The Start of a New Journey

Ok, so thanks to my cousin Faye, I am officially starting Sunday February 15th the South Beach Diet. I am excited about this because I have the food to start, the mentally to want it and I am scared enough to take this seriously.

Why am I scared, well lets see, I am 43 years old and morbidly obese and all my fat is in my belly. The only thing I have going for me at this point is that I still have regular periods which according to the good doctor Arthur Agatston is to my advantage.

I bought The South Beach Heart Health Revolution Diet Book and I am reading the book cover to cover. Normally, I read AA books or a book of fiction but I think its important that I read this. It's my life and I need to arm myself with everything I have in order to live a longer life. I mean I can't control things but I'll be darned if I will die because of terrible food choices and the lack of exercise, it just seems wrong. This book offers me a way to rid myself of the sugar monster and to build a healthier heart and lose weight. I did research on the diet over the weekend and I read tons of positive reviews. I am willing to do what I need to do in order to get away from that awful beast called sugar. He wants to destroy not only my life but my health, well I say to hell with him.

I'm thinking I will journal daily (or close to daily) about my food choices, struggles, weight loss etc with the SBD. I will weigh myself tomorrow morning (if nobody is looking) and post it here somewhere. My goal is to lose 50 pounds by this summer. Maybe some of you will say that's too much but its my goal and I will achieve it by July 3rd (granddaughters 7th birthday). So that gives me 10 pounds a month +/- for the next 5 months. It's definitely doable.

So what do you think of my new layout? I know I keep changing it, but I can't help myself, I'm looking for the right fit and this one really rings true to who I am.

If anyone has any experience on the SBD please let me know!

Thanks for coming by!

Sassle!

Coming out of the PMS fog

Another fine example of why I believe God intervenes through others. This is where I know all "spiritual awakenings" don't necessarily come with harps and angels.

As I sat in the office of my Pastor we discussed my life. She asked me how I was doing, I told her not very well, I had a very rough week. My poor husband and I suffered the raft of my PMS, how it was absolutely the worse case of PMS I have ever experienced. My mind/ego went to all sorts of places, thinking he didn't love me, thinking he had to go on this sudden trip to his family to run away from me and to never come back. My mind thought I would leave him and go back home to my family and friends, my mind went everywhere a happily married woman's mind should NOT go.

Now don't ask me how I got to the point of mentioning sugar to her, but I did and I am totally drawing a blank as to why we were talking about it. She replied how some people were affected by sugar and how it did strange things to them not only physically but emotionally and this is where the proverbial light bulb went off. I told her how I spent the week proceeding and during my PMS binging on donuts, cakes, more donuts and more cakes. I snuck them into the house and abused them like a drug. I had abused so much sugar during the last 2 weeks that I truly believe that is the single most important reason as to why my PMS was so unforgiving!

OMG! I have to stop using sugar for my own emotional well being! I believe that, I really do. I know I'm not willing to go through this again, I can't. I will be divorced in less than 6 months if this keeps up. The self-loathing, the doubt, the distrust, the fears, I can't do this again.

Another awakening came upon me, the dawning that I am an alcoholic who follows a 12 step program to which I am not applying towards my eating habits, most especially towards my sugar addiction (carbs too?). I am not applying any of the 12 steps to this emotionally and physically dangerous addiction. Here I'm thinking I'm doing well with my sobriety, well yes I haven't drank in over 9 years, kudos but have I replaced the bottle with a boxes of Little Debbie Zebra cakes!

A blessing in all this were my 3 pets; 2 cats and a 3 month old puppy. Every time I would go play with my puppy, I would somehow forget that the world was a dark place to be. Looking at her cute face, training her, loving her would make all the darkness almost non-existent for that period of time or when I'd go cuddle up with the cats and my youngest cat (1 year old female) who is deaf and gray would lie on her back and meow with her little voice always asking a question (don't ask, I know, she always asks questions, she's like me). Or my male, he's half mane coon, he's been with me almost 9 years, he's the true love of my life, always loyal, always ready to protect me and those he loves. He'd "own" me or sleep by my feet or I'd see his beautiful face and melt, because I could forget for a moment that I was feeling sad or mad. Thank God for our 4-legged children.

My granddaughter is coming over today, she's coming to chill with Gramma and Papa, and she'll be spoiled rotten which is OK because if anyone deserves to be spoiled it's her.

Thanks for reading, I feel better today, I've been up since 4:00am so a nap and a shower is in order before she comes for her overnight visit. She always makes me smile so it looks as though it's going to be a good day today.

Coming Out of Secret Safe Place

No, I'm not coming out of the sexual orientation closet but I am coming out of hiding. I've been hiding to long and I'm not even talking about this blog, I'm talking about life, my weight, my obesity. Yesterday I did something that I would never have imagined I'd do before, I actually told my cousin how much I weighed. Albeit this was done by email and yes of course I fear judgment but wtf it is what it is and I can't hide.

You see I think if I keep hiding from people or from telling people about the real me I will not lose weight because I'm in hiding. Maybe my subconscious will stop it from happening or my evil ego will I don't know but I believe the old adage, you are only as sick as your secrets. So if I slowly let people into my world, that dark fat world maybe I'll be able to change.

So what do you think?

Of my new page. I wanted something different and to be honest, I'm sort of tired of the scrapbook look (for today) watch me see someone with a cute page and go hunting for something similar. I have some posts that I haven't published yet, you know the kind you start typing and next thing you know you have to leave and when you come back its no longer relevant, especially for those deep feeling ones. So I will review them soon and maybe post them.

I wanna thank all of you who have welcomed me back and for your support re my alcoholism, its so appreciated.

So, that's it for now, I'm going to bed!

Tomorrow I will post about my exercise successes (worked out 3x this week) and what my goals for 2009 are.

Thanks for stopping by!

Sassle!

Looking back on 2008

Got this from an AA blog.

• Where did you begin 2008? I was living in an upper duplex in a very poor part of town where there were drug dealers, guns and then some. We were shot at twice, well hubby was.
• What was your status by Valentine's Day? I am married and can't even remember if we celebrated it, I doubt it though, if this years Christmas is any indication we probably did nothing.
• Did you have any encounters with the police? No *touch wood.
• Where did you go on vacation? Nowhere
• Did you know anybody who got married? Yeah clients
• Did you move anywhere? yes a beautiful farm house in the country where the nearest store is 5 miles away (that's what happens when hubby gets shot at in the city)
• What concerts/shows did you go to? nowhere
• Where do you live now? My new farm house (we rent) where I love it!
• Describe your birthday? Hubby made me a birthday card, we went out for breaky, all in all it was a great day, hubby's great with birthdays (so far)
• What's the one thing you thought you would never do but did in 2008? go to AA
• What has/have been your favorite moment(s)? the whole summer, actually from the moment we moved to the farm its been grate, live in a great town, have great neighbors, life's great on the ranch LOL
• What's something you learned about yourself? That I was lucky to have survived 8 years sobriety without the benefit of The program of AA.
• Any new additions to your family? Yes my nephew "D".
• What was your best month? um, May to October
• What music will you remember 2008 by? nothing comes to mind!
• Who has been your best friend? me, myself and I oh and my sponsor
• Made new friends? oh yes many new friends thank god I was getting lonely...
• Favorite Night[s] none in particular, they're all good.
• Any regrets? more like lessons
• Overall, how would you rate this year? I would give it an 10 because I'm alive and grateful for all that I have, even on bad days like today.
• What would you change about 2008? I would have lost some weight but so far I put on 20 pounds so that would have been nice but aside from that nothing because I'm where I'm supposed to be.
• Other than home, where did you spend most of your time? Outside
• Have any life changes in 2008? yes, many thanks to the program of AA\
• Change your hairstyle? yep, put streaks and leaving it long
• Get a new job? yes, changed businesses and so far so good.
• How old did you turn this year? 43
• Do you have a New Year's resolution? Yes and I already started it.
• Did anything embarrassing? Don't know!
• Buy anything new from eBay? nope
• What was/were your favorite purchase[s]? my horses
• Get married or divorced? nope
• Get arrested? nope
• Be honest - did you watch American Idol? no, haven't since Taylor Hicks won, that's when I said enough is enough LOL
• Did you get sick this year? Yes early in the year but I finally found a solution to not get sick, don't live in the same house as the grandchildren.
• Start a new hobby? Not really
• Been snowboarding? no
• Are you happy to see 2008 go? oh yeah
• Drank Starbucks in 2008? yeah once maybe twice
• Been naughty or nice? both
• What are you wishing for in 2009? to be healthy, happy and at peace with myself.

I'm baaaack!!!

Hey everyone,

Sorry for my absence, life's kept me busy and to be quite honest I felt that I didn't have anything to share but struggles. You see I haven't been following any plan whatsoever so I couldn't go around writing about progress since I wasn't doing anything to see any and I didn't want to write about my failings, lord knows my ego tells me about them enough everyday. Got to quiet that ego down, so what did I do, well today I actually did something good for myself!! Wohoo! I did a DVD workout called Leslie Sansone's Walk Away the Pounds Get Started, I did the whole mile so kudos to me for doing that, I'm a large girl as you all know so that makes me feel good. I used to do her 3 mile walk almost every day and on occasion her 4 mile. I used to be a size 3, I used to this and I used to that. None of that matters anymore now does it.

Another thing I need to air out here because its part of who I am is I'm a clean and sober alcoholic of over 9 years sobriety so its not part of this blog so much as its part of me. I go to AA meetings and I follow the same 12 steps that Overeaters Anonymous follows. Now that's out of the way. I couldn't for the life of me figure out why I wanted to keep my sobriety such a secret, first of all the blog is anonymous and second of all its who I am, take it or leave it. There's a lot of us morbidly overweight women who are recovering alcoholics and have traded one addiction for the other. My overeating is a testament that I'm not doing what I'm supposed to be doing and that's handing my will to God every day. So I hope you stick around and watch me learn to live again while incorporating healthy eating habits, exercise and God all in my new plan.

So I guess the blog will change in certain directions only because I have to be true to me. Basically I just want to share my struggles and successes with weight loss while being true to the recovering alcoholic that I am.

That's it for now!

Thanks for visiting!

Sassle!

Halloweez

I write this at 4:00 am due to a terrible night of sleep with tummy problems and a stuffed nose. My system is all messed up and I think its effecting me emotionally as well. But that's for another time, onto today's topic.

So we took the granddaughter out for Halloween and allow me to tell you that I am embarrassed on so many levels. Why I decided that it was perfectly alright to go out without dying my roots (they were really bad) but I put my hair in a pulled back pony and had no makeup on. Hubby took pics, I'm not sure if it was to shock me or if his intentions were genuine but my butt was huge, I looked worse I swear then my pics posted here on the site. I am fat, no I am morbidly obese. I look terrible but that's nothing, I could barely walk, my lower back hurt, my breathing was horrific and to top off the evening I celebrated by eating half a bag of white powdered donuts (hubby bought them for me).

Why am I still doing this to myself, I panic because of my health and if it weren't for my faith in my Higher Power I would probably worry even more. Has it even occurred to me to pray to God for help on this matter, no it hasn't I should right now.

God, I offer myself to You--to build with me and to do with me as You will. Relieve me of the bondage of self, that I may better do Your will. Take away my difficulties, that victory over them may bear witness to those I would help of Your Power, Your Love, and Your Way of Life. May I do Your will always!

This prayer has so much power if its used and if I pray to God to have me live his will, but I realize that I am not doing my 3rd step prayer and doing God's will, I'm doing Sassle's will.

The photos taken were one thing but I have to say I felt horrible, I couldn't wait until we could go back into the car and go home every step we took was hell on my back and lungs and my granddaughter wanted me to go with her up the stairs which I did but I didn't want to, that's no fun for me nor for her.

Why am I still doing this to myself?