What a waste

I woke up at 5:45 AM and very tired. I just dillydallied around for about one hour before I left for work. 

It is frigid outside. The wind made it well below zero in windchill. I got to work and realized I was further behind than I was three weeks ago. That is after working most weekends. I don’t know how that happened, but it needs to stop! I worked most of the day hard, and at about 5:15 PM, I decided it was time to go home. When he got home, I continued my bad eating habits. I need to stop this.

Tomorrow is February 1. It may be a great day to turn a new leaf and get serious. It’s like a New Year’s resolution, and it may not last, but I need to do something! I am wondering what software would be best. I have been using Fit Day and tried many others. I find that none of them do the job I want to do.

Carry on my friends, carry on!

Life repeats itself.

I slept relatively well Monday night. I was up at six and went to a 7:30 AM dental visit. The roads were very icy, so I just made it on time. What sucks is they have been nursing this one tooth for the past three years, and now they say I should have a crown. However, insurance will not cover a crown for a tooth worked on in the past five years. So screw them. I will nurse it along for 52 months and let them pay then… It's pretty dumb, but so is $1,200 for a crown. WTF… You may want to look for other dentists.

Work sucks! I hate going to work on weekdays and getting further behind each day to go in on Saturday and Sunday to catch up… It just is not right. On Tuesday night, I ate really bad. I should know better! Why do I eat and get so fat? I do not get it, but I eat from strew so often… This needs to stop, and I need to get back on track. Running a mile seems hard!

Wednesday was not much better. Life repeats daily, except I am aging and gaining a few pounds each month. That is stupid to think if I did not gain weight, I would not be living. But that is the only thing that seems to change! Oh well, head to bed at 8:15 PM, and as usual, I expect to fall asleep after about an hour or more. I need to get my crap together! Enough is enough, isn’t it...

Carry on my friends, carry on!

Feel like Bill Murrey - Groundhog Day

Saturday, I woke at 4 AM and was tired. I went to work until 2:00 and then rushed home. I had a wedding to attend. I hate attending weddings. There is no middle road in a wedding. They are either people who are so in love or together—not talking about the bride and groom but the people who attend the wedding. This was a classic case of those who transferred from one to the other throughout the night. This happened right before my eyes. Then you see the “life of the party,” but you can tell it is all a front. I am sure when he goes home, he is an introvert—just my perception. I am getting better at reading people as I get older. It was 11 PM before I got home and went to bed. It may not seem bad for an average person, but getting less than 9 hours of sleep over the past two days is exhausting.

On Sunday, I woke with an average night's rest. I was up at 7:30 and worked on some photo editing. Later in the day, my girlfriend and I went to an Ice Carving competition. It was pretty cool. No, it's not temperature, but seeing the art in action is neat. The weather turned, and it was sleet and ice, and the roads were terrible! Fortunately, the drive home was not as bad as it could have been!

I had to deal with issues with my child on Sunday. There was an issue with medical expenses. Part of being a dad! I needed to sleep, so I took a solid dose of Nyquil and went to bed.

I sleep well from about 10:30 PM to 6:00 AM. However, I had a Nyquil hangover. I dragged myself to work, and then throughout the day, I was tired… I left work at 5 PM and came home to try to relax. There was just too much spinning in my mind. I have not worked out for three days, which is not good. I need to get on track. I have no idea what the hell is going on in this mind! I am older and lazier!

I will ensure I get a lunch and after-work workout tomorrow. I have to do that! I also really need to keep my diet in order. Logging and analysis take time but are well worth the effort. That is easy to say, but I have sucked at implementing good thoughts and words...

Carry on my friends, carry on!

WOW

 Wow, on Thursday morning, I woke up so tired! I had slept worse than I can recall in the recent past. I am trying to understand why! I did get to work, but without working out. I decided I would work through lunch again. I am not that eager to work out. I am no longer extremely sore like I have been in the past, but my energy is slightly lower.

On Thursday night, on the way home, I heard on the radio a couple who had made love every day for an entire year. They stated they were much healthier and happier, and the relationship was stronger. That seems really strange! I could give it a try. It was about 10 PM before I could go to bed on Thursday night. It was 12:30 before I fell asleep. Since we had someone stay overnight, I was delegated to the basement. It was freezing and a very uncomfortable place to sleep.

On Friday, I woke up and was as exhausted as I could ever imagine again. I made it to work early and managed to work all day, but I worked through lunch again. This is becoming a destructive pattern. I hate going to work only to leave work further behind than when I started. But then again, it is such a pleasure to have a job. In this economy, many people need a job. I went to bed on Friday night at about 9:30 PM. I am not tired at all, but I need to get some sleep.

BUT AS I CLOSE TONIGHT, I REMEMBER THAT OTHER PEOPLE MATTER. 

We need to take care of the other person to improve our lives. Even if we are having a tough time, somebody always has orders. We are so blessed, and we need to remember that.

It reminds me of a story I once heard…

This is from an old story from the ’30s when an ice cream sundae cost much less. A 10-year-old boy entered a hotel coffee shop and sat at a table. A waitress put a glass of water in front of him.

“How much is an ice cream sundae?” the little boy asked.

“Fifty cents,” replied the waitress.

The little boy pulled his hand out of his pocket and studied the coins he had. “Well, how much is a plain dish of ice cream?” he inquired.

More people were waiting for a table, and the waitress grew impatient. “Thirty-five cents,” she brusquely replied.

The little boy again counted his coins. “I’ll have the plain ice cream,” he said.

The waitress brought the ice cream, put the bill on the table, and walked away. The boy finished the ice cream, paid the cashier, and left. When the waitress came back, she began to cry. 

As she wiped down the table, two nickels and five pennies were placed neatly beside the empty dish. You see, he couldn’t have the sundae because he had to have enough money to leave her a tip.  

This was a great example of not being selfish!  

Carry on my friends, carry on!

Am I a slacker!

This morning, I woke at about 5 AM. I was not ready to get up and was very tired! I tried rather hard to go back to sleep, but finally, at about 6:45, I decided to get up. I went to the office and worked throughout the day. It was a hectic day, and I skipped lunch. I need to stop skipping lunch. After work, a co-worker was looking for encouragement to work out. I decided to go to the workout room, where I did the elliptical machine for 30 minutes. I completed 4.1 miles. It was a challenging workout.

After the workout, I returned to the office for about 45 minutes. I tried to get caught up from the day, but I just could not. My stress level has been relatively high. As a result, I am almost at my peak ever weight. When I was 15 years old, I once peaked at 298 pounds. In 2005, I peaked at 299 pounds. At my last check-up, I weighed in at 293 pounds. That is 84 pounds heavier than my low weight in 2006 and 127 pounds heavier than when I was 24.

Besides the very stressful job, my adult child has been a little more complicated. Although my child is in their 20’s, in graduate school, and should be more respectable, they are not. He will often go without responding to calls or text messages. I would like to know that everything is going okay during this time of stress. He is juggling a sports team, an internship, and graduate school. These are very difficult and are overly stressful as well. His health has been okay but could be better. He is also worried about relationships. Recently, within the last year, He broke up with a long-term mate of several years and met another relationship, and after five months!

Kids continue to be a parent’s pride and joy for years after they’ve flown the nest. However, the pleasure parents can experience from a grown child’s success cuts both ways. When adult children divorce, struggle financially, abuse drugs, or have similar life problems, it can have a significant impact on parents’ mental health and satisfaction. If you throw into the mix that people are worried about finances, any other issue that’s already there, like an ill child or a disabled child, is going to be magnified that much more.

I struggled significantly raising my child by myself. His mother had moved a thousand miles away after we divorced. I have done everything possible to ensure my child's success, but I sometimes think I failed. This stresses me as much as everything else. But you cannot change what you might’ve said, done, or addressed something. You have to live with that!  Yet that is life.

Carry on my friends, Carru ON!

Thoughts

I woke at 7:30 AM feeling good! However, after an hour, I felt average. Breakfast was not solid; the eggs were with cauliflower and peppers. I know better! I went to work at 9:00 AM and came home at 1:30 PM. I did some photo editing, made dinner, and headed to bed at about 8 PM. I did not find it easy to fall asleep.

I asked myself, “Am I depressed and unhappy”?

Depression is not only a state of being sad. It is a disease that conquers the ability to feel emotion, whether good or bad. Depression not only involves the mind, it also consists of the body and thoughts. They say depression affects twenty percent of all Americans, some without even knowing it, at some time during their lives. Every human being is prone to depression. Men are five times more likely to commit suicide when depressed than women. Men are likelier to keep their emotions bottled up inside of them because of their role in society and because they do not have society’s permission to express their feelings openly. This sounds like ME!

Sigmund Freud (above) believed that a person’s oblivious anger over a loss weakened the “ego,” which resulted in self-hate and self-injurious behavior. Aaron Beck steered differently. He believed that depressives looked at everything in a negative light and blamed themselves for everything that went wrong. This negative thinking made situations appear much worse than held true and raised the chance of depression. Martin Seligman, an American psychologist, thought that depression came from “learned helplessness,” an idea that one cannot control the effect of happenings. All of these theories may hold true in some cases.

As stated, there are many symptoms of depression. Sadness and loss of satisfaction in things once enjoyed are probably the most known symptoms. But some symptoms are sometimes overlooked. Guilt is one symptom that coincides with depression immensely. When feelings of guilt are put on a person, they lose hope. They blame themselves for things they are not accountable for and feel hopeless. Other symptoms overlooked are insomnia and loss of appetite. Not getting enough sleep may be linked to stress and guilt. Stress is another significant factor in depression.

Depression is not a matter I take lightly. It is not something I dismiss regularly, but I will not take it to heart and find help. Hundreds of people commit suicide each day because of depression. I sometimes have those thoughts, but I have enough control to overcome them. My most significant positive aspect is exercise; I am increasing that this year. If I could lose 60 pounds, everything would be better. So, it's time to be positive!!!

Carry On my friends, Carry on!