The Only Way Out Is Through

We Americans like shortcuts, don't we? I know I do. I'm always looking for the quickest, most-efficient way to do pretty much every task. When I was in labor, the hospital doula told me something I've never forgotten: "The only way out is through." Holy cow, that pretty much summarized childbirth for me! But I've realized since then that it applies to many other life situations. I found it very true with weight loss and fitness. *Feeling* feelings, which I used to eat to numb.

Grief is a big one. I remember going through a period of about 10 years where I simply didn't cry much. But boy howdy, did I eat! No coincidence that was the time period where I experienced the biggest gains of my life.

My family experienced a big loss last week. My Pa-Pa (my mom's father) passed away at age 94. Although his health hadn't been great the past few months, he was able to be home and driving until the last four days of his life when he had a sudden illness. The speed of his illness was very hard on my mom, but we are all happy he didn't have to give up his independence, which was one of his defining personality traits. He was the smartest man any of us ever knew, and in reminiscing this weekend, I realize I get so much of my personality from him.

I spent the weekend being strong for my mom and helping as much as I could with all the arrangements. My husband and I played and sang at the funeral, which was the first time I've ever attempted that. So much being strong, and today I am completely spent. Truthfully, I have been running on fumes all summer - my husband and I had a long discussion where he thought last summer was the worst ever, but I think this one has been. Constant stress and worry about my daughter has left me feeling gutted every day. We're doing everything we can, and as the school year approaches, we're seeing signs that she's returning to herself.

In the midst of the funeral planning, my massage therapist called to book an appointment for my expiring Living Social coupon. Mentally, I know I need it now more than ever. I'm feeling guilty about taking the hour away from home, when I've been gone for 5 days, the refrigerator is pretty empty, the laundry not done, the house not clean, and I've seen my daughter very little. But I am talking myself into going anyway, because Lisa is one of the most healing, peaceful people I know, and I have a feeling this is the jumping-off point to dealing with my own grief, and starting the "going through" process that can't be skipped over.

Food Truck Friday

Does your town have food truck gatherings? I find them fun once in a while, and we've even visited food trucks when we've been on vacation. This month, the St. Louis Art Museum is having a film series on Friday nights, where they have food trucks all evening, then a movie outdoors after dark. We went this past Friday, and it was a really nice time. My daughter brought a friend, and they had the best time exploring the museum all evening.
For me, the only downside to food trucks is that it's sometimes hard to find food that feels like my preferred variety of healthy. But I got so excited when I saw the Revel food truck there. I've never eaten at their cafe, but my husband said it was delicious. They actually received a write-up in the New York Times this spring.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/26/travel/restaurant-report-athlete-eats-in-st-louis.html?_r=0I had the "“caulichilada” which tasted completely amazing! Now I've been craving it all week! Then I had a paleo chocolate cookie from the coffee truck for dessert. I was completely satisfied, and it was all so delicious.
I realized I've talked a lot lately about following moderation and being more flexible with family meals as a good example. This situation was the best of both worlds - it was a rare opportunity to have it all!

Modeling Moderation

I hope everyone had a very happy July 4th weekend! Our 4th was nice, but having July 5th on a Sunday was my favorite day in a while. The weather was perfect - high 80s but not too humid. Every place we went in St. Louis had little to no crowds. This is Art Hill in Forest Park - normally it would be packed on a beautiful day like yesterday. We went to the pool, the Art Museum, did a little shopping, and tried a new-to-St. Louis ice cream parlor.

Oh, and Marlena did my face for me. I always love the way she does it, and she frequently asks if she can apply my makeup. I just ignore the wrinkles, ha! 

If you ever get a chance to try Jeni's Ice Cream, I highly recommend it! Marlena was cracking up that she somehow got hot fudge all over her arm! 

But the ice cream brings me to my topic: Modeling Moderation. 

Moderation has never come naturally to me. Honestly, I didn't lose 150 pounds by eating/exercising moderately. As the mom of a daughter, I have tried to never ever say negative things about my body, but there have been many times I've said things like, "I *have* to work out!" or eaten different meals from my family to stay On-Plan. From everything I've read, I have internalized the message that "being hardcore" is the most efficient way to maintain. I try to follow most of Dr. Barbara Berkeley's rules from "Refuse To Regain," including weighing and exercising daily and keeping gains to a bare minimum. A couple years ago, though, I made a choice to eat more treats with Marlena, solely for the purpose of modeling moderation. I'm OK with my extra 15 pounds that resulted. 

In the past six weeks, though, we (Marlena, my husband and I, and a couple adults close to her) have become concerned about her vulnerability to eating disorders. It goes hand in hand with her other emotional issues, and it appears to be widespread among a group of her friends. At this point, her food intake hasn't changed, I don't think her weight has changed, but she's begun tracking her food on My Fitness Pal and worrying about her weight and what she eats. She's also begun running, and continues to love dance. My mama gut instinct tells me she does not have an eating disorder, but we are watching it carefully. My gut also tells me that her running is probably 50% for her mood, and 50% for her weight. 

I have always been very open with my family that the main reason I exercise daily is to maintain my mood. So I shouldn't be surprised that, from the list of 100 Ways To Self-Soothe her therapist gave her, she chose exercise. She's been watching Mama self-soothe with exercise for 8 years! 

All this is just to say that there's a reason I've been eating ice cream this summer, even when I'm not really in the mood. My kiddo and husband absolutely LOVE ice cream! It completely breaks my heart to watch Marlena talk herself out of an ice cream because she thinks it has too many calories. So when she says she wants it, I cheerfully walk her to the ice cream parlor in our neighborhood, and we enjoy the heck out of those ice creams. I enjoy the heck out of our walk & talks. And I say "f- it" to the ice cream calories, because showing her it's OK to be moderate is one of my most important jobs right now. 

The Long Rainy Summer

In an effort to focus on the positive, here are some good things that have happened recently:

My anxiety backed down to more normal levels, thank goodness. I now feel able to be a more effective parent. My appetite is still pretty blunted, so my weight has stayed down. And my hair dresser is going to love all my new grey hairs, ha! 

We've had some nice family outings. We attended the Young Artist Center Stage concert at Opera Theatre of St. Louis, which was fantastic. This is the same young artist program I attended 21 years ago, and I can tell you these artists were head and shoulders above my level of singing at that age! Marlena seemed to really enjoy it, and was especially tickled at my and Sasha's complete opera nerdiness. Ha, little does she know we were only about 25% of the way to opera nerds that night - that was completely mild! 

We also attended Pride St. Louis as a family, and Marlena met some friends there. 

Marlena has done a couple of arts camps, because it's good for her to stay busy. I am so amazed by her creativity and talent in so many different arts. She did an oil painting camp and a "movie musicals" camp, where she sang the lead in numbers from Les Mis, Into The Woods, and Legally Blonde. Next week is pottery wheel class, then a two-week a capella camp at the end of the summer. She's also taking tap and ballet classes this summer. She's taking a break from anything competitive, and we're just focusing on enjoying the arts this summer. 

As a family, we have eaten some pretty awesome ice cream so far this summer. Sasha and Marlena are the real ice cream lovers, but if it's really *nice* ice cream, I do enjoy it. Oh my goodness, we have a place called Serendipity in our neighborhood. It's locally handmade ice cream, costs a tiny fortune, but it's phenomenal. Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams has also opened a parlor in St. Louis (!) but we have yet to try it. So far, that has been our "vacation" ice cream place, and it will still need to be a special occasion treat.

I'm looking forward to seeing my family over the July 4th weekend. 

I hope you all are having a nice summer!

Anxiety sucks

"Breathe in through the nose, out through the mouth . . ." repeat.

This has been my mantra the past couple of weeks. It has been tough, I'm not going to lie. 

At the beginning of this year, I briefly mentioned some trouble my family has been dealing with, specifically my daughter's struggle with anxiety. After months of therapy, then adding very mild meds, things were stabilized. But as soon as school let out for the summer, her mood took a nosedive. Last summer, I felt able to cope and be strong for her. For whatever reason, this time it has triggered my long-dormant anxiety, so now I feel like I'm barely hanging on. It has been probably 20 years since my anxiety has been this bad. Can't concentrate, can't sleep, racing heart, feeling snappish with everyone, and unable to separate my feelings from hers enough to help her cope. 

For me, it feels harder because I'm so introverted and unwilling to share my struggle with friends. My daughter is so extroverted she only feels like her feelings are valid when she's sharing them with others. She's also completely stubborn and not very cooperative with therapy. I feel like we're a toxic combination right now, when I should be able to be her strong support.  Add to that the guilt I feel that she inherited this from me, and I'm feeling pretty crummy and alone. 

I'm also going to have to put away my scale. She has become friends with several girls with eating disorders, and is starting to show signs of worrying about her (completely fine) weight. 

We have another therapy appointment tomorrow, so I'm hoping she finds a little relief there. And being the grownup who's been through it before, I will keep working the steps I know will help me feel better. 

Universal Studios - Day 2

Today was our second day at Universal Studios/Islands of Adventure, and our last day in the theme parks. We toured Hogsmeade again, then rode the Hogwarts Express to Universal Studios. It was cool to see the Knight Bus in the flesh (metal?) 

We did a little more shopping in Diagon Alley. I got a cool sweatshirt/jacket, and Marlena got an awesome Gryffindoor leather phone case.

We ate lunch at the Leaky Cauldron again, simply because of proximity. I actually like the food better at Three Broomsticks, but this was still completely above-average theme park food.

We rode so many rides today! We also did a couple character meet & greets. Sasha was so thrilled to meet a Decepticon. Quite different from the nice Disney characters and Spider Man - he just snarled at everyone, ha! 

By 4pm, we were completely worn out, so we took off for Whole Foods to pick up some dinner. Have I mentioned how much we love the Orlando Whole Foods. Actually, we have kind of a family tradition of stopping at the Whole Foods food bars whenever possible on vacation. So many yummy, healthy options! 

Sasha and Marlena went to the pool after dinner, while I collapsed in the A/C and uploaded photos. 

I forgot to mention that the reason we've booked this particular condo twice is its view of the Disney fireworks. So we watched the Magic Kingdom Wishes fireworks one last time, then went to bed.

Steps for today: 17,093. We were spent. The funny thing was: when Marlena got back to school, she asked her gym teacher if she needed to submit a makeup log. He said, "Yes, please." She said, "OK, I'll write down that we walked x number of miles last week." He replied, "OK, never mind the log - that will do!"

Epcot - Day 2

Epcot today was fantastic, as always. Beautiful beautiful perfect weather.

Walked around World Showcase most of the day, just shopping, people-watching, and pin-trading.

Lunch at Tangerine Cafe again. Should I be embarrassed that the host recognized Marlena and me, and told us "Welcome back"? We love that schwarma!

Marlena also had quite a few yummy treats.

We walked through World Showcase a couple of times and felt like we'd seen pretty much everything we wanted by mid-afternoon. Still, I choked up when we left - I was incredibly sad to be leaving Disney for our last day. Vacation always goes too quickly!

For dinner, we met my husband's dear work friend at Raglan Road in Downtown Disney. She happens to be friends with the manager, who seated us at the best table in the place! We had a great view of the singing and dancing, and the food was really delicious. I had Shepherd's Pie for dinner, then an unbelievable bread pudding for dessert. Oh man, I love bread pudding, but the portion was so huge I was happy to share with Sasha and Marlena!

We walked around Downtown Disney for a while, then went back to our condo.

Steps for this day: 19,342. Believe it or not, it felt like a much lighter day than previous days. I know the gorgeous weather helped so much!