Happy Birthday to Me!

Happy Birthday to Me! Happy Birthday to Me!

"Women, Food, and God"......Loving the skin I'm in

Its day five of reading "Women, Food, and God" by Geneen Roth and the strangest thing happened today. As I was brushing my teeth this morning, I happened to glance up at the mirror and I found the most beautiful brown eyes looking back at me. It shocked me for a moment. I had to look closer and upon closer inspection I discovered that those beautiful brown eyes belonged to me. They are the same beautiful brown eyes that intently watch and pay attention to every detail of the lives of the Artis 6 so that I am able to detect any hint of danger. They are the same eyes that lovingly look deep into the eyes of my wonderful husband every night as I tell him how much I love him. They are the same beautiful brown eyes that pay attention to every detail of our home, always inspecting it to make sure its comfortable for my family, the same beautiful eyes that watch my children play and achieve, and enjoy life. They are the same beautiful brown eyes that I passed on to a few of my sons and daughters that I love so much. Its been high school since I realized that my eyes or anything else on me is beautiful. Its been a while since I noticed how wonderful I am. I am a great writer. I am creative. I am an "out of the box" thinker. I'm a problem solver and a great leader. I can plan a great organized event on a shoe-string budget. I am able to stay calm in intense situations and think clearly. I'm a great multi-tasker. I'm smart as a whip. I'm caring without being mushy and smothering. I'm an awesome wife.....just ask Papa Bear Ike.....he knows how lucky he is to have me. I don't argue and cause alot of tension in our home. I pride myself on creating a loving and comfortable home environment. There are so many wonderful things about me that I ignore everyday as I beat me up for being overweight. Yes, of course I need to lose the weight, for health reasons and other stuff too, but what I have been missing is the fact that I lost me in my obsession to lose the weight. Losing weight has been the focal point of my days, months, and past 14 years. I have decided that yes I'm going to work on losing the weight but it won't be what my mind revolves around and obsesses about. I will enjoy my food without over-indulging. I will live life as I lose weight. I will see the beauty in each day and realize that I don't get these days with my family back. Once a day is done, its gone.......I don't want to come to the end of my life and realize that I wasted so much time refusing to enjoy life because I was obsession over being overweight. I promise to take each day one day at a time and I promise to live each day.

Courtney, Food, and God

I finally have my book in hand. For a day or so, I talked myself around getting the book. I was in denial. I was desperately trying to convince myself that I am not an emotional eater. Yeah, I know after all of that stuff I said the other day, I still returned to thinking that maybe, just maybe I was eating to live......like my body really requires double chocolate cupcakes, ruffles and french onion dip, doritos, with diet coke on the side to function. It took me nearly having a mental breakdown while I struggled to function through the chaos of a day with 6 kids, and 1 husband all talking to me at the same time, all needing something different but at the same time without turning to food to realize that just maybe I'm an emotional eating. So, bright and early this morning I drove to Barnes and Noble and picked up "Women, Food, and God." The author Geneen Roth is really on to something. I walked into Barnes and Noble to find a wonderful display of several of her books. I found myself torn between which books to purchase. I think I need them all! Since I only had a few dollars on my Barnes and Noble gift card, I had to choose. If only you could have seen me standing in front of the Geneen Roth display counting up whats left on my gift cards while the voices of little ones circled around my head, "Mommy, can I get this book, what about a puzzle, can you do this, can I go over there, do you like this shape, do you like this???......" Nothing at that moment seemed as important and getting the tools to help me get free. I've made a list in no particular order. I'm circulating this list out to friends and family members because my birthday is only a week away and we all know that I don't need anymore junk to fill my house that I will eventually end up blogging about b/c I will have to clean it, remove it, or the kids will break it. What I really want for my birthday is to be able to control my eating and lose this extra weight that I have been dragging around with me for the past 14 or so years. Its actually scary to think that I may be on the verge of getting free. There is self control around the corner for me. I can't wait, I think this just might be my year.

1. " Women Food and God:
   An Unexpected Path to Almost Everything
2. 
   

Breaking Free from Emotional Eating

3. Appetites — On the Search for True Nourishment

4. Feeding the Hungry Heart

5. When You Eat at the Refrigerator, Pull Up a Chair

6. Why Weight? A Guide to Ending Compulsive Eating

7. The Craggy Hole in My Heart and the Cat Who Fixed It

"Women, Food, and God"...hmmmm

I'm not a faithful Oprah follower but last night I found myself glued to the television, DVR remote in hand, quickly zipping past every commercial. From the moment I found out that she would be revealing the cure for the fat lady blues, I vowed to watch it. For 3 days my mind wondered and guessed at what this miracle cure could be. I not so intentionally waited til late in the evening to watch it. The not so intentional part I will explain in tomorrow's post, there's never a dull moment with the Artis 6. But anyway, I thought of what foods she could reveal, or what pill, or form of exercise she had found. I was not prepared for what she revealed. I expected quick fixes, that would melt away tens of pounds in minutes, what I got was a harsh reality jolt.
Oprah's big answer which is based upon a book,"Women, Food, and God" by Geneen Roth is to go within and heal my pain......what?!?!? What addict wants to hear that? No food addict or any other addict wants to hear that you must realize that you are using food or your drug of choice to push down emotions that you are afraid to feel, only to realize that you're self medicating after feeling the pain anyway. I sat in shock as I listened to Oprah talk about how she had spent a lifetime trying to make other people happy. The fear of feeling other people's disappointment in her had driven her to eat, and eat, and eat. She confessed to using food to numb herself. I listened to woman after woman confess to hating themselves because they were fat, and they were fat because they were eating when they weren't hungry, and they were eating when they weren't hungry because they were feeling something else, maybe loneliness, or heartache, or the pain of losing loved ones, or feeling like where is my life going, what am I doing, does my life really revolve around baking cookies, and washing clothing, and building my husband up? Don't get me wrong, each woman is happy to have the blessing of family and friends, and the things we as women do to build up and nurture family and friends are labors of love that we willingly do to see our loved ones happy. Why are we eating/numbing ourselves into lala land, slowly killing our physical, emotional, and spiritual selves? Constantly eating is a way of punishing ourselves for the hurt we feel. Oprah said that one of her friends once told her that her overweight self is an invitation to her best life. At first I didn't understand what she meant, but by the end of the show I clearly understood. As I sit here clicking and tapping away as this keyboard I feel my overweight self inviting me to finally take a good look at those things which I have been avoiding. At what point will I see that I am punishing me and robbing me of the joys of being emotionally free, and physically light? What is it that I am afraid to feel? Is it the pain of seeing dreams unrealized, or the fear of chasing them down? Is it the young Courtney from years past who felt like she was never quite accepted by her peers or is that young Courtney from years past alot closer to being me today than I care to admit to? What causes me to be so shy around others, afraid to say what I really think and feel, all too willing to keep my thoughts to myself and voice them later when no one is around, b/c at that point there is no one around to challenge, disagree, or criticize what I think or feel. I always agree with me. I feel like I'm a good writer and I still sit and stare at a post for hours or sometimes days before posting for fear of what someone will think of what I've written........ What causes me to shun the physical contact of people and prefer to be with just me, keeping friends and family members at a comfortable distance.....in a place where I can easily unplug them at a moments notice? Right now I don't know the answers to this questions and just thinking about them makes me crave a big ole slice of molten chocolate cake, but Oprah invited me, and anyone else who watched the show to join her on a 2 month journey and find the answers that will heal our pains. I think I just might take her up on this offer. Its about time that I turn and face the crowd and stop allowing the fear of feelings paralyze me........whew. So I'm off to purchase the book.............

Shame on Me!

Shame, shame, shame on me! Its been forever since I've written on or even visited my own blog! I broke the first rule to having a successful blog with faithful followers.....oh, well today is another day and a chance to start over. Life has been CRAZY to say the least. Let's see if I can give everyone a quick update in a couple of sentences.....as you all know by now, only because I say it in every single post, I'm in school full-time. As if wife-ing and mother-ing 6 happily wild children doesn't include enough tasks to complete a lifetime, I decided I had to complete college so, I'm still working on this degree that has taken me 15 years on and off to do. I will be done in Dec!!!!! I'm throwing a huge party and then I'm jumping right back in and completing my Masters. So homework has consumed all of my computer time, in addition to that I had major back surgery in March....ugh is all I can say about that, Ike went from lovin' school, to hating school and back to lovin' school, but he still kinda hates reading, My Leah Pea Deah has developed into an awesome little reader. We have her reading books 2-3 grade levels above her grade and she doesn't even know it. She just keeps asking for more books. Daddy's precious Say Say is still working to discover more ways to manipulate and woo her daddy. She has my husband wrapped around her little finger. I can't complain though, because I always prayed that my girls would be Daddy's girls. There is nothing more wonderful than the bond that a father and daughter share. I should know because I have the world's most awesome daddy. Miss Sister-Girl is quickly approaching teen-ism and I see it in her demeanor everyday. I'm not so sure I'm ready for this just yet because Mr. Ty is using up all the patience I have for teen-ism. I have reached my limit on teen #1. Don't get me wrong he's a great kid but there is some sort of confusion that takes over your child's mind and body when they become a teen. Make up your mind already.....he doesn't know whether he thinks he knows everything and doesn't need parents or if he wants to return to being Momma's baby. Who knows I just go with the flow. Drew pushed a bead up his nose that stayed there for 3 days before the hubby and I even realized anything was stuck up there. The constant drip of mucus and subtle complaining of mild nose pain prompted me to dig a little further and find a clear hair bead hidden beyond all the mucus, but of course by day 3 its way to far for me to retrieve so we had to cough up $100 bucks to get the ENT to retrieve it, and did I happen to mention that this $100 bucks had to be coughed up a day before we closed on our new home. And for those of you wondering, we chose the beautiful new home in a small town located a little further from my husband's job, but the small town charm has been delightful and the schools are awesome, which is the main reason Ike went from hating school back to lovin' school again. So for the past week I have been attempting to unpack our lives that is tucked away in a million boxes and bins stored in our new garage. Of course I labeled and numbered every box and even created a sheet that gives me detailed information of the contents that each box contains but, that whole system fell apart the last 2 days before moving so I still have 1/2 a million boxes that are neither labeled or numbered......I tried! So overall I can say life has been wonderful, and now that I have a short break before the next semester starts, I solemnly vow to happily blog everyday......yeah right, even you don't believe that, but I'm gonna aim for every other day, and in between I'm gonna visit all of your blogs.