The Nicest Things

They say these come to those who wait, but I'm here to tell you waiting has had nothing to do with the niceness that has come to me since starting this blog. To say I'm touched by the connections I am making is an understatement.

Today, a friend let me know he reads this thing and has been inspired to keep working hard for his own health and safety. I think that's such a sacred thing to tell me and to share with me. I'm over the moon. :) Thank you, JD!

JD also told me of an app he's using to food log and track weight loss. I've tried FitDay and a few other apps - I've even maintained a Weight Watchers online membership just to use the points logging feature - and failed miserably because I'll track well for a while then procrastinate until I forget to bother.

I've even dragged my friend Kelly into using a tracker online with me and we both waffled, although she stayed pretty true to using it better than I did.

Anyway, I asked JD if he'd like to be my friend on this new-to-me app called Lose It! I kind of think that it's a good idea because I'm a bit better about doing things I've got to have accountability for. I CAN waffle and fade out of doing things like that, though, so I have to approach using the app with a sense of realism....STILL....I've hit that reset button with the low carb lifestyle, I'm in touch with a group of other people doing the same thing via my nutritionist, Ivana, and I believe that I would treat JD differently than I would Kelly. Let me tell you why.

Kelly and I are close. JD and I are friendly and I would say mutually courteous and compassionate, and close enough to be encouraging. We are not close enough to forgive each other/ignore that something is missing if one of us is not showing up to food log or if communication about the weight loss stops. We're not close enough to use each other as an excuse to fudge a little. With Kelly, I have a buddy, but I also have a partner in crime. I have that in my husband, too. If one of us goes astray on the meal plan, the other does, too. (Kelly's a bit better at not doing that than Rob and I are!)

I don't have that too-close comfort in my friendship with JD - and I don't think I'd like to. So, yeah, I've asked him if he'd like to be friends via the app and basically just kind of be there for each other to add weight to each of us having accountability - instead of adding weight to ourselves.

I think it's worth a shot. I have learned that it helps if I pay attention to my handicaps. Sorry, Kelly! I'm sure I will still drag Kel into my next food logging attempt even if JD says yes. Then we can all benefit.

And I've made a starter goal in order to be on the right track with my low carb lifestyle again: eat low carb breakfasts, which includes at least one serving o' veggies every time.

And away we go.

Begin Again Again.

Tonight I joined a teleconference with some great people who are ready to trim the carbs from their diets. I've got to clear the carbs out all over again and get to where I'm choosing naturally great stuff to cook up and gnaw on instead of take out and drive thru yuck.

It felt good to talk to other people who are trying the same things. Listening, and even hearing myself speak, brought up enough reminders of why the diet is so worth doing. It works SO well.

In the time I stuck with Yourishment and routine exercise of 2-3 days a week, I lost nearly 50 pounds (kept teetering!) in about 5 months. My thyroid levels increased. I could walk much longer distances without stopping for back pain or to catch my breath, I could maneuver quickly. I could feel my body slimming. I liked touching my legs and my stomach and marveling over the differences. My triglycerides went down. My cholesterol was coming into a better balance. Mind clarity was great. I took Navy SEAL training class. I smiled more. I moved comfortably. I felt capable of more. I...defied expectation.

And I realized that is what I truly love about this weight loss regime: I defied expectation. Whatever I expected - whatever anyone expected of me - whatever medical proofs insisted - whatever physics applications offered - I defied expectations over and over and over again.

Now that I know what I like so much, I am making this my little personal mantra: Defy Expectation. Because I can. Because I DO. Because I have found a successful formula. I'm going to put this little saying...everywhere. Because being able to Defy Expectation and go way beyond or way opposite or way differently makes me feel powerful. It gives me the biggest thrill in the world.

Thank you for supporting me.

My mind, schedule and plate have been SO FULL since the last time I was here and able to post about anything. I can honestly tell you my momentum fell flat for about three weeks and it is just coming back to me - and thank God - I so need it.

January somethingorother I drove to Boston to be with my mom while she went into the hospital and was given a procedure to help give her heart relief from aortic stenosis, a valve-restricting problem that prevents blood from entering the heart properly and also causes a backup of fluid in the body..something CHF patients sometimes endure. So, I was there for a heartwrenching (no pun) ten days of praying she'd stay alive through it and that the procedure would amount to mom being able to take better care of herself. It's going to be a very very slow process. Very slow. But she made it and she's now in rehab, doing what she needs to be doing with people I am confident are very good for her.

Along with mom's medical troubles and my living hundreds of miles away while she recovers and working three part time jobs and heading a steering committee for a local foods festival (which will soon meet more than once a month) I've taken on mom's financial crisis....not really knowing how much of a crisis it really is.

There is so much gone un-handled and there's so much of a dance between what she owes personally and what her company owes (she owns the business my stepfather and she built together) and I am not joking when I say every single day brings another obstacle. Bank accounts get frozen. Customers get letters from outside entities asking for collections. Employees demand pay. Jobs get canceled because pay is not just slow to come in....but is being directed to outside entities which hope to recover what mom's company owes faster by getting money from her customers directly. I can't begin to know how this all happened or when it started happening but I am told by one employee it's been going on 24 years. I don't have a clue as to how this company keeps going or how my mom keeps her house or any of her assets...and I certainly do not know how to save any of it.

I contacted the company lawyer. He contacted the company accountant. I've stepped back a bit because I really have no business in all of that mess. Meanwhile, we are doing our best to make sure payments are sent for vital things like: health insurance, homeowners insurance, mortgage, cell phones (the company relies on them heavily), taxes and life insurance. I can't even look at the pile of bills that come in otherwise. I've taken on a portion of my mom's accounts job and I call her customers every day to follow up on invoices with customers that MAYBE didn't get a letter asking them to pay a debtor directly instead.

So, I've been eating like someone who has no time to cook or think about health. I've had drive through lifestyle for a few weeks and order restaurant food too much. It's gained me the 6 pounds that I lost while I was in Boston at the hospital in January and I feel generally crappy all over.

My heart is crushed. My mind is overwhelmed. My spirit feels like it is in limbo. My attitude remains positive. My hope, my faith, is one salvation. My immediate family is one other. I thank God for every moment I can feel supported and OK despite the problems in my mothers life that continually scream at me.

What am I doing for relief? Not a lot. Now and then I shove everything out of my mind, out of my sight, and spend time with friends. Occasionally, I'll indulge in a couple of beers or a few glasses of wine. Not the ideal way to get free of things, I know, it's just what I've been doing though very sparingly.

Keep in mind I am also a seminary student. I do homework, late, and turn that in, late. I'll graduate in June if all goes well and be ordained on the 10th if I can be!

I'm also planning the biggest birthday party of my kid's life for her sweet 16th which includes fancy dress and a caterer and the works (something I've aimed to do since forever that is a family tradition...always a BIG 16th and I'd like to give her that) - that is slated for July.

And then that Foods Expo is in August, but planning happens every month and I have to attend those meetings.

When all this is said and done - and I do believe this too shall pass - I tell myself it will all have been worth the work. It will have to be.

Don't think this is a complaint list - it's not. It's just a fact sheet to me. When I think about complaining, I think about people in the world who have lost so much themselves or who live in harsh conditions or are in situations they can do nothing about and I just can't find the room to complain.

So, I guess what I'm saying is I just wanted to tell you what's been going on. And I know you're here and I appreciate it. Lots.

I'm Cheating.

I know some of you are waiting to see a post here, so I am posting - but I am kind of cheating because this is something I wrote for school recently. Still, it's relevant material to what is going on and it was a good assignment to complete...because it has helped my overall attitude and freed me a little bit, too.

Reflections on How Can I Help? Ch. 2: Who’s Helping?

“I had to look through him and find something beside this astonishing appearance of a father I could barely recognize physically.”

And like the first storyteller in this chapter, I was caught up in my role as a daughter for a few minutes when I stepped into my mother’s bedroom to find a small bump under the covers. The feeble, toothless woman whose eyes went wide and whose gasp rang out in the room at my appearance had white and grey streaks and no ability to get up out of bed. In the few minutes of observation I yearned for my mother, not the reflection of my deceased great-nana Pearl.

Mom has dyed brown hair, not gray. Mom has teeth in her mouth, not bare gums. Mom is strong and resilient, not bedridden. The fact that I see her only a few times a year is not supposed to change that. But, whom did I see? Not mom.

Until I softened, remembering this chapter of How Can I Help? and the experience of that initial storyteller who had to come to terms with seeing her father near to death in a hospital room.

I feel fortunate to have read that before going to my mom’s house (where I’d been called to by worried relatives.) I’m glad the words prepared me for the distraction of seeing my mother in her truly natural state for the first time.

“So often we deny ourselves and others the full resources of our being simply because we’re in the habit of defining ourselves narrowly and defensively to begin with.”

I admit that I ached as I listened to my mother talk about restrictions that prevent her from getting out of bed, getting in better physical shape, getting good nutrition, getting involved and active with her friends and family, following some form of routine as she would do while keeping her business in the black.

My mom deeply believes she is condemned to a life of lacking mobility, sugar-filled foods and an inability to communicate in business. She sees no other option. Doctors, nurses, physical therapists, psychologists, friends, church buddies, family…they all see other options and also the strength that still exists in her body, if not in her spirit or will to activate it.

I wanted my mom to believe herself capable of 80% more than she suggests she is and yet I knew I couldn’t convince her of it. Not only had other people been trying to, for example but in being around her for the few days I was there, I became aware that my mom is scared to believe she is more able than she is being. I’m not able to answer why.

What I am able to do is love her with her gummy smile and drab hair and strange size. More difficult, though, is being able to listen to her because what she has to say is so sad and very often clearly untrue. I find myself getting tense, ready to argue – sometimes I will argue – instead of listening because my own head is discounting her thoughts as lies. They ARE lies. My mom has always lied as a way of protecting herself and controlling her environment…and while I’m used to her doing that, I also feel desperate for her to stop because her health is the cost of her made up stories.

For example, she will say a doctor said something he or she didn’t like, they “don’t want her to walk or exert herself until after the next appointment” she has with them. Or she’ll say the physical therapist told her “not to try going down the stairs” (with help) because “she’s not ready for that.” These professionals disagree and they will tell me and other relatives involved in my mom’s care that they never said those things. If confronted with that, mom will just make up some other excuse and use some other source to validate it so she gets what she wants.

Her methods are frustrating and they make it difficult for people who support her and love her and believe in her abilities.

“With nothing left to do, we let our heart and intuitive wisdom reveal another way to be.”

So one night, after many of sleeping in the same bed as my mom and going to sleep angry that she wouldn’t budge, wouldn’t try, wouldn’t stop manipulating people, I simply gave up. I had to come to terms with my inability to help. Lying in bed, I reached for her hand and held it. I told my mom I love her and went to sleep, with tears in my eyes, still holding her hand.

It was the first moment I stopped trying to fix my mom.

I spent the next few days trying to arrange her care around how and who she was, not what she could become. Care is costly, involves a lot of people and is taxing on my heart because of my belief in her, but we provide it for the same reason I reached my hand for hers that night: we love her. However she is, we love her.

I’m not a changed person. I still have to come to terms with my inability to help – and I am sometimes so tempted to shove my mom’s wants out of the way and take control of her care more completely just to force her to get better.

I have to step back and reassess often and let my mother be the woman she is, even if I am scared she will die because of it. She could. And I now feel the best thing I can do is be with her and be loving while she is here to be with me and be loved.