Confessions of a Super-Mom: Challenges for Change

It's been two months since I drank alcohol. I've never been an alcoholic or a heavy drinker really. Although there has been times where I overindulged. Once when I blacked out completely (I can recall the night 24 years ago, but not the details of it) but mostly I've just been an occasional drinker. The last time I drank was on Easter where I had two kahlua and creams. Before Easter I hadn't drank for two weeks, resolving to just see how I'd do. Like a social experiment with myself!

About a year ago, maybe two, I did a 30 day challenge that ended up continuing for 100 days. The hardest part was being around friends. Alcohol has always served to loosen me up because I can be pretty uptight in company and so I gave it up to see if I could loosen up and relax on my own. This time, I gave it up because I want to be better at practicing what I preach. I want to be more conscious of what I put into my body.

Alcohol doesn't benefit me in any way. It lets me relax but I can figure out other ways to do that. I also don't want my kids to grow up thinking that they have to drink to have a good time. I don't really like drinking around my kids anyways. I used to think that Montana had such an alcohol entrenched culture but it's almost everywhere. Even here on vacation, I am tempted to sit back and drink a beer but I just keep having to remind myself that I don't really want it.

I also felt tempted to walk down to the main strip and get myself a virgin pina colada but that's like fake meat, which I've stopped eating because of all the chemicals and sodium in the store bought vegan burgers. The point of not drinking alcohol is to not put it into my body so why would I want to go throw back a mixer that is probably full of sugar and other unpronounceable non-food like substances. Maybe I've just watched too many Netflix documentaries!

I've just been way more into ingredient lists than reading nutrition labels and only choosing foods that I recognize what's in them. It's my way of taking care of myself. When I first started my coaching business, I started with weight loss as my main focus because that was part of my past story. I had lost a lot of weight, 70 pounds. I started exercising and tracking calories. I became obsessed, but it took me a long time for me to reach my goal weight- five years!

Then my dad died and I went back to work full time and I started gaining weight. By the time I started my business, I was already on the upswing. The stress of trying to run not just one but two businesses, while trying to balance it all, led me to gaining all my weight back and then some. As the scale moved up, I decided to switch the focus of my coaching to what led me to lose the weight in the first place and that was to start caring about myself.

When I was gaining the weight, it wasn't that I stopped caring about myself, but rather I was focused on a different area of my life. I was focused on my career and not my physical health. It's hard to focus on too many things at once. You probably know that. It's not that my business is a raging success now and so I can turn my attention to my health again (I wish!) but it's more that I want to make changes that are manageable.

I'm telling you I was obsessed! I wrote down every bite I took. I have at least seven journals filled with what I ate every. single. day. I started out doing Sweating to the Oldies DVDs- yes, with Richard Simmons- and then was doing and teaching Zumba, swimming, doing Insanity with Shaun T, and kickboxing! I was in the best shape of my life until I stopped all that and went back to work to pursue my counseling licensure.

I just couldn't figure out how to balance it all. Which sucks. It's been five years now since I went back and in the meantime I was licensed, got certified as a health coach, and started two businesses. I'm ready to turn some of my attention back to my health. Not all of it. I still want my businesses to succeed and I still have children to raise and a marriage to nurture. But I want to make changes that I can handle and not a total overhaul. I can't manage that!

I was thinking about maybe doing something in my Facebook group, like doing monthly challenges. I already do a self-care challenge, but I like the idea of focusing on one change for 30 days. I'm not sure if others would be up for it. I guess I can always just ask and see. I'm already into the no alcohol thing but I am reading Gretchen Rubin's The Happiness Project and a few months ago I read Jennifer Ashton's Self-Care Solution and both are based on monthly changes that move them towards a better self. I'm feeling inspired.

What kinds of challenges have you been a part of and what suggestions do you have for me to try? Send me an email and let me know at [email protected]