Struggling

No, I haven't fallen off the bandwagon. I am struggling in other ways. Yes my eating is affected by it, and thus my weight, but not a full blown fall off the wagon. It has nothing to do with eating out, and everything to do with being just too tired and too worn out to cook non-easy to make food. I go through a period as the weather warms up and July approaches in which I get depressed. It's seasonal, and it's related to my father's death. My father passed away July 6th, and you may say "But that's months away!" and it's true it is. But this time of the year was always my dad's favorite. He hated winter, we lived in Illinois where winter was just brutal, cold, windy and just awful. So when the weather would warm up, he'd grill out, even in like 40 degree weather he'd be out in the little patio thing and grilled in a short sleeve shirt and jeans as if it was 60 or 70 out, when it's been in the negatives for months 40 degrees out feels like a summer day.

When my father got diagnosed with his cancer in May of '06, of course my entire family was shocked, the whole 2 days to 2 weeks to live just floored us. I tried to get time off from work to go home and help take care of my dad and enjoy the last days with him and I was told no. I quit of course. I had next to no money in my account, I filed for situational unemployment and won, which is probably the only thing that kept me afloat at that time. I spent the late nights watching over my dad and my mom spent the days. I often went without sleep for days, not by choice mind you. My dad, because of the toxins invading his body from his liver shutting down due to the cancer was like a 51 year old 2 year old when it came to getting into stuff. Unfortunately he was taller than my mom or I so putting stuff out of reach wasn't really an option lol. But basically you couldn't leave anything out in the open or he'd get into it. So I stayed up all night, since I'd worked night shift before quitting my job, and then during the day I'd go out and do errands, or go to dinner with a friend of mine or something. Well of course, I'd just fib and say I napped when dad was napping in his chair at night but in reality I'd be up all night and get no sleep.

So when this time of year comes around I have a really hard time sleeping. Tonight, for example, I woke up at about 1:30am. I haven't been able to get back to bed, it's now 5am and I have to be to work in 2 and a half hours. I don't really engage in emotional eating, I go the opposite way, I don't eat. Or if I do eat I feel sick from it. Go figure. What's frustrating is that I am not entirely sure what to do about it. No, medication doesn't help, the side effects are worse than what I go through as it is, and therapy is m'eh. I've been there, done that, and wasn't impressed. I don't have daddy issues, I have death issues, there's a difference, and the last therapist I went to was all about the whole "You have daddy issues"....no, I really don't. My dad and I may not have been on the absolute best of terms throughout the years because of his schizophrenia, but I loved him, and felt loved by him, and know I made him proud while he was alive, so there's no issues. A couple of years before he died he apologized for stuff from my childhood, basically that he made me stay home and have no friends, and that he could be so mean sometimes (very mood swingy until he got his medications working right), etc etc. That's fine, we talked, we cried, we hugged, we moved on. So it's not like I didn't have closure on that aspect, don't need a therapist to try to make it out to be something it's not. If you didn't live my life, you don't know, so don't try you know?

No, my issue with everything has just been his passing, and time does help but it doesn't heal all. So every year it gets a little better, but still sucks to struggle through. My dad was 51 when he passed. My mom widowed at 43. Maybe it'd be a little easier if I knew my mom would be taken care of, that she had a man in her life, but so far she's not interested or even looking. I've made it perfectly clear that I have NO issues with her looking again. Hell she's YOUNG, she needs someone else in her life eventually,and I didn't want her thinking I'd hold her back. lol the day I told her she kinda gave me that sideways glance dog heard something look, but I just explained that I didn't mean she needed to go out right then and there and find someone, but that when she felt the time was right and she wanted to move on, that I didn't want to be the thought that entered her mind to hold her back. That was a little over a year after my dad passed. I think the only thing that keeps my mom sane and continuing to move in this world is my cousins that she's guardian of. My parents were married just shy 25 years. They were the first that either fell in love with, so it was especially hard on my mom.

Basically I'm not sleeping, so I'm tired. Since I'm so tired, I don't feel like cooking the meals I did towards the beginning. Since I'm not cooking, I tend to eat more processed stuff than I had in the past, and that has salt in it. This week I have gained a little but I believe it's salt related due to the fact that today I had some Uncle Ben's rice that has quite a bit of salt, and yesterday we had stovetop stuffing, day before that I bought Chinese knowing that I had a huge assignment to finish. Beyond not cooking and not eating as well as I should, I haven't exercised at all, I'm just too exausted. I force myself to stay up until a decent hour before laying down to sleep so I'm not up all night and end up being up all night anyway.

Talk about frustrating. Sorry for being so long winded and probably depressing and such. But since this is my blog, and this affects my weight loss, I'm putting it in here. lol

For now I shall go see if I can find a spot in my bed (provided D isn't like...sprawled across the entire bed by now) and catch an hour or so of shut eye before work. Hope everyone else has a better day than me!

Amber