Week three was rough.  I not only was sick and tired, but it also (sorry guys) was "that time" so I was more hungry, more tired and more irritable than usual.  If you recall from one of my previous posts, I have issues with my hormones so I was feeling TOTALLY off my rocker and it was driving me insane! Glad to be going into week four so I can refocus.  I am traveling for work and I am sure there is going to be an abundance of food I shouldn't be eating so rather than focusing on my diet, my plan is to work on two specific things: my attitude and continuing to learn to love myself!

I seriously need to check my attitude at the door!  I noticed last week that I had a really negative attitude at work.  It's so weird.!  If you know me, you know that this is totally unlike me.  I am probably the most optimistic person I know.  Or maybe I used to be.  I don't know.  But the other day I called myself out to one of my friends at work and she...wait for it....agreed!  :-/  I guess I wanted her to disagree with me but when I said that I had had a bad attitude lately and she agreed with me it was a little like a punch in the gut with a big dose of the truth.  Ugh.  

Luckily it's all temporary and luckily my doctor started me on DHEA - which is supposed to help with the  hormonal madness... pray for me, please!  

I am also continuing to work on loving myself, rather than beat myself up.  I am going to give myself a break, even when I have bad weeks. This journey to health is not just about instantly becoming healthy, its also about fixing what's broken, healing old, deep wounds, learning to shine light on what I have been unable to see and learning how to love myself without blame and without shame. 

Last week I met with my pastor and at the end of our conversation she told me how important it is to love myself and that I cannot have a true relationship with Jesus or with other people until I do.  I told her that I had just blogged about that.  Then on the radio the following day I heard the same thing...they talked about how you cannot love your neighbors until you love yourself.  And then again, a group of young adults that I meet with from my church discussed THE SAME THING.  God is sending me a very clear message. 

When we met, my pastor also said that when we choose not to love ourselves and/or to forgive ourselves we are choosing to believe that we know better than God and we think we are right and He is wrong.  Ouch!  

God is opening my eyes to a lot of things so that I can learn to love myself but it is a process and won't all happen at one time; kind of like what happens to the blind man in Mark 8:23-25:

And he (Jesus) took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the village, and when he had spit on his eyes and laid his hands on him, he asked him, “Do you see anything?” 24And he looked up and said, “I see men, but they look like trees, walking.” 25Then Jesus^c laid his hands on his eyes again; and he opened his eyes, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly.

Like the blind man, everything is starting to come into focus; I can see that I have a bad attitude and others are agreeing with me; I am starting to open my eyes and my perspective is becoming clear; but more work needs to be done before I can see totally clearly.  I imagine if my eyes, or the eyes of the blind man, were open all at once that the brightness would be too much.  Baby steps.

There are going to be rough weeks.  I am probably going to get sick again, there are going to be weeks that I am totally exhausted and once a month "Aunt Flo" is going to show up whether I like it or not.  Life is going to go on and I am going to continue this journey to health. You are not going to see THIS GIRL quit anytime soon.