Missing Parts

I came back to work on Wednesday and was greeted with bad news.

A good friend of mine from work unexpectedly lost her husband, and it broke my heart. I'm still in a sort of funk over hearing this. 

It's so hard to see bad things happen to such good people. She is one of those people that literally make the world a better place. I've thanked my lucky stars for her at work, for her kindness, advice and enjoyable chats. I've never seen her upset in the seven years I've worked here. Not even really angry! She is always so up beat and positive, her smiles are infectious.

Her husband was her whole world. I can't even imagine losing someone that close to you. I've lost a great deal of people who I loved dearly, but not a spouse. He was her entire world, her best friend, her rock, her constant. My heart goes out to her and the family. 

I didn't want to include names here, out of respect for them. My apologies if my entry is difficult to follow. Either way, I just wondered how people move on from events like this.

The truth is, I don't think we every really "move on". What we do, is learn to live with the pain. Loss is loss, no matter how significant or insignificant. It's a necessary part of our lives unfortunately. 

Some of us wait our whole lives to make those types of connections with people. It's just a sour and sad wake up call, to see how quickly it can be taken from you. No amount of time with the ones you love, will ever be enough. 

Forgotten Posts

Initially when I started my weight loss journey, one of my main goals was to look good for my cousin's wedding. 

She got married in October 2012, and I busted my bum to get into shape. I forgot to post pictures so here they are:

That's my sister and I at the venue. The dress I wore, was none other than Calvin Klein! I'm a sucker for such great tailoring, and I really like his line of dresses. I had a good excuse to buy new pumps, so I found these gorgeous purple Michael Kors at Nordstrom when I was there. I originally bought my dress in a size 14, but discovered when I was there it was too big! I ended up exchanging it at Macy's for a 12. Unbelievable! 

Just a few quick pics from the beach in Kailua. Even though I still had lost an incredible amount of weight, I'm still striving to lose more. 

My weight loss has made such a big impact on my life. I feel like I have it back again, and that's something that money could never buy. Stick with it, you'll see results! 

On my own

All by myself, don't wanna be...

All by myself! Anymore! So, giant thing I forgot to mention: Dr. Cusimano closed her practice in September 2013. Super sad. She has been wanting to retire for a bit now, I think running her own practice had proven to be more than she expected. Along with her weight loss patients, she had regular ones as a family doctor and became overwhelmed.

I am truly sad to lose her as a doctor. I finally found someone who I trusted completely with my health, and really liked. She will be one of my favorite people always. I've made good friends along the way, but am truly saddened that no one was able to take over her practice. This community needs a program like this desperately.

For the past few months, I've been pretty much fending for myself. I weigh myself weekly at work and keep tabs on myself through the LoseIt! App on my phone. I still keep in touch with Cody, my nurse from Aviva. Actually, she is soon to be working at a new practice opening up that will be providing a similar program. Thank god, because I need to have someone to answer to at the end of the week! I can deal with self control, but being held accountable definitely helps. 

These past few months have been a bit difficult for me health wise. I got back into  getting crazy over my weight loss, to the point where I think I went damn near mad over it. Obsessing in weight loss is so easy to do. It's different when you were skinny and now you're fat. Being fat and now you're skinny keeps you under so much pressure to never get like that again. I had a battle with cervical cancer in 2008 that I overcame, and it decided to come back and haunt me this August. If you get a call from your doctor, let me just tell you it's hardly a good sign. Every phone call I've ever received from a doctor, has been shitty news. Queue the meltdown. I let myself cry about it for an hour, pulled myself together and dealt with it. Thankfully it was just a scare, and I'm healthy for now. 

If I didn't associate myself with such caring doctors and their practices, I'm not sure how I would have made it this far. Losing Dr. Cusimano was a big deal to me. She was part of my support team, someone I trusted and respected. I'm truly honored and grateful that for her time, and her dedication to her patients. I've since signed up with Cody to follow her to a new office. It has yet to open up, but I'm hoping that after the new year it will all be ready to go. I'm looking forward to participating in a new practice, and hope that Dr. Cusimano didn't set the bar too high! 

Formation

I am such a SUCKER for formation.

Maybe not "a sucker for", more like I'm anal and have OCD when it comes to some things. I'm really feeling the itch to blog again, but I'm blogging from my phone. I recently moved and haven't had time to hook up with wifi yet. I know, I know, I'm such a heathen right?! I'm old school grandfathered in through Verizon, and come hell or high water I'm not giving up my UNLIMITED DATA. That's right kiddies, I'm hitting an average of 10 gigs a month and I'm getting my monies worth damnit! 

Anyway, sorry to the app creators for Blogger but this app royally sucks. I can't change my fonts, change my paragraphing, center things, add links and I'm about to find out what my pics look like when I upload them. Gah! 

Anyway, so this blog entry is focused on format. We are all creatures of habit. As much as we all think we like change, we really don't. Even the slightest change in our everyday lives takes time to get used to. I spent most of my time off preparing for weddings, getting myself in shape and working on my new house. I found myself using up almost all my free time at Lowe's and doing butch manly man work. Secretly so emopowering by the way! I traded in my time at the gym, and did some serious work. Painting, re surfacing my hardwood floors, gutting the kitchen and bathroom, it was a major work out and really good mentally.

We all like to physically see our goals coming to life. When you decide to lose weight, you may not always see it. This is why I love taking before and after shots. All those blog posts of me whining that I hadn't seen any big results...seem like nonsense now! Behold:

The picture to the left was in 2010, and the one to the right was taken in September 2013. What a difference right? I am SO much happier, and I think you can definitely tell. It's strange when I look back, and see a bloated version of myself. I've always loved dressing up and going out, but I noticed in my fat phase I didn't care anymore. I just let myself go. Nothing looked right on me, so I wore things to hide in. I didn't even really invest any time into my hair or makeup. Let's face it, when you're fat there isn't much to look great in. Sure you could probably find something cute, but you would still feel insecure.

My best advice to anyone out there, is to stick to your goals. Set goals that are attainable, and not too far out that you'll never reach. If you put your mind to losing 5lbs a month, that is TOTALLY doable! Treat and reward yourself! I've gone over this many times on here, so I'll keep it short. Reward yourself with something non food related. Do something fun, buy a nice dress to go with your new skinny self! 

Change is hard. Reworking your brain, is not an easy task. You'll shock your system mentally and emotionally. But if it brings out a healthier version of you, freaking do it! Trust me when I say, if I can do it you can too. I know that sounds like such a farce, but believe me. Coming from a girl who has been down that road to self loathing, literally drowning, her whole world caving in. I pulled myself back out, took control of my life and it has made ALL the difference.

So make up a new format for your everyday life. Turn that OCD into some big positive, like getting off your ass and exercising! A healthy mind and healthy body is a serious force to be reckoned with! 

As always, I'm always here if anyone needs help in weight loss support. I'll answer questions as best I can! I may not be posting as frequent as I should, but I promise I read all my emails! Good luck! 

I'm back!

:I don't even know if anyone still reads this:

Looks like it's been a FULL YEAR since I've blogged. Makes me a little sad to know I've let it go for that long, but I'm happy to say that I've kept up with my weight loss and fitness!

Who hasn't had a ton of shit going on? My year was full of weddings, life changes, highs and lows, drama out the wahzoo and lots of lessons.

I've been able to maintain my weight loss, and although I'm still stuck in the 170's I've dropped down in size. Clothes are so annoying. Honestly, I hate how every brand of clothing magically fits differently. A size 12 in one brand could be something totally different in another. None the less, I teeter from a size 12-14. Which I'm happy to say, is completely average.

When I set out on my weight loss journey, I never aimed to be skinny. I just wanted to be healthy, and I am. By no means am I stopping here, I can't! I've made a life long commitment, and for those of you who know me my word is as good as gold. When I commit, I do with everything I have. 

The following posts are ones just to catch up and hit on a few things. Forgive my format, I'm blogging from my phone. My laptop is in need of a funeral.