Moving On...Maybe

In the past, I have always been able to spring back from a nasty breakup with a guy.  I’ve had periods where I stayed single for decent periods of time, but it wasn’t due to being too damaged from a breakup. 

This time there was something different.  Something didn’t just click back into place after it was over.  Maybe it was that the last 2 months of the relationship were spent in a high anxiety state of being.  He was talking to other women over the internet.  He had made himself completely distant from me, refusing to even hug or kiss me, let alone sleep in the same bed as me.  He stopped telling me that he loved me.

He moved into an apartment about 20 feet away from mine and telling me that he wanted us to work through the issues we were having and that he wanted to be close to me.  I wish he had moved anywhere else in the apartment complex except the apartment he moved into.  Within a week, I knew he had another woman living with him, even though he said she was just a friend that was having problems with her husband and needed a place to stay for a little bit and that one of them was sleeping on the couch.  I immediately told him to give me my key back, to which he replied that he thought it was an overreaction on my part.  I later found out, by way of her car and seeing him get into it a couple months later, that the woman I saw was his new girlfriend. 

His continuing to live in that apartment for a year and a half after that time tormented me.  I was constantly looking at his windows to see if the lights were on or off and scanning the parking lot for his motorcycle or her car.  It became a total obsession for me.  I still catch myself looking to the windows of the apartment he lived in even though he’s long gone now.  I wasn’t able to close the door on him and move on…maybe that’s what did it to me.

Or maybe it was how we started that did it to me.  When I met him, I fell in love at first sight…something I didn’t even think was possible.  But it happened.  And I fell hard.  It didn’t help that he made about twice as much as I make at his job and took me shopping and bought me nice things and took me out to eat at very expensive 5 star restaurants.  He literally showered me with gifts the first month or two we were together.  He was also extremely attentive and filled my head with all sorts of promises about how the future was going to be.  There were red flags, but I was too enraptured by what he said and how he treated me that I just completely ignored them. 

After about 2 months into the relationship, after he had been showering me with gifts and affection, he just kind of stopped.  He pulled away.  He didn’t want to hold my hand anymore.  He didn’t want kiss in public anymore.  He barely wanted to do anything with me. 

After about 3 months, he lost his job.  He tearfully asked me if I was going to leave him.  I should have.  I really, really should have.  The thought definitely crossed my mind when he asked me that, but he assured me that he would get on unemployment (he received the maximum benefits available) and that he would spend all his spare time job hunting and turning in resumes.  He abandoned his apartment and moved into mine with me.  Then he spent his days playing video games and chatting with people on the internet instead of job hunting.  He kept saying there were no jobs.  (I’ve had a friend that is in the same sort of profession as he was tell me that there are ALWAYS loads of jobs in that field, so I now know that was a lie.  Surprise, surprise.)  This is when we started really growing apart and he repaid my devotion to him by cheating on me and feeding me a bunch of lies.

But really, I think it was all of those things put together.  I was doomed from the moment I agreed to stay with him after he lost his job.  But I can’t say that I did it to myself.  Sure I knew better than to be with a guy that didn’t have a job and I stayed with him anyway, but that doesn’t mean that it’s my fault.  Not even close to that.  Yet, I’ve been beating myself up over it for almost 2 years now.  I just haven’t been able to fully let go and move on with my life.  I’ve been stuck in a holding pattern.  I really hope Dr. H can give me the skills I need to do that.

I Thought Wrong

I lost a friend.  She didn’t die or slip into a coma.  She just decided she didn’t like me anymore.  We’d been friends since we were in 2^nd grade.  She was one of my best friends in my whole life.  But today, she told me that when she visited me last month that she didn’t have any fun while she was here and that she was actually bored the whole time.  Then she told me that I never thanked her for the gas money she gave me while she was here.  I distinctly remember thanking her for it.  But that’s neither here nor there.  Then she said I didn’t thank her for a gift she gave me.  I may not have said the words “thank you” but I’m pretty sure I told her something like “you’re awesome” in response to the gift.

Then she dropped the real bombshell on me.  She said she didn’t like the person I had become.  She said I was a user and that I just use people.  I don’t agree with this and neither does anyone I know, including one of the people she says I use.  Just because someone is nice to me and likes doing things for me like working on my car without payment does not mean I’m using them.  Sure, this person may annoy me at times, but he’s a really nice person and we have fun when we hang out.  It’s not just about him working on my car.  It’s also not about him paying for dinner all the time, because I buy him dinner too.  She also said something about my bicycle that I got for only $60.  I was supposed to pay 10 payments of $60 to a guy friend of mine (this is about 13 years ago).  It was a $1000 bike, but he’d had it for a while.  After I made the first payment to him, I rebuffed his advances to ask me out and told him I just wanted to be friends, to which he stopped talking to me so I wasn’t able to finish paying him. 

I’m not going to lie, I was shocked and extremely hurt by her telling me so no longer wanted to be my friend.  I cried for a good while.  I will call my therapist tomorrow and talk to her about it.  I felt inconsolable earlier when I read the message.  Then I talked about it with my grandma and with a couple people from work.  Everyone seems to think that there is a little envy that I’m free to do as I please whenever I please because I’m not tied down (that’s NOT to imply that she doesn’t love her family because she does) and that I have people that do nice things for me and don’t ask for anything in return from me.

I’m just so very sad that it came to this and that she felt I was a horrible person that she could no longer associate with.  I thought that she was one of my best and greatest friends.  I thought we had an amazing bond.  I thought wrong.

Numbing The Pain

Food makes me happy.  But, then again, it also makes me sad.  It’s also a huge source of stress for me.  I’ve heard it said by an obese person: “I’d rather have food than have sex.”  Wow.  Exactly how I feel.  I really couldn’t have put it any better than that.  Food is more substantial and more real to me. 

I know I hide my emotions from myself behind the food I eat.  I know that doing this is just damaging me and my body.  It’s damaging me in ways I can see and in ways I can’t see.  There’s the obvious damage in that I’m overweight.  Sure, I’ve lost about 50 pounds in a year and a half and I’ve gotten rid of my acid reflux problem.  Those are great steps in the right direction.  Somehow I need to propel myself into taking the final steps in that right direction and lose the remaining 30 pounds I need to lose to be at a healthy and comfortable weight for me.

The first of these final steps is, of course, getting a handle on my emotional overeating.  Over the past 2 weeks, I think I can count only 2 days where I didn’t overeat.  How sad is that?  Pretty freaking sad, I say.  I’ve got to change that. 

When I eat due to my emotions I go numb in every way possible.  I eat the food to comfort myself but it’s not really comforting me.  All it’s doing in reality is numbing me.  How does that help me?  It doesn’t.  I might as well be standing there telling myself lies.  All I’m doing is delaying the inevitable.  By denying myself my emotions all they’re doing is building up inside of me until they build up so much that they just explode out of me.  I’ve had emotional breakdowns before.  They are no fun.  I’d like to avoid going through yet another emotional breakdown. 

I’ve got to learn to recognize when I’m numbing myself from feeling emotions.  When I can recognize those moments, then I can truly start to help myself.  Because, when I can recognize those moments, then I can stop and question myself about what I’m feeling and why I’m feeling it and then maybe, just maybe, I can actually learn to actually FEEL my feelings again.   

When I watch shows like The Biggest Loser or Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss, I see how much pain these people are holding onto and hiding from themselves with the food they eat.  It makes me wonder, what could be so bad in my life that it has essentially shut down my emotions?  I mean, I had a pretty good childhood for the most part.  My parents instilled great values in me and taught me to take care of myself, but my dad was emotionally unavailable to me and my mom was overemotional in times of stress. 

The only thing I can think of is my love life.  Because of my emotionally distant dad, did I attempt to overcompensate by making myself too open and too available to the guys I’ve dated?  Did I do this to myself from the get go?  I think it’s a very real possibility that that is the truth of the matter.  I did this to myself and only I can make the necessary changes in my life and in myself to achieve the goals I want to achieve.  I have another 30 pounds between me and my goal weight.  I can do it.  I want to be at my goal weight by my birthday, that’s 6 months from now.  That’s totally doable.

Buying My Future

The thought of moving is a little intimidating to me.  I’ve been in my apartment for 3 years now.  I’m used to it.  I feel safe in it.  Change is scary, even if it’s for the better.  Granted, I’m giving myself a little time to get used to the idea of moving into a bigger and better space where I will be comfortable living for the next 16 years.

Another thing is that I’m not just moving into a house, I’m planning on BUYING one.  Of course, it’s all dependent upon my passing the credit check to get approved for a true nothing down first time homebuyer’s loan.  If I can get approved for that around this time next year, then I will be buying a place next year in the early fall.  If I can’t get approved for it this time next year, I’ll give my credit another year to get a little better and try again the next year.

Something I’m excited about when I think about buying my own house is all the fun I’m going to have in the yard.  I want to build above ground planter boxes to plant a little garden in.  I want to grow zucchini, summer squash, tomatoes and maybe strawberries.  I want a covered patio with morning glories crawling up the posts and hanging down around the edges.  The patio can be stamped and stained concrete or it can be paving stones.  Or, it could even be a deck with a pergola with the morning glories all over the pergola.

Inside the house, I would prefer an open floorplan between the kitchen, dining room and living room.  That’s what I have now with my apartment and I really like it.  But if everything in the house I end up choosing is separated, that’s fine too, I’ll work with it.  I would like an en suite bathroom for the master bedroom and then a second bathroom that guests would use.  I want a 2-car garage.  I want to get rid of my storage unit and stop wasting that $91 a month on that.  Having a garage would help me do that.

Moving up and moving on with my life is my theme right now.  And doing little and affordable remodeling projects that I can do myself will help me grow personally.  I’ve done a little with laying tile, marble and slate thanks to that being my dad’s profession, so I can definitely demo the kitchen counters and backsplash and put in something that suits me better.  Also, the bathroom shower and vanity areas.

Settling into my new life in a house I can call my own will be beyond great for me.  I can work in the garden and get satisfaction there.  Maybe I can even have friends come over every now and then.  Heck, maybe I can even throw backyard parties.  I do plan to have a grill on the back patio.  I want to string white bulb lights around the patio area for a more intimate type of lighting.

But really, the whole point is that I will be taking control over a big part of my life.  Sure, it’s scary that I’ll be completely responsible for any and all repairs that may crop up around the house.  But I think it will be worth it overall.  It will help me to grow as a person and come into my own.  I’m 34 for crying out loud…it’s about time I did that!

Moving Forward

I’ve been blogging on here for a year and a half.  Before that, I journaled a minimum of 3 handwritten pages a day for about 5 months.  I’ve started to turn a new page in my life recently with the seeing of a therapist and with accepting that I am stuck in Texas for the next 16 years (until I earn full retirement at my job).  I think between these 2 things I can really start to move forward with my life.  I’ve essentially been in a holding pattern since the break-up with JP almost 2 years ago.  I put my life on hold and just stopped doing anything.  I shut down and quit experiencing life…I quit participating in my own life…I just existed.

Now is the time for me to take that first step forward into my future.  I’ve started using MeetUp.com to look for things to do that will get me out of the house occasionally and mingling with other people.  I also updated my profile on the dating site that I use in the hopes that I’ll get a response or two at some point.  One of the guys at work (I mentioned this the other day) proposed finding a guy for me and I didn’t turn his offer down…in fact, I kind of welcomed it.

I’ve kind of gotten away from writing here over the past few months and I want to change that.  I want to write at least once a week, but preferably more often.  Writing to me is an outlet.  It’s therapeutic.  I know Dr. H would agree with that statement and would encourage me to write as often as I can.

So, I’ve joined a couple groups on MeetUp.com.  The groups I really wanted to be a member of have their monthly meet ups on days that I’m at work and wouldn’t be able to make it, so I didn’t join them.  But I did find one women’s spirituality group that meets every Friday evening, which works for me.  I also joined a kabbalah group but they don’t have a regular meet up.  I’m really hoping I can get out of the house a couple times a month and make some new friends and try some new things. 

Everything I’m doing in my life right now is preparing me to open my life up to living happily and healthfully.  I’m hoping that I can cure my insecurities, at least for the most part.  I know that if I can get rid of some of my insecurities that I can get control over my binge eating problem.  I know that if I keep myself busy, I don’t feel the urges to eat when I’m not hungry.  So…the key is to keep myself busy.  Easier said than done.  Once I’ve bought a house, that will be easier to do because there will be more that needs to be done (yard work, cleaning, etc) than what there is to do in a 3^rd floor walk-up apartment.

New Name, New Look

Since I started this blog a year and a half ago, I’ve been disappointed in the name I chose.  “Blogga.”  Sort of my version of “blah blah blah” because it was originally “blogga blogga blogga.”  I like the new name so much better.  It shows imagination and creativity, which I really do have, I swear I do.  Something else I need to do is start tagging my posts with keywords to help draw in more readers.  Wish me luck!

Not Feeling It

When I eat emotionally, I no longer actually FEEL the emotion that is triggering me the urges that make me eat emotionally.  It seems I have disconnected myself from my emotions.  I’m on autopilot.  I completely skip the feeling of the emotion (whether it’s stress, anger, anxiety, fear, or even happiness) and go straight to the binge eating.

Somehow, I need to learn to feel my emotions again.  Something that is key to the process of stopping the detrimental habit of emotional eating is identifying the emotions that cause the behavior to begin with and feeling them.  But if I’m completely skipping the part where I even know I’m experiencing an emotion, then how am I supposed to recognize that I’m having an emotion, let alone force myself to feel it instead of feed it?  Therein lies my challenge.  Somehow I’ve got to slow myself down when I feel the urge to eat when I’m not hungry, and then to discover what emotion may be occurring within me that is triggering it all.

This is all something I hope to hash out with Dr. H.  I hope I can remember to mention this whole skipping the emotion thing to her when I see her next and see what she has to say about it.  I know that for therapy to be completely successful I have to be as open and honest with her as much as I possibly can be.  And that is exactly what I plan to do.  Maybe I should start a little notebook that I carry around with me at all times and write in it things to bring up at my therapy sessions.  Also in that I can write down what, if anything, I’m feeling when I get my urges to eat and what, if anything, I did to distract myself from the urges.

The book Are You Ready! by Bob Harper is really inspiring me to make the changes I need to make within myself.  I haven’t read a book that has truly made an impact on me in quite some time.  Of course, I don’t usually read self-help books of any kind, so maybe that’s why.  Another book I want to read is also by Bob Harper.  It’s his new book called The Skinny Rules.  I have a few friends that have read it or are reading it and they love it.  So that’s the next book I’m going to buy.