Shaking the Blues

    
Today we decided to put our money where our mouths are and hit the road in an attempt to shake off the blues.  The bad weather hit, and with it came a bit of seasonal affective disorder.  It doesn’t totally dominate my/our lives, but it definitely makes itself known and I constantly have to remind myself that it’s just a trick of my mind, that my blues are just a construct and not my reality.  I forged through Thursday just keeping a stiff upper lip and all, you know, but yesterday was tough.  After the news of Paris and all the rest of the trauma that our world is experiencing came through yesterday evening, I realized that we were all hit with a bit of the sads yesterday.  It was just a sad day for most of humanity.  Last night when I was laying in bed, I made a plan, of sorts, to use what I know to be more mentally successful, thus, happier today.

  • I made sure we ate this morning and all day.  I haven’t been doing a good enough job of feeding myself, lately.  When I get on a weightloss jag I can get pretty restrictive on calories and then I get moody.  Today when I woke up I had coffee, my granola bar and a cheese stick.  All day long I made sure my ‘diet’ mode was switched to ‘off’ and I pretty much ate whatever I wanted.  While I try to never make a habit of eating my feelings, sometimes it just has to be done.  I eat my feelings just a couple of times a year, but when I do it is very intentional anymore and I make a plan to do it- it doesn’t just happen in a binge.  And I don’t go crazy, I just pretend like I’m going to eat a pile of whatever and then drink a buuuuunch of water with a moderate sized serving of whatever it is that I’m porking out on.  It’s a trick but it works.  Mind games.  
  • We ran.  Neither of us wanted to, but I made it happen.  I pried us from our bed, forced us into running clothes and down the street.   We could have run longer, but my partner isn’t sure if this is the blues, a lingering hangover from the whiskey flight on Wednesday or a stomach bug that is making him feel cruddy.  Regardless, we did about three miles and I was happy with that.  
  • Retail therapy seriously works so we headed to Target to do some pre-Christmas shopping.  There has been a deal at Target on video games for a while, but today there was the game released that we had been waiting for, and it happens to be the last day of the sale.  I also cruised the clearance racks for surprises for kiddos…  It was a healthy way to shake the mood, for sure.  Fun, too.  
  • I took care of business and solidified some big plans.  I really wanted to do a make-it/take-it centers day in December with my students where kids can make holiday gifts for people if they need them.  I just remember, as a kid, really wanting to share in the season of giving but being really dissatisfied that I had to use toilet paper rolls and toilet paper to make my crafts.  They just didn’t look pro to me!  So today I figured out all of my crafts and bought most of the materials at the dollar store and Michael’s to get ready!  I’m so excited, and this definitely made me feel like the blues were shaking off!
  • Snuggles were pretty important.  We coiled around one another and the kids all evening.  The power went out, but we didn’t care.  It turned into a read-in/write-in and all we want is one another anyhow.  Our entire focus during this weekend is to reconnect and start out the holiday season feeling like a solid unit.  
  • Lastly, the power of positive thinking…  I decided to make a before, during and present tryptich of my backside.  The first is of me when I was about 32 years old(ten years ago), the second was about three years ago (right after I began this project in earnest- like, just before this website came to be), and the last one was from today.  Lots has changed and it’s such a pleasure to be able to observe what I’ve done!  Blues shaken!  

  

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