Destination Discipline

Just call me Tap Dancing Tonya! I’ve got rings on my fingers and bells on my toes and I’m feeling awesome wherever I go. There is nothing better than running on clean fuel. I took a pit stop on Sunday when I tried to bake gluten free cornbread. And while it was mighty tasty, within an hour of eating it, I was pretty sick. Even though it didn’t have wheat, my body did not like the highly processed flours. And because I had been feeling so great up until that point in time, I took it rather hard. It was kind of like getting smacked upside the head with Thor’s hammer.

As I ate my salad at lunch today I realized that people spend large sums of money on drugs designed to fix their ills and I’m fixing mine with healthy food. I can eat something yummy and good for my body for about $3.00 and feel clear and sparkly, like those pictures they put on spring water that is sold in the grocery store. It sounds crazy and utterly too good to be true, but I’m living proof that it’s possible.

I can manage multiple projects. I have extra energy. I’m happy. And I didn’t even murder my children when they flooded the house the other night. And all because I cut a couple things out of my diet? Wow! If I had known this, I would have done it years ago.

The stress at work has been high this week. There is so much going on, and I really hate to think how I’d be handling it if I hadn’t made this change. Now I’m not saying it would work for everyone, but it sure is working for me. My point is this, if you are sad, tired and sick of being overweight, if you hate your life and don’t know why, if you think about walking into the headlights of oncoming traffic,(don’t do that!), and you are willing to try anything, start by changing your diet. Food is the fuel by which our bodies run. It won’t hurt you to eat more vegetables and less refined white flour/sugar. Making that small sacrifice might just drastically improve the quality of your life.

I have been living with depression for years and never understood why I felt so bad. Now I see the cycle. And what’s so awful about it is that I would eat cookies and candy to help me feel better when they were really making everything worse. I may not have a full on gluten/dairy allergy, but my body is so much happier without them. I would pay a lot of money to fix my depression. If I knew of a sure fire pill, I would take it. So why not adjust my diet? It just makes good common sense.

I am so thankful God is showing me how to take care of myself. Life is hard. Life is imperfect. And we all have a lot of problems. So if I can change this one small thing(yes, I’m calling a gluten/dairy free diet a small thing) I am pleased as punch. It’s one thing I can control. And hopefully, by sharing this with people, maybe someone else will find a way to help lessen their depression too.

That thing would be me. It is so much fun to be different. It catches people off guard. Like, when I’m walking down the hall and I see a casual acquaintance and I wave erratically to say hello instead of the standard, smile and nod greeting that is common in the workplace. People smile more when I do these things. Like when I get excited about my grapefruit and toss it in the air like a baseball and catch it as I “celebrate” back to my desk. I like to think people are happy that I seem to be enjoying myself. They are definitely not thinking, “There goes the lunatic again.”

Today is Friday the 13th. I know the calendar says November 1st but it lies. Because too much wild and wacky stuff happened today for it to be a normal day. Oh, and the moon is full too. You don’t need to look at the sky. You can take my word for it. Most of the day I felt much like a ping pong ball bouncing back and forth between two deranged orangutans. This is how I earn my paycheck, bobbing back and forth. Ask any executive assistant. That is how we roll. And I have every reason to be crabby about it. I could stamp and moan. I could grab a cigarette, make my face pruny and scowl. I could blather on about crossed wires and fake-outs, malfunctioning scanners and goats but nobody wants to hear about that anyway. And besides, kicking the goat isn’t going to make my job easier.

Today I am celebrating. Why, you ask? Well, I feel like I’ve been set free. I have this raging food addiction that drives me batty just about every day of my life. Like a 16 year old boy thinks about sex, I think about food. I’m not kidding. It’s that bad. One of the ways I got through the first month with no sugar was by fantasizing about eating chocolate chip cookies. That can’t be normal. But yesterday was Halloween and I didn’t crave candy at all. In fact, I gathered a giant bag of candy from work and brought it home to my husband and teenage son(that’s how I know about the sex thing) and watched them eat it while I snacked on pumpkin seeds and raisins. And I wasn’t unhappy. In fact, I was completely satisfied. So here is where I let you under the tent…. where I explain how this could be humanly possible.

I had an injection of alien DNA and I am now cured forever of my addiction. Okay, that’s not entirely true, though my mother might attest to the fact that I’ve always been a little “off.” I decided to cut sugar, diary and gluten from my diet. I am on day four and I feel like a million ducks. And I feel so good I don’t miss them. Really. And I hope like crazy I continue to feel this good. Because if it’s that easy to get rid of my depression, man, I am one lucky girl! And no cravings and constant thinking about when I get to eat again. Holy mother of jackpots! I’m a winner!

So if I’m strutting around the office waving my arms like a twitchy cricket, and serenading people who walk into my cube with “Hello Dolly,” well, who can blame me? People like positive energy. In fact, I have seen more genuine smiles today than I have all week. Bring on the crossed wires, malfunctioning scanners and belching goats. Besides, I’ve got some really great Groucho Marx impressions to polish up on.

*Disclaimer – no goats were harmed during the writing of this blog.

This morning dawned dark, foggy and spooky. I have to use the work spooky because tomorrow is Halloween, but it really did feel spooky. I drove down Florissant Road and was struck by how difficult it was to see the road, even with the streetlights. And then I saw them, dark shapes shuffling across the pavement. These spectral anomalies were barely visible but as I got closer I saw that they were merely teenagers, risking their lives to get to school. Brave souls!

The highway was shrouded with thick clouds and felt otherworldly. With the sun absent, I found it difficult to gather my bearings. From high above the slick streets I saw strange, UFO shaped lights blaring through the milky film. Were we getting visitors from another planet? No, they are the street lights that hover over Highway 270. Normally these lights go unnoticed. I mean to say, I appreciate how they illuminate the street but never actually look at the lights themselves. But with the fog, they were startling. They peered through the mist with bright rays that reached out like tendrils. I admit it took a great deal of willpower to turn my eyes back to the road so I didn’t crash my car.

This morning I had a completely different perspective on my way to work. The darkness combined with thick fog transformed my morning commute. It reminded me that often my perspective changes when hardship descends on my life. If a simple change in lighting can change the way I see things, how much more potent is emotional darkness?

When we are despairing, everything feels heavier. Simple joys are beyond our comprehension and pain is like thick, heavy fog. It distorts our vision and we can’t see things we once thought were true. Happiness and contentment are like the blue sky and white fluffy clouds, gone. Even though we know they exist, they don’t register.

In these moments of clarity I remember that God is like the streetlights. He is always there. But I see him differently through the lens of pain. I’m content when he is lighting the way and rarely look up to say “thanks!” But when things go sour, that light gets a little spooky. It is alien, even threatening. I am not ashamed to say it even makes me angry. I shake my fists at the sky and say, “What the heck? My life is supposed to be smooth sailing. I don’t like this fog!”

But have you ever risen on a blue sky sunny morning after a long period of rain? What goes through your mind? I always think, “How beautiful! How lovely! I am so glad to see the sun again.” And my heart lifts with joy. It seems trite to say we can’t enjoy the sun without a little rain. But I find it rings true. Dark, foggy mornings don’t last forever. The sun burns them away post haste. And this morning I thought to myself, “Emotional darkness is the same. When the time is right, God will burn it away. I just have to trust him.”

Also, the perspective I glean while moving through pain is priceless. I find that I learn the most important lessons when I walk through seasons of pain and hardship. I carry this knowledge with me to use for future hardship. And when I encounter other souls who are suffering, I can share these lessons as well. But most importantly, I find that I encounter the great love of Jesus most intimately when I am suffering. This is a mystery to me but something I feel in my body so potently it cannot be denied, even if people think I’m strange.

I am 1.5 days into sacrificing my favorite foods to see if it will help my body feel better. I am hopeful. I see a little speck of light in the darkness. One step at a time, one moment to the next, I am trusting the sun is still out there and one day I will experience white fluffy clouds again. The good news is, God is with me. I sense him in ways I can’t explain. And I am glad.