When "Quitting" Is A Good Thing

• when you realise that what you are doing has started to hurt more than help
• when the passion has died and doesn't seem to be coming back
• when it feels more compulsive than enjoyable
• when it doesn't interest you anymore
• when it starts to lose meaning and stops making sense
• when it's taking up more energy and time than it warrants
• when it starts to feel out of your own hands
• when you realise it's taking you further and further from where you want to be going
• when it's causing sleepless nights and restless days
• when the "get up and go" feeling...got up and went
• when you face it with dread rather than hope
• when you reach limits that aren't possible to break through
• when no matter how hard you try, you realise there isn't anything more you can do
• when your health and happiness becomes compromised
• when it becomes a 24/7 obsession rather than a pleasant past time
• when you worry more about what people are thinking rather than staying true to yourself
• when holding on is more painful than letting go

This isn't related to anything in particular right now, just some thoughts/ideas that have been bouncing around my head- more so lately as 'life' has gotten busier and my priorities are being assessed (and reassessed!). I'm trying to prise things apart and figure out what is 1) important, 2) enjoyable and 3) what is taking up my attention/focus right now that is okay to let go of. I hate the idea of "quitting"- I like to think I can juggle a zillion things at once and somehow keep everything balanced in a nice pie-chart format. That's not working out very well so I am working on accepting that sometimes there are things that I need to just let go. My dad calls this a "strategical retreat"- cutting your losses and backing out whilst you can. I still see it as 'quitting' and prefer to stick with it and hope that things work out.

What are your thoughts on giving up/quitting if it's something that isn't working for you anymore? Do you find it easy to do?

"To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day , to make you like everybody else, means to fight the hardest battle any human being can fight."

- E. Cummings

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The good stuff...

I made the BEST breakfast this morning, featuring this bar that Aisha sent me:

I cooked up some oats and swirled them together with plain fromage frais and frozen blueberries and crumbled a chunk of the bar on top.

The bar was amazing! Such a great oatmeal topping, especially with the blueberries and yogurt. Why have I waited so long to try the coconut and almond combinations I've seen on so many blogs?! (note to self: copy more bloggers- these guys have GREAT taste!) I am rapidly falling in love with the hot oat/cold yogurt bowls!

I've had this sitting in my fridge for ages and have been looking forward to trying it since it's so popular amongst bloggers.

I REALLY wanted to like it. Ccinnamon is one of my all-time favourite spices and I love the short ingredients list (if something has a list that I can read straight through without needing to stop for a break, I LIKE it), but the flavour was strange...spicy, sweet and not what I was expecting. Not a bad thing since I can't get these bars easily and am glad I don't need to add it to my list of stuff to stock up. I do find it weird how I can tolerate such high levels of artificial sweeteners, but I find Larabars INCREDIBLY sweet. Anyone else find this? Or am I just weird? Heh... Does anyone else keep their Lara bars in the fridge?

Hope everyone's weekend is off to a great start!

The Fine Line Between Love and hate

For as long as I can remember, I've had this intense fear that something horrible will happen to my mom. I have memories of sitting in the back of the car when I was 3/4, making symmetrical patterns with my fingertips to calm myself down, believing that if I made perfect patterns, I'd somehow be protecting her from harm. I wasn't brought up in a religious household, but I went to sleep every night pleading with 'God' to keep my mom safe. I should point out that I've never had justification for this fear and I have no idea where it comes from.

Over the last few years, our relationship has changed. I still very much have the same fears about something happening to her, but my reaction is different- I distance myself, pick fights over stupid things, keep myself away from her. I guess on some level I think that the more time we spend apart, the easier it will be to bear the brunt if something DOES happen to her.

Saturday's are now the day we seem to get together- we meet for coffee early in the morning before she goes to shul. This morning I set off to meet her- as much as I love my mom, it's REALLY hard for me to be around her. Something just switches in my head and I become irritable, whiny, needy. She called me half an hour before we were to meet to ask me what the weather was like. Coming from anyone else, this would not have been a big deal. Her phone call, as do most of hers, made me feel like ripping my skin off. I was suddenly agitated, angry and just wanted to turn around and go home. I slammed my cellphone shut and kept walking and met my mom as planned. It was 'okay'. I put on my fake smile, pretended to have a good time and silently counted down the minutes until she would have to leave to go to shul.

I feel horrible for this. I LOVE my mom. I have a lot of respect for her as a person and am so grateful for everything that she has done for me over the years and everything that she has put up with. I can't even imagine the pain she has gone through watching me do the things I have done over the years...but on some level, I hate her. I can't explain why because I don't KNOW. Something about being around her triggers all kinds of wild and crazy emotions. Anxiety, anger, rage, fear. I don't know where it comes from or why it is so hard to be with her and at the same time, be away from her. I manage my eating disorder far better when we have distance- physical distance. But she is the first person I reach out to when things are hard because she 'gets' it. We think the same way and react the same way to a lot of situations- I'm wondering if part of the intensity of my feelings when I am with her is to do with the fact that I see so much of myself reflected in her. I can't help but feel jealous of people who do fun things with their families, because mine evoke such strong emotions in me and our time spent together is fraught with tension. Oh, to live with The Brady Bunch :P

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Breakfast this morning, at the lovely hour of 5am. Yay insomnia!

Oats mixed with vanilla extract and fromage frais, with blueberries and almonds. Need to sort out my sleep pattern ASAP! I don't know why I am suddenly having so much trouble falling/staying sleep these days.

Lunch:

Quorn "ham", laughing cow cheese, spinach and tomato chutney on seeded wholewheat bread.

New snack!

First time trying this flavour, and I LOVED it! This and the Peanut Butter Cookie larabar are my top 2. I've only ever had cashew nuts in stir-fries before and forgot how much I loved them.

Question of the day: How often do you talk to/see your parents? I talk to my mom several times a day (!) and my dad maybe once every couple of months. He lives abroad so most of our communication is via email.

What's In A Year?

It's was exactly one year ago today that I boarded the plane to New York. I remember how excited I was as the plane took off- naively believing that I was leaving what I've come to discover the inescapable behind. Inescapable at least until I have faced up to it and changed it myself. Running away doesn't work. I remember being full of hope that *this* time, it would work- I had somewhere to live, job interviews lined up, social plans made. I was so happy to be going back to where I consider "home".

I remember opening the door to my new bedroom, feeling like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. The sunlight shone brightly through the huge window- a welcome change from the cold dampness I'd left behind in Scotland.

The weeks that followed were filled with job interview after job interview. Nobody seemed to be actually hiring, and I drifted from one company to the next- portfolio clutched closely to my chest. My motivation waned. I spent time with friends, i went to therapy, I tried my hardest to hold things together. I struggled to pay my rent, struggled to keep my eating disorder under control as I was rejected time and time again from one job to the next. I picked up pieces of temp work in between- answering phones, faxing, Xeroxing. The summer heat started to feel more suffocating than welcoming as I grew more and more hopeless and defeated. I sat in my room each night drinking warm diet cream soda, applying for jobs, hunting for somewhere cheaper to live.

My therapist was pressing for me to see a doctor- everyone I spoke to said I needed to go into an inpatient program. I could barely afford my rent with the little work I was managing to get, never mind take several weeks off for treatment. By July, I had given up trying and made arrangements to fly back to the UK. It was okay- i was going to move to London and build a life THERE. It was going to be great. I got a place for college, found somewhere to live...everything was planned out.

One minor detail overlooked: the problem wasn't where i was living or what I was doing- the problem was how I interpreted it all and how I turned on myself when things felt chaotic/disappointing/overwhelming.

I still want, more than anything, to move back to New York. Do I want it badly enough to make it happen? I'm not sure. Last year i really thought, "third time lucky"- I guess I have learned stuff each time I have moved, even if it hasn't always had the end result that I was looking for. I'm not sure how to go about planning another move at this stage- if there is another move, it's going to be the last.

At least I know now that my difficulties come with me wherever I go, and nothing external is going to change things until I have changed what's going on inside of me...

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Onto more fun stuff. I finally found it!

I have been hunting for this because I thought I would LOVE it. I was pretty disappointed. I found the flavour to be bland, but overly sweet- not much coconutty taste at all, just a weird sugary taste that i couldn't quite place. I didn't like the peanut butter cookie one though initially so might need to try this again at some point- though only if it's given to me for free!

Last night I attempted to make one of the breakfast cookies I've seen all over blogosphere lately. Using leftover pumpkin and a sample pack of muesli, I came up with this...


I overestimated the absorption ability of oats a little! Pumpkin : Oat ratio = wrong-o!

Yogurt to the rescue...


And that is how the cookie crumbles!!!

Without Rain...

...there would be no rainbows.

The view from my bedroom window late Sunday afternoon. A nice reminder that through the clouds, is sunshine, even if you can't always see it amidst the rain.

And as promised, some more photos...

I've been starting to get tired of having oatmeal every morning so breakfast this week has featured a new cereal:

I thought this would be more like weetabix, but it stayed pretty crunchy after adding milk- still good though!

with milk, sliced banana and almonds

New snack alert!

mini chocolate brownie clif bar crumbled on top of a fage 2% twin pot

I was SO excited when Sam and I did our exchange and I got some Arnold's sandwich thins to try! Love at first bite!



With spinach and chicken and sweetcorn deli filler.

Anyone have a good recipe for a vegetarian chicken salad? I miss the "power-fu" I ate all the time in new York!


Aaaaand some exciting purchases! I tried lara bars a few times and only recently decided that I absolutely LOVE them. We only get a very limited selection in the UK (at great expense, i might add) but I couldn't resist when I saw these- really, who can resist foods that make you...well...HUMM? Lol. I hope they get more flavours soon- I really want to try the coconut cream pie and the jocolat hazelnut ones.

That's all I've got for now. No doubt back later this evening with my usual ramblings...

Hope everyone is having a great day!