Graceless Lesson
I am not blessed with grace. I mean it, I am one of the clumbsiest people I know. I trip over my own feet nearly every day, sometimes multiple times in one day. I remember as a kid, my mom would forever tell me to pick up my feet. At least that lesson sunk in and I'm no longer a shuffler, but I still don't walk as gracefully as one should.
So yesterday morning I had my dog out and we live in an absolutely lovely area with hills and conservancy, and my dog was taking his usual long time to poop so I was going to guide him down one of the hills. Being 5:30 am, and springtime in Wisconsin, there was a thick layer of frost on the grass and before I knew it, I was on my butt and I felt my shoulder jam from putting my hands behind me to try and break my fall. OUCH! That's not going to be good! After getting up, catching my dog and getting us back inside I cried as the pain set in. I thought for sure I'd torn something. I went to the walk-in just to see what they could do, hopefully get me off work for a day or a few, depending on how bad it was. The nurse who looked at me was compassionate but unimpressed. She said the most they could do was take an X-ray, but she was pretty confident nothing was broken. Yep, I knew that. She prescribed a steroid and gave me an excuse to take yesterday off work. I went to pick up my prescription and was lured in by a big bag of peanut butter M&Ms on the clearance rack. I refused them at first, knowing what I was doing, the same thing I always want to do when I'm hurt or sick, comfort with food. Being under the weather is one of my biggest triggers. I wish someone would take care of me, pamper and look out for me, but I only have myself. And food. So I ended up getting them and eating way too many. In a way it was good, I ate so many that even just looking at them makes me feel ill. I will not have any trouble resisting them now.
I ate oddly all yesterday, those M&Ms were the first thing I'd eaten all day, and that was around 10am. I had a bagel, a handful of BBQ chips and later, a veggie burger without the bun. So, needless to say, I didn't start my lower carb diet yesterday. The good news is, after my little morning/early afternoon apathy fest, I turned it around, and because my bestie is starting to make positive changes too, it made me even more fired up to make changes.
I am a big believer in taking a lesson in the behaviors that go against what I thought I wanted to do. I knew even before I bought those M&Ms that I was feeling sad that I had to care for myself when I got hurt. Yes, in reality I knew my husband wasn't going to come home and lose 12 hours of pay just to drive me to the walk-in and pharmacy, and I wouldn't expect him to, but being that I drive a stick shift and mentioned to him that it was all I could do not to burst out in tears from pain just getting the kids to the bus stop, I thought maybe he'd at least offer to see if I needed help. Nope. He was compassionate and happy I was going to get it checked out but did not offer help. Not even on his way home. Granted, we live a block and a half from a grocery store, and the walk-in and pharmacy are only about a mile or two from our house, but it was still painful and tricky. So here's the thing, I didn't want to inconvenience anyone but I would have like to have been offered. This, funny as it may seem, has very little to do with my husband and much to do with my mom. I feel like she wasn't there for me very often. She assumed I was strong and by not "babying" me I would only be stronger. I like to think I'm strong, but I felt a lack of support and compassion and am sensitive to those issues because I felt like that was largely missing in my life. This a big comfort-eating trigger for me, and I will have to establish ways to work around it or if I really feel like I need something, I will need to learn to ask for it. That is self love, not shoving M&M's down my gullet until the point of feeling ill. So, I am looking on yesterday as a great learning experience. Yes, I feel like my entire right side of my body was beaten with a baseball bat, yes I still wanted to cry in pain while driving my stick shift to work, yes my husband still isn't too impressed with my feats of clumbsiness, but I learned a sticking point for me so now I can head these things off before they even have a chance to seat themselves in my mind. There are a bunch of smaller lessons too, like people can't read my mind to know what I am hoping or expecting out of them. And, frosty grass can be just as slippery as ice, who knew? But in light of Geneen's message to look at the things that are going right, I think I have that in spades. No comfort eating needed today, game on!
So yesterday morning I had my dog out and we live in an absolutely lovely area with hills and conservancy, and my dog was taking his usual long time to poop so I was going to guide him down one of the hills. Being 5:30 am, and springtime in Wisconsin, there was a thick layer of frost on the grass and before I knew it, I was on my butt and I felt my shoulder jam from putting my hands behind me to try and break my fall. OUCH! That's not going to be good! After getting up, catching my dog and getting us back inside I cried as the pain set in. I thought for sure I'd torn something. I went to the walk-in just to see what they could do, hopefully get me off work for a day or a few, depending on how bad it was. The nurse who looked at me was compassionate but unimpressed. She said the most they could do was take an X-ray, but she was pretty confident nothing was broken. Yep, I knew that. She prescribed a steroid and gave me an excuse to take yesterday off work. I went to pick up my prescription and was lured in by a big bag of peanut butter M&Ms on the clearance rack. I refused them at first, knowing what I was doing, the same thing I always want to do when I'm hurt or sick, comfort with food. Being under the weather is one of my biggest triggers. I wish someone would take care of me, pamper and look out for me, but I only have myself. And food. So I ended up getting them and eating way too many. In a way it was good, I ate so many that even just looking at them makes me feel ill. I will not have any trouble resisting them now.
I ate oddly all yesterday, those M&Ms were the first thing I'd eaten all day, and that was around 10am. I had a bagel, a handful of BBQ chips and later, a veggie burger without the bun. So, needless to say, I didn't start my lower carb diet yesterday. The good news is, after my little morning/early afternoon apathy fest, I turned it around, and because my bestie is starting to make positive changes too, it made me even more fired up to make changes.
I am a big believer in taking a lesson in the behaviors that go against what I thought I wanted to do. I knew even before I bought those M&Ms that I was feeling sad that I had to care for myself when I got hurt. Yes, in reality I knew my husband wasn't going to come home and lose 12 hours of pay just to drive me to the walk-in and pharmacy, and I wouldn't expect him to, but being that I drive a stick shift and mentioned to him that it was all I could do not to burst out in tears from pain just getting the kids to the bus stop, I thought maybe he'd at least offer to see if I needed help. Nope. He was compassionate and happy I was going to get it checked out but did not offer help. Not even on his way home. Granted, we live a block and a half from a grocery store, and the walk-in and pharmacy are only about a mile or two from our house, but it was still painful and tricky. So here's the thing, I didn't want to inconvenience anyone but I would have like to have been offered. This, funny as it may seem, has very little to do with my husband and much to do with my mom. I feel like she wasn't there for me very often. She assumed I was strong and by not "babying" me I would only be stronger. I like to think I'm strong, but I felt a lack of support and compassion and am sensitive to those issues because I felt like that was largely missing in my life. This a big comfort-eating trigger for me, and I will have to establish ways to work around it or if I really feel like I need something, I will need to learn to ask for it. That is self love, not shoving M&M's down my gullet until the point of feeling ill. So, I am looking on yesterday as a great learning experience. Yes, I feel like my entire right side of my body was beaten with a baseball bat, yes I still wanted to cry in pain while driving my stick shift to work, yes my husband still isn't too impressed with my feats of clumbsiness, but I learned a sticking point for me so now I can head these things off before they even have a chance to seat themselves in my mind. There are a bunch of smaller lessons too, like people can't read my mind to know what I am hoping or expecting out of them. And, frosty grass can be just as slippery as ice, who knew? But in light of Geneen's message to look at the things that are going right, I think I have that in spades. No comfort eating needed today, game on!
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