I figured I should probably do a post where I discuss everything that was 2015. Unfortunately for me my memory is based purely on what I can find on my Facebook news feed (thank's mummy brain) so that's actually a tricky thing to do.
A lot happened this year that I just didn't bring up here, parts because it was too hard (or against the law) to discuss on such a public medium, and others I simply didn't know if it was even worth mentioning. I'll talk about some of it here now, simply because these things made up such a large part of me during the year, and because you're all such wonderful friends I feel I should share them with you.
The first and best thing I did all year was start writing again after taking 12 months away from blogging. I had gotten to the point in February of last year where I really didn't know what I wanted this place to be. I'd spent a lot of time crawling around a frightening website called Get Off My Internet, where readers would spend all their time slamming bloggers from around the world, including some that I absolutely loved. A lot of their vitriol was aimed at "mommy bloggers" which terrified me at the time because that was what I identified as, and the thought of being the target of their disgust paralysed me whenever I tried to write. I spoke to some of them, to try to understand what made mommy bloggers so hated, and thankfully I seemed to be avoiding the biggest pitfalls of the genre, but that didn't really make me want to write any more. So I walked away for a while, spent some time not writing at all, deciding whether I was really prepared to be such a large target, and also questioning what I wanted this place to be. It was a chance conversation with the wonderful Tamara over at Confessions of a Part-Time Working Mom that got me to dust off my keyboard and come back here. She was so encouraging at the time, and I consider her a great friend, despite the fact that there are several thousand kilometres separating us.
The other friendship I got to rekindle once I came back to blogging was my friendship with the indefatigable Karen over at Baking in a Tornado. She is a huge tube of glue for a large group of us bloggers, and she has managed to create a wonderful community full of welcoming and supporting people, all of whom I love. I am actually going to be doing a guest post over at Karen's website early next year, so you need to keep an eye out for me over there, where I attempt to be a food blogger for the day. You won't be disappointed, I promise. Karen has had her own struggles this year, but through it all she has supported me through everything I am about to discuss, we have had lots of late night email conversations where we commiserate the state of our respective lives and try to prop each other up. She is one of the most beautiful souls I have ever had the privilege to know.
But it wasn't all rainbows and smiles this past year. There were lots of hard moments, times when I wondered the point of continuing anything, and times I even broke for a little while. I quit my job at the beginning of October, and have been living an incredibly hobo-esque life ever since. I found it became too hard to balance a job and my life as a parent, and my health began to suffer. Although life has become slightly harder to afford since I gave up work, I still don't regret my decision, and feel it may have been the best thing I could have done. At this stage I have no plans to work until Miss K starts school in 2017
I had several significant fights with Miss K's dad, we attempted mediation, and nearly ended up suing the pants off each other for custody of Miss K. Luckily we managed to get past all of the horrible fights and hurt feelings, and we've even managed to draw up joint consent orders without having to spend $40,000 on lawyers fees. We come to the end of the year at an albeit slightly tenuous position, but reunited in our attempts to parent Miss K the best way we both can. It hasn't been a smooth road for my little family, and we're still trying to paper over all the cracks we've created this year, but I have hope for us. I may discuss the process we went through next year, just to share with any of you who are dealing with your own custody battles, because whatever you're going through, you're never alone.
But through all the tears, the smiles, the fights, the boredom and the frustration I have felt incredibly blessed. I can't say this was the best year of my life, because that can only mean it's all down hill from here, but despite all the crap, it was a good year. I feel stronger than ever before, and I have faith that I can cope with whatever 2016 has to throw at me.
So I will definitely be back next year, I promise no more holidays for me, and hopefully there will even be some growth around here in the new year. This website has already become more than I ever thought it could be when I first started it three years ago, and I thank every company that gave me an opportunity to speak for them this year. Hopefully there will be more opportunities to come, so stick around and see where we end up.
Happy New Year.
I come for the coffee, I stay for the padded walls and straight jackets
Showing posts with label Happiness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Happiness. Show all posts
Thursday, 31 December 2015
Monday, 20 April 2015
Why I love my electronic babysitters
I'm having one of those months. You know the kind, your four year old decides this would be a perfect time to regress back to the age of 2, your boss feels that the 200 clients she manages on her own simply aren't enough, and it's up to you to figure out how to juggle the bulging diary of an overworked boss, your backside breaks yet another chair, same old thing really. But as any mum will tell you, sometimes when life keeps handing you lemon after lemon, you need a few things to save your sanity. For the housewives of the 1950's it was bottles of alcohol hidden in laundry baskets, but for me it's electronic babysitters.
These days it's a cardinal sin to admit that you allow your children free range of any electronic entertainment that their little heart desires. To the point that I actually resisted buying my daughter a children's tablet for a year, simply because I didn't want the other mothers at the store to judge me. But I'm here to tell those Judgy Mcjudgersons that they're missing the bigger picture by insisting that their children entertain themselves rather than plonking them in front of a TV screen so you can retire to your happy place for an hour or so. (or in my case go to the toilet without an audience). So today I am here as an advocate for every television that remains switched off during the day, and video console which gathers dust on weekends while children argue in their bedrooms over who can do the louder armpit farts. So below is a list of exactly why I love my electronic babysitters.
1. It's the only time children sit still
I'll get the obvious out of the way first. You turn on the television, and your children instantly become mute zombies. They also desire that you become a mute zombie, because every time you speak over the television they miss yet another glorious few seconds of Hulk and the agents of S.M.A.S.H (and let me tell you, the dialogue in some of these shows is pure gold.) When you have a child who only operates on two speeds, super fast and at the speed of light, then you will do anything you can to make them have an occasional rest, short of tying them down. The TV is the perfect solution to this problem. It also puts a stop to the million questions children ask you over the course of a day. Suddenly they don't want to know why you're calling the guy letting his dog take a dump on your nature strip horrible names, because they've got more pressing things to worry about, like how is Batman going to save the day yet again when he has no real powers. You can also rest safe in the knowledge that they won't take the choice phrases you yell through your curtains to school or kindergarten the next day because when the TV goes on, they hear nothing else. It is truly magic.
2. They learn things you don't have the energy or patience to teach them
Thanks to the wonders of children's television Miss K is gaining a wealth of knowledge I have no ability to teach her. Waybuloo is teaching her yoga (or yogo as they call it, which is confusing around here, because that's a brand of chocolate yogurt), something which will benefit me greatly when I decide to enroll in a mummy and me yoga class one day, and my daughter can do the downward facing dog while the other children are sitting on the floor sucking on their thumbs. Thanks to the psychedelic shows like Teletubbies and Baby Jake she's learning the dangers of doing psychotropic drugs like LSD (because you cannot tell me all of the people involved in those shows weren't tripping balls the whole time they were making that crap.) The access to the child safe videos on Miss K's Leap Pad have educated her to the awesome wonders of screaming goats, and excellent physical activities such as parkour. I will admit however that after watching some of those videos I had to rescue her from the top of a mattress that was stacked on its side against a wall in our spare room, as she decided one viewing of these videos was enough to make her a parkour expert. (Either that or her cousin's obsession with Spiderman is really starting to rub off on her.)
3. You can subject your children to countless hours of lectures without losing your voice
This one actually bugged me at first until I realised I could use it to my advantage. Every children's show these days has an important take home message, whether it be the uplifting always be yourself, even if you are a barely evolved caveman, or the more surreal never impersonate a multi-millionaire CEO of a large corporation, as you'll end up in a wacky series of hi-jinx that will be next to impossible to explain to your parents, and may end up with you losing your computer privileges for a week. These days I take special note of all of the messages that come with Miss K's favourite shows, simply so that when she inevitably breaks one of the cardinal rules set out by her beloved TV, I can just sit back and say "Well you should have done what Elmo told you, and you wouldn't have ended up nearly cracking your own backside on the pavement." It hits home quicker than the hour long lectures I used to have to give just to drive a point home, and it comes with pretty colours and spontaneous singing, which is something I haven't attempted since my last night spent drinking butterscotch schnapps.
So people, please go easy on the electronic babysitters, they are more valuable than you realise. I think there are some of you who owe your televisions an apology, and maybe a little hug. Go ahead, I won't judge.
These days it's a cardinal sin to admit that you allow your children free range of any electronic entertainment that their little heart desires. To the point that I actually resisted buying my daughter a children's tablet for a year, simply because I didn't want the other mothers at the store to judge me. But I'm here to tell those Judgy Mcjudgersons that they're missing the bigger picture by insisting that their children entertain themselves rather than plonking them in front of a TV screen so you can retire to your happy place for an hour or so. (or in my case go to the toilet without an audience). So today I am here as an advocate for every television that remains switched off during the day, and video console which gathers dust on weekends while children argue in their bedrooms over who can do the louder armpit farts. So below is a list of exactly why I love my electronic babysitters.
1. It's the only time children sit still
I'll get the obvious out of the way first. You turn on the television, and your children instantly become mute zombies. They also desire that you become a mute zombie, because every time you speak over the television they miss yet another glorious few seconds of Hulk and the agents of S.M.A.S.H (and let me tell you, the dialogue in some of these shows is pure gold.) When you have a child who only operates on two speeds, super fast and at the speed of light, then you will do anything you can to make them have an occasional rest, short of tying them down. The TV is the perfect solution to this problem. It also puts a stop to the million questions children ask you over the course of a day. Suddenly they don't want to know why you're calling the guy letting his dog take a dump on your nature strip horrible names, because they've got more pressing things to worry about, like how is Batman going to save the day yet again when he has no real powers. You can also rest safe in the knowledge that they won't take the choice phrases you yell through your curtains to school or kindergarten the next day because when the TV goes on, they hear nothing else. It is truly magic.
2. They learn things you don't have the energy or patience to teach them
Thanks to the wonders of children's television Miss K is gaining a wealth of knowledge I have no ability to teach her. Waybuloo is teaching her yoga (or yogo as they call it, which is confusing around here, because that's a brand of chocolate yogurt), something which will benefit me greatly when I decide to enroll in a mummy and me yoga class one day, and my daughter can do the downward facing dog while the other children are sitting on the floor sucking on their thumbs. Thanks to the psychedelic shows like Teletubbies and Baby Jake she's learning the dangers of doing psychotropic drugs like LSD (because you cannot tell me all of the people involved in those shows weren't tripping balls the whole time they were making that crap.) The access to the child safe videos on Miss K's Leap Pad have educated her to the awesome wonders of screaming goats, and excellent physical activities such as parkour. I will admit however that after watching some of those videos I had to rescue her from the top of a mattress that was stacked on its side against a wall in our spare room, as she decided one viewing of these videos was enough to make her a parkour expert. (Either that or her cousin's obsession with Spiderman is really starting to rub off on her.)
3. You can subject your children to countless hours of lectures without losing your voice
This one actually bugged me at first until I realised I could use it to my advantage. Every children's show these days has an important take home message, whether it be the uplifting always be yourself, even if you are a barely evolved caveman, or the more surreal never impersonate a multi-millionaire CEO of a large corporation, as you'll end up in a wacky series of hi-jinx that will be next to impossible to explain to your parents, and may end up with you losing your computer privileges for a week. These days I take special note of all of the messages that come with Miss K's favourite shows, simply so that when she inevitably breaks one of the cardinal rules set out by her beloved TV, I can just sit back and say "Well you should have done what Elmo told you, and you wouldn't have ended up nearly cracking your own backside on the pavement." It hits home quicker than the hour long lectures I used to have to give just to drive a point home, and it comes with pretty colours and spontaneous singing, which is something I haven't attempted since my last night spent drinking butterscotch schnapps.
So people, please go easy on the electronic babysitters, they are more valuable than you realise. I think there are some of you who owe your televisions an apology, and maybe a little hug. Go ahead, I won't judge.
Monday, 11 November 2013
I love it!!
I'm sure you're all surprised to see me writing right now. Especially given that lately the only time I hit this old blog up is when summoned by the great Karen at Baking in a Tornado to write for one of her awesome series. Well it's almost 11 o'clock at night, and I'm the only one still out of bed, and I've suddenly been hit with the urge to write to you guys. So firstly sorry for my neglect, and thank you for your patience. I hope tonight's inspiration is not short lived and that I can get back into the swing of things. Especially since I feel so good right now. It's been a long time in the making but I can honestly say I love life right now. It feels amazing to finally say that I am happy. This doesn't mean I spend my days singing from the roof tops, or even that I smile 24 hours a day. I still have bad moods, I still get tired, and I have a chest cold right now, so even at my absolute best things aren't perfect, but they are still pretty damned good.
So just because I am such a giving and thoughtful person, I thought I'd share the love with you guys, and let you know what the go is around here, and why I'm so darn happy now. So the first bit of good news is I finally finished my studies. I have no idea whether or not I've passed yet, I won't get the results from the final exam until next month, but I've submitted my application to graduate next year with the rest of the class, and all I can do now is sit and wait for some kind of confirmation. The final exam was nothing short of a shambles, first off I missed the exam date because of a screw up with messages from the school, and I had to organise with my tutor to "re-sit" the exam. Then on the day I had the exam booked the servers at the TAFE all crashed, so I couldn't access the system to actually take the exam. The joys of being totally reliant on modern technology. I was offered the choice of coming back another day, or going somewhere with free wi-fi and a borrowed laptop and going ahead with the exam on the day. Given I was already two weeks late to sit, I decided against trying again another day and my tutor and I headed of to McDonalds and I took my exam accompanied by the smell of fry oil and pre-schoolers enjoying a trip out with mum and dad. I can't say it was my easiest exam to get through, but it certainly was the most memorable. I'm sure I'll spend my twilight years regaling my grandchildren with stories of the day grandma took her final exam next to the play equipment at Maccas. Then we will all sit back and laugh at my wild antics as a youngin'.
Now I'm sure you're all thinking I decided to sit back and enjoy all the free time that not being a student affords me. That would be true except for two things. Firstly I never actually studied until the eleventh hour the whole year, so there hasn't actually been an increase in free time for me, and secondly, I have gone completely insane and decided to fill in the non-existent free time by opening up a business. I am now an independent Kaszazz consultant, which means that I get paid to make scrap book layouts and beautiful cards, and then sell the products that I used to make my art. It's still early days at the moment, but I've already held one workshop which was open to general public, and started regular private workshops for a select few people (read my big sister and sister in law.) Once I'm more confident in the stock I'm actually meant to be selling and the skills I need to hold the workshops, I'll start expanding and actually hold more public workshops and hopefully make more sales. It has been a huge learning experience already, and it can only go up from here. Except for my bank account, that will definitely keep shrinking because I can't help but keep buying every thing I see in the catalog.
I'm still also employed part time at the law firm, and despite it being as depressing as you could imagine spending your days facilitating other people's divorces and custody battles, I am loving being so busy eight hours a day. I start running the minute I get in the door at 8:45 and I don't stop until 5:30 some nights. It's hectic, stressful and some times confronting, but at the end of the day I walk out the door knowing that I've done a good day's work and earned my wage for the day. And the screams and cuddles I get from Miss K when I go to pick her up are always the best part of the day. And all of the worrying I did before I started that she wouldn't adjust, or that it would make life difficult for her were all for nothing. She is of course in the best hands possible being left in the care of mum and Sam, and I usually spend the first five minutes at my sister's house being shown the latest art project they did together, or hearing the new words she learned today. She's always so proud to show off to me, and it's great to see her getting to try things that she'd never get to do with me.
The rest of life with Miss K is pretty peachy too right now. Of course she's a typical 2 year old, which means she pushes her luck every chance she gets, trying to learn her boundaries and expand them when she can. We're still learning every day what it means to be a mum and daughter, and our relationship is constantly evolving, and of course I have to do a lot of mean things as her mum, like make sure she eats vegetables on a semi-regular basis, and pick her nose when she has a cold, and enforce rules, even when I don't feel like being the bad cop today, and there are days where it takes a lot of chanting "it's for her own good" to myself to get through another temper tantrum, but we always come out the end of it happy.
I am so proud of the person Miss K is becoming, she is so fearless and she charges through life head first at all times. She loves meeting new people and charms the pants off everyone the moment she speaks to them. She actually met her Nonno for the first time a month ago, Ady finally having reconciled with his father and they are speaking again for the first time in years. I'd never met his father the whole time we dated, and I wasn't even sure if he was aware when Miss K was born, so we're making up for a lot of lost time at the moment, and in December Miss K and I have been summoned to meet the rest of his family at their annual family reunion. So far Nonno seems to be a doting grandfather, and there are always presents for Miss K whenever we visit, and mysteriously they are always perfectly suited to her. We went down this weekend and there were colouring pencils and Little People figurines waiting in Nonno's kitchen for her. I have no idea how he knows exactly what to get her, but Miss K certainly always appreciates the gifts and I appreciate the effort and thought.
Things with Ady are going smoothly at the moment, and we've managed to navigate our way through several issues without everything dissolving into screaming matches and name calling lately. I can't say that everything there is perfect, because there are still all the reasons why we never survived as a couple staring us in the face, which does sometimes make it hard to get along, but we're trying to work together for Miss K's sake and so far it's going ok. We're now starting to talk about Miss K staying with her dad by herself, and we're aiming for starting the visits after Miss K turns 3, so I've now given myself something new to stress about. Yay!
Well that's all from me for now, I should probably get to bed too given I need to be up in 7 hours to get ready for work again, the daily grind continues. I hope to be back again soon, but until then, stay awesome.
So just because I am such a giving and thoughtful person, I thought I'd share the love with you guys, and let you know what the go is around here, and why I'm so darn happy now. So the first bit of good news is I finally finished my studies. I have no idea whether or not I've passed yet, I won't get the results from the final exam until next month, but I've submitted my application to graduate next year with the rest of the class, and all I can do now is sit and wait for some kind of confirmation. The final exam was nothing short of a shambles, first off I missed the exam date because of a screw up with messages from the school, and I had to organise with my tutor to "re-sit" the exam. Then on the day I had the exam booked the servers at the TAFE all crashed, so I couldn't access the system to actually take the exam. The joys of being totally reliant on modern technology. I was offered the choice of coming back another day, or going somewhere with free wi-fi and a borrowed laptop and going ahead with the exam on the day. Given I was already two weeks late to sit, I decided against trying again another day and my tutor and I headed of to McDonalds and I took my exam accompanied by the smell of fry oil and pre-schoolers enjoying a trip out with mum and dad. I can't say it was my easiest exam to get through, but it certainly was the most memorable. I'm sure I'll spend my twilight years regaling my grandchildren with stories of the day grandma took her final exam next to the play equipment at Maccas. Then we will all sit back and laugh at my wild antics as a youngin'.
Now I'm sure you're all thinking I decided to sit back and enjoy all the free time that not being a student affords me. That would be true except for two things. Firstly I never actually studied until the eleventh hour the whole year, so there hasn't actually been an increase in free time for me, and secondly, I have gone completely insane and decided to fill in the non-existent free time by opening up a business. I am now an independent Kaszazz consultant, which means that I get paid to make scrap book layouts and beautiful cards, and then sell the products that I used to make my art. It's still early days at the moment, but I've already held one workshop which was open to general public, and started regular private workshops for a select few people (read my big sister and sister in law.) Once I'm more confident in the stock I'm actually meant to be selling and the skills I need to hold the workshops, I'll start expanding and actually hold more public workshops and hopefully make more sales. It has been a huge learning experience already, and it can only go up from here. Except for my bank account, that will definitely keep shrinking because I can't help but keep buying every thing I see in the catalog.
I'm still also employed part time at the law firm, and despite it being as depressing as you could imagine spending your days facilitating other people's divorces and custody battles, I am loving being so busy eight hours a day. I start running the minute I get in the door at 8:45 and I don't stop until 5:30 some nights. It's hectic, stressful and some times confronting, but at the end of the day I walk out the door knowing that I've done a good day's work and earned my wage for the day. And the screams and cuddles I get from Miss K when I go to pick her up are always the best part of the day. And all of the worrying I did before I started that she wouldn't adjust, or that it would make life difficult for her were all for nothing. She is of course in the best hands possible being left in the care of mum and Sam, and I usually spend the first five minutes at my sister's house being shown the latest art project they did together, or hearing the new words she learned today. She's always so proud to show off to me, and it's great to see her getting to try things that she'd never get to do with me.
The rest of life with Miss K is pretty peachy too right now. Of course she's a typical 2 year old, which means she pushes her luck every chance she gets, trying to learn her boundaries and expand them when she can. We're still learning every day what it means to be a mum and daughter, and our relationship is constantly evolving, and of course I have to do a lot of mean things as her mum, like make sure she eats vegetables on a semi-regular basis, and pick her nose when she has a cold, and enforce rules, even when I don't feel like being the bad cop today, and there are days where it takes a lot of chanting "it's for her own good" to myself to get through another temper tantrum, but we always come out the end of it happy.
I am so proud of the person Miss K is becoming, she is so fearless and she charges through life head first at all times. She loves meeting new people and charms the pants off everyone the moment she speaks to them. She actually met her Nonno for the first time a month ago, Ady finally having reconciled with his father and they are speaking again for the first time in years. I'd never met his father the whole time we dated, and I wasn't even sure if he was aware when Miss K was born, so we're making up for a lot of lost time at the moment, and in December Miss K and I have been summoned to meet the rest of his family at their annual family reunion. So far Nonno seems to be a doting grandfather, and there are always presents for Miss K whenever we visit, and mysteriously they are always perfectly suited to her. We went down this weekend and there were colouring pencils and Little People figurines waiting in Nonno's kitchen for her. I have no idea how he knows exactly what to get her, but Miss K certainly always appreciates the gifts and I appreciate the effort and thought.
Things with Ady are going smoothly at the moment, and we've managed to navigate our way through several issues without everything dissolving into screaming matches and name calling lately. I can't say that everything there is perfect, because there are still all the reasons why we never survived as a couple staring us in the face, which does sometimes make it hard to get along, but we're trying to work together for Miss K's sake and so far it's going ok. We're now starting to talk about Miss K staying with her dad by herself, and we're aiming for starting the visits after Miss K turns 3, so I've now given myself something new to stress about. Yay!
Well that's all from me for now, I should probably get to bed too given I need to be up in 7 hours to get ready for work again, the daily grind continues. I hope to be back again soon, but until then, stay awesome.
Friday, 15 March 2013
Playing High/Low
When it comes to being a blogger, days like today are hard. It wasn't a very good day for Miss K and me. There was nothing really horrible, or tragic that happened to us, we were both just a bit touchy, and Miss K was clingy and whiny, and come dinner time she pitched an absolute fit and refused flat out to eat her pumpkin soup and ended up going to bed without any dinner. (Don't worry, I let her get up for a sandwich and a drink later on.)
But everyone has bad days, you say, not just us bloggers. Yes this is true, but non-bloggers don't have to come up with something interesting and compelling for others to read after a day of tantrums and frustration. But because I'm an adult and wearing my big girl panties today, I have decided not to dwell on the crap, and instead focus on the positive things that happened today. My big sister plays high/low with her kids at the end of the day, each person has to say what was the highlight and the lowlight of their day. Since I have already covered the lows of my day, I've decided to spend the rest of this blog focusing on the highlights. So here in no particular order are some of the nice things that happened with me and Miss K today.
- A computer game I ordered on the weekend finally showed up in my mailbox today giving me the high I always get whenever I get mail, and then giving me something to do while Miss K took her nap
- My big sister came over and visited with my nephew so I got to watch the kids play together for a couple of hours
- One of my cousins also came over for a visit, and her daughter who is 7 months younger than Miss K also got a chance to play with the kids
- Bones was on telly tonight, so I got to spend 2 hours watching one of my favourite shows
- When Miss K finally got up for dinner she was in such a great mood we sat together in the lounge room and played together for an hour before I sent her back to bed
- Miss K spent 2 hours doing pirate therapy today for the first time, and she didn't mind the extra hour wearing the eye patch. I love that she can be so flexible to change some times
- Miss K behaved herself so beautifully while we were shopping for dinner tonight. It has taken a few weeks, but she finally knows that if she refuses to get in the trolley she has to stay next to me all the time, and not run around disturbing all the other shoppers. We get quite a few people stop to chat to Miss K when we're shopping and I think it's because she's so well behaved
- Miss K actually got up and danced to one of the songs on Play School this afternoon. Of course it was a song about pirates, but normally she doesn't move if there is music playing on telly and I love that she is finally realizing that she can dance to this music just like the stuff that comes out of the CD player
Well when you look at it that way, the good parts of the day far outweigh the bad parts, and it is a lot more fun remembering the nice times we had today.
And now, for no reason other than it makes me smile, here is a photo of Miss K on the phone.
Well that's it for me, I have places to see and people to do tomorrow so I need to get some rest. I'll be back again next time, but until then stay awesome.
Wednesday, 1 August 2012
Fighting fat (or the nine steps to a new you)
I'm trying to type very quietly today as mum is attempting to have a nanna nap on the couch next to me right now, but I have something I have to get off my chest right now so it can't wait till she's up and getting ready for work.
Anyone who has been a regular reader of mine would know that I try to eat a healthy and balanced diet, and I attempt during the warmer months to do some form of semi regular exercise. Well recently I discovered a support group on Facebook for people trying to lose weight, and I joined up to see if they would be able to keep me motivated in my own winter slump. Interestingly enough, the girl who started up the page is actually a neighbour of mine, but we didn't realise we lived so close to each other until after I joined her group. We now chat on an almost daily basis, and I think I can safely say I have made a new friend which is wonderful.
As for the group itself, while it is wonderful to see so many like minded people from all over the world joining together to support each other in our quests to get healthy, it is sad to see so many people who are incredibly misinformed about the route to good health, and who are also riddled with so much self hatred because of how they look. Now as I have mentioned in an earlier post here, before I had Miss K, I was in exactly the same boat and filled with the same hatred of my body for becoming a lumpy mass of tubbiness, but once I became pregnant and realised what a miracle the human body can be, I learned to accept that I will never look like the photoshopped models on the front of all the magazines and love my body for the incredible machine it is. That doesn't mean that I don't still want to be healthy and fit, it just means that I am more forgiving of the various lumps and bumps that have shown up as I got older, and instead of just being depressed that I am what the health profession considers obese (but I just consider overweight) I have decided to accept what I cannot change, change the things I can, and love all of it no matter what.
So with that in mind, I have decided to share with you my wonderful readers some of the steps I have had to take in the past to get to where I am today, still not perfect, and still trying to lose weight, but not filled with self loathing and pity.
1. Love yourself warts and all
I was always told that no one can love you until you love yourself, and I believe this with all of my heart. Love has to come from within yourself before it can come from anywhere else. If you are unhappy with your appearance, sure make the changes you feel are necessary to fix this, but make sure it is for the right reason. If you are doing it so that you feel better about yourself and to be healthier for yourself then this is good. If you are doing it so that other people will like you, then this is bad. You could be the skinniest person in the world, but if you think that you are worthless, then that is what everyone else is going to think about you too.
2. Treat your body like the wonder it is
The human body is truly a work of wonder. We have so many different mechanisms, all which have a specific function which is necessary to operate on a daily basis. Your body is working 24/7 in ways that sometimes you aren't even aware of. Things we don't even think about like the way your skin absorbs vitamin d from the sun, which is necessary for a healthy skin, organs and immune system. Then there is the wonder of thinks like reproduction which is just mind boggling, the fact that we need our bodies to propagate the species and avoid extinction. All of this makes for one awesome machine which should be respected and loved. I used to treat my body less as a temple and more like a three car garage before I got healthy, and I paid for it big time. No energy, unhealthy skin, digestion problems and all other kinds of nasty ailments have plagued me for years. I still get a nasty reminder of what my life was like if I relax my eating and sleep habits too much, and it is a very effective motivator to get back to the healthy lifestyle which make me feel so much better.
3. Learn about the foods you are putting into your body
In order to learn exactly how much fat I was eating on a daily basis, I started to use an online food diary which not only tracked what I was eating, but exactly how many calories was in each piece of food I put in my mouth, as well as the vitamins and minerals I was getting on a daily basis. This was an incredible eye opener for me, I couldn't believe that if I had one bad day and ate take away for dinner instead of cooking something at home, my calorie intake would sky rocket out of control. Given that there are calories in absolutely everything we eat, and the human body needs on average only 1200 calories a day in order to function, this was proof positive that I needed to make big changes to my diet. But that hasn't meant that I can't eat all the foods I still love, just that they have now become sometimes foods instead of every day foods. And I have actually found that after a while I don't enjoy my take away meals like I used too. Being aware of their incredibly high fat content tends to keep me away a lot more than it used to. For anyone looking for a good food diary, as well as an exercise diary, check out www.myfitnesspal.com. It even tells you exactly how many calories you need to burn a day in order to lose weight, as well as how much calories you do burn when you exercise.
4. Take all the help you can get
It is incredibly hard to stay motivated when you are on your own. There were times that the only reason I went out and played tennis with my little sister is because she was the one who called me every weekend to remind me to come get her and go out for a run around. And at the end of the day I was grateful that she had hauled me off my lazy butt for 45 minutes of sweating and panting because I felt great. I used to live with a friend from high school, and she would make me put on my walking shoes every night and we would go for a walk around town, even in the freezing cold of winter. Again I hated her while I was putting on my shoes, but I always felt so refreshed when we finally got home, our noses pink and numb from the cold air. Mum and I are each other's cheerleader this time, and even though neither of us can motivate ourselves to work harder, we are happy to support each other and give pep talks whenever they are needed. It is much harder to go easy on yourself when others are watching you, and sometimes that is all the motivation you need.
5. Stop caring what every one else thinks
This one was a big deal for me, because I spent the first twenty years of my life caring about what everyone else thought, and completely ignoring my own opinions, or changing my opinions just so that they fit in with everyone else's. But all that meant was that I was a complete doormat, and not really being true to myself. At the end of the day, the only person you spend 24 hours a day with is yourself. The only person who can hear all the little voices in your head is yourself, so why would you listen to the voices in someone else's head before your own? Learn to own the voice inside your head and listen to what it is saying about you. If you don't like what you hear, either change the track or change what you don't like about yourself.
6. Become more selfish
This doesn't mean always take more for yourself before giving to other people, this means start taking care of yourself before you do anything else. For any of my readers who are mums, you will know how hard this one is because our job description means that we put our kids before absolutely everything else. Our hunger, our appearance, our bladders always come out second to the children. But at the end of the day if you want anything for yourself, you are going to have to be the one who does it. I'm lucky because my child is still at an age where she needs 14 hours of sleep a day, so I only need to put her first for 10 hours a day. And when she is in bed, or happily amusing herself with the contents of our plastic cupboard, that gives me plenty of time to stop and have a coffee, or read the pull outs from the Sunday newspaper. And sometimes being selfish can mean refusing to listen to someone's constant criticisms or complaints, or something as simple as making sure you get a good night's rest.
7. Don't take life too seriously
Laughter really is the best medicine in the world. Nothing gets me out of a slump like having a giggle with Miss K. Sometimes it is hard to find the humour in a situation, but if you can learn to laugh at yourself then life gets a whole lot easier. It is too easy to become stressed these days, people work longer hours, women have more things to juggle on a daily basis, the news broadcasters are hell bent on trying to convince us that the world is coming to an end. Sometimes I find myself becoming too focused on unimportant details and stressing myself out, and when I do, I have to take a step back and tell myself to chill out and relax because at the end of the day is it really important that everything is perfect? or is it more important to be happy and calm?
8. Stop beating yourself up
This is a big one for people who are trying to diet. Every day someone in my weight loss support group posts that they have fallen off the wagon and totally hate themselves for being weak willed. I keep telling them over and over again that everyone deserves a treat, otherwise being good is too hard. But every day there is someone else who needs to be told to go easy on themselves. We seem to forget that we are all human, and as a whole, the human race is flawed. There is no one out there who is perfect, and convincing yourself that the only way to prove that you have succeeded is that you can go the rest of your life without eating a chocolate bar, or you are the absolute best at whatever it is you are good at is only setting yourself up to fail. If there are two things that you need to remember to survive in this world, they are that everyone needs chocolate, and no matter how good you are at something, there will always be someone who is better at it than you. This may sound completely depressing, but it can also be incredibly freeing. It doesn't mean never try to be good at anything, just that you need to learn to be the best that YOU can be, not the best that someone else can be. Sure if you have done something absolutely reprehensible like had sex with Mickey Rourke, or head-butted a small child to get to the last biscuit in the pack, then beat yourself up, but otherwise, go easy on yourself.
9. Accept that there are no quick fixes
This one makes me angry. Everyone is looking for the short-cut in life. The get rich quick scheme, the lose weight fast scheme, the learn a new skill in a day scheme. The short answer is there is no such thing. Anything worth doing in this life takes time and effort, and if you really want to be proud of yourself at the end of the day, the only way to do it is the hard way. The sooner you accept this, the sooner you can get on your way to mastering whatever it is you want to do.
Well I'll get off my soapbox for now, but I hope that there is something here that you my wonderful readers can take away from my lecture today. If anyone else has a secret to success that has helped them, I'd love to hear it.
Anyone who has been a regular reader of mine would know that I try to eat a healthy and balanced diet, and I attempt during the warmer months to do some form of semi regular exercise. Well recently I discovered a support group on Facebook for people trying to lose weight, and I joined up to see if they would be able to keep me motivated in my own winter slump. Interestingly enough, the girl who started up the page is actually a neighbour of mine, but we didn't realise we lived so close to each other until after I joined her group. We now chat on an almost daily basis, and I think I can safely say I have made a new friend which is wonderful.
As for the group itself, while it is wonderful to see so many like minded people from all over the world joining together to support each other in our quests to get healthy, it is sad to see so many people who are incredibly misinformed about the route to good health, and who are also riddled with so much self hatred because of how they look. Now as I have mentioned in an earlier post here, before I had Miss K, I was in exactly the same boat and filled with the same hatred of my body for becoming a lumpy mass of tubbiness, but once I became pregnant and realised what a miracle the human body can be, I learned to accept that I will never look like the photoshopped models on the front of all the magazines and love my body for the incredible machine it is. That doesn't mean that I don't still want to be healthy and fit, it just means that I am more forgiving of the various lumps and bumps that have shown up as I got older, and instead of just being depressed that I am what the health profession considers obese (but I just consider overweight) I have decided to accept what I cannot change, change the things I can, and love all of it no matter what.
So with that in mind, I have decided to share with you my wonderful readers some of the steps I have had to take in the past to get to where I am today, still not perfect, and still trying to lose weight, but not filled with self loathing and pity.
1. Love yourself warts and all
I was always told that no one can love you until you love yourself, and I believe this with all of my heart. Love has to come from within yourself before it can come from anywhere else. If you are unhappy with your appearance, sure make the changes you feel are necessary to fix this, but make sure it is for the right reason. If you are doing it so that you feel better about yourself and to be healthier for yourself then this is good. If you are doing it so that other people will like you, then this is bad. You could be the skinniest person in the world, but if you think that you are worthless, then that is what everyone else is going to think about you too.
2. Treat your body like the wonder it is
The human body is truly a work of wonder. We have so many different mechanisms, all which have a specific function which is necessary to operate on a daily basis. Your body is working 24/7 in ways that sometimes you aren't even aware of. Things we don't even think about like the way your skin absorbs vitamin d from the sun, which is necessary for a healthy skin, organs and immune system. Then there is the wonder of thinks like reproduction which is just mind boggling, the fact that we need our bodies to propagate the species and avoid extinction. All of this makes for one awesome machine which should be respected and loved. I used to treat my body less as a temple and more like a three car garage before I got healthy, and I paid for it big time. No energy, unhealthy skin, digestion problems and all other kinds of nasty ailments have plagued me for years. I still get a nasty reminder of what my life was like if I relax my eating and sleep habits too much, and it is a very effective motivator to get back to the healthy lifestyle which make me feel so much better.
3. Learn about the foods you are putting into your body
In order to learn exactly how much fat I was eating on a daily basis, I started to use an online food diary which not only tracked what I was eating, but exactly how many calories was in each piece of food I put in my mouth, as well as the vitamins and minerals I was getting on a daily basis. This was an incredible eye opener for me, I couldn't believe that if I had one bad day and ate take away for dinner instead of cooking something at home, my calorie intake would sky rocket out of control. Given that there are calories in absolutely everything we eat, and the human body needs on average only 1200 calories a day in order to function, this was proof positive that I needed to make big changes to my diet. But that hasn't meant that I can't eat all the foods I still love, just that they have now become sometimes foods instead of every day foods. And I have actually found that after a while I don't enjoy my take away meals like I used too. Being aware of their incredibly high fat content tends to keep me away a lot more than it used to. For anyone looking for a good food diary, as well as an exercise diary, check out www.myfitnesspal.com. It even tells you exactly how many calories you need to burn a day in order to lose weight, as well as how much calories you do burn when you exercise.
4. Take all the help you can get
It is incredibly hard to stay motivated when you are on your own. There were times that the only reason I went out and played tennis with my little sister is because she was the one who called me every weekend to remind me to come get her and go out for a run around. And at the end of the day I was grateful that she had hauled me off my lazy butt for 45 minutes of sweating and panting because I felt great. I used to live with a friend from high school, and she would make me put on my walking shoes every night and we would go for a walk around town, even in the freezing cold of winter. Again I hated her while I was putting on my shoes, but I always felt so refreshed when we finally got home, our noses pink and numb from the cold air. Mum and I are each other's cheerleader this time, and even though neither of us can motivate ourselves to work harder, we are happy to support each other and give pep talks whenever they are needed. It is much harder to go easy on yourself when others are watching you, and sometimes that is all the motivation you need.
5. Stop caring what every one else thinks
This one was a big deal for me, because I spent the first twenty years of my life caring about what everyone else thought, and completely ignoring my own opinions, or changing my opinions just so that they fit in with everyone else's. But all that meant was that I was a complete doormat, and not really being true to myself. At the end of the day, the only person you spend 24 hours a day with is yourself. The only person who can hear all the little voices in your head is yourself, so why would you listen to the voices in someone else's head before your own? Learn to own the voice inside your head and listen to what it is saying about you. If you don't like what you hear, either change the track or change what you don't like about yourself.
6. Become more selfish
This doesn't mean always take more for yourself before giving to other people, this means start taking care of yourself before you do anything else. For any of my readers who are mums, you will know how hard this one is because our job description means that we put our kids before absolutely everything else. Our hunger, our appearance, our bladders always come out second to the children. But at the end of the day if you want anything for yourself, you are going to have to be the one who does it. I'm lucky because my child is still at an age where she needs 14 hours of sleep a day, so I only need to put her first for 10 hours a day. And when she is in bed, or happily amusing herself with the contents of our plastic cupboard, that gives me plenty of time to stop and have a coffee, or read the pull outs from the Sunday newspaper. And sometimes being selfish can mean refusing to listen to someone's constant criticisms or complaints, or something as simple as making sure you get a good night's rest.
7. Don't take life too seriously
Laughter really is the best medicine in the world. Nothing gets me out of a slump like having a giggle with Miss K. Sometimes it is hard to find the humour in a situation, but if you can learn to laugh at yourself then life gets a whole lot easier. It is too easy to become stressed these days, people work longer hours, women have more things to juggle on a daily basis, the news broadcasters are hell bent on trying to convince us that the world is coming to an end. Sometimes I find myself becoming too focused on unimportant details and stressing myself out, and when I do, I have to take a step back and tell myself to chill out and relax because at the end of the day is it really important that everything is perfect? or is it more important to be happy and calm?
8. Stop beating yourself up
This is a big one for people who are trying to diet. Every day someone in my weight loss support group posts that they have fallen off the wagon and totally hate themselves for being weak willed. I keep telling them over and over again that everyone deserves a treat, otherwise being good is too hard. But every day there is someone else who needs to be told to go easy on themselves. We seem to forget that we are all human, and as a whole, the human race is flawed. There is no one out there who is perfect, and convincing yourself that the only way to prove that you have succeeded is that you can go the rest of your life without eating a chocolate bar, or you are the absolute best at whatever it is you are good at is only setting yourself up to fail. If there are two things that you need to remember to survive in this world, they are that everyone needs chocolate, and no matter how good you are at something, there will always be someone who is better at it than you. This may sound completely depressing, but it can also be incredibly freeing. It doesn't mean never try to be good at anything, just that you need to learn to be the best that YOU can be, not the best that someone else can be. Sure if you have done something absolutely reprehensible like had sex with Mickey Rourke, or head-butted a small child to get to the last biscuit in the pack, then beat yourself up, but otherwise, go easy on yourself.
9. Accept that there are no quick fixes
This one makes me angry. Everyone is looking for the short-cut in life. The get rich quick scheme, the lose weight fast scheme, the learn a new skill in a day scheme. The short answer is there is no such thing. Anything worth doing in this life takes time and effort, and if you really want to be proud of yourself at the end of the day, the only way to do it is the hard way. The sooner you accept this, the sooner you can get on your way to mastering whatever it is you want to do.
Well I'll get off my soapbox for now, but I hope that there is something here that you my wonderful readers can take away from my lecture today. If anyone else has a secret to success that has helped them, I'd love to hear it.
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