roll of fat around my middle kind of wondering how I got here. I know the answer, of course. And I know how to get out of this place. And I will. But I wish I had never gotten here.

I generally think Shape magazine is useless but I get it because there was some promo at my kids' school. Anyway, this month has an interview with Brooke Shields, who said something that really struck me. In response to a question about whether there was an athlete or celeb with whom she compares herself, she said no, that comparing yourself to others is always a losing battle since you can never become them. She then went on to say that her best motivator is to remember back to when she felt her own best, the fittest, etc, to remember how that felt and use that feeling to help you get back to that place. That really struck me. I feel gross about myself right now, but I have had times when I feel great about myself. I am going to hold that memory in my mind as I work to try and get back there. So when I want to eat a cookie I need to think short term vs. long-term gratification. Especially since I need to start putting work clothes back on again in a month.

Take that, cookies!