The mind is a very powerful thing.

It has the power to do so much good, a well as the power for evil.

It’s amazing when you think you are over something, when you think that you have moved on. Only to find that the fear you thought you had moved past was just waiting in the closet to jump out at you when you least expected it.

I have struggled with my weight for about 10 years now. Maybe I should be more clear, I’ve been annoyed with my weight gain but done pretty much zero to actually deal with it. I didn’t gain my weight on purpose. I think it was a number of factors including being super sensitive to the hormones in the birth control I was using to being sick for nine months with respiratory problems which lead to lots of antibiotics and such. You would have thought once I dealt with the problem (switched birth control and no longer worked around the stuff I think was making me sick) it would have gotten better on it’s own. Nope. Didn’t work like that.

While I am not an expert in this I have a really good feeling that I understand exactly what happened. Whild weight is super easy to put on ( thanks biology) apparently getting it back off is a little harder. I have no problem with hard work. However something unexpected happened when I gained the weight.

I didn’t like the scale going up or buying bigger pants. That made me cringe as well as cry a couple of times. However it freed me. From what you ask…. men. It freed me from being afraid of men.

I have had a very complicated relationship with men. I will not get into details about any one man in particular, because while there was wrong done I will completely own my part in the situation. I was young and overly friendly. I tend to be overly friendly when I’m comfortable. Being overweight very suddenly made me very uncomfortable. So I became much more introverted. I was then left alone. No more harassment, no more going to work and dealing with your boss being inappropriate. I could do what I needed to do and be left the hell alone. Do I think it was all from being heavy? No probably not. Combine getting heavy and then not being friendly and that created the perfect little bubble for me to safely live my life in.

Two years ago I finally got fed up, or so I had thought. I joined a six month long dietbet and I was going to change my life. I was going to be happy, because apparently all my issue were from my weight and if I could be thinner I could be happy. When I clicked join now I didn’t know I was signing up for one of my lifes biggest wake up calls.

I was faced with the reality that while I didn’t love my weight it was not the source of all my problems. In fact I had used it as a shield to hide from my truth. As my weight started to come off my shield weakened and I had to face my reality. First of all weight wasn’t the reason for my unhappiness and I needed to dig deeper. Second I needed to face my fear, the fear that held me back, the fear that caused self sabotage, the fear that was exposing what eighteen year old me ran from.

It was not an all negative experience. I finally was open with my husband about things I had been hiding since I was eighteen. I became more aware of myself. I was better right?

Wrong again.

Here I am two and a half years later. My youngest is 14 months old and I’m going to try again. This time I feel ready. I want to be healthy. I want to be a good example for my kid. I want my raging IBS to go away. I decided to sign up for a one month bet this time. I made it. I lost ten pounds and I was proud. I had sort of tackled some food issues, maybe not the want for my drug of choice ( sugar) but I learned to set limits such as one cup of coffee only since I hadn’t managed to stop putting sugar in it. Was fine seeing other people eat food I wasn’t eating because I had made a choice to do differently not them. I could even bake a cake and not slip. I was going to do it this time.

So all confident and maybe a little cocky after my first round I signed up again, this time higher stakes because I could do it.

All the sudden the anxiety is coming back.

It’s different this time. It’s not sabotaging my food choices. I had some cake on my daughter’s birthday the other day and realized hey I don’t actually like it that much anymore ( the sugar monster tried to get me to eat more anyway but that’s a story for another day). I ordered a meal kit for fun and ate my burger bunless, guilt free that I “wasted” the bun I paid for because I am not a garbage can. This time it seems to be around getting fit.

I subscribed to beachbody May 6th. I’ve used a handful of times since. I began to try again once some weight came off because I felt confident it would be easier. It kind of was. I was aware that I had let my physical fitness slide, but I was going to fix it. I even signed up for a no pressure accountability challenge. I was going to tackle my next challenge.

The mind is a very powerful thing. I think mine may be screwing with me. I have off and on had a higher than usual resting heartbeat which my doctor feels like is from anxiety and I completely agree after some home monitoring. Every once and awhile I get heartburn that presents in my chest right near my heart. It’s always been this way. I have some ways I can be sure it’s heartburn, I don’t ignore because there is a family history of heart problems. One night it happened, and I had wanted to exercise once the kids went to bed. I found myself afraid. What if my heartburn wasn’t heartburn, what if I tried to do even light exercise and I triggered something.

It was happening again. My mind is trying to rebuild its cracked shield. Exercise was helping to accelerate my weightloss, and my mind wanted to put a stop to it.

I have varicose veins in my right leg. I developed while pregnant with my first daughter who just turned six. They have off and on bothered me since. When I started exercising again I thought about how the last time I tried working out I could get pain in my calf near my veins. Well within a few days it happened. Which leaves me wondering if I created the pain in my mind. It has been a problem I’ve had before but I can’t help but feel like I brought it on. I’m not afraid of discomfort, but the fear of a blood clot seems to have stopped me in my tracks. Due to the location it’s hard to say if its my muscle or my vein. Its also hard to say how much my mind is trying to desperately put its shield back together.

It will be different this time. Last time I just stopped. This time I am spending time evaluating myself and my mind. I am looking at the facts, such as exercise being good for my veins as well as the fact this is always the leg that gets crampy. I am being proactive, but not going to lay down and do nothing as I have in the past. I am wearing my compression sock, I am taking my magnesium for leg cramps, and this time I have made an appointment with my doctor to find out if there is actually a reason to be concerned. I will be having an honest conversation with her about my symptoms as well as the mental battle surrounding this subject. I need to address the elephant in the room, because it keeps sitting on my chest and it’s hard to breathe.

This time I am going to face my mind . I have overcome so much and survived. It is time to learn the difference between living and just being alive.