Health

2021-05-16 Another Week in the Rearview

It’s been a strange week. 

A few days ago I had a call with my friend HL who lives in Denver, who I haven’t seen since my wedding in February of 2020.. You know, that last month of what I’m now calling “The Great Before.”

Before COVID spread the world and took over the airwaves (literally) and our lives. It’s safe to say that here in America we’re on the downhill slide back to normal, but things will never be the same as before. I’m confident of that. 

Anyhow, catching up with HL and being fresh off a 24 hour bout with the norovirus, my mind was still circling the fact that I’ve known my husband for 3 years and had never seen him sick.

The man had never taken a day off of work since I’ve known him and I had never seen him laid up on the couch with a thermometer hanging out his mouth. Consequently, I’d never had to take care of him or experience how his mood is when he is sick.

I told HL I didn’t know what I was thinking, marrying a man who I had never seen sick. It coulda been bad. He coulda been a big baby or pain in the ass. Thankfully (and predictably) he wasn’t anything like that.

He basically rested for a day, took work off (which is what people should do when they are sick and contagious) and didn’t really need anything from me. Plus I got a break from cooking breakfast for a few days. I’m ok with that. 

We actually tried to limit our own personal contact in an attempt to spare me the same fate, as noro is highly contagious. It didn’t work and 2 days later it hit me too. It was the toughest 24 hours I’ve had in a long while. Since June 2020 I would say. And even after I was over the worst of it—the big purge, I was still exhausted for several more days.

I was feeling much better as of yesterday, but still took the day easy and didn’t push for extra cardio or to get my daily allotment of steps. Rest and recovery was my aim.

On the phone HL and I conspired to plan several get togethers this year. We both agreed that we were so ready to travel on a regular basis again. He left for a getaway in Mexico yesterday. I must admit I’m jealous. I know I’m pretty fresh off my own first vacation away from home so I can’t whine too much, but MEXICO!! I’m so ready to go somewhere like that again. 

I say it’s been a strange week because despite all the sickness, it’s been rather a good week. My mood has been good, for the most part, and I’m feeling like I’m getting to a good place. Not that I haven’t been at a good place, but letting go of committing myself to public speaking appearances and other similar engagements where I’m required to prepare or say something has definitely helped nudge me further toward enjoying each day. 

There’s just something about the black cloud of public speaking looming in the distance, no matter how far, that affects my mood. 

At the moment there is no event I’m committed to or obligation I’m thinking about and dreading and I find myself waking up each day, looking forward to what’s on the agenda. Yes, even the dishes and grocery shopping and laundry. Fascinating right?! 

I will say all that doesn’t change how I feel about picking up after teenagers or cleaning toilets.  I Don’t think anything will ever change the way I feel about that. But imma call this week for maid service, at least for the bathrooms, and that’s just another step in the right direction. 

That’s blog worthy news right? I mean, doesn’t everyone want to read about the saga that is the cleaning of the toilets? 😜

I suppose that’s as good a place to wrap as any. It’s Sunday again, and it’s going to be a rainy one. I did a lot of work in the garden yesterday so I could take advantage of the rain we are going to get this week. 

The rain today just means my attention will be on all the indoor tasks, the first of which is catching up on reading poetry submissions for the GLR contest. I hope there are some gems in the pile… to make the reading more enjoyable. 

Ok now I’m ready to wrap. 

With Peace and Love and Peaches, 🍑 

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-05-06 When You Find What Works, Don’t Fight It 🌳

Thirsty Thursday again and date night tonight. A 1-2 combo that aims to satisfy. 

As it often is, I think I’ve figured some things out this week and feel pretty good about my newest declarations. 

  1. No more volunteering to do interviews or lead workshops or make any public appearances where I have to speak. I’m officially releasing myself from all that noise. 
  2. I’m gonna put more focus on exercising, at home, and also let go of the classes I’ve been attending which don’t seem to mesh with my schedule. 
  3. I’m committing to an hour or two of GLR each day and am going to try to make that a regular part of my workday. This means not procrastinating until there’s a mountain of stuff to do. 
  4. I’m going to work on my diet… and try fasting and eating more Whole Foods again. Less processed stuff. (Within reason 😉). 

That’s enough right?! As this week has gone on, I’ve felt better and better and I think it has something to do with distancing myself from obligations that involve doing things that make my anxiety flair. It also has to do with regulating my sleep and productivity. I’ve gotten a lot done this week and have had decent sleep. 

Today I’m going to CB again and will see both of my parents. My husband works in CB on Thursdays so I may try to pop by his office for a visit…. You know, really make the trip across the Missouri River worth it. 

Otherwise it’s the typical line-up. Exercise, chores, GLR, errands, and then as I said it’s date night so I’ll need to finish everything on my to-do list by like 5ish. Our dinner reservations are at 6. We’re going to a new place we’ve never been before and you know what that means??.. It’s cheeseburger time! 

It’s a win-win-win as I also need to up my iron intake in order to donate blood next week. 

So that’s the plan for today.. let’s see how good I am at sticking to it (and my new declarations). 

But first… Cardio, 

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-04-17 On the Eve of the Next Big Adventure

If I had to pick a theme for my life lately it would be “Practicing the Art of Letting Go.” So many things have slid off my radar and the biggest thing I feel like I’ve let go of is worrying about all of it. In that sense, it’s been quite positive. 

It’s definitely not like me. I typically check my steps several time a day and tend to scramble at 8pm if I’m close to my goal and check my sleep first thing when I wake up and check my cardio duration at the end of a workout. But not lately. Lately I’m not checking like I normally would.

I also typically spend a lot of time focusing on my eating and drinking habits and general productivity. It’s just how I move about the world, with the goal of living a healthier life. It’s part of what this blog is about—the daily musings of a girl who is just trying to figure it all out.

But even this blog has been neglected lately. Neglected is such a negative word and that’s the wrong way to frame this post. I’m actually reflecting on the phenomenon of my “letting go” lately and thinking very positively about it. 

It’s one thing to check in on ones self to make sure good choices are being made. It’s another altogether to take it to a level akin to obsession. Now I’m not saying I’m necessarily obsessed with my “stats” but I have been known to run around the house at 9pm to hit my step goal.

I’m not sure what has changed lately to cause me to care a little less about stats and productivity and meeting certain expectations, but whatever it is, it’s been a breath of fresh air. 

Perhaps it’s the arrival of spring or maybe that I’ve been getting better sleep and don’t feel as exhausted all the time. Perhaps it’s the choke hold of Covid being loosened or finally accepting my new role as full time household engineer. Perhaps it’s pondering my moms new diagnosis (stage 3C ovarian cancer) and realizing that life is too short to worry all damn day about what you are doing or not doing or eating or not eating.

Maybe it’s the combination of all of this, but whatever it is, I’ll take it. New Burdens have been placed upon me this year and others have been lifted. Lately I’m just rolling with the punches and not worried about “success” so much. It’s a great feeling. 

I’m being kind to myself, and forgiving. And I’m not putting guilt on myself like I normally would when I have not met my own expectations. It’s glorious. 

And today?? Today my focus is shifting into vacation mode. Today I’m packing and gathering all the plans I’ve compiled for the coming week into an organized document to share with my love as we skip town. 

Tomorrow I’m getting on an airplane for the first time since my honeymoon which was just before Covid lockdowns began in early 2020. Tomorrow I’m taking “letting go” to the next level and that, too, is glorious.

So the next post, if there’s time, will be posted from a yet undisclosed location somewhere in the United States. It could be anywhere folks… and you’ll have to check back to find out where. 😉

On that note, my time is up today and I’ve got to get packing. 

Cheers to letting go, loving yourself, and embracing the next adventure one moment at a time,

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-04-12 The Clandestine Miss SugarCookie Surprisingly Secures Seven Hundred Followers… 💃💃💃

Sometime in the last few weeks, the number of followers for my WordPress blogs tip-toed over the threshold of 700. It only took like 4 years. 😜 (Technically 10.5 years since I started my first WordPress blog in 2010.)

It’s actually pretty good for a random human simply musing day-in-and-day-out about the same 12 topics. Over time I’ve had many thoughts about what I could do to make this blog into a more helpful, marketable, informative, or entertaining place to visit. And each time I get an idea about that, it feels like more work than it’s worth. Plus I can’t seriously commit to rating cheeseburgers, being a travel blogger, or trying to give advice about ANYTHING as a self-proclaimed expert.

To be fair, there are literally thousands of folks out there just like me trying to utilize WordPress to build their name or establish a brand for what they are interested in “selling” or what they are passionate about. So the world doesn’t really need or want any more of that. Or maybe we do, because every human connection is valuable to someone. But it’s not what I’m about here. 

So what am I about? Why do I keep doing this week after week?

Well, the tag line for this blog has not changed since its inception four years ago. It’s my attempt to put focus, each and every day on living a healthy and more fulfilling life. I’ve lost my way in life a few times, and part of that comes from coasting and not really paying attention to time passing. How can a person lose 5 years of their life and not realize that is happening? The answer is pretty freaking easily if said person goes about their business every day working for someone else without thoughts for what they really want to get out of life for themselves. 

My life has changed drastically over the last four years and I can honestly say I feel like I have the secret to living the life I want to live figured out. However, it doesn’t matter how sweet things have become, the daily struggles in life persist.

I may think I have it all figured out but I still have days (sometimes weeks) where I’m in a funk and just can’t seem to snap out of the rotten mood I’ve found myself in. Kind of like yesterday.

I’ve been told to keep my personal melodrama out of my poetry for my own good, but this blog is a different beast and so I have zero issues confessing that I broke into tears like 5 times yesterday. Maybe more. 

My emotional swells were exacerbated by the random watching of the movie 2012 with Jim and Z yesterday afternoon. When I saw that is what they were watching, I was all like “oh this is the one where they all almost die like 50 times. Not an exaggeration.

In fact, if you count all the “near misses” of buildings and bridges crashing down, the ground opening, and last second getaways, it might be in the hundreds. I knew this when I started watching and it still…. STILL got to me. Each emotional moment of the “families” journey made me cry. What the hell.??!!

At least that was sort of heart-wrenching. What’s not heart-wrenching is a rando episode of bachelor in paradise which also made me cry. That’s when I know it’s hormones or some other bullshit causing me grief and not actual sad stuff. My poor daughter looks at me and says “oh mama.” She reaches over from the adjacent couch, touches my arm, and smiles. She gets me.

I say with a weak smile and tears welling up in my eyes, “yeah, it’s that time.” 

“That time” being any given day where I’m emotional for no reason. About 10 days ago I had my period, a whole week early, and now I’m spotting again which is not typical. So I’m definitely going to tag hormones as the cause. And they are probably also responsible for my persistent headache and upset stomach. 

Anyway, so yesterday was one of those strange funk days I struggled getting through, which is exactly why I can’t just declare I’ve got life figured out and drop the mic. 🎤

It’s why I need this blog. It’s my way to write through what’s ailing me and figure stuff out. It’s my therapy and the jumping-off point of all my crazy ideas, dreams, and personal experiments. It’s my version of therapy. And oh, by the way, it’s way cheaper than an actual therapist! 

Today the clandestine Miss SugarCookie has 706 followers and at least 4 actual humans reading on a regular basis. And I’m extremely grateful for each and every one!! 🥰

That’s it for Monday. Time to start climbing through the week. 

Peace and love, 

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-04-02 What is it they say again about doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result?….

It’s going to be a beautiful day today and I have every intention of getting out there and enjoying it. I am going to CB and will see my mom but my aim is to spend a little time catching up with my sister. 

But first I’m gonna treat myself to an exercise class called “turbo kick.” The primarily focus of that is cardio but also has elements of core strength and balance. 

April has to be my month. It’s got to be the month I get my act together physically as I keep slipping farther and farther away from my ideal. I try not to get too bent when I gain weight but when my clothes don’t fit, something has to give. 

Jim says I should just buy new. To that I say, no. Nope. No way man. 

Yes, it’s true I could use some new clothes but I do not, not, not want to go up in size. My image of self-worth is damaged enough. I don’t need to add insult to injury by letting my physical self go. 

The reason for the weight gain?.. I’m no idiot and know that it’s not exercise that’s the problem. I think I get enough exercise and have pretty good heart health. All signs point to diet as the source of my problem.

My eating habits are currently very poor and, I may have mentioned a time or two before, but I’m doing my fair share of drinking lately which I believe is a major contributing factor to my weight gain. And I feel like my willpower is non-existent lately. 

I really, really, really have to change something. I really need to work out this healthy eating puzzle or at least find some level of moderation. And it needs to start today. I mean, I was going to start yesterday because it was the start of a new month but I failed miserably last night. 

Evenings are the toughest time. In the mornings I have zero problem sticking to the plan. I don’t even get hungry until 11 or noon and am able to cut out coffee with little more than a shrug. I get my caffeine through a pill and only miss the coffee for the sweet creamy flavor it has. 

It only tastes that way because of the amount of coffee creamer I add. I may as well not include coffee at all and drink the coffee mate right from the bottle! 😜

If I want something hot to drink, I can have an apple cinnamon tea as that doesn’t have caffeine or sugar. But I don’t crave that so I may as well have nothing.

Then I get to 3 or 4 or 5pm and all my resolve goes out the window. I get super hungry and start eating and snack and snack and have dinner and snack some more. And.. if I have a drink with dinner it almost always leads to more drinking.

I dunno. I’ve struggled with this aspect of trying to be healthy for so many years (not the drinking, just the eating healthy), I don’t know if I have it in me to change anything.

So there it is. The rock and the hard place. The place between where I don’t do anything or change anything because it’s just easier to stay the same. But now I’ve gained enough that it’s the heaviest I’ve been in my life (except for when I was pregnant). Something HAS to change.

I don’t have an answer right now. I really wish I did. I suppose like a lot of tough things I just need to take it one day at a time. Today I’m starting again. This time will be different. 

Fingers Crossed, 

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-03-10 News Too New to Process…

Yesterday’s brief topic was about no news being good news. So of course the Universe responded right away. It was quite literally 10 minutes after I posted (and was ramping up for my cardio) that I answered a phone call from my mom asking if I could take her to the ER. 

I will say I wasn’t surprised as she’s been suffering with some issues for several weeks now. Our visit yesterday was actually the third to the ER in a week. The first time she drove herself. The second time, she drove but my sister had to pick her up because they gave her morphine for the pain and she could not drive herself. Yesterday I took her and sat with her the entire visit. 

Three visits in one week seems excessive, I know, but two of the three she was following instructions from her primary care physician. This last time the concern was nausea and dehydration as she hadn’t been able to eat or drink anything for 2 days. It was concluded that the morphine was responsible for that. So no more narcs. 

On of her previous visits to the ER they had done a cat scan and told her she had cancer. 

I’m not being dismissive of this, but at this point it feels like one piece of info among a myriad of other diagnostic pieces and symptoms. It’s also hard to put it all together when the info is coming from my mom who is lucid, but not the best at remembering/relaying details. The story also seems to change slightly based on her immediate problem. 

One minute it’s her bowel movements and she diagnosed herself with colon cancer before ever seeing a doctor. Then it’s her upper-GI, because she’s nauseous and can’t eat. And now the tissue that can be seen on her abdomen has been labeled as cancer. 

From what I know about cancer, is that the actual diagnosis is dependent on pathology. They have to get a sample of the tissue and do a biopsy to know anything for certain. I feel like I’m maybe keeping myself a little disconnected from all the possible outcomes until I know for sure. 

There’s no reason to spend cycles on the “what if’s” and the focus should be on helping her with next steps and making sure she’s getting the best care as quickly as possible. 

I’m not personally bothered by 3 ER visits in 1 week because it’s Medicare you know and she’s paid into that her whole life and so have I. That’s what it’s there for. Yesterday she had an IV with meds to get her hydrated and relieve her nausea so she could eat and drink. 

Today she has a visit with an oncologist and I wish I was going to that to hear first hand what the doctor has to say but my sister is taking her and they only allow one other adult in the visit because of Covid. They are supposed to call me though, so I can be on speakerphone, we’ll see how that works out. 

That visit was actually scheduled to start 5 minutes ago and so I’m just waiting now. 

I’m a little anxious but not bad. I think that’s going to be it today. 

Peace and love, 

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-03-07 Checking It and (Mostly) Not Wrecking It ❤️💤☯️ ✔️✔️✔️

It’s Sunday again and I’m up early and checking my stats. I changed things up for the month of March so this is my first week evaluating new measures. 

For exercise I’m still keeping tabs on my step count but also trying to improve my heart function by making sure I get some good cardio in. I had no idea what to expect for my heart rate with certain activities so I set my goal for this first week at 15 minutes a day in the “cardio” zone. 

Cardio zone for a woman my age starts at 121 beats per minute and apparently that’s not as easy to achieve with my normal routine. I can’t seem to walk fast enough on the treadmill to get there (no surprising I suppose) and I’d have to kick it up to a jog. Gross! 

I went to a few weight training classes this week and that doesn’t do it either. Again, not surprising as that’s not a cardio activity, Then on Friday I went to a “Turbo Kick” class and it literally kicked my ass. Yes, I got 44 minutes of cardio that day but I also almost died. Good gravy! 

I also achieved 1 minute in the “peak” zone during that class which is anything above 147. There’s got to be a happy medium. I just need to find an activity that gets me right to 125 and doesn’t make me feel like I’m going to puke or pass out. 

Another discovery this with addition of cardio this week is that all the sports bras I used to use for Jazzercise no longer fit my body. They are all too tight and I think that between being less active during the pandemic and stress eating and also just enjoying life as a married woman, I’ve gained some pounds. Sadly it’s not my cup size that has gone up but my circumference. I mean.. you don’t put weight on in your boobs. It’s underarms and back fat I’m talking about. And one might say it could be muscle but I’m 100% certain it’s not. The conclusion of that little tangent is that I’ve got to shop for a few new articles of clothing. 

Anyway so that’s the cardio story this week and now I’m determine what I need to do or adjust to improve. I did hit my target 3 of 7 days so I think just sticking with 15 minutes and aiming for like 5 of 7 would be good. I think it will be easier now that I know what activities work. 

This week I also changed my sleep measurement to include going to bed (sleep) before 10:00. The FitBit records when I fall asleep. So I’m banking on the fact that when I go to bed I’ll fall asleep right away which is almost always true for me. I achieved that goal 4 nights out of 7 but for overall sleep goal only 3 of 7. The check and balance is seeing if going to bed earlier actually improves my overall sleep score. 

I’d like to adjust the goals a little differently for the weekends because I’d actually like to get to a place I can stay up late and sleep in more, so figuring out a way I can factor in later bed times for Friday and Saturday and still hit a certain goal. As it is with most things I’m like.. it’s a work in progress. 

I still haven’t been meditating like I’d like. I even set a timer to remind me every day to stop what I’m doing and meditate. That was an absolute fail as I just dismissed the alarm EVERY SINGLE TIME. I’d say.. “I just have to finish this task and then I’ll meditate.” Then I finish and forget and rush off to do something else. I’m gonna try to do better this week. I really am. 🤞 

The other thing I added this week was screen time including duration on “social networking.” I set the goal at less than 2.5 hours of screen time and less than 30 minutes of social. For screen time I achieved my goal 5 of 7 days and for social 3 of 7. 

“Social networking” is in quotes because Apple includes text messaging in this stat. I don’t necessarily agree with this because texting is mostly just communication with my loved ones. Last Sunday for example, I didn’t meet my goal because I logged 1 hour of social time yet 56 minutes of that was texting and 4 was Facebook. So to really set a true measure I’d have to look at each day and set a different goal for messaging versus everything else. 

Frankly that’s too much work and I’m going to just try to stretch my goal this week to under 25 minutes and then just not text as much. I’m also stretching my overall daily screen time goal to less than 2 hours and 15 minutes. We’ll see. 

Today is going to be tough because I’ve already been looking at stats and typing for almost 2 hours. I’m going to wrap soon and then hopefully put my phone away for most of the day. Again, we’ll see.

I think that really is it for today. That’s enough right?! 

Cheers to the Change Up,

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-02-28 Looking Back to Improve the Future… 🗓 ✅🚫⏰

It’s the last day of the month and the last day of the week AND the last day of my little experiment to untether myself from my phone. You know what that means? It’s time for the ultimate Sunday status. 

First off.. I’ve already been analyzing “stats” for about 50 minutes of today’s walk so either I’m gonna keep walking and get a huge boost on my steps today or this post is going to be super short. 

My update is also going to be a little skewed this week cuz I did try to disconnect from my phone and normal routine to see what affect that would have on my mood and outlook on life. 

This means I did not check my steps or sleep or anything else all week and did not keep track of meditation or eating habits. I just let it all go for a week. I didn’t have a FitBit in 2006 so I treated this past week as if I still didn’t. However, I still wore the FitBit so it could collect the stats anyhow. Why? Just cuz. 😜

Syncing this morning it appears that there are no surprises. Aside from the addition of exercise classes this week, my steps remained about the same and my sleep did not deviate from the norm. 

Those are the only two categories I have definitive results on. As I said the others weren’t tracked and are largely subjective anyhow. 

Moving on to the the results of my little experiment to bring 2006 back…. all things considered I would say it was kind of an epic fail. I suppose I did a fine job leaving my phone alone for the most part and embraced limiting my checking of email like a champ. I’m already a minimalist when it comes to Facebook and twitter and insta so it was easy to not open those apps all week.

In short, all things that are naturally easy were easy. The more challenging areas are responding to text messages and I came to conclude that I wasn’t going to be able to give up this daily blog. It’s the main activity that boosts my screen time each day. And that didn’t change this past week. 

My daily average screen time last week was 2 hours and 27 minutes (down 32% from the previous week). The previous week was about an hour longer. The devil, of course, is in the details. I can look at the apps and categories (productivity, social networking, and creativity) and see where my time is being spent. Very useful.

It looks like the reporting of data collected only goes back 4 weeks so I don’t have long term analytics like I do with FitBit, but it’s enough to analyze my week last week and perhaps set new goals. I’m not inclined to try and limit my productivity (this) but can definitely set a goal around “social networking.” 

I find it interesting that the messaging app is categorized as social networking along with Facebook and Twitter. I dig digging into this data and am already developing a new set of metrics and goals. I just can’t help myself. 🤣

***

Tomorrow is the start of a new month and new week which means an opportunity to start fresh and redefine the goals. Considering my attempts in February (and January too for that matter) fell short, I’m going to try and take a look at things from the new perspectives gained these past few weeks. I’m no longer going to be measuring “success” according to the same scale. Here are the new-new targets:

For sleep, instead of going according to the sleep score or duration, I’m going to be hyper-focused on whe time I go to bed. The goal will be to be in bed by 10pm with about half an hour of wind-down time beforehand. If I’m able to do that, the other stats should validate that it is working. 

I’m removing food and healthy eating from the set list of goals. Instead I’m going to try not to think about it as much. I’m putting the scale away and not imposing any restrictions or trying any fad behaviors. The ultimate objective is to put the focus elsewhere. I spend too much time struggling with the healthy eating puzzle and always seem to fail. Maybe if I let that shit go, I will have more time to work on other mental puzzles. We’ll see.

I’m keeping mood and meditation for now, but added an daily alarm on my phone to stop what I’m doing immediately and meditate. We’ll see how that goes too. 

As for the screen time and dependency on technology.. my new goals are to keep daily screen time down under 2.5 hours a day AND not more than 30 minutes on social stuff (remember that includes messaging). To support this I’m going to continue to keep my phone at a distance, both overnight and during the day. At least that part of what I did last week seems as though it would be easy to adopt more permanently. 

I’m not really changing my expectations for steps but adding 20 minutes of cardio as another check. The classes will help and I’m going to look into what cardio classes my gym offers. The strength training I started this week is great, but I’m really missing Jazzercise or some other form of cardio. If all else fails, I could always just bike here at home. 

I’ve actually switched to the bike now. I’ve perfected walking and typing at the same time and so this is a test of biking and typing. 

I think that’s the end of the changes for this week. Am I ready for a new week? Am I ready for March? Yes and no. 

Ready or not though.. time waits for no one.

Cheers to Healthy Living (and Analytics),

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-02-21 Sunday Status Funny Money 🐹

It’s Sunday and I’m checking my stats. How did I do meeting my goals? 

For sleep I achieved my goal 6 of 7 nights. 

Healthy eating.. 4 of 7. 

Mood.. 4 of 7.

Meditation.. 2 of 7. 

Exercise.. 6 of 7. 

Most of this looks good but feels a bit like funny money. Like you know how you get paid every two weeks for doing a job and the money is electronically deposited in your bank account and then some other company comes along and takes that coin back out for things like rent, electricity, insurance. It’s like a magic trick. One minute the numbers are there and the next.. Poof.. gone.. It happens automagically. You never actually see the cash, hold it, count it. That’s funny money.

Kinda makes a person feel like a hamster in a wheel. You know, in that metaphor what gives the hamster quality of life? Stopping to eat. Stopping to wee (or woo). And getting pulled out of the cage by the giant 6 year old who lets her run around the bedroom floor for a while. Perhaps getting a lettuce or carrot on these tiny adventures and of course weeing and wooing on the purple rug is the BEST! 

What does this metaphor teach us about life? That we need to maximize our time off the wheel. Cuz pretty soon now, that tiny little pumping heart can’t take anymore and the hamster dies. Poof!.. Just like that. 

I check my stats regularly. I set goals for my self. I’m constantly evaluating myself and my health. I gave up my old hamster wheel last year but I’m still on this one.

My New Years résolution this year was to do less instead of more. To be kind to myself and more forgiving. To meet that end, I backed off on my daily goals. But here we are nearing the end of February and I’m questioning the validity of all this. Like money in the bank, it all becomes numbers and checkmarks on a page. I add them up but they don’t amount to much.

So I backed off on my sleep goal and the result this week is a 6 of 7 instead of 4 of 7. So what? I still feel the same. I still have the same energy issues each day. I don’t get more restful sleep just because I back off on my goal. It just makes me feel better about how I’m doing. But it’s a magic trick. An illusion. 

It’s the same with the other stats. I have my daily step goal, which I reduced from 12k to 10k as a part of my resolution. So today’s calculated 6 of 7 would have been 4 of 7 instead. So what. It doesn’t change anything. And the other measurements are just as suspect. 

I took away “productivity” and replaced it with “mood” and I added one for meditation. Mood is subjective as there are no numbers and this feels more legit. Of all the stats I’m tracking, it feels the most genuine and important. I think that’s because that’s the real goal. To FEEL better. To FEEL healthier. To FEEL like I’m getting the most out of every day. 

Tangentially related is the brain child idea I had this week about inviting 2006 to 2021 and living life for a week the same way I was back then.

No smart phone. No social media. No googling everything or relying on the internet so much. It crossed my mind that 2006 was pre-FitBit too and before I tracked my stats so vigorously. 

It also predates any regular daily writing so my mind is really foggy with how life really was. It might be an interesting exercise to try and mentally recreate a day in the life of Miss SugarCookie in 2006. The first step of course is removing all those things I just mentioned. 

This means (if I go through with it) that I’ll not be keeping stats for as long as the experiment persists. And won’t be mentally tethered to my phone.

Tangentialy related is also the argument I had with my darling daughter last night because I did not have my phone with me when she texted the specifics of what she wanted to eat. I cooked the wrong thing and she refused to eat it and it was so ridiculous. I got so so so angry that she was acting spoiled and ungrateful and she just didn’t get it. Jim said I just needed to make the other thing and remember that she’s sick (one day post vaccine shot and running a fever and in bed all day). So I did. And she didn’t even thank me. Whatever. 

My point is that the people that will be the most affected by this little experiment of mine are those who “expect” things from me or are used to communicating via text. Nobody on FB will miss me because I’m not really on FB anyway. Same for twitter. And since I don’t have a 9 to 5 anymore, there’s nobody who is going to miss me not getting back to them ASAP there.

So today is my day of preparation. Thinking about what it is really going to look like when I pull the trigger on this test. Rolling back to 2006.

Why 2006?

I had to draw a line somewhere, you know, and thinking about what things add value to my life, like that hamster with their brief breaks from the wheel. Eating adds value and so does sleep. It is not a basic need in the pure sense of the word but music is pretty much essential for my daily existence.

If I’m giving up my phone for a week, then I need some other way to get my tunes. I don’t have a working CD player so my original iPod will have to do. I actually looked up the model number and it’s circa 2006. So that’s why. 

No Bluetooth of course so I’ll have to find a wired set of headphones or earbuds. I know I have some somewhere, just have to find them. That part will be easy compared to making my people understand that if they want something from me, they need to ask me in person. How novel. People living in the same house sitting down face to face. 

I think my treadmill time today is past being up. I’m secretly hoping people stay asleep a while longer so I can get more time to myself. We’ll see. 

Next stop.. 2006 and scrapping the stats!

~Miss SugarCookie

2021-02-18 A Serious Need to Not Take Anything Too Seriously

Having another one of those days. You know.. where I just want to tell the world to efffff off. Not you darlings though. Nope. 

This mood has been a fairly regular thing these weeks, I’m finding. I was soooooo tired this morning and tired of being tired. Caffeine helps but then I feel bad about being addicted to caffeine. Then I tell myself there are much worse things to be addicted to and that I’m being to hard on myself and then I pop another pill. 🤷‍♀️

Often I go round and round about this, and the result is always the same so why do I keep doing this to myself when there are bigger fish to fry? 

All of everything that I am concerned with is small. I have to remind myself that it’s tiny, tiny potato’s. Not enough to make one single helping of mashed taters…. AND that I have to not take anything too seriously. If I can just go about my day, with this in mind, it would be better. 

So much has changed in my life yet it’s bizarre, like super strange, how much never changes. A few days ago I remembered a blog I started on Tumblr in like 2010. A little bit of writing I had missed as I was organizing and backing up all my files for a rainy-fucking day that will never come. 

I logged in and pulled all those posts to my laptop, next stop is the external hard drive. I digress. 

Last night I began to reread these posts for something to do before bed. Super unproductive but whatevs. Mind you all that was written 10 years ago, so finding some of the same “issues” I’m still dealing with is … well….. comical. I mean, how else can I look at it? 

Yeah, I’m still struggling with body image issues and obsessive about my weight. Yeah, I’m still trying to eat healthy and failing. I still hate social media. I still worry I’m a bad parent. I still get irritated by my ex and lament about wasting time. I still have trouble sleeping because I can’t shut my brain off. I am still too concerned about what other people think. And I’m still listening to the same music.!! 🤣

Right now? 

  • Listening to ‘Beercan’ by BECK. 
  • Messaging with darling daughter about how she can get her second vaccine shot because she missed her appointment last Saturday. 
  • Drinking strawberry ginseng fizz in water for more caffeine. 
  • Tried to donate blood today and failed cuz my iron was too low. 
  • Thinking about refusing to do any social media shit for GLR. Just flat out saying “I don’t care, someone else can do it.” 
  • Rescheduled 2 meetups this week cuz I didn’t wanna, including my dad today. Selfish, but I don’t care. 
  • Bought discount cut flowers at the grocery like a hypocritical BOSS.
  • Procrastinating calling a tow truck. 
  • Procrastinating cleaning toilets. 
  • Procrastinating <insert everything here>.
  • Put periods at the end of all my bullet points cuz that’s the way I am. Not sorry. 

I already had a website/blog when I created that Tumblr 10 years ago. The purpose was so that I could let loose all the random thoughts I had that were not exactly “blog” worthy. Or rather, all the shit I was thinking that I really didn’t want on my primary and publicly promoted site. Anything a little angry, or seedy, or jealous, or needy. 

It’s actually some funny stuff. Reading it I forget how much I enjoy my own sense of humor. And again, a good reminder not to take anything too seriously. 

The last post there was late 2016, when I hit rock bottom. Or like right before I hit rock bottom. Like a hot 10 seconds before I drank myself down a drain and hit my head on the concrete at the bottom of the sewer. 

Not sure how long I was out, but the day I woke up wet and covered in shit was the same day I decided to start this blog.

I haven’t needed that alternate blog because I have this! And I have you!! My oh my. What a day of epiphanies!!! Seriously!!!! 🤣

Why taking caffeine and saying “I don’t care” out loud makes me feel better, I don’t know. But I love it.  

Yours truly,

~Miss SugarCookie