30-Day Challenge: Hiding

I have to confess, I've deliberately avoided blogger the last few days. I vacillate between being embarrassed and furious about the last week or so. I won't go into detail, as it's the end result that matters. And the end result is that today, the last day of the 30-day challenge, I weigh 125 lbs. Exactly the weight that I started at.

Ok, I hadn't been doing spectacularly; every other post had some reference to a big food-related screw-up. But at least I was losing, albeit slowly. Then in the last week I just turned around and undid it all.

So discouraged, but I know I've only myself to blame. I just want to hide from the world.

Tomorrow we go on holiday. I've been so excited about it, but A and I had a big argument last night about how to organize things. Turns out that in my family my dad's always figured out the logistics of holidays, and in his family his mom's always done it. So we both had this unspoken assumption that it was the other one's responsibility, and the result was that everything got left to the last minute, which was stressful. As is so often the case, the argument snowballed until I don't think we could even remember what we were fighting about; we both just ended up pulling out the last year's worth of grievances and hurling them at each other.

I know that "love keeps no record of wrongs", but what the hell do other people do with all their hurt and resentment? We're both so angry about some things, y'know? And I think we're both justified in our anger, we just don't know what to do with the destructive aspect of it.

I did have an appointment with the chaplain this morning and asked for his thoughts on the matter. He pointed out that the phrase "to take offence" implies some active participation on the part of the offended. The situation may be forced upon you, but the feeling of offence isn't; you take that. He also reminded me of the phrase "innocent until proven guilty", and suggested that it might be helpful to assume that things which I find hurtful weren't said or done in order to hurt me, but that they were just borne of carelessness or absent-mindedness. He said a bunch of other stuff too, which I won't post here (what is this, a marriage blog?), but I will say that I value his opinions largely because he's not on my side. That might sound strange, but I think there's more value in the opinion of someone who looks at you objectively than in the opinion of someone who has an agenda as your collaborator. And he always points out things that I can do to change my reactions to a situation. Granted, I'm making excruciatingly slow progress in that regard, but it's more empowering to believe that your contentment is within your control than to believe that you're a victim of circumstance. And that's applicable to all of us.

Ok, sermon over, folks ;)

I'm going to keep trying to shift this weight. Back to square one... *sigh*
But first I'm going to go on holiday :)

I think you all are fabulous, and will catch up on your blogs just as soon as I get back.