Back again... Secret Service Hotties and raw foods.

I took my camera to DC today and SWOON to the Secret Service.  What's up hotties? I mean seriously; I walked for around 20-30 minutes, did a huge perimeter of the White House, and I saw maybe 20 Secret Service guys who were dressed like police (same types of outfits, but they were SS).  I swear to you out of 20, at least 18 were gorgeous, and the others were still good looking, just a little too short for my desires.  In my head I was screaming "What's cookin' good lookin'!?" and hope that it never came out aloud...

Well I'm back (again).  Every time I begin a new diet regiment (or rather re-start a better lifestyle) I become super "cravey."  I suddenly want Mexican food or fast food.  For example, I don't eat fast food (i.e. McDonalds, Burger King or Wendy's), but I've been suddenly craving Taco Bell like crazy. I don't even like Taco Bell!  I have decided that instead of doing calorie counting or Weight Watchers or anything like that, I'm going to try to just eat as many fruits and vegetables as possible in place of the crap foods that I'd usually eat.

I pulled out the almost never-opened Raw Food cookbooks that I have and am going to try to make more raw foods. For breakfast instead of Starbucks I'm going to try to make fruit smoothies and eat a Larabar about an hour after that. Then, instead of fast meals that I can microwave, I'm going to try to make sandwiches with no bread, or eat salads and foods like that.  We'll see how it goes.  I won't go 'cold turkey' into raw foods or anything, because I know that I always have the boomerang effect.  I need to have an egg in the mornings some days, I won't allow myself to feel guilty for it.

I also need to get back to the gym. I wish I liked the gym.  I am going to try to do other things, like hiking, biking, walking the dog etc.  We'll see how it goes!

Have a happy Easter / Passover / Sunday / Day off of work!

A little bit o' pity

I'm a very optimistic, upbeat dreamer. I take after my father in that way, my family always lets me know that.  I don't regret it though, dreaming.  The only thing that I hate about being a dreamer is this:  The higher you dream the harder you fall, if you fall.  I hold myself to very high standards, so it can be really difficult to go through these "falls."  I went through one today, and it hurt...

This morning I woke up with a general feeling of 'blah.'  The puppy I'm house-sitting for woke me up at about 6am and I had to take care of the her, and the cats. At about 8:30 or 9 I fell back asleep, until noon.  I was so irritated that I slept so late, I was just feeling grumpy.  The only way that I can explain how I felt was told to me on Twitter today:

OneHotDiehl Christa Diehl 

@ 

@300toFinally140 As my husband says. Bad words and violence!!

Three months ago, I applied to a top 25 in US University. I have a 4.0 in 3 classes relating to my course of study, and an overall 3.5 GPA. I originally took a non-traditional route in school, then took a job that I thought would be a great career choice. Clearly not. I want to just stop what I am doing in life now and finish my BA, maybe get an MA. As an older student and a female with great letters of recommendation, I thought that I'd have a decent shot.

I went home to meet my roommate, see a movie and do dinner. I grabbed the mail on the way in and found two letters from the school. I was immediately devastated because they were letters and not packages you get when you get accepted. But, seeing that there were two I thought that maybe I was accepted and was given additional info.

I opened the first letter: standard rejection letter.  I opened the second letter: standard rejection letter. I got rejected twice. In the same day. At the same time? For the one spot I applied for??? ARE YOU FLIPPING KIDDING ME? Talk about deflating a balloon (aka my spirit!!!).

I cried, and tried to hide it from my roommate, she bought dinner and our movie, which was so nice.  I didn't count Weight Watchers points, but I doubt I went over, getting up late took care of that for me.

So anyway, here's the rest of my pity party, party of one. I have now totally brought out all of my angry feelings:  I'm hovering around 260ish still, as I've been for 4 weeks. The job that I am supposed to start was pushed so that I'm unemployed for another month. I'm lonely from the male/female relationship aspect, which always comes out around my birthday, which is in about a month.

I just want to feel these feelings and then let them go. I'm allowing myself to feel this pain. But I'll admit, I'm SO frustrated.. Annoyed. Angry. Hurt. Sad. Self-loathing. Feeling worthless. You name it... Ugh.

Tomorrow is another day. I'll start investigating new schools to go to, I'll work out tomorrow, because I have to, not because I want to... I'm human, and I know that this too, shall pass.

My NEW (second) blog!

I created a second blog.  This blog is for day-to-day happenings, stress, weight loss, happiness, etc.  The new one, is to specifically follow my new love (ideal) of plant-based dieting. 

The link is here: Making Monumental Success Personal. The reason it's called that is because of 'The China Study,' a book by the Drs. Campell and actually study done in China. At the recommendation on twitter by the lovely Bob Harper, I saw the documentary 'Forks over Knives' today.  I needed to get away from my mind, and my goodness now I can't wait to get away from my current lifestyle! 

The other blog will probably only be a couple of posts per week, and will contain mainly food and plant-based food information (i.e. recipes that I like, hate, try, etc).  I'm trying to come up with a structure and I think that I might do 1 recipe per week, and give myself a time limit until I'm eating like 90% plant-based foods or something.  I'm toying with the structure, trying to see how I can incorporate it into my current Weight Watchers plan, etc.  I'm so excited though!! :) 

This I Believe, This I Deserve.

I love http://thisibelieve.org/  There are so many powerful essays that speak to so many different types of people.  I listened to a Jillian Michaels' podcast today, and as I mentioned in a prior blog, she asked the woman who called in to the show what she wanted, what she deserved in losing weight.  This is what I believe, this is what I deserve.

I believe that I am worth it. I believe in myself. I believe that I am intelligent, witty, kind, beautiful, and as many people have told me: the spark that lights up any room that I enter

This is a recent phenomenon for me, as before about a year ago I only sought acceptance and love from others. I cared more about what others thought of me than what I have thought of myself.  I always wanted to lose weight FOR so-and-so, BECAUSE so-and-so might love or appreciate me, IF xyz happened in my life, you name it, I excused it.  

In my teen and young-adult years, I always had adult men say things like "Oh, if I were only 5/10/20 years younger .... If we only met at the right time ... You'd have been my first choice if I wasn't already married, dating, there was no age difference, etc... Someone wonderful will come along for you..."  I have had experiences that I'd much rather forget, and I haven't met one man who truly cares enough about me or respects me enough to deserve me.

Now, I imagine Bob Harper & Jillian Michaels from The Biggest Loser (who, yes, I've put on a very tall pedestal) would say to me something along the lines of: "Cut the crap. What's blocking you? Get up, get moving, get over it!"  So, that's what I'm attempting. 

In the past year I have lost my job, lost nearly 40 pounds (that took at least 3 years to gain) and lost what I thought was my sanity, but what turned out to be the exact opposite. I lost some things that were holding me back, now I'm trying to shed the rest.  

For the future, this I deserve: 

• I deserve a body that matches my wonderful personality.

• I deserve a body and mind that work together, and not against one another. 

• I deserve unwavering self-confidence. 

• I deserve to live in a world where I am not fighting PTSD on an hourly or daily basis.

• I deserve to walk down a street and not feel judged, most of the judgement coming from within.

• I deserve to feel sexy and confident in a Little Black Dress.

• I deserve to walk into a store and pick out fashionable clothes, not flower print tops meant for the elderly.

• I deserve to feel love from a man, with a connection that I've never had, in a way that I've never loved.

• I deserve to love myself over all others, unselfishly and fiercely. 

This I believe: I am fighting a battle that will take a long time to win. I believe that I am strong enough to fight it, if I just continue to believe in myself and ask for help. I believe that I will have good days and bad days. I believe that although there are days that I will want to hide under my old fat-suit, but I know that it's an escape.  I believe that I will succeed, and that I will bring many people up with me. I want this, all of this I believe.

Instant expectations, eternal manifestations

"Frustration is the manifestation of over-expectations." - Samm Brown, Michael Jackson's old tour manager.

I am the Queen of many things: Sarcasm, short but powerful week-long stints at exercising, self-deprecating humor, amazing first two weeks of diets, dreaming, optimism, self-loathing, (iwishofEnglandalso,dangthatkatemiddleton,loveher,jealous!), retail therapy, going to the movies, I could go on.  I find that there are very few things that stick to me, because I feel like I am always running.

Read that last sentence carefully - I FEEL like I am always running. I can run, but only for about a minute to two at a time. I was in a class where Samm Brown was guest lecturing. I was in awe of what he said, which I'll say again: "Frustration is the manifestation of over-expectations."  My manifesto.

If there is anyone in the world who can make a mountain out of a molehill... I'm sheepishly raising my hand. I believe it was Jane Austen's Mr. Darcy who said this about a woman's mind: "it jumps from admiration to love, from love to matrimony, in a moment."  I do that with everything. I meet a man and within a moment I wonder if he'd be a good husband. I start a diet, or rather a lifestyle change, and within 30 seconds I am picturing myself at a US Size 6, holding hands and skipping through a sunny field of tall grass with Prince William, because he has seen how wonderful the size-6 me is. At size 6, I've become me, I'm not me at the version of myself that exists now. That last bit stopped upon the royal engagement - I bowed out of that crush gracefully ;) ..

But as usual, I digress. What Samm said to me six years ago sticks to me like glue.  I have a gastric bypass view of the world: A Biggest Loser expectation of my life - instant coffee, instant internet searches, nearly instant diet and exercise results. Hard work is incredible, I love working hard. I don't mean to even say that what the BL contestants do is instant, I know how hard they work. But, knowing that I have probably another year of really hard work on my own to even become who I want to be is SO frustrating.  I want to be the version of myself that I picture in my day-dreams and dreams, not the person who lives in this fragile shell.

Frustration envelopes me. I go to the gym, and after say, 400-800 calories of burn, I look in the mirror later and still see this disappointment.  I expect so much of the world that I turn people away, and I turn myself away because I detest myself.  Like I said the other day, Emotion vs. Intellect kicks in quite often. I don't really intellectually detest myself, but emotionally I'm not who I expected myself to be.  The 4 year-old version of me expected that I'd have a string of men who would want to court me, one of whom would become my fairy-tale husband with whom I'd have 2 or 4 wonderful children, a lovely old home, and a level of importance within the society around me.  I expected to make a difference and a huge change in the world, but I can't find a way to change myself..

Right now the late-20s version of me is like an insane person, constantly turning back the clock and asking the younger me what I was thinking, asking where I went wrong!?  Why am I not who I expected, how can I meet my expectations, and why is this all so important to me?