There are just certain things that I absolutely love.  My fella, my friends and family, of course, and my animals.  My children…I love them the most.  But there are other things in this world that inspire me.  That make me just a little bit happier each day.

Like The Beatles.  I love The Beatles, especially circa Sgt. Pepper.  I love vanilla ice cream splashed with a little milk so that little milk ice crystals form.  I love eggplant and sushi and well-prepared coffee.  I love shoes and knee socks and clever t-shirts.  I love that show Intervention and I love Meg Ryan movies.  I love Bethesda video games and board games and old card games.  I love math.  Yep, math.  It’s so reliable.

I love exercise.  I love the way my legs feel like jello after Barre class and that post workout soreness, despite the fact I can hardly sit down to pee without wincing. I love it when I can’t breathe because my abs hurt so bad.  I love when I inhale during yoga and exhale just a little bit deeper into a pose.  I love that point in my run when I forget that I’m running and my body takes over and I truly believe for a minute that I can run forever.  And I love when I’m done.  Oh, how I love the finish.

I love me.  I really do.  But I’m not taking care of myself like I should be.  Which is why I’ve signed up for Body Back, an eight week diet and exercise counseling program that is offered at my gym.  The classes are capped at 12 people and from what I’ve heard, the hour long session consists of some body conditioning and some mental conditioning.  We’re given a plan for food and we’re asked to journal everything we eat.  All of this sounds fantastic.  I like the idea of combining the physical with the mental because as we all know, if you’re not at peace up in the noggin, you can’t really find peace anywhere else.  I really want to fix my relationship with food.  There’s just one tiny thing that’s making me a bit nervous.

We’re weighed each class.  Like on a scale.  With a number.

Here’s the thing, I haven’t weighed myself in over a year.  I won’t even look at the number when I go to the doctor.  I gauge everything by how I feel, how my body feels, how my pants feel, how I feel about what I see in the mirror.  Numbers used to rule my life…the number on the scale, the number of calories I ate versus the number of calories I burned, the number of days I worked out, the number on my clothing tags.  Those numbers made me feel like shit because they not only quantified my success, but my failures as well.  I put the numbers behind me because I don’t like to fail.  And I really don’t like to feel like shit.  But now I’m putting myself in a position where numbers will once again dictate my success.

I’m in a much better place now, emotionally, mentally, physically, than I was back then.  I’ve learned to forgive myself for my failures and accept that failure is the only way we grow.  Mistakes are just learning experiences.  And I love learning things.  I’m really excited to start this program because I don’t like the way I feel right now.  I don’t like the way I feel about what I see in the mirror.  I don’t know what to expect but I’m going in with an open mind.  And maybe I’ll even learn to love those numbers again.