A Diversion

Or, Why People from the Midwest Should Undergo Training before Moving to a Large City:

I am walking to the metro from Gallaudet University, where I was attending TFA professional development. I pass two middle-aged men waiting for a bus. I make eye contact, and because I am from SE Ohio, I smile.

Man 1: How you doing?
Me: I'm good, thanks.
Man 1: Lookin' good.

Sigh.

At sea

I don't know what's wrong with me. I don't know where my head is half the time. I'm itchy. I can't sit still.

I'm at a loss, but I don't know what for.

Not doing so well

Ruined another weekend night with Jim. I got upset over something stupid, then I kept beating myself up for getting upset, and then it just went downhill from there.

I try so hard to be less self-critical, but how do I just stop noticing all of my glaring faults? I try, I fail, and then I feel even worse because I'm a) failing and b) whoppingly self-centered. This kind of narcissism isn't the fun kind, people. It's the kind when you just can't think of anything else but what a craptastic person you are - lazy, boring, fat, self-centered, a shitty teacher, insecure, whiny.

I just feel paralyzed. I don't know how to make this better and I'm afraid it's going to make things even worse.

And here we go again

Two more bad days. I know that teaching is going to have its ups and downs, but dammit I really thought I was on the right track.

Trying to think of something positive to hold on to. I guess what's really keeping me going is the thought that I have one person who has decided, for some reason or another, that he wants to spend not just this year, not just next year, but a whole bunch more years with me. Like all of them. And that long after Teach for America is a memory, Jim will still be there.

The same goes for my family - no matter what happens, I've still got them.

So that's something. If that's what it takes to get me through, then so be it.

Expending Energy

I have spent the last two hours HATING myself, my body, my lack of self-control. I bought some much-needed khakis and there was no denying it, from my reflection to the larger size. I am bigger. All over. And I am making myself schizophrenic over it.

Dinner parties. Wine and cheese. Bread. Chips and salsa. Candy. It has to go. It all has to. Because I can't even handle a little bit of it.

But it can't go.

But it has to.

It can't.

It goes.

It stays.

It goes.

I hate this.

Stagflation

I can't move forward, I can't move back.

I've been doing well about cutting out the fat-talk. But the fat-thinking? Ohh, that's still there.

I look in the mirror and I know I've gained weight. My stomach is different. My hips are different. But I don't know how much I've gained, because I haven't weighed myself in months. Good lord - not since January. So when I say I want to lose weight, I don't know what I'm really saying.

I'm eating things now that a year ago I would never have considered. Last weekend I had a fucking enchilada, cooked for me by a couple we're friends with. An ENCHILADA.

Do I want to give up these new things? Do I want to give up the freedom I'm starting to have with food and drink? Give up candy corn, cider, wine? Okay let's be serious, I'm never going to give up the grape. But do I want to go back to non-stop gum-chewing at social functions? No alcohol due to the empty calories? No crunchy cereal at night before bed?

What do I give up? What do I change?

Mind Games

I am sick. My throat hurts, my head hurts. It's actually not as bad as it was this weekend, but it's still pretty unpleasant. And I'm exhausted - the kids were nuts today.

So I'm not going to work out. I'm going to take a nap and then I'm going to do some work and cook some spaghetti squash and then I will watch Mad Men with Jim.

Having made this decision, my brain is SCREAMING at me to work out because my fat lazy ass hasn't been on an elliptical since Thursday and holy cow, that's right COW I'm so huge it's not funny.

I just want to get some rest.

Got to admit

It's getting better. A little bit at a time. The past three days my aide has been out, which is usually a recipe for disaster. But I've had an AMAZING parent step in and help out most days, and today I had eleven out of my usual 16 - it is sicky season. I am sick myself - sore throat, stuffy nose etc. But yesterday and today I think I actually TAUGHT something. And my kids fucking understand syllables.

And Jim is amazing. Of course.

Week in review

Or not, because last week was so epically bad that I never even want to think about it again. I managed to piss off so many people, from people at work to parents to Jim. Jim. Of all the people I do not want to piss off, I pissed off Jim and ruined the Friday night that was supposed to be my respite from the crap of work.

But I digress.

Last week was so, so bad that it forced me to take a really hard look at myself. I looked at my attitude, my actions, my words. It was kind of like when I look in the mirror before I take a shower - troubling. I found a lot of things that made me squirm. A lot of things that I want to change.

Of course change is hard and scary and whatnot. But I have to do it, or I'll keep having shitty weeks and pissing off the one person who's keeping me together.

Bad days

Two terrible days in a row. I mean full out awful, complete with yelling and lectures. And Jim feels sick.

Can I handle another one?

Home and home

I went home this weekend to see my family and get my car. Oh goodness. My family. They surprised me by bringing my older sister - I hadn't seen her since Easter! Everybody got along and there was good food and I ATE and I don't hate myself for it.

Now I'm home in D.C. (two homes, eh?) and there is a shiny car in the parking lot that is mine (well, after we get it registered). On the drive back I read The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. Cheesy, yes I know. But I really think it helped. I'm setting goals. I'm taking action. I am going to be a good teacher, a good wife-to-be, and a good person. I think.

I'm just trying to like myself, regardless of what anyone else thinks of me. If you've never done it, it's harder than you might imagine.

Going home

Back in my RIDIC GMU class. We have been here an HOUR and have yet to discuss content.

But I digress.

I am going back to Ohio this weekend! Jim and I are leaving early-early on Saturday and spending the night with his family. My parents and younger sisters are coming up and we'll all eat dinner and hopefully the experience will not be terribly awkward. And then I WILL HAVE A CAR. For the first time in my life, I will have a car of which I will be the primary driver. It's a Buick Century, nothing flashy, but it drives and it will reduce my commute by 45-60 minutes. That means MORE SLEEP for tired Miss Howison. I am Miss Frazzle, not Miss Frizzle.

Aieeee

A snapshot in my brain:

Ohmygod you ate so much pizza jesushchrist stoppit lessonplansaaaaahhhh you don't have time fatfatfatfat fattttyyyyyyy gaah howonearth will you ever behungryagain fatfatfat

You get the picture. And I sit here very calmly while Jim and our friend play video games on our new tv and they have no idea I'm about to go into the bathroom and hyperventilate for a little bit.

I am SO FUCKING SICK of this. Recover already, Lisa. Enough of this in-between shit.

But can you ever really leave it all behind?

Moving Images

Today I endured something that can be excruciating for anyone, let alone someone in recovery from an eating disorder: I watched myself on film. On Wednesday my TFA mentor came in and taped the beginning of my day. We watched the film today during my planning period.

Awful as it was, I learned a shit ton. We talked about some solutions that would be quick, easily implemented, and would go a long way to improving things.

I also realized that no, I'm not thin and lithe but I am also not a fatass. Not. A fatass. Of course I hate the way I look naked but at least in clothes, I'm okay.

And I have good hair.

Why are we here?

I'm sitting in my masters' class at GMU and aaallllll I want to do is go home. This isn't really helping.

I FINALLY got my aide today. The rest of the week is going to be bumpy, but we should get the hang of each other soon.

I got spit on today. I really don't care - it's better than pee.

Swings

It has been and up-and-down kind of weekend.

Friday: came home and vegged out - good.

Saturday: cleaned in the morning and Jim came home - very good.
Had a nice dinner to belatedly celebrate my birthday - also very good.
Got into an argument (it involved calipers) - not good.
Made up and talked about it - very good.

Sunday: lesson planning/progress reports - okay.
Anxiety - not good. Very not good.

I'm just so keyed up and tense right now. I need to get this teaching thing right, and soon.

Birthday

Today is my birthday. Someone told me it's my "golden birthday," because I'm turning 23 on the 23rd. Unfortunately the only "golden" thing about today was the two students who had accidents during naptime.

Thinking about food (trigger warning)

There's a KitKat commercial on TV that shows people working in cubicles, taking time out to blissfully enjoy the chocolate-covered wafery goodness of a Kitkat. Men, women, black, white, Asian - all of them taking a bite and savoring it.

It made me realize I could never do that. I could never walk to a vending machine and select a KitKat. I could never tote it back to my cubicle (or classroom) and unwrap it. I could never sit down, eat the KitKat, throw away the wrapper, and go back to my life.

No. I can't eat food without thinking about it. If I do - Jim made candied walnuts the other day and I ate a ton of them - later on it comes back to haunt me. I can't just make a meal. I stand in the kitchen and agonize - what will fill me up with the fewest calories? What will give me the most nutrition for the fewest calories? What will taste good?

There's a tug-of-war, always, in my head. No, don't eat that, says one part of my brain. And then the other part says Go ahead, have a little cashew butter. Have a triscuit. Have a bite of sugar-free pudding. Eat eat eat, it'll make you feel better. But of course it doesn't, I feel like shit.

Not that it matters. No matter what I eat I will never, ever be thin.

It doesn't matter. It shouldn't matter. But it does.

Keeping on

I'm still a craptastic teacher, but at least I didn't leave in tears on Thursday. My aide won't be there Monday, so who knows what will happen then.

I'm not quitting. I"m NOT. I have to convince myself that's not an option.

Error message

I may have made the biggest mistake of my life doing Teach for America.

I am terrible. Terrible. I have no authority and I don't know how to get it back. I will tell the students to do something and they laugh at me. Another teacher will walk in and say the same thing and it's done without a peep.

I am a basket case. I have Teach for America staff sitting in on my class nearly every day of the week.

I can't remember the last day I didn't cry. I am dreaming about my students - even in my sleep, they don't listen.

And I'm stuck for two years.