The Year of theFrog

So today? I took my English Composition CLEP exam? And I totally got a 63.

That means I passed, by the way. It also means that I now have 6 college credits, three of them counting towards my Writing 1100 course (which is a general ed requirement AND a prereq for dozens of other classes I need to take) and three of them counting toward my electives. For just $85 dollars and an hour of my time, I nailed down two college classes!

In addition, I am now a college student at the University I work for getting ready to take my first class Feb 13th.

Did I mention the part where I’m doing the happy dance? Because I totally am right now.

And yes, to the theme of Rocky. Always to the theme of Rocky.

Wow - it’s 4 weeks already?

In some ways it feels like it’s been a whirlwind, but when I really think about it, I’m amazed at how much of my life has completely changed in just a matter of weeks.

New diet. New job. New budget. New household rules. New therapy (with the accompanying medication). Pending school (yes, I’m going back to get my degree). I have actual GOALS that I am actually working on for the first time in YEARS. It feels good. It feels like I’m accomplishing something. And, as I said, I’m amazed at HOW MUCH is being accomplished in such a short time. It hasn’t even been a month yet and already everything about my life has changed completely - including how I look at my life.

So, that being said, in the weight matters, I was a bit slack. I was working on other things and the diet got sort of left by the wayside… still, it wasn’t a complete wash.

• Weight Lost: .5 (yes - I’m counting it!!!)
• Total Weight Lost: 7.5 lbs
• Organizational Status: I’ll be honest - I’ve done nothing but laundry for the past week. It’s BAD and I need to rededicate myself to this.
• Money Management: Pending the next statement - still, with the new income we’re doing better than we have in a long time.
• Therapy: I’ll talk more about that after my next appointment, but I DO definitely feel a difference in my energy levels. I don’t feel anything mood altering, so we’ll see if that changes.
• Hair: I got a much needed haircut and now I feel super cute.
• Video Blog: Yes - long overdue. I’ll have to whip something up this week. This is also something I have to rededicate myself to.

As you can imagine, with a new job and a new therapist, and… well… lots of new-ness, lots of things are changing and it’s all happening at once.

Obviously, I have to adjust to my new schedule. I don’t have the free time I once did to get all the little stuff around the house done, so I’ve gotten a little behind on the housework. The other side of this, of course, is that with my new schedule and out-of-home responsibilities, TPO is going to have to step up to fill in the gaps that my new job is creating. So far, I haven’t pressed the issue, TPO hasn’t offered, and our house has suffered for it. That’s something that will be changing next week - at least the “I haven’t pressed the issue” bit. I’m going to give him another week of being footloose before I start cracking down.

As far as the anti-depressants go, though - well, I can’t say I’ve really FELT much of a difference. I have been sleeping better, which is always a good thing. The drain I feel after social interactions has decreased significantly. Also, I’m not as tired throughout the day. However, as far as emotions go - as far as the way I feel, I’m not noticing really any difference. That was more or less to be expected since the Dr. told me specifically that it would be some time before I notice any changes in my mood.

I HAVE noticed one weird thing, though. I have almost always slept on my stomach or on my side. I can’t remember a time in my life, other than in a hospital, when I have been comfortable sleeping on my back. Since I’ve been on the Lexapro, I have been noticing that I wake up from a sound, comfortable sleep on my back. Not that it’s a bad thing, but it did strike me as odd the first few times it happened.

My next appointment is next Tuesday, and we’ll see if I end up staying at the 10mg dosage of if he’s going to increase me again to 15 or 20.

Food-wise, this week was a bad week. Though last week was emotionally very tough, this week had more to do with me making conscious decisions to partake in celebratory dinners and snacks rather than staying on course. I restrained myself fairly well, so I don’t have an overwhelming feeling of guilt plaguing me as I did last week, but obviously, the decisions have been reflected on the scale. However, there are more aspects in life than food, and in just about every other aspect, huge improvements have been made.

• Weight Lost This Week: 0lbs
• Total Weight Lost: 7lbs
• Organizational Status: My kitchen pantry is in a state of disarray as I “make a bigger mess” to clean it all out. This is tough because as an amateur culinarian, my pantry is chock full of all sorts of higher end foodie fare that (while neat to have) I rarely use.
• Money Management: $7841 - Unbeknownst to me, TPO continued using the credit card a few times over the past few weeks, so while our debt did manage to go down by over $600, it would have been more had there not been any additions to the account.
• Therapy: I go for my next appointment on the 29th, but so far, I can see that the medication has been a benefit. The therapist said that it may be several weeks before I feel the anti-depressant part of the drug working (which, I have to agree with - I have not noticed any difference in how I feel so far), but I should start noticing an increase in energy and getting better sleep fairly soon, which I have. I’m nowhere near as tired as I usually am throughout the day, and I definitely notice that it’s not only easier for me to fall asleep at night, but I sleep better and wake up more rested in the morning. That, in and of itself, is a huge improvement in my life. The real test will be on Tuesday, though, when I up the dosage from 5mg to 10.

As I said, there were some setbacks, but overall, this was still a very good week.

I have SERIOUSLY got to develop ways to celebrate festive/happy occasions without automatically thinking “oh, let’s go out to dinner!!!” or “hey!!! Let’s have come cake!!!”

Because this week? This has been a bad food week. I guess we’ll have to wait until Sunday to find out the outcome of this.

I don’t even know where to begin…

It seems like things have been going a million miles an hour over the past few days that I didn’t even notice that I didn’t press “publish” on the real post for yesterday. DOH!

Work is going well. For starters it helps that I have a friend working here with me, so I automatically don’t feel alone. Another bonus is that this is a pretty small office and I started work during one of the slow periods, so I can’t help but get to know them.

Another bonus… INTERNET ACCESS!!! I can’t even remember the last time I worked for a company that allowed internet access. Cool cool.

The visit to the psych went well and there will be follow ups. I am now on anti-depressants (Lexapro) and we’ll see if that helps the doom and gloom. Surprisingly (and I don’t know if this is the Lexapro or if this is psychosomatic), my headaches are almost completely gone. I don’t know how to describe it, but I almost always have some form of pressure or tension that causes headaches. I’ve been headache free for two days. This might be normal for  y’all, but this is a freakin’ miracle to me.

Obviously, I don’t have time to do much of a video post until the weekend (I had planned to do it on my day off, but instead I ended up starting my new job on my day off).

This year has officially surpassed my expectations… and I will do everything in my power to make sure that I’m not jinxing things here, because this is just the beginning of the year and I want to continue this upward trend in my life.

Before I get into the meat of this post, go over to the Lilypad and take a gander at today’s post - this has been an INCREDIBLE day!

The news there means several things here. The first of which means that our credit card will be paid off MUCH sooner - we may be completely out of debt by August! The other thing it means is that we can actually start putting away MORE money into savings NOW rather than waiting until the debts paid off to put any sizeable deposits into our account. It also means that while I am not planning on increasing the regular household budget (because it is more or less working for us as it stands) we will have a significant amount of wiggle room every month. I’m not saying that TPO and I are living paycheck to paycheck, but with me working full time again (and getting paid slightly more per hour than what I do now), we won’t have to wait as long to save up the cash to make certain purchases that we’ve been waiting on¹.

Obviously, a new job will slow down the organizing and decluttering efforts as my free time is sucked up, but I am in the process of making plans to keep going with the organizing once work starts. This will be the hardest hit area of the New Year’s Resolutions because I will have to make a seriously concerted effort to keep up with the house AND move forward on the decluttering/organizing on the weekends.

As far as the diet goes, I actually think that it will benefit me more to be on a full time schedule with regular breaks throughout the day to keep my meal times completely consistant. Sure, I’ll have to plan out my meals at home and bring them to work (which won’t be a problem for me AT ALL), but by resolving not to purchase anything else (ie. from a vending machine or from nearby food retailers), I am not only eating at the same times every day, but I am limiting my access to unnecessary food throughout the day.

Tomorrow will be an incredibly busy day - not only do I have the appointment with the shrink, but I need to stop off at my new work to sign paperwork, stop off at my soon-to-be old work to help find coverage for my remaining scheduled shifts (and sign any paperwork I need to sign as well), get all of the shopping done for the next few weeks (taking full advantage of my LAST weekday shopping trip for a long time… this is VERY sad), figure out my inaugural work outfit for Wednesday, and get as much done in the house tomorrow as possible because my free time will be at a premium from here on out.

I had planned on posting about the diet plan I’m on and about setting goals, but hopefully you can see and understand why this was a bit more important. At least to me

1. A new bed in the guest/computer room; a few pieces of furniture to finish the living room; a new computer [↩]

This week was tougher on me than the last - as I mentioned, it was more of a mental challenge than anything. This week’s results are good, but I truly believe that they would have been better if I had not psyched myself out. If I had stuck to my guns after my slip ups, my weight would be lower and the organization progress would have progressed. This week was a lesson to me - probably not the last of its kind, unfortunately (I tend to need hands-on reminders when learning lessons) - about how much of this is overcoming my own mental blocks.

So, without much further ado, here are this week’s stats:

• Weight Lost This Week: 2lbs.
• Total Weight Lost: 5lbs.
• Organizational Status: Stalled temporarily - I’ll get back on that this week.
• Money Management: After an unexpected bonus, TPO and I were able to pay $800 on a $8450 debt. I’m not sure how much that will pay off the principle after interest is calculated, but I will check on that ASAP. On sticking to the budget, I may need to tweak things a bit, but I did lower our costs by removing premium channels from our cable plan and by clipping coupons. I don’t know all of the coupon clipping secrets (some people are able to turn a $150 grocery bill into about $40… I can’t conceive of how that’s done), but I’m trying to learn.
• Video Blogging: This also got halted - I had planned on doing two video posts, but got all stuck on the slip ups that progress more or less completely stopped. This week will be better.
• Admitting How Much I Actually Weigh on a Semi-Anonymous Website: I’m getting there slowly. Patience, grasshopper… because that shit is scary.

Have a great week!