That is the title of a song that I heard this morning - needless to say I was crying by the time I got to the office! That phrase resonates so much truth in so many areas of my life - the first of these scars would be the obvious infertility - God only knows what this does to a woman, a wife, a husband, a marriage. It can truly make or break you and I think DH and I experienced a bit of both. I will forever bare the scars of infertility. Those scars are both good and bad - I will appreciate every moment of this pregnancy where others might not but I may always carry around a secret bit of bitterness at those who take the miracle of pregnancy for granted?
The real wounds and scars that I carry are those from the past and being overweight. So many times I have wondered why I couldn't just forget the fat girl, leave her behind and pretend that she never existed. I didn't want to remember drowning my sorrows in a double whopper with cheese and a large fry. I didn't want to remember being teased without mercy or worse than that, being invisible. Some days I want to pretend that I got asked out and had boyfriend and that people liked me. I want to pretend that I shopped in regular stores and wore cute clothes but those are all figments of my imagination. I never had those experiences. I spent the first 25 years of my life trapped inside a fat suit and slowly medicating myself with food. I never dealt with anything.
Since the weight loss I have spent agonizing hours trying to erase the past and morph into a different person. I have gone through phases of bitterness at how I was treated by society. I have looked in the mirror with self loathing at the skin and stretch marks. But today I realized that the hurt I still carry around is the wound......that needs to heal. I also realized that I don't want to lose who I was when I was overweight because that girl was still Stephanie. Part of who I am now is part of who I was then.
Losing weight has taught me so much about myself. Erasing that from my past would mean erasing all of the lessons that I have learned. The good ones like learning to trust myself, learning to love myself and learning what Stephanie really wanted. It also made me appreciate all that my body has done for me. I never want to forget where I came from or who I was.......I could stand to leave the pannus behind but the rest of it can stay!
This picture makes me cry!
Thought it was time to change my picture
Friday, May 30, 2008
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
Need some help from my techy friends
I desperately need a new blogroll thing but of course this barbie is blogger challeneged. Anyone have an idea on how to create a new blog list??
Thanks!
Thanks!
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Week 9 and I still just look fat!
Yep - I still just appears to have huge boobs and a wobbly belly......not that I didn't have a wobbly belly before but at least I could blame it on skin rather than cookies and chocolate! On a happy note my boobs have gone from a 34A to a solid 36C in about 4 weeks........now if only I didn't have to roll them up and tuck them in to make them look semi-normal??!!
As for cravings - I spoke too soon. My complaints about watermelon and salsa are gone......now I'm craving chocolate and cookies and brownies and CRAP! Oh and don't forget cereal........I could eat cereal 6 times a day and not get sick of it. I do have to admit I am only allowing myself to eat puffed wheat which is pretty easy on the calorie bank (60 calories a cup). It is the most bizarre thing to find myself at the mercy of Captain Crunch and Betty Crocker......I mean what happened to my willpower - my drive - my determination. Ummmm, I got pregnant and tired I guess???
I am rather proud of the fact that I hauled my butt out of bed on Saturday morning for a spin class. I was afraid. Oh who am I kidding, I was freaking terrified!! I just knew that I wouldn't make it through the class without falling over but I did it. The last 20 minutes I had to slow down but I was busting it for the first 40 minutes. And I have discovered that it is true....it doesn't take long for your body to lose it's ability to exercise effectively.....my butt is still sore today!
Candace asked how the son and family reacted to the news that we were pregnant......well my mother freaked out - I'm talking crying, shrieking in the middle of her office. It was priceless. My dad hasn't wiped the smile off his face yet and he calls just about everyday to check on Jellybean and JM (Jellybean's Mom - that's me). Our son was excited but he's a boy so it was short lived and pretty much shadowed by the fact that his buddy was at the door wanting to shoot hoops. Really everyone has been so happy and so excited. We are so blessed to have such supportive family and friends.
Oh and guess what!!!!! We sold our house!! After 6 LONG months on the market we sold it and just in time......we can now close on our old house 11 days after we move into the new house. That is such a huge weight off my shoulders and I can't wait to be settled in and unpacked so I can concentrate on decorating. Not to mention I'm going to go from commuting 105 miles a day to 45 miles a day - my baby will know who it's mommy is!
Guess I should run and get some work done.......then home to pack - can I count that as cardio??
As for cravings - I spoke too soon. My complaints about watermelon and salsa are gone......now I'm craving chocolate and cookies and brownies and CRAP! Oh and don't forget cereal........I could eat cereal 6 times a day and not get sick of it. I do have to admit I am only allowing myself to eat puffed wheat which is pretty easy on the calorie bank (60 calories a cup). It is the most bizarre thing to find myself at the mercy of Captain Crunch and Betty Crocker......I mean what happened to my willpower - my drive - my determination. Ummmm, I got pregnant and tired I guess???
I am rather proud of the fact that I hauled my butt out of bed on Saturday morning for a spin class. I was afraid. Oh who am I kidding, I was freaking terrified!! I just knew that I wouldn't make it through the class without falling over but I did it. The last 20 minutes I had to slow down but I was busting it for the first 40 minutes. And I have discovered that it is true....it doesn't take long for your body to lose it's ability to exercise effectively.....my butt is still sore today!
Candace asked how the son and family reacted to the news that we were pregnant......well my mother freaked out - I'm talking crying, shrieking in the middle of her office. It was priceless. My dad hasn't wiped the smile off his face yet and he calls just about everyday to check on Jellybean and JM (Jellybean's Mom - that's me). Our son was excited but he's a boy so it was short lived and pretty much shadowed by the fact that his buddy was at the door wanting to shoot hoops. Really everyone has been so happy and so excited. We are so blessed to have such supportive family and friends.
Oh and guess what!!!!! We sold our house!! After 6 LONG months on the market we sold it and just in time......we can now close on our old house 11 days after we move into the new house. That is such a huge weight off my shoulders and I can't wait to be settled in and unpacked so I can concentrate on decorating. Not to mention I'm going to go from commuting 105 miles a day to 45 miles a day - my baby will know who it's mommy is!
Guess I should run and get some work done.......then home to pack - can I count that as cardio??
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
How I Have Changed
This post isn't just about the most recent pregnancy changes but more "how I have changed" over the last few years - in essence, the impression that weight loss, infertility and finally pregnancy has left on me. Man that is mouthfull - talk about a lot of baggage to be carrying around!
Hmmmm, where to start - weight loss brought about a new image of myself. In some cases almost a more distorted image of myself. I had always been the fat girl and I was comfortable with that. I didn't say HAPPY but I was comfortable. I knew how to protect myself from snide comments and the sneers. I knew how to dress in black to appear slimmer (haha - that's a joke!). I knew how to disguise my ability to eat 2 double whoppers and a large fry by eating a light dinner with family and then heading to the drive thru. I knew these things and then came weight loss. It was scary and meant dealing with a lot of demons that I had pushed down for most of my life. It was a challenge and as I realized that I could climb those mountains I began setting my sights higher and higher. Did I ever reach the top of my "weight loss mountain". Did I ever plant my flag at the crest and take in the beautiful valleys that I had come through??? I honestly can't answer that because I still looked in the mirror and saw things I didn't like. I saw stretch marks and saggy skin - OH and saggy boobs too! But I was healthy and happy and in love with a wonderful man. I went from being the fat friend to being the amazing shrinking woman and my identity began to change - I began to be known by people only as thin and healthy. In fact, there are people who never knew me fat.......huh, what???
Fast forward a few years - I'm in the middle of marriage and work and kids and cats and life in general. Living a life that I never dreamed I would have because I had kind of chalked up my future to being the crazy cat lady. So hubby and I are trucking along in life...throwing around the idea of having a baby. We had already waited a couple of years because it was important to us to let the newness of our marriage settle in, especially because my husband was raising a son from a previous marriage. We just assumed that having a baby would be easy......I mean every time you turn on the news you see headlines of some teenage girl giving birth and abandoning her baby.....surely a stable, loving, mature couple could get pregnant. WRONG - the first few months we got the usual "let the pill get out of your system" speech. After that it was "relax and have fun with it". Everyone had there own piece of advice and though I'm sure they all meant well, no one can understand the heartbreak that takes place month after month. Finally after being referred to Reproductive Endocrinologist was I able to get some answers. PCOS with insulin resistance.......I had no idea really what that was or what it meant to my fertility. I did know that it meant drugs and the doctor warned me in advance that those drugs caused weight gain. I thought at first it would be no big deal but after 21 months of "no big deals" I was basically spent. I had given up hope and put on 15-20 pounds. I was raw emotionally and a shell of the fat and skinny girl that I had once been. Infertility had left a brand on my heart - I will never be the same. Not only have I changed physically but emotionally I have travelled so far. I have learned the true depth of my husband's love, I have learned that life is too short to spend every minute of every day obsessing about eating exactly 1500 calories while tempering that with 325 calories burned in exercise. I've learned that there are some spaces that are in us that can only be filled by something specific - you can't substitute those holes with other things - food does not fill a void nor does it ease the longing for a child.
Fast forward one more time to Pregnant Barbie - WOW - I thought I would never say that! Again I have learned so much about myself......I am no longer my own person but I belong to someone that I've never met. I have fallen in love with my husband over again, every single day. I have fallen in love with this baby in spite of the fatigue and spreading hips. I find myself no longer looking at being thin or fat but at being a healthy mother who has a healthy baby. Everytime I go to the gym (when I can muster up the energy right now) I think about how good the exercise is for the baby.......5 weeks ago I agonized over heartrates and calories burned. I wouldn't eat an apple because of the carbs. Things are so different now - I have a true sense of peace regarding who I am. This is something I have never had - it is a little foreign to me. With that sense of belonging and peace comes my ability to become lazy too! Yep, that's the downside. I'm not nearly as driven right now. I'm not trying to be the next Top Model but I do want to be healthy and pizza, chocolate cupcakes and NO exercise does not equal healthy. There has to be a balance and I am out to find it.
I guess my whole point in putting this down was just to see how life changes. Sometimes we have no idea how things from our past will affect our future - we aren't able to see the big picture - we don't know how the cards will play out. All we can know is to keep moving forward, keep hoping, keep striving, keep believing. If we can do those things then maybe our miracle, whatever it is for us personally, will come forth???
(((HUGS)))
Hmmmm, where to start - weight loss brought about a new image of myself. In some cases almost a more distorted image of myself. I had always been the fat girl and I was comfortable with that. I didn't say HAPPY but I was comfortable. I knew how to protect myself from snide comments and the sneers. I knew how to dress in black to appear slimmer (haha - that's a joke!). I knew how to disguise my ability to eat 2 double whoppers and a large fry by eating a light dinner with family and then heading to the drive thru. I knew these things and then came weight loss. It was scary and meant dealing with a lot of demons that I had pushed down for most of my life. It was a challenge and as I realized that I could climb those mountains I began setting my sights higher and higher. Did I ever reach the top of my "weight loss mountain". Did I ever plant my flag at the crest and take in the beautiful valleys that I had come through??? I honestly can't answer that because I still looked in the mirror and saw things I didn't like. I saw stretch marks and saggy skin - OH and saggy boobs too! But I was healthy and happy and in love with a wonderful man. I went from being the fat friend to being the amazing shrinking woman and my identity began to change - I began to be known by people only as thin and healthy. In fact, there are people who never knew me fat.......huh, what???
Fast forward a few years - I'm in the middle of marriage and work and kids and cats and life in general. Living a life that I never dreamed I would have because I had kind of chalked up my future to being the crazy cat lady. So hubby and I are trucking along in life...throwing around the idea of having a baby. We had already waited a couple of years because it was important to us to let the newness of our marriage settle in, especially because my husband was raising a son from a previous marriage. We just assumed that having a baby would be easy......I mean every time you turn on the news you see headlines of some teenage girl giving birth and abandoning her baby.....surely a stable, loving, mature couple could get pregnant. WRONG - the first few months we got the usual "let the pill get out of your system" speech. After that it was "relax and have fun with it". Everyone had there own piece of advice and though I'm sure they all meant well, no one can understand the heartbreak that takes place month after month. Finally after being referred to Reproductive Endocrinologist was I able to get some answers. PCOS with insulin resistance.......I had no idea really what that was or what it meant to my fertility. I did know that it meant drugs and the doctor warned me in advance that those drugs caused weight gain. I thought at first it would be no big deal but after 21 months of "no big deals" I was basically spent. I had given up hope and put on 15-20 pounds. I was raw emotionally and a shell of the fat and skinny girl that I had once been. Infertility had left a brand on my heart - I will never be the same. Not only have I changed physically but emotionally I have travelled so far. I have learned the true depth of my husband's love, I have learned that life is too short to spend every minute of every day obsessing about eating exactly 1500 calories while tempering that with 325 calories burned in exercise. I've learned that there are some spaces that are in us that can only be filled by something specific - you can't substitute those holes with other things - food does not fill a void nor does it ease the longing for a child.
Fast forward one more time to Pregnant Barbie - WOW - I thought I would never say that! Again I have learned so much about myself......I am no longer my own person but I belong to someone that I've never met. I have fallen in love with my husband over again, every single day. I have fallen in love with this baby in spite of the fatigue and spreading hips. I find myself no longer looking at being thin or fat but at being a healthy mother who has a healthy baby. Everytime I go to the gym (when I can muster up the energy right now) I think about how good the exercise is for the baby.......5 weeks ago I agonized over heartrates and calories burned. I wouldn't eat an apple because of the carbs. Things are so different now - I have a true sense of peace regarding who I am. This is something I have never had - it is a little foreign to me. With that sense of belonging and peace comes my ability to become lazy too! Yep, that's the downside. I'm not nearly as driven right now. I'm not trying to be the next Top Model but I do want to be healthy and pizza, chocolate cupcakes and NO exercise does not equal healthy. There has to be a balance and I am out to find it.
I guess my whole point in putting this down was just to see how life changes. Sometimes we have no idea how things from our past will affect our future - we aren't able to see the big picture - we don't know how the cards will play out. All we can know is to keep moving forward, keep hoping, keep striving, keep believing. If we can do those things then maybe our miracle, whatever it is for us personally, will come forth???
(((HUGS)))
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Get your hands of my melons!!!
Watermelons that is......lately I have craving watermelon like a mad woman so I've been buying one every couple of days and that's been lunch and snacks. Well the over the weekend I was out of town and I had packed my watermelon for the trip......a girl should never leave home without them! I walk in the kitchen of the condo and spy my nephew eyeing my snack - I hate to admit it but I turned into a lunatic......the kid had never seen anyone react so dramatically to watermelon before. He kept saying, "I was only looking".......I felt bad for a second and then blamed on pregnancy hormones - LOL!
On other notes....life is hectic as always. Looks like we may be making an offer on a new house - YAY baby won't have to sleep in the bathtub now! The only hitch is that we still haven't sold our current house soooooooo we may be making 2 mortgage payments for a bit. Can you say stress with a capital S??
As for the baby front, we are rolling right along at about 7 weeks and 2 days. Still having some bloating and still really tired but other than that I have been blessed with very little morning sickness. Oh and thank goodness for the Swizzle's May exercise challenge - thanks to that I'm getting a few workouts a week in. Not stellar but better than nothing.
I wish I could say something fantastic about health and exercise but right now I'm pretty much addicted to watermelon and salsa (not together) and somehow I'm thinking that is not what WW has in mind for the 8 healthy guidelines! With all the crazy stuff going on right now I'm trying to keep up with everyone - so if I missed something important can someone please smack me up side the head and let me know who is up to what??
You girls are so incredible - amazing and I feel so blessed to know each of you!
(((HUGS)))
On other notes....life is hectic as always. Looks like we may be making an offer on a new house - YAY baby won't have to sleep in the bathtub now! The only hitch is that we still haven't sold our current house soooooooo we may be making 2 mortgage payments for a bit. Can you say stress with a capital S??
As for the baby front, we are rolling right along at about 7 weeks and 2 days. Still having some bloating and still really tired but other than that I have been blessed with very little morning sickness. Oh and thank goodness for the Swizzle's May exercise challenge - thanks to that I'm getting a few workouts a week in. Not stellar but better than nothing.
I wish I could say something fantastic about health and exercise but right now I'm pretty much addicted to watermelon and salsa (not together) and somehow I'm thinking that is not what WW has in mind for the 8 healthy guidelines! With all the crazy stuff going on right now I'm trying to keep up with everyone - so if I missed something important can someone please smack me up side the head and let me know who is up to what??
You girls are so incredible - amazing and I feel so blessed to know each of you!
(((HUGS)))
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
The Count
The long awaited results are in - we have ONE very healthy little baby with a beating heart!! Hubby and I are ecstatic that everything is good and hubby is really happy that it is only one! According to sonogram I am due on December 28, 2008 so it appears that I actually ovulated a little late. The fertility doc released me and I have my first appointment with my new OB doc next Thursday. I just can't believe that we are finally here and that everything is good.......I honestly thought it might never happen.
Thank you all for your support, thoughts, prayers, comments........I wouldn't have survived without all of you! Of course, I can't be on a "diet" during pregnancy but I refuse to blow up - it really is important to me to mantain my good health and physical activity so don't fear - Barbie will still be around - I'll just be in tow with a baby!!
HUGS from Barbie and ONE baby!!
Thank you all for your support, thoughts, prayers, comments........I wouldn't have survived without all of you! Of course, I can't be on a "diet" during pregnancy but I refuse to blow up - it really is important to me to mantain my good health and physical activity so don't fear - Barbie will still be around - I'll just be in tow with a baby!!
HUGS from Barbie and ONE baby!!
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
We will have the official baby count by the end of today!
So the doctor's office called and moved my appointment from Friday to TODAY - seems that the doctor got invited to speak at some large convention so he was having to reschedule.........I am sooooo excited but soooo nervous. I will report back as soon as the tallying is done - LOL. Truth be told - I would almost enjoy twins but shhhhh.....don't tell my husband!!
(((HUGS)))
(((HUGS)))
Monday, May 5, 2008
So incredibly thankful
I am honestly at a loss for words. I was reading some blogs of other women that are struggling with infertility due to PCOS and I realize that I am so blessed - not that I didn't know that before but there are women everywhere who are experiencing years and years of infertility with no positive results. DH and I went through almost 2 years of agony and pain. Some months I would cry for days because I just couldn't understand why it wasn't happening for us....now it has happened, I'm pregnant and of course, paranoid. Am I doing the right things, am I doing too much, am I gaining too much or eating enough........acckkk - it's a whole new set of rules over here - LOL!
In reality the only changes that I've noticed are my boobies - they are growing like crazy and TRUST ME - I'm not complaining! I've had little morning sickness, the fatigue can get a little rough but it's not unbearable. I just feel so blessed to be able to have this experience when I had almost given up hope of ever being pregnant. Sorry to ramble on but I just needed to make my thankfulness known.......now the countdown to see our precious miracle/s begins - 4 more days!!
In reality the only changes that I've noticed are my boobies - they are growing like crazy and TRUST ME - I'm not complaining! I've had little morning sickness, the fatigue can get a little rough but it's not unbearable. I just feel so blessed to be able to have this experience when I had almost given up hope of ever being pregnant. Sorry to ramble on but I just needed to make my thankfulness known.......now the countdown to see our precious miracle/s begins - 4 more days!!
Thursday, May 1, 2008
Hungry Girl Cookbook Review
I went out and bought this book with the hopes that it would be full of super easy, super good food swaps and I was right!! This book is really great - it's fun, easy to read through, has great recipes and great tips. If you haven't checked out here site you can at www.hungry-girl.com - you can also view the recipes titles that are included in the book by going to http://book.hungry-girl.com/. She lists all the nutritionals in the book and the points are listed on the site. It really is a great purchase for those of us trying to eat healthy and enjoy our food!
Just wanted to pass it on......it's a keeper!
Just wanted to pass it on......it's a keeper!
Oh Baby
So I had my last blood draw yesterday and it appears that everything is progessing fine. Other than being really tired and feeling really bloated all is well. I'm going to work hard at trying to get back into the groove of hitting the gym....it's just been so hard with the fatigue. I actually went and hit the elliptical for half an hour the other day and almost passed out. Come to find out the a/c was broken......no wonder I was so hot.
I do have a question for any pregnant women or mommies out there - how soon was it before you were growing out of your clothes?? OMG - I'm not exagerrating when I say that NOTHING fits anymore. My 6's are long gone and my 8's are laying on top of the clothes heap too. It freaks me out a bit because I don't think the fact that "I am pregnant" has actually sank in and I'm gaining weight. Some of it is water retention because my fingers and legs are puffy but geez!! I also have been STARVING - crazy hungry - the hubby keeps laughing at me because I'm eating so much cauliflower and fruit.....can't help it though. My belly always seems to be growling!
I need to catch up with everyone and promise to work on that - I've been sleeping just about every spare minute that I have lately.....another really unusual thing for me. Oh btw - we have our sonogram next Friday to count babies - LOL - my doctor thinks that is a funny joke.......I'm beginning to wonder though with my growing belly???
Gotta get back to work - (((HUGS))) to you all!
I do have a question for any pregnant women or mommies out there - how soon was it before you were growing out of your clothes?? OMG - I'm not exagerrating when I say that NOTHING fits anymore. My 6's are long gone and my 8's are laying on top of the clothes heap too. It freaks me out a bit because I don't think the fact that "I am pregnant" has actually sank in and I'm gaining weight. Some of it is water retention because my fingers and legs are puffy but geez!! I also have been STARVING - crazy hungry - the hubby keeps laughing at me because I'm eating so much cauliflower and fruit.....can't help it though. My belly always seems to be growling!
I need to catch up with everyone and promise to work on that - I've been sleeping just about every spare minute that I have lately.....another really unusual thing for me. Oh btw - we have our sonogram next Friday to count babies - LOL - my doctor thinks that is a funny joke.......I'm beginning to wonder though with my growing belly???
Gotta get back to work - (((HUGS))) to you all!
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