Remembering/Forgetting

Remembering- weird thing to contemplate, huh?  Maybe the topic should be forgetting instead remembering. Either way, I struggle with this.

Maybe now is the time to talk a little about my childhood. Looking at my family, we looked great. Both of my parents were involved in the community as scout leaders and volunteers at both our schools and sporting activities. My brother was a Boy Scout and got his eagle award. I was a Girl Scout and involved in many different sports. Everything looked really nice.

But it wasn’t. When I was 8, my mom moved out of my parent’s room and into her own room. Nothing much was said about; what I recall my mom saying was that she wanted her own room, just like my brother and I had. Not much later, my brother and I were sneaking around looking for Christmas presents and found divorce papers in my mom’s room. My brother made me promise that I would never talk about what we found, and I promised. Yet the next day, little 8 year old me had to get up and act like nothing was wrong. And the disassociation began.  Little by little I “forgot” what I had seen but deep inside I knew and was tortured. Day after day for 7 more years, my parents lived in the same house, in separate bedrooms, and said nothing about anything that was happening between them. All the while, I got better and better at disassociating, basically not questioning, not thinking about reality, and not being present. This began around 8 and has continued today.

When I was young, I used this skill to get through each day, basically to survive. But the unfortunate side effect of practicing this for so long is that it has seeped into many areas of my life. I tend to “discover” things about myself, forget it, “discover” it again, over and over. It is annoying yet I have not wanted to take a good look at this to be able to make any headway against it.

Many years ago, my husband told me that he uses notes to remind himself of things and that over time, it has improved his ability to remember. I have been so resistant to this because it reminded me of my mom (don’t really like her) so I would not try it. Lately, though, I have been putting concerted effort into this to, at least, begin to be more conscience of myself, my past, and what I want in the future.

Upgrading Me

This is one of my outfit I think looks pretty good.

Yesterday was an interesting day because I got rid of tons of clothes; probably the most I have ever gotten rid of at one time. My husband and I have been talking a lot about clothes and fit, and how that relates to feeling good about oneself.  So he suggested we drink some tequila and go through our closets and see what stuff we have that doesn’t do anything for our bodies and get rid of them.

As I have stated before, I haven’t really cared much about myself over the years; as a results, many of my clothes do not flatter me.  Getting dressed is not so much fun and thus I don’t feel good about how I look. Yet I have been so unwilling to make the effort.

And what effort you might ask? There are several areas to which this is connected that I have never taken responsible for.  

First, I have never taken the time to pay attention to my shape and what kinds of clothes fit my shape best. Growing up in an angry (and non-fashion) household did not give me any kind of start on this and then as I got older, I became more and more disinterested in life, which directly showed in my clothing.

Second, I have not cared enough to get to and keep myself at a weight that is constant, which makes clothes buying a problem. It is expensive to need to have new clothes often because of weight changes. So usually I just buy whatever I can find that fits okay and is fairly inexpensive.

Third, I have been ashamed of my curves and my boobs since I grew them. It’s not like I actively wore stuff to hide myself like muumuus, but I rarely show off my cleavage or that I have a nice hour glass figure. The majority of the time I wear clothes that fit but do nothing for my shape.

Mostly I think that I have been unwilling to move past being hurt as a little one. That hurt turned into depression and apathy, which has allowed me check out of the fashion\fitness world. But I am on my way away from that.

I went through all of my bras, dresses, skirts, and sweaters. I will continue to go through my stuff and getting rid of more that does not work. In the future, I plan to make a much bigger effort to make my body more fit and to try on clothes a lot more often. Nadine and I often go to clothing stores, and I will now take the opportunity to try stuff on. The world is full of clothes I never even tried on and now, I want to see what those clothes look like on me. J

Weight- To Care or Not To Care

That is the question.  I have fluctuated between both ways of thinking for many years.

I have not taken responsibility for is my weight. Oddly I have lost many pounds over the years but have not committed to keeping it off. I have lost and gained pounds over the years.  Each time I gain weight, I do it as a response to stress. I feel I deserve to eat unhealthy foods to make myself feel better.  I have considered what connections this has to my childhood.

On Easter morning in my house, my brother and I were always extra excited because it meant candy and sugar cereal and Quik milk mix.  Our family would also have cinnamon rolls every Easter. Christmas was the same.  Sounds lovely and it was. Holidays were the rare times we all of played super happy. No one was really happy in my household, and most of the time, it was palpable. But on holidays, we actively tried to be extra pleasant.  I related sugary, more decadent foods to happy feelings, still do.

Now I have seen this connect before yet I refuse to let go of the belief I had as a child that certain foods will make me happy.  The adult way to see this is that if I could commit to losing the weight and maintaining it, I could have some unhealthy stuff occasionally with minimal weight gain. In my life, I have been blessed with a husband who has clear convictions about his weight and has shown me the truth through his example. Weight maintained allows one to have cheaty foods occasionally.

I have decided to finally commit to losing the rest of the weight I want to lose and keeping it off. Above are the pictures of how I look now, and I will continue to put up pictures of my progress with updates of the weight loss program.  For me, doing a low carb diet works wonders so I will be following that plan. 

Alrighty! Thanks for riding along on the journey. Big Hugs!!

Boxes

Have you ever considered boxes? I know what you're thinking, boxes?

I have lived most of my life in boxes that I have in my mind about what is okay to do, think, ways to act, etc. It has been weird to come to a point in my life when  have seen that I have not allowed myself to live fully because of these boxes. Where did these boxes come from? I think many places but really that is not relevant. Because past a certain point, I was the one keeping myself in the boxes, no one else.

So this comes up because I have just started to push against these boxes. Yesterday I wore cutlets (bra inserts) to work. I was so sure some one was going to say something, But I decided because I was afraid of it, I had to do it. And I did. End result? I loved being very aware of my great boobs all day, and no one acted any differently than usual. :) Today, in the morning, it occurred to me that I never wear sexy underwear to work. I always thought I would not enjoy it or I shouldn't. So I did today. And once again, I was proven to be wrong. I felt lovely all day. 

In addition, I decided to start looking at the clothes I have and getting rid of or altering the things I have that I don't really like. I have gotten rid of a few things already and have alter one thing. 

Being responsible for my own happiness has seemed like something out of my own reach, oddly, like I shouldn't question the boxes because they were me. The boxes defined me instead of me defining me, and maybe redefining me again and again :)

I have many other boxes to push open and finally  I believe I can.

The Last Saturday

I have thought about and started to write many times what happened last Saturday night when my husband and I went to our friends’ house for dinner yet I am having a hard time articulating what’s going on in my head. Regardless, here it goes. It might be a long one. J

We had made plans to go over to Vivian and Edward’s (our very good friends) house for dinner. I was excited to hang out with them because they are fun and adorable people.  As always, I get nervous about what to wear when we go out.  I tried on several things and decided on something that was sort of an outfit. I say that because I really do not love most of my clothes.  Most of my clothes I bought because they fit and I look ok in them.

We went over to their house and had a lovely dinner. Whenever we get together, we talk and talk about pretty much anything and everything. Its awesome!!   After hanging out for a couple of hours, having a great time and drinking wine, we went home for a bit so my husband could change. (He waited until their little one went to bed.)  He is a crossdresser and had shared that with our friends but had never dressed as a woman in front of them. When he dresses as a woman, he goes by Nadine.  It was going to be the first time he dressed as Nadine in front of people we know. (We have been out and about together many times over the last 5 years or so.)  He was nervous yet really desirous to share this aspect of himself with our friends.  I was proud of him for being himself.

Nadine chose a very flattering outfit that did a great job accenting her figure.  I have seen this outfit before and thought it was a great choice. Nadine looked fantastic. We returned to our friends’ house and they were the beautiful that they are and showed support and interest in Nadine and her outfit.  I was feeling good and had a little more wine. We talked more and hung out. Deciding to smoke, we all went out on the back patio.

 As we talked on the patio, it came up that they thought I am beautiful, but don’t dress in a way to show that off.  During this conversation our friends compared Nadine to me and commented that she was dressing younger than me.  I did not think but felt during this conversation. I said that really I didn’t really care about how I looked or showing off my great boobs.  I basically thanked them for being complimentary but inside I felt a little sting because I actually thought I had made some effort. Yet I said nothing because I didn’t want to.

 I look back on that and see the sting meant I knew they were right but I just say I don’t care so I don’t have to be responsible and possibly fail. For so long I have told myself some messages I heard when I was young. Sadly I haven’t wanted to see that I am and have been saying these things to myself for years.

We all went back inside. A little while later, Nadine mentions that on the vacation we were all talking about taking she wanted to dress as Nadine because vacation is one time she has regularly dressed as a woman.  Within 5 minutes I attacked her. HUGE SIGN that I missed!  I said I wish she would dress as a man during some of our vacation time, that I was missing feeling romantic on vacation.  I got super emotional, cried, and blamed my husband for not thinking of me. I fought with Nadine in front of our friends. They were uncomfortable, of course; who wouldn’t be? Eventually Nadine was able to get me to stop.

It took some time for me to see that I refused to look at myself and understand what I was saying was not true; I was experiencing old, negative feelings unrelated to what was really happening and that caused me to attack my husband.  I will have to be explore these feelings in more blogs those come up in me because I haven’t really looked .

Practicing not caring for so long has had a huge effect on my life. I do not take responsibility for my own happiness and well-being and I am unhappy L.  And that came raging out on Saturday. 

My friends and husband were being honest and kind when they made the comments they did. But I took it as criticism. Looking back into that feeling, I see the connection between the feelings in that moment to what I already say to myself deep inside but just haven’t wanted to look at, which goes back to not caring because of my decision to not deal with the trauma from when I was young.

I hurt my husband deeply. I robbed him of the joy of having a great experience for the first time of dressing as woman in front of people he cares about.  He deserved that.  I blamed him for my feelings of inadequacy and made him look like an uncaring person which is so far from the truth. No one has stood by me and loved me like he has, through very trying times, which I created. 

I hurt the relationship with our friends. I lied. I said I do not get offended yet I allowed myself to be offended by something which was not even offensive. On the contrary it was amazingly wonderful and touching and real! My own feelings about being unwilling to take responsibility for my body, my clothing, my hair, to say the least, created my response, not one word actually said.  Vivian and Edward are wonderful, caring, open people whom I respect and want to be friends with for a long, long time.

 I am very embarrassed by what happened on Saturday, and very, very angry with myself, so therefore I am going to use that situation to finally get to me, to see that what happened to me as a kid did affect me, and begin to really make the choices I want and need to be me. From my dark to my light!!!

Boob Revolution

Before

After

Last night my husband and I were setting up this blog for me to write my journey.  We decided to take a picture, but my husband suggested that I make it a picture that represents the new me.  So I enhanced my boobs with inserts and used his awesome cleavage enhancer, and WOW I could not believe the results.  I couldn’t keep my eyes off them all night. This experience has really made me think about all the things I have been unwilling to try and what I have been missing out on.  Not caring about myself, it occurred to me last night while staring at my HUGE boobs, has made me miss out on many opportunities in life, some I am aware of, but I am sure there have been sooo many that I just let pass me by because my heart was not into living.

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog!!  This should be an interesting journey for me and hopefully you will follow along with me. I am going to be using this blog to help me to stop the swirling that is my brain and find the life I want to live. For many years I have been running from responsibility as a result of trauma from when I was a wee little one, 8ish. I decided then that I did not really care anymore because no one else cared either. To my personal detriment, this attitude of "I do not care" about anything including myself has been with me for over 30 years. Now, I must stop this non-caring  and get a life that is fulfilling and peaceful. After many many many years of not caring and shirking my responsibilities, my life is really on the edge of crumbling. This is not acceptable to me. As never before, I want to reinvent myself into the person I see in my mind's eye as the best me ever.  I have been blessed with a warrior of a husband and amazing friends who are inspiring me finally to take the steps I need to take for myself to"fully realize my potential." (I know, so cliche!)

Thank you for being here to begin what I hope will be an amazing trip!

Big Hugs!!