The journey from fat to fit. Road trip, woo hoo!

My Easter food was somewhat out of control.  But not too horribly.  I did not keep great track of what I ate, and I ate throughout the day, but I did keep away from the candy for the most part.  I impressed myself with that because man, oh, man, I do love me some candy.  Someone did bring over the evil Reese’s peanut butter cups, not as lethal as the egg, but damaging nonetheless.

Breakfast: JC pancake meal

Lunch: skipped it, I was cooking dinner, but I did munch probably 3 or 4 deviled eggs

Dinner: ham, leg of lamb, mashed potatoes, asparagus.  I picked at the ham throughout the kitchen clean up.  Also had a moderate slice of chocolate cake.

Candy: probably six little mini Reese’s cups throughout the entire day. 

Alcohol: at least ½ a bottle of champagne, two glasses of red wine

My positive post for the day: I had a beautiful day with family and friends, a beautiful feast with 16 adults at the dinner table, four teens at the coffee table, one baby in a swing, two cats under the table and five children running amok, eating here and there and blowing bubbles over the table into our food.  I love my family and my friends, who are like family, and my kids and their kids and it’s all about love, love, love tonight.  I’ll be singing another tune when I dare enter the playroom and see what damage has been done!

I cleaned my house for seven hours today in preparation for a sit-down dinner for 15 adults and 6 kids tomorrow.  We’re having a glazed ham and a feta-stuffed crusted leg of lamb.  YUM. I am making a deal with myself that I can over-indulge a little bit on the dinner as long as I stay away from the candy.  To help keep myself on track, I bought candy that I don’t like, so poor kids get no Reese’s eggs this year!  I stuffed candy and treats into over 100 Easter eggs for the big “hunt” and in the morning I get to make the annual “bunny cake.”  This is a photo of last year’s bunny cake.  I love family holidays and the traditions that go with them.  I also dyed eggs with my 9yro daughter and 19yro son.  Who knew cocky teenaged boys still liked to dye eggs?!  Happy Easter everyone!

Why am I so mad?  I am so short-tempered lately and can go from 0 to 60, i.e. “normal” to “kill you where you stand rage”, in a matter of 3 seconds. 

Case in point: I jumped down DD9’s throat because she forgot to do some of her homework.  This is a recurring theme.  She announces that she is finished with her homework, then gets on the computer, watches TV, reads books, creates art, etc.  Then after dinner and shower, when it’s time to bed, the waterworks start because she “forgot” to do some of her homework.  Granted, she is nine years old, BUT I don’t feel like I need to micromanage on things like this.  She knows what she needs to get done and I think that the “forgetting” is not legitimate, is more of a “I don’t want to do anymore homework right now” kind of thing.  But, regardless, my reaction was a bit extreme.  I did a lot of complaining which was uncalled for, but I think the punishment is legitimate.  No more TV for the rest of this week in the hopes that that will help her remember better.

Second case in point: DD20 comes home from her night classes last night and starts to tell me what her loser ex-BF / baby daddy said to her… and before she can get it out of her mouth I am enraged by the fact that she even had a conversation with him.  I shut her down, never did find out what she was upset about, and she basically stormed off in the middle of me berating her for continuing to make poor choices about her contact with him.  Again, I think my anger is justified, but my immediate rage reaction was extreme.  But this one has been brewing for a long time.  She is 20, has a baby, they both live with us, DH and I provide for all of her needs while she is in school AND I do 35+ hours of childcare for the baby while she is in school from 2 - 9:30 pm five nights a week.  All of this because (1) she is my daughter (2) I love her and (3) we want to help her get to a place where she can live as an independent adult raising her child.  But when she continues to engage with the biggest loser in the world, I feel like she (1) does not appreciate the sacrifices we’ve made for her (2) is an idiot who will never be able to live independently because of her stupid choices and (3) it’s basically a slap in the face to go against the one thing we are adamant about (which is if she gets back together with him, she’s on her own, zero support from us.)

Finally, DH and I had the mother of all blowouts this morning about, of all things, recycling.  Come on.  I won’t even go into detail because it was SUCH A STUPID THING TO FIGHT ABOUT, but again, my fury was immediate and intense.  He was being a jerk about taking out the recycling, and instead of saying “Hey, stop being a jerk,” I went into full-on verbal attack mode with a vengeance.

 I had a completely hysterectomy years ago, so it’s not hormonal or TOTM related.  My weight loss has been slow and steady with no big hiccups, nothing unusual going on there with regard to food or exercise.  I am a little overwhelmed work-wise, but not anything too intense and certainly not worse than I’ve managed to handle with sanity intact before.

I have no idea why I am so angry, but I am ready to attack.  And to top it all off, I had a last minute work schedule change, had to cancel my JC appt. for tomorrow and am going today, mid-day, which SUCKS THE BIG ONE.  I usually go first thing in the morning with an empty stomach, and since I am going at noon today, I won’t be surprised to see either a gain or a “hold”, which might just put me over the edge.

 I’m going to go scream into my pillow now before I get behind the wheel!

I am a wife to a wonderful husband.  He’s my second husband and we’ve been married for 10 years this April.  It’s a good marriage… having been in a bad one for 13 years, I feel I can say that with some authority.  I have two children from my first marriage, a daughter who is 20 and a son who is 19.  I have a stepdaughter who is 14 and a “baby girl” who just turned nine years old.  My 20 year old daughter surprised us all when, after having lived with her dad for a while and fallen in love with a loser boyfriend, she came back to us pregnant (yikes) and broken up with Mr. Loser (yay).  Believe me, there is A LOT more to that whole saga, but to make a long story short, we now have a four month old granddaughter living with us.  She’s a delight… not something that I expected at this point in my life, but she’s here now and we’re making the most of it.  I’ve got two cats who I adore, one of whom adores me back and the other who pretends she’s never met me before each and every day.  That’s my family.  I have a dad and a sister and a brother, but they’re all at least 2,000 miles away.  Sometimes I feel like I only exist to be a part of “the clan” and play my role.  And sometimes I’m okay with that.  But every now and then, like tonight, I realize that it’s important to exist outside of the clan as well, as a freestanding unit, and that’s something I need to work at a little bit more.  When I look at my beautiful home, my dysfunctional but adorable family, my dear friends, I realize how truly lucky I am to have what I have.   I want to be fit and healthy so I can enjoy life to the fullest.  I want to be able to keep up with everything going on around me and feel comfortable enough in my body to jump in and enjoy what life has to offer.  That’s why I’m here, in the hopes that putting all of this down on paper (or up on the screen) will help me make it a reality.