Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Quotes from Lyndsey 1/5/2011

As I am putting Christmas stuff away. "Bye, bye Christmas. Thanks a lot. See ya next year!"


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Monday, January 3, 2011

My Day with Two Babies

No I am not babysitting. Lyndsey has been potty trained for about 4 months. I potty trained her when she was almost 2 1/2 and Alyssa was almost 6 months. She did great and it was super easy. She almost never had accidents and she told me when she needed to go.

In the last week she has had more accidents than she has had the whole time she has been potty trained. I know regression is normal but I don't like it.

Today she pooped and peed in her underwear for the 3rd day in a row. That is more than she had EVER done it before. As I was changing her she said the same thing she has been saying every day after she poops in her underwear, "Just like Alyssa!"

I came at her with a harsher tone than normal explaining that big girls go in the toliet and babies go in a diaper. I then asked, "do you want to be a big girl or a baby?"
"A baby," was her immediate response.

I reminded her like it says in her favorite Big Sister book, that big girls can "Walk and talk, play with toys, and eat pizza and apples and ice cream."

I asked again, "so, do you want to be a big girl or a baby?"
"a baby."

So I decided to let her be a baby. I put a diaper on her and told her she is not allowed to walk, only crawl. I fed her carrot baby food for lunch. I took away all her big girl toys and she is playing with baby toys. I even let her sit in Alyssa's bouncer while I folded laundry. Every time she wanted to do something she would normally do, I told her, "babies can't do that." And she would say with a big smile on her face, "I'm a baby." I held her and cuddled her and gave her a sippy cup with milk. I rocked her and sang rock-abye-baby.


My child whose favorite phrase is "Lyndsey do it," the girl who throws a fit if I turn the light on instead of letting her go to her room, get her stool and come back to do it herself; let me carry her to her room and put her down to sleep in the porta crib she hasn't slept in since before she turned 2.



I plan on continuing this, Bread And Jam For Frances, style until she decides she wants to be a big girl again.



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Conversations with Lyndsey 1/3/2010

Lyndsey is 2 1/2

Lyndsey: Mommy, can I have milk in a pink cup please?

Me: You can have milk in a purple cup.

Lyndsey (laying her head down on the table in anguish): I sad mommy

Me: Are you sad because you can't have a pink cup? The only clean cup is purple.

Lyndsey: Had a pink cup yesterday.

Me: And now it is dirty.

Lyndsey (as if she has an amazingly brilliant idea): Mommy, put in dishwater (that is the correct spelling for how she says it)

The conversation continued and Lyndsey drank milk from her purple cup.



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Sunday, January 2, 2011

My Past and Struggles with Food Issues 2

I left off talking about junior high and high school. After posting I pulled out a dusty old box of pictures. I found pictures from elementary, junior high, and high school. I had some scanning issues but will get the pictures up eventually. Looking at these pictures made me mad. Why did I think I was fat? I found so many pictures of myself sitting with my arms crossed - classic teenage Carrie - trying to cover her non-existent stomach. I wish I could go back and talk to this girl.

I wasted so much time obsessing about my body and my weight. Me, me, me! And honestly, one of the things I have come to realize recently is that I have still been obsessing about it. Whether it is how many calories I have eaten, or woe is me I can't fit into my jeans. There are so many more important things to focus my thoughts on. But I will get to that, for now, back to the past.

So like I said, throughout my youth, I thought I was fat but was not. I even remember the summer before my senior year, going to tennis camp in Santa Cruz and refusing to take the one "fun day" at the beach because I was afraid to be seen in a bathing suit. I was probably in the best shape of my life. So while all my new friends went to the beach and the boardwalk, I stayed at the tennis courts and hit balls against the ball machine.

So when did I actually start to gain weight? It is so hard to say since I always truly believed I was fat. I don't know when it started so it was probably pretty gradual. Maybe that is how it happens for most people. It creeps up on you. But I do think part of my problem was; I just gave up. My expectations of myself, my dieting, my sit ups and aerobics classes, all the tennis and running - nothing was working. I would never have that flat stomach, so I gave up. And then I had a new reason to eat, I was depressed because I was fat, so I ate to make myself feel better. It was a vicious cycle.

So far I have mostly talked about body image. I have a lot to say about overcoming food issues but I feel like body image is at the root of this problem. The difference between how a person sees them self and reality. How a person sees them self is their own reality even if it is in contrast with how the world views them. In my youth I thought I was fat but was not. But my body image effected the way I lived my life. When I entered my twenties, I could have been medically classified as overweight.

I do know there is a difference between someone who is 160 pounds, 180 pounds, 250 pounds or more. But in that 160 pound person's head, they may weight 250 pounds. Or that might be what they see when they look in the mirror. And the opposite can also be true. After eating healthy and exercising for two or three days, a person might feel truly thinner and more confident when they have actually not lost any weight. These are some of the ideas I will be talking more about as I talk about renewing my mind in the way I think about food and the way I see myself.

Mingle 240

My Past and Struggles with Food Issues 1

There is so much to say. What is relevant for others to read about and what isn't? I have done so much searching into my past to find the root of my struggle. It has taken a lot of time, prayer, and more time. I hope what I have to say will help someone out there who reads this. I felt so hopeless and lost in the area of weight, size, body image, and dieting for so long. I have countless journal entries pouring out my heart for concern about wanting to lose weight but not being able to stick to a diet. I want to let you know that I feel like I have found the answer! It is not a diet, it is not exercise. Ok now I am making it sound like a miracle drug or something. The answer for me has been the renewing of my mind in the way I feel about food. It might take me a while to get to the answer but I want to share with you the journey I have been on.

It started so young. I remember thinking I was fat in elementary school! I was not fat but I truly believed that I was. I wanted to do workout videos. I wanted to go on a diet. I do not want to blame this on anyone at all but I do not know how I could have believed these untrue things about myself if I had not seen it modeled by family members. I am only saying this to help get back to the root of where it started.

In elementary school I thought I was fat and was told about the tiny little plumpness to my belly "it is just baby fat." Well, I was not a baby. Looking back, I wish I would have been told "everyone in shaped differently, we were all created to look different. You are absolutely beautiful the way God created you." Who knows if this really would have helped, but I have two daughters and that is what I plan to tell them if they ever come to me thinking they are fat when they obviously are not.


In junior high I was obsessed with almost non existent "love handles." I did endless sit ups and went to aerobics classes (it was the early 90's, step aerobics was the thing to do.) I would try on outfit after outfit and look at myself in the mirror sitting down, horrified by my rolls. My stomach looked nothing like Cindy Crawford's and therefore, I was FAT!

In high school the obsession of course continued and at this point my weight actually did begin to yo-yo a bit. I was probably never actually technically overweight but I did gain weight and then lose it. I was an athlete. I played tennis and ran track. But I never had a flat stomach. I constantly compared myself to friends and models and I never made the cut. I think adults probably thought my thoughts about being fat were silly since they could see that I was not fat. But all that really matters is that I could not see it. I believed I was fat and this belief is probably where my actual struggle with weight and food grew from.

Actually the struggle with food was always there. I remember very specifically, and this is so hard for me to share because it is embarrassing, coming home after school and making cookie dough or brownie dough and eating it. I was always alone after school because my parents were divorced and both working and I would come home and eat. There was never anything "good" in the house. I would mix up brownie mix and water or the basic ingredients for cookie dough (minus the egg) and eat it. This started around age 12.

My Plan for this Blog

Where to start, where to start? I almost wanted to name this blog Overcoming Food Issues but I don't just want to talk about that. I want to talk about life. I want to talk about family, being a stay at home mom, faith, living in a small town, friends, recipes, my business, my past, hopes and dreams, goals, fitness; life. So I hope these ideas will all be woven in, but I will begin by focusing on overcoming food issues. This is something I have been dealing with as long as I can remember but I am finally getting to the point where I feel I can say, I am winning this battle!