About Me

Hi, my name is Angela and welcome to my blog. This is a place where I write about my life in an honest and open way.

I am 36 years old, single, and a Christian. God gave me a heart to work with children and so I spend my day teaching kindergarten. It is my fourth year teaching and although it is hard I love it. I currently go to a college for my BA in Elementary Education which keeps me busy. Between work and school there is not much time left but I enjoy serving and helping others, watching netflix, or reading a good book.


Sunday, January 20, 2013

Stuck in Funk

I want to keep this as little negative info as possible so it will be short and brief. It has been a really hard week. Sometime last weekend I just kind of broke. I do that sometimes when things get too emotionally stressful my body just kind of shuts down its systems. So for the last week I have struggled at getting to places on time, I didn't do homework till last min on saturday. There was no exercising and I did not track my food all week. It has been rough.

However, I have finally reminded myself that this is not how I want to live and am picking myself up and dusting myself off. It will take a few days to get myself back to where I should be, to where I was. But I know that I can.

How did I get out of my funk? It was a combination of realizing I was going to miss my Saturday night church, which I LOVE to go to, because I was being so lazy I wouldn't get out of the Denny's booth and go pay for my food and drive across town. I did go but was a half hour late. It literally took 45 min of convincing myself. Anyways, then the service was great and reminded me that God wants more for me and this numbness was getting in the way. Then of course I remind myself of a verse that has become very important to me. Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord. "Plans to prosper not to harm. Plans for a hope and a future." Being late, missing homework, and spending countless hours watching stupid tv shows while surfing Pinterest is not the plans God has for me. He was so much more! He wants me to prosper but I have to make the choice to do so. And it is this that helps me get out of my funk.

Friday, January 11, 2013

This is why...

This is why I always give up. This is why I always fail. I have spent 10 days fighting cravings. 10 days exercising nearly everyday. Making sure to always take extra steps here and there. I have been staying close to my calorie goal with my average being 500 under the last couple weeks. (The goal calories putting me at losing 2 lbs a week.) Tonight I stepped on the scale, thinking it had been a while it was time to check and what does the scale say? 292! In 10 days I have not gained or lost anything! Why am I pushing myself so hard. Why am I passing up the food that I want when it apparently doesn't even matter! Ahhhhhhh!!!!

I know what you want to say. "Muscle weighs more then fat." "You have to give it time." NO! How is it that my body never loses weight the first month that I exercise! How is this possible? This is not the first time I have said this on this blog. It is so annoying! Why go through so much pain so much talking myself away from food and away from the drive threw when it doesn't make a difference? I know, "what about my clothes? I bet they are feeling looser." NO! In fact all week my pants have been tight it has been awful and today I didn't think I would button them. So please tell me how my waist is growing larger now that I am eating less and exercising more!

I don't understand.

Thursday, January 10, 2013

Pause Before Eating

Things have been going well. I am working on school work, watching dogs, volunteering, working a little bit. I have also been tracking all of my food and exercising. Ok. I didn't exercise yesterday but a day off is not horrible and I still made sure to do lots of walking. Right now I am hitting about 6000 steps a day. Of course the system wants me to be at 10K a day but I will work up to that, maybe.

This morning I had agreed to volunteer for Koman again but not until eleven. I got up and worked out doing my third Kettle Worx video, resistance. It was difficult but with a few breaks I got through it. Though this time I was too tired to do anything else. I volunteered, went to work and then to bible study. I got home and changed into my work out clothes, I wanted to burn a few more calories before I ended my day. Here is where the problem came in.

Back in November I bought a pretty new Macbook because my old computer was six and dying. I have used the old computer to connect to my tv to watch Hulu and Netflix. Mostly because plugging this one in will be more difficult and expensive. The old computer has gotten worse and worse. At one point I couldn't get it to turn on at all. Today it crashed a couple times while playing Hulu so I thought I would try this trick to wipe off a bunch of information I no longer needed. Well it didn't work. The computer is totally fried and won't get past the first grey loading screen, it won't even soft boot. This all happened between work and bible study.

When I got home from bible study, as I said, I went and changed into work out clothes, came out into the living room and only then realized that I couldn't watch Hulu on my tv because my old computer was dead. I can stream on my new computer but couldn't figure out a place to put the computer while I worked out. I have a dvd player but I really wanted to watch hulu because I have a long list of shows to watch. So I sat down, started my show on my laptop and then started thinking about what I wanted to eat. I even considered going back to the Jack in the Box I had passed on the way home to get some junk food. It was this thought that flashed me back to reality. I was out of calories. I didn't have anymore to eat. So maybe I didn't have to exercise but go eat thousands of calories because your dying computer finally died?! That is crazy. How many times have I justified eating things just like this. I mean I would have eating food that satisfied in the moment and I would have watched the shows I wanted to so what is the bad side? But it is not what I want long term.

I closed my computer and sat for just a minute to think about an alternative and then duh! Like a big palm to my forehead. My brother and sil were out and they have a hookup to there tv for the same type of computer. The solution was that easy, right there ten feet away. It is so ingrained in me that I need eat to pacify the uncomfortable feelings that I am having. I was mad that things weren't going how I wanted them to. Okay be mad. But instead of eating a thousand calories and then figuring out the solution just stop for a second. Think about it, go to God about it. I know I will do it again. It is my habit. It is the easy temporary solution. I am glad that this time I stopped went across the way and burned 400 calories stair stepping and got to watch my show.

Tuesday, January 8, 2013

Long days begin

The craziness has begun. Today I was supposed to start my day at 7am but I am still working on switching my schedule around so I was up at 8:30. At 9 I had a phone call with the teacher who is supervising my internships. I got ready and waited for the call. The call went well and as I had thought fairly quickly. I made myself I nice breakfast of sausage and cheese omelet and a plain bagel with chive cream cheese.

After breakfast it was time to run out the door. From time to time I help my local Susan G Komen with data entry or mundane tasks they need done. From 10 to noon I entered in checks into the system, (I am great at data entry from my years in call centers.) I had to scoot at noon and go across town to let some dogs out for a family. I babysit for they two kids all the time, they are great. The mom's grandfather passed away so she had to fly out to South Carolina for the week. Although dad and the kids are still in town they wanted to have the dogs let out mid-day this week so I am helping out.

After dog watching I went home. I was starting to get hungry but I had to exercise first. Back in November I was wandering the aisles of Target when I saw on a clearance section the 10lb Kettle Worx system for $18 down from the normal $60. If you haven't seen it, it consists of one 10 lb kettle bell and six dvd's with 20 min work-outs to follow. I had been eying it for some time on the shelf at various stores but I didn't need a new work out system. But at that price I snatched it up. As you know Nov is crazy for me so it just sat in my living room unopened. Then in December, my brother (roommate) decided to start using it and so I thought I should try too. They have three dvd's cardio, core, and resistance. You do one of each every week for six weeks. Each dvd has six different workouts to go through, so it gets progressively more difficult. I did it once and was sore for two days and did not got back to it. My sister-in-law did the same. My brother did manage to do it for two full weeks before they went on vacation. So here I am in January, trying to get rid of these pounds so Sunday I did the Cardio and today I needed to do the Core. I was still sore from Sunday's workout but I knew I had to do it anyways. So I did it! Let me tell you the Core workout is not as exhausting as the Cardio so I wanted to do more.

In December I had driven out to see a friend, we met out at the Tempe Marketplace. We have the tradition of watching all of the Twilight movies together. After we hung out and parted ways I decided to stop by Sports Authority. I had been thinking that the KettleWorx program was too difficult because the Kettlebell was too heavy so I wanted to get a lighter one. Although I did not find a smaller kettlebell I did find an amazing deal. As you know I love the products by The Firm. I have a step system I bought years ago and then about a year ago I bought their new Transformation program (which killed me when I saw it on clearance at Target for $20 when I had spent $120 on it.) Anyways they had a program that came out a while ago called The Wave. It always seemed interesting and I had liked the steps but I never bought it because of the price. Over the years I have looked for them numerous times on Craig's List but everyone is still selling them at $60+. I was at Sports Authority and I walked by a clearance rack and the Wave system was marked at $10! I couldn't believe it. This system that I have considered spending $100+ on many times is $10. I took it up to the register and it was actual a blue dot item which meant it was half off. I spent, with tax, $5.47. That was crazy. So again I have had this in my living room for nearly a month and haven't used it. It was time. It was pretty good. I was getting frustrated because the girl was going so fast but I remember with the other video's once you learn the routine it doesn't seem so fast. So I did 20 min core with a KettleWorx and then I did 30 min on The Wave. I am so proud of myself!

My day was not done. I went and took a shower, had a protein shake and then went off to work. We have this new security measure in place, I think I have mentioned it before. So I was planning on staying from 4-6. I was a little conflicted because there was this meeting at my church I wanted to attend at 6pm. I had been getting off at 5:45 before the break but with traffic I figured it would take a half hour to get to church. I left it in God's hands to figure out. I got off work at 5:15 and was 15 min early to the meeting.

Right now I am praying intently about going to Belize on a mission trip. I mentioned this before, well my church is going again. A couple in the church help start a church down in Belize and now they have their own Pastor from the town. So the church goes down to help in the town and do retreat's. One retreat for women and one retreat for the men. So April 27th through May 4th a group of women will be going down to Belize for another women's retreat, the men Sept I think. I really really feel led to go. I know that God, through the church, can take care of the financial part of it to help me with that. The concern is that my classes end on the 27th. My last classes for my AAS degree. So if there is any problems then I will be out of the country and won't be able to fix them. Now I have never had problems but it makes me nervous. I know that I can always work ahead and see if the teachers won't grade a little early for me. Most of all right now I am focused on seeking God's will in this. That has been my focus in life for the last year or so, God's will not mine. I know that if this is God's will, for me to go, then there will be rough patches but it will work out. But if I go because I have always wanted to go on a foreign mission trip and so I am going anyways then that is not God's will and who knows if everything will fall apart. I will continue to pray on this. I have to have an answer by the end of the month and I pray that I see God's will in one direction or the other.

After the meeting I stopped at Chipotle for dinner. I put my calories in my app before I stopped to make sure that I didn't go over. Mmmm...delicious tacos. Then off CR - Celebrate Recover, which was great. Now home to blog way too many words to you. The rest of my week goes pretty much like this and then my internship starts on Monday so I will be really busy. For now off to bed, need my sleep so I can wake up tomorrow.

Sunday, January 6, 2013

Moving Forward

As a follow up I paid for my classes with my credit card. It took a couple of days and many hours aimlessly walking through stores to get my thought clear. Above all else I trust in God. The verse I continue to hold on to is Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans to prosper not to harm, plans for hope and a future." I also know that where God is doing an amazing work satan tries to stop it. So I push ahead following the plans I have seen the Lord lay out for me. Trusting that He will get me through each of these bumps along the road.

Classes start tomorrow and work starts on Tuesday. I had meant to get an early start but I have only done one of the assignment so far. I really want to get a head start on my work. On the fourteenth, in one week I will start my first of two internships. They are each 80 hours to be done over 4 weeks so they will take up a lot of time.

As before mentioned I have gained some weight, ok twenty pounds is a little more then some. My birthday is mid-March and I would like to get as much of the 20 lbs off as I can. I have no idea how I am going to fit it in with everything else I have going on but I will find a way. A little bit each day and being careful with calories and I will be able to do it.

Did I tell you I have a Fitbit? It is a very fancy pedometer. It tracks steps and flights of stairs and converts it to calories. It also tracks my sleep. It connects to my Lose It! app so I can compare calories eaten to calories burned all on the same program. I have been trying to eat better but my desires are crashing against each other. The want to eat the right thing against my habit of eating when I am tired or anxious or watching tv.

Thursday, January 3, 2013

Too Much

The blows just keep coming one after another. I try to push through. I lean on God and have faith that this is just a blip on the radar just one day out of many and then...

What do you do when it is just to much. When you have been hit over and over again and pull yourself up over and over again just to be pushed back down again. The body can only handle so much. Today was too much. I am numb. I can not smile even when I try. It was, just too much.

The problems I run into with school are ridiculous. They are one after another and are totally weird and when I call the school for help no one has an answer for them. Just a couple weeks ago I was dealing with an issue where I needed special approval for some of my last semester classes. I sent the request mid- October and was told it was too early to send it end of Nov. So I send it Dec 3rd, they don't get to it till the 11th and I am told it is too late to request classes because they need 45 day. I explain and send a copy of the e-mail where I requested the classes 45 days in advance and they would not allow me to do so. They tell me that, that is correct that mid-october is too early to register for classes but we still need 45 days for your request to go through. This makes NO sense!!!!! I escalate the issue pushing how crazy this is and they approve the class and it is added. (I still wait on two other classes starting later in the semester to be approved through the standard 45 day process.)

Thanksgiving was ok, but ended in me crying. It usually does. I hate Black Friday as I am broke and can not buy things and hate listening to all of the other people going out and spending money. Christmas was horrid and lonely. I wouldn't wish that experience on my enemies. New Years was okay, I babysat and worked on homework. How sad is that?!

So as I am dealing with my lack of friends, my singleness, and the fact that I have gained 20 lbs in 2 months and yet can't get myself to stop eating junk food a new calamity occurs. Yesterday I received notice that I have exceeded my maximum number of credit hours to receive financial aid. Did you know that was possible? I didn't. I guess because I switched major's three times but had all of my credits transferred to Rio I am exceeding my limit. So I try not to freak out, only yelling a little bit, I fill out the form to explain my change in degree's and this, according to the form appears to be a valid reason to have extra credits. I figure out the scanner on my printer and I e-mail it over.

Then today my financial aid is removed. Now I had thought that is fine if my grant is removed while the process goes through because I am also taking out a student loan. But the loan is through FAFSA so it has also been revoked. So I have four days to come up with $1600 or get dropped from my classes! This is absurd!

I call, of course, and try to talk through the situation with one rep and then their supervisor. They didn't care in fact they didn't even listen. See I got special approval for the class, the approval that is supposed to take 45 day. If it takes 14 days for them to review my case and then re-apply my financial aid then all of my classes would have dropped, including this one. That would mean that I would have to wait, after financial aid is re-approved 45 days till I can take the class. That is not possible! I would have to push my classes back a semester to the Fall, I can't do that. I can't keep working part time like this. I try to explain how they have put in holds on my account in the past to keep my classes from being dropped due to my varied schedule. The manager won't even listen! Worse she thinks I am a lier. Apparently the system says they e-mailed me about this issue on the 30th, even though I got the e-mail on the 2nd. I offered to send her proof but she dismissed me. Then she called over to admissions and they say they don't have the form I sent in. She then starts talking to me as if I hadn't sent it in and was simply lying about it. I got a reply e-mail from the department, I know it went through!! AHHHH...

Halfway through talking with the supervisor I am so pissed and angry and just want to curse at this lady and so instead my entire body goes numb and I am overcome with tears. I feel like I have nothing good in my life right now and I just hold on to this school thing. I just need to graduate, I am so close. One semester away. I use this to push myself forward. All of my finances are tied into this. I work part time, I make maybe $400 a month. Without the financial aid I have to work full time. I did realize at one point that I have a credit card I can put the classes on. But what if my aid is still declined. I can't take 17 credit hours while I work full time. There is no way. In fact I am not even sure how I am going to get through the 17 credit hours working part time.

It is too much. But time just keeps moving. So I keep fighting my way through, hoping that the promise of a hope and a future that God made is out there somewhere.

Tuesday, January 1, 2013

Page 1

Happy New Year! Welcome to 2013!

I heard someone say today is the first blank page of a 365 page book. What an interesting thought. How will you write each day?

No resolutions for me just living my life. Over the next four months I will work my butt off to get my AAS degree in Early Education. It will mean some very long days and weeks but it will totally be worth it.

Last night I was seriously thinking about getting a Body Bugg. A devise that you keep on your arm and it tracks how many calories you burn throughout the day. It costs $150 and has a monthly fee of $7 a month. The other option is a FitBit it is like a fancy pedometer, tracking steps throughout the day and sleep patterns. It costs $100 and has no monthly fee. I ended up deciding on the FitBit. It connects to the LoseIt! app I use on my phone to track calories and the program the FitBit uses converts it into calories. Have I mentioned lately that I am up to 290 lbs. After maintaining 270 for a very long time I have gained and am now maintaing 20 additional pounds. Not ok.

Day One: Slept till noon. Caught up with my brother and sister-in-law back from their trip. I did a homework assignment.  I then went out and my brother very kindly bought me the FitBit I wanted as a Christmas gift/thank you for watching their cats we then went and watched The Hobbit (for a second time) in HFR 3D. I am not watching romantic movies while cleaning the living room and blogging. I would say a good day overall.