live free. see beauty.

Awhile back, someone asked me what my 'why' was for this whole lifestyle change. Why did I all of a sudden decide that I needed to get healthy when I had basically spent the pat 30 years not being healthy? There is no simple answer. There are no cut and dry, black and white words that I can type that will even come close to explaining it.

There are words that I could say. Things like: I want to keep up with my boys and I want to be around to see my grandchildren and I want to be able to fit in all the roller coasters at theme parks. All these words are true. There are also words that I could say like: I want to be able to shop at whatever store I choose and know they have my size or I want to see what the world looks like from the tops of mountains or I want to have real life adventures with those that I love. Every single breath of the those words is true and I mean them with every fiber of my being.

But saying all those words is complicated. There is a deeper meaning behind every single one of them. A root behind every thought. Over the course of the past year, I have realized things about myself that I had never known before. I have a resolve in me that is great and mighty and steadfast. I'm not trying to toot a horn here or brag or make myself important. It's just something that I have realized.

Recently, my friend Tracy introduced me to the term sankalpa. Basically (and this is very basic and I hope I'm explaining this correctly) a sankalpa is a phrase that expresses your inner desire and basic truth. It's resolve. It's you. Right where you are without changing who you are, but helping you realize the deep places in your life. Okay, so I'm not a yogi and I don't practice yoga on a regular basis, but unbeknownst to me, I have a sankalpa. I have boiled down my 'why' and I'm trying daily to make it truth.

Live free. See beauty.

My past lifestyle kept me in bondage. That bondage was fear and pessimism. I was afraid to do things because my weight got in the way. I always saw the worst in things because I felt horrible about the way I looked and felt. So what is the opposite of fear and pessimism? For me, it wasn't courage and optimism. It was freedom and beauty. More than anything I wanted the freedom to live my life with adventure and risk and taken chances. I wanted to see beauty in everything. See the beauty in my children, my husband, my family. But also see the beauty in my dark days and the valleys and the clawing and scratching to survive.

Live free. See beauty.

I have uttered that phrase more than anything in the the past year and a half. When I wanted to give up. When the workout was just too hard. When counting one more calorie was too much for me. When the biggest had a tantrum. When the littlest broke another set of blinds. When I finally ran up the big, stupid hill. When I was able to walk and keep the hula hoop going. When I could do an actual push up. When I hiked with my dad and my son without being completely breathless.

Live free. See beauty.

So call it my 'why' or my sankalpa or my mantra or whatever. It's my phrase. What I say when things are amazing and when things are so hard that I don't think I can take one more step. It's what I think when the biggest and the littlest are doing everything in their beautiful power to drive me up the wall. I squeak it out between sobs when darkness starts to set up in my mind and heart. It's my verbal cue to start praying in the good times and the bad. I've shouted it from mountain tops. I've whispered it, breathless, when I've beaten my best mile's time. I've proclaimed it in my life.

It's me. And it's what I want.

ownership

 

that is mine

that road that you

fenced in and let 

grass grow

you have a piece 

of paper that says it 

belongs

to 

you

but it is mine

you may not know

that i walked and

rode my bike

and buried treasure on

my way from home to granny's

you may not know that i

whispered to trees and

ran my hands along their bark

leaving little girl secrets 

to grow in their rings

i don't blame you

grown-ups don't understand

little girl dreams

and whispered secrets to trees

they understand property lines

and deeds

and fences

and keep out signs

such is the reason

i have not hopped

the fence

this is not a do-over.

I started this little corner of the world with the intention of it being a weight loss blog. It is still that. But I also need something else right now. I need to get thoughts out of my head that don't always have to do with weight loss. I need to talk about being a working mother and having boys and write about foods I like to cook that have nothing to do with how many calories are in each serving. I need to write and share poetry. I need to be honest about being a parent of a special needs child. I need a place where I can post the funny stories and videos and anything else that pops into this brain of mine.

Many times over the course of the past couple months I have wanted to post something that was on my mind, but because it had nothing to do with weight loss, I didn't share. Lame. Then I was all like "this is my blog. I do what I want. Because I can!"

I need space to sprawl out and just let it all loosey goosey.

So that's that. Here's to something a little different.

blessings

today i sat in the stairwell
of my little church
tears rolled down my cheeks
and splashed into your
mussed up blonde hair
you kicked
and screamed
and fought
one arm broke free
and nails that i try
to keep trimmed
clawed my face

i whispered my mantra
over
and
over again

children are a blessing
from the Lord
just as they are

Children are a Blessing
from the LORD
JUST AS THEY ARE

the other hand broke
free this time
it grabbed a handful of my hair
and you thrashed against me

time slowed down
i knew what was coming

your beautiful head bent forward
and then slammed back
into my nose
in that moment
the cinder block wall that
i braced myself against
met my head

tiny pricks of light
danced in front of my eyes
then i said the words
that i cannot take back

why can't you be normal

the words became stone
sunk into my belly and grew hot
i crumpled to the
floor beside your thrashing body

mother of the freaking year

growing memories

today we held hands,
and breaths,
as we tip toed into clear,
frigid mountain water
I watched as you carefully
let go of my hand
and then charged knee deep
perpendicular to the current
I watched as you lost your footing
on the loose, silty creek bed
I reached out my hands to you,
but you did not reach for me
independent, and drenched,
you found your own way to the bank
of that frigid mountain stream
I made  note of your autonomy
and closed my fingers around
a gentle breeze

later, dry and eating sandwiches
I lay back on the scratchy grass
and closed my eyes
I felt you beside me
and knew it was the littlest
even though you made no sound
you put your shoulder to my shoulder
and your head to my head
I opened my eyes and turned
your two and a half,
almost three, eyes smiled into my
thirty-one, almost thirty-two, eyes
a toothy grin broke across your face
and your nose brushed mine
I made note of your dependence
and closed my arms around
all of you

this is what we call a miracle

First off, this post is not weight loss related. It has been so long since I have actually written a post, but I wanted to share this with a large group of people and the actual telling of the story requires a bit more space than what is ideal for a facebook status update.

Second, I want to talk about something that we, as a family, do not talk about with a lot of friends and family. Some people know. Some people don't. It's not that some people are more important than others and it's not that we are ashamed of it, but...we just haven't shared it with everyone. Okay, sorry for the vagueness. I'll just be blunt. We are in the process of trying to determine if Silas (the biggest) is on the autism spectrum. We have had had suspensions and he has displayed symptoms for quite some time.

Silas loves to tell us 'hi' and 'bye' and wave at us appropriately. He loves to sing and he is building quite an extensive repertoire of Veggietale songs. He is sweet and caring. He likes to wrestle and run and swing and play with cars. He likes to line up his stuffed animals and 'talk' to them. He dances and does a mean downward dog while we are doing yoga together. He likes to lift weights with his mama and daddy. He loves to ride the school bus and has fun with his friends at school. He is making academic progress as well as social progress. He can climb and run and jump and has such good control of his body. He is starting to like books, but he doesn't like to be read to. He just wants to look at the pictures on his own. He is an ace at some of his games on his ipad. And that kid loves. He loves with his whole, huge heart!

But that's not all there is to say about Silas.

Silas has taken 3 and a half years (basically his whole life) to call me mama/mom on a regular basis and that just started recently. He still doesn't call Dave dad or daddy. My mom and dad and Dave's parents have yet to hear a clear granny/papaw/mamaw. He is just now putting two (very unclear) words together. He has an extremely high tolerance of pain. He is a hand flapper. He refuses to eat if you don't have his 'approved' foods on hand. I'm not talking picky. I'm talking refuses to eat. Meaning he will go days and days without eating a single thing. He sometimes has tantrums that involve banging his head on the floor or wall until bruises form, biting, pinching, scratching (sometimes drawing blood) himself, screaming until his throat is raw, and sometimes he requires physical restraint and relative darkness to get him back under control. He is sometimes too overwhelmed to go into a store to shop. Or if we are somewhere new and there are lots of people, sometimes we can't stay.

I don't tell you this so that you pity me. We don't need pity. I don't tell you this so that you think my job as parent is more difficult than your job as parent. If you are a parent, then you are on your own crazy ride and I'm right there with you. Holding on for dear life! Being a parent is hard no matter what your circumstances. I tell you all this so that maybe, just maybe, you can understand how big this miracle really is.

We have been waiting for an entire year for an appointment at the Weisskopf Child Evaluation Center in Louisville, KY. After getting all his paperwork and application sent in at the end of April 2013, we waited. In June of 2013 I started calling. I continued to call every single day until mid February 2014. Every day I talked to a string of people and all they could tell me was that his paperwork was being processed. In mid March, after deciding to go a different direction with his evaluation and treatment, we finally heard back from the Weisskopf center telling us we had an appointment scheduled for April 22. I talked to the receptionist at our pediatrician's office and was told that we no longer needed to keep that appointment since we were going a different direction. I called the Weisskopf Center and told them, in a rather smug and snippy manner, that we had decided to go a different direction since they had taken such a long time to get back with us. I confirmed that I no longer needed, nor wanted, the appointment. They cancelled it and that was that. Since the packet of information they sent to us contained social security numbers, medical records, and personal information I took it to work with me. I put it in the shredder, pressed the button, and was glad that I was not longer going to have to wait for the elusive Weisskopf Center to get back with me.

  Fast forward to this past Thursday, March 27, 2014 . I finally get a call back from a special program that we were banking all our hopes on for this new path we were taking. It's a clinic here in Eastern, KY just for children with special needs. It would mean no more trips all the way to Lexington for his doctor visits. No more taking off full days of work (which we cannot afford to do) so that I can take him to his doctor appointments. We were thrilled. As we were talking, the sweet (amazing) nurse asked me if we had had our evaluation at the Weisskopf Center yet. I informed her, in my rather smug and snippy manner, that we had declined that appointment since they had taken so long to get back with us and that we, his parents and primary care provider, had decided to go a different route. This route. With this clinic.

"Oh," she said. "Does your primary care provider know that we and the Weisskopf Center are two separate entities that work together and that we need you to have that appointment so that we can best manage your special needs care?" My heart dropped into my stomach and tears immediately sprang into my eyes.

"No," I wept into the phone. "I was told to cancel that appointment because we didn't need it anymore."

"Well, we've had families sometimes wait up to 15 months for those appointments. If you have cancelled your appointment, we'll have to call and get you back on the waiting list." At this point I was basically sobbing into the phone as she tried to calm me down. "Here's their number. Maybe you can call them and see if you can get the appointment back. I'll do anything I can to help you out as well."

I hung up the phone and sobbed at my desk. There was no way we could wait another year. I felt like a failure as a mother. I had robbed my son of this apparently hard to get appointment that he needed to get help. I had done all that, in a stupid smug and snippy manner that no one was going to forgive. I had sentenced us to another long year of waiting on another appointment.

I pulled myself together as much as I could and dialed the number she had given me. I was put through the same string of automated responses and accidentally hung up. So I called back. Tears of defeat rolling down my cheeks and completely ready to beg and plead for an appointment that wasn't a year away. This time I managed to get through the automated system correctly and got to speak with an actual person.

"Yes," I croaked into my phone. "My son, Silas Allen, was supposed to have an appointment on April 22. I called and canceled that appointment because I was told that I didn't need it anymore." Sniffle Sniffle. Quiet sob. "Is there any way possible for me to get that appointment back? I was just told that I do, indeed, need that appointment. I need it desperately." I closed my eyes and waited for her smug voice to tell me that since I had already cancelled that there was no way to get it back. She asked for his social security number and date of birth. I could hear her typing away. I could hear every conversation going on in our office at work. I was hyper aware of everything going on.

"Ma'am," her voice was just plain. No inflection and I basically just started crying. "We still have him scheduled to be here at 8:00 am on April 22. Your appointment wasn't cancelled." Cue happy sobs and complete hysteria. Not even joking! I jumped up from my desk and squealed.

"Seriously?! I cancelled that appointment!" That's at least what I was trying to say. I'm not sure how she understood me.

"Well, he is listed and I'll go ahead and confirm the appointment for you. Is there anything else you need help with today?"

"No! You have completely made my day!" I hung up the phone and completely just let go of all the sobs that I had been trying (unsuccessfully) to hold back.

I immediately called the super nice nurse at the clinic back and told her the good news. She was just as thrilled as I was and because the appointment was so close, made an adjustment to our appointment with them. After even more tears were shed with her, I finally was able to pull myself together and get the rest of the workday done.

When I got home, the thought occurred to me that I no longer had the packet of information that we needed for this long awaited appointment because I had shredded it at work. I called back and they told me that I needed that packet and that it couldn't be resent because it contained all kinds of crazy passwords needed for online surveys that was time sensitive to each case, etc etc, and a bunch of stuff that didn't make sense to me. So my elated mood went simply crashing back to the ground. They told me to continue to look for a day or two, but if I didn't find it I would have to re-do the entire application process and get put back on the waiting list.

Back to where I started earlier today. Sobs. Tears. Shaking. Failure. My fault.


I stood at my kitchen table and just shook. There is no way we could wait for another year, or longer, for this appointment. But I was out of options. I knew I had shredded the packet of information and there was no need to look. I would call back on Friday and get the application process started over again and cancel that precious appointment that was ours.

I mindlessly started shifting things around on my kitchen table and picked up an unfamiliar 'certified' envelope that had been opened. I turned it over and saw a Louisville postmark. My heart skipped like three beats. I pulled out the thick stack of papers and saw the Wesisskopf letterhead. Every.Single.Page was there. It was all there. Not shredded. Not destroyed! It was there in my hands! There would be no need to call and cancel and start over.

You can call it coincidence. You can call it a fluke. You can tell me that I must have shredded something else instead and that it was an accident that someone didn't do their job and cancel his appointment. You can call it a lie. I CALL IT A MIRACLE! A downright, bona-fide, God given miracle!

So now we make plans for this miracle. I have to find a hotel close to the center. There is no way we can drive all the way to Louisville from West Liberty the day of the appointment and be there at 8:00 am. I have to take off work and plan for that.We've got to save money so that we can get that hotel and food and gas taken care of. But the Lord will provide. He will not turn His back on me! He has brought us this far and He will not forsake us now! He is holding my son, and my family, in the palm of His hand and we will not be moved!

Thanks for sticking with me through this long winded story. Thanks for your friendship and your support. Thanks for all your thoughts and prayers and hand holding and tears and everything. I have amazing people in my life and I am thankful for you!
                                                                          

fill up your cup friday

 

Happy Friday, Friends! 

I have been a wife for 7 years. I have been a mother for 3.5 years. My identity is now tied up in a name change and two balls of dirt and milk and legos and hotwheels cars and snot and poop that make a lot of noise (otherwise known as two little boys). I am no longer Sarah Stoltzfus, single. I am Sarah Stoltzfus Allen, married mother of two. 

And I wouldn't change that for the world! Let me just say that again so that the next part of this post doesn't sound all selfish. I wouldn't change that for the world!

Here's the deal, though. I spend so much of my time pouring into the lives of my husband and sons that I sometimes forget that I exist. I sometimes forget that Sarah likes to take photos of subjects that aren't her sons. Or that she enjoys reading Dave's gaming magazines on occasion. Or that making music with other individuals fuels her creative juices. I'm sure she has forgotten what it is like to poop by herself.

So in the spirit of taking care of myself (and being selfish for about 20 minutes every Friday), I have declared Fridays as Fill Up Your Cup Friday! What is this, you might ask? Well, every Friday I plan to find a way to spend 20-30 minutes doing something that I want to do (hopefully with no interruptions). Something that fills up my 'cup' and helps me re energize. It could be reading a bit more scripture than normal. It could be journaling, reading, making music, dancing, savoring a piece of dark chocolate without sharing. Whatever. It just has to be something that satisfies me on a spiritual/emotional level. 

I want you to join me! We pour ourselves into the lives of others so much, that we NEED to have some time to pour back into our own lives. We often find ourselves unhealthy simply because we don't take care of our emotional and spiritual needs. That needs to change! So every Friday, do something that makes you happy. For you! I promise you will be a happier, healthier person. 

Let's make it a movement, shall we?! (yeah right!) If you use instagram, tag your photos with #fillupyourcupfriday !