Fat & Healthy ( How I Survived Shaming and Learned To Love My Body Again)

Got Stress? Yeah, I Got That

Stress, that awful word that brings anxiety just by looking at it is the quickest and easiest way for me to not only gain weight but also to become unhealthy. Proven to be a major cause of sugar spikes, high blood pressure, elevated cholesterol levels, all sorts of heart problems, it's just an overall crappy part of life that we all have to go through from time to time. Not going to escape it but we can find ways to manage it. Finding the time is a bit more difficult as the demands of an active adult life already full of work, family, kids, exercise seems to take up more hours than what the day gives but the truth as I believe it to be is no matter how good the diet, exercise plan or your intentions to become healthy are if you don't find a way to manage your stress you will never be a healthy person no matter what that number says on that scale. I honestly believe that you have to be happy most of the time to be truly healthy. So even if its just ten minutes in a parked car before you head home from work, or in a bathtub with the door locked, or just before you go to sleep at night make the time to try and relieve your stress for the day. How do you find a way to relax? Well I am going to tell you two ways I manage my anxiety but there are many ways and you have to find what works for you. My only real advice is go out there and if your not happy already try as many new things til you find what works for you. If you want to lose weight and junk food made you happy try something new until you feel as happy as what you were eating the junk food. Keep trying and don't give up! Hey you may even find something that makes you even happier and on the way you may even find new friends, new loves, a new side of you to love. Just go for it!

Trying to explain my love and joy for music is kind of like trying to explain why the earth is always spinning. You can come up with ideas and put words to it but really you did not know for sure why or how it started. All I know is when I put earphones in my ears and block out the world I go into a happy trance where for a short time my problems disappear with every beat, sound and feeling in the song. My body gets lighter and lighter. I feel as if I am in cloud of wispy hope of good things that are for sure to come no matter what bills are due or who I have made mad at me for some ridiculous thing I have done. I am always doing the ridiculous things. An example is one time my mom was too tired to talk on the phone to a good friend of hers and she told me to tell my dad who was waiting on the phone line downstairs to tell him that she did not feel like talking to her friend. Well I was young but old enough where I should have realized that if I picked up the other phone to tell my dad that my mom did not want to talk to her friend that it might be taken the wrong way by my mom's friend who was also still on the phone and could hear everything I said, and my mom's friend did take it the wrong way for many months. Music helped me through that tough time. Music has helped me through many, many tough and stressful times that I have either brought on by my foolishness or things that I could not have helped even if I did think them through a bit more. It helped me through the C on the math exam that I worked so hard to get an A on, or the death of a pet, or the cranky mood swings that all women get a certain time of the month. Music is always there whenever I needed it and its asked nothing of me but to just give myself over to its power and that is what I do whenever I can. Its easy to have music in general playing while you do many chores like cooking, driving to work, writing ( yes I am listening to music now as I write this) but that is not exactly what I mean when I say I use it as a tool to relieve my stress. I have to be alone with the music and not be distracted by anything around me to have that cloud effect or go into that happy trance that I so love. This is usually about a half hour before I go to sleep every night.

Meditation was something I found complicated at first because at the time I learned it I did not realize the freedom that came with it. You can not really do it wrong and I would tense up thinking I was doing it wrong, missing the enjoyment of the experience altogether. Meditation is a great way to focus and kick charge your creativity along with relieving stress. Basically all Meditation means is to dedicate a certain amount of time to quietly ponder your thoughts or reflect. Preferably not on what has happened already but on what your goals in life may be. Simple goals or complex goals. Are you thinking now that you have no goals? Well then you definitely need to Meditate. You can google many techniques and ways to meditate in many different ways. I tried Meditating with water but that one never really felt good to me but its pretty popular, you put your feet in a water soak that is warm or cool and focus on your body as it comes back to its normal temperature. I prefer the breathing Meditations, where I focus on a positive thought, like the ones I have been sharing in the smile times at the end of every part of these stories while at the same time focusing on my breath. At first when I am stressed my breathing is pretty erratic but as the thought and my breathing become one it gets very mellow and calm. Once I reach my calm place the Meditation is over and that is when ideas start to come to me or I just clear my head to focus better on the task I already had started. Meditation for me is a gateway or advice giver when I am confused and need to just take time to figure things out. Once I let my anxiety go over fear of Mediating wrong it has never failed to help me out. Most of the time it only takes fifteen minutes for me but sometimes it has taken half an hour or longer I must admit to feel calm. However it was always worth the time it took and I never had any regrets about it, however I did have many regrets and made numerous mistakes on my journey to good health which will be coming soon in the next part of my story.

*Smile Time* I seen this joke on the internet last week and it still makes me chuckle. In case you did not hear fat is the new word for hot. LoL ( I hope you laugh out loud)

Joke- Friend One- Omg I figured it out! Friend Two- What did you figure out?

Friend One- You know how when things get hot they expand? Friend Two- Yeah?

Friend One- Well I am not fat, I am just hot.