It's Good for You...

Sitting here nursing a very sore mouth. I had to get a crown and today was the sizing and temporary crown being put in. My face is weird so dental work is always a challenge. The nerves are flipped on one side of my face so the numbing doesn't always take. Today getting work done on the other side of my face which doesn't have the weird nerve thing but has something else to with the size of my jaw bone it took 5 shots with the last one going directly into my jaw right at the tooth as a last ditch effort. It hurts getting that much Novocain shot into your face. My jaw hurts from the shots and from being open for the work. And it will take until well in to the evening for all of the numbing to wear off.

I knew it would be like this today. It always is. It will hurt tomorrow as well. Hopefully he won't need to numb it out when I got back in for the permanent crown, often they don't, and that's so much better. But even if he does I'll get it taken care of, because it's good for me. Though I have done dental work not numb before just to forgo getting another shot. I was right on the edge of that today. If the last one in to the jaw hadn't worked I would have just sucked it up and dealt with the pain. Because it needed done.

And isn't that a pisser? When you have to do the things that are good for you no matter how uncomfortable they are? Dental work. Mammograms. Pap smears. Bra fittings. Dermatology scans. Exercise. Eating healthy. Visiting your in-laws...

Nobody likes it. Nobody wants to do the hard stuff. But we all soldier on and get it done. Or we face the consequences. Like my tooth. Dr. Youngblood has been watching this particular tooth for a few years. It had a giant filling in the middle and it was developing cracks in the edges of the tooth. Every year he would take a picture of it, measure the cracking and say, "we need to keep a watch on this one." Until this year. I knew as soon as the hygienist popped the latest picture on the screen, and sure enough, the cracking had gotten wide enough that he was afraid the tooth would split if we didn't get a crown on there. I could have said no, I'll just wait, but odds are that tooth would have cracked even if I wanted to wait. Biting down on an almond one day it would have said, "And I'm done..." and that would have been much worse than what I did today. We do the things we need to do no matter how uncomfortable they are.

Or we face the consequences.

I was talking to C this weekend and we were talking about diet and exercise. I know A LOT about both, as you all well know. So we were talking about some healthy food options and then I had to say I wasn't going to do something I had been talking about doing because I could recognize that it was triggering my crazy button. It's not super comfortable to tell people that I am off mentally when it comes to diet and exercise. I know that might be shocking to you all since I talk about it pretty openly, but it's not easy. I know it comes across as crazy and obsessive. And that's only because I get crazy and obsessive about it. When I was younger I would just stop eating at all. A little older than that and I only ate things that were extremely low in calories. In Weight Watchers I always ate less than my points allowance AND I would work out to bank even more. When I use food trackers I do the same thing. Every day I try to eat a little less than the day before. To take in fewer and fewer calories while burning more and more. Right up until I scare myself then I stop tracking at all and gain a lot of weight while I try and ignore the panic.

It's not good for me. It's actually really bad for me. And yet I've done it over and over again.

So I do the uncomfortable thing and tell people about it. That way they can help me watch. So the times when I am not aware that I am being crazy and obsessive they can mention it. Gently, if you tell me to do anything too directly I tend to fight it, another problem I know I have but gently works. So it sinks in and I put the brakes on and stop. Again. I've gotten a lot better. I really have. I recognize it now. Usually. I can stop it before it gets way out of hand. Mostly. And I ask for help. In my own way.

So like getting the work done before the tooth falls apart I do the thing that is uncomfortable because it's good for me.

Like sharing with you all when I go off the rails with food. Too much or too little.

So right now I am working on losing weight. Slowly. So very fucking slowly. I gained a lot last year. And I'm trying to get back to my knees are happy zone. Which is about 12 pounds less than I am right now or 21 pounds less than I was January first. So yeah, I've lost a little less than a pound a week so far this year. Which is great, I know it is. I know it's really steady and the best way to do it and it's still making me a little nuts that it's not faster. I'm doing it by cutting back on added sugar. I was going to do a sugar detox/cleanse when we got home from Hawaii and cut out all the added sugar. It was going to make me lose weight faster and more and better and...I realized while we were on vacation that it was not a good idea. One it's really unsustainable. I like cider. I like baked goods. You need sugar for those things. And two it's something to get obsessive about. And when that happens bad things happen. So I had to back off of that. And I told Brent and I told C and now I'm telling you all.

I will continue with limiting added sugar, but not cut it out completely. I will continue with my gym time, but not add another hour later in the day. I will continue with the slow and steady pace. And I will continue to talk about what I'm doing so people can watch me. Because I need extra eyes. Knowing where you are lacking is the first step. Asking for help in that area is the second. Actually doing the things you need to do even when they are uncomfortable is the constant.

Thanks for letting me be awkward and uncomfortable with you all.

Because it's good for me.