Booby Traps

One night when I was about 3 years old I woke up to find my bed full of snakes. In the moonlight I could distinctly see slithering bodies crawling all over my bed. I screamed like Macaulay Culkin in the movie 'Home Alone' which of course woke the dead, and everyone in my house.

"Arggghhhhhhh!!!!! There's sneaks in my bed!!! There's sneaks in my bed!!" I cried.

My dad ran into the room and flipped the light on. He found me sitting up pointing to the covers at the bottom of my bed. It didn't take him long to figure out I thought the wrinkles in the bed were snakes except I couldn't say snakes so I called them sneaks. My dad smoothed out the wrinkles to show me they were just wrinkles--not snakes. Soon, I saw he was right. There were no sneaks in my bed--none at all. My imagination had grown some monsters in the dark and until the light fell on them, I couldn't see what was really there.

I thought of this story a few weeks ago when I was waiting to see the doctor about the lump I found in my breast. It was nearly as big as my thumb and on the right side of my breast. My imagination started to run wild with thoughts of "what if it's cancer???" Fear put me in a choke-hold. But even if I wanted to... I couldn't pull the covers over my eyes in an attempt to deny this sneaks existence. It was real and I had to face it--head on.

I had a woman radiologist the day I had my mammogram & ultra sound. She came in after both procedures to let me know what the lump was. My lump is a cyst. Tears fell down my cheeks as fast as heavy weights falling to the floor. I cried because of the huge relief I felt. I cried for joy because I didn't have to wait another week to get the results. It's in times like this we can become ill with worry waiting for news.

And much to my embarrassment, I also cried because I had not had a mammogram in over 10 years. I'd been foolish for waiting so long. I winced at all the times I'd scheduled mammograms then canceled them a few days before my appointment. Let's face it, it's not comfortable to have your boobies pressed into a pancake or wafer. I could always come up with an excuse why it was OK to wait. I told myself I'd make another appointment but I never did. The truth of the matter is that taking care of myself in every area should be a priority... not an option. Then I cried because I had put my health last as many women do. Yes, I was a slippery snot bucket by the time I left the hospital. I could have been rented out as a slime machine for a kid's party.

Fear can sneak up on you and plant some deadly seeds. I've done this with PTSD and my fear of driving or being in a car, too. I heard a saying once that said it best about fear.

'Fear is the darkroom
where negatives are developed.'

So if you haven't had your check up in awhile...please do. You are worth it and your boobs will get over the squish job. Don't give the sneaks in life a place to grow into monsters. Shed some light on your thoughts so they don't become negatives.

'Pink Lady'
Watercolor and Ink by Lille Diane

Heart Waves

Journal art "Love Grows Here"
Pen and Prisma colored pencils

Tomorrow I'm having the stress test to determine why my EKG was abnormal with an inversion in my T wave. I've been focusing on my art, and not much else. Lots of heart art going on around here. I'll be posting the new work soon.

Wii Wii Wii all the way home

Monkey pantzzzzzzz weigh more than you think.

Film at 11:00
Or right now.....
Check it out...Yikes

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7y7L5YrA5M

Smoke Free One Year Anniversary

I did it! It's been a full year. No cigarettes. No coughing when I laugh. No smelly clothes, breath, hair, car, house, fingers, furniture, drapes.... I can hold my grandson knowing he will not have any 3rd hand smoke from my clothes touching his sweet face. I can kiss Superman without going through the de-stink ritual. I don't have to stand out in the frigid winter air outside a restaurant to puff. I don't have to run out at 11:00 pm to get a pack just in case the 3 cigarettes I have left may not get me through the night.

I have saved a ton of money. Average pack is $5.oo. I was smoking 1.5-2 packs a day. That's roughly $275-350 a month.

My reward [besides better health] will be getting my teeth whitened.

Yeah, baby! I totally deserve it!

Not Weighting Any More

Good week. Great results, plus lost some of me along the weigh. OK the barium was... Ummmmm, shall I say weighty. I believe that crap is closer to being like cement than glue in your pipe-a-roos---gross stuff. But it was kind of fun watching it pass through my physical pipes on the "big screen"... Between taking X-rays, the tech pointed out what everything was inside of me as the chalky, white, alien, tar baby first lit up my esophagus, then my intestines, and finally my large intestine.

I twisted my brow in a knot a few times asking her, "What IS that??" Think about it. We don't really get to see what is inside us. We only see the outside, and inside is an awesome machine we rarely even think about as it functions around the clock....24-7... keeping us alive. Plus, I'm curly, and curvy on the inside. Fluffy. Billowy. TMI?? Sowwy...

Please note:
Being off of sugar can make you feel giddy... stoned like. So a lot of this ramblin' sh*t ain't my fault....

This is how I felt when I quit smoking cigs last December, too. I got a head rush when the oxygen finally hit my brain after my blood veins became unclogged from all the nicotine, and tar. Plain oxygen gave me a buzz. A whole new twist on being an airhead... Some of you who have quit tobacco know just what I'm talking about, and now that I'm giving sugar the ole' stink eye... I've been babbling back and forth to myself like Cheech and Chong in a 70's movie. I guess detoxing has its perks. Anywhooooo... where was I??

Something about weight. Let me think a minute. Oh wait it was about my pipes. I was going to say.... no one tells you how freaky it is to see barium come out the "other" end. It's white with a grayish tint to it. Pasty gray. I felt so alienish. For freaking days. Sowwy, another sugah rush gone bad. I'll clean up my potty mouth.

More weighty matters??? Yes, what was the weighty matter this week?

When I weighed in at the doctors 1.5 weeks ago I weighed 191 lbs. I can barely breathe after typing that. Now that is the alien in my body--the extra weight. Those lines around my eyes--aliens, too, dang-it! I look at myself sometimes, and can't help but think of that Bonnie Raitt song, Nick of Time" where it says:

"I see my folks are getting on and I watch their bodies change
I know they see the same in me and it makes us both feel strange
No matter how you tell yourself, it's what we all go through
Those lines are pretty hard to take when they're starin' back at you
Scared to run out of time

When did the choices get so hard,
there's so much more at stake
Life gets mighty precious
When there's less of it to waste
Ooh ooh ooh ooh
Scared to run out of time"

I'm not here to have a pity party about "aging". I earned this right of passage. And I know for sure after going off that embankment in the accident I'm especially grateful to be alive, let alone any age, even if some people consider my age to be old. That inner "you" still expects to see "you" looking back...not that old girl-guy?! Friends, what I know is this;

I'm at a cross road in my life regarding my future health, and I need to take better care of myself while I still have a self to take care of...

Most of you reading this are probably baby boomers. Right? So you may understand how I feel when I say I don't want to waste any time making some positive changes in my personal health. I have this wild child inside me that thinks she can keep eating bad foods, and get no exercise and not have any repercussions from it. I think it's time I told myself, "Girl, you got yourself into this out of shape mess and you're the only one who can get you out of it." I want to feel vibrant inside and look vibrant on the outside! I want my zest back!

Who doesn't want to get an instant skinny fix simply by reading that article about crunches in Absmopolitan.

You mean, "I gotta work for it? But...."

[But... but.... butt bigger butttt....]

I am the only one who can fix me whether it's losing 5 pounds or 105 pounds.

My weight loss goals have everything to do with feeling good, and having great health. Looking good, and feeling good about one's self are light years away from each other. I don't have to tell you that one. I have to tell myself that, and somewhere in the middle, I want a firm grasp on both of those. I had so many of you JUMP UP and say, "I'm going with you, Lille!!! I'm losing my fluff with you, too. I want more energy. I want to get in shape. I want to lose some poundage~~~

Sah-weet-sassy-molassy-monky-pants!

So who wants to know my weight loss this week??? I have news. Weighty News.

I do need to address one thing first though. I had to change my starting weight. I weighed myself when I got home on my digital scale [God, I love this scale as much as I love a skinny mirror in a lingerie store] and it said I weighed 188.5--not the whopping 191 my doctor's lying hunk of junk scale said I did. I weighed myself two days in a row to make sure I had a steady starting weight. Psssttttt.... We all know a doctor's scale makes you weigh as much as an entire mini van with 18 bags of groceries in the back seat plus a zebra .... or two strapped on the bike rack in back. Ahem... **cough***cough**

4.5 pounds. I lost 4.5 pounds!!!! This was not painful, people. I actually ate more than I usually do. My choices were better though. Cutting out sugar was huge. Plus no cream my coffee. I wanted to slit my 'caffeine filled-with-cream-n-sugah' veins just thinking of the deprivation of having no twins in my java. I got over wanting it in under 3 days. I am in shock! Coffee actually tastes good nekkie. WTFrappucino! Who'da thunk it?

A quick question for you.

How many of you would be interested in meeting here with me for 5-15 minutes for a live vlog? A little fun so we can put the wag back in our scally's. A little silliness and motivation for those of you who'd like to do this together. Just think you'll all get to see me 'weighs-ting away to nothin' before your eyes... and you will be, too.

A time suggestion might be good, too. Mornings? Noon? Afternoons? Evenings? More than once a week perhaps?? Mix it up?? Let me hear from you... Who's in and when?

[insert 3rd grade girl giggle here]

New Year's Resolution Starts NOW

Holy Crap.... I am totally stepping out and putting it all out there [here?] I cannot wait until January 1st to start taking healthy measures. It never works when I try to change/start something on that day anyway. Honestly---does it for you? Probably not.

Example:

Last December 14 I quit smoking. I never intended to quit that day. I planned to stop "one day"...but never set a target date. I knew I wanted to do it before my grandson, Emery, was born. He was due the end of December. He was born January 1, 2009. So I guess in a way I can say he was my New Year's Resolution.

I was in the hospital, and it was bitter, frigidly cold last winter. I was sneaking out to puff with my IV pole in tow. People were staring at me because I was only wearing my hospital issue socks, and had a blanket tossed over my shoulders, and hospital gown. Pathetic picture now that I think about it. I was sicker than a dog, and the urge to smoke was so huge I risked getting sicker to have a cigarette.

The week before I went into the hospital, I told Superman I wished I could just go somewhere, like spa or retreat where no one smoked so I could have a few days to detox from cigarettes. I can't say a hospital stay was exactly what I had planned but it certainly presented itself to me in the exact way I needed to have a smoke free environment to stop. I tossed my pack, and lighter in the trash in the hospital lobby and hobbled, practically frost bitten back to my room. I asked the nurse for a Nicotine patch. My prayer was answered any way you look at it... For that, I'm eternally grateful.

I can't say it's been easy but it's been worth it. I was able to greet my grandson into the world smoke free and with no second hand smoke at my home or third hand smoke on my clothes, fingers or breath. I still think about a cigarette, and admit I've stared at some good looking butts lying on the sidewalk with lust and hunger. Sick... I know but it is an addiction that doesn't respect any boundaries or borders you place on it. I may always have to do battle with this villain. That's OK. My health, and my family is worth it.

So Here's The Skinny

I have put on 30 pounds since the auto accident May 4, 2008. I was 10 lbs over my goal weight then. Now I know I shouldn't be so hard on myself because I've had 2 surgeries this past year, quit smoking, and have been battling some major battles with PTSD. But something has to stop [or start] before I find myself on the other side of 200 pounds. I'm not too far from that now.

Oh crap... double crap...crap crappity crap... Here it comes. Oh crap.... I weigh... oh may I please say crap again??? OK thanks. CRAP!

I weigh 191 frapping, fluffy pounds! I can flat out tell you my driver's license doesn't say that! I had my license renewed recently and asked the lady behind the counter if I could be arrested for "fudging" the weight question. She said if that were the case we'd all be in jail.... whew.

So I joined the Joy Fit Club today, and I am going to work to bring some good things to my life, and my future. My health is key to any permanent gift I could give myself. So if any of you'd like to join me in making some healthy goals for yourself, please join me. I'm listed under Woodstock Lily. I have nothing to hide, and need the accountability.

I'll be vlogging so you can see me "waist" away. BTW I measured my waist today, too. That shrill scream heard from coast to coast was me... Poor Opie Taylor. He pooped on the rug because I screamed so loud! [I lied... he just ran out of the room like he'd been scalded] My waist measures [can I lie here???? puleeeezzzeeeeee!] Crap, crap, crappity crapolla!

40 inches That's just wrong!
Who's body is this anyway????

Ummmm Opie didn't raise his paw on that question... so it must be my lily-livered, shaking hand weakly rising to the occasion....

OK I feel lighter just getting that off my chest. I need to eat well. Exercise. And love me back to wholeness. I want to invest in the whole package, my mind, my body, and my spirit. I haven't come this far, baby, to not be the best I can be all around. My grandson needs his "Birdie" to be able to fly, flit and be fit.

I'll update my progress weekly. There's a little gadget on my side bar with a frog under the lily pads that will also let you see how I'm doing.

So ready.... set.... go! I'm officially on my way! Carpe Diem! [ya'll thought I was going to say Crapie Diem....didn't ya???]