I am feeling a lot better today, about myself and about life.  Thank you all for your supportive thoughts, prayers and comments.  That’s one thing that I really like about the “blogosphere”.  I know that it’s really important to have a support group of friends and family around you for all sorts of things – motivation, encouragement and to help lift you up when you are feeling down.  I have S, who is my major support.  And I have friends who are very supportive too.  But with my best friends and my family on the other side of the country, sometimes I feel very alone.  Especially when it comes to eating and food issues – those are very isolating thoughts and feelings which, understandably, it is very hard for other people who have never experienced such issues to understand.  So to be able to come here and talk it out, and then to get support and comments, it really helps and it really means a lot.

I did a lot of thinking last night.  I went to bed exhausted and very upset.  But I woke up this morning with the feeling that this is a brand new day.  Not only that – it is about to be a brand new year and I have so, so much to be thankful for in my life.  Yes, I still have some food and eating issues.  But, compared to where I was one year ago, two years ago, four years ago… you get the point…. I am doing so well.  I am so proud of myself and how far I have come, and I have to keep that in mind and be thankful for it every day.  Yes, I have some mental things I have to work through sometimes.  But don’t we all?  This is my issue in life, but other people have other things.  That’s life.  You take the bad with the good.  And I truly believe that it is going through the bad that makes us able to recognize and appreciate the good.

That being said, I have made a few decisions.  I have talked them over with S and he is in full agreement and support which really helps.

1. I will stop using Fitday.  Period.  I tried to stop using it before, and only succeeded for a day or two before I let myself go back.  It becomes too compulsive with me, and I find myself making food and eating choices based on my calorie counts and what I feel I should be eating rather than listening to my body.  So I’m done with it.  I am going to eat when I am hungry, stop when I am full.  I usually make healthy food choices, so I am not worried about what I eat – rather how much.  But the truth is that my body should be telling me how much to eat – NOT an online calorie counter.
2. S and I will eat main meals together at the kitchen table.  As crazy as it sounds, we have never eaten a meal together at the kitchen table unless we had company over.  We eat on the couch, either in front of the TV or our computers.  And that is horrible.  We both agreed we need to break that habit – for our own health, for our relationship’s health, and also for any future family that we will have.
3. I will continue to write in my own blog, and read/comment others blogs.  As I said before, I love being a part of the blogging community.  I love food, I love health, I love reading about people’s lives and their families, friends, travels and experiences, and looking at all their pictures.  It just makes me happy.  And that is not because it fuels any eating issues – it is because I simply find it fascinating and fun.  And that is ok.
4. I will not photograph every single thing I eat.  I won’t feel “obligated” to photograph something or eat something in particular so that I can post a picture.  I’m sure some people do that, but I feel like that would fuel eating issues or preoccupations.  Besides – I do tend to eat a lot of the same things sometimes, and I’m sure that gets boring to look at.  So I will photograph some things – the things I find interesting, or out of my ordinary routines.  I will still make new recipes and post and photograph them, and maybe there will be days when I photograph everything – even the mundane.  And maybe there will be days when I photograph nothing.  But I will do so because I want to do it and I want to share it – not because I’m preoccupied with it or feel like I need to prove or justify anything.
5. I will write more about my feelings.  I found writing last night’s post very cathartic, and I realized I haven’t done that sort of “get it all out there” post in a while.  That’s the whole reason I started this blog.
6. I will ask S for support when I need it, and voice a problem when I have it.  He does want to help, but he doesn’t know how.  And the truth is that a lot of times, I don’t know how he can either.  But knowing he is there for me and he loves me, and we will make it through this, makes all the difference in the world.

And today, he did try very hard.  I told myself I would not ask him, the entire day, if he wanted anything to eat.  I would just leave him alone and do my own thing – if he wanted food, he would ask for it.  And he did.  I woke up early and worked.  He came downstairs at about noon again (must be nice!!!) and I was making lunch for myself.  He said “I’m going to make myself a pizza!” and bless his heart, he did.  And he sat down with me at the kitchen table and we ate lunch together.

I had a monster salad, the usual, with a Veggie Patch veggie burger.

I also had a handful of a new trail mix I got.  It has mixed nuts, yogurt chips, dates and raisins.  It is very good, although I wish it had less peanuts and more cashews and almonds.

After lunch, we decided to make a trip to Ikea.  We recently bought a wall mount and mounted our flat-screen TV on the wall in the living room.  So now we wanted to get a little shelf to hold the DVD player, Wii, PS3, cable box, etc. underneath… because it was all sitting on the floor.  That, with all the wires hanging down, made our living room look like a freshman guy’s dorm room.  Yeah.

We totally got dressed up to go to Ikea.  I wore a skirt with boots and a nice sweater, and S broke out the collared shirt with vest and his MJ/Frank Sinatra hat.  I didn’t get any pics of myself, but I did manage to snap one of him while he was getting our box at Ikea!

That hat totally cracks me up.  And he thinks he is hot stuff in it, let me tell you!  Psst… don’t tell him… I think he is too

After our shopping, we were both hungry and went to the Ikea restaurant to get food.  I didn’t know what I felt like, but totally made up my mind when I saw a PB&J sandwich!  I know.. weird.  But I was totally craving it.  And a totally kid one – no crust, white bread.

I was a little skeptical at first, because I like me a lot of peanut butter on my sammy.  But I went for it anyways.  It was only 99 cents!!!  And I wasn’t disappointed.

It totally hit the spot.

After shopping, we headed to Starbucks to relax for a little while and get a coffee.  They were giving out cute little donuts for free, so I had to sample one.  I got vanilla, S got chocolate.

It was delicious, and perfect portion control because it was just a mini donut.  I loved the frosting on top!  S thought his was just ok.  I took a bite and it tasted great to me… oh well.

When we got home, it was already dark and I was feeling lazy so I decided instead of going to the gym I would play with the Wii.  I did Jillian Michael’s Fitness Ultimatum for a half hour while S put together our new piece of furniture.  Sorry, no pics.  This is intentional – I started right when I got home from our outing so did it wearing only the leggings I had on underneath my skirt and my collared shirt I had on underneath.  Thought I would save you that scary image!  But it was really fun.  And by the time I was done, we had this:

No more mess!  And yes, that is Modern Warfare 2 you see in the background.  Now S is playing it again, on the hardest level.  Sigh.

We had a nice, sit down dinner together at the kitchen table too.  I had a bowl of italian wedding soup (from the can…)

two clementines,

And some Sugar Cookie ice cream for dessert.

And that’s all she wrote, folks!