Long Time No Write

I realized that it had been a minute since I had been on here. I did not realize just how long that minute was. I have never been very good with follow through. I start things all the time that I never finish. I literally have hundreds of projects, poems, stories, etc. that I have begun and never ended. I have stacks of journals that I have started and abandoned.  It is not one of my better qualities. I can say that I will try to be better and I legitimately will…until I get sidetracked or something better comes along. That’s who I am. I struggle with it. Some days are better than others. This is who I am and it isn’t always pretty.

So where have I been for four years? Oh, I’ve been around. Here and there. I moved and moved again. I have nomad disease. I hate to stay put. I keep saying that I haven’t found my forever home, but the truth is that I wonder if that place even exists. I have found places that feel more right than others, but no place exactly that I have said I could live there forever. Maybe I never will. I do know that where I am now is not where I want to be and I actively looking for some place else and the resources to make that happen.

I have gained weight and lost weight. I went back up to nearly 600 pounds and I went down to 450. I had gastric bypass in 2015. I lost another 180 pounds, then I stalled, then I gained back 30, then I started again. I am now holding fiercely to 290. I can’t seem to break the plateau. I am still a food addict. I am still an emotional eater. I am back in therapy trying to deal with this and other issues. I may blog about them at another time. I make no promises.

My family is largely the same. I am still married to my best friend Shawn. My daughter turns 14 tomorrow. She is an amazing, beautiful, talented, genius of a young woman and I am immensely proud of her. Of course she is also mine which means I am often incredibly frustrated by her and we butt heads A LOT! I may write more on that at a later date, but again, no promises!

I start a new job tomorrow. Another of my fabulous, not so fabulous, qualities is that I am a job hopper. Again, I am working on it. It is one of things I most hate about myself. Apparently I have impulse control issues. Who knew?!? Lol.

You may ask yourself, and me, what prompted me to write a blog after all this time? Well, the truth is that today I started to write a poem. This is a big deal for several reasons, not the least of which is that I can’t remember the time I wrote a poem.  I used to write all the time, but I have not for a long time. I used to call myself a writer and dream that some day I would make a living from it. I gave up those ghosts year ago and when I did I slowly stopped writing. It was so gradual that I did not even realize it until my daughter started writing. It reminded me of who I used to be. Not all of that person I was, was bad. I am sad to say that most of my writing got lost in a move and probably was destroyed never to be recovered. I can’t change that, but maybe I can start to write again. So here goes…the beginnings of my first poem in a long, long time…

 

I rage

my mind rages

my heart rages

my thoughts rage

my emotions rage

Like a fire rages

I burn

Out of control

until I am surrounded

by nothing

but smoke

and ashes

My What’s In A Name Rant

I have a rant. It is a small thing I know, but it has bothered me so many times and I feel the need to complain about it. Please feel free to ignore this blog. It is largely written so I can get the emotions out without actually screaming at an actual person. I am just venting my frustration. Of course if you do read it and realize that it applies to you, maybe it will do some good in that regard too. People’s feelings matter.

I have a rant. I do realize that it is petty. I recognize and admit that it makes me egotistical. I know that in the grand scheme of things, it is small and not overly important. All that being said, it totally pisses me off when someone spells my name wrong.

When I was born my parents decided to name me Mindi and they spelled it M-I-N-D-I. That is my name. I did not pick it nor did I choose how to spell it. My mother wanted my name to be Mindisue. It didn’t end up that way. To be completely honest, I do not like my name and I never have, but it is what it is and I live with it.

When most people hear my name they assume that it is spelled in the traditional way and I forgive them the mistake. I am even understanding and forgiving of the casual acquaintance who misspells it. What really bothers me are the friends and family who I have known for years who still spell my name wrong. I think that after knowing me so long they would know this about me. What bothers me the most is the people who look right at my name and spell it wrong. It has happened with teachers, doctors, and others who have my name clearly written in front of them and yet they still spell it wrong. Facebook is the most common scene of this crime. When you are on my Facebook page to leave me a message, it is spelled in big bold letters. When you send me a private message on Facebook it is right there in the “to” line. So when you are writing my name and spelling it wrong, it is inconsideration, laziness or ignorance when you spell it wrong? Is it that you think you know better than me how my name should be spelled and you refuse to defer to the spelling that I have lived with for my entire life?

Again, I realize that in the grand scheme of things, someone spelling my name wrong is not a huge betrayal, but it is a small slap in the face. It is disrespectful of you to not take the 10 seconds (or less) necessary to spell it correctly. It makes me angry and often it hurts my feelings. So, PLEASE, stop it.

In closing let me say that I am sorry of this blog has offended you. I feel the way that I feel. My name is Mindi. If you cannot force yourself to spell my name with an I at the end, please feel free to call me Min, or hey you, or crazy bitch. Whatever. Just please, whatever you call me, try to spell it right.

Cruel Comments

This blog is not to the general public. It is not to my family and friends. You are all welcome to read it, of course, but it is written to a specific target and they know who they are. Here you go hater. This is what your comments caused.

I am so, so far from perfect. I have so many issues that some of my issues have issues of their own. I try to be a good person. I’m not always successful. I have an Irish temper. I inherited it honestly. Over the years I have tried to learn to control my temper and behave rationally no matter how angry I am. I am not always successful. Sometimes I get mad and my mouth starts running and before I can catch it, damage is done. Sometimes I hurt the people that I love the most. I am always sorry. I always feel terribly. Even in those times when I was told that what I said was not out of line or that the person might have deserved it, even then I felt terribly. I have never hurt a person without feeling bad about it. I admit, that I have hurt a lot of people, but no one more than myself. I feel bad about that too. For all the times that I said something nasty to someone, whether it was true or not, I have felt ashamed of myself. For all those tears that I have caused, no matter how I felt about the person doing the crying, I have felt guilty. My heart has hurt for every one of the hurts that I have caused and in some cases, I hurt myself way more than the other person.

For all of my mistakes, I can honestly say that I have never attacked a perfect stranger for no good reason. I have never lashed out and said horrible things to someone I didn’t know just because I could. Not that there is ever an excuse for hurting someone, but at least there should be a reason. To attack someone without provocation and cause them pain just because you can is unimaginable to me, yet it has been done to me.

In the months that I have been making YouTube videos I have met some wonderful people. I have made close friends who I love and value more than I can say. I have found support, encouragement and inspiration from people I may never have met otherwise. It has brought me together with people who I hope will always be in my life and though I have never met them in person, many of them have become very important to me.  I am so grateful for all of them and for the opportunity to share our lives with each other. Sadly, it has also brought some nasty people into my life.

There are people on YouTube who have nothing better to do than to go around watching videos and making nasty comments on them. Sometimes they are snide and mocking, belittling, insulting and crude. Sometimes they are downright cruel. I’ve heard them called trolls and haters and some other more colorful names, but whatever they are called, I think they need to be called out.

Now I realize that there is freedom of speech and people have the right to say that they don’t like my videos. That is fine, but they can say that without being ignorant. You can give feedback, positive or negative, without hurting people terribly. While I would rather have everyone tell me that I am wonderful, I am well aware that I am not everyone’s cup of tea. Please feel free to dislike me in a positive way or at the very least, dislike me from a distance. If you don’t like me, you don’t have to watch my videos. You can go on your merry way and leave me alone.

It is very hard to have the courage to make a video about yourself, share yourself, your experiences and your feelings with the world. It is scary to post that video and allow others to see you for who you really are. I know that I willingly put myself out there to be loved or hated, accepted or rejected, and I am willing to face whatever the outcome is, but I don’t think that I should have to be hurt because some people have no sympathy, empathy or tact.

I think that some people get lost in the anonymity of being online. Because you aren’t physically talking to someone, you lose some perspective of things. If you don’t hear yourself say something and see the other person’s reaction, you might not realize the implications of your comments. I’m certain that some of the nasty comments made are simply miscommunication and not meant to be hurtful. Those comments I usually brush off with little further thought. It is the comments that have no possible interpretation other than cruelty. Some comments are made that are so hurtful, I can’t image how anyone can type them without feeling horrible about doing it. I always wonder, when I read comments like that, if I were standing in front of you, would you say that to my face? If your mother, sister or daughter was standing beside you watching what you write, would you still spew your venom? If you knew that I went to bed and cried myself to sleep because you chose to attack me, a perfect stranger, for no other reason than the fact that you have freedom of speech, would that make you stop and think before you leave me another nasty message?

The fact is that I do have a choice whether or not to post videos and I choose to put myself out there. 99% of the time I am glad that I do. I also have a choice in how I react to the comments that I get and whether or not I let them hurt me. Most of the time I don’t, but sometimes I do. Sometimes I let my emotions overwhelm me, and yes, sometimes I am mean, but I am never cruel. Can you say the same?

Mindi’s Bootcamp

People are always asking me what workouts I do. I tell them that I strength train three days a week and I try to do cardio every day. I have had so many people tell me that they either don’t know how to strength train or don’t want to. Many women are afraid to strength train because of the myth that they will get big bulging muscles. That is so not true. It actually takes a concentrated effort to get bulky like that. Strength training gives you lean, strong, healthy muscles that support you in every aspect of your physical life and also help you burn calories. I have to confess that strength training is my absolute least favorite exercise. I hate every minute of it. I hate the pain, the burn and the repetition. It is hard work and not fun. I hate every minute of it and yet I do it religiously because I know how important it is. After you turn 35 you start losing muscle mass and if you don’t take steps to stop that process you will continue to lose. This is not what you want to happen! I tell everyone that they must strength train. So a few weeks ago I started posting “Mindi’s Bootcamp” routines. I post them on my facebook page Mindi’s Taking It Off and my pinterest board Mindi’s Bootcamp. I am not a health or fitness professional. I am just a woman who has been overweight her entire life and is now trying to get healthy. I would love to help others get healthy too. I started off with relatively easy workouts and I have been slowly increasing the difficulty. I am happy with the response that I have gotten from them. I thought I’d share them here too because the more people that I can help the better. I am always open to suggestions and I welcome any comments or questions. Today is Monday and here is the workout for today. 

Happy sweating!

It’s Time To Walk

I tell my daughter, Marissa, all the time that she is the only one who can control herself. She has control over her actions, her behavior and her attitude. I tell her to think about the kind of person that she wants to be and then act that way. I totally feel like we have control over who we are. We cannot control our feelings, but we can control how much power they have over us. We cannot control other people, but we can control how we react to them. I believe this talk with all my heart and yet lately I have not been walking the walk.

I am, by my nature, a very emotional person. I am sensitive and I feel emotion quickly and strongly. I laugh quickly and cry easily. I get angry and I get hurt. This is all part of who I am and I cannot change this about myself. I have an amazing ability to love people in almost an instant and once I love them I love them always, even when I don’t like them anymore. I want to take care of the people that I care about. I would walk through fire and give everything I have for those that I love. That’s just how I roll.

On the flip side, I have a quick temper and I tend to hold onto a grudge unless I force myself to let it go. I am oversensitive and I get hurt easily. I have a hard time trusting people that I do not know and I am always afraid of getting hurt. I tend to push people away before they have a chance to hurt me. I can be a very pessimistic and negative person. These are things about myself that I don’t like. They make me the kind of person that I do not want to be and most of the time I actively try to overcome them. Lately I have not been doing this. Lately I have been letting the darkness win and the negativity, anger, fear, pain and sadness have been weighing me down.

The kind of person that I want to be is happy, friendly, trusting, strong and open. I want to be all the best parts of me and few of the bad. I want to be optimistic and hopeful all the time. I want to laugh more than I cry. I want to not let other people’s issues affect me. I live my life for me and how they feel about me should not affect my happiness. I want to be the best Min that I can be and nothing else.

So here I am, today, refocusing. I am going to try harder to be better. I have control over the type of person that I want to be and I will be who I want to be. Goodness knows I can talk the talk and now I will walk the walk.

Not Too Daunting

When you are incredibly overweight and you are trying to get healthy, it can seem like an overwhelming task. At times it seems nearly impossible. I have been on my weight loss journey for a while now and I have lost a lot of weight. I am very very proud of how far I have come. Still, there are days when all I can think of is how far I still have left to go. Yes I have lost 159 pounds since January and 199 pounds from my all time high weight, but I still have over 200 pounds to lose before I can reach a healthy weight. Sometimes it feels like I will be on this journey forever and in a very real sense, I will be. My journey does not stop when I hit some arbitrary number on the scale or when I fit into a certain size. I am a food addict who has beaten her body into an incredibly unhealthy state and unless I want it to remain so unhealthy, I  must eat right and exercise every day, for the rest of my life. I’m not saying that I will never overeat again or that I will exercise every single day, but I have to constantly be on alert to not fall back into my old habits. It is way to easy to be unhealthy and I know that that is not the life that I want. It is not easy to take the healthy life path, but it is so very worth it. One year ago I could barely walk and I was in a lot of pain every day. Today I did my Cardio boxing workout, then I went to my daughter’s basketball party and played a little basketball with Shawn and the girls, and then I came home and did some Just Dance 4 with my daughter. That is SO amazing! I never thought that I would be capable of doing all that in a week, let alone in a day. This is why I will not let anything stop me. This is why, even when I get overwhelmed and afraid, tired and discouraged, I push on. This is the life that I want and this is why I fight the battle every day and I always will.

Have You Ever Heard of Ticket America?

I am a bargain hunter. I am a coupon clipper. I am a power shopper. These are all very very true. I have been trying to find the best deal for all of my adult life. At times we have had more money and sometimes we have had even less, but no matter what our financial situation, I have always tried to save money. So when I am looking for ideas for fun things to do I, of course, try to spend as little as possible. I came across a website called Ticket America and I thought I would share it with you.

We like all kinds of music. I like almost every genre of music. Shawn likes hard rock, 80’s and country best, but he is slowly becoming more flexible about music. Shawn, Marissa and I all love live music, so going to concerts are a great family activity.

We both really like Jason Aldean. He is doing a tour in all of these huge venues like Wrigley Field in Chicago and Fenway Park in Boston. You can see all of his concerts and the ticket prices at http://www.ticketamerica.com/jason_aldean_tickets.html.  Some of his shows are with Miranda Lambert and I absolutely LOVE her! I think it would awesome to see them together!

Shawn and I both really like Coldplay too and would love to see them in concert. To see Coldplay’s upcoming events you can go here http://www.ticketamerica.com/coldplay_tickets.html. I imagine that they would do such a great live show.

They also have tickets for sporting events like WWE (http://www.ticketamerica.com/wwe_tickets.html) which Shawn likes, but I don’t, football (http://www.ticketamerica.com/sports/football/nfl) which I love and Shawn kinda likes and NASCAR (http://www.ticketamerica.com/nascar_tickets.html) which Shawn loves and I kinda like. They have theater tickets too for those of us that LOVE theater.

So Ticket America has a lot of tickets AND they have a guarantee. That’s right, they have a buyers guarantee which you can check out here http://www.ticketamerica.com/buyersguarantee. I really like them and I will be using their services in the future.

What do you think? What ticket service do you use?

I May Be Switching…

I think everyone knows that I have a BodyMedia armband and I love it. I have loved it since I got it and I still feel the same, however, I do NOT love its price or the monthly website fee. I have had it for almost three years now and it is wearing out. I know that soon it will need to be replaced and honestly, I do not want to spend another $150 or $200 to get the one that I want (with built-in wireless). I also get a little sad every month when I see the $7 charge on my account for their website fees which most other companies provide for free. So I think I may be breaking up with BodyMedia…

I have been looking at other products that could replace my armband like Fitbit,  Nike Fuel, and other similar items. I really want something to tell me how many steps I take, how many calories I burn and how active I am. I love the sleep info as well, but it is not essential. I want something that is accurate, but not expensive and I cannot afford a lot right now. So that’s where I am. If you have any advice and/or input, I’d love to know what you think.

I was contacted by a woman who said that she represented a company that was bringing out a new product that she’d like me to try and then blog about. I was totally interested, but I haven’t heard anything in months so I’m not sure if that is still happening or not. I am all about trying new things and I am very willing to give my honest review about them, so if anyone wants to send me a Nike  Fuel band or a Fitbit or a new heart rate monitor, or any other health related item, I’d be glad to review them for you. I also really like free stuff 🙂

I Just Found Out About The Most AMAZING Results!!!

Yesterday I went to the doctor for the results of the blood-work I had done in September. It was done 3 months after I started Body by Vi. I was nervous about it because I have put so much faith into Body by Vi. I know that it has changed my life in so many ways already. I have never slept this well or had this much energy. I have had less pain in the last few months than I have in over six years. I was also nervous because I was on Actos for my diabetes since I was diagnosed and this was the first blood-work done since I went off of it. I was worried that it would be bad and I would have to change meds again. So when I met with the doctor yesterday I was nervous, but excited.

First, the nurse took my blood glucose and blood pressure readings in the office and both were fantastic. Two hours after eating and my glucose was 119, my blood pressure was 110 over 60 and I weighed in at 435. All those are good numbers and I was feeling pretty good at that point.

Then the doctor came in and checked my feet, which tickled a lot, but was good. My feet are holding up just fine. That, in itself, is a big relief! She said she is absolutely thrilled with my progress and I should keep it up. She said I may want to lower my calorie intake a little if I stop losing weight, but I already knew that of course. Then she looked at my blood-work results and got a huge grin on her face. All of my blood-work was really good. My cholesterol was down and my LDL, which is the bad cholesterol, went from 220 to 110!!! That is cut in half in three months time!!! She was shocked that the only thing that I changed was Body by Vi. For more info on LDL cholesterol go here.

And now for the most incredible news…my A1C was 5.5!!!! For those of you that don’t know what that means it is FANTASTIC!!! If you want more info on what A1C means go here.  The lowest my A1C has been since my diabetes diagnosis was 7.1 and that was the last blood-work before this one. So even with diet and exercise my A1C was still high. Body by Vi helped me get it to where it needs to be!

So for all of you non-believers, take it from me, I am living proof that Body by Vi is amazing and life changing. I have the tests to back up my claims. Not only has it helped me lose weight and feel good, it is helping me get healthy in just about every way. I am so SO grateful for Body by Vi!!!

If you’re interested I will also be doing a vlog (video blog) about this and a few other things. It will, no doubet, be emotional. Here is my channel if you want to watch and/or subscribe to me.

As always, thank you so much for all your love and support!!!

Please, please, please!!!

If you have been reading my blogs, watching my vlogs, followingmy YouTube, friending me on Facebook, or have been anywhere near me at any time in the last several months, then you know what I’ve been doing. I’ve been working my butt off, literally, getting healthy and rocking the Body by Vi 90 Day challenge(s). I have been taking part in the ViSalus Challenge Showdown, making videos about my weight loss journey and posting them for all the world to see. Well yesterday was the last day to post videos for the Showdown. Today they posted the top 100 channels for everyone to vote on. There were over 5,000 channels entered into the contest and I am so excited to be one of the top 100 channels that advanced to the Showdown Throwdown. Out of these 100 channels, 10 will be picked to win their own webshow produced by none other than the amazing Ben Silverman. I would LOVE the opportunity to share my story, my weight loss journey, with the world. Please help to do that! Please rate my channel a 10 so I can be one of the top 10!!! Thank you!

via Watch, Rate and Share My Video.