Waking Up!

I've had a very good week! All week I:

• got out of bed in the morning.
• ate breakfast each day.
• drank at least 8 8 ounce glasses of water.
• walked at least 20 minutes, some days up to 50 minutes.
• was conscious about what I was eating, and ate only when hungry, not out of boredom.

The biggest benefit I have noticed from doing those five things consistently has been that I feel in control of my life again. I know a week isn't a long time, but I haven't been able to accomplish those five things for two days in a row let alone seven. I feel like I'm waking up from a weird coma in which I was conscious but unable to do anything to help myself. I'm waking up!

My challenge to myself for the coming week is to KEEP IT UP!

Progress!

I feel good. Hmm, nice change of pace. For the last 3 or 4 days I've been careful about what I eat. I haven't been feeling deprived because I've been choosing good food, but not junk food. I think maybe I can gain some control over the way I've been living. I know I won't be in control everyday, but if I keep going I'll get there, right?

I've been successful at two challenges too! I've been drinking at least 8 glasses of water a day and getting up by 7:00 everyday, except weekends. I do reserve the right to sleep in occasionally! Oh! And I guess I've been doing a pretty good job of getting a high quality breakfast in my belly most mornings.

Hope. I think that's what I'm feeling.

I know that I'll have setbacks. This post is my reminder to myself to not give up. I don't have to do everything perfectly or fail utterly. I can stumble and get back up and start over and just keep going.

Encouraged

I think it is time to do something about my weight. Being overweight is probably the single most depressing thing in my life, or is it just a symptom of being depressed? I think, like so many other things, it is a symptom that becomes one of the causes. In any case, for my health, for my peace of mind, for my self esteem I need to get serious about losing some weight.

I've been dabbling in weight loss for a while now, being careful with what I eat for a day or two and then running right back into the arms of potato chips - my lover or some cheesy gourmet dish and a couple glasses of wine - my other lover. Each indulgence leads to a string of them, and then I feel hopeless again.

I've been feeling differently lately. More ready, I guess, to stick with it, do what has to be done. A few weeks ago I checked out several books on CD, thinking I would listen to them while I walk on the treadmill, but a couple of days ago I took them back to the library. Last night I was wishing I had hung onto them because I really wanted to start walking today.

I figured I'd tackle the drudgery of walking with nothing to occupy my mind except my own self defeating thoughts. Then this morning I was driving my kids to school, and one of the books on CD slid out from under the passenger seat of my car. It must have fallen out of my library bag and never got returned. It's a small thing, but it was like a gift, an encouragement. So, I guess I'll go fire up the ol' treadmill and take a walk.

Goals

The water drinking, breakfast eating, exercising, challenge is still underway, going okay but not great. I'm doing better, drinking more water and eating breakfast about half of the time. The exercise isn't happening.

The get up at 7:00 am challenge is going well. I've been forcing myself to get out of bed, and I'm sleeping better, but my days are aimless, lacking direction. I don't even have a reason to get dressed most days, so I don't. I'm going to try something new to fix that.

I have a notebook, and every night before bed I'm going to write down one goal for the day in four different areas of my life: personal, house, health, and work. I will have to keep the goals small for now. Really small. For example, tomorrow's goal for my house will be something like "do a load of laundry," and a personal goal might be something like, "call a friend."

I need to start building some sort of structure into the rubble my days have become.