An Ode To My Husband

You ever tell your husbands things – and you are certain they hear you because they respond – but you aren’t certain that they really grasp the intensity with which you mean these things?  My husband is phenomenal.  I’m talking the most hilarious, kind hearted man you could imagine.  He listens when I speak, he hears me (most of the time) and he responds to me.  However, there are certain things I feel so deeply that it gets clear down to my bones and I want him to know I stinking mean every last word of them.  So I will tell the world these things, so he knows I am not messing around. J

First, I love you – like really, really love you – the kind of love that gets into your blood stream and hurts your heart because I love you that hard.

Next, I believe in you.  I’m not talking like Thomas the Train believe in you, I am talking like blind faith, total trust, complete conviction believe in you.

I freaking love your dimple.  I want to kiss it a billion times a day.

I am grateful for you.  I don’t get all puddles of mush on you very often, but on the real, I probably couldn’t live without you. I mean, I could survive because I would breathe and eat, but it would be one incredibly lame and boring life.

I am proud of you – the kind of pride that wells up and makes a woman so glad she chose a man.  I am proud of you for struggling and coming out on the other side, for dedicating yourself to your education no matter how many setbacks you experience, for being responsible about life, for being honest…and the list goes on and on and on….

I delight in you.

I appreciate you: your ability to hear me when it’s something you don’t like and your ability to tell me things I don’t like.  I believe this particular perk in our relationship makes it work better than most...for if your spouse can’t be brutally honest yet still love you wholly, who can?

I don’t have a word for what I “_______” in you when it comes to your faith because no word exists for the example you have been to me or to others.  What is the word for “my-heart-hurts-so-good-it-makes-me-cry-you’re-a-spiritual-giant?”

“If you’re not a 10, you’re a 9.9” – but you’re a 10.  Probably a 10 +++++

For the next three months we will be strangers to each other.  It will be this way as you enter the first of your final 3 semesters of schooling and we pass one another on campus between classes or for a quick kiss as you grab something to eat on your way out the door. I have gladness in this, too, because this means you are just doing more things that make you incredible, more knowledge in your brain and life experience under your belt.  Those things make you flat out full of all the awesomes.

Basically, in true D&A style, I’m going to resort to a movie quote…

“Listen to me, mister. You’re my knight in shining armor.  Don’t forget it.”

Lastly, my love, “As you wish.”

Through MY Eyes

So I recently watched this clip on you tube of Louis C.K. on Conan.  Firstly, this man is hilarious and the clip is worth watching just to laugh your buns off!  Secondly, something that he said in his hilarious monologue really hit home with me and that was, "There's explosions and acrobats and they are looking at it through their little 3 inch screen!" That is what I want to focus on, but thirdly, if you watch the clip the whole way through, the Jesus bit had me rolling on the floor!!!

Back to the 3 inch screen...I need to preface this with saying that I LOVE photography.  I think it is an incredible art form and captures the most precious moments.  I am married to a man with an eye for art and color and he manages to take the most beautiful photos...the old fashioned way...where he doesn't manipulate and delete and retry and touch up.  I think it's an incredible talent and I think that cameras have made capturing memories so much easier and readily available. 

HOWEVER

I also think cameras and cell phones and the quick digital capture of all things in life are the work of the devil.  How can I believe such polar opposite values of the same concept you might ask? Well, because I can.

BECAUSE:
1) A captured picture of BFF's seeing one another for the first time in months is SO EXCITING and fun to see, but a couple will do, I don't need to see 20 of them.
2) Your pregnant belly is totally adorbs and I love the idea of seeing it grow as your pregnancy progresses, but I only need a photo of your increasing belly once a week because the 4 you post daily, well, your belly looks the same in all 4 of them from that day.
3) I SUPER love sharing the moments of your honeymoon and get totally jealous of your beach pictures, but your husband probably would have appreciated it a little bit more if you kept that one romantic dinner to yourselves for your own precious memories.
4) HOLY CRAP YOU GOT TO SEE A CELEB!!! Exciting business! But only once, after picture 10 it is lame and no one cares anymore.
5) Your kid's new shoes or latest smile or newest face is only cute once or twice and by picture 8 of the same thing, I'm over looking at something that could have been cute in moderation.

There are many other reasons and examples I could include, but the most important one for me as I heard Louis C.K. say it is that so often we get too busy looking at life on a 3 inch screen instead of setting down the technology and being in the moment.  I got the immense pleasure of going to Cheyenne Frontier Days and seeing Brad Paisley live.  Before the concert started we took tons of photos, but when Brad came out, The Hubs tucked the camera safely into my purse and told me no more.  I don't have extensive photos to show you how amazing it was when Brad took some one's camera out of the audience and made a video on it for them.  I don't have a photo of the moment he signed a guitar and the cowboy he handed it to passed out. I don't have photos of the reel of pictures he played while he sang "When I Get Where I'm Going" acoustic, nor do I have a photo that captured the incredible feeling in the air as his speakers projected the music.

I take TONS of pictures in our life.  I want them, they are moments of memories I hold dear.  It has taken me a long time to learn this balance though, this balance where I put down the camera and LIVE in the moment.

Sometimes I don't have pictures, but I DO have the most amazing memories in my heart and in my mind.  I have the feel of my husband's hand as he brushed away tears I wept freely and without shame as I was touched by my emotions in Palmyra, NY this summer.  I have the taste of double fried wings and true blue cheese in my memory.  I have the feel of the warm Caribbean and the texture of running my hands across a dolphin.  I have the whispers of our future as The Hubs reminded me of all the reasons I fell madly in love with him on our anniversary at the helm of a ship.  I have the reminder of how my belly aches from laughter when I am with my brothers.  I have the reminder of the sheer joy my nieces and nephews feel when I see them and focus ON them, not look at them through a 3 inch digital screen.  I have the touch of heat on my skin from a summer campfire and the gleam in my eye from the reflection of a clear summer sky.

I'm not saying it is easy.  I'm not saying there aren't moments where something so AMAZING happens that I immediately think I need to share it with people I love. What I am saying is that I have learned to let those moments pass me by sometimes, and to just live in the moment of whatever is happening, and allow the photograph to be in my brains, in my blood, in my guts, for me and me alone.  I still pick up the camera.  I still share things and my parents are so grateful I do, but they also are so proud of the way I have managed to let some of those moments go unnoticed but to me and fox at me feet, or the man at my side or the bird on my window pane.  I love pictures, but I think that maybe, just maybe, my memories when I watch the entire sky bursting in pink versus just the part my camera can capture, are quickly becoming my favorite.

It's Okay Friday

It’s Okay…

*To have had a fun summer but to also have had a summer in which we were stressed, exhausted, financially stretched to the limit and tested with trials clear to our wit’s end – so we are sending it off with giant SCREW YOU. We won’t miss you summer of 2012.

*To have considered blowing my diet when I saw the commercial for Endless Shrimp at Red Lobster…in fact, I’m still considering it.

*To seriously intend to not use my cell phone after work tonight until tomorrow night. I need to sleep in. I need a life without interruptions for a while.

*To be excited that I saved about 400% by buying my text books online this semester….AND to be jacked that if you have an “edu” email you can get amazon prime for FREE for 6 months when you set up a student account.

*To be so excited for football season!

*To have watched and loved Ice Age: Continental Drift.  Don’t judge me.

*To have watched and loved ParaNorman. Don’t judge me. AND don’t take your child under the age of 10-ish.

*To already know what I am getting The Hubs for Christmas.  It has to top last year’s present and I am CERTAIN it will.

*To have added “take a vacation in a hut in the ocean” to my bucket list.

In My Most Vulnerable Moment...The Scales Tipping

I feel like I have struggled with what the right way to document my weight journey was. How was I to express emotions that effect women around the world without categorizing or improperly applying a stigma or being unfair to people or perpetuating stereotype that results in more hate or judgment? So, I have kept quiet about it. I know what the three numbers read on the scale day in and day out and my husband knows what the numbers read and I figured that was good enough right? Until today when I saw a Facebook status that directed me to a website that promoted skinny bodies – a website whose domain I refuse to type in my blog because I will not be responsible for giving her more hits or more traffic.

As I read some of the things the author of the blog (who chooses to remain anonymous) had stated and the comments that her supporters had written, I got piping angry.  Women struggle with body image no matter what size we are.  I can vouch for this because today, I am going to publicly address my weight loss/regain/lose again (ongoing) struggle.

So here it is folks, in black and white for the world to see.   I was at my all-time heaviest, 5 feet 7 inches, tapping out the scales at 210 pounds.  I’m not proud of that. It isn’t easy to announce it.  When I decided I wanted to lose weight it was because I wasn’t personally happy with myself.  It wasn’t about my husband. It wasn’t about my family. It wasn’t about awful people like the host of the skinny site saying I was the ugliest thing on the planet.  It was about my desire inside myself to make a change to reach a happier goal.

So I set out on a journey that led me to a weight loss of 60 pounds.  I lost a child worth of weight people.  So at my thinnest, in my adult life (the day before I left for my honeymoon cruise) I weighed 149 pounds.  I fit into a size 6 comfortably and I could force myself into a 4 if I didn’t want to eat that day.  I got there through hard work and discipline.  I didn’t eat one pumpkin flavored thing that fall.  I didn’t eat my holiday dinners for that matter.  Instead I opted for a protein shake and broccoli with a 4 ounce slice of turkey while everyone else enjoyed the homemade rolls and mashed potatoes.  I didn’t eat pecan pie.  On Christmas I didn’t eat a ham.  I didn’t eat any Christmas treats – cookies, fudge, none of it.  I didn’t celebrate New Year’s with the pizza and dip like my company did. I drank tap water and pretended it was all the same.  My birthday came and I had salad and chicken.

Here is what I learned:

I was miserable.  I hated it.

I am a big boned gal, I have been my whole life.  My BMI was at the lowest end when I weighed 149, nearly into the unhealthy range, but according to every weight chart I could find I still have another 15 pounds to lose before I was healthy.  So I became obsessed with my weight.  I went from being the fat person obsessed to the skinny person obsessed and I learned that counting every calorie and allowing no cheat days had me feeling just as awful and miserable about myself as weighing 210 pounds did.

So I did what any mature adult would do and gained 25 pounds. 

Ok, so that isn’t what most mature adults would do. AND it wasn’t all just due to my eating whatever I wanted.  Part of it was due to some medical issues I was having and prescriptions I was taking that were out of my control.

So there I was at 174 and not feeling any better than I did at 210 OR 149. Until my husband gave me some perspective and said this to me: “Ayzlynn, 160 was always your goal.  That weight puts you right smack in the healthy BMI range for you and you can wear a size 6.  Why did you lose sight of that? That was your healthy place.”

So I am on a journey that is less about weighing an exact number again and more about fitting into my size 6 formal.  It is less about what those damned 3 numbers on the scale say and more about what my healthy BMI tells me when I am at the doctor.  It is less about thinking I need to look like a model and more about learning my own inner peace. It is less about living up to a societal standard and more about believing that I am on infinite worth and my insides are the most beautiful part of me.

So there is all my ugly.  There I am revealing numbers almost all women keep locked up and secret because we don’t reveal our weight. It’s not what we do.  Well, I did it.  And I didn't do it anonymously so that I could hurt other people or attack other women behind a black shield.  I did it and I hope it empowers whatever woman might read this to believe that she has to find her own version of happy and healthy and that isn’t dictated by nasty fat haters or nasty skinny haters or a freaking body weight chart.  If you can rock a size 2, a size 10, a size 16 or a size 48298098 and feel good about yourself and are healthy, freaking do it! We all have different bodies, therefore we all have a different healthy.

The author of the blog that got me so fired up says she is 5’7” and weighs around 100 pounds.  I am 5’7” and in this picture I weigh 149 pounds.  You tell me, if I lost 49 MORE pounds what exactly do you think I would look like? Because in my mind what I would look like is nobody’s version of beautiful.