Parenting: Getting Teenagers to be Quiet in the Evenings

(From a journal post in March, 2013)

So, I've been falling asleep earlier. Anyone whose been here for any length of time knows that I have struggled with insomnia for a long time.

My kids are generally good about being quiet at night. And going to bed at a reasonable hour. I used to be awake to be witness to this, or to tell them to "Hush" if they started getting noisy.

Things have changed. They've been staying up later, getting more obnoxious (or the fact that I'm not actually able to sleep IF its not quiet has changed things)... So, I have tried several ways to tell them that I don't care WHEN they go to bed, as long as they aren't grouchy the next day AND as long as they are QUIET at "bedtime".

We've started having a struggle with the quiet. The kids, being teenagers, on breaks or weekend especially, have been staying up later and later and later and getting LOUDER to the point that its disrupting my sleep, Abyni's sleep... its just gotten ridiculous.

The other night, in the car with my 15 year old daughter *P* and 17 year old son *K*, *P* was being a SPAZ, and I told her that she'd have to calm her tits once we got home because it was bedtime. 

The kids were all, "Well, good luck with that!" and I tried talking to them reasonably about it being an issue of respect... to no avail, so I explained a little what I MEANT by 'mutual respect'.

I said, 

"Listen, your father and I are quiet when WE go to bed out of respect for your ears, so you can and had best start showing MUTUAL respect for the quiet that happens at bedtime, or we may not bother to be quiet either."

My 15 year old got it immediately and was all, "EWWWW!!!"

The oldest son, oddly enough, took a bit before he started 

"OMG! MOM!!! EWWWWWWW!!! I'm SCARRED!!!! OH MY GOD!"

I just said, "What? I mean when we're watching movies, we're always quiet in OUR ROOM..."

But they didn't believe me.  This is a good thing.

Boy, was it quiet in our house that evening. I think I made my point.

Epiphanies whilst Eating the Food and Finding Myself

This is kind of a rambling post, just raw feelings as I have some realizations about myself on this journey.

Learning to love myself is much harder than I thought it would be.

I realized last night that I'm subconsciously twisting things to fit my own self doubt.  Subconsciously setting myself up for failure and self loathing.  Feeding my insecurities.

There are games that I play that he can't possibly win... because I play them to keep my own insecurities at the forefront because I don't think I deserve to feel good about myself.  I don't deserve to be loved.

I want him to chase me.  I want him to want me.  Yet I feel so insecure about myself that I can't bear to be touched if there is any chance that he's going to be repelled by my weight.  I don't believe him when he says he wants me.  He can't win.

Somewhere deep inside me, I feel unloveable.  Undeserving of love and affection.  I don't know how to reach this part and bring it out.  I attribute it to the weight I've gained, but I know its deeper than that.  Its not like I felt deserving of love when I was thinner.  I always think, 'I can't control what is going on inside of my thoughts/feelings but I can control the weight, even if I can't seem to fix what's inside.  

This has been my lifelong battle with my weight.  I'm trying to control the one thing that feels like it is within my ability to control when everything else seems out of my hands.

I go to bed alone, lonely, aching for his touch.  He comes to bed and curls up around me, his hands caressing me and I tell myself that its only because I made a big deal about him not being attracted to me anymore.  He can't win.

He will admit that although he is still attracted to me, he was more attracted to me when I was leaner.  I can't even be angry, because I feel the same way about myself.  How can he possibly be *as* attracted to me now, 70 pounds heavier?  Why do I have to hear that as a black and white "I don't want you until you lose the weight", when that isn't at all what he said?

I asked him to tell me the things that he finds sexy or attractive about me, so that I would feel sexier.  He commented that my ass is looking pretty fine.  It wasn't a surprise, or maybe it was, but it broke my heart a little bit that that was the only positive thing he could think to say about my looks.

I don't know how to "eat the food" and be okay with continuing to stall or gain weight, but I LOVE not being a slave to food anymore. I KNOW this is the right thing to do.  I thoroughly believe that I need to eat enough, and that taking restrictions off has absolutely helped me with my disordered eating habits.

I don't know how to quit drinking when I feel so devastated and undeserving of happiness.  I know that if I quit drinking every night that I would be able to lose the weight faster.  I just need to get my head in the right place.  I was sober for almost 4 months at the beginning of this year.  I can do it again.

Maybe if I stay sober long enough, I can force myself to deal with these feelings that I keep bottled up and get them out.  Get the voices out of my head that tell me I don't deserve to be happy, that I don't deserve to be loved. 

I will continue to meditate on it, and try to change those voices... it feels good to just get it out of my head right now.

I deserve to be loved.  

I am beautiful.

My body is... (Maybe I'm not quite there yet.)

My body is strong.

I want this to be the last time that I struggle with food.  I want to get healthy and lose weight in a healthy way so that I can maintain it.  I want to get past the inner struggles and heal myself from the inside out.  I deserve to be loved, and my husband deserves to have a wife who can accept his love and love him back.  I will get there.  I am not giving up, because as much as I am hurting right this minute, I feel like I am finally on a sane path to healing my self image and learning to love myself.

And when my husband asked me how I was feeling today, I wrote, "Odd space.  Depressed.  Feeling unloveable, unattractive and lonely."

His reply, "You are a beautiful, funny, intelligent, attractive and witty person who I love with all my heart."  If only I could have a loop of HIS thoughts about me playing in my head all day!

I know this was a sad post, but it was pretty raw and honest and I hope that by acknowledging my feelings on this, that I can get them out of my head and maybe start some healing conversations that will help others along with myself.

Back to the Gym!!!

I made it back tot he gym last night!

It felt SO good to be back.

I was feeling extremely crabby and frustrated.  Mostly because I had just finished two cleanse days and a lack of sleep, which makes me cranky, not to mention taking before photos and having to upload them and see myself... for real... with no baggy clothes to hide behind.  I know its for the best, but its hard to do when you are the only one in a houseful of people making such a drastic change.  Not that our 'clean eating' or even the 'slow carb/paleo' eating is a big change, but I'm doing a ten day cleanse to get a jumpstart, because I'm the only one with 70+ pounds to lose.  The rest of the family just wants to stay healthy.

I find it beyond frustrating that it is so much harder for me to lost weight than it is for my husband.  Seriously. He can just think about it for a minute and he can lose weight and gain muscle.  Ugh.  Men.  It makes me feel like he doesn't appreciate all of the sacrifices I'm having to make and he's just asking me why I'm so irritated at him, when really, I just feel like I'm alone in this.  I hope this phase passes quickly!

Anyway, I went to the gym and tried the treadmill.  Even though I wore my back brace, I still felt a little too anxious to try the elliptical.  As it was, I was only able to do 2.6 on the treadmill without feeling like I was going to re-injure myself.  That in and of itself was really depressing.  I felt like I wasn't going to be able to make any changes with that little work!

I have to say, I had a HARD time staying focused and staying positive.  It was really hard for me not to beat myself up for being back at the beginning again.  I did the best I could, and every time I found myself putting myself down or feeling like "I am NEVER going to get into shape again, I'm going to feel awful FOREVER." I would forcibly change my attention to one of the many "Transformations" that had encouraged me and just pictured myself at the end of my journey.

I tried to be purposeful in my movements with the weights and make sure I was focusing on each muscle as I worked out.  I worked on chest, shoulders & triceps from a workout plan I found online for working through a back injury.  I left out the military bench press and seated shoulder shrugs because they put too much strain on my back.  I ended up doing:


Day 1
1/13/2013
Time  6:00-7:15
Cardio Treadmill for 10 min. @ 2.6
Chest/Shoulders/Triceps
Flat Bench Press *20x12 40x12 50x12
Incline Bench Press 20x12 20x12 20x12
Dumbbell Bench Press 15x19 15x12 15x13
Dumbbell Flys 8x12 8x12 8x12
Front Raises 8x12 5x12 5x12
Tricep Push Downs 20x12 30x12 30x11

*I wrote each set with # x how many reps.

I am really excited to keep track of my weights and reps, because I know that I'll be able to see a lot more improvement that way, especially since I can't do much of anything cardio wise for at least another week or two.

Ten Days Down. Let the Planning Commence!

So my husband, Patrick aka Personal Trainer gave me ten more days of down time for my back to heal.  Then I can start PiYo.  And get back to my TOTALLY AWESOME BODY TRANSFORMATION!!!  I hope to be strong enough by the end of the month to add in weights and other cardio.

My plan is to have a plan.  Deep, right?  I know:) I'm using Jamie Eason's fat loss workout plan from the Body Building website.  It is laid out in such a way that you can print out the workouts to keep track of your weight/reps, etc.  I'm excited to have something so well laid out.  I also plan on doing PiYo and extended stretching at least three times a week as well.

3 Month Goals!

*Beginning January 15, 2013

(vague until I am healed enough to get a measurable starting point)

• Increase flexibility (I'll set actual measurable goals once my back heals and I can see where I'm starting from!)  This is a big one for me because I have never been flexible and I know it is a big factor in my injuries.  I want that to STOP!
• Lower body fat (I ordered this electronic body fat analyzer today and I'm really looking forward to seeing how my body fat % is going down as I work out!)
• Lose 25-30 pounds.  I know this is a somewhat high amount, but I have at least 75 pounds to lose, so I don't think its unreasonable.  After the first 3-4 months, I plan to focus even more on strength training and developing those habits, but I really need to get a good portion of this weight off so that my joints and my back aren't under so much pressure.  
• Increase Cardio:  I want to be able to do 30 minutes (not counting warm up & cool down) on the elliptical with resistance/incline HIIT and not be dying at the end!  I'm starting at no resistance, no incline and doing just 30 minutes of that is tiring!  I want to improve this hard core!
• Increase Weights when lifting AND be able to do: 
• 3 full pull ups (I'm super pathetic in that area right now, but its very important to me to increase my upper body strength!)
• 10 pushups (no knees)
• 2 minute plank
• 5 Turkish Get Ups (weight TBD)
• Improved Nutrition:
• Isagenix:  EITHER one 9 day cleanse each month, or one 30 days cleanse to start.
• Cut wheat out entirely for the first 3 months
• Cut out refined sugars, HFC & MSG completely.
• Limit grains

Coming Soon!  My Six Month Goals

*Once I'm about a month or so into my first 3 months, I'll set definitive goals for the end of June

My husband and I Feb. 2011

**My 19th anniversary is at the end of June!!!  I want to have a formal party on our back deck and I want to look and feel fabulous when I celebrate with my amazing husband!  So some of my goals may be vague, but I want to have plenty of energy, I want to feel GREAT about myself and what I've accomplished... and most of all, I want to feel sexy:)  I mean, what could be better for celebrating 19 amazing years together?

Day #5 of my Awesome Transformation: Insomnia Improving!

Insomnia:  It still took me a while to get to sleep last night, and although I woke late this morning, I felt like I had ACTUALLY SLEPT.  That is huge.  I still had tons of dreams and some of them were a little bothersome, but I slept!  Yay me!!!

Then I woke up to two huge piles of dog shit in the house because my kids all slept in, too.  No, I didn't just wake up to it, I STEPPED IN IT.  I must say that its a testament to the fact that I must have slept pretty freaking well, because stepping in a big pile of cold dog shit first thing in the morning didn't elicit either yelling or cussing from me.  Not even under my breath!  

Having big sweet dogs that apparently don't feel like they should wake the kids to let them out has its downfalls.  I think I'll scrounge around for alarm clocks for the kids for Christmas, because that was gross.

Working Out:  *emailing whenever with my P.T. a perk of being married to him?

Me:  What are we working on today? Just wondering.  I was going to plan on a PiYo either this afternoon or before bed...
Patrick:  Plan a strength-centric PiYo.  I'm going to make you hate me through the vehicle of cardio machines tonight :)

P.T. knowing when and how to best kick my ass?  A downside to being married to your personal trainer?  Or a perk?

I'll report back on how badly he kicks my ass later tonight.

For now I'm focusing on Goal Setting and Tracking Progress.  I'm trying to find the best way to track my progress, to make sure that I'm actually keeping up with things and paying attention to progress.  I am measuring every Tuesday.  I weigh every morning, but my scales are very crappy and can vacillate within 5+ pounds within the same two minute period, so I don't hold much with those.  In addition to that, though, I want to make sure that I track my strength as well.  A month from now, I want to be able to look back and see how much stronger I am... how much longer I can hold a plank or how many more reps/weight I can do with a particular exercise.  Being able to see progress is HUGE for me.  It is one of my biggest motivators.  After all, who wants to kick their ass day after day for nothing?  Not me.

Tracking:  I'm trying to decide if I want to stick with an online program like Fitocracy or Spark People, or if I just want to create my own printable workout logs and chart them on my own.  I like the idea of an online app, but I don't like the lack of choices when it comes to work outs.  Maybe I just haven't figured them out yet.  What do you use?  In some ways I'm almost partial to pen and paper.  I can always upload it into a google doc or something.  I don't know.  I can't figure it out!!!

I'd be happy with THIS size, and this was after I'd already gained nearly 30 pounds when my metabolism crashed on me.

Secondly, I'm trying to figure out What My Goals Are.  Because I don't have much of a clue.  I want to get back to my prior 'fit' state, but I don't know how to quantify that.  I also don't know what kind of time frame to put on any of it.  This is so confusing!  I definitely need goals, though.

For now, I'm going to make my Top Five CHANGES that I want to make:

1. Drink at least four 52 oz. glasses of ice water every day
2. Take my supplements EVERY morning
3. Eat protein within 30 minutes of waking every morning
4. Stop drinking alcohol & Change bedtime routine/habits and learn to sleep without it.
5. Stick with exercise plan set by trainer and PiYo/Yoga at least 3-4 times a week, either for strength or relaxation before bed.

What are your goals?  If you don't have any set in stone yet, what changes do you want to make?   Let me know in the comments, and link to your blog if you're blogging about health, fitness, nutrition or weight loss!