Pyralis

Love your theme as well, especially the images. Just googled the chinese new year before coming to the forum and was thinking about doing something similar 😁 But tiger themed since I'm tiger. Are you dragon? My cat is EXACTLY the same!! We've tried so many brands and consistencies but whatever it is, he only likes the food from freshly opened can, everything else, despite microwaved, requires for him to turn up his nose several times until he finally approaches and eats anyway. And then he digs around the bowl like he wants to tell us he'd rather not see this again. First world cat problems. 🤦‍♀️ (One trick we use is letting him sit on an open window, somehow curbs his appetite) Anyways, best of luck with this new year full of opportunities and strength and ... breathing fire? 🐉

Sounds like a great start! Here's to new beginnings! I know how hard it can be to take baby steps away from some kind of slob state, luckily it quickly improves (because doing anything is an improvement then, haha). Over time I've started to accept these temporary zombie periods, I mean, it would be cool to maintain a balance during the day, but guess sometimes it's only possible to maintain it via slump after high. Hope you're doing okay and wishing you best of luck that your teeth will be fine.

This year I've bought myself light glasses to battle winter blues and I have to say, they do seem to make a difference. You surely know it that you can sit in front of some bright daylight lamp in winter for a while to improve mood but it's very impractical and I soon stopped doing it. These glasses I can put on (looks like a fancy space accessory :D) and do whatever. After 20-30 minutes, depending on chosen intensity, they turn themselves off and that's it. I used to feel much worse after a work day when it was dark but after 1-2 weeks of wearing them, I have more energy during the day and the evenings feel lighter and it's easier to do things/go out instead of wanting to lie in bed immediately. Thought I'd drop this here for anyone who might need it and wish you a great challenge and good health and all the best for 2024!

I think of this every now and then and I even read a fair bit about it (can't find it anymore, but I think it used to be some "trend knowledge" a while ago when social media started to be flooded with fitspiration and fitness influencers, and people thought it was easy to look like this). Nobody talks about real people and how their gains are often not noticeable because they do not look like fitness models, and it's something we should be aware of. I did gain some biceps, shoulder definition, back muscle, but when I wear shirts and jeans, I merely look average, and people assume I am not strong, lol. I help a woman with her horses from time to time and she thought I could faint when carrying the water buckets. I do heavier carries at home with weights. She said she likes that I am not frail. How could she ever think I am frail, doesn't she see I AM STROOOOOONG LIKE BEAR? Nope. Not so visible. When I have worked out and feel super strong and shower, there's the belly flab, I am one of those people who have the fat in their lower body mostly, my upper body you can see ribs, but the belly flab never seems to go away (it does, but it is really hard for me to lose that and I can not remember having had a flat stomach like.. ever. I have pictures where I weigh below 60 kg with a height of 176 cm, which borders on underweight, and my belly button is like - and not like i because it looks like some flab roll is pushing down on it, ALWAYS). So I shower, admire my back muscle maybe a bit or my shoulder, and get dressed, and look plain average and not like someone who lifts at all, go to the city with my muffin belly and my cankles, and see girls and young women walking around in crop tops and skinny jeans with that super toned body, slim legs, the nice vertical separation line on their stomach (linea alba, look it up, I never had it and remember staring at my classmate with 12 who was a bit pudgy in the face and arms, unlike me, but sporting a flat stomach with that line. Even back then I found myself wondering why and how), not an inch of fat on their hips, and think: Hm maybe all that fitspiration is not a scam, how can they all manage to look like this? Are they just naturally thin and toned? Are they lifting a lot (more than I do)? I think mine is broken. Why do I get the broken one?? The answer is: I DON'T KNOW. And it doesn't matter. To be fair, I reached the kind of muscle definition I have in my back, arms and shoulders, because I lift relatively heavy. Insanity and bodyweight stuff never got me there, which does not mean it can not, just speaking from my experience. But I think I also have it because my upper body is skinnier. I do see some muscle definition in my legs as well, especially when I flex, and when I was doing bodyweight exercises, insanity, Billy Blanks, stuff like this, I did notice an increase in muscle tone in my legs after a while, but it never was as extreme as when I started a real weight lifting program and noticed a difference after 2 weeks already (not in looks but it felt firmer). So I'd recommend getting into heavy lifting for a while and see if that helps (sorry I did not read everything so maybe someone did recommend this already) It kinda sucks that you do not feel an increase in strength.. I am not sure I felt this a lot when I was doing fitness bodyweight stuff. For sure I learned the movements and gained endurance, but did I gain strength? Not sure. I even did not gain much strength doing my heavy (haha) lifting program. I mean it's theoretically heavy because I lift to failure, or 90% of that, but my 100% is laughable, and this is why I can relate very well to what you experience. I've started the serious, heavy lifting in 2022, before I was lifting a bit too, and hitting the gym, but always only for a month and then I would not do it for months to follow. So in 2022 I started with the Greyskull LP and worked my way up with the weights until I hit a cap, that is not super bad when it comes to bench press (35 kg), but laughable when considering squats, deadlifts etc, and worst of all: pull. Or maybe squats are still worse. I worked my way up in over a year to low bar squatting, hold your breath, *drum roll*, 35 kg. LOL. Let me look up what the beginner female squat average should be. 30 kg. I started with the bar, our bar at home weighs 10 kg. The novice average for women is 48 kg. Ahahaha. And now the best: I learned that squatting like I squat, because I have long femurs and fold like a swiss army knife, might hurt my lower back in the long run, plus I can never squat even to parallel like this. So I had to start over. With front squats. AND NOOOOW I am back to lifting the bar. And after lifting those measly 10 kg for a few sets, the next day, my butt and legs are absolutely destroyed for days. Yay. I can't see myself progressing past beginner in the next 5 years, I don't see I can ever reach my goal of doing a real pull up, I can not do bodyweight exercises like even crow, a hand stand, the cool stuff, because I am too weak. After 1,5 years of regular lifting. Yes, these people exist. But what matters is that you are moving and experimenting and finding ways to go about it. Some results you might not notice but they might be there - isn't your back thanking you for moving, when you used to be sedentary? Mine surely is happier when I keep moving. Maybe your bone densitiy is better than of someone who does not work out. And maybe you just need to find something that works for you. I love running, biking, swimming, but these kinds of exercise seem to keep me skinny fat. Only lifting "heavy" (my heavy) is doing the trick. Maybe you can also try something like bouldering or rock climbing, I noticed strength growth there quickly despite going only once a week. About the weight loss - did you post your height? 115 lbs don't seem like much and what you write about body fat does not either. I feel like when you don't have the muscle definition you want but are also not blatantly overweight, you are in this weird grey zone of .. well, like I described above. You wonder why you are flabby, since you do not weigh that much. You seem to need to lose weight. But it does not really work or does not make you look much better. As I wrote above, when I was a bit younger, I thought the key to looking better was weight loss, and I still think this from time to time. When I was in my early 20s, I starved myself to 58 kg and was still unhappy with how I looked. But last year, with over 30, I picked up the lifting, and was weighing almost 80 kg, and felt better and more toned than with a lower weight before. Of course I still lost weight because 80 is too much, but I doubt weight loss alone is the key here. Maybe if you picked up lifting, you could eat a small deficit and still gain muscle, someone gave you a link already for this. The issue I always had with what you describe, for example with the push ups, which I feel very much, is that knee push ups are too easy, real push ups I can't do, or not enough, to gain from them, and there is no inbetween. Weight lifting has many different exercises for the inbetween, that's why I prefer it, because then I can do something that does feel efficient, more than cranking out 50 knee push ups and not being able to do a real one anyway. I feel like the repetition, in my case, of the easier stuff, does never progress me to the harder stuff. I think you need to find a way to challenge your muscles more efficiently than doing 1 bad real push up, or 50 knee push ups. And I had to learn that I can't wait until it feels easier until I go for harder and heavier, because yes, it still feels very hard, but sometimes I got to load more weight onto the bar and just see if I can do it, and then suddenly, I can. What helped with the push ups btw is my boyfriend standing above me and lifting me up a tiny tad - that was harder than knee but easier than without help - you can get the same effect with a resistance band that you put somewhere above you and then around you so it lifts you up a bit. And if you look for free training possibilities, are there fitness trails in your area or even playgrounds? You can get resistance bands, they're cheap, and use them with the bars and whatever those trails or playgrounds provide. Maybe there's even a group in your area you could join.

Maybe that's lame and too easy but can you just pick a scene that interests you for whatever reason and write that scene? And if it's just a test and you totally rewrite that later because the context changes. At least it's writing and dabbling with the characters and finding out more. Especially as pantser, or plontser, I feel it's important to connect with the characters and story to get a feeling for them, and the more written, the better. You could also try, I always think I will do that but then I never do, filling out a character sheet, like their biography, if you haven't already, or pick those super open end prompts and write it for a character/from their perspective. Hm, and maybe that's just me, even though our art teacher gave us the advice to pour a bit coffee on an intimidating white paper before drawing - I can thrive better in environments that are "draft-y", and in time slots that are not huge. For example if I have this perfect, nice program that provides tons of structure and I have 5 hours in front of me for writing, I will squirm on my seat, keep getting up, search for hours for the perfect music, and then don't get it done. I just wanted to write how it's easy to quickly write inbetween in an ugly notebook or in Wordpad, but I would be lying. It's not easy. It's also hard, but the first option stated is harder for me. Maybe do try to write per hand though if you aren't trying already. Or a change of scenery. I just recently started carrying around a tiny notebook, something I've wanted to do forever, to jot down ideas as they come. Let's just write, without judgement. Just focus on the activity. I think the one thing that really gets me to do something is finding a detail about it that absolutely thrills me and thriving off that. There is still always temptation to save that spark for later though, because thinking about it already excites and then it fizzles out before it's used. Edit: Didn't check out the snowflake method, will do now

Sometimes you do make ripples. Sometimes it's just other people preferring you to stay silent or scared to make ripples themselves, so they perceive you as making them and it makes them uncomfortable. What you write about words being your weapon reminds me of a sentence I recently read: Sounds like you know exactly what you need right now.

Ohhhh. Good idea and great you're going to participate (officially) again. How will you go about it, I mean, plotter or pantser? Do you notice a difference afterwards? Good luck with the challenge and ofc the writing!

This sounds so paradoxical because you felt you had to hound her for information but yet she felt like you didn't reach out enough. Kinda crazy. Not you or her, the situation. Reminds me of a friend who later said she was disappointed with me because in a time when she was very depressed, I did not force her like another friend did. Like, force her out of the house, force her to group therapy. Well, "force", convince. I was a bit speechless because for me, the other friend who "forced" her always seemed very intrusive for my taste. It was exactly what she needed, but I wasn't close enough to her to intrude in this kind of way. I did visit her on her birthday with a present, and checked in on her, and I was also fending off this other friend who tried to force his self help stuff on me. Everybody has a different perception, no wonder these things can be so difficult. Was it weird for you to hear it though? That she feels you do not reach out enough? What you describe, and the control he had - I think it's easy to fall for this kind of stuff, even though later, when out of these kind of relationships, we might think: Wow. How could that ever happen? Had a narcissist male friend when I was in my early 20s, and when I later read my journal entries of that time.. the stuff I tolerated. I feel like after such a relationship/friendship, you refine your senses and things you watch out for, and you might not fall again for the very blatant stuff, but it's still easier than thought to fall for it. Sometimes I wonder if it is a trauma thing, like this: Like, you have this elaborate alarm system maybe after such an experience but someone can manage to push the right buttons and AGAIN you find yourself entangled with someone like this. I had to force myself very hard to cut contact immediately at first signs even though I liked people (usually men) and understood them, but had to learn to trust my experience and leave it be, knowing it wouldn't get better over time. Sometimes I wonder if my bf is a covert narcissist. Sometimes I wonder if I am a narcissist. The therapist told me, I hope I am not repeating myself, that my bf's way of simply not doing things is one of the most powerful demonstrations of ... power. And it's true. Even though he might not be actively DOING something, he is deciding like this what we do and what we don't do. This is so relatable! Do you think he preyed on you and did this on purpose? I have no idea if my friend back then did (we were very close but never sexually intimate or in a relationship, yet together all the time), knowing someone in their early 20s would not reject him like an older woman seeing right through his bs would. He kept having a tendency to befriend younger women and trying to leech off of them, so I think there definitely was some calculation on his part, as well as moving very fast, bonding strongly and early, and I, stupid as I was, TOLD him that I didn't have many friends and experience and all. I just know that I could never behave this way towards younger, inexperienced friends, could never take advantage like this. Again, I understand you so well! The anger I know myself. I found myself being angry after the friendship ended and before it ended (I tried cutting him off twice before I did for good, both times he lured me right back in with promises and said he had gone to therapy and would change, only to throw another tempter tantrum in the car while driving, having me fear for my life (again). And after a relationship where the guy completely leeched off me (a different one) and mistook me for his mom, I found myself angry as well. And yes, I know those people who do not interfere. Even my parents did not. They did not even think it's weird that her 21yr old daughter has a 35yr old guy attached to the hip. They even said we might be like Harry and Sally. YUCK. When I told them later what he said and did and how he threatened and endangered me and his violent fantasies and all, they simply said.. nothing. Only "Good you cut him off". Until this day I find myself scared he might still think of us. He has wrote mails and sms once or twice the last years, trying to provoke reaction. Do you know the book "The gift of fear" ? It helped me tremendously. Not typing my experience to divert, btw, just want to say: I can relate. It was different, sure, but I appreciate you sharing this and I think getting out of this, even if it required moving, which I can fully understand as well, was the best thing for you. And so happy you found a new relationship where it all is much easier! Does your ex still reach out? And did you talk these things through with Dave? Yeah, it's not like that. The thing is - when you have been in bad relationships, you tend to see everything that is not as bad as good. Even when it is not even that good. And we had those "clicked into place" moments, too. But maybe it was me overrating a lack of abuse. I felt great in the beginning with my bf because I felt he wasn't judging and constantly teasing and making me feel wrong. Around the time we met, I had met another guy that I cut off shortly after because he was negging me all the time and despite liking him (you know, I like the challenges and the difficult people because the drama is interesting and I have to force myself not to waste my time with that), I decided "Nah, never again". I thought maybe the a bit boring time with my - then new - bf was HEALING and that I had now changed with my partner selection. We did not have good and interesting talks but we did things together. The latest ex who leeched off me had always talked a lot and made promises, my bf seemed like the opposite, and the opposite seemed good. But now.. An hour ago I tried initiating a conversation about what we want in life because it is something I am very busy with atm thinking about and trying to figure out and I was just in general harping on about how the universe doesn't simply assign you stuff, and how that is a good thing, then how can you want something and freely decide with your free will what you want, if it gets assigned from above, but how I wished back then someone would just assign me my life purpose. And how therapists also can't do this for you and it's always work and this is good because can you take someone seriously who doesn't know you and tells you what to do and what is right? Nah. I thought the topic would be interesting for him because he's considering therapy and said he didn't like that our couples therapist didn't engage him more. I said it's not how it works, you have to do the work and engage the therapist, you have to be active, you want something, and you "use" the therapist to help you, the therapist isn't interested in making you like this or that. He looked at me dumbfounded. As always. It's not like I dumped the whole paragraph from above without a break on him. I tried to engage him. Nope. I mean, I said I was harping on, but usually there is no reaction, then I say it differently, wait, no reaction or acknowledgement whatsoever, etc.. Why do I even still say something? OHHHHHH I just had an epiphany again. If you never react and this has the other person harp on, the other person is the bad guy. Again. Doing things to you. Furthering strenghtening this dynamic. I SHOULD shut up. Then he stuttered and mumbled some agreement. Okay, to be fair, he is working. I do not understand how your mind can be SO FULLY occupied ALL THE TIME that you can't think about anything else in some spare 5 minutes but fine. Even when we are walking somewhere or grocery shopping and talk about this kind of stuff he suddenly gets so INVOLVED with a branch on the way and carefully stepping over it, or an item in the store, that I wonder, bro, is this really using up all your brain capacity right now that you can't follow a simple thought train? I feel wrong. I even wondered if I am just autistic and infodumping my sh*t on him. He's the poor victim, of course, and overwhelmed by my constant demands of having conversations other than "what do we eat today", "have you closed the bedroom window", "i am going for a walk". And this is the devilish thing about our relationship. He's not OPENLY abusive. I can't make him the bad guy. Then it would be easy. Maybe I am the bad guy here. Sometimes i wonder if I am trying to villainize one of us so I can finally make the decision to get out. This is not directed to anyone specific so do not feel like you need to read it or react. In fact, I do not expect responses ever, even though I am happy when someone does, of course ❤️ ------ Tomorrow is our anniversary and I do not have a thing for him. 5 years. Didn't feel like dealing with it and buying him presents he then ignores. Something he does as well. Ignoring presents. Pretending nothing is there. I asked him recently why he does it and he said: "I thought it was gonna be a surprise and I wasn't supposed to see it and I didn't want to ruin it" I said: "Sure. In all those occasions where I put it openly for you to find on your desk/bed/etc., it was always something I accidentally did and you didn't want to ruin the surprise. Gotcha" He said he doesn't know why he behaved the way he did. Maybe it IS all just a giant misunderstanding where someone is insecure and the other interprets is as constant disinterest. This is not unlikely. But jeez. Am I the insecure guy rehabilitation center? I am ALSO insecure and have to deal with it. Since when is that a reason for everything and anything? At least you could voice it. I will not ramble on and go to my riding lesson now. Take care.

Sitting together in silence is also nice, though. We often do talk about this and that. It's just with important topics, or anything beyond smalltalk, he never seems to have an opinion and just parrots what I say. If even he told me he's not interested. Right? I recently thought I would like to be a therapist working with clients and horses. I bet it pays well. But horses are expensive. And I have zero qualifications. Luckily in my company it's ok to have this attitude, as long as you do your job well enough. I still have this idea that something I spend so much time a day doing should be more fulfilling. The part about writing gave me an idea - often for these kind of jobs, you need to hand in something you have written. That is actually doable. Often I think I would like to apply to x job but do not have a portfolio and don't see myself making one. Even for jobs I could totally do, like some photo editing, I'm pretty good with Photoshop and could easily work somewhere pushing pixels, but I do not have a portfolio. I do it for fun in my free time, and I have lots of experience, but I never bothered to do it "for real" to show around, and whenever I thought about it, I thought "ugh". A friend suggested to create fake merchandise for a fake brand for a portfolio to get into this kind of job, but I simply don't want to. Writing though is actually doable, especially if it is something interesting. I could check for jobs requiring something written. Thanks for that! I mean, obviously thanks for your whole reply, to all of you! Think it would make a difference and I'm not over it yet. We do talk a lot recently. I think the point is that I feel hurt that he doesn't seem willing to face the issues we have. That he refuses to hear and see that it hurts me, and in the long run, us, when he isn't willing to stand up and deal with things. He tried to describe to me yesterday how I had written so much during the therapy and he read it and didn't know what to do with it, and first I couldn't understand why not, when it dawned on me: Because he's taking the role of the co-driver. It's like in work situations when you are below someone and are waiting for them to process information and do the work. You observe, you might even understand what is being said, but since you are not responsible, you do not channel the info into action, and therefore also do not proactively tackle the task. If you alone were responsible for the result, you would maybe ask questions, read the information provided differently, and try to make out next steps for your actual action. My bf is behaving like the relationship is done to him, not like he actively shapes it. Therefore he doesn't go into situations like he actually decides anything or needs to come up with an action. It's just thrown at him and he sits there and shuts down in defeat. He said he had the impression me and the therapist wanted to just scold him. I said NO, I was waiting for you to step up and step in and say something and deal with what was said, not collapse in silence. No idea if he got it. If he gets it. My main goal is not to invest too much, as I said.. Money, time. Put it on hold for a bit. lol my favorite counter argument (he did not bring but I was expecting) would be: What if I threw all of this at you? What would you do? Wouldn't you be overwhelmed? Nah. It would be like finding water in the desert. I'd look up into the sky, tears of gratefulness rolling down my face, raise my hands and shout: OH THANK YOU. thank you for this gift of information I can actually do something with!!! Please. Give ME MORE INFORMATION. I see, and I get it. It can be hard to reach out, especially if you do not feel the need to communicate all the time. I think what we tend to forget is that it can hurt people we like because it might be perceived as not being interested in them and what they're up to. But of course it also depends on how invested we are in each other's lives. And how people react when you reach out. Some reply in this way that you can not reply to. Like wishing you a nice day after 1 sentence. Or using 1 word replies. Is this a hint? I am never sure if I am not getting hints or am overreacting and overinterpreting. It's text, after all.. Kudos to you for working on this, btw! it's good to read your perspective! Do you remember how? The words you chose? The situation? Hmmm. There is this thing I do not understand in general: Why it is a big deal for so many. I always liked to chat and talk and the back and forth. Didn't need to be with close friends even. But many people are so overwhelmed by this. I get that it is not feasible for most people who have otherwise busy lives. But I also do not get why most people do not seem to be interested in conversations in general. Another phenomenon I do not get is when you have fun talks with someone and they seem to have fun and you go way over the time, so that I even already feel a bit uncomfortable in the end because they do not stop talking and it's late, and then they never contact you again. I've learned that usually people do not have issues with others but themselves, but we project it on ourselves and feel hurt. Like the friend you mention who had an issue with herself and you felt rejected and took it personally (like everybody would). It's just this pet peeve of mine that I simply do not understand how people tick, why they're cool and easygoing but then never interested in me anymore. I also know it's normal when you leave a school, job or any other situation where you were forced to deal with certain people and friendships form, these friendships often do not last. But I also know many people in their 30s report it's very hard to find friends, and it's hard to not think bad about yourself when you keep trying to be open and social despite the setbacks and still people hardly reciprocate. That group from the vacation, a whatsapp group was created, the first 2 days we were writing this and that there, horse and riding related stuff, now it is silent. Why? Do they not care for horses or riding anymore? Do they not want to talk about it? Doesn't look like it. But they seemed so super invested during the course. Now I and another woman are the only people still invested in this and interested in the group members. I've already accepted it and do not write there anymore, but understand it I can not (is that even proper structure of a sentence?) Do you care to elaborate? Were you living together? And why wasn't it as emotional as you thought? Maybe it is necessary for me/us that we get over this. Clearly our relationship dynamic is unhealthy. I managed to mother someone again despite me not wanting to do it anymore. I am bored by being passive. I hate waiting for others. Maybe it's time for us to deal with this and develop ways together to function differently. I still want to keep dropping the reins for a while and see what happens. Maybe this doesn't help me personally at all because with another person I would not have these issues. But maybe I would. Thank you for your kind words, I am not cutting everyone off but I know it sounds like it. But even if I did - I am used to being alone anyway. This sounds bitter, but is not meant this way. I've been very fine all on my own for years and if this relationship reaches a point where I feel more content alone, I will go back to it.

@Elastigirl Hm, no. I think if you really want to connect with someone, you do so. If not, you do not. Often people when I contact them tell me this story about how they thought about me often and wanted to contact me but didn't, and I think, cool story. But you didn't. Period. Why are you on the non initiating side? It's not like I talk to people ALL THE TIME, I just notice there is a trend that I'm usually the one contacting others. I tried during the camp to drop it and it worked just fine, suddenly they were initiating conversations with me. With the relationship, I have no idea how it will go. There's a chance he will see it as punishment when I do not step in to pick up the slack as usual. But, to quote a friend here, then I've done all I could. The therapy has now officially ended. The therapist asked if we want to continue, I said, I don't, my bf said he doesn't know yet, then he simply never replied or even opened the website ever again. Nice move. As always. I think actions speak louder than words. He's showing clearly what he wants or does not want. I should take it just as he shows it. Currently channeling her energy https://youtu.be/zi8ShAosqzI?t=9 I'm so glad I took this course, it was such a great week, had tons of energy and it was fun. I'm getting more lessons now on Icelandic horses and it's a wave of fresh air in life. My whole life feels like a dead end currently though. I discovered that I do not care about IT, development work, coding and all of this. I do not want to create websites, I don't want to be IT project manager, I don't care about ITIL, app lifecycles, databases, querys or how the internet works. I don't want to learn about it. It's boring af. Kinda annoying I sank almost 7k into this bootcamp. But at least, now I know. I think it's fine to have a job you don't care for, at least I do not need to pretend anymore it's something like my secret passion because it is really not. When I read job offers alone I want to puke in my mouth a little. Same goes for UI, UX and so on, and partially, for design, and everything including scripting and formulas. If I could, I would leave immediately to work on a horse farm, unfortunately it's not like they are waiting for me or it pays good. At least my starting point has changed now. It might not be a nice realization that I fooled myself like this, for years, for over a decade, but here we go. Thinking about contacting a coach or someone to help me figure this out. I think I will stay in my job and do my best, but now I can drop the burden of trying to change careers to something I also do not care for. I think I should do things I want to do. Or should I do things I am good at? I forgot. I am not really good at anything, so maybe should go with what I want. Unapologetically doing what I want? I want to write. I want to help people. I want to go outside and connect and smell the earth and trees and touch fur and feel my body and be physically fit and mentally free. I hope now you didn't throw up a little in your mouth reading this 😁 In this horse riding course, I met a woman. Life had scarred her. She had deep wrinkles and a constant look of worry on her face. She was afraid of the horses a bit, afraid of galop, she was angry, she always found a negative thing about everything. The way you pick up the riding crop scares my horse. The way you stand here scares my horse. My horse is scared. This is dangerous. The economy is bad. War is coming. You have to grit your teeth and fight for your life. She gave me advice, she said she had a dayjob she hated and then after those 8 hours she went to her side business she was building and worked on this way into the night. I said: How did you have the energy for this? She said she didn't really care about this, she WANTED to work in this side business, it was interesting, motivating, so she did it. But I should plan 10 years of tedious grinding until my business could take off. Now she has a second house in Italy, horses, a car, etc.. Do I want that? Do I want to grind like this? To be like her? Actually nah. I stared at the ground for a while and said: Then I guess I do not care for my "side business" as much. Thinking of developer work. Websites. IT stuff. Gnah. I saw in her eyes how her opinion of me deteriorated, but I do not think life has to be that hard. Or maybe it has to. No idea. I don't want to be scared and afraid of everything. If I believe it, it will be true. For next challenge I will come up with goals again. Guess this here is a spontaneous come to Jesus challenge.

Late to the party as always. I've had enough. Currently doing a 1 week horseback riding beginner's course. I'm all alone in a foreign village without car in a holiday apartment, walking 3km in the morning each day to my course, hanging out on a horse farm with my small group of fellow beginners, learning the basics with the horses and riding, then walking back to my apartment, washing my laundry in the sink because they do not have a washing machine and I could not bring enough clothes in the train, going grocery shopping and hanging out here on my own. What can I say? I love it. I love being with the horses and the other animals there and I love the riding and how constructive the course is and I love being here on my own entirely without my bf and being able to conquer this quite intimidating challenge on my own. I really needed that. Of course it has me questioning things. It's day 4 today and I've realized I'm fed up with almost all relationships in my life. They suck. Maybe I suck. I'm a people pleaser but in this course I am realizing I can't be friends with most people. Maybe I'm going too fast, maybe it is because of the ADHD, but almost all my "friendships" involve me engaging with people. Asking them how they are, what they're doing, initiating conversations, and so on. Even in my relationship I do most of this kind of work. My bf might ask how it is going, but he never engages in conversations with me. It's mostly me talking AT him. Frankly, he bores me. So, I've said it. I'm bored by what he says and how he says it and how he has never anything interesting to say, never thinks about anything, has no interests but watching youtube videos of weight lifters or anime, and is unable to tell me anything ever I don't know already, never challenges me in any way and never contributes to a conversation. Our relationship worked because I did that, and he... took it. He is there for me, that is true, but emotionally and intellectually I am bored to death and on my own. I get more support and input in this forum than I ever got from him. My "friends" do not care for me. Why should I care for them? I've decided here and now that I will stop. I will stop engaging in these kind of friendships and I will stop carrying our relationship in this way. If it falls apart then, so be it. We are currently in couples therapy and EVEN THERE, and we already picked an ONLINE therapy where he can CHAT, so he does not have to talk and actually in real time word a meaningful sentence but can read and write with enough time (once a day), I am doing most of the work. The therapist said I am taking the role of his mother or the therapist. Fuck this. Fuck that. Fuck you. Fuck off. My so called friends can kiss my ass, too. In this course I tried engaging with people but some of them are so weird. Like I ask this woman I am sharing a horse with if she wants to go first. She says "why?" and assumes I have some shady agenda. Jeez. WHY NOT. Because I am nice. FUCK YOU. From this day on, I will only invest effort in people who actually reciprocate, and besides that, I'll do whatever I want when I want. That's my goal for now.

life is funny sometimes. sat on my desk to start with a coding exercise and one of the exercises was called something with plants. for some reason I thought of pixel plants and how cute they are in pixel games and the game Gobliiins that had this level with some plants which was super fascinating for me as a kid: You walk around this sorcerer's place and it is full of mysterious and weird things. Then I remembered I had played a level of a game recently that I thought was a Gobliiins part but was not sure, so I opened dosbox and checked if it was Goblins 3. It was, and I was wondering why I didn't create a savegame after playing the first level, so I decided to quickly play the 1st level again and save to continue later. But it seems it's a demo because it closes after the first level. Then I remembered a shit ton of other old games I wanted to search for, for example The Neverhood, and Spacekids. Found a review video of Spacekids by some woman, turns out she's a tech inspired artist who does pretty cool stuff. I check out her website and a podcast about women in tech and learn she made a game called "Oh my Git" https://ohmygit.org/ for people to learn Git via time travelling analogy. So I was learning Git today. I still don't really git it, haha. ha.

Proudly announcing (while my cat is slowly and sneakily pushing me to the outermost edge of my chair jesus christ he started out in the corner behind me and now is taking almost all the chair space already) that I made the doctor's phone call today. Did I mention that the book "Eat that frog" came to my mind recently? The book did nothing to me but the title stuck. Sometimes I feel like certain phrases and titles accumulate in my brain forever and sometimes come together in a certain constellation that triggers an action. Recently read a quote somewhere about things you don't prioritize but you still want (to do) eating away at you. Something just snapped and I jumped up and called the doctor today. Wasn't that bad, but he's on vacation currently and I have to call again. The woman was nice though so next time will be easier. Then I checked how to revert some of the already solved exercises in the bootcamp so I can do them again. Thought that wasn't possible but when half asleep remembered we use git so ofc it's possible. I found a way to make it work but not sure if it's the correct way to do it. Will do it that way because after 1 hour of trying, this was the only working way I found. Might ask a coworker tomorrow if there is a faster way (it's basically jumping with git checkout to a certain commit before I committed most of the solved exercises, manually copying the files without my solution and only the To Do's from the folder, saving them somewhere, switching back to the latest commit, replacing the files with the ones I've just copied and saved somewhere else, and committing them again - if anyone knows how that works or works better, feel free to tell me. I bet it's possible to replace the latest files with the files from an earlier point in git) Will play some Beatsaber later to kill a few calories. And maybe VR boxing. Then might do an exercise from the bootcamp. While I did make a list of what I need, I did not make a real roadmap yet to visualize this better. I don't want to get distracted with this kind of stuff because it is not the actual work, more planning related, and don't want to make the mistake to be busy with planning and thinking of work all the time but not actually solving the exercises and learning the shit. There's also the Odin Project, a path to become a developer for absolutely free, and they have many great resources as well, so I will crossread there while I follow along to get some concepts better.

Guess we gotta wait another week for an official new challenge? You will not believe it, but I got up at 3 am and read 2 hours, then went for an early morning walk to enjoy a glimpse of the golden sun and pink sky, and then went through the bootcamp structure. Only because I wrote that down here. Maybe. Also I did not intentionally get up at 3 am but this is how it is for me. Go to bed "early", wake up 3-4 hours later, fully awake. I know it's normal and called biphasic sleep but I can't fall back asleep for shit when it happens. Could be because of my habit to go to bed between 6 and 8 am. Currently reading "Finish - Giving yourself the gift of done" and boy feel I called out. The book is simple but funny and has a lot of interesting points of view. For example that some people are reward motivated, others more by fear/avoidance, and BOTH are ok and BOTH can be utilized. Used to think my usually avoidance driven motivation is BAD and I should FEEL BAD and transform this somehow into a goal I want to go towards. I've also always never struggled with listing all the things I DON'T want, but all the other stuff? Nice to have. Merely. Glad that I don't need to use another 848372 self help books or go to therapy for the next years to transform all my goals into positive things I am driven towards instead of striving to get away from things I absolutely do not want anymore. When I think about it, that has often really been my biggest motivation. This and spite. And aesthetics. I just love to say "bye, fuckers" and go for greener pastures. This is the day I live for. Another interesting point of view is acknowleding noble blocks or whatever the author called it, stuff like "I gotta do x first before I can do y", bullshit we make up, stuff I mentioned earlier, like, when I get to the Bootcamp I need to "do it right"™ (whatever that means) and other buckets of concrete I love to stick my feet in before I can achieve anything. It goes along with what the author of the Gift of Adult ADHD book says, of finding fun in the tasks. Anyway, this is why I finally allowed myself to start the Unity developer part and jump right in. Usually I would tell myself Unity can wait, first I need to do some "real coding" (the boring stuff, like half-assedly read a thing about JSON and API and DOM or whatever) in some super dry environment, and if I start Unity, I need to start at the start with the super boring beginner's tutorial for the beginners. Not because I actually am a beginner, I know Unity pretty well because I have worked with it for years, but because it has been a couple of years and there are new versions and what if there is something different now and not the same "I move this block with holding CTRL and some arrow sliders" as in every 3D program?? My bf is currently doing the programmer part as well and I see it across the room and think "Oh he's so lucky being able to do this, I wish I could do this"... like. IT IS FREE. I CAN DOWNLOAD AND START IT ANYTIME.

Agree! Didn't see the pics first in the spoiler but it looks great, suits you! I like before and after but after looks a bit more cheeky 😁

true. often I look at our salad (I mean literal lettuce), or when we had a green smoothie with kale earlier, and think: phew. at least I don't have to care for veggies now with the meal. we often buy mixed frozen vegetables and just heat them in a pan, some of them are really good. no added sauces or anything. doesn't feel like "real vegetables" but better than nothing, I guess

I had another brainfart yesterday, something I was never interested in but suddenly am, which is learning a handstand, very stereotypical thing to want to do these days but oh whatever, so I might incorporate this on some days, or at least some exercises in that direction for inbetween.

Early recap omg the challenge is over tomorrow? I didn't do anything yet. Well, despite a few things and the interesting horse twist. lol. What went well? weight loss ✅ still losing my 3rd kg with a snail's pace (currently at ) but that's fine. Still tracking calories daily exercise ✅ more regularly recently and with new motivation thanks to changed plan general work life balance ✅ I work and still feel like I'm on a neverending vacation. When going on a bike trip recently with my bf to have dinner at a nice restaurant afterwards I felt so happy and optimistic about my future What needs improving? Bootcamp 🔜 I thought about it and I think I will not ask them for getting the certificate anyway. I simply do not want to bother and I don't need the certificate as proof. I probably would not even mention having been at a bootcamp to a future employer but rather say I gathered all my experience at work and during my studies ADHD meds aww how cute is that star? Why didn't I discover that earlier? I can't believe it myself but I missed the second call of the doc's office and can't make myself call them It's so terrible. Maybe I'll ask a friend to call on my behalf. Hm. I think I will start with working 1 hour daily on coding to get back into this. Currently I do not even know where to start. Maybe plan a few days for revision. Currently reading "The gift of adult ADHD" and will check for some techniques I can use. Got this little voice in my head telling me I need to do it "the right way" and to repeat everything from the beginning, which is, you guessed it maybe, BORING, and maybe not very useful anyway. Might jump right back into it and the exercise that seems most intriguing. What I know for sure is I need a roadmap To visualize what I need to learn and what lies along the way. Of course the course has this covered but not in a picture and I need this as picture to grasp it. So. might start with this simple and actually doable task for the next challenge. MAYBE ALREADY TODAY. OR TOMORROW. Let's not get cocky. At least I got energy drinks. Other goals Sign up for a horseback tour with my bf in August/September at a near horse farm ✅ --> not signed up yet but contacted them, asked if we can do this as beginners, they said yes and we will agree on a date. so this is happening!!

If it helps, I've never seen another person at the hairdresser with wet hair and thought "man, their head for sure looks like a pumpkin" 🤣 heyyyyy so I had a look at your thread FINALLY and as always I'm mindblown to read so much familiar stuff around here. About the challenge being some blog of failures or just social stuff and the weight loss and waiting for a new challenge and life throwing curveballs and so on. so jelly of your ipad with procreate btw! OMG AND THE PUPPIES. Wish I could get one, they're adorable. It's so mind-boggling that these little still unaware potatoes grow up to have their own distinct personalities and characteristics and will be great companions that hopefully go on many adventures. right, about the veggies, no idea if that is an option for you but I am lazy and I often eat veggies in a way that I just wash them, cut them in small pieces and put them under the rest of my meal. I also do this with salad when I am too lazy to prepare a dressing which is most of the time. My main dish for a while would be freshly cut veggies, raw, in a bowl, and red lentils or rice or whatever else meal on top. I like to dig them out. They get a bit warmer and they make the whole meal taste fresh and more interesting. I also like the mix of texture with the processed foods and the raw veggies and use to go for zucchini, bell pepper, sometimes cucumber or brakaly (depends on the season, I try to keep this in mind more). Many vegetables you can simply throw in the oven as well but I prefer to eat them raw.

Urgh that sucks. This is exactly what I mean! The horse in the forest was shuffling its feet lol and I was even expecting it to fall any second. Sorry to hear about your shoulder. When did this happen? Was it a serious injury? It also brings me to the question if it's common or would make sense to learn falling when horseback riding. Learn falling seems pretty useful for many occasions actually 🧐 This is how I imagine it to be, and this is also how my private lessons teacher went about it. Before I got to know her, I thought natural horsemanship was the shit, but she was very against it, saying you just pressure the horse psychologically instead of physically and she doesn't approve forcing the horse. She said horses like to play, are curious, like contact with humans (well, mostly, and a lot of the time), you can be their buddy and have them play along without forcing them to anything. (maybe her stance on natural horsemanship is extreme but she was mostly referring to one particular guy that is popular in my country and his methods do seem cruel) Wow. THIS would make me anxious. touching their hooves. with what are the hooves trimmed? I would guess you need some kind of machine for that? Scratching the horse's hooves was my number one nightmare. Bend over with my butt in the horse's direction and my head on the height of their feet almost and then touching their legs, with 10000 flies around and their tail going left to right.. urgh. And then scratching around in their hoof with something trying not to tickle or otherwise aggravate them To be honest, I feel super uncomfortable walking around a horse and I could never get rid of this fear. It was silly during the lessons when I wanted to go to the other side of the horse and rather squeezed myself through the gap between the horse head and the fence, or ducked under the horse neck, to avoid having to walk behind the horse, and when called out, walking a HUGE circle around it

lol for me it was the other way around. My whole life I felt I was allowed to pet horses or look at them but I wanted to ride them so badly. With 14 I was at some summer camp for children and teens and they had ponies and some kids were allowed to ride them. I wasn't. It was like some small club of people allowed, so they would ride around on the horses (14 yr old girls), talking, on the huge meadow the horses were on, and I would follow them, going: "Can I ride? Can I try it? Can I also ride? When is it my turn? Can I ride now?" Until one of them told me very rudely that she would notify me as soon as it is my turn, but it was clear that would be .. exactly never. So I would just sit on the horse when nobody was there. Without saddle and all. I was lucky it was a very chill pony. After this girls riding club was gone, I stayed another week and pestered one of the camp leaders enough until they let me ride back and forth several times during which I tried to gallop somehow but didn't manage. I knew nothing about riding. I even have full blown nightmares of going to riding lesson and not being allowed on the horse. That sounds awesome! I know a few places where to ask for private teachers. There are also 2 icelandic horse farms here that seem down to earth and chill. My bf and me are about to book a small tour there. Not sure if they will agree since he really has only sat on the horse once in his life when he accompanied me to a lesson. Again about this: I fully understand and agree. When I was on the horse the first time during my first course in 2016, I was like.. wow that is high. And what always got me by surprise is that, hard to explain, I was expecting to feel like sitting in something, not on so much, because for some weird reason I imagined to sit between the horse neck and the horse butt. Lol. Like there is a hollow I sit in, like between the humps of a camel. When I then actually sat on a horse, it was like sitting ON the hump. Of course the neck is not higher than me, no idea where my weird misconception came from. At the same time, being on top of the horse like this and being able to control it a bit gave me the probably very false sense of indeed being somewhat in control. It was a weird mix of trusting the horse and influencing it. When we first did the trot and it was supposed to be rising trot, I was shocked, it was very exhausting, my legs felt like spaghetti, it was shaky af, but when I got used to it and learned to have the weight on my feet instead and that I could balance myself hands free fine despite the horse movements, it felt great. Another thing that shocked me was how insecure on the legs the horse itself seemed to be during one or two trips through the forest. I think my false sense of security stems from not being aware of the things that could go wrong and false sense of control. Sure, there could be a deer running across the street, scaring my horse and it could run on the street and we could both die, but for some reason I ignore it as much as I ignore it when I go downhill through the forest with my bike sometimes and hoping there won't be a deer. Maybe it's stupidity. I'm not usually reckless, rather on the anxious side. Don't trust my bike much. But sometimes it's so much fun I don't care. But man how the horse was stumbling around in the leaves und uneven ground of the forest. Sometimes it felt like I was pulling it up from bending in its forelegs with the reins alone. No kidding, as soon as it is possible, I might prefer robot horses for predictability though. Did you consider not to ride though? Many people, especially after they had an accident, decide to not get on their horse's back anymore and just go for walks with it and play with it. People always say that you ruin its build. Like it develops muscles in wrong places or does not walk correctly and then is underdeveloped in other places. Makes you wonder how people used to learn riding. What about natives? Are they all hurting the horses because they do not ride dressage? I want to be able to ride in a style that doesn't put too much unnecessary pressure on the horse's back and not be on its back like a sack of potatoes. If I finish this thought train the conclusion is not to ride at all. Thank you for the recommendations! Will have a look at them! edit: just checked yourridingsuccess and the first video has me like BTW we have this partboarding here and many people are looking and I'm in some local groups but they almost all add "no beginners", "not a beginner horse", "experience at least x years" etc., so I decided to take more lessons first. We also have certificates you can get to prove you have some experience. Like a rider's license. Maybe not the worst idea. It won't prove much but if it helps some people believe..

Haha I knew some mentioning of horse would summon you Yeah, there are reviews, mostly good, and the teacher's message to me when I asked her about being shy also left a good impression. You are anxious with riding? Didn't expect that. Because of the horse? Also LOL about the nervous poops, can relate. But when I think about it, I only felt super nervous about the group situation, not so much about the actual dealing with the horse and riding itself. When it came to that, my worries were about doing it right so the teacher approves, the horse was usually ultra relaxed with me. The teacher even noticed with surprise that usually when people are about to sit on this particular horse's back, it frowns (it did have this way of frowning by pushing its lower lip out and giving displeasing looks when you would fetch it from the box in the morning), but when I got on its back, it didn't. She was like: "Oh wow she must really like you, usually she frowns". From that day on I had to ride a different horse. lol. Never felt insecure because of being on the horse, but about the teacher shouting instructions and commands at me and me not being able to process them quickly enough. Worst were her commands about where to ride next. I was busy with dealing with riding itself. We never had time to really learn anything, it was all just about quick quick quick hurry hurry. The course was awful. Later during private lessons which were great, I was still mostly worried about pleasing the teacher. The teacher was nice enough and yeah, finding something here would be ideal @Alanna, I am looking here, but is not so easy to find people with private horses they use for lessons with adult beginners either. I am willing to pay accordingly but so far I didn't have luck to find something close enough. I wanted to check out the whole western riding scene as well. I even once mentioned to the latter teacher that I could do everything on my own, I am sure, but not when she's there, then I am insecure, and she laughed and said if I want, we can give that a try next time and do it this way. But then she had health issues and I had work and then we moved away. Might sound arrogant but if I had my own horse, I am sure I could deal with it. BUT. I would probably f*ck it up with my bad riding. I don't want that. This seminar teaches beginners a good way of sitting and the basics, they have video and discuss our body position and all, which I think is super helpful because I could never really do anything with the instructions I got. Teacher would tell me that I bend in the hip. ? Like what? To the front, left, right .. ? If I could see it, I could rather correct it. One thing I never got to do was gallop, at least not on purpose. There was this one time where the bad teacher from the awful course suddenly pushed the horse I was sitting on to gallop, and even worse, it was at a moment we had the stirrups up because we were practicing sitting trot. No idea what she was going to achieve there. She said my riding is bad, so why would she have me surprise gallop? Did she hope I would fall down? Too bad, I didn't. It was so much fun. From that day on I wanted to try it again but wasn't allowed to. And the horse of the private teacher I could never motivate to gallop effectively, only trot.

Another sudden brainfart has made my life quite exciting recently. Instead of doing anything for the Bootcamp, I was playing FC6 a lot, which has horses. And remembered my tumblr favorites where I had saved this text about romanticizing your life and steps. I had over 1000 favorites so I decided to go through ALL of them. Further back were favorites which just included horses and cowboys and I remembered this terrible horseback riding course I had joined in 2016, but also the pretty amazing lessons from 2018, and how I wanted to go back to this here definitely. So I looked up teachers near me, and remembered there is this pretty good course that I had been wanting to join for years but never had the money and then there was covid. The whole story of how this course came to life is pretty cool. It's a method by Bruns-Behr, and was developed mostly by Ursula Bruns, who was an older beginner who struggled to find good teachers. She stressed that adults learn differently than children. Children learn by observing and can copy patterns of movement more easily than most adults. She also was annoyed by how nobody was able to properly teach her because nobody wanted to bother with adult beginners, and how she didn't learn much in classic lessons. So she came up with her own method tailored to adult beginners. This course is an 8 day intensive riding course for adult beginners and costs a fortune. LOL. Well, in the grand scheme it's not anything I can't afford, and I was planning to do it anyway. But now I've seen there is a course starting in 11 days that has free slots, and another one end of September with free slots. I researched all of it already, the whole cost, clothing, travel, food, the course, but am still hesitant. Partially because for sure it's something. Like, go there, be on my own in a hotel or something for a week, go to this course every day and ride for hours, for sure it will be uncomfortable. But mostly it makes me very excited. It's just that it seems so stupid to now spend more money on ANOTHER course after the failed bootcamp. And because I have no way of assessing if this course is right for me. What if I drop out after day 3 because the teacher shouts at me I'm a hopeless case (again) and has me get off the horse and all the money is wasted? I did get in contact with the teacher already and asked them how it is with people who are anxious/shy/insecure. She seemed pretty down to earth about it and not like she would make my life living hell for it. I know other people often assume I do not want to be there because I am tensed and anxious and not excited and outgoing, but it's not true. I'm just trying very hard to do everything right and worry a lot. It also depends a lot on the group chemistry which is a 50/50 chance of being good or not so much. With the course end of September, which I favor because then I have something to look forward to and can lose a bit more weight and get fitter and have more time to buy riding clothes, there is the risk that I can't go because they decide for a lockdown or something in fall, or decide only people with the nth booster can participate suddenly. I'm sure the latter is not covered by insurance. I would just get travel insurance for other risks but this thing.. I think I will just wait until 2 weeks before the course and see if it seems safe to book or if there will be another covid mess coming. One thing I would be looking forward to is like 1 week break from my entire life. I love it here and I love my bf but the idea of being absolutely on my own there for a week in an anonymous hotel room is pretty cool. So far I'm pretty sure I will be doing it. I really want to. If there is one thing I want to do, then horseback riding and horse stuff. I'm not sure of many things in life or myself but this I know 100% This brings me to the bootcamp topic again. I might have failed in keeping up but I changed my perspective a bit. Even if I had not dropped out voluntarily, I would not have learned everything in depth and in time. Most of the people graduating will not be professionals afterwards. The time is not enough for anybody there, and I saw when they were showing code snippets that they were not smarter or understood more than me. Not trying to bash them, it just requires more time than we have in the bootcamp, for every single participant. So it's not exactly a drama I dropped out, and I simply have to get back to it and resume learning and try to grasp as much helpful stuff as possible to help me in my current job and/or switch jobs. I got some raises this year because I do a good job, even though it's not exactly what I want to do forever, but after this part time is over, I can comfortable live and safe with this salary at least, so I'm quite motivated to get back to making more out of myself. This opportunity is not ruined, it is not over, it is still there. And at work our devs are struggling and could really use a hand. Same goes for training. I slacked in the past 2 weeks, even though during the last workout I didn't really notice a lack of strength. BTW @Alanna I tried what you suggested and it makes so much more sense! It feels a lot better to lift the heavy weights earlier and go for volume after that. It also keeps my motivation during the set higher when I am done with the highest weight quicker, and it was great to see I do not have to do so many warm-ups. I even was sore afterwards which I have not been for quite a while. AHHHH IM SO EXCITED!!!!!

My bf tried to get me invested in buying one but I just didn't see it. How is it different from an oven? The result, I mean. The only thing that would convince me is if that thing was able to more dry things with a temperature of ~42°C so they would still count as raw.

Man my clothes have arrived and they look terrible. LOL. Just as I thought. Will keep a tankini top anyway and the swimming shorts but can't imagine to go swimming looking like this. I'm still losing the 3rd kg of my 10 kgs. The past days were not so great regarding this. Been busy the past 10 days with saving a total deficit of 2590 calories which is ~34% of 1 kg. The main difference is the burned calories having been around 300 cal lower the past 10 days. Blaming my cycle. The past 10 days have been rough. Then my doctor called because of the medication and I didn't answer and now I can't make myself call them, so at least I wrote them an e-mail today asking for a callback and putting my phone off silent mode. Meh I wish I had lost all the weight already but at least I didn't gain any.