Two steps forward, one step back. That's how it feels like things have been going for me lately. I've been doing really well with sticking to my "diet", but I've been craving sweets hardcore and having a hard time not giving in, which also means I haven't been buying Halloween candy. :) Work has been weird lately, too, although I think that's more because of somebody that's feeling a little beat down trying to suck others in so they'll be on their side if/when the shit hits the fan. The manager at my old job has been asking me about coming back for the holidays and, although the money would be kinda nice, I don't know if I want to be working all the time through another holiday season. I guess the bottom line is that although things aren't going great, they sure could be going a lot worse.
The weird part is that, although things are ok, I've been feeling kinda tired and run down. I think that's really the reason I'm looking at the stuff that's been going on in a negative light. I barely see or talk to my friends, I barely make it to the gym, and I don't even really get anything done at home either. I think, o, I'm kinda tired, maybe I'll take a little nap...and then I proceed to sleep for five hours, even if I set an alarm for an hour or so after I lay down. And I still sleep seven hours or more at night (or day on the weekends, since I work overnights then). I don't even feel sick. Just....tired. :/ Maybe it's just the weather changing....I hate fall.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Thursday, September 15, 2011
can't sleep, clowns will eat me
ok, i don't really think clowns will eat me, but i really can't sleep. and then other times, i can't wake up. gah! i keep sleeping just a couple hours at a time, then being up for way longer than one should be able to function on just two or three hours of sleep...and then i eventually crash and sleep for like 16 hours straight. i'm not trying to do this at all...the only times i force myself to stay awake are the nights that i work. outside of that, i get involved in doing something, my brain gets going, and then i can't turn it off. which is why i'm going to go to the gym at 4:30 in the morning today (when they open)....if i don't, i'm probably going to be too out of it to get there today, since they close at 9 pm. *sigh* i fail.
Wednesday, August 31, 2011
Monday, July 25, 2011
making a house a home: overview
this is an overview for a series i intend to do about getting my house cleaned up, getting necessary repairs done, actually decorating/designing a bit instead of just having stuff be "good enough" to live with, and maybe even doing some real upgrading.
over the next week or two, i'm going to be working on sorting through some of my junk and hauling stuff either to the dump or to places like goodwill. i know i have a LOT of clothing and craft supplies that i need to get rid of, and i plan on getting rid of pretty much all of the furniture currently in my living room. it makes me a little sad, because i really really love one of my couches, but it smells and really needs to be reupholstered in order to be at all nice again. i don't have the knowledge to do that myself or the money to have someone do it for me. i looked into it once and it sounded like i could buy a new (clearance or sale) or a good used one for less money than i could have this one redone. plus it's huge and heavy and has already punched a hole through my living room floor (just a small one from a leg).
which brings me to the next part of this project. my house has several soft spots in the floor throughout the house. i have wood laminate flooring in two rooms - one bedroom and the bathroom. all of the other rooms (two bedroom, living room, kitchen, and the hallway) have a major soft spots. there are at least two actual holes. so, as the cleaning progresses, i'm going to be moving things out of my living room until it is completely empty. this is part of why i'm going to get rid of my furniture. i don't really have room to store very much of it, plus i know i have a loveseat and a couple swivel rockers in my (very full) pole barn so if i end up not having money for new furniture later, i can bring those in.
once the living room is empty, we're going to rip up the carpet (at least 2 layers - classy, huh?) and fix the subfloor. then we can move things out of the other rooms (kitchen and bedrooms) one or two rooms at a time to repair the subfloor and lay new floor coverings. i want to do wood laminate in the living room, and i figure we can put that down once the rest of the floors are done so we don't wreck it by moving a bunch of stuff in and back out. my house also has three doors - one that we use and two that we can't. one that we can't use has been calked shut because it was leaking; the other, the layers of the door and casing are actually splitting apart. it got so bad that we couldn't get the door to latch, let alone lock, so my husband nailed it shut. here's hoping we don't have a fire. ;)
the decorating part is pretty self explanatory. i really love the light, airy feel of cottage or country style decorating so that's what i'm hoping to do. i may have to convince my husband to set up his projector and his game systems and all that stuff in one of the bedrooms. it can be like a guest bedroom and man cave all in one. ;) the other bedroom i'd like to set up as a craft room and office.
the unnecessary upgrades i'd like to do are removing the entryway that's been built onto my house and replacing it with either a real room complete with insulation and heating or a big deck and add an overhang over the door and doing something with my kitchen cabinets. i'm not sure exactly what we would do with them (or what we'd replace them with) because i've never really looked into pricing for that sort of thing and i don't know how much money we could spend on something like that. i just know that the cabinets we have now are ugly on the outside and dingy on the inside.
so that's the plan in a nutshell. if you'd like to follow my progress on this, just watch for posts titled "making a house a home". part 1 will be "getting my house cleaned up", part 2 will be "getting necessary repairs done", part 3 will be "decorating and designing", and part 4 will be "real upgrades". there will probably be more than one post for each part, so think of an outline: part 1:a, part 1:b, etc. :) wish me luck!
over the next week or two, i'm going to be working on sorting through some of my junk and hauling stuff either to the dump or to places like goodwill. i know i have a LOT of clothing and craft supplies that i need to get rid of, and i plan on getting rid of pretty much all of the furniture currently in my living room. it makes me a little sad, because i really really love one of my couches, but it smells and really needs to be reupholstered in order to be at all nice again. i don't have the knowledge to do that myself or the money to have someone do it for me. i looked into it once and it sounded like i could buy a new (clearance or sale) or a good used one for less money than i could have this one redone. plus it's huge and heavy and has already punched a hole through my living room floor (just a small one from a leg).
which brings me to the next part of this project. my house has several soft spots in the floor throughout the house. i have wood laminate flooring in two rooms - one bedroom and the bathroom. all of the other rooms (two bedroom, living room, kitchen, and the hallway) have a major soft spots. there are at least two actual holes. so, as the cleaning progresses, i'm going to be moving things out of my living room until it is completely empty. this is part of why i'm going to get rid of my furniture. i don't really have room to store very much of it, plus i know i have a loveseat and a couple swivel rockers in my (very full) pole barn so if i end up not having money for new furniture later, i can bring those in.
once the living room is empty, we're going to rip up the carpet (at least 2 layers - classy, huh?) and fix the subfloor. then we can move things out of the other rooms (kitchen and bedrooms) one or two rooms at a time to repair the subfloor and lay new floor coverings. i want to do wood laminate in the living room, and i figure we can put that down once the rest of the floors are done so we don't wreck it by moving a bunch of stuff in and back out. my house also has three doors - one that we use and two that we can't. one that we can't use has been calked shut because it was leaking; the other, the layers of the door and casing are actually splitting apart. it got so bad that we couldn't get the door to latch, let alone lock, so my husband nailed it shut. here's hoping we don't have a fire. ;)
the decorating part is pretty self explanatory. i really love the light, airy feel of cottage or country style decorating so that's what i'm hoping to do. i may have to convince my husband to set up his projector and his game systems and all that stuff in one of the bedrooms. it can be like a guest bedroom and man cave all in one. ;) the other bedroom i'd like to set up as a craft room and office.
the unnecessary upgrades i'd like to do are removing the entryway that's been built onto my house and replacing it with either a real room complete with insulation and heating or a big deck and add an overhang over the door and doing something with my kitchen cabinets. i'm not sure exactly what we would do with them (or what we'd replace them with) because i've never really looked into pricing for that sort of thing and i don't know how much money we could spend on something like that. i just know that the cabinets we have now are ugly on the outside and dingy on the inside.
so that's the plan in a nutshell. if you'd like to follow my progress on this, just watch for posts titled "making a house a home". part 1 will be "getting my house cleaned up", part 2 will be "getting necessary repairs done", part 3 will be "decorating and designing", and part 4 will be "real upgrades". there will probably be more than one post for each part, so think of an outline: part 1:a, part 1:b, etc. :) wish me luck!
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
sorry it's been so long...
(warning - this is a sorta TMI blog)
i've been really out of it and lacking motivation to work at my weight loss in the last couple months. most of the time, i'm still thinking about making healthy choices as far as food, but i haven't been counting my calories and i've definitely overdone it with junk food several times. i think the biggest thing holding me back right now is that i don't have any desire to go outside and do things. i try to convince myself, but i just don't get anywhere. i just feel so lazy! i really don't want to do ANYTHING most days and it bugs the heck out of me.
i think the problem might be that i've quit taking my antidepressant. i realize this maybe doesn't sound like an awesome plan, but hear me out: i was on the lowest dose prescribed, i forgot to take it half the time anyway (so i effectively was on half of the lowest prescribed dose), and the thing that actually made me decide to quit taking it - reports of it causing birth defects when taken by pregnant women. that may sound like a "well duh" but when i started taking it, i was under the impression that the only significant risk in pregnancy with this drug was a slightly increased risk of miscarriage. maybe it sounds bad, but i'd rather have a miscarriage than have a child that has a significant birth defect that will directly affect their quality of life or expected lifespan.
i'm not pregnant yet, but my husband and i have been married for eight years now and have used birth control off and on, but overall have probably had at least five years worth of unprotected sex under our belt without getting pregnant. i'm sure my weight is a big piece of why we haven't gotten pregnant since i have an irregular cycle and most info points to my weight keeping me from ovulating at regular intervals.
sometimes i blame my husband for us not having a child yet because if he doesn't feel like sex, he will refuse every advance i make (even the dressing up sexy and trying to be all seductive thing that EVERYONE suggests) and, if i push the issue once he's said no, he gets mad and flat out ignores me. even if i tell him i think i may be ovulating based on my fertility signs. but i have no proof that we would have gotten pregnant even if he was more cooperative because no doctor i've been to has been willing to do any testing to really see, definitively, whether or not i ovulate. they've suggested i take clomid, but i don't see the point in taking it when there's a good chance my husband won't feel like sex during the couple days leading up to ovulation. the blood tests i've had done always come back normal and the doctors i've seen say they think i likely ovulate most (if not every) cycle, just not every 4 to 5 weeks like most women seem to.
we've had the "are you maybe just not really ready to try for a baby?" discussions and i've gone back on the pill once and offered to use condoms and all those things. nothing has made a difference and he insists that he'd be ecstatic about having a baby ASAP. but i always feel like he isn't willing to hold up his end of the deal to make it happen. we've talked about him going in to have a semen analysis done, but he avoids the topic and, at the very least, won't make the appointment himself. i suppose if i made an appointment for him he'd probably go, but somehow it doesn't seem right for me to push him to do it. i dunno.
i guess i need to commit myself to getting healthy in case it happens and try to not worry about making it happen. but anyone who's ever spent any length of time trying to get pregnant knows that's WAY easier said than done.
i've been really out of it and lacking motivation to work at my weight loss in the last couple months. most of the time, i'm still thinking about making healthy choices as far as food, but i haven't been counting my calories and i've definitely overdone it with junk food several times. i think the biggest thing holding me back right now is that i don't have any desire to go outside and do things. i try to convince myself, but i just don't get anywhere. i just feel so lazy! i really don't want to do ANYTHING most days and it bugs the heck out of me.
i think the problem might be that i've quit taking my antidepressant. i realize this maybe doesn't sound like an awesome plan, but hear me out: i was on the lowest dose prescribed, i forgot to take it half the time anyway (so i effectively was on half of the lowest prescribed dose), and the thing that actually made me decide to quit taking it - reports of it causing birth defects when taken by pregnant women. that may sound like a "well duh" but when i started taking it, i was under the impression that the only significant risk in pregnancy with this drug was a slightly increased risk of miscarriage. maybe it sounds bad, but i'd rather have a miscarriage than have a child that has a significant birth defect that will directly affect their quality of life or expected lifespan.
i'm not pregnant yet, but my husband and i have been married for eight years now and have used birth control off and on, but overall have probably had at least five years worth of unprotected sex under our belt without getting pregnant. i'm sure my weight is a big piece of why we haven't gotten pregnant since i have an irregular cycle and most info points to my weight keeping me from ovulating at regular intervals.
sometimes i blame my husband for us not having a child yet because if he doesn't feel like sex, he will refuse every advance i make (even the dressing up sexy and trying to be all seductive thing that EVERYONE suggests) and, if i push the issue once he's said no, he gets mad and flat out ignores me. even if i tell him i think i may be ovulating based on my fertility signs. but i have no proof that we would have gotten pregnant even if he was more cooperative because no doctor i've been to has been willing to do any testing to really see, definitively, whether or not i ovulate. they've suggested i take clomid, but i don't see the point in taking it when there's a good chance my husband won't feel like sex during the couple days leading up to ovulation. the blood tests i've had done always come back normal and the doctors i've seen say they think i likely ovulate most (if not every) cycle, just not every 4 to 5 weeks like most women seem to.
we've had the "are you maybe just not really ready to try for a baby?" discussions and i've gone back on the pill once and offered to use condoms and all those things. nothing has made a difference and he insists that he'd be ecstatic about having a baby ASAP. but i always feel like he isn't willing to hold up his end of the deal to make it happen. we've talked about him going in to have a semen analysis done, but he avoids the topic and, at the very least, won't make the appointment himself. i suppose if i made an appointment for him he'd probably go, but somehow it doesn't seem right for me to push him to do it. i dunno.
i guess i need to commit myself to getting healthy in case it happens and try to not worry about making it happen. but anyone who's ever spent any length of time trying to get pregnant knows that's WAY easier said than done.
Monday, April 11, 2011
why am i so tired??
life has been going pretty well lately. i still like my new job - sometimes, i have a shift that makes me want to pull my hair out, but overall, i really enjoy it. my old job has been really cooperative as far as scheduling goes. i'm scheduled one day per week there, and i've gotten a few calls when they need a shift covered. so that's working out really well, too, which is good since i like the people i work with there and the little extra money i make by staying there has allowed me to start building up some savings.
i've also started regularly attending bellydance fitness classes. i've been going to one or two classes per week. it's awesome! i don't know how else to describe it. i just love it. :) some friends of mine are getting me into pole dance classes too. i paid for five classes at a big discount, but i don't know if i'll keep going after those five classes. it's a lot of fun, and a serious work-out, but there's a lot of stuff that i can't do there because of my weight. so i dunno. i might keep going, or i might give it up til i've lost a bit more weight. i guess i'll decide for sure when i'm at my fourth or fifth class, so i can see how much progress i'm making. i've only been to one class so far and my second will be today.
so, what i don't understand, is why am i so tired? i don't mean physically tired - that would fully make sense, since i'm working between 40 and 45 hours a week when, for a long time, i was working less than 20 most of the time and almost never over 30. i'm mentally tired. my brain doesn't want to function, i have no motivation to do anything around the house or to exercise outside of the classes i've been taking. i'm struggling with tracking my calories. i'm all whiney and cryey and i don't even want to get dressed most of the time. it's pretty standard for me to feel like this in december or january....but it's april, the sun is out, plants are coming back to life....why do i feel like this? i just don't get it.
i've also started regularly attending bellydance fitness classes. i've been going to one or two classes per week. it's awesome! i don't know how else to describe it. i just love it. :) some friends of mine are getting me into pole dance classes too. i paid for five classes at a big discount, but i don't know if i'll keep going after those five classes. it's a lot of fun, and a serious work-out, but there's a lot of stuff that i can't do there because of my weight. so i dunno. i might keep going, or i might give it up til i've lost a bit more weight. i guess i'll decide for sure when i'm at my fourth or fifth class, so i can see how much progress i'm making. i've only been to one class so far and my second will be today.
so, what i don't understand, is why am i so tired? i don't mean physically tired - that would fully make sense, since i'm working between 40 and 45 hours a week when, for a long time, i was working less than 20 most of the time and almost never over 30. i'm mentally tired. my brain doesn't want to function, i have no motivation to do anything around the house or to exercise outside of the classes i've been taking. i'm struggling with tracking my calories. i'm all whiney and cryey and i don't even want to get dressed most of the time. it's pretty standard for me to feel like this in december or january....but it's april, the sun is out, plants are coming back to life....why do i feel like this? i just don't get it.
Monday, January 31, 2011
sharing a series...grocery shopping 101
i stumbled across a series of blogs that i found highly educational, so i figured i'd share them....
Part 1: Asses Your Kitchen
Part 2: Meal Planning
Part 3: Unit Price
Part 4: Re-think Quantity
Part 5: Save More
do you have any tips or tricks when it comes to meal planning, grocery shopping, or getting the most bang for your buck when it comes to food?
Part 1: Asses Your Kitchen
Part 2: Meal Planning
Part 3: Unit Price
Part 4: Re-think Quantity
Part 5: Save More
do you have any tips or tricks when it comes to meal planning, grocery shopping, or getting the most bang for your buck when it comes to food?
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
heavy
have you seen the new show "heavy" on A&E? i love and hate this show at the same time.
i like that they try to get into the struggles that people face. how they got to the weight the're at, why they need to lose weight (the health issues they actually face rather than just what they *might* face one day if they don't do something), etc. i like that they try to deal with the emotional problems. they show these people losing a lot of weight in a fairly short period of time, but they're being supervised by people who know what they're doing the whole time. they aren't competing against anyone. that's what i like about it.
what i don't like is that these people piss me off! tonight's episode had a woman who was the same age as me. her start weight is just over 30 lbs less than my start weight and she's all "i can't play with my kids" and it shows her getting out of breath just walking across the yard and climbing up on a trampoline. wtf? that isn't cuz you're fat, girl, that's cuz you're out of shape. it's cuz you spend too much time on the couch and not enough moving. i'm slower than someone my age who's normal weight, but i can do just about anything they can do. most stuff that i can't do (or am uncomfortable doing) are because of weight limits (a lot of fun "toys" have weight limits between 175 and 250 lbs) rather than because i actually can't physically handle it.
i don't have high blood pressure (it borders on high when i'm stressed out), i've been tested for IR and other blood sugar issues repeatedly and the tests never show any signs of a problem, i can climb a flight of stairs, i can walk a mile, i can jog/run in short bursts (but it hurts my ankles!), and if you put a camera in my face while i was working out, you can bet the LAST thing i would do would be cry or whine about it being too hard! i would probably keep going til i dropped or literally COULD NOT do another rep cuz i wouldn't wanna look like a ***** on national TV!
so i guess....i like the show. i (so far, anyway) HATE the people on it. what do you think?
i like that they try to get into the struggles that people face. how they got to the weight the're at, why they need to lose weight (the health issues they actually face rather than just what they *might* face one day if they don't do something), etc. i like that they try to deal with the emotional problems. they show these people losing a lot of weight in a fairly short period of time, but they're being supervised by people who know what they're doing the whole time. they aren't competing against anyone. that's what i like about it.
what i don't like is that these people piss me off! tonight's episode had a woman who was the same age as me. her start weight is just over 30 lbs less than my start weight and she's all "i can't play with my kids" and it shows her getting out of breath just walking across the yard and climbing up on a trampoline. wtf? that isn't cuz you're fat, girl, that's cuz you're out of shape. it's cuz you spend too much time on the couch and not enough moving. i'm slower than someone my age who's normal weight, but i can do just about anything they can do. most stuff that i can't do (or am uncomfortable doing) are because of weight limits (a lot of fun "toys" have weight limits between 175 and 250 lbs) rather than because i actually can't physically handle it.
i don't have high blood pressure (it borders on high when i'm stressed out), i've been tested for IR and other blood sugar issues repeatedly and the tests never show any signs of a problem, i can climb a flight of stairs, i can walk a mile, i can jog/run in short bursts (but it hurts my ankles!), and if you put a camera in my face while i was working out, you can bet the LAST thing i would do would be cry or whine about it being too hard! i would probably keep going til i dropped or literally COULD NOT do another rep cuz i wouldn't wanna look like a ***** on national TV!
so i guess....i like the show. i (so far, anyway) HATE the people on it. what do you think?
Friday, January 14, 2011
back at it again.....
so i've been mia. i started a new job, which is awesome! i'm working in an AFC home with developmentally disabled adults. i won't go too in depth right now, but it's great to be doing a job that meets a true need in the community. nobody truly needs fast food or craft supplies. both are nice, but people could get by without them. however, as long as there are people with disabilities that can't care for themselves, someone needs to be there to look out for them.
i'm trying really hard to get back on track as far as counting my calories and getting back into the habit of exercising regularly. i actually tracked all my calories for thursday! i went over, but just the fact that i wrote it all down is a step in the right direction. i've decided that i'm going to track midnight to midnight as a day....i used to track from when i woke up til i went to bed, but i'm working overnights at my new job, and still working day shifts at my old job, so i think that will be the most consistent way to track.
now, let's see if i can stick to it. :)
i'm trying really hard to get back on track as far as counting my calories and getting back into the habit of exercising regularly. i actually tracked all my calories for thursday! i went over, but just the fact that i wrote it all down is a step in the right direction. i've decided that i'm going to track midnight to midnight as a day....i used to track from when i woke up til i went to bed, but i'm working overnights at my new job, and still working day shifts at my old job, so i think that will be the most consistent way to track.
now, let's see if i can stick to it. :)
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