PopPrincess89

There are so many things I want and I have no idea how to get any of them.

I want to lose weight…can’t seem to find a way that I can stick to.

I want to publish a book…can’t seem to stay focused on one book long enough to actually finish it before moving on to another.

I want to open a daycare…don’t know how in the world to even begin looking into how to do that.

I want a place of my own…can’t afford one.

I DON’T want to be a teacher anymore if it means doing what I’ve been doing at this sub job for the last three months…but teaching is all I know how to do.

There’s an episode of Boy Meets World where Shawn realizes he always has an eskimo standing in his way whenever he tries to do something or accomplish something.  (It’s actually quite ironic that I’m making reference to this episode now because it’s their Super Bowl episode and the Super Bowl is coming up in a couple of weeks haha.)  Anyways, I can relate to Shawn because I seem to have a lot of “eskimos” standing in my way for one reason or another and I just can’t seem to plow through in any direction and get a leg up in at least one area of my life that I’m trying to improve.

I’ve done some major planning tonight though and I’m hoping to finally bust through and make some things happen all across the board.  I’m sick of feeling miserable and like a failure at 22 years old when I still have my entire life ahead of me to look forward to.  I should be looing ahead with hope, not dread.

Like most people who struggle with overeating, I have little to no will-power when it comes to dealing with food.  As hard as I may try, I just can’t bring myself to say no to food.  I also have no will-power when it comes to getting things done when I say I will.  I’m a big time procrastinator and things have sometimes gone years before they got done, if they ever got done.  The one place I do have will-power?  Men.  I easily cut them off and delete them from my life when I want to.  Even when they try to weasel their way back into my life, I don’t give in.  Now why can’t I have that kind of discipline with food?  Cut the bad stuff out, and even when I’m faced with the temptation of that food trying to weasel itself into my mouth, I just say no.  That would be fantastic!  Hmmm…how to transfer some of that will-power…

2012 is here and it’s time to make some serious changes!  Every year I make resolutions and I’m always trying to find ways to make changes for the better…and I never follow through.  Ever.  I’m hoping this is the year I make those changes once and for all.

1. Lose this blasted weight.

2. Write a book.

3. Read at least 25 books.

4. Run a 10 minute mile (or better would be acceptable too haha).

5. Clean/rearrange my room.

6. Get a job I actually enjoy.

7. Find a way to make money on my own and be my own boss.

8. Clean/organize my house from head to toe.

9. Go on a roadtrip.

10. Win NaNo

I’m sure I’ll think of things to add as time goes on, but here’s my list to start me off.  Later tonight I plan on sitting down and mapping out this next year.  I’ll break the weight loss and cleaning into small, manageable chunks to accomplish each week.  Once these big goals are broken up into smaller pieces, I’m thinking I’ll be able to tackle them much more easily and get on the road to success.

Last night I was looking at my junior prom pictures.  That prom was in April 2006.  I was 17 years old, 148 pounds, and I looked amazing!  I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.  I was stnading next to girls that I’ve always regarded as thin, and didn’t look fat standing next to them at all!  The crazy part is that I can remember thinking and feeling like I was fat.  I had lost a decent amount of weight leading up to that prom and must have still been in a “chunky” state of mind.  I’m definitely going to start pulling those pictures out more often, just to remind myself that I was once at that point and can get back there again with some hard work and determination.

I’m still here, fighting the good fight, despite many setbacks and hurdles, and I’m determined to make it to the end and see that goal weight one way or another!

I hope everyone who celebrated it, had a great Christmas!  I had a fantastic time with my family this weekend, celebrating the holiday.  I also ate and ate and ate - oops!  No gains though, which is a shock!  The cookies and candies all over my house are still a huge temptation, but I’m trying to keep from indulging too much.  I’ll do my best while the stuff is in the house and look forward to the point when it’s gone and when our tree is out of the house, freeing up my workout space again. 

Geez, I feel like I was just blogging the other day and then I check the date of my last blog and it was November 26!  Well things have been full swing with the job.  It’s been keeping me very busy (not to mention very exhausting) and therefore the weight loss has taken a backseat once again  :(  In the last week I’ve had two major wake-up calls though.

1) My sister and I took the dog for a 30 minute walk a week ago and my calves were aching were two days.  I used to walk 45 minutes every day and not feel it that bad afterwards.  Exhibit A of how far I’ve let myself go.

2) One of my fourth graders asked me on Wednesday if I am pregnant.  I know I have a bulgy belly, but that was a wake-up call as to how bulgy it is.  Exhibit B of how bad things have gotten.

SOOOO here is my plan: I’m currently mapping out my food for tomorrow and possibly the next few days as well.  I had been doing great for a few weeks back in August and then fell off the wagon completely due to being on vacation and then hitting a slump of “I just don’t care anymore.”  I’ve come to think that I was actually a bit depressed during that time.  I literally just did not give a crap about anything because I felt like a failure for having worked my butt off for four years to earn my degree and get my license and I was 22 years old and unemployed with nothing to show for all my hard work.  Even though I hate the job I have now, I’m still happy because at least it’s a job and I have something to show for my efforts.

So there you have it.  I’m making the millionth attempt at this and hoping for the results I want!

Happy belated Thanksgiving to everyone who celebrated the other day!!!  Food wise, I ate more than I should have but at the same time I did pretty darn good!  I can’t ever remember a time that I’ve walked away from the Thanksgiving dinner table without feeling like I was about to explode - but that did not happen the other day.  I felt full, I felt like I could have opted out of that third dinner roll or could have chosen to have a smaller piece of pie, but I didn’t feel like I was about to explode.  That in itself is a huge step for me.

That all being said, I need to get the ball rolling on this working out business.  My number one problem with that has always been motivation.  Getting off my butt, putting on my sneakers, and just doing it.  Once I’ve started, I usually push myself pretty decently - the trick is getting started in the first place.  Any suggestions in motivating myself to just get started with my workouts each day?

Exactly two and a half years ago today, I joined this website and started really trying to lose weight.  In those two and a half years I fluctuated up and down, back and forth, losing and regaining the same 10 - 14 pounds.  During all of that, I managed to never get back to my starting weight, which was 180.  I came close a couple of times, bouncing back to 178 or 179, but I never saw that 180.  Until today.  I totally let myself go for about the last two or three months, and it shows.  I hadn’t stepped on the scale in almost three months and was not happy with what I saw today.  At the very least, I can say that I haven’t hit a new heaviest weight, but I’m still not pleased.

Today has been Day One of my challenge for myself.  I’m very much a go big or go home type of person when it comes to this.  I need to dive in head-first and give it my all or I won’t do it, so there isn’t any easing into it for me.  At this point, I have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn’t work for myself and I’m going to use all the knowledge I have and really give this a good go once again.

So far, so good.  Yesterday I spent all day snacking on jelly beans and gummie fish.  Today I had one jelly bean and haven’t touched the bags again.  I had a sandwich as a sort of brunch with water and four pringles.  I had a small handful of mini caramel rice cakes a couple hours ago.  I’m starting to get a little hungry again, so I’m gonna go drink some more water and then have some grapes.

I’ve been successful in the past at losing weight without counting calories, and actually when I tried to count calories and was very careful with that, I didn’t see any losses.  So I’m gonna try it this way for now, since I know it’s worked for me before.  If I’m not seeing any changes though, then I will try the calorie-counting method again and give that another go.

There are five weeks left until Christmas and I’ve decided to challenge myself and see where that gets me.  I’m gonna bust my hump to lose ten pounds by Christmas.  I haven’t been on a scale in Lord knows how long, and I’m kind of afraid of what it will say  :/  But I will hop on first thing tomorrow morning to get my official starting weight.  I just want to jump-start this now, before the holiday season is really in full swing with tons of cookies and desserts, so that I won’t gain even more weight over the course of the next several weeks.

My schedule this past week was very busy, but should be opening up a bit now - which means I have plenty of time to squeeze in some kind of workout in the evenings after work.

Speaking of work, I know this next part isn’t about weightloss, but I feel the need to get it off my chest and tell people: I’m starting to think I made a mistake going into special education.  I’m quickly finding that being a teacher is tougher and more time consuming than I had thought it was - and adding IEP meetings and trying to update IEPs and all that kind of special ed work on top of what the general ed teachers do is very quickly wearing me down and I’m not sure if I’ll be able to handle all the pressure that is put on teachers by the administration, the parents, the state…  It’s a lot to take on.  As a matter of fact, I felt so overwhelmed last week that I was looking into ways to make money from home/start my own business.

I’m feeling very bogged down by being a grown up.  My dream would be getting to be a stay-at-home-mom and fitting in some writing to hopefully publish and make a little bit of money off of.  I know that in this day and age and in this economy, my dream of being a stay-at-home-mom is very unlikely, but it can be done and I’d like to find a man who wants to do that with me.  I’m just not cut out for the working world  :/  I was really good at being a student, so it’s not the whole deadlines and following someone elses rules/instructions that’s getting to me…it’s just the added pressure and stress that I don’t think I can handle very well  :/

I’m slacking BIG TIME!  It’s unbelieveably disgusting how bad I’m slacking and how many pounds I’m putting back on (not that I’d lost many to begin with).  I was gonna get myself back on track a month ago, but of course I didnt, and then two weeks of insanity hit my life.

Two weeks ago last night, a huge Nor’Easter hit my area.  We thought we were in the clear, not having lost power the night of the storm, but we weren’t.  We lost it the following morning.  For five days.  My eating options were rather limited (not that I had been trying to eat helathy anyways), and I spent a week on my butt, freezing it off.

Finally the power came back on at about 2am that Friday morning.  By noon on Friday we got a call saying my uncle was in the hospital and he was dying.  So no sooner is one problem over and done with that another one arises.  My mom spent the entire night in the hospital with him until he passed and from then on it was just nonstop running around and hustling and bustling to get everything done for the funeral.  From Saturday afternoon until Wednesday afternoon, I pretty much didn’t stop, and definitely didn’t sleep much.  If I wasn’t finding pictures for my mom and making copies of those, I was babysitting for my cousin so that he and his wife and my mom could make all the arrangements, or I was helping to put together the photo boards, or at the wake or funeral (not to mention fitting work in there somewhere…oh yeah, did I mention in my last blog that I got a long-term sub job?  Probably not since I don’t think I had it yet at the time of that blog lol).

Then two days later, this past Friday, I took off for the weekend to visit a friend that I don’t get to see very often and to celebrate her son’s first birthday…so of course we just hung out and ate junk all weekend.

I now feel disgusting and disappointed in myself that I didn’t just get my butt in gear any of the millions of times before when I said that I would.  It always seems that when I’m behind in one aspect of my life (weightloss, cleaning, hobbies) I’m behind in all aspects, and when I’m ahead in one, I’m ahead in all.  I don’t get it, but all I know is that it’s time for me to get ahead again.

Now that the chaos of the last two weeks has died down, I’m going to work extremely hard at getting everything back on track again.

I hope everyone has been well this last month, and I promise it won’t be another month before you hear from me again