Finding My Voice

In January 1999 I found myself taking a Interpersonal Communications class at my local community college. I had dropped out of nursing school the year before and was floundering with what to study. My dad had died just died 6 months ago and the grief was still raw. My life at home was somewhat unstable as mom struggled to pull herself out of her depression and most days never left her bedroom. To say I was a little lost is an understatement.

But I digress.

The instructor was a middle age hippie. Picture long gray hair. Converse sneakers. Jeans and old T-shirts were his uniform of choice. The first day of class he had us move our desks into a circle and proceeded to spend most of the class having us go around and say something about our current life. Whatever was going on in our head. No filter or judgement he said. The only rule was we all had to listen to each other and there would be no discussion on what was said.

Every class that semester started the same way. Us sharing our thoughts. A motley crew of Community College kids trying to figure out our place in this world. Me being shy I was mortified at the time having to talk. But something happened in that classroom that spring. I found my voice sharing things to these people that I thought would never leave my head. My grief over losing my dad. How hard it was dealing with mom. How I felt lost and listless in my future choices. All came pouring out of me at 10 AM on Tuesdays. That semester my soul started to heal and my grief became less. It also amazed me how similar my classmates worries were to my own. How in the end we all were just trying to find our path forward in the world. The instructor showed us in a novel way how communication and understanding happens.

Current events have reminded me how important listening is. There is a saying from the Dalai Lama that goes, “When you talk, you are only repeating what you already know. But if you listen, you may learn something new.” We need to stop listening to reply and start listening to understand.

I don’t have the answers. But I do believe that showing up with kindness, love, and listening ears is more important than ever. The scariest person of all is the one with power and no compassion for others.

Rewild Your Life

There’s a trend that’s been building for a few years now, one that looks as though it’s here to stay. It is called Rewilding – the trend of wellness, of natural living, of caring for and connecting back to nature. Read on to learn more about how to Rewild.

LIVE CLEAN

Switch to natural products to improve your health. You would be surprised at how many so called “pure” and “natural” items in your home are filled with components that are literally toxic to humans, and it’s totally legal! Being well-informed when purchasing home and personal care products is so critical to your long-term wellbeing.

LIVE CONSCIOUS

Kickstart the habit of mindful living. Don’t just live on auto-pilot or worse still, stuck in the trap of “it’s just what I’ve always done.” Become aware of your consumption, your routines, your impact on the world around you and make changes – not just your eating habits, but your whole lifestyle – physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. It’s incredibly empowering to know that the life you live was CHOSEN by you, not just something you consumed. Rewild yourself, your way.

LIVE CONNECTED

For me, this is the most important thing. I need to get out into the wilderness as often as I’m able. Reconnecting with the power and beauty of nature is by far one of the best ways to improve your mood, your health and your overall quality of life. If you don’t already, find ways to escape to nature as often as you can. Spend a day at the beach, head to a local creek or waterfall, go for a hike, or even just lay in the grass in your back yard if that is all you have. Feel it, breathe it all in and stay connected. You won’t regret it!

LIVE CONTENT

Prevent illness, don’t just sit around and wait for it. Start by incorporating daily practices and natural products that support your wellness. My absolute must-haves on any given day are sunshine, exercise and essential oils. Once I started to incorporate these things into my everyday routine, I noticed a massive shift in my physical and mental wellbeing. I feel better than I have in years!

Own Your Life

I have been thinking a lot recently about how people achieve large scale success. I am talking Oprah.  Richard Branson.  Elon Musk.  Deep down I know they are no better than any of us.  But yet they have innovated a life that has defied all expectations. They are leaving a legacy that will last generations.  And it all started with the belief that they could.

Maye we truly are what we believe.

Let me tell you a personal story. When my dad died when I was 19 and my mom fell into grief and would lock herself in the bedroom for days at a time leaving my sister and I to fend for ourselves I thought I was alone. That NO ONE had been through what I was going though. How could I graduate from college and live my life when I had been through so much loss? How could I deserve to pull away from my family struggles in order to better myself? Guys, it was hard. I had to BELIEVE my life could be better. That I deserved to live my life even though it meant leaving the life I knew.

I want to tell you today – don’t let your past OWN you. Step in and own the full progress and trajectory of your life! You have no idea what your legacy will be. There is nothing that anyone who’s living on earth has ever felt or known or experienced on a soul level that hasn’t been felt or known or experienced by someone else.

One of the most difficult things in life is feeling that you are the only one. That you are the only one who’s traveled this path, who’s felt this way. But it is those people who rise above those feelings and know how to course correct, how to keep going and never quit.  They have faith in the bad and aim for the future.  They are the ones that change the trajectory of their life.

You can own your life. Till the day you die you are growing. You are creating. Don’t sell yourself short because of self-limiting thoughts. When you keep inputting positivity, there is no room for negativity.

Own your life.

Change your hair, Change your Life

I cut my hair on Saturday.  Like really short.  And I love it.

Last summer I decided to grow my hair out.  The previous 15 years I basically had a pixie cut and decided to try and grow it out for something different.   For most people this is no big deal.  For me it was like making the decision to go ahead with a root canal! You see I have thick wavy hair.  The type of hair that grandmothers the world over would tell me I would someday embrace as I would never have that old age problem of thinning hair.  And I will give them that.  I will never have thin hair. lol

But I am not a primper.  Blow outs are for the birds.  Brushing the hair? I can maybe do that on a good day.  I just like to wash and go.  Plus living in Florida and dealing with the heat and humidity is enough reason to keep the hair cut on regular intervals.

But I decided to chart into those unknown waters.  And for a while it was fun.  When I tried Keratin on my hair and it made it soft and straight like the perfect blow out I thought I maybe had found my answer of easy going hair plus length.   But that was just a tease.

I got tired of hair falling into my face.  Ponytails hurt.  Headbands were annoying.  I spent way too many waking hours thinking about the state of my hair.

So after a year of growth and finally getting to shoulder length I cut it off again.  Experiment over.

Life is like that I guess.  It is good to try new things but the comfort of home is always going to be what you come back to.

 

The Joy of a Quiet Mind

I am naturally a quiet person. I remember as a kid the teacher going to my mom “she is bright but prefers to eat and play by herself.”  And I did.  It wasn’t till middle school and hormones that I realized there was a gender called boys, and that social norms dictated I hang with girls and talk.  It was a hard stage for me.  Thank god you only have to live through high school once.   College hit and I found my balance of socialization and internal solitude. I learned how to balance both.

But with today’s digital age we are so afraid of the quiet. We fill every waking moment with noise or light.  We stay more connected then ever with those around us through social media.  We like to tell everyone we are “too busy” because we put our kids in after school activities and sports that in turn invade our weekends.   We are plugged in more than ever to the news and pinterest has made our cooking endeavors into an Olympic sport.  And what is all this gaining us?  We are all more tired than ever!

Why are we so afraid of the quiet? When I drive I normally don’t turn on the radio.  No audiobooks or podcasts either.  I love the few minutes of stillness (other than your daily traffic) that my car provides me.  I use the time to think and process my day or just let my mind wander.   I find my creativity increases the more time I am able to spend in these quiet solitudes.

Back in 1999 which happened to be a year after my dad died, I had the opportunity to travel to South America and visit Machu Picchu in Peru. It was magical.   In the quiet of those majestic mountains my soul was able to truly rest and heal.  To just be.  A great vacation can do that.  Soothe your soul and body and rejuvenate your spirit.  How do we bring this ability home?

I say embrace your quiet! You can meditate yes, or start yoga.  But it doesn’t even have to be all that in the beginning.  Just be.  Sit and turn off the noise around you and try and live in the moment.  There is so much strength and wisdom to be gained in the quiet.  You see, stillness allows your brain to process all that “noise” that blankets us during the day.  Your body and mind in turn will clear and your joy will increase!

Try it. Practice just “being.”

The Holiday Breakdown

I cried in the Dunkin Donuts drive thru line this morning.

It started innocent enough. A image of my dad holding his coffee mug while shuffling to his home office and my mom yelling at Cindy and I to run to the car as we will be late AGAIN for school ran through my mind as I waited for my coffee and bagel breakfast.   But then I thought about Omi’s Christmas cookies, and how dad would hoard his cookie tin from all of us because he loved to drink his coffee while eating them. And how on Christmas Eve mom would make us take naps so “Santa” would come and when we woke up we would open presents before heading to church that evening. Santa always came on Christmas Eve at our household. Maybe because we had to drive two hours on Christmas Day to see dad’s relatives. Santa was on a timeline you know.

I miss them. My parents. My sister and I were talking over Thanksgiving how memories are growing thin, especially with dad. 18 years now since he died. He would have loved Bryce. Bryce loves trains just like he did. They would have bonded over that.   The funny thing though is the year before his death was hard. We were not close as a family. Mom and dad had just moved us from South Jersey to North Jersey and the transition didn’t go well. Mom would spend all day in the bedroom depressed and dad would sit at night alone in the basement playing his old vinyls. And the fights. So intense between them. And then all of a sudden he died. Less than a year after we moved. Just like that. No nice ending, no goodbyes. No I am sorry and I love you please don’t leave me. It was bad and then it was over. And mom fell apart. Her depression, along with her injuries from the car accident left her unable to care for us emotionally. She never recovered. And with it our relationship with her never recovered. When she died in 2015 Cindy and I were only talking to her sporadically. When I got the call from the hospital at 1:00 AM saying she had passed I remember screaming in my head “NO! I never was able to fix us! It cannot end like this!” But it did. It ended messy, with no kodak moment goodbye like I had envisioned for us.

But oh do I miss them. Because before it was bad it was oh so good. My sister and I had a great childhood. Mom and dad loved us and provided for us. We lived in our little bubble in South Jersey where we had a pool and a dog and during the summers we would swim all day and play too many video games. And along with our other relatives, holidays, birthdays and vacations were amazing. We had fun as a family. So that is what I choose to remember. The good.

As Bryce gets older I am starting to incorporate family traditions from my childhood. This year we are doing one of those chocolate advent calendars with him. Last night while opening the little door and extracting the chocolate prize I clearly remember doing that with my sister and mom. I love that I am passing it down. Because in the end those family traditions are what you will remember when you start crying in the Dunkin Donuts drive thru at 7:30 AM on a Thursday.

Life is messy. We all will have regrets when it comes to our family and life choices. But you can’t let it consume you. I encourage all of you out there who are challenged by the holidays to just embrace the good. Hold on to those good memories. And create new ones where you can.

 

Just Put on Your Damn Swimsuit

Recently I have been seeing a lot about body positivity on Facebook, Instagram and various news outlets.  It seems like Millennials especially are embracing the movement and plus size models are becoming more mainstream. Fat is now a thing apparently.

I have almost always been overweight. As a teenager it was awful because back then in the “old” days of the early 1990’s, there just wasn’t that many clothing options for teenagers past the size of 10 (Remember the store 5-7-9?  Yeah, I never could shop there either).  I would go to the mall and stare forlornly at the “junior” stores as I headed into Lane Bryant to try and find something that didn’t look like my mom would wear it.

In college I lost a bunch of weight and for a short while got to shop at all those stores that I used to have to pass. It was fun.  But I was hungry. A lot.  And dating still sucked. Did I mention I was hungry a lot?

As the years passed and I got married and settled in to office cubicle life my waistline grew. Now at the age of 37 I am firmly in the “plus” camp.  And after having a baby my body also is no longer, ahem, “youthful.”

Do I wish I could have a supermodel bod with a non-appetite? Sure. But this is me.  All size 16/18 of it.  My weight fluctuates a little but I know I will never be a size 4.  Even in my “thin” days I was a size 8. Does this mean I am a sloth who does nothing but eat? No.  I am always trying to workout and move more.  But I also am living and have decided not to be tied to the number on the scale anymore.  Whether I am thin or fat I am still a person.  Living my life and I deserve to be happy and loved as I am.

I have been living my own body positivity movement for the past 10 years.

I had a friend post recently that she is afraid to put on a swimsuit this summer. She doesn’t like her thighs. What?  People, she is thinner than me.  She is gorgeous.  She is the person you want to see at the beach with a swimsuit on. Yet she is afraid of her body.

I want to tell all of you out there right now – Put on your damn swimsuit and swim! Run, skip and jump. And “gasp” put on a pair of shorts! Who cares if your thighs rub together or you have cellulite.  When it is 90 degrees outside the people around you are just thinking about getting to the closest air conditioned room, not the size of your thigh gap.

I will admit I used to be afraid of shorts. But then I moved to Florida.  Where you sweat in the shade.  Now I have a drawer overflowing with shorts.  And guess what? No one ever has said anything about my thighs.  There are so many clothing choices out there today.  And online shopping has made plus sizes more accessible than ever.  Treat yourself to some cute summer things and WEAR THEM.

Have your own body positivity movement. Life is too short not to wear shorts.

Acupuncture and Life Balance

Two days ago I got acupuncture again. I had gone 3 years ago to see if it would help my infertility and crazy hormone issues.  After 8 weeks of treatment I stopped going but got pregnant soon after.  Coincidence?  Maybe.  But I had never felt so “balanced” emotionally and physically and I am sure that helped get me pregnant.  And after 5 years of never getting that magic pregnancy line I sure wasn’t going to complain!

So when I developed Carpal Tunnel type pain during pregnancy and it still didn’t go away after birth and after trying wrist braces, exercises, rest, etc. I went to my acupuncture lady.   One treatment and the pain went away and never came back.  I so wish I would have seen her sooner instead of wasting so many months dealing with the pain.

Lately I feel like my hormones are all over the place again. My cycles are spacing apart.  My skin is crazy.  Ever since I gave birth I feel like I am one hormone away from losing it.  That or it is the lack of sleep and the fact that the bottom of my purse is now a garbage dump of half eaten goldfish crackers.  Either way I feel unsettled. Unbalanced.

So this week as I laid on a table with needles poking from every limb while trying to not think about that fact, I tried to meditate on why I am feeling so crazy lately. I remember feeling free and unstoppable.  Youth does that to you.  When you are 20 the responsibilities of adulthood feel so far away.  I didn’t think past that weekend.  That summer.  And what summers they were…..  But now? At 37 with all the responsibilities of job and home and never ending bills…..it is enough to just give in and say “this is it.”

And as a mom to a young toddler I feel like there are a lot of expectations that you are now supposed to be just a mom. Your dreams and ambitions go on the backburner.  Your life is their life.  Maybe it is my mom guilt that makes me perceive this but I am just trying to balance everything the best I can.  Being a mom is harder than I thought it would be.  You constantly feel like you are not doing enough yet feel pulled in every direction.  And as much as part of me would love to stay home all day with him the reality is I also like having a “life” outside of being a mom.  Of interacting with adults and knowing TV shows other than Bubble Guppies. I didn’t get a college degree just for the hell of it.  But since I graduated – 15 years ago! – I have yet to find my way, my calling.  These are the thoughts bouncing around my mind while I laid there.

I love this quote as it pretty much sums up what I need to do right now.

“Be Addicted to the Feeling of Having your Shit Together.”

Now if I could only figure out how. Maybe next week’s session will uncover that…..

Maybe Reality Really Does Bite

I turned 37 years old yesterday. I didn’t think it was going to bug me. I mean, 40 is the new 30, right?

So I should be OK with turning another year older.  But I am a mess.  It isn’t the whole “I’m so damn old, woe is my aged self” thing that has me reeling, although I do confess feeling kind of old of late. It is the nagging “shouldn’t I feel like a dang grown up by now?” question. I am like, way far into this dog-and-pony show, right? At what point, exactly, will I feel like I am where I should be?  When will I feel like I have this life thing figured out?

I briefly considered diving into a good old-fashioned midlife crisis – but dipping my toe in those waters just doesn’t appeal to me. For one, I can’t drink a 21 year old under the table anymore, let us be honest here. And those clubbing clothes of my younger days? Let’s just say there is a reason there is not a junior clothing section for moms.

So the midlife crisis is off the table, which is for the best as I don’t have time to self-destruct just now. There’s really no spare time to blow everything up when you are just hoping to get your kid and yourself out the door with lunch packed and pants on both of you, seriously!

But what then? Or what now, I mean. Here I am being all old (but not), coming to terms with the idea that maybe, JUST maybe, this is all there is.

Maybe I am not destined to change the world, or even my little corner of it. There is no cosmic line to cross or switch I have to find to make things “the way they are supposed to be.” No fairy godmother is going to come donk me on the head and pronounce that I am now fully qualified for adulting and open a door to some wonderland land of perfection for me.

And then this thought hit me last night. Here in 2016 and MANY years away from my college degree, I have come to the realization that I’ve been on this planet for 37 years and still cope with stressful situations primarily through nacho consumption and wine drinking.

Maybe growing up is overrated. Pass me the nachos please.

That Runners High

Seriously. Can I be honest with you? I don’t get that “runners high” so many people chase by logging mile after mile running.  I actually hate working out in general.  I hate giving up carbs and sugar.  I love glasses of wine and big dinners.  I love Chick-Fil-A.   And I really love these things called Snicker bars.  But my weight is the highest it has ever been.  My energy levels?  Let’s just say I could fall asleep when Jeopardy is on TV.  I let my baby and work be the excuses not to do anything about it last year but this year it has to stop.  So I have started walking lots of miles.  I eat less “shudder” carbs.  And I am drinking less wine.

And this week? I ran. Almost a mile straight.  I thought I would pass out and my legs felt like jelly, but tomorrow I will do it again.  I am going to do it not because I get that runners high but because I want to smile when I see photos of myself  or pass a mirror.  I want to be able to keep up with my active son.  I want to like me more and I like me better when I try harder.

I realized if I am going to be a health and wellness advocate I need to physically be a better billboard! I am pretty sure that the run down, squeeze into outfits, can’t keep up with my toddler me is not the appearance I want to give off to others.  Nor is it how I want to be. I let denial rule me for so long but no longer!

The struggle is real though. There have been days this past month when working out didn’t happen. Or the Snickers bar magically appeared in my mouth somehow.  But I am not giving up.  So here is to month two:  Let’s do this!  Here is to trying harder and chasing that mythical runners high.

 

The Active & Fit Kit – Perfect for those after workout aches and pains