All of my life, I’ve had goals. I wanted kiddos, I wanted to help others, I wanted to be comfortable financially, I wanted to be a pro, I wanted to be healthy and skinny. So far I’ve managed to hit them all – although it’s been about 12 years on the skinny front, but I was there once.
In the last two or three years, however, life seems to have replaced my goals. To be honest, it’s mostly my fault. I had a goal of staying home after my second son, Brian, was born. I started myself an online business and made that happen – even if I’m still paying off the first few months of no teaching paycheck.
Now that I’m raising happy healthy children, seem to be scraping by in a healthy, if unique, marriage and have a nice home that will keep me busy for years updating, I’m not sure where to go next.
And I have to go somewhere, it’s my nature.
I think the biggest problem is I seem to be living two or three separate lives in my standard twenty-four hours. It’s too much to fit comfortable, but I can’t figure out what I want to do about it.
* I have a successful writing business that could easily consume my entire working day crammed into my evenings.
* I have a teaching job that is immensely rewarding, but rather draining that takes me away from my boys too often for my taste.
* I have a fantasy life of Wii, books, movies, sleep and exercise that used to be my existence before the boys and the writing showed up.
I can’t figure out where I want to go next.
- I want to be the mom that can whip up fifteen different healthy chicken recipes or use campfire breakfast recipes to wow the entire Boy Scout troop.
- I want to be the woman at the trade shows making connections with other self-sufficient, totally egotistical, definitely successful freelancers and webmasters.
- I want to work a handful of hours each day making a full-time income – during the day!
- I want to work with my junior high school students to try and help them overcome the obstacles they face.
- I want to work out for an hour a day again so I can enjoy the sensation of my clothes growing larger.
- I want evenings to mean relaxation, rest and preparation rather than more work while housework goes undone.
- I want to eat more chocolate and lay on the couch.
- I seem to want it all, but at the same time want nothing more than what I already have.
It’s just one more sign that I’m a knowledgeable woman, a dedicated mother, a terrible cook and strong enough to be willing to do what it takes to reach the goal.
Now I just have to figure out which goals I want to actually reach. At this moment, I’m leaning toward the chocolate one….
January 28th, 2009
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Rebecca |
Mom's Laments, Notes from a Real Mom, Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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So all my good intentions for this year have come to naught. I’ve not lost all that baby/stress weight, and I’m not sure what weight loss diet I’d need to perform such a miracle on the schedule I’m currently following. But I do have a resolution for my fat that is very much in tune with a form of a weight loss diet – I’m going to be diabetic.
I know, I know – I think I tried this before. But now I’m really going to do it. It’s time now.
My father has Type 2 diabetes. So do both of my Aunts. I know that I can prevent it for quite some time if I can get my weight down, stop eating sugar and start exercising (again.) So here’s the plan:
I will (starting tomorrow) follow the same style of diet I’ll have to follow in about ten years. If I am even reasonably close to cutting out all the sugary crap in my diet, I’ll be in business – I’ll lose weight, I’ll feel better, I’ll be setting a better example for the kiddos and I’ll be preventing diabetes.
Finding time to work out will be the hardest part, but I can work it in when I can for the next few months and when summer rolls around again, I’ll join up (again) at the Y to utilize the childcare, awesome kiddie swimming pool and the elliptical machine.
It’s workable. I just need to do it long enough for it to become habit.
December 31st, 2008
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Rebecca |
Big Babies, Holidays, Baby Fat Exercise, Baby Fat Diet, Baby Fat, Notes from a Real Mom, All Parenting Articles |
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I did try to do things correctly and eat in a healthy way, but somehow it just didn’t work. I’m pretty sure it’s because I have no willpower.
I used to have willpower. I went about 12 months in high school eating maybe 500 calories a day - and I’m 5′9″ on a sturdy frame. I actually turned yellow due to malnutrition and my period stopped. Crazy, right?
Well today my skin is pink and glowing do to all the healthy fats it’s receiving in my current diet. And believe me there are plenty of them coming into the system.
I’m growing more convinced that will power deserts us:
- When we have a husband on the Michael Phelps diet who never gains weight and leaves junk everywhere.
- When we sleep six hours a night in six different segments - thanks, boys.
- When we have an outrageous schedule that leaves little or no time for fun.
In my little world, food is my fun. “Hey, I can’t watch TV or read, I have to work. But I can sure eat some Skittles to keep me awake just a little while longer! Oh, and there’s a brownie - yum!”
Case in point: As I jot this down, my hubby walks out the door to the store asking, “Hey, do you want any candy bars or anything?”
Naturally I say no since I’m trying to pretend I have self control for a hour or two, but later I’ll just eat his because he leaves it on the counter and I’ll need the artificial energy.
Plus it’s just sitting there half eaten, and as we know - I have no self control.
Don’t worry about me. I think my self control is hiding under the shadow my butt seems to be making these days. I’ll find it again eventually.
August 28th, 2008
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Rebecca |
Baby Fat Exercise, Baby Fat Diet, Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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I’ll admit that I’m not a skinny person. I was never a skinny person, although I know a skinny person lives inside me. I was slender, and dare I say it - HOT, back in the day.
At the moment, I’m what I’d like to call “fat,” which is a shorter way of saying “I have thirty pounds of baby fat still to lose following my 12lb 8.5oz* child born a year ago.”
At least according to friends who also have a life, it’s normal to take years before all the weight comes off. I also have skinny friends, but they just lucked into the weight loss - plus they are better at eating small portions. But I think that’s because they are smaller people - they have smaller stomachs, too.
*(I find stating his weight makes people forget that I’m overweight - it’s proportional)
But now that Brian is about a year old and Jake is three (although not potty trained thanks to six months of moving hell), it might be time to tackle this fat once and for all - or at least get started on the three year process.
My Plan?
The skinny person diet.
I don’t have time for counting anything and have no desire to leave my kids to go to meetings. Can’t go in the evenings anyway - I’m working.
So I shall simply pretend I’m skinny and eat like the skinny people do. And I don’t mean the people like my husband (who isn’t skinny, just slender) who have mega-fast metabolisms. I mean the skinny people who DO have the time to count things. I figure if I watch them and eat the way they do, I’ll be benefiting from their hard work.
I’ll let you know how it goes.
You may have noticed I also have time for a renewed interest in my blog. Here’s to my future non-fat self and my renewed blogging!
June 29th, 2008
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Rebecca |
Baby Fat Diet, Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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Until you have two children, it’s almost impossible to understand how hard it is to balance the two kids, your husband, your job(s), and your household. Of course you’re in the mix somewhere, but everyone is always able to tell the mother of small children - maybe it’s the split ends and sweats.
Finding Balance
I’ve been working for years at too many things. I was finishing a Masters, I was teaching, I was writing at night and on weekends,and I was pregnant and trying to raise my son. Oh, and I was married, too. My husband will tell you just how often I forget that…
October 18th, 2007
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Rebecca |
Baby Fat Exercise, Baby Fat Diet, Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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I can prove to you that you must exercise to lose weight effectively, especially Baby Fat. Maybe breastfeeding helps. I wouldn’t’ know because it didn’t work for either of my boys despite my best efforts. So I don’t get those free calories burned off.
I’ve been wavering between the last fifteen and twenty pounds of baby fat for about two months now and this stuff is sticky. It won’t budge without some serious cardio. At least I hope so, because that’s the one thing I haven’t been doing, so it’s my last hope.
October 11th, 2007
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Rebecca |
Baby Fat Exercise, Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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I told you I’d keep everyone posted on my weight loss, so here is an update.
I haven’t lost a ton of weight just yet, but I am getting there sloooooowly.
September 10th, 2007
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Rebecca |
Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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It’s an odd thing, but if I can muster up the energy to climb on the treadmill at the end of the day, I’ll have extra energy the next day – even if I have to stay up later to do it. Like I said, it’s odd.
Exercise gives me (and presumably you) an endorphin kick and it also helps energize me the following day. Thirty or forty-five minutes on the treadmill should be burning off some calories, which I serious need, but it also is building up muscles and repairing the damage lack of exercise has done.
I’ll admit it, I didn’t exercise properly for the last two years. Coincidently my son is now two.
Exercising with a Baby
It should have been easy. There are tons of ways to exercise with a baby, and for a long time, we were doing just fine.
August 31st, 2007
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Rebecca |
Toddler Drama, Infant Issues, Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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Type II diabetes runs in my family, and its very likely I’ll land the disease by around age forty-five. Occasionally I’ll quit eating sugar and sweets just to make sure I still can and to help shed a few pounds. The last time I did it with any real vindication, I was in college. I dropped two sizes in about thirty days and felt great. I haven’t been serious about taking on a diabetic diet again since then – until now.
My childbearing is over, at least for a few years. My teaching career is on hold for a year. I’ve finally got a bit of time to exercise and focus on myself, so its time that I do.
I’m going cold turkey. I’m quitting sugar.
August 25th, 2007
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Rebecca |
Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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I’m officially six weeks postpartum, and should be given permission to exercise at my appointment today. It’s a good darn thing – I’ve been hauling huge toddlers and infants around at the same time for weeks now.
I’ll admit it – I haven’t been waiting for permission.
I’ve griped before about how I’m going to figure out this weight loss thing, but with a full fifty (yes, 50) pounds already lost, I’m inspired. Plus I got new running shoes today which are always inspiring. This is the best they will ever smell.
August 14th, 2007
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Rebecca |
Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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So, I’ve got some weight to lose, and I need a plan.
I’m working with some severe handicaps.
Ugh. It’s that time again!
I gained 60 pounds with my first and lost all but about 5 of it in four months. I gained 70 pounds this time, and it’s time to get serious about losing the baby fat – again.
Unfortunately I started about 25 pounds over what I like to weigh, so I’ll have that to lose, too. But first things first!
I delivered Brian four weeks ago and have lost 47 pounds so far.
July 30th, 2007
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Rebecca |
Baby Fat, All Parenting Articles |
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