Life Beyond Contest

I realize I've been gone a while, and I'm sorry. :( It has really taken me quite a while to even get to a point of where I could verbalize my feelings.


To Start...

So, I took three weeks off from the gym. Yeah... On purpose. It was really to take time where I felt like I didn't have it. To get my house to where I needed it to be, run errands, do our new business acounting (I've been 2 months behind), everything else business related, etc. Catch up. Although I had only planned on one week, life demanded another week… And then I lost control.

Week One:

By Tuesday, I hated not being at the gym.

By Wednesday, the weight coming on was noticeable by how my body felt.

By Thursday, my back hurt badly from not exercising.

By Friday, the weight coming on was noticeable to everyone (or at least, it felt like it..)

Although I don't have post-comp blues, I certainly had a post-comp binge. Or two. And god bless my fiance for saying "Oh you can get that off easy." Yeah. Except it wasn't easy getting it off in the first place. And honestly, I'm really effing tired of dieting. I don't want to diet.

Now, that doesn't give me permission to just put food in my mouth all day long (like I will...). It also doesn't give me permission to eat a cinnamon roll every day (yeah, that happened... But... Can I just share first of all, that I am NOT a cinnamon roll person. I am not the woman who a Cinnabon has EVER sounded good to. Second, did I mention that these were made from BISCUIT dough?! Don't judge me, I'm a foodie.).

Weeks Two & Three:

At the beginning of week one, our sweet, sweet dog Molly was getting pretty sick… She was eating less, drinking less… She had been limping previously, which we attributed it to Zeke (our 180lb male great dane) playing with her too hard, so we left her inside a few days to keep her activity down a bit. At the time, she would spend whole days inside and not touch her food. We attributed it to her lack of activity. It seemed that all the weight she was losing, I was finding.

I made my way to Seattle for Memorial Day weekend specifically to spend time with my family… One of my big sisters had the lead female part in Oliver!, and we had a small family party for my Grandma's 80th birthday. All the while, Patrick stayed home to work & take care of our animal babies. And if you're just tuning in to this blog, my dogs & kitty are like my kids.

When Patrick and I spoke over the weekend I was gone, I knew the Molly situation was getting serious by his tone of voice. Now, Molly has always been HIS baby and he always seemed to be over-worried about her… So when *this* tone of voice came in, it had me worried. I took the overnight bus (yeah, we're small business owners and barely making it..) from Seattle to Spokane and unfortunately it was too late.

Our sweet Molly was laid to rest a few hours after I got home. I am so thankful I was able to make it home in time to tell her how much I love her. Molly was only 2 1/2 years old. :( And watching her suffer, spending ALL of our money to take care of her, putting her down, losing her, burying her... absolutely crippled me.

I know most people think the relationship to an animal is different than what we have with people, but not this one. And not for me. This was an incredibly deep loss for me. Me & Patrick and our animals… We are a family.

In the last few weeks, I haven't had any positives to my life of note. Until we received our engagement photos back, and realized we had the most beautiful treasure. Many photos of our little family, including a very happy & healthy Molly.

Sweet baby. Now we have all of these lovely memories with her.

How HUGE does Agent Humongo (Zeke) look in this?!

Happy little family :)

In looking back, what did I get at the end of my weeks off from the gym? 10 extra pounds (up 18 lbs from stage weight… ugh, admitting this is hard!), a sore back, and eyes that are tired from crying. Not staying true to what you want for yourself, is simply humiliating. And yet, like I said. I'm really effing tired of dieting. My mind has needed a break, and so did my body. And I guess, that's exactly what it got.

What I learned during this time, is that I overeat and crave bad foods ONLY when I feel insecure or out of control. I eat well and healthy when I feel in control. While I am not in a depressed state over having gained weight, I am in a bit in the midst of an internal war…. And this goes back to dieting, while I'm irritated with the extra weight, I'm also irritated with having to diet. So I'm not gonna. I'm just gonna deal with having the extra weight for a little while, workout and not diet yet. Although, I think we all know I'll probably change my mind as my wedding date gets closer. :)

The next few weeks will be dedicated to growing our business (Have I mentioned how difficult it is being in business for yourself??) and finding my own version of staying healthy. And for this period of time, my version of staying healthy is going to mean workouts only and not judging MYSELF for not being perfect. And sometimes I think we have to allow grace for ourselves to not be perfect.

I'll keep you updated on my progress & wedding stuff next time! :) I've missed you guys!