HEALTH

I am soooo not good at coming up with titles.  
Went to the doctor yesterday because my knees are killing me.  I live in an upstairs apartment...so that's always a fun thing.  Looks like there is fluid around them...all puffy, etc.  Thought she might just drain them & put "shots" into them.  Nope.  She DID order x-rays but basically told me that losing weight would help.  My lower right leg swells up often & is getting darker because of blood vessels bursting (that's what I got from the explaination anyway).   I'm supposed to be wearing compression socks on a regular basis...which I haven't been.  I get mad at my ex for doing the same thing I have apparently been doing...if I don't acknowledge it...it's not happening.  Stupid, I know. I have known for most of my life that I needed to lose weight.  Have always been on one diet or another.  I can never stick to them because I love to eat.  Bottom line.  But I have to quit having a love/hate relationship with food.  Have to stop thinking about it all the time.  When I'm eating breakfast (which I rarely do), I'm thinking about what I'm going to have for lunch, etc.  Wondering if I should eat this or not eat that.  Feeling guilty as soon as I eat something.  I used to just ENJOY the food when I was eating it.  Not worry about the consequences.  It hasn't been like that for a long time, yet I keep eating too much & feeling like crap.  As I have gotten older, I have found that there are foods that I can't eat anymore...like eggs.  I love those things, but they aren't worth the pain that it causes me.  I was drinking protein drinks until they started making my stomach hurt for hours after...because they contain milk.  Bread or any other carbs make me tired,...and make me gain weight.  I know that I'm all over the place with this post & most, if not all, of my other ones will be like this too.  I just write as it comes to me...which means that I'm here, then I'm there, then back here again.  I apologize for that.  It's just who & how I am.  Exercise & I...well I'm OK as soon as I start doing it...but it's just getting to that point.  After my fiancee left me last August I started exercising every day.  Usually for an hour or more.  Felt good.  I had motivation...hoping that it would make him come back to me.  Yeah another stupid idea.  What I'm getting at with that is, I wish that I would have just kept it up instead of quitting when I realized he wasn't going to come back to me no matter what I did.  Instead I let myself gain this weight back again.  I'm frustrated & annoyed with myself.  I need to get healthy.  To be there for my kids for as long as possible & to feel better.  It's not easy for me to make changes.  It would be so easy to just bury my head in the sand & go on like I have been, but that would just make things worse.  I don't want my life to be like an episode of "My 600 lb Life."  I get so pissed off at those people when they come up with excuses as to why they can't lose weight or whine that they can't do it, sneak food & sabotage themselves.  Yet I do the same thing.  I'm taking responsibility.  I let myself get this huge & now I have to get un-huge.  It won't be easy for me.  I usually start out with a bit of motivation & then quickly lose it.  But I'm tired of being in pain, not feeling good, being tired all of the time, not being able to fit into clothes that I want to fit into, looking fat in pictures, being invisible.  I don't want to end up like a woman I saw at the doctor's office.  Heavier, older, using a cane, having to be on oxygen.  I don't want to be that person who other fat people look at & think to themselves "well at least I'm not THAT fat."  Yes we do that to each other.  As long as there are other people fatter than us, we tell ourselves that we're OK still.  We're not though.  So here is to losing weight & feeling better.  To NOT quitting anymore.

GAMBLING ADDICITON

I haven't bought a scratch ticket since around May 12th.  Yes this is significant for me.  I have an addiction & it sucks.  I love to gamble.  Even though I don't have a lot of money to gamble with. That has never stopped me before.  But it does now.  I need to get a grip.  I need to grow up & quit doing stupid shit.  I need to act responsible.  The real test will come when I get paid on June 3rd.  Will I be able to fight the urge?  I hope so.  I'm going to do my best.  I compromised with myself.  I will give up scratch tickets, but can still go to Bingo.  I love playing Bingo.  But it's not just that.  I like the friends that I have there & the whole social aspect of it.  I'm just not willing to give that up.  Cut back to maybe once or twice a week?  Yes.  I live in a small town.  I can go up to 3x a week here (probably a good thing that I don't live in a city).  Do I NEED to go 3x a week?  My addiction says HELL YES!!  But I know that I can't be doing that UNLESS I'm actually winning & coming out ahead.  I can go Wednesday, Thursday & Friday nights.  If I had to choose just one, I would pick Friday nights.  Even with that, I didn't go last week at all & won't be able to go this week either.  NEXT week I will be able to.  Another thing...I need to just spend the bare minimum.  I sometimes have a tendency to spend a lot more than I have to.  Those who go to Bingo or have been to Bingo understand how easy this is to do.  Another thing, I can only go to Cripple Creek once every 2-3 months or so.  They have a bus that goes up there the first Monday every month.  It's fun to go..but so easy to just blow your money.  A town with a lot of casinos...as soon as I get into one of those places, it seems like I lose all sense of reality & am like a zombie.  Love the sounds, smells.  I get an adrenaline thing going.  I have learned only to take a certain amount of money up there with me & to leave any credit/debit cards at home.  I also need to quit borrowing money from people..because then I can't pay them back right away usually.  It's embarrassing.  I was able to pay some people back at the beginning of this month....but still have a few people to pay totally back.  I'm NOT going to borrow anymore money.  My mom helps me out when she can if I need something for the kids.  But she is on a fixed income now too.  Plus she has my niece, my niece's boyfriend & their 3 1/2 month old baby living with her at the moment.  She has enough problems & things to deal with.  She doesn't need me adding to all of that stress.  I feel like such a moocher & loser sometimes.  I'm 45 years old & I still depend on my mom too much.  Always have.  I just need to be better about everything in my life.  I'm not happy right now.  I have to figure out what will MAKE me happy & do that.  I have been trying to figure it out...shouldn't be such a hard question, but, for me, it is.  

LIFE

The boys had their bowling tournament last weekend in Denver.  It went really well.:)  They had a good time.  Though Dominic (my middle one) has anxiety some & likes his "routine," so it was a little hard for him...but all did well.  Matthew (youngest) got his highest score ever...201!  He was so happy & excited.  I'm proud of him.  We went to the mall while we were there.  Their aunt had given them some money & then my oldest. Phillip, got paid that weekend from his job...which helped a lot since he could buy his own things.  I reached my goal on my funding site, which was amazing.

I know that a lot of people probably think that Colorado is cold most of the year...or at least cooler in the mountain areas.  That hasn't been the case in years.  I have lived in a small town surrounded by mountains for most of my life.  It has been getting into the 90's & up starting in May for a long time.  This year....totally different.  It has been cold, raining, snowing...being pretty crazy.  I don't like it really hot, so I love the cooler weather & am not complaining.  Just strange that it's like this.  I could do without the wet snow though...it just turns everything into slop.  My mom's driveway turns into nothing but mud.  I love the rain though, the thunder & lightning.

I haven't been doing so great on the low carb thing.  I did manage to lose 16 lbs...but have been hovering there for awhile  We don't have any money for food right now, let alone low carb food.  So I have been eating a lot of what I shouldn't be.  It makes me feel crappy...physically & mentally.  I really want to get this weight off.  I also want to feel better.  My joints have been hurting a lot lately.  The inside part of my knees gets really stiff & when I go to stand up...it really hurts.  Not sure if it's arthritis, the Fibromyalgia or a combination.  I'm tired A LOT.  I don't sleep well at night.  I keep telling myself that I'm going to start exercising "tomorrow," but then never do.  I think it would help me to feel better if I did.  I just have to get off of my lazy ass & do it.

I have still been talking to the guy in West Virginia.  It's kinda hard to do right now though, since I don't have a phone for a few weeks.  Being broke pretty much sucks.  I keep thinking that I should try to get my job back at Wal Mart, but then I have days like I have had for the past few days & not sure that I CAN work.  It's rare that I feel good.  I know that there are people out there working that feel worse than I do.  I'm just not good at working when I'm hurting or feeling sick.  Calling in isn't the best idea...especially if it's on a regular basis.  So I'm trying to figure out how to make myself feel better first & then see about working again.  Anyway, I"m still going to try to do low carb...I still have a few things around the apartment that are low carb...though not many.  I don't know how anyone can be anorexic.  I love to eat too much to starve myself.  I have tried.  All is does is make me feel sick & also leads me to binge eating.  NOT a good thing.  As I have gotten older, I also have come to find out that my stomach doesn't like a lot of things that it used to like.  Which is annoying.  It may change from day to day too!  I eat something one day & feel fine...eat the same thing that next day & it makes my stomach hurt, or makes me tired or makes me nauseous.  I hate being nauseous & hate throwing up...so bulimia is out too.  I'm not making a joke here.  I know that anorexia & bulimia are real problems.  I'm just saying that I couldn't be either.  Though I DO want to be thin.

I have started feeling "panicky" again.:(  I hate it.  I used to have panic attacks ALL OF THE TIME or at least feel that anxiety in the pit of my stomach.  The Effexor has helped both with the depression & anxiety, so not sure why it's coming back.  I can't handle it.  I think I'm just freaking out about the future, though I try to live in the now.  Too much stuff to think about.