NEW BLOG

My new blog is up and running. Still need to post a pic to go on there...Now I just need to get you all on board to put my new url on your blogrolls!

Please email me at loislanejudy at yahoo dot com and I will make sure you get the link! I have already put my blogroll to the right into my new blog.

I would appreciate if you would delete this blog from your current blogrolls. Thanks!

I'm very excited about having a new focus and a new look!

A woman changed

So the thing is, I’ve started a new blog. I mean, I haven't posted to it yet or anything, except one post. But I just haven’t had the time to put the bells and whistles on it, so I’ve not been writing here or there. I am focusing more on the knockoff bag theme and soon, my marathon training.

But today, I HAD to update!

Happy one year anniversary to me!

Today is the one-year mark since I turned my life around, started eating healthier and exercising. The one year anniversary of my rebirth, I suppose, as a woman who took charge of her life and cherishes it now.

To think. A year ago today, I was 193 lbs. At my highest, which was earlier last year, I was 204 lbs.

Today I am 164.5 lbs. (only 19.5 lbs left to go!)

A year ago today, I could barely run for a full minute.

Today, I am in day 2 of training for a marathon.

A year ago today, my thighs would rest and you would see cellulite.

Today, you see my quads.

A year ago today, I was alone, lonely and sad, even though I was generally happy.

Today I am falling in love (if not already there!) and only lonely when I choose to be. I am happy, period.

A year ago today, my hair was long.

Today, it’s growing back from being cut super short. A move I would never have done as my former self.

A year ago today, I didn’t get into a bathing suit last summer but once, at a family barbecue.

This year, I’ve worn a bikini on the beach.

It just doesn’t get any better than this. Although we’ll see, in 19.5 more lbs., we’ll see after a few more weeks of marathon training.

Who knows what the future holds?! That’s why change is good!

So happy anniversary to me!

It's a knockoff life...

I'm still here.

Details to come...

Memories and daring yesterdays

Janet has tagged me and I must do my duty.

5 things I miss about my childhood, in no particular order

1. Shopping for school supplies. I didn’t like school clothes shopping because my mom dressed me very out of style as to what was in with the kids. I wore corduroy when it wasn’t cool and brandless sneakers. But I did, however, love school supply shopping. The passion I have for all things pens, pencils and paper grew out of school supply shopping. And the smell of a new trapper k??? New folders? Wire-bound notebooks? *sigh* Those were the best parts of late summer!

2. Playing with dolls. Every now and then, I wish I could bust out Barbie and dress her up and live her life for her, with that child’s innocence we all possess when we’re young and haven’t yet heard about the birds and a the bees.

3. The first day of school, every year.
It was so exciting! I couldn’t wait until I got my textbooks, and homework. I loved homework! I loved the anticipation and the challenge of the lessons and couldn’t wait to take notes with my new pens and notebooks. I know, I know. I’m a dork.
4. Bike riding.
There was something solitary, freeing and satisfying about bike riding when I was a kid. Out on my huffy, I’d tool around whatever neighborhood I lived in, either by myself or with friends. I don’t do it much anymore, because it’s just not the same.

5. Halloween.
It’s just not the same when you’re an adult. I loved trick-or-treating and dressing up in costumes to canvas the neighborhood. The smell of my bag when I’d open it, all the chocolate and fruity candy scents mingling together for days. Your mom telling you that you can only have two pieces a night, but when she isn’t looking you sneak a couple more. As young as I may look, I am not looking young enough to be trick-or-treating, and I miss it!

In other knockoff news…

I went down the shore yesterday with MN. While he studied, I lounged and soaked up the really hot sun. I read a little RW and slept, catching myself snoring at one point.

I did this all in a bikini.

Yes, yes yes! Wow.

I’ve come a long way from a year ago. A year ago, I was still very overweight, and had given exercise a go by joining my local gym, but I didn’t stick to it. A year ago this month, I was on the cusp of turning my world around. A year ago this month, I could not have even run a full minute, I don’t think. Now I can run oodles and oodles of minutes!

Truth be told, I wasn’t going to wear the bikini. I probably shouldn’t have, either. I’m still slightly overweight, having slid back about four pounds from my April weight and fitness, which was the best it had been since I was in college. And I’ve only just started routinely doing weights and running again, and just last week discovered exercises to tighten my abs…so I’ve got the little pooch at my tummy. My thighs to me are thick.

But I tried it on, the bottom was conservative, and fit me so that it hugged my curves without cutting into my hips. The top acted like a big push-up bra for me, and kind of took attention away from my middle, which aside from jiggling when I walked a little, wasn’t all that horrific. I asked MN, honestly. What do you think?

He didn’t falter, telling me I looked cute, encouraging me to wear it. Making tiny noises that trash men might make while driving by. He said I shouldn’t worry what people think, that besides the point, there would be plenty of other people there in bikinis who definitely shouldn’t be attempting them.

Of course, I did worry and I was self conscious. I laid down as much as I could because my tummy was flat, on my back. I pulled my towel across my middle when I sat in my chair, reading. I stood up really straight to lengthen my torso when I walked around.

But I survived! And now I’m more motivated than ever to get to the gym and not only get those tight abs but run extra miles.

Here we go loopyty-loo, here we go loopty-la

Oh, the thrill of a roller coaster! The feeling of spiraling out of control, rushing in and out of loops, racing down hills!

Oh, the feeling of having a panic attack!

What? Oh yes. The way I react to planes and needles, it applies to roller coasters as well.

It was spring, 1995, when I went on my high school senior class trip to BG, where two friends coerced me onto my first loopy-loop roller coaster. I remember facing the first downhill drop, thinking, “Oh my god, I’m SO falling out and dying!”

I scrunched my tiny teenage self as far down in my seat as I could before the cart plummeted down the bright yellow track, and right into a loop. Little by little, I opened myself up to the experience in those couple minutes. My eyes opened. My body unscrunched. I screamed. I even went on a second upside down roller coaster that afternoon.

I thought maybe I’d conquered my fears.

Then in 1996, at GA, I failed to ride a simple hill roller coaster and the space ship that just floated back and forth, back and forth and then went upside down, hanging for a moment. On both of those rides, I climbed in, sat down, even buckling myself in on the one ride, and then jumped right back out on the opposite platform. My poor friend, since it was only the two of us, I abandoned her to ride along both times.

Yet, later that same day, I took my seat on a loopy-loop that advertised a tight corkscrew turn and daring plunges as my palms sweated and my heart pounded. The impending doom shown in my eyes with pooling tears. I was terrified.

But then the ride was over, and I was exhilarated.

I decided that what makes my roller coaster anxiety special from my other anxieties is that my fears can be relieved.

But this isn’t all. My anxiety is a two-parter. While I fear and feel anxious over loopy loop roller coasters, I will attempt to ride them and feel greater afterwards for doing so. BUT. I just can’t even bring myself to attempt the hills and rides like that upside down swaying ship.

If it doesn’t have shoulder harnesses, I fear it. And I can’t get over THAT fear.

Which brings me to my ultimate point of all this set up.

MN wants to go on a miniature amusement park tour this summer, and has decided his mission is to cure me of my roller coaster anxiety.

Which includes, my friends, those 205 foot drop roller coasters that are steel or wooden and do NOT come with shoulder harnesses.

MN is about to see a side of me that he has only heard rumors about when I arrive home from frightening airplane trips.

I want to open myself up to going on these rides. I am sure too, that once my ride on them is complete, I will feel exhilarated and free, happy and excited. But it’s the buildup. The freaking soles of my FEET sweat just thinking about the climb up one of those steep hill roller coasters, the anxiety of seeing the drop before it happens will just about cause me to have a heart attack.

Hundreds of people go on and don’t fall off. Why do I think I’d be any different.

I need people to tell me that I won’t fall out. That I will be safe, secure, and I can overcome this. I refuse to stay at home and be a party pooper. But I am terrified of sitting on one of the seats, and racing out of it to the exit before I can buckle myself in.

I want to impress MN with my bravery, facing my fears in the face and overcoming them by his side!

But I’m TERRIFIED!!!!!

So if anyone can tell me what it’s like to ride those roller coasters that are fast and furious, falling at steep drops from high points, without shoulder harnesses, I would MUCH appreciate any encouragement.