It's my party, and I'll cry if I want to.

My birthday is here.  I hate my birthday. They seem to be getting less amazing and more mundane. Let me explain. Six months ago I moved from the 50 mile radius that I spent 26 of the 27 years of my life in.

For the last five years I worked for a company that I put 150% of my effort into.  I kind of stopped hanging out with a lot of my friends because of this all-consuming job. I missed opportunities to go (for free) to Latin America, and things like that because this job was supposed to be my future, the all-encompassing EVERYTHING.  Two years before I started that job, I made and immediately spent thousands of dollars on going to more than 150 concerts all over the country in one year, therefore also blowing off some of my oldest friends to meet the friends that I had only for the concert-going period of my life.

As I became more and more overweight I set goals for myself, like "I'll surprise my old friends and show up when I've lost 20 pounds, 50 pounds, 100 pounds, 150 pounds..." and "I'll ignore Facebook [which is where I keep in touch with some of my oldest friends] and suddenly put new and pretty pictures of the thin-me up so they'll want to see me again." "When I get a job that pays me well enough to travel, I'm going to ask some friends to go on a great trip!"

So much bad and worse had happened to and with me during the last two years of this so-wonderful-job that I was left with very few people in my life. I moved, and I ended up leaving the company that I dedicated all of my efforts to.  Subsequently, in the last six months of unemployment, it is as if the sh*t finally hit the fan.  Now, no one really contacts me on a regular basis, and in return, I have nothing new to contact them about other than "Hi, doing the same nothing today, the dog park was empty today, very unusual! The dog has gas, it's very stinky. How are you? Loving married life? Beautiful children! New boyfriend? Awesome!"

As I stated before, I can't stand my birthday.  It falls around father's day (I was a "Father's Day baby"), my father passed away years ago, since I've all but disappeared from all of my friends, I have nothing and almost no one around for my birthday.

My siblings and I never really did the presents thing for one another - for whatever reason it just wasn't like that.  Not to sound super selfish, but I received one (albeit very nice) gift from my mother, and Facebook 'Happy Birthday's" from everyone else.  It just seems kind of .... disappointing.  Then I feel really selfish for feeling like I even deserve anything for my birthday, because I know there are people who have even fewer people and things than I do.

I watch my sister call, text, e-mail, facebook all of her friends - she has dozens of them at home. My brother has the same thing - I watch him and his 'crew' that he has been friends with for literally 15-20 years and I just feel terrible. I finally told my sister the other night about how I feel about my birthday.  She had been giving me a hard time about not caring what we did on my birthday, not caring if we went out, not having an opinion on what to do. I started crying in the middle of the restaurant. It was horrible.  I'm crying again now as I write about this, and again as I re-read it.

So, as stated in my previous entry, I have pretty much just given up. I'm back to many of my old habits, I haven't given any thought to even doing Weight Watchers at all, I haven't been to the gym in weeks because of that stupid pedicurist. I just don't care.

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.

Harry Potter, StumbleUpon and routines

I lead a very exciting life.  As I'm not working (not by my own volition), my days consist of applying for jobs, scouring the internet for more jobs to apply to, taking my dog to the park, taking my dog out to go to the bathroom, feeding my dog, reading, watching TV, thinking about going to the gym, occasionally go grocery shopping or going to the gym, cutting coupons, etc...

Sometimes my routine changes..  I'll occasionally lose myself on twitter or on StumbleUpon. About 15 minutes ago, I found a video about a seal totally falling in love with a woman on a beach. If you haven't seen it, take a few minutes and watch it.  If you need to smile today, you will. I had an ear-to-ear grin on my face.

I never read the Harry Potter books.  But about ten days ago I was told that I should, so I'm borrowing all of the books.  Slightly embarrassed to admit that I'm already on book 6.  I'm going to end the most pointless blog ever and go read it now.  Good night!

p.s. If you read this, check in! Comment! Have a blog? Leave the web address and I'll check it out and follow your blog in return! :)

Movin' on up, and lookin' back.

So, I took the unemployment train to job-town and got off.  As I'm still waiting for all of the dust to settle, paperwork and red-tape to be completed and rubber-stamped, I will only say this:  it's in sales, and I'm so happy to have a job again!

Now let me complain for a paragraph.  My last job had jeans and sneakers attire, and I was there for more than 3 years, but less than 10.  Yes, I'm trying desperately to pretend that I have a shred of mystery to myself.  I lived in comfort, which I think could have helped me get to the weight where I was at my highest (300.0!). Today I wore shoes that not only gave me two new blisters, but the one that I already opened up. My feet, well, you get the picture. Why do women put ourselves through this!?

Today I would like to address irrational fears.  I have so many of them that I can only laugh at myself.  These are my favorites that I can remember off the top of my head from childhood:

1. If I go on that sailboat, I will sink it, or will cause it to tip over when I change sides.
2. If I ride that horse, I will break its back.
3. If I ride that bike, I will pop its tires.
4. If I walk over a grate on a city sidewalk, I will fall through. This might explain my fear of falling.
5. I will sit in a chair and it will break because of my weight. (that may have actually happened....)
6. I will cross 200 pounds and die, or should die.  (that was at 183 pounds at about age 15)

Now, most of these fears came to be before I was 150-175 pounds, some of them as early as 5-6 years old (the sailboat thing, definitely by 5). Ridiculous to think that 250 pound men do the first 4 things easily without a problem and I was simply terrified. I don't understand irrational fears, nor will I try to hide mine.  I'm sure I'll remember more.

Last night I went through my closet to do inventory on what fit and what didn't.  I have some clothes that are brand new and never fit, but were in purchased in my "goal" category, but fit now or will very soon.  Some clothes are (finally!!) too big. Even better, I have some clothes from 3-5 years ago which are probably about 15-20 pounds away, meaning mid-summer.  I have a pair of Old Navy size 20 jeans (meaning size 16-18 at a Women's store) which are so close to fitting and I haven't been able to wear them in easily 4 years.

I can't even bring across in words how lamely excited I am about this.  From late 2004-2010, I gained around 100 pounds. I'm down to 262.6 (woo!), slowly shedding. I wish I could drop it in 5-6 months like in the Biggest Loser, but I know in "the real world" this takes time, probably 15-18 months total for me (from January 1, 2011).  Plus, as I've previously stated, Kate Middleton at St. Andrews age / pre-wedding scary-skinny is my total body look alike goal.

I could rant forever, but I will stop here. Comments are appreciated and welcome! :)