Welcome to this week’s Five Minute Friday. Our instructions, via creator Kate Motaung: “Write for five minutes on the word of the week. This is meant to be a free write, which means: no editing, no over-thinking, no worrying about perfect grammar or punctuation.”
Today’s prompt: SIMPLIFY
When I was within a few minutes of sitting down to write this post last night, squeezing the writing in before getting to bed early (because I had to be up for work at 5 a.m.), my husband called urgently from the guest bathroom ……… where he had discovered a half in inch of standing water.
So much for the simplicity of simply writing for five minutes.
I gave up on the blog post composition so I could get to bed as soon as we had the immediate problem resolved.
I’m still not, however, feeling the “simplicity” prompt.
I’m feeling ……… weighty ……… physically and emotionally. Maybe emotionally BECAUSE of the “physically” part.
I’ve been through the weight loss/gain cycle before (repeatedly) and find myself wondering how I got here, heavier than I was with either pregnancy and, frankly, avoiding socializing with people.
I know it seems simple to say “move more and eat less.”
When I met with my electrophysiologist Wednesday and explained that I had not had any arrhythmia episodes because I hadn’t exercised, he said “at all?” And I responded, “yes — pretty much.” (To his credit, he had good bedside manner when he said it — it could have been sarcastic but it wasn’t.)
I said to him, “I can barely remember the days when it was routine to go out and run ten miles.”
He, of course, reminded me that my medication does work (ahem) and to go at things gradually.
I’ll have to leave this one for this week with the complex issue of returning to simplicity.
This post is part of the weekly Five Minute Friday linkup.
Wife of one, Mom of two, Friend of many. My pronouns are she/her/hers.
hi paula:) i’m your next door neighbor at FMF today. re weight, i can so identify:( i lost some weight last year after taking a class with a nutritionist. then my husband was in the hospital a couple of times in august and i fell off the wagon:( i need to get back on now that life has stabilized. i enjoyed your post. sounds like your life is so normal! ugh! moving on from the water leak, i hope it is fixed now b/f going into the weekend. have a great weekend.
Hi Martha! It’s such a cycle — talking about weight (and dealing with it in genera) — but I process through writing so here I am, writing about weight. Thank you for your kind words!
I love your vulnerability in this post! Like you said, simplification can actually feel pretty complex! Thanks for sharing your thoughts, even though you are still wrestling with them.
Thanks! Nice meeting you here in the comments. 🙂
I had a hard time figuring out what to write about simplicity today as well, and it’s been heavy on my mind for over a month as a theme of my year. Weight/food is high at my priority list this year, I have done a lot of self examination on this and know that I tend to have an addictive personality and turn to food instead of the Lord for emotional support. I’ve been trying for four years now to get this under control and it always comes back to me. This year I decided to get off that crazy cycle by focusing on making good decisions. Instead of having a thousand things I can’t have or rules I must follow, my goal is to eat mostly clean with 90% of my decisions being good then hopefully I can see more long term progress as opposed to fluctuating 10 lbs in either direction all year long like last year where I gained and lost the same 10 lbs about 6 times.
I’ll be praying for you as you figure out what works for you and just exactly what your perfect balance is! If you want an accountability partner, I’d love to connect with you on MyFitnessPal or via email.
Thanks! The funny thing is we have actually been doing quite a bit of simplifying because we are getting our house ready to sell. That, however, is a whole different thing than weight/body issues. I don’t have My Fitness Pal but feel free to connect on email paulakiger (at) gmail.com. 🙂
Thank you for being vulnerable with us. I think so many of us fall into this trap of feeling like a failure etc. I’m also thankful your doctor was wise. Good doctors are the best.
Yes, they sure are!
Appreciate the honesty in your post! Sometimes everything we go for when it comes to “simplify”, comes out as …. “irony”. God bless you as you continue this journey!
YES EXACTLY (on the irony).