40th smoothie

The last smoothie in this challenge is another orange julius made of 3 peeled oranges, orange juice, 1/2 c simple syrup, powdered egg white, powdered milk, ice.

It was good.  Really like it!  Frothy on top, smooth and creamy as you guzzle it down.

Ghosts

I've been talking to ghosts all day.  Imagining conversations with First Love, his current wife's late dad, and First Love's Child.

First Love told me how angry he was at me, that it was based on how angry he still is at his alcoholic dad, that his dad is the first person to make him feel unloved and worthless,  but still how he's so furious that I betrayed and rejected him too.  I tried to explain I didn't see what I did as betrayal or rejection of him, but then I realized it was futile to explain anything.  I tried to explain that anything I did to him I did to myself too, and hurt myself more than he is hurt.  He told me I need to stop defending myself to feel his pain and rage.  I admit that is hard for me to do.

His rage was so strong, and he did not relent in any way.   I kept saying I was sorry, and that I loved him despite everything.  He kept spewing his angry hate at me.  Telling me how I betrayed and rejected him so he wanted to see me suffer forever for doing that to him.  There was no reasoning with him, his anger was so livid.

I thought he really cannot love me to hate me so much.  I thought my relationship with him was unhealthy just like it was for Ex.   That he is just too selfish to ever think of anyone but himself.  I don't know if that is true.  I only know that my love is still strong for him, even despite everything.

So I ended up just praying to god for the blessing that I learn what I need to learn from this, and asking for some relief from the aching pain I feel from losing First Love.   But god said that aching was important for me to understand and feel everyday of my life.  That it was there to teach me.  So I have to accept it.

I asked god to please let me move on from it, and god just repeated that I need to accommodate it in this lifetime.  The feeling of loving First Love is still strong, and I can't seem to loosen it.  I feel it in my left fallopian tube when it is strongest.  I did love you First Love, I still love you, even though you hate me and want to see me tortured by your serial rejections.

I saw how First Love's anger left a string of pain in his life.  Leaving no room for anyone to love him, because he still loves me and hates me, and that's all there is room for.

I spoke to his current wife's late dad, and he said they are not doing well.  She is in love with someone she used to know too.  They are both in love with other people, and neither of them has room to love anyone else.   He said their marriage is likely to end within 3 years, except that First Love has ensconced himself in her family and life, and he's unlikely to have the strength to leave that.  The only way he will get out of that relationship is if his current wife thrusts him out very forcefully.

His current wife's late dad didn't tell me what lesson was to be learned either.  Just matter of factly told me what is going on.  They don't like each other, and certainly don't love each other, but they are trying to need each other.  It sounds very sad.  He said it is up to them what happens, their will be done.

So the lesson I have to learn is that unrequited love that I feel daily, minute by minute, it is something that simply has to be endured for the time being.  Maybe once I understand it's value, beyond allowing me to empathize with the other creatures on Earth, then maybe I'll be able to let it go.  So I suppose I'd better think about that more now.  I mustn't just forget it.  I must figure out the lesson.

And I must try very hard to open my heart anew to the world and to the possibility of new love.  

39th smoothie

An ok but not super good smoothie:  1 banana, 1 can pineapple and juice, coconut water, ice.

It was very frothy which was nice; but too much pineapple made it too acidic.

Fond

I'm not sure I know what love is, but I think I might be able to love Nicest Boyfriend I've Ever Had if he felt that way about me too.  He so gracious and polite.  I like that.  He's thoughtful, considerate, constant, dependable, self-sacrificing.

If I don't love him yet, I think I could love him.

For certain I am fond of him, and he makes me excited.

38th smoothie

Haven't made a smoothie for a couple days.  But today is was simple and good: 1 banana, coconut water, frozen strawberries.  Yum!

Shelf

Woke up with a bad headache.  Have been more unwell lately which is something that accompanies being overweight.  When I had the cold all I ate was saltines with butter and diet cola.  Of course I gained weight.

I don't want to weigh myself because I'm afraid I weigh over 200 lbs, but I had to buy new pants in size 16.   So I started to be careful again.

I sometimes do feel uncomfortable in my body due to my bulk and just the general sense of feeling unwell that comes with being overweight, so I shall start weighing myself every day and taking my measurements occasionally, that has always worked well to motivate me to stay on track.

I will be working more hours in future too, so I need to establish really good habits before that starts.  I really, really, really want to be slim and attractive again.  The only thing that feels better than being slim and attractive is when people who love you admire you for being slim and attractive too.

I've been really angry at First Love lately.  Just furiously, almost hating him kind of anger.  It's as if I want to have him near me so that I could express my anger face to face, day by day.

I felt that way with the Ex near the end too.  I wanted him around so that I could  show him how angry I felt towards him; so I could argue, express my anger, and also ignore him, have him there to witness and feel the wrath of my anger.

I know that isn't nice of me. I do pray to get over it because I feel guilty about it too, but part of me knows I'll get over it soon enough and so allow myself the grace to feel through all those angry emotions.

I talk to First Love's wife's late dad in my imagination and tell him I'm sorry that I want his daughter to be miserable with First Love, but I do.  I want them both to be completely and utterly miserable with each other.

I tell myself if I really loved him I would want the best for him, and back when he first did this to me the first time, I did have those feelings very genuinely and sincerely. This second time I just have anger and wanting to see him feel as lousy as I do.  It's mean of me.  It does me no good.

I know (hope) I'll get over it soon enough but that's what I'm experiencing right now.

37th smoothie

Only ok smoothie.  2 very ripe bananas, coffee, cocoa powder, unsweetened almond milk, organic dairy milk, ice.

The bananas are a little too ripe.  I don't like dairy milk because I've become lactose intolerant in recent years, but didn't have enough almond milk  I should have used more ice instead.

36th smoothie

Made another unsuccessful smoothie:   unsweetened almond milk, frozen mixed fruit, Concord Foods Strawberry Smoothie powder.  

Just yucky!

Too sweet, too fake tasting.

Pure yucky.

35th smoothie

Strawberry Spinach smoothie:  coconut water, frozen strawberries, spinach, honey, sugar, powdered milk, powdered egg white.  

It was not nice,  much too, very, very, very  tart.   Still needed more sweetener after adding at least 3 Tbl of sugar and honey.

34th smoothie

Puppy power smoothie:  dairy milk, baby baby carrots, and frozen dairy milk, cheese and chicken cubes.  It was loved by the puppy!!

Orange Julius:  orange juice, 1 peeled orange, rest of baby carrots, 1/2 banana, 1 Tbl skim milk powder, 2 tsp egg white powder and ice.

Very delicious, enjoyed by all as usual.  More orange-colored due to carrots.

33rd smoothie

First time in the 30-day smoothie challenge that I didn't make a smoothie.

Cold is too bad.  All I ate today was saltine crackers with butter,  or potato chips.  All I drank was diet cola.

I'm getting better.  Yesterday I had the chills, today I had a fever.  Yesterday I was sick, today I was irritable.  Irritable means I'm on the mend, even though I'm very wheezy.

No 33rd smoothie, sorry to disappoint.

Did make a discovery yesterday maybe or was it this morning?  I discovered if I wrap a windbreaker type of jacket around the blender when mixing, it does muffle the sound level a bit.

32nd smoothie

Today am very ill with a deep cough in my lungs and sinuses.  Tried to be vegan especially because of all the mucous in my system.  Was mostly successful.

First smoothie was: almond milk, 1/4 c coffee, 1 Tbl cocoa, and ice.  It was good I needed the coffee to cut through all the junk in my system.

Second smoothie was Peaches 'n Cream: almond milk, 1 bag of frozen peaches, 1 Tbl powdered milk, 2 tsp powdered egg white, 1 Tbl sugar.  It was good.

Added the milk, eggs, and sugar to make it a nicer texture and flavor for everyone else who shares the smoothie.

31st smoothie

. . . continuing on to 40-day smoothie challenge.  Getting a stuanching cold with sore throat, the whole she-bang.  Made another Vitamin C orange smoothie.  More yummy every time.

Made with: 3 peeled oranges, 1 c. bottled orange juice, 1/2 c simple syrup with vanilla, 1 Tbl powdered milk, 2 tsp powdered egg white, ice.  Creamy, perfect.  Everyone loved it!

30th smoothie!

YAY!!!  Final smoothie of the challenge!!!!  YAHOO!!!

Today found an Orange Smoothie mix by Concord Foods.   It contains sugar, corn syrup solids, nonfat dry milk, sodium citrate, xanthan gum, natural and artificial flavor.

Added 1/2 of that mix to 3 peeled oranges, 1 c. bottled orange juice, 8 ice cubes, and 2 fiber pills.  The result was delicious!  Not the healthiest choice, maybe not even vegetarian since I learned from Food Babe, Vani Hari, that "natural and artificial flavor" can include literally anything.

But anyway, everyone liked it, no one said no.

p.s. feels like I might be getting a cold so need the Vitamin C.

29th smoothie

Had an early morning breakfast of: 1/2 banana, unsweetened almond milk, 1/4 c coffee, 1 Tbl cocoa, and ice.  This was so good;  smooth and perfect.

28th smoothie

Tonight we invented a weird but delicious Bananas Foster smoothie:  unsweetened almond milk, 2 bananas, 2 Tbl Earth Balance margarine, 2 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, 1/2 tsp salt, 10 leaves spinach, ice.

It's very yummy, surprisingly yummy.

Stable

Still trying to heal from the loss of First Love.  Within the first year of dating he wanted to marry me and I wanted to marry him too but I was afraid, naturally, of something new; additionally I was under the very strong belief that my mom wished for me to never marry, never have children, and to pursue a fulfilling career instead.  In the past 3 years I asked her if my perception back then was correct and she vehemently confirmed yes, that is exactly how she felt.

When First Love asked me to marry him I said yes, in my own mind I'd committed myself to him  within the first month of dating when he told me how he'd dated several girls and pleaded with  me to never break up with him and I agreed.  By the time he asked me to marry him, I was still shocked by his request, but I dearly wanted to be married to him and have lots of babies with him.  We had things mapped out.  His dad wanted him to take over the family business but he wanted to be an English high school teacher or English college professor.  I wanted to live in a house in the country near our families, in an old farm house and have babies and be a stay at home mom.  Watch the babies grow and teach me what is truely important, garden and cook and clean the house, that is what I most wanted to do in the world.  Work at the library when the children were bigger.

My hoped for family: First Love, Sebastian, Zoe, me, Clara.

I strongly wanted to have babies with First Love.  I didn't have many friends in my hometown, and expected I would have to leave the city or the country before I'd meet anyone who understood me.  When First Love loved me, it was so remarkable to me, the impossible happened, finally someone who wasn't my own family was able to love me.  It was a miracle.  My attraction to him was so strong, I wanted to have babies with him so strongly.

When First Love asked me to marry him I said yes, but not until we graduate from college.  I did want to marry him.  In order to marry him I couldn't just go home and say I was going to get married, that would have been too difficult, I needed to work out a way to get out from under the direct influence of my mom.  I thought the excuse of going to college out of town would be a good stealthy way for me to move out on my own in a way my mom would not give trouble.

So we moved out of town to go to college.  But I'd chosen a college in a big city with a lot of crime and I found the move very difficult.  Just learning to live on my own, even with my parents help would have been difficult for me, but moving to a city where there was so many things I needed to learn and navigate just to be physically safe as a woman, it was almost too much for me without the support of family and friends.  And First Love didn't have to worry about personal safety to the same degree that I did as a woman.  Men are physically stronger than women.  As a woman I was brought up to be receptive, gentle, caregiver and was not well prepared to defend myself against attacks.  I depended on others to watch over me and protect me.

First love and I broke up that first year in the bigger city, when I'd grown to love him more deeply than ever.  I wondered about the irony of that.  When I kept a slight emotional distance between us he wanted to marry me, but when I feel in love with him more deeply and started to lean on him a little more then he broke up with me.  I have to admit I didn't treat him as well as I should have the first year we lived in that big city.  He kind of unofficially moved into my bedroom apartment where I did not have a closet but did have a few drawers and didn't share any with him.  Then when he left his clothes in a pile in the room I got mad at him for that.  We both had trouble communicating.

When things finally ended between us, I was completely lost and unprotected in this big, dangerous city.  The years I lived in that city, divided by the number of placed I lived, equalled that I moved more than once a year.  My life was very unsettled.  I didn't consciously choose to be so unsettled but I moved a lot and I think that reflected my unsettled heart when First Love left.  That trend continued up until this day.  I have moved a lot, and when I am settled for a while I move furniture around a lot, trying to work out the most advantageous design.

unsettled heart nest

The point of this blog is to say that I had trouble making a stable place to settle down in, to live in.  My job situation is not the same. There have been only a handful of places where I have worked.  Financial stability has been important to me even though I haven't been very ambitious about earning more money, my income has changed very little since I was young, but the place I reside has changed frequently.

27th smoothie

Today is a slight variation of yesterday's smoothie.  Dairy milk, Postum, spinach and ice.  Again, it's a little bland but I like it.

Then later we shared ice cream that was delicious and fresh. Dairy milk, honey, frozen strawberries, spinach, ice.  Oh yum!

It was so thick and I should have layered the spinach under the strawberries but didn't, so little green spinach pieces were visible and gorgeous inside the strawberry pink ice cream. And the seeds weren't entirely pulverized so that was nice too.  I love the seeds.

26th smoothie

This was kind of bland but I loved it.  Organic dairy milk, vanilla, cocoa, 10 leaves of spinach, and ice.

I could have added a banana or sugar to make it more flavorful but liked it bland.

Next time I'll make one with unsweetened coconut or almond milk, Postum, spinach and ice.  I think that will be delicious too.

25th smoothie

Didn't make a 25th smoothie.  Sort of, half broke the challenge.  Did drink the rest of the 24th smoothie, so did have a smoothie, just didn't make a new one.

Have been down lately. Really down.  Couldn't figure out why for the longest time.  Kept asking why don't I have the motivation to take better care of myself?

Figured it out today.  I know the reason is because since the divorce I don't make enough money to support myself.  When I was younger and made this much money it was ok because everything was less expensive, but everything is 2-3x more expensive now, and I simply don't make enough money.

It's depressing, and makes me feel very stupid.  Just read an article titled "Why so many PhDs are on food stamps".

But at least, finally, I understand what is bugging me.  Why I felt so down. Maybe I can start taking better care of myself now, now that I can see why I was so disappointed with the decisions I've made in my life, why I don't like myself enough to want to take care of myself, as if I'm punishing myself for not being as good as I wish I was.  It was a self-destructive little mental/emotional train of thought.

24th smoothie

Made a banana, coconut milk, pineapple, 10 spinach leaf, and ice smoothie.

23rd smoothie

Wow, I forgot to post this last night.  I bought an Orange Julius from Dairy Queen, then came home and made my homemade version orange frothy and they were not even close.

My homemade version was much sweeter with stronger vanilla flavor, and had much, much less orange juice flavor.  So I'll have to half the simple syrup vanilla mixture or double the orange juice to adjust for this and try again.  The texture of the homemade version is nicer than the Dairy Queen version though, it is much closer to the 1970s Orange Julius super creamy texture that I remember.

Am still not over losing First Boyfriend.  Why can't I just let go of this??? I'll be reminded of someone who reminds me of me,  then I'll think how his wife (and previous wives) is so much like me too, then I don't understand why he likes women who are so very much like me, but not me.  Why does he like them and not me?  It hurts me every time I think about it.

Then I have to go over all this again, to convince myself it's for the best.  He was always trying to control me, eventually it would become very demoralizing.  He did nothing to compromise with me, he demanded I do all the compromising, we were not equally yoked.  That is why it was wrong for both of us.  That is why he went away.  Please accept this.  Please let go.  Let go.

Why do we fall in love with the people we do?  Especially if they seem to be the people who torture us the most?

22nd smoothie

Today had the rest of the sorbet from yesterday.  Tried making a peanut butter smoothie but then dropped a glass, it shattered and I threw everything away and cleaned up and did not make another one.  Shattered glass is so threatening.

Thinking about numerology. My understanding of the numbers is this:

0 - represents nothing but its really a highly complicated concept of ouroboros, cycle of life, snake eating its own tail.  In 2-D it is a line shaped into an infinite circle defining the inside and the outside as two separate things so creating a divide, a dualism. In 3-D it is an egg or a sphere.  So it is a representation of something that is supposed to represent nothing, an oxymoron. Something that is nothing that will return to nothing.

1 - the beginning of something.  In computer language of dualism there are only two letters/words, 0 and 1.  A single unit, unity.

2 - dualism, being able to have a choice.

3 - a tripod is the beginning of being able to make something solid you could sit on or hang something from, put some pressure on, but it has a delicate and precarious balance. It stands only in balance with the other parts.

4 - a very solid base, a strong solid base for a chair to sit on or building to live inside, with fairly strong and consistent ability to withstand outside pressure.

5 - the five fingers of a hand, manifestation, the material world. Very simplified, in nature the way organic things seem to divide from 1 into 2 into 5.

6 - sex, not sure why other than they are both s-x; also it is double 3s, so the intercourse between the two that are each in a very delicate balance.

7 - heaven, as in lucky number.

8 - turn an eight on its side and you have infinity.

9 - end of something.

21st smoothie

Today's smoothie is sorbet, not a smoothie per say.  1 part sweetened aloe vera juice flavored with mango, 3 parts frozen mango and frozen mixed fruit.  It was good, but very cold.