Pieces of the Pie, Part III: Mental Health

When I broke up these posts, I only expected to look at nutrition and exercise. But it's become abundantly clear that my mental health plays a big part in my success, and how I manage myself along my path.

I feel like someone split in two. Half of me has these great goals, and I'm doing everything I can to achieve them. I truly feel that I'm walking the walk and not just spewing the right words. I'm eating well. I'm excersising. I feel great! I've got some life goals with plans set out in front of me...

...but I'm stuck. We`ve come up with a five-year plan, and I'm so excited by it. Unfortunately the first step is to find work within a reasonable distance from where we want to make our new home. And it's TOUGH. I've been looking and looking and looking. I've been applying and have actually had a good amount of interviews, considering that I generally compete with about 400 applicants for the types of jobs I'm looking at. That increases at this time of year when job postings become rare.

And then there's my current job. You all know very well how unhappy I am, whether you know why or not. I feel that it takes some kind of insanity to return time and time again to a place that sucks the life out of you. I catch myself thinking 'I hate my life' and remember that it's 'I hate my job'.

I've felt like I'm just not good enough more than once along this path, and it's getting harder and harder to get re-energized. Doing my exercises and eating well gives me a great sense of fulfillment, but it's short-lived.

I wish I could end this post on a good note, but I haven't the energy left to do so. And seriously, you're all my friends. I'm not going to hide what I'm going through from you.

Pieces of the Pie, Part II: Exercise (a.k.a, half eaten pie)

I split up this post because I felt that I was going to write a huge story between the three topics. So I put part two down for a couple of days, with expectations of telling you where I started, how I was doing, and what plans were for the near future. The funny thing is that I feel a bit off track already!

I guess I should begin at the beginning (good place, no?).

After about 5 weeks of good eating habits developed and weight stabilized, I felt that it was time to inject the exercise and start seeing some results. Thomas and I hit the gym two weekends ago, on a day where we had nothing else planned. That way we could go through it at our own pace and not feel rushed about getting out of there.



It was GREAT. I can't remember the last time I felt so good about working out. It re-energized the way I was looking at life and everything that's been going on.

The best part is that we kept going. Monday, Tuesday, Friday, Saturday...exercises of varying degrees, from a neighbourhood walk to a killer home video to a couple more trips to the gym. By Saturday afternoon I was so exhausted that I couldn't formulate thoughts properly. We pushed on, making sure that our responisbilities to others didn't fall to the wayside.

And then suddenly we'd been given more responsibilities by our community. Now, getting out of a rhythm that you've barely gotten going can be a game breaker. But these responsibilities need to take priority for about 10 days or so, and then we can get back to it.

In the meantime we'll just have to squeeze our exercise in where we can and get back to the full on game as soon as possible.

Pieces of the Pie (Pi? Pye?), Part I: Nutrition.



...mmm pie :) (I kid. I actually don't miss pie that much. It was never a big thing for me.)

So it's been a while since I've updated on my physical health and nutritional well-being. And that's mostly because I was starting something new. It's a mesh of some great ideas from something called the ABS diet (it's an acronym, not an ab-focused diet), the old weight watchers, and the eventual re-incorporation of exercise (to be updated in another post).

About six weeks ago I made the decision to cut the crap out of my diet. The biggest piece of that was to quit drinking pop and eating fried potatoes of any sort. The funny thing is that cutting them out together made quitting eating both of them a lot easier. Anytime I craved a 'happy meal' in its various forms, I realized that two thirds of what was included I'm no longer eating.

I'm also including some food that I was afraid to for a long time due to their fat content - avocado and assorted nuts. Under the Weight Watcher regime, their fat content was too high and pushed the points numbers up. Because I'm not as strict with the numbers, I toss in some nuts or avocado into a big healthy salad, a sandwich, or some snacks. And I shot my fibre intake way up.

I didn't track calories or points for the first few weeks. I still ate out, just made sure that I was choosing the healthiest choice available. Sushi, salads, vegetarian burritos without the heavy stuff like refried beans.

And I didn't gain any weight. Previously, any time I didn't diligently track what I was eating, the pounds would go up in slow increments over time. At one point I stopped tracking for so long that I gained 14 lbs. I started tracking again, lost it, stopped and gained 4 lbs back. So here I was, over a six-week period with no weight gain and no tracking....

I honestly hadn't thought about tracking again. But a good friend found me on MyFitnessPal and I thought I'd do so again so that we could encourage each other. The site also makes it easier for me to track Weight Watchers style to keep me in check. After all, the only major weight loss I've ever had was on the old WW progam.

So I'm back, and I'm feeling great about what I'm doing.

Just a thought.

Strong feelings of happiness and misery at the same time has been exhausting, and in turn is allowing the misery to overtake the happiness. This bodes well for no one.