So much has happened lately. We've had the kids for two months now. We've all adjusted fairly well, although I have been somewhat stressed lately because of all of the demands that I'm facing in life right now. I'm still trying to get through my second Spanish class. I swear this class feels like it is taking forever. I've had enough of trying to learn this language. I know that I won't learn it by taking classes alone. I need to practice with someone daily and right now that's not happening. I feel like I've hit the ceiling on my ability to absorb what I'm being taught and all I'm doing at this point is just trying to get through the class. I want it over with already. I haven't been dancing since the kids moved in. That's two months people! No wonder I'm stressing. That was my weekly stress reliever and boy do I miss it. It seems that we've broken the chain and are now finding it impossible to get together again. My dance partner has been having a lot of family trials to deal with. His sister-in-law is dying from breast cancer, his middle son's girlfriend's father brutally murdered her mother and his daughter's best friend was shot and killed last week. My dance partner is a very generous person and he's very involved with his kids. He is just as devastated by these deaths as his children are.

Work has been stressful too. My co-worker has been out on maternity leave since last month and the girl that was hired to help me is doing her job while she's out. That's all fine, except that now no one is helping me get my work done. My boss asks why I don't just come in early and get some overtime in. She doesn't seem to understand that I do not do early. I can do late when I'm not rushing to class or home to cook dinner for the family, but early, no. Definitely not. It's not that I haven't tried. I try every day to get up and out on time but for whatever reason, I still end up arriving 1 or 2 minutes late to work. Plus, I just had my 8 year anniversary at work in which I receive my accrued vacation time of 15 days. Only problem is that I still have 10 days left over from last year that I never got a chance to use. A whole year with only 5 days off people! I can't take any time off until my co-worker comes back but I vow that when she does I'm taking those 10 days off. Heh.

You might not think that any of this sounds stressful but I'm a very low key, low energy person. I need a slower pace in my life. I like to have quiet weekends without much going on so that I can recharge for the week to come. Since we've had the kids, we go out every weekend and then I also have lab time to put in at school and homework to complete. It feels like too much sometimes. Phew! That was a nice little vent. Thanks for letting me get that out.

Good things are happening too. Tomorrow for Thanksgiving we are taking the kids to the Disneyland Hotel for the annual Thanksgiving Dinner. They open up the Grand Ballroom and serve all kinds of food. It's a feast for the eyes as well as the stomach. The kids are going to have a ball. I hope they stuff themselves silly. Lastly, the best news of all is that I've lost a total of 15 lbs. since I stopped consuming sugar at the end of September. That makes me smile through all of this other stuff.

I have an addiction. Last month I finally made the decision to quit. It wasn’t an easy decision to make and it took a great deal of persuasion on my end to cause it to come about. My addiction isn’t anything that you usually hear about. There are no clinics, no meetings or support groups. When I tell people about my addiction their response isn’t the same that I might get if I told them that I was a drug addict or an alcoholic. Usually they say that they have the same problem. Actually I think most people do but they don’t realize how severe it can be. My addiction is sugar. You might think this is not a serious thing, but think about it, it can be just as deadly in the long run as drugs or alcohol. Your body can only handle so much sugar before it starts to react.
For the last 4 or 5 months I’d been feeling really crappy. I was achy and fatigued. Getting out of bed in the morning I felt like I’d been beaten with a stick. It took a major effort to get moving. At the same time my sugar cravings had begun to increase. The more I ate, the more I wanted and I thought about it all day long. At work, there was always a fresh supply of some baked good or candy sitting about so I was never in lack for feeding my addiction. I had finally gotten to the point of thinking that I should see my doctor. Since that is an event I wanted to avoid I began to think about what he would tell me when I went to see him. If I could figure out what was wrong with me I could save myself a trip. Drawing on previous experiences with my doctor I knew that the first things he would ask me would be if I was exercising and eating right. Um…yes to the first and no to the second. Ok. That makes sense actually. If I’m not eating right that may be why I feel like crap all the time. Garbage in, garbage out right? So there was my answer. I needed to change my diet, stop eating all of that sugar and eat more vegetables and fruit instead. I figured that I would at least try it and see what happened. As it turns out, it has worked wonderfully and to my surprise I’ve lost weight (10lbs. so far) and my acne has cleared up entirely. That was unexpected. I never thought that my blemish problems stemmed from my diet. Needless to say I’m thrilled with the results. Sugar is not my friend. In moderation it’s okay, have a treat once in a while, but who can stop after just one piece of cake or pie or candy or eat just one homemade chocolate chip cookie? Not many people that I know of. How about you?