IT'S GO TIME!!!!!

It is October, the month I spend all year begging to not come, I swear that every time it will be different, but then it is more of the same. I fall back, slink off into the dark of the early sunset...I beg and plead for the 14th and the 15th to just not happen...but every year it is the same cycle.
For the sake of sounding redundant...Not this year, but no really not this year.



What has changed and why am I so pumped this time around?? I have spent 280+ days preparing for this moment. I have changed small things daily to get the point where I can figure out how to stop this pattern. Now, I want to pause and say this, the days are going to affect me in some way. The pain is still very real, but so is the fact that I have memories to honor and I have seen what happens when I succumb and slink off...I want to see what is possible when I choose to fight back and stay the course! I want to see what is possible when I simply do a swap of feeling it for the moment instead of allowing it to swallow me whole.

I am standing at that old familiar fork in the road, I can choose to evolve or I can choose to repeat. Well, I know what repeating brings and honestly, I do not think I have time for that. I seriously have come to far to come this far. I have spent too much time working on self care and my mental health to let it slip through my fingers.

This idea came from a very successful plan I have been using for my nutrition....swapping. Like, I got mini cliff bars, kind bars, and larabars to stop me from hitting up the candy box. I bought proportioned bags of chips and now rice cakes to keep from mindlessly eating a bag of chips. Sparkling water and water flavorings to cut out the soda. So, it got me thinking if I can do this, why not swap out how I look at things. Instead of dreading the days because of the memories that flood and the sadness of them not being here...why not swap it out for a chance to celebrate their lives and live in the traits that they taught me. I know I say I am going to do this every year...I can look back and see it. I know I try it every year...but do I? Do I really try or do I give it a half ass motion and then allow me to just wallow in things that I can not change.

I have spent a lot of this "be here a year" working on mental health and getting that in check. I have talked about shame I have been carrying for 8 years, I have talked about anger, denial, finding a new normal...I have journaled and blogged out a lot of heaviness that I have carried...I am slowly telling my story one blog post at a time. Y'all have seen the set backs...now it is time for the comeback. I am in the perfect place to start where I am, with what I have, and make it work!

I am not the same person that started this blog in 2012 (Holy shit 7 years of this!!) I am also not the same person that started this phase of my journey in Dec of 2018. I am grateful for both of those versions of me. They showed me that I have so much more to do, but in that time and in that season, I was exactly who I needed to be. It also shows me I have more to learn, I need to remain coachable and stay open to what the lessons of each day brings me. A very wise man once told me and it has stuck with me since I was probably 12....Always learn something new everyday. A day that you learn nothing is a wasted day. I refuse to waste another day!

This is the strongest I have ever felt mentally walking into October since that fateful day in 2009. I have put in the work these past 281 days. I have changed jobs, I have gotten my house in order, I have found a semi routine that works for me and my A-Team. Now, do not get me wrong, there is so much more work to do, I am far from done. I get up everyday knowing I gotta stay in the step work, the focus on my recovery-one false step and the whole thing crashes in. I have to take action everyday.











Speaking of taking action, as I am embarking on something totally new to me tomorrow, I did the weight and tape thing...I knew me and the scale are having a disagreement...up and down a lot lately. Currently I am up 2 pounds from day 1 of these past 281...BUT I am down 51.4 inches!!!!! I have taken 4 feet of my frame!! I have lost almost 2 feet of that in my torso, waist, & hip area. So this slow and steady progress is showing up in my mental health and in the inches I carry on this 5'4" body.

One of the things I have really accepted this year is things are going to come up and suddenly and unexpectedly happen. I can not control it nor can I stop it. What I can control is how I respond to it and what happens next. I can continue fighting the new or I can understand that a plot twist is not a stopping point, but yet a pivoting point.Today, I am choosing to pivot and find a way around any boulder that drops in my path. As I embark on the hardest thing to date I am setting out to do, I know that what I am about to learn about myself is going to be bigger than what I have learned thus far. I am going to laugh, cry, throw a fit, and refuse...then I am going to accomplish something that I have yet to wrap my head around.

I am going to be able to do this because of all of the preseason work. I am going to be able to do this because I have learned to pivot, I have learned to make it part of the journey. I have learned I am not going to get to the next level by stopping. I also have a different action plan in place...I start each day with a moment of prayer. Not just when it is convenient for me to sit with my coffee and journal. I make the time. I may have to get up earlier, but my mental health and my commitment to getting out of my comfort zone this year depend on two things...




Prayer first, Action second. I can not wish for it, I can not wait for it, and I damn sure can not keep doing things the way I have been doing them...I know where that leads me.

As I wrap this up...this year I am going to be putting in the hard work. I am making a commitment to me in honor of my team of Angels (Mom, Dad, Bonus Dad, TJ, and Alexis). I am going to be putting all of the coaching into action. I am fighting for my life....and I am going to thrive in a season I typically barely survive. I am going to do this because I have faith that God will bring me through it and that I will find a way to show up daily for me because no one else is going to do it for me. At the end of the day....




Till Next Time Y'all-
Audie