360 degrees is the amount of degrees you have to turn around to find yourself right back in the same direction you were already walking. That’s a brilliant description of this past week for me.
Forgive me if I take a little time to unpack how this all started and how I’m working to get it back “together” so-to-speak.
Last week, I caught you up to date so I could be current with my updates and give you my struggles and successes in real time, when I need your support and your “keep goings” and celebrations with me most of all. As much as I’ve told myself I don’t need the support, I do. I need to know that I am not alone on this journey. Maybe you’re reading this because you’ve known me or know me and just want to see me succeed somehow on this ambition. Perhaps you don’t know me at all but you admire the gumption to put all my efforts out there. It could be you’re on a similar journey as I am and have been afraid to reach out to me for mutual support, or you could be a voyeur just seeing what happens from week to week. Whatever brought you here, and whatever keeps you reading or sharing or looking even at these words, I am honored. Honored to even have a moment of your time.
Truly.
I have come to realize that me putting myself out there by sharing my food logs, my thoughts and ideas does what it always has done for me. It exposes me to the possibility of failure and the fear I have of succeeding and not being able to maintain this or the momentum or the life-long intention to make these changes in my life. I’ve done this forever and its a habit I fully intend to break or at least work towards chipping away at. But here I am, picking myself up, licking my wounds (which this past week I’ve heavily salted – will explain shortly), and I’m telling you the good and the otherwise and the moving forwards.
It began with a feeling of anger I’ve not had in a long time. Seriously, last Thursday my frustration tolerance was as close to zero as its ever been. I worried it was a result of my new ADHD medication Vyvanse which has been really helping me with task persistence and completion. It does not have the side effect for me, however, of appetite suppression (insert sad 🐼 here); but in the end I don’t take it for that. I take it because unbeknownst to me (even a master’s level clinician), I never saw myself with ADHD. Until recently when people have been exploring adult ADHD did it even occur to me to potentially get assessed for it; well that and seeing a friend who runs an incredible group site actually discuss how being diagnosed has changed her life and her work (learn about her here), that I thought maybe I should look into this and as part of my commitment to myself in 2023 I did.
Back to the anger though! Literally everything that I usually experience as part of my job and home life, annoyed me. I was short-tempered and just short with people and that’s not me. I started to worry that maybe my depression medications were not being as effective as well. I had been taking a supplement called Alpiliean as well (as an attempted substitute for Mounjaro), and up until now it was keeping me from over-eating and seemed to be keeping the cravings at bay. Until now. I wanted to eat everything in sight and I did. One portion controlled package turned into 4 portion controlled packages and I even tracked it for a few days because I wanted to hold myself accountable. I was angry, frustrated and feasting away at every thing. The behaviors (especially the anger), was noticeable enough that my partner suggested I talk to my psychiatrist about these feelings. I had every intention of doing so…until Saturday night. That was the evening that my “estranged” Aunt Flo decided to barge back into my life and every bit of rogue symptom and behavior I just mentioned made sense. These were behaviors I had associated with my menstrual cycle. However, being 48 years old, cycle turns into occasional with the hopes that someday soon I’ll transition to that no-period time of life known as menopause.
So here I was, 3 days into a binge-type pattern and looking headlong at Fat Tuesday and I decided to give myself a break this week and just eat as I pleased for the rest of the week. I felt guilty at times, and at other times I showed myself grace and said to myself, sometimes on this journey I was going to need to have these times on occasion, as long as I didn’t let them evolve into mindless and reckless never-ending times.
In the end, I didn’t get to eat the things I wanted on Fat Tuesday and knew that instead of giving things up for Lent, I was going to give my body the opportunity to find it’s way back into a mindful way of eating and being again. After reaping the consequences of this week of debauchery, I weighed myself and got back into bed suffering from big time nausea and gastro-discomfort.
Still. Here I am…writing again. Tracking again. Being mindful. Being accountable.
Even when, I feel like time, age and other factors are against me. I’m here.
Are you?
Anyone?
THE AMUSED LIFE 
I am thoughtful and very supportive of your journey. You can articulate the multitude of frustrations, mental battlefields, with step forwards with the anguishes of tipping sideways, to recover. I support you in how you share with your readers; you invite us, me, to put words to any personal challenge and find shared clarity of being human, and woman. You are not alone. For different reasons, I cheer you on as I journey too.
Thank you TJ, I’m struggling and am going to be writing a post about it but I’m not defeated just refiguring…I think we’re all on our own journey just trying to stay the course in a world that looks to push you off a cliff at every turn.