Just because it's January...

I think I'm suffering from "New Year's Syndrome." This is something I just invented to explain the feeling I suddenly have that I need to DO SOMETHING about my weight. It's actually not bad - I need to lose about 10 pounds to get back to "normal" - but it just seems so DAUNTING. And it sounds all well and good to start eating better (read: less cheese) and exercising more (read: at all), but I start school next week and I just know that there's no point in trying to start something until I know what the term is really going to look like. My work schedule is even more travel-heavy in the spring than at other times of the year, and I just don't want to do what I did last fall, which is to try to start working out only to find that I was too exhausted to make time for it. When your only real workout options are 5 a.m. or 9:30 p.m., it's pretty hard to find any motivation. Those are sleepy times.

I guess I hope that because I'm only taking one class this semester, and I don't think it's going to be too work-intensive, maybe I can get myself together and actually do something. I'm at the point where it's just kind of a nagging annoyance that I've gained weight, and I'd like to reverse the trend before it becomes a) worse and b) even more daunting than it already seems. I think it must be true that your metabolism starts to tank in your 30s, and my metabolism wasn't really firing on all cylinders to begin with.

But really, I'm not going to think about this anymore for another week. That's when class starts and I'll see how time-intensive the syllabus looks. If I won't have 2 hours of homework a night, maybe exercising at 9:30 won't seem like such a bad idea.

La-di-da-da-da-da-da, feelin' chubby

A few months ago, one of my friends posted on her blog that she'd realized she was heavier than she wanted to be. (I am not linking to it, because I doubt she really wants additional traffic to that particular post.)

But anyway, where I'm going with this is that today I've had a similar realization.

It's not like I looked down and went, "Whoa, look at that! When did I suddenly gain all this weight?" More like, I just finally decided I'm tired of it. Since I got the Wii Fit, I've actually been weighing myself, and I've noticed that my weight keeps going up instead of down. According to today's weigh-in, I am currently a depressing 20 pounds heavier than I was when I got pregnant five years ago. This would explain why all my pants and skirts are tight, and why most of my button-down shirts do not comfortably button around the hips anymore. Some of them don't button around the hips at all anymore.

So. Not. Cool.

I attribute this frustrating situation to a few factors:
1) I quit exercising a year ago when my kickboxing teacher got fired, and the new one sucked. Since then, I have convinced myself that I don't have any time to work out because I have other things to do, like work 50 hours a week, travel frequently, go to school and, oh yeah, try to spend time with my family.

2) I travel too much. And as anyone who travels knows, most of the time you're at business dinners that involve rich food - and too much of it. And I have no willpower, so if somebody orders dessert for the table, I eat it. And when I travel is the only time I drink - and alcoholic beverages are rather caloric in general.

3) I still think my thyroid my be off. I go back to the endocrinologist in October so I guess I'll find out then. When I had my yearly exam a few weeks ago, my doctor said my thyroid felt okay - so this might be an empty theory - or an attempt to blame this on something that is not my fault.

4) Stress. I have been super stressed-out and on edge lately, and I am a stress eater. I don't just eat and eat and eat, but I do tend to turn to ice cream for comfort when I am crabby.

So, tonight I did something insane and I actually busted out the running game on the Wii Fit. And I ran for TWELVE ENTIRE MINUTES. Which is shocking, because I hate running. I also did advanced boxing and step aerobics. I guess it's a start.

The question remains if I am going to feel crummy enough about myself to actually head back to the gym with any regularity...as my willpower certainly deteriorates quickly after 9:00 p.m., which is about the time I would be able to go to the gym.

I just want my stupid clothes to fit again. Bleh.

Will keep you posted on how I decide to tackle this latest challenge. I'm open to suggestions.

Fillings

So, today I had to get three fillings in my teeth. This was a crushing experience because I feel like my teeth are betraying me. I have been very, very good to them for as long as they've existed. I brush at least twice a day. I floss every day. I use a fluoride mouthwash. And until a year or so ago, I'd never had a single cavity.

And then I got one. Not a bad one, but it still required shots and drilling and general unpleasantness.

Then last week I went to the dentist for a regular cleaning. I love getting my teeth cleaned. It is just the most refreshing feeling, and I wish I didn't have to ruin it by eating soon after. The hygienist said I had "excellent" at-home care and that I should keep doing what I'm doing. Hooray! And then the dentist came in and said I had three - THREE - tiny cavities.

Our dentist is awesome. He's really, really good at what he does and it doesn't even really hurt when he gives you shots. There are many, many dentists closer to our house than this guy, and we go to him anyway. But I still think this all might be his fault, because I never had a cavity until I started going to him. Okay, I don't really think that, but it was funny to tell him so. I also told him that everything was falling apart because I'm turning 30 next year. He laughed at both things. And then he told me that I shouldn't feel bad about my cavities, and to come back for three fillings.

So I got three fillings today (all on the top), and my face was mostly numb for quite awhile this evening. It was actually pretty hilarious because one side of my nose ended up being numb, so I tried to crinkle my nose but only one side crinkled. That was weird, and funny.

Stupid teeth. I've taken such good care of them, and this is how they repay me. Argh.

Either the best or worst customer service ever

So, I have to get a blood test to check how my thyroid's doing (or, more accurately, how the hormones I take to make up for my deadbeat thyroid are doing). Thanks to our new insurance plan, my endocrinologist wasn't allowed to actually take my blood at his office; instead, I have to go to one of the vampire shops where all they do all day is take people's blood and ship it off to various testing facilities. So I called the nearest location today to make an appointment for my test. Turns out, you can't actually schedule your appointment with the person who answers the phone. There's a special number for that, or you can schedule your appointment yourself ONLINE.

Wha?

So I went to the website and very easily chose - and reserved - my very own appointment time. I got a confirmation page to print and everything. No going back and forth with the person on the phone about what time might work or not. No settling for an odd appointment time just because I didn't feel like digging into a more convenient option. But also, no actual person.

I'm leaning toward thinking this is a fantastic development in medical care...but part of me thinks you ought to be able to just call the place you want to go and talk to someone about when you want to come in. Is this awesome, super-convenient service, or just a cop-out so they don't have to pay someone to answer the phone and make appointments?

And if the person AT the testing office doesn't schedule appointments, why does that person even need to answer the phone? Why else would anyone be calling?

This is simultaneously terrific and perplexing.

Hooray for Dad!

My dad's surgery went great! Everything went according to plan and he's doing really well. He will most likely be able to go home from the hospital tomorrow - yippee! He'll have several checkups in the next weeks and months to make sure the stint the doctor put in to reinforce his aorta and cut off the blood supply to the aneurysm is doing what it's supposed to, but right now all signs point to "Wahoo, it's over!"

I'm back home after a very tiring trip (we left my parents' house at 4:50 a.m...which wasn't so bad until my car, which lives on Central time, told me it was really 3:50 when I started it up this morning), but not for long. I leave first thing in the morning for a (thankfully short) business trip. It will be much easier to focus now that I know my dad's doing okay.

Thanks to everyone who said prayers or thought happy thoughts for my dad today. They worked! :)

Whew.

Tests and papers

I realize I post a lot about school here...but it's a major new force in my life, so that's why.

This weekend I had my third class, at which I had to hand in a paper, give a presentation based on the paper, and take a midterm. I think the paper and the presentation were okay. I studied like a maniac for the test (or at least, I tried to remember how to study) and it seemed to go okay, too. However, I did have kind of a breakdown Friday night that involved wailing, "There isn't room in my head for all this information! There's nowhere for it to go! I can't do this! I'll forget it all and I'll fail! I should just quit now!"

Brock handled all this extremely well. He told me I should go to bed and get some sleep, then get up early and study. He turned out to be quite right about this, as the early morning studying was way more effective than the late night studying, and all that info was perched at the front of my brain come test time - perfectly poised to spill out onto my test paper and away from my memory. I'm waiting to see how I did, but I don't think it was awful so I was fairly pleased. Considering I had to absorb seven book chapters and about 10 hours of lectures in just two weeks and then take a test, I didn't think I could have done any more to prepare, anyway.

I have to say, though, that I really have to learn APA style. We didn't have to use it for this paper, but we do have to use it for another paper. I used MLA as an undergrad and now at work I use a weird hybrid of AP style, corporate style and "Jessie style," as appropriate. So when I sat down to write my paper for school I was questioning all kinds of things...like do you put one space after a period or two? Do you indent your paragraphs or just put an extra return in between them? How do bold and italics (two of my favorite writing tools) work on a college paper? It just amazes me how much my writing style has changed in the past seven years.

On another note, for those of you who read this but whom I don't get to talk to very often, my dad is having surgery for an aortic aneurysm on Thursday this week. I will be down for that so I can hang out at the hospital with my mom and my sister, and then I have to drive home and be ready to catch a plane for a business trip early on Friday morning. So that's going to be kind of crazy. We're all just hoping surgery goes smoothly and Dad doesn't get too cranky without food or coffee in the morning. This is a real danger that I don't think the medical team fully understands. He seems like a really sweet, easygoing guy until you take away his caffeine, and then bad things start to happen...so please think happy thoughts for my dad on Thursday that all will go well.