Skinny Guilt

I'm scared to write this post.

Scared of what you'll think of me or even what some of you will say about this post.

I tried to write it a few days ago and realized I was too angry and self-righteous about it to write it then and too scared. So I deleted it.

Then a couple of days ago I found and fell in love with a new blog.  The blogger is open and honesty and so funny. I've been scrolling though all her previous blogs and every post she writes strikes a chord with me.  I feel like she got inside my head somehow and wrote exactly what I feel.  Then I stumbled upon this post. I LOVED EVERY WORD.

So in a passive attempt to share how I felt, I shared her post on Facebook and tried to be content with that. But while the blogger really hit home about how I feel about this there is more I want to say/share.

So I confess I have..

Skinny Guilt 

Guilt. The feeling I relate most to being skinny.  And I'm tired of feeling guilty about it.  I have plenty of other guilt that I think it totally justifiable.  Mommy guilt on days I feel like I haven't been the best Mommy.  Guilt about bad money choices and guilt about eating like crap. But skinny guilt is something I'm tired of feeling.

I have been thin for as long as I can remember and I have not ever done anything to manage my weight.

And I'm sorry.  I know that there will be people that will read that sentence and hate me a little (or a lot).  

Some will think I'm lying.

Some will think I secretly have an eating disorder.

Some say I don't eat enough- either in amount or variety.

Some will be jealous.

But its true and I'm sorry.

The truth is it simply comes down to genetics. I eat like crap. 99% of the time. First let me dispel a couple of myths about why I am thin that drive me crazy the most.

1.  I don't eat enough.  Truth is : while I usually skip breakfast and sometimes barely eat lunch, I eat pretty much all day. I'm constantly munching on something. And its usually junk :-(  Telling someone they're so skinny because they never eat enough is as close as you can get to saying they have an eating disorder, and that's hurtful. If you really think someone has a serious eating problem take them out for coffee or something and have a private conversation just to let them know you're concerned about it. Don't point it out while in a group and then laugh it off.

 2. I'm too picky.  I'll be honest I used to be more picky. Then we had Bean and I started to push myself to try more things because that's what I want her to learn to do. I still don't like some foods but most of that has to do with texture issues. (I shudder at the thought of broccoli, strawberries and shrimp). When people say this about someone it paints that person as childish and even if its true its unkind to point out someone else's flaws. Besides, I have never understood how me not liking broccoli makes me so skinny. To me that math simply does not add up.

The truth is I am tired of always feeling guilty for being the way God made me.  I want to be free to vent about not being able to find the perfect pair of jean without an eye roll and a comment like "yeah, must be so hard for you". I want someone to understand that even though I'm thin some days I still don't love my body.  I wish we could all love own bodies enough and love one another enough that we wouldn't tear each other down with hurtful comments about each other's weight. ( and let me be clear here ANY comment about someone else's weight that is anything short of building that person up is a hurtful comment)

And so I'm letting go of this guilt and choosing to be happy the way God made me. I hope you will too.

The Biggest Secret No One Tells You About Having a Baby...

So after my last post I thought I'd write a more serious post cuz I feel like I'm on a roll :-)

In 67 days our "baby" will be 2 and you want to know something?? Most days I still feel like I have no idea what I'm doing... Every day is something new that we have to handle and try to figure out.  For example Bean has recently been experiment with not taking a nap (ahh the horror!!). If she doesn't take a nap (ugh) she goes to sleep at 8:30, if she takes a nap (yay!!) she doesn't go to sleep until 10:30- boo.  I want her to have some quiet time everyday but sometimes she falls asleep but then stays awake until 10:30 so what do I do...  This has been the story of our life every since we found out we were pregnant with Lizzie. Weighing the pros and cons of every possible situation, every situation having really good cons and really bad cons :-)  And its not just the immediate pros and cons we have to consider we have to think about how this will affect Bean in the future.  It can be exhausting and it doesn't get any easier AND I'm fully expecting each kid after Bean to be completely different :-) Joy...

Now its not like there's not any advice out there.  In fact you can practically be buried by the amount of advice out there.  And for every issue there is advice for BOTH sides (or all of the sides..).  For every side there is someone who believes that their way is the best way.  As soon as people found out we were pregnant advice started rolling in and hasn't stopped.(I'm not complaining because it definitely has helped).  But despite all the advice here's the piece I either never got or was too delusionally happy to retain or understand: Most of the time you will have NO idea what you are doing or should do :-)

That's basically it. Every day is something new, a new problem and new challenge.  I never thought it would be this hard (or this great).  I had experience with kids, but being a mom is something totally different. And I still love it, even if Bean stops napping or naps and then stays awake until 10:30 and I can't decide which is worse and therefore which to encourage ;-) But by the time we figure it out something new that we don't know what to do with will come up. Yay... But totally worth it :-)

TLC VoxBox from Influenster

So on Saturday I received my first (hopefully first of many to come) VoxBox from Influenster.  For those of you unfamiliar with Influenster it is a site where you write reviews of products and do activities for brands.  In return for your time and effort you have the chance to receive what they call VoxBoxes full of samples of products to try (and when I say samples I actually mean full sized products to try.) which you in turn write more reviews for and do more activities.Here's how it works:

First you must sign up.  I believe you have to be invited by someone who is already a member (just ask! I'd love to send you an invite!) Then you select 5 expert badges to unlock and as many lifestyle badges as you would like.  (Choose your expert badges carefully- you only get 5 and you can't undo it once you've unlocked one.) Then you different activities to raise your impact score.  Each badge has a score and each time you connect a social media platform you get more impact points.  Then you can write reviews for products, stores, services etc that you have tried and rate them.  As you unlock badges, connect your social media and write reviews your impact score will begin to rise.  It can take a while of some serious work to see improvement in your score so be patient and keep working at it.  I joined in November and quit after a few days because I wasn't seeing any movement in my score and it seemed like too much work.  Then I kept seeing these really cool boxes that people were getting and decided to give it another go.  I read up some on blogs about how to raise my score and all I kept seeing was that you needed to be active and patient.  So I committed myself to simply writing 5 reviews a day and just being patient.  I did this for 2 weeks and only saw my score raise a point at first.  Then I logged in one day and my score had jumped 3 points and all my expert badges had gone from 0 to all over 70. Then a month after restarting I received my first VoxBox!! So now I am enjoying this a lot more :-) Basically if you decide to join just be patient and keep working at it! Here's what I got in my first box!!

** I got all of these products free from Influenster for testing purposes***

Here's the box it all came in

The card that came with the box lists all the items in the box, gives a brief description and price.

Included in my box was 

A card for the Shell fuel rewards program.

I'm not so crazy about this program.  It says you can earn money off gas by shopping at certain stores (only one of which is in our town), eating at certain restaurants (none of which I have ever heard of), linking your MasterCard (which I don't have) or referring friends. Plus we live right next to Road Ranger that gives us .05 cents off every times we use their debit card. So.. bust...

Neosporin to Go

This looks handy. Lizzie doesn't get a lot of scrapes yet but I'm sure it coming some day... But its a cool concept.

A package of Puffs to Go

Always handy :-)

A bar of Ivory soap

I'm not their biggest fan, I don't really like their soap and like the brand less because of an ad they put out about this time last year that I found kind of offensive (nothing crude just not nice to people who don't like their soap- check it out on Youtube- the 5th mom).  But there are lots of things to do with a bar of Ivory soap on Pinterest so that's what I'm going to use it for.

Avon Anew-wrinkle concealer

I was kind of excited about this (no, I know I don't have wrinkles yet but I do have some lines on my forehead that I'm not crazy about. Probably from raising my eyebrows too much ;-)) because I thought it would help make them go away.  Instead it only a concealer and it really doesn't work.  It takes so much effort to get it on and if I raise my eyebrows once all the lines reappear.  But this is a great example of why I love Influenster.  This is a 30 dollar product that I got to try for free.  So instead of paying for it and finding out I hate it and then throwing away the rest I got it for free and could try before buying.  That's how this program works.

And saving the best for last!! 

Sorry its kinda blurry :-( 

 This is a coupon for a FREE tub of Bryer's new Gelato!! This is the best part of this box!! Again the same reason I love VoxBoxes.  This tub was 6 bucks (on sale) and is about half the size of a regular carton of 4 dollar ice cream.  I probably wouldn't have ever tried this on my own.  I would have just reached for the cheaper ice cream I know I love!! But this stuff is awesome!!! Plus its made with less fat :-) Only probably now is that I love it and will probably want to buy more in the future ;-)

So there it is, the good, the bad and the middle.  I'm not crazy about everything in the box but I'm grateful for some new cool things to try and hope to get picked for more boxes in the future.

After you receive a box the fun isn't over yet.  In your profile there is a set of activities you can do related to the items in the box.  It includes everything from create Pinterest boards to blogging to tweeting so there's something for pretty much everyone! PLUS they unlock brand badges.  Brand badges are where you can do a set number of listed activities and after you complete them you are entered into a drawing for a prize from the brand and Influenster. For example this box has unlocked the Bryer's badge and the Shell badge.  The prize for the Bryer badge is a year's supply of gelato and a big gift card to Target (you better believe I'm doing my best to win that one ;-) and Shell is offering a 50 dollar gas gift card to 10 people (also nice).  If nothing else you have a bunch of new items to write reviews for!! 

Hope to see you on Influenster!! (I have plenty of invites left ;-))