General Update

Not much going on that is blog-worthy. Frankly, I've been so busy with everything else that I've not had time for thinking & reflecting! I used to nearly crave those days. Now....not so much. I miss my down time. I miss me-time! Would have never expected to hear those words from this human-doing!

Ran errands on Thursday. Met a friend at her new apartment on Friday, had dinner & helped her get some stuff organized. Saturday, cleaned the house in the AM, went to a Bday party for my DD's friend. Grocery shopping, more errands. Cooked til midnight for Sunday's dinner. Sunday AM, sang at church. Raced back home to cook some more for the week. Picked up my mother and went to this dinner get together at a friends house. Didn't get home til 9:30 and then had to do a minor kitchen clean and get food & stuff ready for Monday. YAWN.

I did seize the opportunity on the drive to dinner to ask my mother about my Aunt (father's sister). She really didn't have much information for me. She basically said that my Aunt was always very happy, boisterous, life of the party, social. I wonder if this also was a "mask". Who is really like that ALL the time? And she was morbidly obese and died young of uncontrolled diabetes. To me, those factors say she was not enjoying her life nearly as much as she appeared to. She was very smart and quickly climbed the ladder in her career. She had a jealousy of &/or anger toward my father when he was born. Apparently, he was a sick baby so he got all the attention and then when their father left, maybe she blamed my father for that. She was 5 years older so she was 6 when their father took off. She never spoke of him. Never really cared for her stepfather. As adults, my mother said my aunt never spoke badly of my father. It just seemed that he was so determined to hate her that she felt like she had to do it in reverse. My mother also said that their mother did not treat my Aunt in the same spiteful way that she did my father. So maybe that's a reason my father was so hateful toward my Aunt, feeling she was favored. My mother did mention something vague about my father being ashamed of his mother for being overly flirtatious in between her marriages. Except he was like 3 when she remarried so how could he have known her behavior? I think he definitely has some sort of inbred hatred of women and a belief that most of them (us) are whores.

Let's see......I've been binge free since I posted my Letter to Food. I've got my moments where it's harder to resist. But this is still the beginning and I've been so busy so I've not been home to obsess much! I've stuck to healthy foods for the most part with the exception being last night when I went to a dinner get-together. I couldn't resist my own dessert!! I made this fabulous pear tart on a gingersnap crust that has a cheesecake-like filling in the middle. YUM!Interestingly, since I have been eating better and less, I find that my physical symptoms of stress are decreasing already. How can that be, I first asked myself. I decide to stop doing the thing that works as an escape....to face my feelings as they come up.....and somehow I am LESS stressed? I guess the stress is being contributed to by NOT feeling my feelings. So clearly, this is a life change whose time was way overdue. With any luck, this knowledge will make it "easier" to continue my good choices.

Other than the above....work has been a madhouse. We got a new digital phone system installed and they accidentally cut our DSL line so we have no internet!! AGH! We're supposed to be back up as of tomorrow afternoon but it's been hell. I can't work with no internet and in between trying to put out fires, arrange for new service, etc...I'm also trying to learn a new & complicated phone system as well as train the rest of my staff. I'm exhausted. I'm going to make lunches for tomorrow and do some good self care by going to BED!!