A Weight Lifted Update 8

Well, it's been a while, I know, my weight has been up and down over the last few weeks with the problems with my arm. Just before Christmas I had joint pains in my right elbow - both tennis and golfer's elbow - meaning problems with my tendons on both sides of my right elbow joint. I managed to get treatment for the lefthand side of the joint but then the righthand side flared up again, and the doctor at our surgery that specialises in joint injections has been on holidays for January. Anyway, Wednesday, I should be able to have another injection (gee, I hate needles, but the pain of the joint is worse).

Now my strategy for pain used to be to overeat, to take the hurt away and replace it with fullness, but then I would feel guilty and eat to take the guilt away, etc, etc. I managed to curb some of that behaviour and managed to keep my weight gain below 17st, and now the weight is being lost again. Today I've managed to get back to the lowest weight I was before my pain problems and now I have lost a total of 8.5lbs so far, cue the fireworks again...

So weight in the beginning (Nov 2008) 17st 4
Weight today: 16st 9.5
Weight lost: 8.5 lb

It's about 11 weeks till my trip to Dublin, so I hoping to have lost a stone in total by then, so still working towards that :)

I think that works out as a sleeve rolled up on my "coat", don't you? xx

Autumn: Not Dying but Celebrating

I’ve always loved Autumn as a season (although as a child it meant back to school) but I often wondered why, as it was seen as the time when things died back ready for winter. The leaves fall, things turned to brown, the nights drew in and some days it just never seemed to get light. But then during a counselling session I was talking about colour and Autumn, and remembered really what Autumn is about. It’s not about dying, it’s about putting your best clothes on and celebrating life, and that's what I love.

The colours are so much brighter in Autumn: trees that are usually green turn to burnished copper or to golds and reds, like the brightest fires. The earth that may have been pungent with Spring and Summer’s blooms becomes more rich smelling, so spicy, with the leaves, as they fall to the ground, in gentle mounds, sitting waiting for fun. And the smell of bonfires… with the tang in the air of fireworks, hot tomato soup and frying onions. Of course some bushes choose Autumn for their display of berries, ruby red, with spiders’ webs taking on the look of diamond necklaces left carelessly on the hedgerow for those who look to see. And the white hairs of old man’s beard plants billowing in the winds, like elven washing lines of silk. Yes, Autumn brings storms and rain, but its Sun feels so much warmer than Spring's which feels brash by comparison. Winter may be just around the corner but Autumn wears all its finery to celebrate: no sleepwalking into Winter, it holds its head up high.

There is nothing like kicking up the leaves in Autumn, as it says come play with me just one more time before the dark days, and the ruby faces of children and child-spirited people say it all on an Autumn day. As part of my therapy, my counsellor sent me out to photo an Autumn day and these are some of the photos I took. It surprised me to still find flowers, but it just shows how we look but don’t see.

After that session and the pleasure that it rekindled in me, as I thought of the autumnal walks I had had with my Grandad (a great influence in my life), I started to introduce colour and texture into my clothes, still some black as a base, but with autumnal colours or rich berry purples to reflect this side of me, and I started to celebrate a bit more and use my camera a bit more to record life rather than let times pass me by as much. So no wearing things only for best, as best can be every day for me. And all this just from Autumn…? Perhaps it’s because I was an Autumn baby, born one Bonfire Night, a few moons ago ;)

xx

PS thanks to dc for her blog on kicking up leaves for giving me food for thought :) xx

Sailing my Own Ship

One of the best things that did come out of my first marriage was that I went on an Outward Bounds course to learn how to sail, but learnt so much about life. Normally I was so quiet, frightened to say anything because I would be criticised or called stupid. My ex-husband was so dismayed that as we drove back from Birmingham New Street train station to home a hour away all I wanted to talk about was the course and what I'd done, rather than wanting to hear what he had done all week whilst I had been away - should have been a warning signal then, but you ignore those when you think that you're in love. I was in love with an idea and so was he, for most of the time we were never truly in love with each other, and certainly not at the same time.

Anyway, one of the things that I still hold onto from that course is the saying "Ships in harbours are safe, but that’s not what ships were made for." That got me to Belfast to push my comfort zone and I had a great time, meeting people and seeing Brian Kennedy in concert in his hometown, and hopefully that will get me to Dublin in April.

I didn't learn the next saying on the course but I also keep this one with me: "I am not afraid of storms for I am learning how to sail my ship."

The photo below is a picture of the boat that my son and I made when we all went to Enginuity at Ironbridge a few years ago, which is a hands-on museum attraction. (My son is from my second, current and much happier marriage!) They were having a "build your own boat and see how it does" day. This is our boat...

xx

Lessons from life - The Hudson River Plane Landing

Saw this on the news and was also so thankful that everyone seems to have gotten out ok. Good, despite the odds. It showed to me that when things look the worst they possibly can be that there is still a chance they will work out OK. Improbable but not impossible, as a million to one chance is still a chance...

xx

Blue Monday

According to the "experts", today is supposed to be the gloomiest day of the year - all to do with distance from Christmas, distance from Spring/Summer and the weather + the economy news at the moment. Actually I thought it was supposed to be next Monday as it's a month from Christmas, but then I'm not the expert of formulae for happiness.

All I know is that today I'm not going to let someone else tell me what my mood is supposed to be. I have positivity and strategies - they're not raining on my parade!!

Thank U Alanis Morissette

Each time I listen to this song, it inspires me or I see something that hits a chord. It was actually instrumental in making me think about "letting go".

xx

Thank U

How 'bout getting off of these antibiotics?

How 'bout stopping eating when I'm filled up?

How 'bout them transparent dangling carrots?

How 'bout that ever elusive kudo?

Thank you India

Thank you terror

Thank you disillusionment

Thank you frailty

Thank you consequence

Thank you thank you silence

How 'bout me not blaming you for everything?

How 'bout me enjoying the moment for once?

How 'bout how good it feels to finally forgive you/

How 'bout grieving it all one at a time?

Thank you India…

The moment I let go of it was

The moment I got more than I could handle

The moment I jumped off of it was

The moment I touched down

How 'bout no longer being masochistic?

How 'bout remembering your divinity?

How 'bout unabashedly bawling your eyes out?

How 'bout not equating death with stopping

Thank you India

Thank you providence

Thank you disillusionment

Thank you nothingness

Thank you clarity

Thank you thank you silence

A Map of my Scars

My life could be mapped out by the scars that I have: the one on my thumb from an operation at 18 months old, the one on my palm when my skateboard found a stone and stopped and I found another and didn’t, or the time where my hand went through a glass door and those are just one hand. Chickenpox, shingles, barbed wire, my brother’s mischiefs, bike-riding, cyst removal, mole removal and my first ante-natal stretch mark – some of the events in my life that all left their scar. But a scar is a reminder that a trauma happened, and although the body may have needed help, antibiotics, stitches etc, it took its time and healed itself, as best as it could. So although I may have scars they don’t define me and my life is so much more than a map of scars, as scars may be ugly at first but over time they can fade and be forgotten. I am me, despite my scars, and only sometimes because of them.

xx

Negative v.s positive

Yesterday my positivity evaporated - I got too close to a negative black hole - but it showed me as a reminder to keep myself away from negative energies and thoughts. I used to surround myself with negative people. I don't consciously seek it but they found me. And the thing about negative people, they don't build their esteem up, they knock yours down to their level, and zap your motive and energies. And it takes all your strength to stay positive around them - they are negative black holes and they leech your strengths out.

I chat and help others on a website for those recovering or seek to recover from mental illness, of which depression and anxiety (my original illnesses) are just a few. Together and separately, we each on the website and its portal are trying to find the ways that work for us to turn away from that black hole, and get some space between ourselves and it. And some ways will work, and some don't, but from each other we get new ideas or the fuel to keep moving away from the black hole, and sometimes we have to work alone, as we are the experts on our ups and downs. Something happened today, I found something I thought was lost (nothing really, just a phone charm I'd bought but which disappeared) and this revealed two things to me: 1. sometimes things/ideas etc are found when you aren't really looking for them or have stopped looking for them and 2. that sometimes light reveals much more than darkness does.

Advice isn't for everyone - it's for us to acknowledge that it is just advice and we can choose if we take it on board or discard it as not for us, but we do have a choice. It's what makes us us and not other people . Yesterday luckily there were people out there ready and willing to let me lean on them, and their words, compassion and empathy helped to repair the work negativity had done to me, as negativity is contagious, drawing you back if you’re not careful. In recovery I'm learning how to live with my illness, rather than it telling me what not to do. Keeping some positivity for me, but sending some out too, best wishes for today and the weekend, wherever they each find you, love xx

Pay your debts or you get hexed?

From AOL's weird news

Witch employed to collect bad debts
Last Updated: Friday, 16 January 2009, 06:19 GMT

A Lithuanian debt collector has hired a witch to hunt down companies and individuals who are failing to pay their debts amid the credit crunch.

"Our new employee will help them to understand the situation, reconsider what is right and wrong and act accordingly," said a company spokesman.

Vilija Lobaciuviene, who describes herself as "Lithuania's leading witch", is renowned in the former Soviet republic for providing such "magical" services as predicting the future and casting spells.

A Weight Lifted Update 7

7!!!! I know, but 7 is the magic number, as the scales showed I've lost my 1st half a stone today. I'm realistic that it won't always be like this, but going with it, as it's still a success, with what's been go on in me for the last week or so. Confronting my thoughts about the need to be protected from attention and my tendency to eat to fill inner emotional emptiness and self-sabotage have been hard, but I've been using strategies to distract and replace those thought patterns and feelings. I've also been trying to organise something and been confronted mostly with silence and the implied negativity of that that I've thought I've seen. But I am looking at silence as just meaning that, not apathy, not lack of support, just the inability to talk for whatever reason. I've got to remember I'm not a mind reader. I don't know what people think and they don't know what I am thinking, unless I tell them. And that we have choices on how we choose to see things - glass half full, not the glass half empty. 7 lbs :) yes.

Starting weight: 17st 4
Weight today: 16st 10.25

Weight lost: 7.75 lb

Cue the fireworks... xx

[You might have guessed I like fireworks, but they don't always come out in photos :(. Probably the love is because I was a Bonfire Night baby. Arrived into the world on a rocket ;) bum first. I used to think I was special because no one else had fireworks on their birthday, but when I was a child, I was soon told that I wasn't special. Now I know that I am unique, only I am wired up quite how I am, although I share common threads with others, so really I am special, just as we all are.]

The 4 Walls Blues

This isn't meant as serious, more as a parody, although I do get the 4 walls blues, and when that happens it isn't really a laughing matter.

But this is lighthearted and should be done to a standard blues rift - you know - der, der, de, dum, de, dum, de, dum, der, der, de, dum, de, dum, de, dum ;) Can't think of a 3rd verse yet... any tryers

The 4 walls blues

I woke up this morning
It was those 4 walls again
Just looking at me, as they do,
As I looked back at them

It’s rainy outside
So I’m not wanting to go out
So it’s those 4 walls again
That make you want to shout

xx

A Weight Lifted Update 6

Week 7 and a bit more lost. 17st has been left behind and now I'm 16st 11.5.

It is surprising me but perhaps it is determination or the emotional weight from my past is leaving me. I have all sorts of things going on in my life at the moment and today is the first day back for school for my son, which in the past has been a trigger day, as I used to feel that I'd lost my use, not being needed all the time by someone, being on my own again, and feeling that I had lost worth. That is still at the back of my mind but this time I have some strategies to distract me - blogging, fruit to snack on, sewing, some taped TV shows to watch, art course readings, organising, washing...

I have also been away from here as I had some issues to deal with. I saw a TV programme advertised and discussed in preview on other programmes about sexual bullying and it bought things to a fore. It put a name to things I had suffered from as a child and young adult and I've been dealing with the memories it provoked. I was bullied as a child and an adult, but now realise that some incidents that also happened to me would now be classed as sexual bullying. Having a name to give it gives some freedom, but it also brings the knowledge that my problems started earlier than I had thought, but bears out a thought that came out in one counselling session that between 6-8 years old were a difficult time for me, although at the time I said I didn't really know or remember why or what happened. Trying to lose weight and the thought patterns that I developed to defend me has meant trying to find different ways to tackle losing some weight and not self-sabotage as I go along. And with my right arm muscles problems and soreness, I've been resting, but still here, there for helping others, as much as I could.

I'm starting to see light again. I hadn't put the little incidents into the whole line of abuse (mostly mentally) and bullying that I had recognised as such in my past. But it is my determination not to be a victim, and I should be able to close the door again soon on those little things. It was just the trailers for the programme (Panorama) and discussions on breakfast television that brought some of the things back under my focus. And yet I've still come through.

Starting weight 17st 4lb

Total lost: 6.5 lb

xx

The B of the Bang 2

Now this would have been much safer LOL xx

PS Can I have my Arts Council Grant now ??? ;) - it's performance art, dar-ling. I hasten to add the cannon wasn't actually working at the time, as a photo opportunity. It's the gun deck of HMS Victory in case you're wondering.

The B of the Bang

From The Times
November 18, 2008
B of the Bang artist pays Manchester £1.7m in damages over disintegrating sculpture.
Spikes began to drop off B of the Bang within two weeks of its unveiling

by Russell Jenkins

Mancunians nicknamed it Kerplunk after the well-known 1970s children’s game — an apt description for a £1.42 million sculpture of giant spikes that began to fall off soon after it was completed.

Now, the creator of B of the Bang has agreed with subcontractors to pay £1.7 million in damages to Manchester City Council over the failure of what was supposed to be one of the country’s most exciting pieces of public art.

Thomas Heatherwick’s 180-tonne starburst of metal spikes, which was designed to reflect the explosion of energy at the starter’s pistol, was built three years ago to dominate Manchester’s eastern gateway.

It was hailed at the time as confirmation of the city’s growing status. Yet two weeks after the Olympic medallist Linford Christie unveiled it in January 2005 parts began to drop off as it swayed alarmingly in the wind. Further spikes exhibited defects and had to be removed, including nine that were lopped off and taken down for testing in April this year.

The sculpture, which stands outside Eastlands, formerly the City of Manchester Stadium, the venue of the 2002 Commonwealth Games and now the home of Manchester City Football Club, has presented a forlorn sight, fenced off and with discarded spikes left on the ground. For a time the road next to it had to be closed because it was thought to be so dangerous.

The council said that it began legal proceedings for negligence against the artist and his engineers “with reluctance” when repeated pleas met with little response. Costs began to spiral from £750,000 to £1.42 million early on and work is still required to ensure its safety. The claim, for £2 million, was brought against Thomas Heatherwick Studio and its subcontractors, Packman Lucas, Flint and Neill Partnership and Westbury Structures in October 2007. The parties have reached an out-of-court settlement before a scheduled hearing in the High Court next week.

Susan Orrell, the council’s solicitor, said: “The settlement allows the council to recover substantial damages and avoid further cost and the risks that are always associated with legal proceedings. I am pleased that we have reached a settlement that is, in my view, in the best interests of the council. Now that this has been achieved, it means the council can move on and consider options for the future of the structure in conjunction with the project’s funders. When this work is completed a report will go to the council’s executive in the new year.”

It is a humiliation for Heatherwick, 37, who until the middle of last year was describing B of the Bang as “close to his heart”. He was assuring critics that the problems would be ironed out because it is a “beautiful and important project for Manchester”. Meanwhile, the artist has been fêted by the art world, receiving an honorary doctorate from Manchester Metropolitan University. A spokesman for the defendants said: “The B of the Bang sculpture was an ambitious and groundbreaking design. It is a matter of considerable regret to all of us that the sculpture that was intended to symbolise the outstanding success of the Manchester Commonwealth Games has suffered the problems that have come to light. We are pleased that a settlement has been reached to the proceedings.”

The sculpture is still lauded on the company’s website, which suggests that the design “reacts against the convention for passive-looking monuments to sporting events that celebrate peace and harmony, rather than the dynamism and explosiveness of physical competition”.

About £700,000 of the sculpture’s £1.42 million cost came from the European Regional Fund; £500,000 was from the North West Development Agency.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

PS In case you're wondering why "The B of the Bang", it's part of a quote from the UK 100m sprinter Linford Christie, when asked about starting out of the running blocks, how come he was so fast out of them, and he said that the strategy was to go on the B of B-A-N-G, ie as soon as you hear the starting pistol without thinking about it, just reacting. xx

A Weight Lifted Update 5

Not sure how I'm doing this, but today I broke the 17st barrier and weighed 16st 13.5. I'm wondering if something's wrong with the scales ??? But going with it... So in a month and a half, I've lost 4.5lbs, according to my scales. Perhaps it's determination, although I have been having a few soups for lunches rather than sandwiches. Anyway, however it's going, it's going, and I'm happy.

So total lost 4.5 lbs

since 26 Nov 2008

New weight: 16st 13.5

xx

Random

I was just looking at other people's photos on a website and came across this. I like the mood, calmness, even though it's dominantly blue. Found randomly, hence my title. Just goes to show what you can find when you're not really looking, xx

Far Side - odd ball

The Last Thing The Fly Sees

Just flicking through flickr and there is a group that re-enact scenes from Glen Larson's Far Side cards. Love this one. xx

http://www.flickr.com/photos/cayusa/419590922/in/pool-farside/

Excuses

Just been listening to my ipod and would thoroughly recommended the itunes only Alanis Morissette iTunes Originals session. It's from a few years ago and in it Alanis sings some of her songs but also explains the thoughts or meanings behind the songs or their times in her life. I don't listen to it too regularly, but when I do I found things to inspire me or encourage me, and it is this vein that I include the lyrics of this song that's on the session. Alanis says that the song came from all her self-limiting thoughts that over the years she used to keep herself stuck or keep her in a self sabotaging way from moving on - didn't I know what you mean, yep. So I include this to inspire me to move on (I've cut out the repetition) xx :

Excuses - Alanis Morissette

Why... no one will help me...

I am too dumb... I am too smart...

They'll not understand me...

I am lonely... they'll hate me...

And there is not enough time...

It's too hard to help me...

And God wants me to work...

No resting... no lazy...

These excuses how they’ve served me so well

They've kept me safe

They've kept me stuck

They've kept me locked in my own cell

I'm too far from home...

It takes far too much energy...

And I cannot afford to...

No one will ever see me...

These excuses how they served me so well…

These excuses how they're so familiar

They've kept me blocked
They've kept me small

They've kept me safe inside my shell

Bringing this into the light

Shakes their foundation

And it clears my side

Now my imagination

Is the only thing that limits

The bar that is raised to the heights

No one can have it all see...

I have to... they want me to...

And I can't let them down...

I'll never be happy...

These excuses how they’ve served me so well…

These excuses how they're so familiar…

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?id=15197492&s=143444

The Best Revenge

Sometimes the best revenge is to live, inspite of your past. xx