[The Little Bowl] Staying on Plan When Emotional

[Guest guest]

Yesterday was a tidal pool of emotions. What went from an idea suddenly exploded into a molten mass of emotions that I was not ready to deal with. Even with all the emotions swirling around me, I decided with determination that I was not going to eat or drink over it. I needed to stay grounded. In a nutshell, the goal we are working on is to do this trucking thing for 4-5 years and then move to Denmark. It would mean having our own home again and a few years early retirement. My idea was that I could lop a year off of the financial goal by working a year. The cutting edge to that idea is that my husband and I would be separated for a full year. I would no longer live on the truck with him, which would mean of course he would have to take on the extra tasks of cooking, laundry and cleaning. Was it worth it? Just to test the waters, I looked at available jobs in the area we have the apartment. I knew instantly that I could not bear to go back into banking or accounting. Just looking at the jobs made me feel sick. I was so burnt out when I gave it all up a little over a year ago. No way could I do it again. I then thought about child or senior care. I checked into a few local places that catered to this sort of thing and found one where I set up an account. I had an immediate response! They wanted to check my reference so I talked to my daughter as I cared for my grandchildren for 7 months full time and of course all the other times she needed me. But when she learned I was thinking about this, she of course wanted me to help care for her children when her husband is deployed again next April. I talked it over with my husband and he was so enthusiastic about it that it overwhelmed me. This whole thing was snowballing! Now I am writing this all out today, when I have had a chance to digest it all. but yesterday, I felt like I had been kicked in the stomach. His glee over cutting the time he has to do trucking down is perfectly understandable, but to overlook the separation part, to not be seemingly bothered by it REALLY bothered me. I reminded him that it would be a whole year’s commitment. He said that sure, it would be a lonely existence out on the road for HIM, but the advantages were too great. We could overcome the separation for the glory of making our goal come faster. Such a practical and unromantic husband I have. I could hardly deal with this. I knew how “I†felt about separating so long and told him that I didn’t know if I could do that. He continued to press on about the advantages. True, I would be able to spend another year with my grandchildren, their golden years. True, we would make the goal sooner. True, many other married couples suffer separations, my daughter certainly has with her military husband. I went from feeling sad that my husband wouldn’t miss me to feeling selfish and guilty that I was holding back on making this happen. I felt pushed into a corner. So the entire day, I felt a sorrow I could not shake. No matter how logical I could be about it, the underlying current of sadness was that he was too willing to make a goal over the emotional side to the separation just made me feel kicked all over again. Yesterday morning I was determined to stay on plan all day and had tipped the bottle of brandy over into the drain, dumping about 1/3 of the remaining booze before I even made my coffee. I am so glad I did, because after all this started to tumble, I would have made myself a drink and sat in the bathtub full of hot water and mineral salts. I did do the tub thing, but had no booze to nurture. It would have been a worse day had I drank on top of it…and ended up eating too. It would have been an avalanche. I stayed on my eating plan and just stayed in the moment. I worked on a few projects, but my heart wasn’t in it. I could have gotten far more done yesterday, but accepted that the emotional side of me needed to express itself and it would soon pass. I went to bed, got 8 hours of sleep and feel better this morning. I leave tomorrow for Hawaii. I am excited about the trip and will talk to my daughter about it when I get there. She has mentioned she had planned on coming back to the continent when her husband deploys as she doesn’t want to be left there with 4 children alone and without a support system. But it would cost a lot to maintain two residences and the possibility of me helping her in Hawaii is an option. For now, I just want so badly to see her and be with the children and welcome my little granddaughter into the world. Things will fall into place as they always do. Yesterday’s Meals: B- 8 oz coffee, 1/2 cup half and half, 3T flaxseed meal, 15g coconut oil, 1/2 tsp dark cocoa powder, 1/2 tsp whole milk powder L- 450g spaghetti squash, 20g butter D- 90g napa cabbage, 43g bell pepper, 295g linguica sausage 1608 calories, 129g fat, 44g carbs, 13g fiber, 51g protein. Higher calories than I needed, but they came from the sausage I needed to finish up, I can’t leave any food in the fridge while I am gone. I did check my weight yesterday morning, it showed a 10 pound gain from my bingeing. I am not keeping this weight as official. Today is my weigh in day, but I honestly forgot and had my coffee and breakfast before I remembered. So tomorrow, I will weigh myself to have a comparison to what I will weigh when I return Sept 3. My lowest weight for July was 239. Another wasted month to get to MY personal goal. Damn it. --

Posted By elisaannh to The Little Bowl at 7/27/2010 07:29:00 AM