Mama Bean believes she deserves it

We've all heard the cliches that change is inevitable. Of course it is. Time passes, inertia science et cetera...things change. 

We change. Be it for good or bad, maybe small but meaningful, maybe shallow and inconsequential, maybe deep but silent. 

I don't know about you, but I want Good Change. I want things to get better, I want to be better. Better body, better worker, better friend, better housekeeper. Better wife, better mother, better Christian.

When we look at lists like that, it's easy to flip it around, and see it as a list of the things we're not. At least that's what I do. And what it boils down to is these awful things I tell myself about the way I am: I amfat and lazy. I tell myself these things about the Present as though they are so True and Real that nothing can be done about them. And I've stopped looking at that list like it's something about the Future. Because my (untrue-but-true-in-my-head) Present is all I see.

The thing is, I can't hate myself into being better.

We can't hate ourselves into being better.

I can't tell myself I'm lazy, and then expect myself to believe I'm strong enough to stick to a diet, or go on another run, or lift another weight, or put the cookie down. (Or finally clean the bathroom, or stop yelling at my kids...)

I have to believe I deserve it. I have to believe I am beautiful and strong and worthy right now. That's the great paradox about Good Change. I have to believe I am already good enough in order to follow through on the behaviour that will create the good change. If I don't believe I am already good enough, guilt and doubt will blind me, and the change I want will become the same inconsequential or damaging change that happened last time. And the time before that.

Now that I see the paradox, I can't unsee it. That doesn't mean I love myself all the time, all the way. But, when I start thinking The Nasty about myself (my self! my own beautiful self!) at least I know how to shut it down. And that means I eat fewer cookies. And I go on more runs.

(But I don't have a cleaner bathroom... yet.)

Mama Bean's little boy thinks everything has two syllables

It's pretty darn adorable.

I don't know where it came from, but for a week or two, Bean's been turning one syllable words - usually those with two vowels "walking together" - into two distinct syllables. I first noticed it when he was eating a meal, and calling the protein mee-yat. "Mmm, 'ummy mee-yat." Then I noticed he did it with eat, too: ee-yat.

He does it in this very toddler way, where his mouth moves extra lots, because little kids don't know that English is basically the laziest language in the world, we barely move our mouths to talk. So he's pursing his lips right together for the "first syllable" of shoes... "Mummy, put on shoo-ez? Put on shoo-ez, go ow-whut?" He looks like he's going to swallow an egg when he makes the ow sound of out :)

I'm sure this is a normal phase of language development, though I do repeat the word with an emphasis on its single syllable after he says it. But mostly I want to get it on video, because it's so darn cute!

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I have a word story for every member of my family, I just have to remember them. Sprout has learned her first sign, for "more." In my world, this is the word/sign that is most useful, because she can tell me what she wants. (I guess "please" is along the same lines, I'll teach her that next.) So mealtime is easier now, I'm gradually convincing her it's more effective to quietly and calmly sign, instead of screaming-grunting-rubbing-her-sticky-hands-in-her-hair-with-frustration. In fact, instead of please, I may teach her "all done." We'll see. Bean caught on to "milk" the fastest, but Sprout is not quite as addicted to that substance as my son was/is. Is. He is a milk fiend.

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On a recent car trip, Papa Bean and I were talking about Sprout pulling off her bib, to which The Precious (her soother) is clipped. I said he should have put on a bib with a button, instead of velcro, because she can't pull those off (as easily.) He said he didn't know we had bibs with buttons, which I didn't believe, because we had discussed numerous times when Sprout was young how we wished we'd known button bibs were so awesome when Bean was a baby, they're so much better than velcro. I rattled off the half dozen or so bibs I know for sure have buttons, to which he replied, voice dripping with semantical superiority, "You mean snaps, bibs with SNAPS?"

Oh pardon me. In my life, buttons and snaps are the same things, essentially. It's like squares and rectangles. A square is a rectangle, but a rectangle is not always a square. A snap is a type of button, but a button is not always a snap. They're in the same family. I mean, surely it was not such a stretch of the imagination that when I mention button bibs, I'm not talking about some exotic bib creature the likes of which we've never seen in our (vast, trust me, vaaaaaast) bib collection, but rather, I'm talking about snap bibs that we use often, with great pleasure.

So.

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I don't remember what the word story about myself was. I'll try and remember for later.

Mama Bean is, like, a runner now, sort of? Maybe?

Today, I ran three minutes in a row. A month ago I couldn't run down the block.

Let's back up. We have a friend who decided to see how far she could run. The next day she ran a little farther. And she kept doing it and going a little further, and making other changes to her eating and strengthening and emotional status. Now she runs for miles, and teaches spin classes, and by all accounts, is the happiest she's been in a long time.

It turns out I have quite a few inspiring friends like C.Lo, they're all over my facebook, running 10Ks and halfs and full marathons. They update their status with how much they hated that run, or how much they loved that run, or how the weather is interrupting their run. I have a friend who's had knee surgery, and she runs. I have a friend who continued running through, I dunno, six or seven months of her second pregnancy. (Though I did warn her to wait to run after delivery, to avoid prolapsing her uterus lol.) And I found, randomly, this guy, who started running when he weighed over 360 lbs. He ran a 5K race while still well over 300; I already weigh less than his goal weight, and he's completed two Ironman races. I sat and read his blog from start to finish on my lunches for a week. I found at least a half dozen or more other fitblrs (fitness/weight loss tumblrs) of women who've gone through ridiculous health transformations that center on healthy eating (obvs) and running. Just running. 

All this to say, clearly, running works. If you want to get healthy, if you want to lose weight, this is a good way to do it. And it may be that the old excuses, about knee pain or shin pain or I'm-too-heavy or it'll-hurt-my-joints may not apply. (They very well may, on the other hand, it's not my place to say that. Papa Bean is not a good candidate for running, but he's freaking great at cycling.) So. I decided to try it.

I went with the Couch to 5K program, because it is tried and true. The first day, my knees hurt and got swollen and could barely move the next day. I iced and stretched diligently. The second day, my knees still hurt and were still swollen - stayed swollen, in fact, night and day, through work and caring for my kidlets, for almost a week. I iced and stretched diligently. It may be to my advantage that I am a health professional, so I know how to self-treat? By the third day, I'd sourced a decent knee brace. Less pain and swelling. Less icing, still stretching. I decided to stick with it. The first day of any week is kind of exciting, to see if I can do the new challenge. The second day sucks. The third day I congratulate myself for the whole first half that I'm actually bothering to continue, and then breath you're-almost-done repeatedly the second half until I am, in fact, done. And then it's a new week! Week 2 was stretched out by spring rain and a nasty stomach virus from hell. Then I did a week 2.5, with distances and rest times kind of halfway between the week 2 and 3 times. Now I've finished week 3. I can run three minutes in a row, twice. I think I'm gonna do a week 3.5, too. Week 4 says to run five minutes in a row; I'm gonna ease in by running four minutes for a week. I think it's gonna be good.

The truth is, running isn't necessarily fun while it's happening. I feel like my thigh fat vibrates with every step, and everyone is peering out their houses to watch it jiggle as I lope past. I feel bad calling what I do "running" because I'm pretty sure a normal adult could just walk comfortably next to me and go faster. But the difficulty of it is directly proportional to my pride at finishing it :) I drop out of the last run interval and smile victoriously (through my panting.) It's truly a sickness, and I think I'm infected... the other day I got a flat tire on my way home from work, and my first thought was, crap now I'll be too late to go for a run. And when I got home and settled around 10pm, I went anyway. And felt really proud of myself after.

I really appreciate this perspective from bendoeslife: "The DVDs will end, P90X will give way to something even more Exxxxtreme(!!!), WODs will be replaced by some even cooler acronym, and we will get tired of Jillian yelling at us and telling us we’re fat... So, yes, enroll in that crazy ZUMBA class. Have fun and do INSANITY from time to time. But have a foundation with some of the lower-case lifestyles. swim. bike. run. jog. walk. lift. stretch."

Part of this decision was how lower-case this is for my lifestyle, right now. It's not financially practical for us to have gym memberships, and it doesn't fit into our parenting, with our kids as young as they are, to have one of us popping out for workouts, diminishing the hours of "team parenting" (which are precious to me, truly. I love my teammate, he keeps me sane.) It doesn't require extra equipment, not terribly. I already had the runners and yoga pants and ipod timer thingy. I had to get a knee brace. I need to get a sports bra. I drool over garmins, but it's hardly a necessity. I don't have to take a tonne of time, I don't have to drive anywhere. I step outside my door. Later, I step back in and take a shower.

I have to say, it's hard to measure the benefits of cardio exercise like this. It's not like weight-training, which my body and psyche is more tuned for. I don't know how to describe it, but I don't feel like running lasts into the next day - it lasts until the sweat is washed away! But I've started to notice I don't get huffy walking up the stairs to Bean's bedroom, I'm not totally wiped out pushing the kids in the shopping cart up the ramp from the parkade (Yes, my supermarket has a parkade, it's awesome. We have winter here.) I guess I can see a muscle get bigger, or feel it get stronger. But I can't tell, day to day, that my heart and my lungs are healthier. I'm starting to see these aspects of my health in a different way. To be honest, I've been dragging around this extra weight with a tired ticker for so long, it became my normal. So.

Here's to a new normal. I'll let you know how it goes.

Mama Bean really just wants french fries

I had a revelation today. For a little while now, I've realized that, when it comes to potato chips, I really just prefer plain ones best. During my pregnancy with Sprout, I could sort of only eat plain, because anything flavoured flared up my heartburn. But even before that, I knew in my Heart of Hearts I preferred plain chips.

I think I was ashamed to admit it because plain chips are to salty snacks what vanilla ice cream is to sweets. And it's bad to be vanilla. It's boring and staid and predictable and boring. Also, boring. But, shame be damned, it's just what I like! Plain chips are simple, salty, greasy, and delicious.

(I may as well admit I like vanilla milk shakes more than any other flavour of milk shakes.)

(Also, even if I prefer salty snacks, let the record show I have a well-developed sweet tooth. A sugared molar, if you will.)

Anyway, here's my revelation. The reason I like plain chips so much is because they taste like french fries. And I love french fries. LoooOOOoooOOOoooOOOve them. McDonald's. With extra salt. Yes, really. I love how they're crispy on the outside, but soft on the inside. I love how they get a bit spongy with oil. I love how they don't hurt my mouth (unless they're too hot, and even then, they taste so good fresh, it burns sooooo good.) I love french fries, all. day. long.

I like plain chips because they're the closest to what I actually want in my belly, the softer gentler form of fried salted potato, the french fry. 

And get this, when I do eat a flavoured chip, I prefer those that are like something you'd put on a fry; Ketchup flavour! Au gratin, which is just Cheese!

This is so obvious to me now, I wonder why I bother with chips at all. They are both equally accessible. They cost about the same, financially and calorically. In fact, french fries can be bought and delivered through the window of my car! On the other hand, the enjoyment of chips is not temperature dependent, and fries really lose their allure once they're cold. And, to be honest, I shouldn't be eating either, because I'm supposed to "changing my lifestyle."

What's your favourite flavour of chip?

Mama Bean wishes she'd never made this Lenten commitment

Here are some disjointed thoughts I have had today:

-Sometimes, when people care about something, they don't care who they hurt defending it. Even if their defense is justified, I have to hold out that hurting others in the process is not. (That makes it war, right?)

-Some people only want you to see what they see in a picture, leaving no room for the joy or beauty you see from your angle, and then they lose twice; they've rejected the friendship you brought in your willingness to share your point of view, and they're blinded to the beauty you brought with it.

-I used to think honing your Rhetoric Meter was something that could be learned and practiced, but I increasingly wonder if it's a factor of personality. As frustrated as I get at others' inability to hold onto the Big Picture over and against what I see as the trivialities of details, they probably get just as frustrated at my inability to hold onto an idea with simple passion, over and against the complexity of the bigger reality.

-In conflict, I experience a rush of adrenaline that makes me shake uncontrollably. I also have a similar reaction to action or suspense scenes in movies.

-There is no happy ending where everyone stays friends.

Mama Bean adjusts your spine, not "the" spine

Sometime in the past year, I heard the language I was using with patients in a new way. When I explained what I was adjusting and/or why, I'd catch myself talking about "There were some areas in the low back to work on" or "I really focused on the neck and base of the skull" or "With the office work you do, it's common to find muscle and joint imbalance along the right side of the neck."

I realized, to this person in front of me, trusting me with their pain and their health, it wasn't "the" low back or "the" neck or "the" whatever - it was their low back, their very own neck, the whatever belonging very personally and uniquely and exclusively to them. And my language needed to reflect that.

So, I have been more intentional about answering questions or offering explanations that address the person directly. "There were areas in your low back that needed work." "When muscle imbalance disrupts your spine, it's necessary to address both alignment and muscle tone." 

I'm not perfect at it every day, but I want people to know that I see them, and not just a faceless set of joints and muscles in front of me. And I have noticed the same sort of language glitches in other service professionals addressing me. It's good for me to be sensitive to how that makes me feel, because then I know this sort of semantical detail does mean a lot, it does make a difference. It is important for me to bring this into my practice and use it to serve people with more compassion.

Mama Bean is in flux

• A continued flow or flowing, a flood; the flowing in of the tide
• Constant or frequent change, fluctuation
• The discharge of large quantities of fluid material from the body, especially the discharge of watery feces from the intestines
• A state of uncertainty about what should be done (usually following some important event) preceding the establishment of a new direction of action

To say things are in flux is an understatement. I might even say things are in crisis, or at least critical flux. And so, I am in crisis mode. I have vast quantities of stress and responsibility blended smoothly with low quantities of patience or other emotional resources. It is a maelstrom.

I can't necessarily blog openly about any of the details. Many important relationships and professional consequences depend on the maintenance of discretion. So.

I will say this has revealed to me how my NJness shines through in such crisis/flux states. INtuitive, see the Big Picture; Judger, make a Plan. If I only I didn't have this pesky Feeler complicating things, making me sensitive to relational needs. It would be easier if I could be coldly logical and Thinker-like about this.

My NJ gets frustrated by the S(ensing) and P(erceiving) I am seemingly surrounded by. I want a bullhorn, "Let's keep our eyes on the big picture here, people! These are the essential things, list a) b) c)..." And while it seems to them I am glossing over details right now, it is only because getting hung up on those details prevents action on the Plan, and when it's the best Plan we've got, acting on it really becomes fairly imperative. So keep your negative Nit Picks to yourself * humph *

It seems what the folks around me really want is (endless) affirmation of how they've been victimized, how their anger is justified, how Wrong It All Is. And guess what? It is. It's wrong and I'm angry and I am victimized, too. This is all true. I'm sorry. But we cannot allow anger to paralyze us. We cannot allow sadness and helplessness and intense emotions to seize our faculties completely because there are other people depending on us! Like, isn't this obvious? Do I really need to explain this? Hell, I am depending on you! So snapoutofitalready. srsly.

I wrote about Lent being like a flood - and a flood of change and upheaval and chaos it has turned out to be. Change is the only constant right now, everything is changing in fast and slow ways all at the same time. Maelstrom. And it does all feel a bit like watery feces, a great pool of watery feces permeating my day. There is great uncertainty. And uncertainty smells...

The great flux that has eclipsed all the other flux results in this: I will have much greater responsibility at my job. I will have much greater financial and relational responsibility, to keep everything and everyone running. My job will become much less part-time than it has been thus far. I will see less of my children, at a time I feel it critical for them to be seeing me more. 

This all feels like a weight, and I will admit, after a day of putting on the strong NJ face, in the private moments driving or writing or waiting to fall asleep, my stomach clenches in that vice of anxiety, my mind swirls with unanswered hopes, and my heart is not settled. I feel to cry. The moment to moment stays mundane, the central role of my job is unchanged and still enjoyable, I still celebrate the good and happy of my days. But the undercurrent flows... and I am desperately staying afloat.

(I missed two days of LentenBlogging last week because I went on an "extended Sunday" weekend retreat with the women from my church, and did not have time to pre-post as I had planned. It was a blessed blessed escape from reality, and I treasured every minute.)

(This Season of Flux seems to have descended on a number of my friends at the same time. I feel us all swirling. If something has anchored me, it is continuing to pray for them, for their own flow of watery feces, prayer that we all come out of this dry and relatively unscathed. I am looking looking looking for the reasons behind it all, and prayer seems the only way to find those...)