Surrounding yourself with Support

Last night I had pre-event jitters, and woke up around 11pm and couldn't get back to sleep. I was frusterated because I had to be up at 5:30am to put the roast in the crock pot. Then I had to be rested for the company I was going to have that morning. I lay there awake, staring at the wall. For some reason, my mind went to my Dad. With everything going on with my Grandpa, I began to think of the loss I've had with my Dad, and his entire side of the family. If you haven't realized yet through my blog, it was a huge loss for me. I am hugely family oriented, and to loose the relationship with the entire side of my Dad's family was heartbreaking. It was also all over a misunderstanding. That hurts even more.

So the events that lead up to me ending relationships with them rolled through my brain. Tears formed in my eyes, and fell down my cheek. Great.... I wasn't going to get back to sleep. I went through and tried to figure out what I could have done differently, then it hit me. I COULDN'T have changed the outcome. I couldn't change their minds no matter how hard I tried. I even though about looking up my cousin who I had a somewhat good relationship with, but I figured it would just look ...... weird?, or Desprite?. I don't know, but it didn't seem right. If I knew that me backing down and forgiving and forgetting about everything would change their minds about me and how they treat me then I would do it in a heart beat. Problem is, I know they would treat me the same. Like a red headed step child. So in bed around midnight I realized that this wasn't my problem. I couldn't change things. They simply were not supportive, and did not love me. Fact was cold and hard. They didn't care about me. I know that seems blunt and somewhat so awful, but it's the truth. Had they cared about me they would have come to me with any problems or questions. 

I've been rolling this around the last few weeks. I've been doing my absolute best to surround myself with people who loved me and wanted to see me succeed. I've cut people off that were hoping for me to fail. I've ended relationships that were not healthy. Let me tell you it's not been easy. It's torn me up inside because I still care about everyone that I've removed from my life. Including  my Dad's side of the family. I still love then with all my heart. And I forgive them. However I can not forget that they don't care enough about me to include me in their lives. So there for, I've removed them from my life. 

It doesn't mean I don't think about these people I've removed. I do. It's sort of a burden I have to bear. I have to continue my life loving them, knowing that I can't be in their lives because it's not healthy for me. If I want to see me and my best. They can't be there by my side.

It breaks my heart. But I am doing this for myself. I've given enough of myself to other people disregarding my own needs for so long that I've gotten myself to this point. Now I am getting myself out. I'm sorry if you're one of those people. I still love you and care. But this is how it has to be.

I wish it could be different. But it can't.

So this is where I learned boundaries.  I've heard people talk about boundaries before and I never knew how to set them.  Until now.

I do want to thank those of you who are in my life now, and supporting me. I appreciate it. You mean the world to me and my life wouldn't be the same with out you in it, and with out your love and support. I have successfully surrounded myself with love and support. Thank you all.

Needless to say, I got back to sleep last night shortly after I realized I was doing what was best for me. Shed some tears but I still stand by my choice. I'm doing the right thing regardless if it hurts. 

Waiting for Glory

Every day I think about the goals I have for myself. I wonder how realistic they are sometimes and ask myself if I'm in it till the end. Every day the answer is, "Yes, I'm in it till the end.". So every day I give all that I've got to give that day. Sometimes that day I don't have enough to give, but I still give my all. I love it when people push me to give me more then I've got to give, and I find my new rock bottom. It amazes me how much I've changed in such a short period of time.

So today, I woke up at 5:30 to put the roast in the crock pot to make pulled pork sandwiches, and slumped back into bed and slept a while longer. When I woke up the second time I started wondering if enough people would show to My husbands birthday part today to eat the food I'd be preparing. I literally prepared a feast. veggies, dip, chips, pulled pork sandwiches, crackers, salsa, and my mother in law was preparing the famous German chocolate cake. I still had doubts that enough people would show to eat all this food. A hint of frustration came thinking that I would be stuck to eat all this fattening junk food. But I gave it my all, let it all go in hopes a good turn out would come. And they did come.

We had the most amazing gathering. People mingled, and enjoyed each other's company. It really was a good time. Towards the end, after a few compliments on the spread, I started to think about my accomplishments. I've gone from running a dash, to being able to run 1/4 mile. That in itself is a huge feat for me. But it's so much more then running further, or getting stronger. I've changed as a person. I've learned how to feel happy for myself, I've learned how to care about myself and for myself. I've learned how to set up boundaries, I've learned how to celebrate life's simple joys. I can't give anyone credit for this but myself. I've faced some hard facts about myself and I came out kicking on the other side. I'm fighting to make myself into a person that I love and adore.

My point here today is that even though there may be one big glorifying event in your life where you really soak in your accomplishments, there are hundreds of small ones to celebrate. The fact that I threw together this party last min and it was such a great turn out and such loving people showed up...... it just amazes me. I am so thankful for the people that I have in my life now. I have nothing but support. I am so blessed.

So with this post, I wanted to share that I am having hundreds of mini celebrations through out my week. I'm loving life, and enjoying everything. And to top everything off, I was able to enjoy my food today, and not beat myself up about it. This is a big thing for me. I realize that one day will not change the rest of my life. Because I plan on being active for the rest of my life.

There is no waiting for glory, because today there are celebrations to be had.

When we were kids

When we were kids, it didn't matter what kind of shoes we had on for running. We just simply ran when we felt like it and stopped when we couldn't run anymore. When we were kids, we thought reaching 30 years old was an eternity. When we were kids, we stopped eating when we were full and begged to get down from the table and go play.

Now, we have to have the best performance running shoes in order to run. We must schedule time to run in our busy day.

Now 30 years old reaches us in a flash and time just flies by.

Now, we think about food all day long and try to convince ourselves to finish what is on our plate, and tell ourselves that we need a second helping.

Now, we rarely play.

Lately I've been learning how to be young again at heart.  And to enjoy life. That playing, laughing, and giggling is an important part of our daily lives. When we were kids we didn't care or have to schedule play time. We just simply played. But now being adults we find ourselves consumed with errands and things to do that we MUST make time to play and have fun.

So play a little this week. Have fun. Be a kid again.

Not again.....

So last night was awesome at group. I was so proud of myself because I think I shaved 15 seconds off my lap time. I'm pretty sure anyways I timed it and I think I got it right. I just feel like it's a large amount of time and perhaps I made a mistake. But.... I'm going to enjoy that I did the lap in 3 mins none the less.

We also did the bleachers. I have to say my knee takes a beating going down hill. It really doesn't care for it. Uphill is ok, but the tendon in the back feels very funny as if it's rolling over something or catching or something. I'm just going to keep it up and strengthen it the best I can.

When I got home last night there was a message on the machine. It was my mom, "Grandpa Bobby is in the hospital and I need your help, call me as soon as possible.". My first reaction was Oh no, not another family member near the holidays. I seriously don't know if I could take another one. I called her and she said she might need me to take her to Sacramento tomorrow, (which is today). We are currently waiting on a phone call from my Aunte who is down there. So... the waiting game. I don't really know how bad it is, because my mom doesn't really know how bad it is. All I know is that he's elderly and has congestive heart failure, along with Atherosclerosis. I also know that when you get up there in your years you just don't recover from things like younger people. So no matter how small of a procedure this may be or an event in his life, recovery may simply just not be there.


This makes me sad. And I feel selfish that I may have to deal with another loss near the holidays. I have such hope for these holidays and I just don't know.


So thats all for this morning. I'll try and keep you all posted.

Beginning to see the light

Last night we did that daunting hill 3 times!!!! I have to say I didn't think I could make it up the 3rd time I have to thank Alyshia for coming back and encouraging me on the last trip up. I walked most of the trips. I would run up to about the same spot and have to walk the rest of the way. I have to say I expected pain this morning. I expected calves to be in knots like usual and shin splints to be throbbing away. Instead I have some soreness, but I CAN walk.

So that can only mean ONE THING!. Either my legs fell off while I was running the hill OR I am getting stronger! I'll go for the later one of the 2. I am so excited that I am getting stronger. I actually can't wait to hit the Amador track again and time another lap. I hope this is the beginning to being able to recover faster so I can participate in group every time I go instead of laying back and waiting some stuff out.

I have to tell you that I am so excited that I even did the hill one time. Because my first time trying that hill, I started run up it then began to walk and quit at Mountain View. I never even saw the top. So seeing it 3 times for me was an amazing feeling.

It makes me want to go hiking with my husband, and snow shoeing like we used to. We used to be so active and we kinda stopped doing stuff like that because we felt it was "too hard" or "too much work", or more often then anything, "we were too busy". I am so looking forward to some of that stuff this winter. I will be able to keep up with him much easier this year.

So this is an accomplishment day. I am going to relish in it.

Holidays growing nearer

I don't really know what marks the beginning of the Holidays for me but it seems that my body knows they are near. Maybe it's the fact that November has began and the stores are now going to begin to put out Christmas stuff if they haven't already. Like many people, the Holidays come with a double edged sward for me. Not only does the joy come from being able to share special memories with my family, but the fact that loved ones are gone and I will never be able to share another Holiday with them saddens me.

I know exactly when this feeling began. It began when I had to put my pony down when I was 17 the week before Thanksgiving. It was a heavy weight to bear for such a young adult.

Later in my life my dad was diagnosed with Bone Cancer, and passed away also, the week before Thanksgiving. Again, another holiday I had to go through the motions and know that I had lost someone dear. Somehow they have left little scars on my heart. My Grandma passed away later that year only about 8 months later. It was a double whammy that year.

I thought about this AGAIN as the holidays began to take hold on the world. To tell you the truth I really don't want to go through another year of sadness during the holidays. I know my dad wouldn't want me to, and nor would my grandma. I've been working on changing myself the last few months and have made such progress and I have grown so much over the last year that I feel like a completely different person. I feel like this year I have made leaps and bounds to change.

This morning I started to think about how I wanted to spend these coming Holidays. I thought to myself that I wanted to spend them with love, and joy. I wanted to have a free spirit. Light hearted and full of love. I wanted to remember those who I have loved and lost with happiness in my heart and not grief. I wanted the holidays to be what they were supposed to be. Good.

I have an idea of how to go about changing this. I plan to change my thought process and when I catch my mind drifting to darker thoughts to turn them around to positive. Not allowing me to fall into a sadness. I plan to make new rituals and memories that are happy and fun. I also want to be able to work hard on my health, but not feel guilty about having that thanksgiving meal. I want to be able to indulge but not go too far, and be able to know that my hard physical work I'm doing combats the negative I may be indulging in.

I want happiness this year.

I also feel my first 5K drawing near. Run to Feed the Hungry 2010 in Sacramento is coming up. Only  3 weeks away. I know I am ready, but I am beginning to get a little nervous. The what if's are coming into play. The what if I have bad leg cramps, what if I get lost on my route, what if have to use the restroom during my 5K, what if I forget something. And again, I have to stop myself and let it all go. Let it run off my shoulders because it's still 3 weeks away and worrying now does nothing to aid my run.

To top all of this off it's my husband's 30th Birthday today. Happy Birthday Tyson!!! This lets me know that the big 3-oh is coming up for me and reminds me that my 30's are going to be AWESOME! I am going to be the person I wanted to be. My 30's will be great. I've learned so many lessons during my 20's that I think I'm going to be going into my 30's with a LOT of knowledge of who I am as a person and what I wanted to do do with my life. My 20's were all about learning. Now I'll get to live!

The Dash - (aka The Stuff)

This morning a few of my girlfriends and I went on a walk. Towards the end we hiked up the hill to the town's cemetery. Let me just say that this cemetery creeps me out, so this was the first time I'd spent any time in it. As we walked around we looked at the names, dates, and sayings that were on th headstones. I noticed one woman's headstone that was still unfinished. There was her husbands name and date, and then there was her name and her date looked something like this. 1950-     .... and there it was blank. I thought about this and realized the person was still alive. It then occurred to me that the most important part of someone's date was the - in the middle. It was clear all of a sudden. What ever was - happening, what ever was currently happening, what ever was continuing, that was the most important part. The "stuff" in the middle. Not the beginning, and not the end. But the middle.

I got to thinking how this applied to my life now. And I realized how amazing the middle can be. What fills the middle is really great stuff. The things we do with our middle. It's what matters. I asked myself what I was doing with my life now, and I was pleased with my answer. Had you asked me 5 months ago the answer might not have been so positive. There may have contained discontentment. But now.... there is contentment. I have goals, I have things I am working and towards. I have achievements no matter how little they may be.

But lets be real here. There are stuff I'm not doing so good at. Such as my diet. I have found a weakness. You know the time right before you go "big" grocery shopping, when the fresh food is almost all gone, and the fridge is running on empty. What do you do? You start to turn to the pantry. I found this is a crutch. I realized that I turn to the pantry because we're running low on food and I'm running low of ideas. It's frustrating because I don't know how to change that. It's not like I can go shopping when we're not ready yet. I talked to Wendy a friend of mine and she told me she struggled with that at first too. But then pretty soon you'll run out of that bad "pantry" stuff and you won't buy it anymore. Also she told me how she budgets her grocery shopping. I'm going to give it yet another adjustment and try harder. I also need to find an air popper for pop corn. How I am making it is just not acceptable.

So that was my day. Any suggestions on budgeting for grocery shopping and how other's do it I'd love to hear em.

So anyways, what are YOU doing with your middle? Anything good?