Time of Our Lives

Lately I've noticed myself being selfish.  Selfish of my time and the way I spend it.  The older I get the more I've realized prioritizing my free time is well, a priority.  So often we spend our time on things we think we should be doing, or do out of feelings of guilt, if I don't go to this or that people are going to think I'm rude (or any variation of that, I think women are worse about this than men).  Honestly, time is by far the most precious resource we have, and the most limited.  I've gotten really good at saying no to the things I would be doing just to appease, just to not be judged, and feeling good about my decision.  When I say yes to something, it's something I know I'm going to grow from or something that will cause me joy instead of stress and anxiety.  I have to start working on doing things for myself and not feeling guilty about it. 

Please don't misunderstand me, there's a time and a place to say yes.  There was a point in my life I said no to everything out of fear.  If I hadn't of changed my mindset and started saying yes to new experiences I never would have met Ryan.  I never would have gone zip lining (where I realized I have a crippling fear of heights), I wouldn't have Ruby Sue, I wouldn't have a home, and on and on and on.  I was driven by fear which is why I always said no previously, I had shut down, turned in on myself.  I was lucky to have a tribe who challenged me, who knew that person wasn't me, and encouraged me to start saying yes to new experiences.  I believe you have to say yes, 100%, now I'm in a different space, a different moment in my life.

I've realized, mostly out of loss, how precious our time is, and how I want to fill that time with the people I love and the experiences that will broaden my life and bring me joy.   One of the best experiences I've had in the last year is going on a girl's trip with my two girlfriends from high school.  That is a trip I will remember forever, reconnecting with those girls, who have seen me at my worst and at my best, and have never judged me, was such an overwhelming feeling for me.  It is true, as women, the older we get, the more precious our relationships with our girlfriends become.  I feel that time and time again; I'm lucky to have strong friendships to lean on when times get tough.

I will continue to say yes to new experiences and things that will help me grow, but I refuse to feel any more guilt to saying no to things.  And not because I'm saying no out of fear anymore, but because the way I spend my time matters and it's a way I can put myself first, replenish myself in the day to day, so I can continue to live my best life.

Guess Who's Back?

I started this blog 9 years ago.  For a while, I was pretty consistent with posting, updating you on all the important and mundane moments in my life, and then I just stopped.  I don't remember why.  Maybe I ran out of things to say, which seems unlikely, I always have something to say, whether or not people want to hear it.  Maybe, my life became what I thought was too hectic, I lost my focus, or forgot how writing made me feel, even if I'm not working on Pulitzer Prize winning material.  Whatever the reason, in the last couple of weeks, I've found my mind wandering back to this blog, to the release writing allows me to feel.  I did some finger stretches and shook the cobwebs off the writing portion of my brain and am going to give it another go.

Since the last time I posted, almost three years ago, a lot has happened in my life.  Ryan and I moved in together.  We added a member to our family, Ruby Sue, I mean just look at that face! Bought a house; maneuvered many of life's ups and downs, questioned where we were in our lives, went on adventures near and far, celebrated accomplishments and grieved losses.

Baby Ruby Sue.  We had her about a week in this picture.

Our closing day!  December 2016

Taking a break from hiking, spring 2018 

The last few weeks have been difficult for many reasons, it's funny how you're trudging along in life, stuck in the predictability of the day to day, and then your world just explodes.  And not just once, but over and over and over.  That's the feeling I've been carrying around for the last few weeks.  In my work, every day I talk to someone about trauma.  The impacts of trauma, trauma behavior, trauma history, secondary trauma, on and on.  When I'm talking about it I know exactly what to do, exactly what to say, how to navigate someone through it.  When it's my trauma, I'm at a loss.  That's a difficult realization to make and even more difficult to acknowledge to others.  I try and be very strong all the time, for everyone around me, and when I don't feel strong, when I feel very vulnerable, I don't lean into it, I push it away.  I'm learning to lean in.  I'm allowing myself the option of sitting with my grief, with my disappointments, with my fears, of allowing the tears to come, even at inopportune times, but also allowing the joy and the laughter to come alongside.  

At almost 39 years old, I'm understanding the need to embrace all the experiences in my life, positive or negative, angry or joyful, sad or celebratory, and take them for what they are and the impact each one has on my life in that moment.  It's not going to be an easy journey, but one I'm willing to take on. Let's see where this ride takes me.

Expendable Organs

It's a very odd idea to realize some of your organs are expendable, and not an idea I ever thought I would have to consider.  Three days ago it became a reality when I had my gallbladder removed due to it being diseased and full of gallstones (I mean, how terrible a word is gallstone, yuck!).  

Several months ago I began having some health issues, that I just brushed off as really bad heartburn.  My boyfriend, who works in the medical field, kept telling me to make an appointment and get "scoped", I kept putting him off and popping Tums like Milk Duds.  A few weeks ago, I definitely knew it was more than heartburn when I ended up in the ER for the most excruciating pain I had ever experienced,  Once examined in the ER and labs upon labs upon labs were ran, it was there I was diagnosed with gallstones.  (Again, ew, such a gross word.  Along with gallstones I also had "sludge".  It is the actual medical term, I asked, multiple times what the "real"word was.  "It's sludge.").  Following the diagnosis, came more tests, more painful days, and finally a quick removal of my gallbladder.  I went in for a surgical consultation on a Monday, and had my gallbladder removed on a Thursday.  Apparently, the thing had to go, soon!  I'd be lying if I said it wasn't a mix of emotions.  I was happy to get the issue taken care of and start feeling better, but I was also terrified of a surgical procedure, no matter how "routine" I kept being told it was, on an organ that wasn't really "necessary".  Uh....why is it in our body if it's not essential to our well-being?  It's was a hard fact to wrap my mind around and one that caused me major anxiety up until and even a little post-operation.

I am now in the recovery phase, day three post-op.  There is some tenderness, some pain, bruising, tiredness, and still some anxiety on my part  about how my body really will function down an organ.  However, I am reminded through this process how comforting it is, at any age, to have your parents come and take care of you.  Nobody else in the world can take care of you like your parents,  My parents have been here every day but one since my surgery.  Even when I told them not to come, they came anyway, and just having them here, has helped tremendously.  

I continue to be leery of what food I am putting in my body for fear something will send me into a tailspin, but maybe this can be my new diet plan!  Need to lose a quick 10 to 15 pound?, Have an organ removed, just make sure it's an expendable one!

It's the Little Things

I love Sunday mornings.  It might be my favorite part of any day.  I especially like it when Ryan is home and not working, because we curl up on the couch under a blanket, sip coffee, eat breakfast, and he lets me read him things I find of interest while I peruse the Huffington Post.  Even if he doesn't find them as interesting or sometimes infuriating as I do, he pretends well.  This morning I found this gem.  As I read these out loud to Ryan, we both decided we do about three of those things in different variations than the article depicts, and then talked about a few other things we could think of if we made our own list.

We went about our day after that, going on a hike, I helped Ryan haul some firewood, normal household chores, but that article kept coming back to the forefront of my mind while we had this normal day together.  I began to think about how many articles I see on the regular about how couples irritate, annoy, anger, each other and how to fix it.  I am completely aware relationships are far from perfect for anyone, they take work, daily work, but I commonly see articles expressing the negatives and not really celebrating the positive, the day to day.  So, I have decided to make my own list.  Not a list of what Ryan and I do to annoy each other, but just a few of the many reasons I love him and how he's made me smile in the last 48 hours.

1.  When we decided to grab a very quick lunch in between all the other things we decided to do on Saturday, and we unwrapped our corn dogs and mine was burnt, he took it out of my hand and gave me his non-burnt corn dog.

2.  Instead of watching Sports Center on Sunday morning, he tells me I can watch "Say Yes to the Dress", because he knows it's what I do every Sunday morning when he's at work, even though he doesn't say that.

3.  When I complain for the 25th time the light in my bathroom isn't working, he fixes it for the 25th time.

4.  He paints the ceiling in my shower yellow, one of my favorite colors, even though it's his least favorite color in the world, as a surprise for me.

5.    He rubs my back almost every single night knowing it helps me relax and puts me to sleep.

He continues to do all these small daily thoughtful things, even after I have grabbed Twizzlers out of hands on countless occassions and thrown them across the room, just because every time I do it he still has a look of surprise on his face that makes me laugh until I cry.  (Perhaps I need to work on doing more little things or him!)

Times, they are a changin'.

A big change occurred in my life on September 29, 2014.  For the first time in 13 years, I was not living on my own.  On October 26, 2012 I went on a blind date, with this high energy, up for anything, guy who took me on a whirlwind of a first date.  I had never experienced a first date quite like that one. For example, he stated multiple times if he had a papoose he would pick me up and carry me around in it, so I didn't have to walk around in my heels.  That was definitely a first for me.  But that whirlwind date, and that charismatic guy, swept me up, and one month shy of our 2 year anniversary, we moved in to our first home together. 

Anyone who has lived on their own for a significant period of time and then joins their belongings and life with another person, no matter the amount of love they have for each other, and says it's a beautiful easy transition, is a liar.  It's not easy.  It's hard.  It's stressful, and it's at times completely and utterly overwhelming. It's also, undeniably worth it.  We have worked hard at making this our home, a reflection of our life together in this moment, and I could not be happier. 

Here are a few pictures to document our new journey so far:

The day we got the keys to our home!

Goodbye  apartment 11!

Mailbox official!

Our garden guys looking comfortable in their new home.

My dressing room, my happy place!

The day I came home from work to find Ryan had surprised me with Dia de la Muertos mums.

Pictures I have taken from our hikes and framed for art above our bed.

Fall settling in to our front yard.  We have a yard!

  

When Did We Put A Deadline on Love?

Lately I have noticed a trend of not just people posting "bucket lists", but "specific age bucket lists" on facebook or Pinterest, or whatever social media site is hip now.  For instance, "Things to Accomplish by My 20th Birthday" or 25, 27, 30, whatever.  I have my own working bucket list, so I have nothing against making a list of life goals, desires, wants, so forth.  Actually I love making lists, my life would not function without lists, and I sure as hell would get nothing accomplished at work if I didn't have the 15 fluorescent colored post it notes telling me what to do on my desk, computer, phone, any surface a note can be stuck to, really.  It does make me cringe a little though when I see young women, late teens/early twenties, posting goals with narratives having to do with relationship status, or parenthood status.  For example, "If I'm not married with 2 children by the time I'm 25, my life will not be complete", or "If I haven't fallen in love with the man I'm going to marry by the time I'm 27, I just give up on love", and so it goes.  Now, I was never the little girl who played house, pretended to be a bride, or a wife, or a mommy, I know a lot of women who were, women I love and admire, I just was never one of them. (And, that's not to say I never want to be any of those things, but as a little girl I was nursing stuffed animals back to health, reading, riding my bike, playing softball, and chopping off all of my Barbies hair).  I also don't think any of those things; bride, mommy, wife, are bad things or should not be included on bucket lists, I do however believe putting a deadline on those things, can cause way more damage than good.

What happens when these "goals" don't become attainable?  What happens when a young girl makes the married with a kid by 25 goal and what happens instead is;  start dating someone at 20, get married by 22, have a child by 23, get overwhelmed and realize you have no idea who you are or who the person is  you married, and get divorced by 25?  Or the person who HAS to be in love with the man she's going to marry by 27, what happens when she's still dating dirt bags at 27, and completely gives up?  She misses out on potential great romances that could begin at 28 or 29 or 37!  Or what happens when you've set your ultimate goal of being a parent by a certain age, and your body or your significant other's body just won't cooperate with what you've pre-determined? 

I firmly believe setting goals can be productive and positive in life, but I will never believe pre-determining an age for love and family to be productive to a life of happiness.  To those who attain, bravo, but to all those who do not, I cannot imagine the disappointment and pain they may be setting themselves up for.  When did the ultimate goals for women become your relationship status and whether or not your were a parent by a certain age anyway?  Again, I believe those are two important and admirable things to be in this life, but it does not define who you are as a person living this life.  I confess, I am a 35 year old, unmarried, non-parent, and my life is pretty great! I have a family who loves and support me, friends who stand by me through all sorts of crazy, a relationship that lifts me up and makes me a better person and pushes me out of my comfort zone, (and I was still dating dirt bags at 27!) a job that fulfills me, and a life that makes me happy.  ( I do still have a shitty apartment, so that's number one on my bucket list, "buy house to get away from dealing with assholes who smoke in the community laundry room, and complain because water from my plants is leaking down the balcony").

So for all you young women making your bucket lists, let's stop putting an age limit on finding love.  Let's instead find out who you are as a person, who you are at 22, 25, 27, 30, 35....and use pencil on those lists, so you can add and subtract to it as you go in life, as your interests change, as you change.   

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

I am guilty.  Guilty of what I can only assume 99.9% of women are guilty of, talking and thinking negatively about our bodies.  To be real, I have, as long as I can remember, always had trouble with negative thinking when it comes to my body.  For the majority of my teen and adult years, I have, in my mind always been too thick, too curvy, too short, too chunky, too flabby, and the list goes on.  I've used all those words to describe myself at some point in my life.

As a teen I was active, athletic, a gym rat, and then I went to college. And like, some who went before me, and some who will go after me, I spent less and less time working out and more and more time going out, and I paid for it.  I gained, not just the freshman 15, maybe more accurately the undergrad 25. (I know...but I went to a party school, and I was good at it!).  About three weeks following my college graduation I started my first "professional" job as a social worker.  That job was challenging to say the least, and I spent many long hours driving all over the state of KS, dealing with crises I was not ready to deal with, seeing and hearing trauma I was not prepared to see and hear, and dealing with it by shutting down, smoking lots of cigarettes, sitting in a car driving on long empy highways for hours on end, and eating whatever fast food was available in whatever small town I was driving out of on my way to the next.  I became a person I did not recognize, physically and mentally, and I knew I had to change something before the girl I once knew had completely disappeared.  So, I quit my job, without a job on the horizon, and decided it was time to get healthy, both mentally and physically.

In a month's time I had a new job, which could not have been a more perfect fit for me and how I envisioned my life as a social worker ( that job was so perfect for me, I'm still doing it!), and had started a healthy eating and exercise plan.  As time went on, I became recognizable again to my friends and family, and most importantly myself, and I ended up shedding about 35 pounds. Pounds that accrued due to my inability to manage my life, or really care enough at that point, to have the self realization I was self sabotaging in every way.

After my initial weight loss, I had never felt more confident in every area of my life.  I had found my groove in my professional career, and once I found it, I have always felt confident about the work I do.  I felt confident in the people I had surrounded myself with, my friends, old and new, and I felt confident about my body.  I finally felt like I looked good!  I was excited to go shopping, I wanted to buy swim suits.  Swim suits! Working out was part of every one of my days, always. That was eleven years ago.

I maintained that state of mind for several years, and it is only in the recent year or so that I have felt those old negative feelings creeping back into to mind.  Have I stopped working out as much as I should?  Yes.  Have I gained more weight than I would like to admit? Yes.  More than I am happy with?  Absolutely.  Have I used those old words to describe the current state of my body?  Yes.  But, am I happy in my life? YES!  I am so happy with my life as it is currently.  I have a lot of things going really well in my life right now.  And this body, that I have put so much emotional, physical stress on over the years, has always kept me healthy, kept me alive.  I know I need to make changes again to my workout regime, my eating routine, and I'm working on it, but I have to find a way to be happy about where my body is right now, today, April 8, 2014 at 9:00pm.

I work with young girls, pre-teens, teens, even younger who struggle with body image issues every day.  I have a five year old niece, and I always want her to know she is beautiful, but that she is also so amazingly strong, and resilient, and powerful, and in charge of her own destiny.  I want that for all the children I work with, and I don't want the insecurity about how their body may or may not look, hold them back in any way, and I can't allow it to hold me back.  I am a constant work in progress, as we all are, but I am working everyday on this issue that has once again reared it's ugly head in my life, to silence the negative and work on the positive, not just for me, but for all beautiful strong girls and women in my life.