each day is a new day. a new day to succeed or a new day to totally screw up. most days I screw up, just my nature. heehee
so the difference? even if I screw up royally, sometimes to the point of completely throwing everything up (not as much fun as you would think) I can retry the next day. very much like an alcoholic falling off the wagon, I know. but since food is a necessity, the key is to learn to live within the confines and rules of the game.
rules of the game:
eat each day. eat three times a day. do not feel guilty. do not miss a meal. do not over or under eat. know in advance what you will eat. pre-measure and know that when the plate is empty. you are done. do not wait so long between meals that when you do get food, you do not DEVOUR it and forget to chew it up THOROUGHLY!
so knowing that, knowing that there are limits such as volume and content. currently my volume is 4 oz and content is 90% of anything that I want to eat with the exceptions of the following that make me sicker than a dog:
hot dogs, cheap hamburger
sausages
bagels
corn & cauliflower
corn chips
noodles (chicken noodle soup)
sweets like cake frosting, sweet breads, trifles
knowing that the high fats and high sweets still can kick me down, I do sincerely try to avoid them.
I just have the hardest time with 'maintenance', not in volume and content, but fluids. I KNOW that I need it, I know that it is important, but finding the time, well that is another matter. same with the regularly scheduled meals, sometimes I get so much fluid, that I am not hungry come meal time. so lately the challenges are not nearly as hard as they were in the beginning, but challenges they remain.
the greatest lesson that I have learned on this journey, is that I was not taking as good a care of me as I was taking of everyone else, which was completely mental. how can I take care of anyone else if I do not take care of me. basic and fundamental. so now that I have 'me' squared away, and know that I have to maintain the maintenance for a lifetime. taking time out for me every day not just once in while.
how many times does a mom say, well I do not have time to eat right. I do not have time to sleep right. I do not have time to exercise. I do not have time to WHATEVER. I really do not think that it is a matter of having or not having the time, but finding time to remember to take the time. heehee
[If you give a mom a muffin, she'll want a cup of coffee to go with it. She'll pour herself some. Her three-year-old will spill the coffee. She'll wipe it up. Wiping the floor, she will find dirty socks. She'll remember she has to do laundry. When she puts the laundry in the washer, she'll trip over boots and bump into the freezer. Bumping into the freezer will remind her she has to plan supper. She will get out a pound of hamburger. She'll look for her cookbook. (101 Things To Make With A Pound Of Hamburger.) The cookbook is sitting under a pile of mail. She will see the phone bill, which is due tomorrow. She will look for her checkbook. The checkbook is in her purse that is being dumped out by her two-year-old. She'll smell something funny. She'll change the two-year-old. While she is changing the two-year-old the phone will ring. Her five-year-old will answer and hang up. She'll remember that she wants to phone a friend to come for coffee. Thinking of coffee will remind her that she was going to have a cup. She will pour herself some. And chances are, if she has a cup of coffee, her kids will have eaten the muffin that went with it.]
so get a calendar and make a schedule. mine actually text messages me throughout the day and makes life so much easier!
the second pearls of wisdom would be that life does not begin and end with children. they are the the most or the least of our day, they do not define us or give us reason for existing. they simply are important to us. I think that once I figured that out, delegated 1/2 the parenting of said children to the other half, my life became much more stable. children do not need to be 'involved' in outside activities, it does not fulfill them or deprive them. I think that we set ourselves and our children up to fail by putting such an expectation of being so involved in so many things that no one is truly happy.
imagine my children finding such pleasure in just existing, without all the brouhaha of a plethora of activity and my pleasure in not constantly being stressed about schedules and changes in routine. this is a much healthier way to live. I do work outside of the home, but I do not let that dictate that I need to 'show more of an interest in my kids' by shuttling them to yet another activity to show that I am interested. (If that makes any sense) I do visit the school an hour a week and 'that' shows my interest. reading to their class once a month has shown more 'interest' than an entire season of sitting on my butt freezing my blooming arse off at a bleeding soccer field. (I did it with the twins, never again). even a quarterly lunch hour with the kids at school is worth more per minute than 10x the time spent chauffeuring to some stupid activity.
yes, Erik does patrol the cul de sac with a vengeance. 90% of the time, he is at Brettyn's on her trampoline as anything else. as for the happiness of true boys, they would be THRILLED with living in the country, I would just need to get a backhoe, and make them some jumps,and they would be on them 16 hours a day if possible with their bikes. the week we were in Boise, they lived on the BMX track! They think that living in the city is unreasonable torture. but if you must be a soccer mom complete with SUV, heehee, go right ahead. snicker. as for me and my clan, no 'rules of fair play' we are seriously doing good to get him to his weekly chess club for 1/2 hour after school. it dread the days that I have to supervise that activity. grueling.
teaching my children that I am important enough to put first teaches them that they should treat others as more important. I truly believe that by putting ourself last as a mom sends the wrong message to the child. they are not the center of the universe and to imply that they are does them a dis-service. Their self esteem does not need it. you just end up with kids that grow up to be self absorbed, self centered and selfish. It surely doesn't hurt that fathers learn that mom is not the last of the totem pole either. ;-) total win/win situation all around.
