travel

Ok… so I was a blogging fool for a few days, but then I seemingly quit here the last few days. But it’s not because I haven’t been on plan or been active… it’s because I’ve been TOO ACTIVE! Which is awesome.

Everyday for the past 2 weeks I’ve gotten up at about 5 to 5:30am and been at the gym for at least a half hour to an hour each day. I’m maintaining very well… and hopefully it will be well reflected on Thursday morning. I would love to say that I am half my size on my birthday.

The other thing that I’ve been busy with is preparing for the mission trip. I leave this Saturday for the Dominican Republic where our team will be building a duplex and working with people in Batey Fao (a community just northest of Santo Domingo). I really can’t begin to explain how excited I am to see how everything is going to go… and see how God works in my life.

Keep me and my team in your prayers!

So far today, I have felt such crazy up/down emotions it’s nuts. Let me take you through my day. Trust me, in the end you will understand why I wrote this on my “Weight related Wednesday” post…

• Woke up late… and thus was 10 minutes late to work as well.
• Scale-hopped and it was nice to me.
• Got a phone call at 8:30am saying that the pants I brought to the dry cleaners were indeed done last night… but the person helping me couldn’t find them when I was there. Wrote it on my list of things “to do” to go back after work today to get them. I forgot, and have to go there on my way to the church meeting.
• So busy at work, I didn’t know really which way to “turn”… but still had time for some good ‘ole boredom eating. (How does this happen?!?!)
• I have a new crush… and he’s been on my mind A LOT today.
• Got a manicure on my lunch hour… and remembered just why I really need to do this more often.
• Can’t find “Aeroplane” by Red Hot Chili Peppers on iTunes. Debating buying the album at Best Buy yet tonight… if they even have it.
• Because of last minute things I need to do before I fly to Houston tomorrow, I missed my Weight Watchers Meeting. It was probably a really good one too.
• I bought a new computer case for my trip. The backpack just isn’t going to cut it this time.
• I am still not packed. Nothing like waiting ’til the last minute. (But apparently I have time to blog. Hmmm…….)

So ultimately all of these things, the ranges of emotions – the feelings of joy, excitement, happiness, confusion, fear, boredom, and even a sense of being overwhelmed really got to me – especially this morning. I’ll admit it. I’m not perfect. I ate all of my points by lunch…

I also have to add, I am a little (ok, VERY) fearful of this trip. I have my next weigh in mid-late next week, and in years past I have experienced some substantial gains after this trip. Most of it is waterweight from the *extremely* salty food that previous hotels have served, but there also is the alcohol and sweets factor that comes up as well. Hopefully they’ll serve cheesecake for dessert – I don’t like it – so no temptation for me there. And who knows… we might not go bar-hopping. Overall, still a little fear resides to the unknowns of what will be happening in about 24 hours.

Off to a meeting at church now… then pack and get to bed.

I have to up tomorrow at 3:30a… hopefully I won’t turn off the alarm this time around because I don’t want to miss out on the 75 degree temperatures!

Do you ever feel trapped? Like there is something that you are missing?

For years, I felt trapped in my own body, knowing who I was… what I wanted to be… but couldn’t – or at least felt that I couldn’t until I lost the weight. I realize now that I shouldn’t have hid myself so much. But I did. And still to this day, even though I have an adventurous side to myself… I am not sure sometimes how to go about doing what I want to do.

Ever since losing the weight, I know that there is a greater purpose in my life… something bigger than I can imagine, I just don’t know what that is.

I feel like lately there is an adventure to be had… like there is something that I have to do, but I don’t know quite yet what it is… but an adventure of some sort. I feel like I’ve been stuck inside for a while now (figuratively in my head & literally this winter) and just don’t know how to get out. Inside my head, my thoughts keep going back to possibilities of where I could be travelling or even possibly living. As far as being outside, I’ve been dying to go for a good long walk lately.

Would it even be possible for me to drop everything in my life and say move to Europe? Especially without knowing anyone there and, outside England of course, not know the languages. Or could I just pick up my life and move to a random place in the south… Florida and Texas both sound great right now… and “start over”.

Sometimes I wonder if I really just want to escape the “who she was” that I see in myself yet while I live here in the small-ish town of Holland. I know so many people that didn’t know me “back then”, but I still carry around the feelings that everyone does remember the “old” me and that’s how they still see me. Timid, shy, and not outgoing. But part of me wonders if I have really changed.

Yes, parts of my life have changed, and I am somewhat more outgoing. But will you see me out at the bars by myself trying to pick up a guy… probably not. But then again… do I really want to be that girl?

Anyway… my life needs an adventure. Maybe it’ll be a road trip… maybe me moving to the warm climate I’ve been dreaming of for months now (ever since the first snow started to fly)… and maybe it’ll be something that will come up unexpectedly right here in my own front yard.

Off to find the adventure…

So the past couple of weeks have flown by like crazy. There’s been so much happening, but I just haven’t had time to write about it. Let me try now… I am hoping that this will be coherent enough to understand.

As you have read, I reached my goal about 3 weeks ago and have been working to maintain in the weight watchers program. For some reason I thought that this would just come naturally for me after losing the 150 in the past 3 years. Apparently not so much. The first week I did GREAT!!! I even maintained exactly to the tenth of a pound. So it was at that point that I decided (and don’t ask me why) to increase my points. Ok… now the reality of the world is that if you increase the amount that you eat – you will GAIN weight… and yes, that in fact IS what happened. 2 weeks in a row.

I finally caught on to this whole detrimental affair with the numbers and stuck with my “old” Weight Watchers points value for the week. Thank goodness, because I lost this week what I had gained over the past 2 weeks. I am so happy about this. So that means I am back to my “goal” weight (or actually slightly below) and can work towards my Christmas goals of losing about another 5 pounds or so. If I can reach that… I would be stoked!!!

Another noteworthy item in my life happened last weekend. I met a couple of my Weight Watchers friends in Wisconsin. I am so thankful to both of them for their friendships and just have to say that they mean a lot to me… especially with the support they have given to me over the past year. That’s how long I have known both of them. At the time, I had no idea that I would be so close to people that live “far” away from me… now I can’t imagine them not being a part of my life.

One remarkable thing that came from this past weekend was that the 3 of us were able to make good choices for food all weekend. All of us followed our plans and stuck to them. I think overall it will help all of us in the long run knowing that we did that. Mind you… we ate out at the favorite fast food joints like Wendy’s, Culver’s and Subway to make it work (as well as enjoyed the breakfasts of the Holiday Inn Express). It can be done!

Lastly… and somewhat leastly… this past Monday we got our first dose of reality with about 6” of lake effect snowfall. I was not prepared and wore some really nice shoes to work that morning. Yup… after a full workday in my nice heels that I enjoy wearing – I had to walk out to my car and brush off this “beautiful” white stuff. Didn’t fall… so I think I deserve an award for the hard work and effort that it took not to fall and break a valuable bone in my body (because I consider all of them valuable… any bone that would be broken may devastate me!)

Final thought… I must pay better attention to the weather forecasters. They might just be right.