Category: The Me stuff

A better me

Back in 2010 when I was still blogging over at Parent24 everyone was writing love letters to their bodies.

At the time I could think of nothing worse and the mere thought of having to deal with the way I looked, much less say nice things about my body, filled me with dread and fear. So I politely ignored the whole thing.

But it stayed with me. It was like a little scab that I kept picking at, this inability to love my body for what it was post-children and mid-depression. I kept promising myself to lose weight. If only I could lose weight I would love my body. I would love and accept myself.

But only then.

As it turns out, I had it the wrong way around.

You have to love yourself first before you can lose the weight.

I didn’t realise that at the beginning of this year. All I knew was that I had just turned 39 and that I was not planning on looking the same way when I turned 40. So I gave myself this whole year to learn to love myself. And believe me, it took the most of this year. I didn’t start out the year wanting to love myself, I started it out wanting to take my power back – in fact it was the word I chose for the year. (just had a little cry reading that by the way)

I still have to force myself to look in the mirror and not cringe at the flabby tummy and the stretch marks some days, but these days I’m closer to carrying them with pride, this irrefutable proof of motherhood and LIFE. I marvel at how I get into the bath and not fill it out quite so completely. Or at how much space there is in a movie seat all of a sudden. Or at how I went ice skating with my kids last night – something I would not have done a year ago. Or at how I can walk a quick 5 kms and feel ALIVE when I’m done. Not to mention the impact on my relationship with Etienne and my children.

I am a better person for not loathing myself.

Because how can you love without reserve if you aren’t ok with yourself?

Here are some more things I realised this year:

I told myself that I would look old and wrinkly if I lost weight – not true. Many people comment on how much younger I look these days.

My friends are amazing. They have supported and loved and carried me through this journey. You know who you are, I love each and every one of you for this and there are not enough words to thank you.

I always thought people that are thinner look at me and judge me. I don’t judge anyone, and the people that judge me aren’t worth my time or effort.

We are our own worst enemies. We keep telling ourselves that we should really lose that last x amount of kg’s, our boobs aren’t nice enough, we have a big bum or a fat stomach. We judge ourselves harsher than anyone else does.

It doesn’t really matter what I look like, if I am happy with myself my relationship is amazing. Yes, shedding a few kgs helps, but in the end I had to make the mind shift before the weight finally started coming off.

I had to break the cycle of emotional eating. I still battle with this, but I know the triggers now and try to occupy myself otherwise.

Anxiety and depression are our enemies, we should wage war against them.

Take care of yourself. I took control of my health this year and it has made a massive difference.

This blog post has been rattling around in my head for some time now and I can only hope I did it justice. All I really want to leave you with is that you owe it to yourself (and to the people that love you) to love yourself and your body and accept the things you probably cannot change without surgical intervention.

How much weight did I lose? Almost 20 kgs (and yes, I could do with losing more, but I’m good for now)

How did I do it? Less crap, less alcohol, more walking.

So, 40, I’m coming for you. It’s you and me babe. You. And. Me.

Proudly OCD

I don’t see myself as hugely OCD, even though I know I tend to over analyse (often), but I am a master list-maker when required to be so. Strangely enough I don’t make prolific lists of the day-to-day stuff, but going on holiday brings out the list freak in me.

So much so that I’m about to open a Dropbox account for Etienne so that we can easily share lists. Yup. I’m that bad. He rolled his eyes, but darling Tertia completely gets me

I have a list of ‘things to buy last-minute’, a medicine list, a menu list (we will be gone for 11 days and I do not want to spend my days in the shops), a ‘sauces to make and take’ list, a ‘music to download’ list, a playlist, a ‘clothing to pack’ list, a ‘random stuff to take’ list, and a ‘stuff to take from home’ list. No, the last 2 lists are not the same thing at all, the random list is like beach towels etc and the stuff list is stuff like mustard powder.

At least with my trusty iPad I now have complete access to all the recipes I could possibly dream of, lucky girl I am.

Now just to work those last 4 days and then we can head off to the beach.

How do you prepare for holidays? Are you also a list-maker?

The Bookshelf

I came across this article this evening that rang very true.

When Etienne and I started dating after we had been friends for a long long long time (since primary school) he had to pass a couple of tests. I wasn’t going to open up my heart to just any guy in a hurry, I had just had it trampled on in a rather public and spectacular way, so I was reluctant to say the least.

There was the kiss test – which he passed with flying colours. The food test, the conversation test, the music test (a big one!) and lastly, the book test.

It’s like this you see, I could have married someone that doesn’t love music, but I could not ever marry someone that didn’t love books as much as I do. So I made him read some of the books that had moved me the most at that point in my life. I can’t remember all of them and I took myself very seriously back then, but amongst them were The Bridge Across Forever (Richard Bach) and The Celestine Prophecy (had a good giggle at that one). Granted, a lot of them were tough going for a sweet guy like Etienne, but he read every single one of them and then some.

In turn he introduced me to writers that I have fallen in love with since and opened up genres to me that I never would have bothered with otherwise.

I’m such a lucky girl.

What was the one thing you would not compromise in a relationship?

Blogger Secret Santa

I am taking part in Secret Blogger Santa with a bunch of bloggers and other awesome on-line people this year and I have to post my Christmas wish list, so here goes.  I am so very late with this post, please accept my apologies if you are my Blogger Secret Santa!

I’m an avid online shopper. In fact, if I never have to set foot in another shop ever again I would be the happiest girl alive.  I am one of those freaks that don’t enjoy going into shops and aimlessly pulling garments off rails (My credit card would BEG to differ of course) and I’m allergic to kaggeltjiekak*, so I always ask for something really boring for Christmas like a book or cream.

I have therefore spent a lot of time thinking about this post, more than should probably be normal, but this year I decided I’m going to ask for something, anything that is not a book or cream.

Guess what I came up with?

Amazon gift voucher (so I can buy e-books, can be emailed to me at rouxtania9 at gmail dot com if you so wish)

Body Lotion from Esse or money towards it (a gift voucher from The Beautiful Store will do for this purpose, thank you) Check out this post about Esse which I had to finish before I could write this post, crazy, I know.

Essie nailvarnish.  (you can mail me a bottle or send me a Zando gift voucher to the above email address, apparently they stock them)

Stretch Mark Oil from Tranquil Treats, it is a brilliant 95 SA Ront for a 200ml bottle.

Ipanema flip flops from Woolworths, or a gift voucher towards them.  (sorry, I’m not sure how much they are, but they are really awesome flip flops.)

So, don’t you think I did really really well this year?  Ok, you can stop laughing now.

The only other thing I can think of that I really want is an apron.  Yes, an apron.  Would you believe that I don’t own a single apron?

The other things I need are big stuff, like proper running shoes and a silwer necklace that doesn’t hang too low and a candy thermometer and a mandolin so I can make vegetable chips for the kids no longer required as I won this on Tanya’s blog last week, how cool is that?!

*kaggeltjiekak is such an awesome word.  My Mother is an avid collector of kaggeltjiekak.  For example, when they moved earlier this year I found 7 (!!) different types of toothpick holders in her house.  She buys random stuff from little old ladies that she keeps or tries to sneak into my house.  This is a very true story.

 

I review Esse Organic Skincare

I recently wrote this post asking about skincare for my, er, slightly aging skin.  I am almost 40 you know, virtually over the hill and all that.  I’m sure my zimmer frame will be dropped off any day now..

I don’t normally review products, but Esse very generously offered me some discount on their products, so I went a-shopping and ordered some products.  As luck would have it, Rachelle from The Beautiful Store* saw that I was using Esse and loved them so much she is now stocking their products and I received a gift voucher from her which I then promptly spent on more Esse.

So now I have a little family of Esse in my bathroom.  I love my new little family, I can’t wait to get home in the afternoon so I can wash my face and smother myself, it is that good.

As you can see from the pic I use the following products (from left to right):

Rich body moisturiser – by far my favourite product.  I absolutely love the smell, somewhere between peppermint and something else I cannot put my finger on.  I put some on in the morning before I leave the house and sometimes catch a whiff of myself during the day.  I don’t wear perfume at all, so this is perfect for me.  I also noticed that the cream claims to even out skin and initially did a little eye-roll, but suddenly I no longer have red little bumps on my upper arms, something I have battled with all my life.  I am most impressed and this cream is on all my wish lists Christmas and my birthday.

Toner – it’s a spritz toner which I’ve never tried before and I was worried that I would miss a spot, but it works very well.

Serum – amazing stuff, I use it at night and it feels like an instant facelift.  It really makes a difference to those tired old bags and lines around my eyes.  I’m almost too scared to use it because I don’t want the bottle to finish!

Eye and Lip cream – my eyes are loving this cream and as a big believer in eye creams this rates all the way up there with the expensive stuff I used to use BC (before children).

Gel cleanser – this is the first thing of Esse I ever tried and it is also a favourite, I love the pepperminty smell and leaves my skin feeling as fresh as a daisy. I’m very keen to try the Cream Cleanser too, I need something to remove make-up too.

Microderm exfoliator – I only have a sample of this, but I’m going to invest in a pot soon, lovely.

Deep moisturiser – this moisturiser is incredible, it has a thicker consistency than the stuff I have been using lately, but it doesn’t leave a residue on my skin at all.

So, if you are looking for a new skincare regime you should seriously consider giving Esse a try, it is not too heavy on the pocket and their products are certified organic, things that make me very happy with my new little family.

If you try, let me know what you thought?

Thank you to the ladies at Esse, I’m a firm fan!

*Rachelle is offering 10% discount on Esse products on The Beautiful Store until the end of November and her delivery charges are very reasonable, so pop over and have a look, she has some other rather cool stuff on the site.  Don’t you just love internet shopping?

 

The Idiot’s Guide to going for a Mammogram

So I’m just going to come right out and say it:  I went for a Mammogram this morning and its all clear.  So the story has a happy ending, you can start breathing.

But fun it was not.

I went to see our GP last week with a bump under my arm and on my chest (duh) that’s been bugging me for a while now and she sent me for a Mammogram and Ultrasound at the Apffelstaedt Clinic.  I was going to have to go next year anyway as part of celebrating the big Four Oh, so I thought it best to get it out of the way.

If you have known me or this blog for any length of time you will know how much I hate abhor detest drama in any shape or form as I’m from a long line of hypochondriacs and drama queens, so I decided to keep this to myself as far as possible.  I’m still not really happy blogging about it, but I see I didn’t manage to write anything last week as I was clearly not going to be able to blog with this hanging over my head, so I’m just going to get it out in the open and move on.

As luck would have it I saw almost all of my oldest and favouritest (I know, not really a word, whatever) friends this weekend and ALL I kept thinking was how much I love them and how much my life could potentially change come Monday.  (there may have been several bottles of bubbly involved in coming to this conclusion).  To say I was worried would be an understatement, as my Mom had cancer when she was 42 and my aunt died of breast cancer when she was in her late 40’s.  So the stats are stacked.

I also kept thinking about Etienne’s intimate relationship with my boobs and how potentially losing one or both of them would make us both feel, knowing how attached he is to them. (possible overshare, I know, once again, whatever)

So, I gathered myself toward myself this morning and off we went, my girls and I.

Herewith then my idiot’s guide to going for a Mammogram:

  • The best time to go is within 10-14 days from the first day of your last period.
  • You need to take about 2-3 hours out of your day for the whole thing.
  • Go for an Ultrasound and a Mammogram as apparently 10-15% of cancers are missed by the Mammogram, but picked up by Ultrasound.
  • Have a Mammogram when you turn 40, because it is good to have a baseline.  This way, if the shit hits the fan somewhere down the line, they have something to compare it to.  Almost like having a set of x-rays of your teeth.  Or something like that.
  • Take extra underarm stuff with you.  They wipe it all off before the Mammogram as some underarm lotions contain powder that blurs the image, and I sure as hell wasn’t about to take that chance.
  • Yes, it hurts like fuck hell, but it’s over very quickly.  It’s a squash/squish, thank you very much thing and then that’s all done.
  • The only thing that hurts more is the Ultrasound.  No lies.  I had the added benefit of my Radiographer being trained on a new fancy-schmancy machine WITH THE TRAINER IN THE ROOM at the time of the Ultrasound.  And baby, were they working that Ultrasound, they were very very thorough.  Those were the longest 15 minutes of my entire life.
  • Be prepared to need a shower after the Ultrasound.  I have never ever seen so much KY, not even on a 38 week scan of my massive belly when I was expecting the girls.  I even had the stuff in my neck, right up to my chin, although this may have more to do with the fact that I kept craning my neck to see what was going on.
  • Be prepared to have your boob squished some more in that horrible machine as they might need to take a 5th (!!!) shot of your poor boob just to be certain.  I’m not complaining, as far as I’m concerned I got good value for my money, they could Mammogram and Ultrasound the living shit out of my boobs as long as they were happy with what they saw.

The moral of the story? If you worry about knobbly boobs (or knobbly anything for that matter) go and have it checked out, don’t wait.  You’ll waste precious time worrying that you could have spent hugging children and, er, chatting to your husband.

Seriously.

Just do it already.

Have you been for a Mammogram before?  Did I miss anything important?

My other job as a kitchen elf

Oh my hat, I can’t believe it’s Wednesday already and I haven’t had a chance to tell you about my spectacular Saturday evening.

You may or may not know that one of my favourite Food People is Jane-Anne Hobbs. Whenever we are looking for a recipe idea to make a feast we inevitably find it on her blog or in her book she released earlier this year. She is very quick to point out that she is a cook, not a chef, and I think that is why the food she makes appeals to us so much. It’s not fancy, it’s REAL and whenever we make something of hers it is always a hit.

So, imagine my glee at being lucky enough to be her kitchen elf on Saturday night at the Spier Secret Festival dinner. Ticket holders could choose to have dinner cooked by a celebrity chef at different venues. Our venue was, well, interesting, to say the least. Lets just say we went with rustic in the end. I also got to meet some lovely people, amongst which were Pat from Yumsy and her son Jason. Here is the post Pat did on the dinner, I couldn’t have said it better myself.

Thank you thank you Jane-Anne, I will quite happily be your kitchen elf any day!

Insomnia

I used to think that insomnia was all in the mind.  That you tell yourself that you suffer from insomnia and therefore you cannot sleep. Except for people that watch TV in bed, I used to scoff at them too. (even though I was one of them for a long time)

Well.

I have known for the last 2 years or so that this is not the case.  I’m not talking about when your kids keep you awake at night and you sleep in 15 minute increments and take shifts.  Then insomnia is NOT a problem.  You go from bedraggled to fast asleep in 0.2 seconds.

I’m talking about when you are woken up or wake up in the middle of the night and you can for all the friggin love of being productive the next day not go (the fuck) back to sleep.

Take last night for example:

The kids must have been fiddling around with the docking station in the kitchen as the alarm went off at midnight, much like it did the night before.  Because I did the sprint down the passage the previous night in a state of sleepfulness I completely forgot to sort it out before we went to bed last night.  So when the bloody thing went off again at midnight Etienne did the sprint and just unplugged the whole thing.  I was in quite a deep sleep, so I just turned over and off I went to dreamland.

At 02h00 Isabel wanted to go pee. She was pulling at me from the one side and Etienne was pushing me out of bed from the other as it was now my turn to get up and eventually I managed to drag myself up and off we went.  For why I don’t know as she is more than capable of switching on the light, but anyhoo. (yes, yes, grumpy, I know).  She did her thing, we switched off the light and I tucked her back in.

I get back into bed.

I toss.

I turn.

I sigh.

I worry.

I work myself up into a flat panic about stuff I have no business worrying about at 02h00 in the morning, much less in broad daylight.

I give up, take out my kindle and eventually managed to fall asleep again. (but only after I woke Etienne up with the light)

I am not pleased.

Do you suffer from insomnia?  How do you deal with it?

Things that make me happysad

One of my most favourite people I “met” on twitter, Nikki Moffitt (@nikkimoff), wrote this post yesterday about living in another country and how hard it is to be away from your family, especially when they are going through a hard time.

I was sitting on the couch, eyes leaking, trying to hide it from Etienne, when he looked up and, instead of seeing the incomprehension I used to see when something on the internet used to make me cry, he just kind of nodded.

He knew.

He knew that I was probably crying over something that was really important to someone that is really important to me.

Someone that I may or may not have met IRL (in real life).

Someone who could be in another time-zone or just up the road.

Someone that may have lost a baby or be pregnant, or moved house (or countries!), or had a bad night with awake/sick children.

Someone that might be going through a divorce or is worried about their child/ren adapting to this hectic thing we call life.

Someone that has found new love or loves their child so very much it is palpable through my phone and makes me want to weep at the beauty of it.

He also now knows that if something is bugging me I can call on all those “someones” and they will rally around me, offering me virtual glasses of wine and hugs.

Because that is how we roll.

PS: Yes, I’m a complete wimp, I even cry for TV adverts.

PPS: No, I’m not suffering from a delayed case of PMS and neither am I pregnant.

Stop the bus please I want to climb off

The sole purpose of this post is so I can whine a little, so if that’s not your thing it’s completely fine, off you go, there’s nothing here to see.

Still here?

Welcome to the crazy. I started counting sleeps till when my holiday starts about a week ago. (87 sleeps and counting FYI).

Now don’t get me wrong. I love my life and I certainly don’t have a lot to complain about, but it feels like my head is about to explode.

The only way to explain it is like this: everything going on in my head right now.

Ready?

Plan what gifts to make for Christmas | organise way overdue food blog | work | make Christmas gifts | think about Etienne’s anniversary gifts | buy Etienne’s anniversary gift | work | bake cake for school for cake raffle on Friday (yes, I know I can buy, but that’s like cheating, don’t even ask) | decorate said cake | arrange girls’ night out at the end of October | work | have old book club gang over for drinks | worry about Daniel at school (long story) | work | arrange anniversary dinner reservation | have argument about said dinner reservation | work | have another argument about relevant child are option for duration of anniversary dinner | think about Christmas gifts some more | remember to make sandwiches for school staff (also for Friday) | work | worry about where to find second dress that will fit Mignon as I had to return the 2 dresses I bought yesterday as they were too small and now they only have one dress in the right size and not another one anywhere to be found and now only Isabel has a dress that fits | remember to follow up on tickets for Sauvignon Festival | lunch boxes | worry about kids during holiday week next week | work | (insert unpublishable worry about family here) | worry about Daniel’s allergies and sinuses | try to squeeze all admin into Saturday morning | try to not go mad | work | think about ways to catch up with some favorite friends I don’t see often enough | and so on and so forth |

Did reading that make you tired?

It sure made me tired, I think I’m going to go and lie down now.