Happy Birthday EVE!

Hey There!

I hope you are all well rested and feeling awesome, because I am not (well, not completely). Doing overnight shifts is a great way to make some money by not having to do a whole heck of a lot, but it really f***s with my schedule and makes it hard for me to keep my head on straight. 

After leaving work at 8:40am yesterday, I headed up to Malibu to get in my run by the beach so that I didn't have to deal with the weather in the valley. (the joke was on me, it was overcast out here all day long... but it was pretty muggy). 

I mean really, who wouldn't want to run here every single day?!?! I managed a little over a 5 mile run, did Day 3 of the 30 day ab challenge, and then came on home to what I was hoping would be a shower and a nap!

Well, I came home and showered and eventually fell asleep for about an HOUR! it was a mess. I was wide awake and hungry. I made myself some lunch before my good friend Sederia came by for a visit. She brought me my birthday present, and made me feel like a schmuck the luckiest girl, ever, to have such an amazing friend. 

She bought me a book by Jessica Alba, The Honest Life

It has tips on food, beauty, style, products, home decor and even baby suggestions that are all about living naturally. This is the perfect reading companion for my current "Clean Eating" and living obsession right now :D. She also added a really cute green glittery "C" key chain that she picked me up from Vegas and a $25 dollar gift card to Trader Joe's!

How does she know me so well?!?!?!

We sat and bitched chatted for a bit about life, relationships and family until I had to leave to go to my OA meeting. I hadn't been to a meeting in about 2 weeks, and I really was looking for any reason not to have to go... but in the end I am SO glad I did. I got to see some people I really love, and hear exactly what I needed to hear. 

I ended my day with dinner (I was STARVING by the time I got home) and a little excursion to the grocery store. Remember when I decided I was going to give up dairy and eggs the other day?!?!?! Well, apparently NO ONE carries Soy Yogurt ANYWHERE! I went to two stores last night, and NOTHING, NADA, ZILCH! I almost went to a 3rd, but it was after 9 o clock and I was exhausted!I'm not sure if this is a sign to just keep doing what I'm doing, but I guess I'll tray again next time.

Thankfully, after doing some reading, writing and meditating, I was able to drift off to sleep. I woke up really early this morning, even though I'm still EXHAUSTED, but I may try to drift back off for a bit.

I'm planning on getting in some Yoga today. My lower back is killing me, which is a sign to me that I need to take it slow today... so I shall. Chat with you later!

Terrific Tuesday, Day 2 of the 30 Day Ab Challenge

Good Morning (yes, it is 4am where I am)

I am working an overnight shift for work, 12am-8:30am, and trying to get a bunch of ish done. So I figured I would blog about my Tuesday. Today was a really great day!

I started out the day with an exhausting 3.2mile hike with a 1,803 foot elevation gain and a Max Elevation of 2,947. In other words... that shit was straight up hill!! It was also extremely hot outside, and we did not bring nearly enough water, so I spent the remainder of the day feeling grossly dehydrated. After the hike we did Day 2 of the 30 Day Ab Challenge. 20 sit ups, 8 crunches, 8 leg raises, 8 push ups, and 12 sec plank. All and all, it was a good day for some physical time.

When I got home all I wanted to do was jump in my pool! During the hike I had mirage visuals of just floating in the cool breeze. Well, at 10am the pool wasn't quite what I wanted, so I dipped in, and then tanned for a little bit while reading.

The rest of the day, I spent relaxing and trying to nap (this was not hard considering how dehydrated I felt). I watched only a little TV, and spent most of my time just trying to drift off into la la la.

Later in the evening I had dinner plans with some friends I use to work with at a nice Italian restaurant called Guiseppe's in West Hills. It was a cute little Italian place that had lots of great options. However, because I wasn't sure how it was going to go down, I just planned on having the soup and salad. It was just my luck that their soup of the day was a tomato based Vegetarian soup that was TO DIE FOR! and the salad bar was pretty awesome too!

 

I even got this fun little tomato monster in my salad :D. The food was good, and the company was even better. I then went home to try and drift right off to sleep! It didn't quite work out the way I wanted to, but I'm making it work with tons of coffee now!  

 

Behold my current reading list :)!!!! Super Foods was LITERALLY just give to me by a coworker, but Skinny Bitch is what I am currently in the middle of reading. 

 OK, so I've mentioned Skinny Bitch a couples times lately, and now is the time to talk about it. I find the book very fun, poignant and sarcastically motivating. It takes a tough love approach to educating you on the horrible things that are done to our food and explains why going vegetarian is so important. Although I wish the book title was "Healthy Bitch" instead of "Skinny Bitch"... I just have to reaffirm that difference in my head on my own. My own path to being a vegetarian started for health  (and figure conscious) reasons, and not necessarily from a "Animals Rights" perspective, but now having read the first half of this book, I am taking it a little more seriously. You'll have to read it on your own to discover all the horrible things that are done to animals, and I HIGHLY recommend that you do! To be honest, this book has convinced me that I need to go completely vegetarian (aka eliminate dairy and eggs from my meal plan). However, since both of these things are main staples in my day, and I still have a ton of dairy products in my home, I have decided that I am going to ween myself off of dairy, and eventually work my way to eliminating eggs to. I consider this completely doable, since I really only consume Greek Yogurt and Feta Cheese on the regular.  For now, I have configured a 3 point plan to help catapult Operation "Clean Up My Food". 1. Continue to stay away from refined and Processed sugars (IE, cookies, ice cream, cakes, and any other delicious looking goodies). Tyler and I made a pact to stay away from recreational sugar for 30 days... and I am now in Day 5 of the plan :) 2.  I am going to finish up the containers of Greek yogurt that I have in the fridge and then make the switch cover to a soy based yogurt. I will also then begin to use soy cheese products when necessary. 3. I will begin to only eat eggs every other day until I feel comfortable enough to eliminate that from my meal plan as well.  Enough blogging, I think its time to get back to my readings :).Since the beach is on my way home I was planning on getting in a run near the waves before going home in the morning. Hopefully it works out as planned.

 

 

Sweet Dreams!

Motivational Monday

Hello Beautiful People!!!


Today is Monday, and I am feeling super Motivated and inspired. I realize that I have been REALLY off with my blogging lately, and I promise that I am going to TRY and make it better :) Life has just been somewhat crazy lately, and I haven't been taking the time to sit down and handle my shit!

Things are going really good for me right now, I have about 93 days of abstinence from purging (Yay!!!), and for Today, I have the binging under control and I am eating clean. My clothes are still very snug and I have to be somewhat selective with what I choose to wear, but it has finally become the motivator I need to get my ass in gear!

Sooo... I when I went to group therapy on Friday afternoon, our therapist introduced us to The Healthy Mind Platter... (please read more about it here).

 

 

Balance is a crucial key in Recovery, and life in general. When we eat, we should have a balanced meal of Carbohydrates, Healthy Fats and Proteins. When we work out, it is important to balance fun with function (aka ZUMBA!!!) as well as balancing the muscle groups we work (circuit training). For the past few years I have balance a work life, school life, family life, intimate life, and social life (what little I had).

 

The Healthy Mind Platter Helps us balance (and carve) out time for things that are important to us and our functioning. Like all great things, balance of these 7 essential times (Sleep, Physical, Focus, In, Play, Down and Connecting) is essential for optimal brain functioning. Lately I have been COMPLETELY off balance (with food, life, and exercise)... So I become motivated to start working on balancing my plate.

 

My favorite part of the Healthy Mind Platter is that nowhere does it involve FOOD!!! Granted, I know that eating well is essential for functioning, I can appreciate that it is not an integral part of this model. So much of my life has been wasted on food, and avoiding these other parts of my life. This reminds me that it is crucial, but not the sole purpose of living :)

 

Right now, I'm focusing on my Physical Time:

Me and my beautiful friend Leah after a short 3.5 mile run, and some ab work :)

This area of my life has been severely unbalanced for the last few weeks. It was not uncommon for me to avoid a run, or ditch out on a zumba session because I just didn't want to. So VERY unlike me. So, for this week, I am focusing on getting in physical activity 6 days this week with a balance of running, hiking, swimming, strength training and taking a class or two.

 

Today I started out with a short, and brisk 3.5 mile run with my friend Leah (pictured above). It was hot, so we were sweating BUCKETS! But she gave me a good run for my money. Then we followed it up with Day 1 of the 30 Day Ab Challenge!!!!

 

 

However, we didn't exactly stick to the challenge (what fun is that?!?!)

 

Today we completed:

15 sit ups

10 crunches

10 leg lifts

10 squats

10 lunges

10 push ups

10 sec plank

 

Boy, did it feel good. So, I guess that is my base, and I will work up from there.

 

Now, don't let me fool you, I am still working on the other areas of my Platter, but I am going to talk about those in another post. Also, I have been reading the book, "Skinny Bitch" and I am now considering ditching dairy in my life!!! More on that to come. I'm not done with the book, but will write a review when I am. However, so far I find it Fun and Informational :)

 

OK, time to get ready to leave work. I'll chat with you guys later. Stay Motivated, beautiful People!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Most Wonderful Month of the Year!!!

HAPPY JULY 1st, everyone!!!

This is my favorite time of year. It's summertime, I don't have any school obligations, my 21st, 25th, 27th birthday is less than two weeks away, I get to catch up on all the wonderful things I DIDN'T do during the school year, and everyone just seems to be in a much better place. I am looking at this month as a rebirth for myself. Not a do over, but a rebirth.

The last few months have been very challenging for me to stick to a regiment and on plan. I have gained a substantial amount of weight (I haven't actually weight myself so I don't know exactly how much) and I am having some trouble fitting into most of my clothes and the rest I am just insanely uncomfortable in. You would think this would have been enough to keep me out of the food and in the exercise groove... but it was not. Instead it kept me right where The Disease wanted me... feeling pathetic, pitiful, hating myself and just wanting to never get out of bed or the food.

But something clicked with me on Saturday and I started to come out of the swamp that I had created. However, instead of doing it "full steam ahead" as I have usually done. I am making small changes a little at a time, and accepting that I am not the same person that I was at my peak in April. That does not mean that i can not ever return to the state of living... it just means that I can not be there now and that is ok.

Anyways, I am trying to focus on eating "healthy" foods (lots of fruits and veggies, lean proteins, healthy fats and carbs) and keeping my meals balanced. I'm also trying to focusing on my OA program. I started checking in with my Sponsor every morning at 8:45 to red two pages of the big book and just discuss it. I really stopped sending her my foods and my AEIOU's, but I think slowly I will start getting back to doing that.

Sometimes I feel like program and recovery just becomes very overwhelming. So I am going to do what I can, and not beat myself up if I cant do it. I am also trying to work on not "planning" out everything as much. I've found that I do better when I have structure, but I do not need to be worrying about Wednesdays structure when it is only Sunday.

I have some goals for This week and for July as a whole

This week:
1) Eat 3 balanced meals and two optional snacks (carbs, fat and protein) with no snacking in between.
2) Log all of my foods everyday
3) Complete question 2 from my OA workbook
5) Exercise for at least 30 minutes a day every day
6) No binging on TV (more than 3 hours in a set)

Month of July
1) Enjoy my Birthday by not celebrating with food
2) Find a good balance of recovery and relaxation
3) Attain 30 days of eating cleaning without bingeing

I will do my best to update you guys on my progress. Have a great First day of July!

Summer Vacation... Sorta

Hello! Long time no talk! Sorry I haven't been updating, surprisingly my break has been CRAAAAZY!!! I don't know that I've even had much of a break :/

Friday/Saturday: Allison and I were in Temecula in order to run the SoCal Women's Wine Half Marathon. It was an interesting trip. It took us 4 hours to get there (it's only 2 hours away...). Allison choose to run the 5k instead of the Half (She's having issues with her hip), but i still choose to do the Half. So, after the first half mile, apparently every girl went the wrong direction. Essentially, I  (and all the other women) went about 5 miles off the course :( However, we still got to compete. They just adjusted the course. I still managed to run 14.1 miles of CRAZY rolling hills, steep slants, and dirt EVERYWHERE... I made it.



We came home, I had a flat tire.... BUMMER.. I fixed it, I FINALLY got to shower and eat some dinner to Celebrate Tyler's graduation (no pictures).

Sunday: Father's day. I didn't do much. Went to target, had coffee with my friend Rachel and then went to dinner with my family. I really wanted to eat in, but they were NOT having it! I had a mini melt down about having to go have Mexican Food... and then sucked it up.

Monday: I worked all day, turned in my Mental Health stipend application, went for a run, and then hit up a meeting! it was EXHAUSTING!

And Here I am at TODAY:

Abstinent: Yes (Day 72!) and Sober with my Food  (Day 8)

E- I went to Zumba!!!! (Totally realized half way through the class that my pants were on inside out!!!)

I- Began my day with reading and For Today Went to a 7am meeting, shared, took another timer commitment, got a pedicure with my mom, met with my new therapist, enjoyed an afternoon with an old friend, took a Zumba class, and paid for a 10 class card, Fed myself balanced meals, made two outreach calls and several texts, bought some new running music

O- Encouraged a new comer to keep coming back, took a fellows phone number, encouraged a girl in Zumba to keep on trying, normalized a fellows feelings, Helped a fellow who binged and purged today and does not have a supportive sponsor.

U- Being in a state of powerlessness is one of the most humbling and rewarding places to be. Without it, I am not able to move forward, or be of service to others. Without it I am still stuck in the disease: Blind to the beauty of reality surrounding me. With it, I am invincible, and get to be part of an amazing support team like no other.

Ok... I'm exhausted and REALLY want to go to bed :)

I'll write more tomorrow.

67 Days of Abstinence

Good Morning, Beautiful People!

I was way too tired to update last night when I got home, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't get an update on my progress.

Yesterday I took a chip for my 60 days of abstinence!!!

Well, It was really my 67th day of abstinence... But I did not go to a meeting at all last week because of finals, so I just got to take it last night. I wasn't expecting it, but I was REALLY excited. There was a lot of good energy in the room (and 4 birthdays... including my Sponsors!!!).. so I guess I was able to just feel excited about it :)

I have had a very interesting journey with my abstinence. I went from loving it, to hating it, to abusing it, to pushing the limits DANGEROUSLY far... and today I am in acceptance of it.

When I took my 30 day chip, I was overly focused on all the things that my abstinence WASN'T, and all the things I hadn't yet achieved. At day 67, I am able to look at all the things I DON'T do anymore.

1. I don't throw up every night

2. I don't stop at stores, gas stations and 7-11's on my way home to buy random foods and scarf them down in my car before I get home.

3. I don't stop at Drive thru's and order enough food to feed 3 people
4. I express my feelings when they are making me upset, sad, angry, lovey dovey.. etc. and I don't allow myself to feel bad about it!

I still have a lot of progress to make, but hey! It's progress not perfection ;) Now that I am on summer break, I am trying to get into a new routine. I am going to start my morning with reading and mediation/prayer. The readings will be For Today, a passage on acceptance from the Big Book (pg. 416) and the script on Recovery from Carolyn Costin on Recovery. My goal is to try and do this EVERY SINGLE MORNING for two weeks. Today was day 2 :)

Anyways... I'm going to be going to Temecula with my best friend, Allison, today. We're walking a half marathon together tomorrow morning and getting to spend some good quality time together! I know it is going to be WONDERFUL! But before I do that, I still have to pack, and I want to get in a short run this morning. So, I'm just going to give you my AEIOU's from yesterday. I will be taking my lap top with me, but I don't think I'll have Internet... so I will update you when I can.

A-Yes, and Sober with my food for the 3rd day in a row :)
Breakfast: Mediterranean Egg White omelet (sun dried tomatoes, feta cheese, olives... yum) with avocado, salsa and hot sauce on Flat bread with a side of grapes and strawberries
Snack 1: Starbucks Skinny vanilla latte and a banana
Lunch: Oatmeal with trader Joe's Breakfast trail mix
Dinner: Veggie burger on a sandwich think with rice and steamed veggies with cilantro dressing and hot sauce
Snack2: Greek Yogurt

E- hiked 4 miles (1:10), 30 minute walk with my man

I- began my day with reading and prayer, enjoyed family and friends,   bought some new summer duds, went to a meeting, took my 60 day chip, spoke honestly about my feelings, gave away my food history

O- checked in on two fellows, thanked the speaker, gave my mom a ride, made Tyler dinner

U- I really did have to let go of purging in its own to see how powerless I am over food.

Have a Beautiful Day!!!

Checking In!

And the award for WORST blog updater goes tooooooooo.......................

ME

I'm hoping you'll hate me less with a cute pug in my arms!

Fun Fact: It is exactly 1 month until my 27th Birthday!!!!!

Well, I am PLEASED to report that I am officially done with my first year of GRADUATE SCHOOL!!! I managed to survive the hell that was Finals Day, and am ready to move forward in life. Since dealing with the stress of finals, I have managed to get myself back on the sober track :) Today is my 3rd day being sober with my food, and I am SO GRATEFUL for the ability to do so. I am at day 67 with my abstinence though!!! Which is pretty awesome. I haven't thrown up in over 67 days... that's a flippin miracle and I am proud to report it :) I didn't go to any meetings last week, so I get to take my 60 day chip at tomorrow nights meeting :) I'm very excited about this. It should be awesome.

I've had a lot of good things happen in the last week since I posted, and many things to be grateful for!

1. I was nominated for and awarded a $3750 fellowship at school! It's really nice to be recognized by faculty and be rewarded for my hard work... even if I don't think I deserve it (somebody did). Even better, was a very good friend of mine also earned the award!!! We both have mental health issues, so it made it seem even more special (me with my ED and her with her OCD). There was a fun dinner event and EVERYTHING that i took my mom to. She was the only parent there, but I'm really glad I had her with me.

2. I am going to be spending my 2nd Year Internship at the San Fernando Valley Mental Health Center!!! This was my top choice, and I am so blessed to be getting this opportunity. I really did not think it was going to work out the way I wanted it to, so I surprised and Grateful!!

3. I made it through 67 days of abstinence! I rock!

I'm sure there was a lot more, but that's all I can recall right now. I am now applying for a new job working with foster youth and will be applying for another fellowship in the next two weeks, so please send some good vibes my way.

OK. Here is the good stuff for the day

A- Yes. And sober with my food

Breakfast: Egg whites and 1 yolk, kale, mushrooms, salsa, organic waffles with peanut butter and banana

Snack: Pear and chocolate milk

Lunch: Vegetarian Gyro (1 cup mixed beans, feta cheese, salad mix, avocado, black olives and gherkin pickles) 2 baby apricots

Snack: Greek yogurt with granola

Dinner: Sausage, veggies and potatoes with corn Chile salsa

E- Ran 5 miles (48 minutes), walked for 5, cleaned my ENTIRE kitchen (while dancing to music : D ), 2 loads of towels!

I-  Began my day with For Today, and another reading, Spent the day with my best friend running errands, ate my breakfast outside :), enjoyed easing in to my day, Didn't get upset that I didn't clean my room today, went to a meeting, made plans for a hike with a friend tomorrow

O- Lent money to a friend, checked in on two fellows, cleaned my kitchen for my family, made my step dad lunch for tomorrow :)

U- I am making a commitment to be good to myself, which includes eating well-balanced and abstinent meals, expressing my feelings readily, making time each morning for meditation, prayer and/or reading, an regularly attending OA meetings. I am redefining my standards for myself, and will aim for PROGRESS not PERFECTION. Today, I feel good about myself (Abstinence, pg. 158)

Have a Peaceful Night