It seems strange to say that literally the day I posted my last post, which mainly revolved entirely around weight loss tips, literally a little over 12 hours later, I lost my job.
Over the past couple of months or so, I have been commenting on how my job was making me miserable. I guess it was kind of an omen, and especially the post a few months ago where I commented I was pretty close to losing my job, finally comes to a head.
I've only had about four jobs in my entire life, not counting odd jobs or babysitting. The two in the middle I quit because of mistreatment, one ended because the restaurant closed, and the first one I got fired from because I couldn't sell time shares over the telephone when I was 18. So this is the first job I've been fired from in 6 years, so needless to say, it's kind of surreal. The jobs I quit, whatever was bothering me built up for so long, and the quitting was dramatic, so it was kind of like the ending registered. It was there.
When I got fired, they did it right before my regularly scheduled lunch hour. When they fired me, I didn't get upset. I acted like I didn't care, and I always thought when it got to this point I would actually be excited because I could focus on getting the job I want, which did float through my mind for a moment. But when it happened, I started thinking about this: Literally the day before I got fired, I applied for and got approved for a credit card (my first!), and that same day went to go look for a new smart phone (largely why I'm getting a credit card), and then I started thinking that James is supposed to have oral surgery, and oh yeah! So am I! And not to mention, our wedding which we have been saving for! And oh yeah, my phone payment's due in 5 days and so is James! And cable! And how much we struggled when James supported both of us. I still didn't get upset, I wasn't going to let them think I cared. As I was leaving, I made my best effort to make it look like I was just leaving normally, and wasn't upset, but I'm sure I looked a little bit dazed. I didn't let it hit me until I got home and saw James, and to be honest I was only upset because I felt like I had let him down, but I didn't let him down. He had been waiting for this to end, and really so was I, but it was just awful timing!
So early this afternoon, we started driving around Gainesville looking for a job. We eventually decided to only stop at businesses with help wanted signs in the window. We drove around for not even an hour and I walked into a mexican restaurant. The manager asked me a grand total of three questions, told me what to wear and to be there at 11am Saturday, and I was kind of flustered as I started realizing that I was just handed a job. We even walked into one more place and got an application before I looked at James and said, "Did I just get a job?"
I feel like I'm in this weird in-between place. I still don't feel like I was ever fired. I feel like I just have a lot of days off this week because it felt so sudden. I'm still kind of in shock, even though I really hated it there, I really did. Maybe if I had reacted more, it would have been less strange feeling. It feels like a weird dream (and as someone who sometimes confuses the dreams with real life, it's even stranger feeling). Many people there were worse employees and missed more days than I did, but I'm honestly starting to think it was because I didn't kiss ass there, and I didn't act like I loved my job, and it's very hard for me to "fake it". They may have also just felt like they needed to make an example of me in my department. Whatever it was, I didn't care and that was probably conveyed more than I realized in my body language and actions, and it was time to move on.
Then getting handed another job so quickly feels strange. I'm so nervous about waitressing again, I haven't done so in about five years. It feels like it's too good to be true, so I'm afraid I'll screw up right away, which I know is ridiculous. I think when I start Saturday, for a few days I might feel like I have two jobs. None of it's hit me at all. I haven't even told my parents I got fired. It feels like some weird clerical error. Imagine their surprise when I just have a different job.
I'm hoping this feeling of shock wears off soon. Wish me luck at my new job!
Friday, April 08, 2011
Wednesday, April 06, 2011
I'm moving past the feeling
I've always been a little on the brazen side, especially when I write. I put things out there that I probably shouldn't. I don't see myself stopping any time soon, so here's s'more, whether you like it or not.
I am an emotional eater. Big time. I don't know if this is something I've ever said out loud to anyone. Over the past few weeks, I have been eating late at night. A habit I broke for quite some time, and for some reason is back. Well, not for some reason.
I'm always reading about bad eating habits and weight loss, and over the past few weeks I've found some really helpful things online. My biggest problem with weight loss is not staying active, it's what and how much I eat so I am usually looking for tips on controlling my eating habits, specifically emotional eating.
Probably the two most interesting things I've read on overeating, or emotional eating, is that the reason people overeat, and even emotional eating is partly biological. The reason people overeat is because we are biologically engineered to eat food when it is in abundance. Our minds trick us into thinking that this isn't going to last long, so we need to eat all of it, because humans were never made to live in a world where access to food is always readily available. We are biologically striving to store fat, because that is what used to be necessary for survival. What I read, also said that people who tend to store more fat, i.e. lower metabolisms, would have had the biological edge back then. If you think about why so many people are overweight, it makes sense. I've known people all my life, some I was close to and some I was not, that ate much less than I did, and were much heavier. Emotional eating is also a biological trigger. Our ancestors, in times of stress, would eat. This was for power, for fuel, a biological necessity to fight whatever was threatening them. This also makes sense when you think about the long term effects stress has on the body. The human body, while very resilient, was not designed for prolonged levels of stress like most people feel. That also explains more about why many people have to have some outside source of relieving that tension. Whether it's healthy or unhealthy, we all have coping mechanisms for stress.
While this is refreshing, I have to be careful that I don't use it as an excuse to eat badly (cause I will), but more as allowing myself to be easier on myself when I do slip up.
Lately, I have been eating just to eat. For example, today I started out very well as I usually do. Sometimes, I go bad from the start (haha!), but at least that's a consistent day! But anyways, when James got home from work we drove to Denton after finishing up my errands like we planned, and we ate at McCallister's. I probably ate more than I should have, but I didn't go overboard. But on the way home, my stomach was a little upset and I started talking about how I was going to eat some crackers when I got home to settle my stomach, but it felt like it was just an excuse to eat. I didn't eat the crackers when I got home, but after James went to bed, I ate about 10 or 15 of them, and a couple of hours later had a leftover cupcake and a cheese stick, and I wasn't hungry. My excuse was that I didn't want to go to bed (because I have a 6 day work week coming up, and work is depressing me) and as you can see I'm still not there. I'm sort of falling into this slump where I'm not doing anything productive.
I feel like the eating comes from boredom, which can be a big trigger for me. Even though I was always kind of aware that my eating was emotional, I'm really trying to dissect my eating habits so that I can end the bad ones. I think there's several parts to my emotional eating: One thing is that when I lived at home, there was limited to no junk food, and there was never soda. When we were younger, my mom would buy us a snack and a soda on Fridays if were good all week. This developed a pattern that I sort of perverted. What should of happened, was that if I was good all week with eating healthy then I could treat myself. Instead of that, I now feel entitled to it or like I deserve it because I had a long day so I eat crap. Though obviously, the "being good" all week, didn't have anything to do with diet. Fyi: I don't eat fast food very often. My crap refers to soda, chocolate, and if I mistakenly buy something horrible for the house. I think I also eat/drink the crappy stuff because I guess I felt deprived as a child, but I know now that I will do the same for my kids. My parents were so adamant about not letting us have soda that it became a false addiction. This is something I'm working to improve.
I also eat my feelings, especially when I'm depressed. I consider myself to be a highly emotional person, and I am expressive. I wouldn't consider myself to be passive aggressive. I think sometimes I feel things way more than I want to, or I use it as a way to distract myself or block myself from emotions. For example, a friend of mine and her boyfriend flipped their car twice after leaving my party. James told me after I found out that he had tried to stop him from driving, and my friend tried to drive but obviously that didn't happen. There was a whole horror story attached that sounded like something out of a movie. They are both okay though, and that's what matters. The point of my story is that when I found out, I didn't react like a normal person. I actually accused her of messing with me, and sent her a really nasty text that I won't write here, let's just say it was uncalled for, and she sent me a photo of her boyfriend's bruised up face. I think I reacted like that, because I immediately felt a sense of guilt, and I didn't want to believe it. I can be extremely cold to people I love because I want to seperate myself from feeling or caring about other people. Over the past few days, I have even mentioned that I don't want to see them for a while, and mentally thought some things trying to even dissuade myself from being their friend anymore, which wasn't real. This same friend had an accident where her hip popped out of place for months because she fell after I lost my balance hugging her and accidentally put all of my weight on her. Not long after something pretty traumatic happened (not between us), but anyways paramedics and cops were called and she was carried away in an ambulance, and while she will admit she avoided everyone for a while, I wasn't as good as a friend as I probably should have been. But, I'm not really processing it the way I should be. The truth is I feel really bad, and I'm just trying to give myself an excuse to not apologize because I feel guilty, even though James told me I should not feel guilty because it's not my fault, and it was scary, and they can be emotionally draining to be friends with.
And another reason I think is that I feel empty and unsatisfied with my life right now, and I feel stuck. This is partly why I feel depressed which also adds to my overeating habits. And the last reason is that I have always felt like a dissapointment to other people because of my weight (which is ridiculous because I've never really been that big). I was a chubby kid, and I still have self image issues because of this. I guess I felt like I was supposed to be perfect, which is still something I struggle with. I'm just not happy with myself, and that's the biggest reason why I overeat. On that note, your mind, in another biological trick, gets a high or a genetic benefit from being right, so you will rebel from eating healthy if you're doing it for other people. Just like you won't stick to an excercise if you don't want to be healthy based on your own decision to do so.
Oh, and before I go: A couple of neat tricks I learned about how to talk myself out of eating at night: This article said to treat yourself as you would a newborn, or your child. You wouldn't let your children overeat, you would put your newborn to sleep when it was tired, you wouldn't wake them if they weren't well rested, you would make sure they only had healthy food when they were hungry, so you should treat yourself like that. Another tip was to imagine yourself as your ideal self. What your habits would be, how you would spend your basic day, the things you probably don't think about when you think about your future or ideal life. But if you catch yourself engaging in a bad habit, ask yourself: "Would my ideal self do this?" "Would my ideal self be sitting here gorging on chips and dip at midnight?" "Would the person I eventually want to become eat an entire bag of M&Ms by herself?". This has been extremely helpful for me.
[Note: Sorry this blog post is so scatter-brained. I'll try to go back and edit it later. My blog seems to mostly be a place where I vent and process my feelings and feel much better afterwards, even if no one reads it.]
I am an emotional eater. Big time. I don't know if this is something I've ever said out loud to anyone. Over the past few weeks, I have been eating late at night. A habit I broke for quite some time, and for some reason is back. Well, not for some reason.
I'm always reading about bad eating habits and weight loss, and over the past few weeks I've found some really helpful things online. My biggest problem with weight loss is not staying active, it's what and how much I eat so I am usually looking for tips on controlling my eating habits, specifically emotional eating.
Probably the two most interesting things I've read on overeating, or emotional eating, is that the reason people overeat, and even emotional eating is partly biological. The reason people overeat is because we are biologically engineered to eat food when it is in abundance. Our minds trick us into thinking that this isn't going to last long, so we need to eat all of it, because humans were never made to live in a world where access to food is always readily available. We are biologically striving to store fat, because that is what used to be necessary for survival. What I read, also said that people who tend to store more fat, i.e. lower metabolisms, would have had the biological edge back then. If you think about why so many people are overweight, it makes sense. I've known people all my life, some I was close to and some I was not, that ate much less than I did, and were much heavier. Emotional eating is also a biological trigger. Our ancestors, in times of stress, would eat. This was for power, for fuel, a biological necessity to fight whatever was threatening them. This also makes sense when you think about the long term effects stress has on the body. The human body, while very resilient, was not designed for prolonged levels of stress like most people feel. That also explains more about why many people have to have some outside source of relieving that tension. Whether it's healthy or unhealthy, we all have coping mechanisms for stress.
While this is refreshing, I have to be careful that I don't use it as an excuse to eat badly (cause I will), but more as allowing myself to be easier on myself when I do slip up.
Lately, I have been eating just to eat. For example, today I started out very well as I usually do. Sometimes, I go bad from the start (haha!), but at least that's a consistent day! But anyways, when James got home from work we drove to Denton after finishing up my errands like we planned, and we ate at McCallister's. I probably ate more than I should have, but I didn't go overboard. But on the way home, my stomach was a little upset and I started talking about how I was going to eat some crackers when I got home to settle my stomach, but it felt like it was just an excuse to eat. I didn't eat the crackers when I got home, but after James went to bed, I ate about 10 or 15 of them, and a couple of hours later had a leftover cupcake and a cheese stick, and I wasn't hungry. My excuse was that I didn't want to go to bed (because I have a 6 day work week coming up, and work is depressing me) and as you can see I'm still not there. I'm sort of falling into this slump where I'm not doing anything productive.
I feel like the eating comes from boredom, which can be a big trigger for me. Even though I was always kind of aware that my eating was emotional, I'm really trying to dissect my eating habits so that I can end the bad ones. I think there's several parts to my emotional eating: One thing is that when I lived at home, there was limited to no junk food, and there was never soda. When we were younger, my mom would buy us a snack and a soda on Fridays if were good all week. This developed a pattern that I sort of perverted. What should of happened, was that if I was good all week with eating healthy then I could treat myself. Instead of that, I now feel entitled to it or like I deserve it because I had a long day so I eat crap. Though obviously, the "being good" all week, didn't have anything to do with diet. Fyi: I don't eat fast food very often. My crap refers to soda, chocolate, and if I mistakenly buy something horrible for the house. I think I also eat/drink the crappy stuff because I guess I felt deprived as a child, but I know now that I will do the same for my kids. My parents were so adamant about not letting us have soda that it became a false addiction. This is something I'm working to improve.
I also eat my feelings, especially when I'm depressed. I consider myself to be a highly emotional person, and I am expressive. I wouldn't consider myself to be passive aggressive. I think sometimes I feel things way more than I want to, or I use it as a way to distract myself or block myself from emotions. For example, a friend of mine and her boyfriend flipped their car twice after leaving my party. James told me after I found out that he had tried to stop him from driving, and my friend tried to drive but obviously that didn't happen. There was a whole horror story attached that sounded like something out of a movie. They are both okay though, and that's what matters. The point of my story is that when I found out, I didn't react like a normal person. I actually accused her of messing with me, and sent her a really nasty text that I won't write here, let's just say it was uncalled for, and she sent me a photo of her boyfriend's bruised up face. I think I reacted like that, because I immediately felt a sense of guilt, and I didn't want to believe it. I can be extremely cold to people I love because I want to seperate myself from feeling or caring about other people. Over the past few days, I have even mentioned that I don't want to see them for a while, and mentally thought some things trying to even dissuade myself from being their friend anymore, which wasn't real. This same friend had an accident where her hip popped out of place for months because she fell after I lost my balance hugging her and accidentally put all of my weight on her. Not long after something pretty traumatic happened (not between us), but anyways paramedics and cops were called and she was carried away in an ambulance, and while she will admit she avoided everyone for a while, I wasn't as good as a friend as I probably should have been. But, I'm not really processing it the way I should be. The truth is I feel really bad, and I'm just trying to give myself an excuse to not apologize because I feel guilty, even though James told me I should not feel guilty because it's not my fault, and it was scary, and they can be emotionally draining to be friends with.
And another reason I think is that I feel empty and unsatisfied with my life right now, and I feel stuck. This is partly why I feel depressed which also adds to my overeating habits. And the last reason is that I have always felt like a dissapointment to other people because of my weight (which is ridiculous because I've never really been that big). I was a chubby kid, and I still have self image issues because of this. I guess I felt like I was supposed to be perfect, which is still something I struggle with. I'm just not happy with myself, and that's the biggest reason why I overeat. On that note, your mind, in another biological trick, gets a high or a genetic benefit from being right, so you will rebel from eating healthy if you're doing it for other people. Just like you won't stick to an excercise if you don't want to be healthy based on your own decision to do so.
Oh, and before I go: A couple of neat tricks I learned about how to talk myself out of eating at night: This article said to treat yourself as you would a newborn, or your child. You wouldn't let your children overeat, you would put your newborn to sleep when it was tired, you wouldn't wake them if they weren't well rested, you would make sure they only had healthy food when they were hungry, so you should treat yourself like that. Another tip was to imagine yourself as your ideal self. What your habits would be, how you would spend your basic day, the things you probably don't think about when you think about your future or ideal life. But if you catch yourself engaging in a bad habit, ask yourself: "Would my ideal self do this?" "Would my ideal self be sitting here gorging on chips and dip at midnight?" "Would the person I eventually want to become eat an entire bag of M&Ms by herself?". This has been extremely helpful for me.
[Note: Sorry this blog post is so scatter-brained. I'll try to go back and edit it later. My blog seems to mostly be a place where I vent and process my feelings and feel much better afterwards, even if no one reads it.]
Saturday, March 19, 2011
24 approaches ...
As my 24th birthday approaches, I'm finding that this funky mood I've been in isn't going away. Since adolescence, I would say 13 or 14, I've always had a kind of depression. I go through periods where I feel like I've dropped off the face of the earth, where I go between feelings of helplessness and just complete apathy. For the most part, the depressive periods don't last long, especially in the last few years where I've only been depressed about once a month (haha).
It seems like this one has only come about in the past week or so, I can't place it exactly. The point is I was fine, I was excited about planning my wedding, and then not even a week ago I suddenly became aware of my birthday being close. This might have been the first year where I wasn't a kid about it. Usually about a month before, I jokingly (well, half jokingly) remind everyone that my birthday is approaching. The other day James and I were watching something on television and I looked at him, and said surprisingly that it was only a couple of weeks until my birthday, and I'm still fine. I went shopping with my mom the other day and I didn't mention it once. Since that moment I acknowledged my birthday, little by little, each time I mention it, and then the past few days where I'm wholly aware of it, this kind of dread is seeping in.
For the first time in my life, I feel a little bit like I'm not sure I want to celebrate it and maybe I'm starting to understand why some people don't care about their birthdays. I'm not sure if my upcoming birthday is the reason for my melancholy. When I was growing up, my parents always made birthdays so special, and I would literally wake up feeling like the greatest person in the world. I remember the warmth and love I felt for myself, used to feel for myself, on that day, and how it radiates from my parents so it feels weird that I should have any apprehension towards it.
There are several factors I believe that are contributing to this funk:
1. My frustration with my horrible job and mostly horrible coworkers. I can always find something good about everyone, but one of my key faults has always been that I am terribly honest about myself and other people. Observance of other people makes faults in other people surface, and since I tend to be unforgiving of my own faults, I have trouble not seeing the faults of others, though I do forgive people rather easily. I always say I am too lazy to hold a grudge. However, I find myself dissapointed with most people. One of my very good friends told me once that I don't like anyone. I don't know if this has more to do with my distrust of most people, or that I'm just picky about the people I choose to spend time with. I think it's the latter. I've always a small group of friends. I'm not into having 100 friends who I barely talk to, when I could have 10 that I'm close to, and have meaningful conversations with. Either way, most of the people I work with are dumb as bricks, gossip hounds, or looking for any chance to stab you in the back. As if the job doesn't suck enough. It's draining to listen to a coworker literally complain about someone else for 20 minutes or talk about how Jeff Dunham is the funniest guy in the world (puke).
2. Part of that job frustration is how I seem to be taking up the slack of a guy who worked only nights who quit recently. I can't tell you how irritating it is to maybe get to see my fiance, that I live with, for maybe an hour in an entire day. When I work until 11 or 12 (only occassionally 12), I also can't go to bed for several hours. It doesn't matter how little sleep I got the night before, it takes me three to five hours to wind down enough to sleep, and lately I can't sleep past 11:30 which sucks when you went to bed at 3 or 4, and sometimes I can't wind down until 5 or 6, in the morning.
3. This job is soul sucking in so many senses of the word. Most of the time, I am mind numbingly bored by doing repetitive tasks and/or "conversations" with my coworkers. Not to mention that I work for what I consider to be the greediest, penny pinching, bigots of all time. There is absolutely no creativity in my job, and when I don't have it in my life, my mood goes south. Not to mention the fact that I still haven't found another job, which I have little to no time to look for, plus I feel like I'm underqualified for everything even with a bachelor's degree.
4. James and I have had little, to no time together whatsoever where it's just us being together. It's all been wedding planning, getting our pictures taken, looking at places or us working completely different schedules because where I work they apparently don't believe in giving people the same work shifts unless you've worked there close to ten years, and us having plans with other people.
5. After my last story in February for the paper, I've recently been given another story for a barber shop in town. This place is only open Thursday - Saturday, and I tend to have the worst hours on those days. So now, I'm just completely overwhelmed with wedding planning, the newspaper, work, and never seeing James. While wedding planning is fun and exciting, it is also very time consuming.
6. I've been reevaluating what it is that makes me happy, and I'm beginning to worry it's not what I went to school for. What makes me happy is the people in my life and while I already knew that, I don't think I am going to be happy with a life consuming career. The things I enjoy doing are not things that make a lot of money, though that doesn't matter to me as long as I am happy. (Photography, writing, graphic design ...)
7. Mostly, I think I'm just feeling stuck. Stuck in this horrible job and I'm scared that this is it. I'm also about to have more oral surgery (oh joy!) and am just thinking about how much further it will put me behind. It also makes me worry about my job because any time I have any kind of oral surgery/am on pain killers, I tend to need about a week's recovery time, and since my attendance is not great to begin with I'm afraid I'll just be fired. I keep putting off even making an appointment because I know even if I don't get fired, we can't afford a week's worth of work not on my paycheck. Not to mention my phobia of all things dentist related. And now, I'm turning 24 (which sounds so old! Way too close to 25!) and where am I in life? Nowhere it feels like. My self esteem over the past week has plummeted in almost every way imaginable. I know I'm getting there, but do I have to be so overwhelmed in the process?
Whenever I get in this mood, I tend to avoid all responsibility in my life. I don't check my e-mail, I don't do the things I know I need to in order to succeed at something I'd much rather be doing than working at my horrible job. I guess I shouldn't be in such a hurry to get everything figured out, and I should know by now that good things only come through hard work and perserverance. I should listen when I tell myself not to expect over night changes. I just don't know how much longer I can stay at this soul-sucking job.
It seems like this one has only come about in the past week or so, I can't place it exactly. The point is I was fine, I was excited about planning my wedding, and then not even a week ago I suddenly became aware of my birthday being close. This might have been the first year where I wasn't a kid about it. Usually about a month before, I jokingly (well, half jokingly) remind everyone that my birthday is approaching. The other day James and I were watching something on television and I looked at him, and said surprisingly that it was only a couple of weeks until my birthday, and I'm still fine. I went shopping with my mom the other day and I didn't mention it once. Since that moment I acknowledged my birthday, little by little, each time I mention it, and then the past few days where I'm wholly aware of it, this kind of dread is seeping in.
For the first time in my life, I feel a little bit like I'm not sure I want to celebrate it and maybe I'm starting to understand why some people don't care about their birthdays. I'm not sure if my upcoming birthday is the reason for my melancholy. When I was growing up, my parents always made birthdays so special, and I would literally wake up feeling like the greatest person in the world. I remember the warmth and love I felt for myself, used to feel for myself, on that day, and how it radiates from my parents so it feels weird that I should have any apprehension towards it.
There are several factors I believe that are contributing to this funk:
1. My frustration with my horrible job and mostly horrible coworkers. I can always find something good about everyone, but one of my key faults has always been that I am terribly honest about myself and other people. Observance of other people makes faults in other people surface, and since I tend to be unforgiving of my own faults, I have trouble not seeing the faults of others, though I do forgive people rather easily. I always say I am too lazy to hold a grudge. However, I find myself dissapointed with most people. One of my very good friends told me once that I don't like anyone. I don't know if this has more to do with my distrust of most people, or that I'm just picky about the people I choose to spend time with. I think it's the latter. I've always a small group of friends. I'm not into having 100 friends who I barely talk to, when I could have 10 that I'm close to, and have meaningful conversations with. Either way, most of the people I work with are dumb as bricks, gossip hounds, or looking for any chance to stab you in the back. As if the job doesn't suck enough. It's draining to listen to a coworker literally complain about someone else for 20 minutes or talk about how Jeff Dunham is the funniest guy in the world (puke).
2. Part of that job frustration is how I seem to be taking up the slack of a guy who worked only nights who quit recently. I can't tell you how irritating it is to maybe get to see my fiance, that I live with, for maybe an hour in an entire day. When I work until 11 or 12 (only occassionally 12), I also can't go to bed for several hours. It doesn't matter how little sleep I got the night before, it takes me three to five hours to wind down enough to sleep, and lately I can't sleep past 11:30 which sucks when you went to bed at 3 or 4, and sometimes I can't wind down until 5 or 6, in the morning.
3. This job is soul sucking in so many senses of the word. Most of the time, I am mind numbingly bored by doing repetitive tasks and/or "conversations" with my coworkers. Not to mention that I work for what I consider to be the greediest, penny pinching, bigots of all time. There is absolutely no creativity in my job, and when I don't have it in my life, my mood goes south. Not to mention the fact that I still haven't found another job, which I have little to no time to look for, plus I feel like I'm underqualified for everything even with a bachelor's degree.
4. James and I have had little, to no time together whatsoever where it's just us being together. It's all been wedding planning, getting our pictures taken, looking at places or us working completely different schedules because where I work they apparently don't believe in giving people the same work shifts unless you've worked there close to ten years, and us having plans with other people.
5. After my last story in February for the paper, I've recently been given another story for a barber shop in town. This place is only open Thursday - Saturday, and I tend to have the worst hours on those days. So now, I'm just completely overwhelmed with wedding planning, the newspaper, work, and never seeing James. While wedding planning is fun and exciting, it is also very time consuming.
6. I've been reevaluating what it is that makes me happy, and I'm beginning to worry it's not what I went to school for. What makes me happy is the people in my life and while I already knew that, I don't think I am going to be happy with a life consuming career. The things I enjoy doing are not things that make a lot of money, though that doesn't matter to me as long as I am happy. (Photography, writing, graphic design ...)
7. Mostly, I think I'm just feeling stuck. Stuck in this horrible job and I'm scared that this is it. I'm also about to have more oral surgery (oh joy!) and am just thinking about how much further it will put me behind. It also makes me worry about my job because any time I have any kind of oral surgery/am on pain killers, I tend to need about a week's recovery time, and since my attendance is not great to begin with I'm afraid I'll just be fired. I keep putting off even making an appointment because I know even if I don't get fired, we can't afford a week's worth of work not on my paycheck. Not to mention my phobia of all things dentist related. And now, I'm turning 24 (which sounds so old! Way too close to 25!) and where am I in life? Nowhere it feels like. My self esteem over the past week has plummeted in almost every way imaginable. I know I'm getting there, but do I have to be so overwhelmed in the process?
Whenever I get in this mood, I tend to avoid all responsibility in my life. I don't check my e-mail, I don't do the things I know I need to in order to succeed at something I'd much rather be doing than working at my horrible job. I guess I shouldn't be in such a hurry to get everything figured out, and I should know by now that good things only come through hard work and perserverance. I should listen when I tell myself not to expect over night changes. I just don't know how much longer I can stay at this soul-sucking job.
Friday, February 25, 2011
Holes, so many holes ...
I just realized the prescence of a very large hole in between my last two posts. Particularly the bit about being terrified of marriage, and then a month later my very obvious status change from "terrified" to "ecstatic".
The reason I grew terrified is because I was, as I mentioned several times, looking at the word "marriage" as a life sentence. I thought once I got married that was it. Once I got married, I couldn't do all the things I wanted to, especially the things that involved travel and trying all sorts of different careers and places to live.
So, I changed the way I was thinking about it. If James and I had never got engaged, never planned to wed, would things be different? No. James has always maintained that he would go with me wherever my life (our life) took me (or us). His common denominator is me. Mine is him. Neither of our lives feel complete without the other in it. The only difference between being engaged and being married is a slight name change for me and the loss of my parent's insurance which I'll be dropped from when I turn 25 anyway, which by the time we're married will only be about six months away or less since we're planning on a fall wedding.
What we'll gain from being married means a lot more.
The reason I grew terrified is because I was, as I mentioned several times, looking at the word "marriage" as a life sentence. I thought once I got married that was it. Once I got married, I couldn't do all the things I wanted to, especially the things that involved travel and trying all sorts of different careers and places to live.
So, I changed the way I was thinking about it. If James and I had never got engaged, never planned to wed, would things be different? No. James has always maintained that he would go with me wherever my life (our life) took me (or us). His common denominator is me. Mine is him. Neither of our lives feel complete without the other in it. The only difference between being engaged and being married is a slight name change for me and the loss of my parent's insurance which I'll be dropped from when I turn 25 anyway, which by the time we're married will only be about six months away or less since we're planning on a fall wedding.
What we'll gain from being married means a lot more.
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
My new story and some things I've missed ...
Here is the link to my newest story, that was published the 11th:
http://www.gainesvilleregister.com/local/x1227161495/Otts-Furniture-celebrates-50th-birthday-Saturday
One thing, I'm realizing that I missed was my curiosity for new music. It sounds strange to say that I didn't have time for it last semester. A few of the things I've been digging lately are LadyTron, Two Door Cinema Club, and Beirut, bands I already knew about but am re-discovering their music. I'm getting back into Cage the Elephant and Florence and The Machine. I've decided that a portion of this large income tax check is going to be devoted to more music. While our CD collection is large, a lot of it is not new. Most of the time, I am listening to my new music on the internet at home. I am one of those odd people who don't have an Ipod. Well, we have an Ipod shuffle but it never grew on me. While there is something I LOVE about a sort of soundtrack to my life, I also love to hear people talking, birds chirping, construction even. There is something musical in itself, and something that's a big part of my creativity in the everyday. I hate people who pop in their earbuds at every opportunity (make that missed opportunity) to be engaged in life. I like to soak it all in: the sights, the sounds. But I love music when I drive, and as someone who used to clock about 350 to 450 miles a week in my car, having good CDs can make a world of difference!
Also, in recent news, James and I have been discussing wedding plans again, and tonight I put a down payment on the perfect wedding dress for me! Unfortunately, I did not save the image for some reason, just the link and she removed the listing so I don't have a good picture to show you, but I messaged her and hopefully she can send me a full size jpeg to share with everyone. Since I paid the down payment on the dress, it's starting to feel real, but I'm excited. I'm realizing that the hesitation that was coming with actually starting to plan was nothing but just that I started treating marriage as a life sentence, as an end of sorts. I got into this weird mindset that once I got married, I would never travel, would start popping out kids immediately, and all my life's dreams would fall by the wayside. I guess I started to feel like I was losing my identity, and I started thinking of the word "marriage" as this scary, larger than life entity. We have lived together for almost three years, and it's pretty much going to be the same thing except we are just declaring our love for one another in front of our friends and families, and showing that our love is going to last forever. Just a stronger union, and I'm starting to feel as excited as I was when he first asked me. My only real concern is that after we get married, I will not be on my parent's amazing insurance anymore and I'm fixing to have to have a series of oral surgeries that we cannot afford, but now is the perfect time to take care of it, and most of my dental issues should be resolved by the time we get married.
And lastly, I was feeling some anxiety about not finding the perfect job yet and still working at Wal Mart, but lately I've found peace with it. I'm enjoying having actual days off now. I'm remembering what it's like to keep my house clean, and how great it feels to be home when it is. I'm experiencing what it's like to go out to dinner with James, and not thinking constantly about the work I have to do when I get home. I'm remembering what it's like to get 8 hours or more of sleep a night. I'm remembering what it's like to read for fun. I'm remembering what it's like to have a social life again, what it's like to have free time again. It's really nice that I'm able to have this time right now to, I guess, feel like a normal person again, so while I'm still trying to get a better job, I'm not going to freak out because things aren't happening immediately, and now I actually have time to plan my wedding!
A few pictures of my wedding dress that will be here around the middle of March:
http://www.gainesvilleregister.com/local/x1227161495/Otts-Furniture-celebrates-50th-birthday-Saturday
One thing, I'm realizing that I missed was my curiosity for new music. It sounds strange to say that I didn't have time for it last semester. A few of the things I've been digging lately are LadyTron, Two Door Cinema Club, and Beirut, bands I already knew about but am re-discovering their music. I'm getting back into Cage the Elephant and Florence and The Machine. I've decided that a portion of this large income tax check is going to be devoted to more music. While our CD collection is large, a lot of it is not new. Most of the time, I am listening to my new music on the internet at home. I am one of those odd people who don't have an Ipod. Well, we have an Ipod shuffle but it never grew on me. While there is something I LOVE about a sort of soundtrack to my life, I also love to hear people talking, birds chirping, construction even. There is something musical in itself, and something that's a big part of my creativity in the everyday. I hate people who pop in their earbuds at every opportunity (make that missed opportunity) to be engaged in life. I like to soak it all in: the sights, the sounds. But I love music when I drive, and as someone who used to clock about 350 to 450 miles a week in my car, having good CDs can make a world of difference!
Also, in recent news, James and I have been discussing wedding plans again, and tonight I put a down payment on the perfect wedding dress for me! Unfortunately, I did not save the image for some reason, just the link and she removed the listing so I don't have a good picture to show you, but I messaged her and hopefully she can send me a full size jpeg to share with everyone. Since I paid the down payment on the dress, it's starting to feel real, but I'm excited. I'm realizing that the hesitation that was coming with actually starting to plan was nothing but just that I started treating marriage as a life sentence, as an end of sorts. I got into this weird mindset that once I got married, I would never travel, would start popping out kids immediately, and all my life's dreams would fall by the wayside. I guess I started to feel like I was losing my identity, and I started thinking of the word "marriage" as this scary, larger than life entity. We have lived together for almost three years, and it's pretty much going to be the same thing except we are just declaring our love for one another in front of our friends and families, and showing that our love is going to last forever. Just a stronger union, and I'm starting to feel as excited as I was when he first asked me. My only real concern is that after we get married, I will not be on my parent's amazing insurance anymore and I'm fixing to have to have a series of oral surgeries that we cannot afford, but now is the perfect time to take care of it, and most of my dental issues should be resolved by the time we get married.
And lastly, I was feeling some anxiety about not finding the perfect job yet and still working at Wal Mart, but lately I've found peace with it. I'm enjoying having actual days off now. I'm remembering what it's like to keep my house clean, and how great it feels to be home when it is. I'm experiencing what it's like to go out to dinner with James, and not thinking constantly about the work I have to do when I get home. I'm remembering what it's like to get 8 hours or more of sleep a night. I'm remembering what it's like to read for fun. I'm remembering what it's like to have a social life again, what it's like to have free time again. It's really nice that I'm able to have this time right now to, I guess, feel like a normal person again, so while I'm still trying to get a better job, I'm not going to freak out because things aren't happening immediately, and now I actually have time to plan my wedding!
A few pictures of my wedding dress that will be here around the middle of March:
I am so excited! I can't wait!
Thursday, January 13, 2011
Finally ...
I graduated from the University of North Texas the 18th of last month. The feeling that afternoon and that night was one of infinite hope. I was so proud of myself. And I still have those feelings, but that day and night is something I'll always hold in my memory.
The day after graduation, I was sick for almost two weeks with an upper respiratory infection that moved into my sinuses. I guess my body was just tired of all the nights where I either didn't make it to bed or got very little sleep, and the stress. It's weird how adrenaline kept me well up until the day after I graduated.
During those two weeks, I was just focused on getting better. I actually missed a lot of work, and to be honest, I'm probably pretty close to losing my job. Deep down, we know it's time to move on but honestly we still need the money, and while I'm not trying to lose my job, I know I will mess up eventually because I'm not perfect and the next time I mess up, I'm out of there.
But that's not important either. On the 1st, about an hour after the new year began, I started a huge list about all the things I wanted to start working on EVERY DAY (yes, I have a tendency to over inflate the amount of time I can devote to, well, everything).
If you're not aware the day before I graduated, I had a meeting with the publisher of the Gainesville Daily Register who let me know that they had set up a series of feature stories for me, that are to be published on the front page, along with letting me know that if I have any pictures I take that I think are good, they will buy them from me and also publish them on the front page.
This, along with my ambitious plan to organize my entire apartment, practice poetry and short story writing every day, work on my website every day, job hunt every day, work out every day, take 100 - 300 pictures a day (a suggestion of my professor), read for fun, job hunt every day, work on this series of stories for the paper, along with keeping my current job, and making time for a social life, has turned me into a nuerotic mess.
When I was at home with James before work, or when we both had a day off, I was filling myself with this sort of anxious energy where I couldn't relax unless I was working on something on this list. Unless I was working on something on this list I was driving myself crazy. I would not relax. All I would talk about would be that I feel guilty that I'm not being productive. Then the first time I told James about how hard it was to go back to work after I graduated, and how I feel when I'm not doing these other things, like I'm going to spend the rest of my life at Wal Mart.
I guess after I graduated, and got well, and maybe even the beginning of the new year made me suddenly aware of time again. After I turned 23, I went through a sort of crisis where I suddenly felt how quickly my days, weeks, and months were going by and I felt older and suddenly aware of my own mortality. After about a month, I sort of lost it again. I guess it's back again. Is this what being an adult is like? You have large periods of time where you're too busy too think about time and then you have a week or two where you feel like your whole life is over and you better start accomplishing things or in a couple of blinks you'll be 40, and have kids, and get married and that's just it.
Maybe it's just general confusion about what it is I'm SUPPOSED TO be doing right now. And maybe I'm a little bit afraid of marriage all of a sudden because it sounds like a sentence. The first syllable doesn't sound so bad. But when I get to the -AGE, it's a little bit like a sunken feeling in my stomach. Like the end of this sentence is the end of my goals. Even though I know largely it will be the same between us, I'm afraid of all of this. I'm afraid of not accomplishing my goals before I die, and it sounds crazy but I can't calm down.
After James and I got into a small argument today after I was once again, in my anxious mood and I was getting upset because I thought I was going to have to do all this crap to get a new license, when come to find out I lost in my car and I was getting mad because I wanted to do other things today, so James actually told me he wanted for us to have an okay day because I had been irritable and I hadn't been able to just be with him without thinking, or talking, about other things, but today I did. We had a wonderful day where I didn't work on one thing and I did, I completely forgot about it.
But now, I'm afraid I'm addicted to overdrive. I'm so used to keeping an insane pace that I don't know how to relax. That I don't know how to slow down, or stop thinking and worrying about everything all the time. I just need to learn how to relax again. Either I'm losing it or trying to do this job and trying to find a career just isn't working. I'm just struggling with self motivation after college. I know if I don't stay self motivated, I will just sink into a depression, though it may not be so bad since I do have this freelance thing. But then it's like I'm anxious about making sure I stay self motivated and if I take a day off then I wasted a day. Who thinks like this? I wasted a day, and now my life is ruined. This is crazy, and I do know one thing: I can't handle this much stress for much longer, so I'm going to have to make a decision soon.
I just feel lost, like I lost my identity when I graduated. And overwhelmed. Definitely overwhelmed.
The day after graduation, I was sick for almost two weeks with an upper respiratory infection that moved into my sinuses. I guess my body was just tired of all the nights where I either didn't make it to bed or got very little sleep, and the stress. It's weird how adrenaline kept me well up until the day after I graduated.
During those two weeks, I was just focused on getting better. I actually missed a lot of work, and to be honest, I'm probably pretty close to losing my job. Deep down, we know it's time to move on but honestly we still need the money, and while I'm not trying to lose my job, I know I will mess up eventually because I'm not perfect and the next time I mess up, I'm out of there.
But that's not important either. On the 1st, about an hour after the new year began, I started a huge list about all the things I wanted to start working on EVERY DAY (yes, I have a tendency to over inflate the amount of time I can devote to, well, everything).
If you're not aware the day before I graduated, I had a meeting with the publisher of the Gainesville Daily Register who let me know that they had set up a series of feature stories for me, that are to be published on the front page, along with letting me know that if I have any pictures I take that I think are good, they will buy them from me and also publish them on the front page.
This, along with my ambitious plan to organize my entire apartment, practice poetry and short story writing every day, work on my website every day, job hunt every day, work out every day, take 100 - 300 pictures a day (a suggestion of my professor), read for fun, job hunt every day, work on this series of stories for the paper, along with keeping my current job, and making time for a social life, has turned me into a nuerotic mess.
When I was at home with James before work, or when we both had a day off, I was filling myself with this sort of anxious energy where I couldn't relax unless I was working on something on this list. Unless I was working on something on this list I was driving myself crazy. I would not relax. All I would talk about would be that I feel guilty that I'm not being productive. Then the first time I told James about how hard it was to go back to work after I graduated, and how I feel when I'm not doing these other things, like I'm going to spend the rest of my life at Wal Mart.
I guess after I graduated, and got well, and maybe even the beginning of the new year made me suddenly aware of time again. After I turned 23, I went through a sort of crisis where I suddenly felt how quickly my days, weeks, and months were going by and I felt older and suddenly aware of my own mortality. After about a month, I sort of lost it again. I guess it's back again. Is this what being an adult is like? You have large periods of time where you're too busy too think about time and then you have a week or two where you feel like your whole life is over and you better start accomplishing things or in a couple of blinks you'll be 40, and have kids, and get married and that's just it.
Maybe it's just general confusion about what it is I'm SUPPOSED TO be doing right now. And maybe I'm a little bit afraid of marriage all of a sudden because it sounds like a sentence. The first syllable doesn't sound so bad. But when I get to the -AGE, it's a little bit like a sunken feeling in my stomach. Like the end of this sentence is the end of my goals. Even though I know largely it will be the same between us, I'm afraid of all of this. I'm afraid of not accomplishing my goals before I die, and it sounds crazy but I can't calm down.
After James and I got into a small argument today after I was once again, in my anxious mood and I was getting upset because I thought I was going to have to do all this crap to get a new license, when come to find out I lost in my car and I was getting mad because I wanted to do other things today, so James actually told me he wanted for us to have an okay day because I had been irritable and I hadn't been able to just be with him without thinking, or talking, about other things, but today I did. We had a wonderful day where I didn't work on one thing and I did, I completely forgot about it.
But now, I'm afraid I'm addicted to overdrive. I'm so used to keeping an insane pace that I don't know how to relax. That I don't know how to slow down, or stop thinking and worrying about everything all the time. I just need to learn how to relax again. Either I'm losing it or trying to do this job and trying to find a career just isn't working. I'm just struggling with self motivation after college. I know if I don't stay self motivated, I will just sink into a depression, though it may not be so bad since I do have this freelance thing. But then it's like I'm anxious about making sure I stay self motivated and if I take a day off then I wasted a day. Who thinks like this? I wasted a day, and now my life is ruined. This is crazy, and I do know one thing: I can't handle this much stress for much longer, so I'm going to have to make a decision soon.
I just feel lost, like I lost my identity when I graduated. And overwhelmed. Definitely overwhelmed.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
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