Do as I say, not as I do

I should get that printed on a t-shirt. Because what I say to you, the advice I give you, how I may encourage you; is what I really want for you. I want it so bad for you, but not for myself.

I tell you the wonderful things I see in you, I'll help you find the silver lining, I'll encourage you to get the help you need, whatever that looks like so you can live a happy and full life. I'll tell you to embrace the person you are and to love yourself.

But inside, I talk so much shit to myself. I say the most negative, mean, judgmental things to myself. About myself. We are our own worse critic, which is so very true. I'm sure some of you can relate to the saying "do as I say, not as I do."

Let's say we're looking at a picture of me. You may notice my smile, you may notice what I'm doing, who I'm with. You may notice if I've gained or lost weight. You may notice some of my flaws. Many people say they just see a compassionate person. I look at the same picture and I first notice that my left side of my mouth droops, an after effect of bells palsy. I see my scar on my shoulder, representative to me of a crash that I shouldn't have been so dumb to let happen. I see the uneven skin tone from terrible sun damage on my face. I should have spent more time on my hair. I should have cared more about my clothes, why didn't anyone tell me that shirt looks awful. I should have sucked my stomach in, my thighs are huge, how many chins do I have...

It goes on and on. Everyone is hard on themselves, right? It's normal and if everyone does it, then it must be okay. Comes to turn out I would discover how uncool it is, how confining it is and down right detrimental it is.

Let me step back a few months. My Ironman training fell apart. I thought it was because of a foot injury. But my foot got better, although I was still restricted to 4 miles, my training didn't come back together. I made a difficult decision to pull out of my races for the year due to being so far behind on training for the long runs required for an Ironman.

I felt a tremendous weight lifted from my shoulders. I thought my workouts would resume and life would be good. After a turn of several events I realized I was depressed and had been depressed for quite some time, years possibly. I talked to my coach like a therapist, trying to flip every stone looking for the root of my depression, but I never quite got the right rock. He challenged me to start listening to how I talked to myself, in workouts, at work, in any situation. So I did for several days. Holy shit, I talked so much smack to myself, NON-STOP. At the end of the day I made myself exhausted listening to my brain go 100 miles a minute in a bad direction.

I went to my doctor and told her about dropping out and my depression. She said matter-of-factly, "oh the girl who uses endurance athletics to run away from her feelings doesn't have that anymore" and hearing those words was like being smacked in the face with the rock I had yet to flip.

There was a Humans of New York post that talked about a guy who was going to therapy, unloading all his shit so he could get better and be healthy. Then a friend posted about how we all post about our workouts getting our bodies healthy and people celebrate those, so why not celebrate our workouts to get our mind better? That got the hamster in my head turning its wheel on a post.

So what do I know? I know I talk shit to myself all day, every day. That I don't believe in myself the way I believe in you. What does it all boil down to? I have no self-esteem, self-worth or self-love. The exact things I try to empower those in our circle with; I talk the talk but don't walk the walk. Wow that's shitty of me. Who am I to treat myself so badly? I wouldn't let anyone treat you that way, so why do I think it's okay for me treat myself that way?

For a long time I was able to compensate for my bad self esteem with my professional and volunteer accomplishments. In the last few months I received several incredible professional accolades and I didn't feel like I deserved them because how I look. At this point I realized that I was no longer able to compensate for lack of self esteem, I had work to do.

I decided to take action. It's hard to undo all those bad habits of being mean, talking negative and having hate for yourself.

So like that guy in the Humans of New York post, I'm going to celebrate what I'm doing to improve my mental health. I decided to get on a low dosage anti-depressant. I noticed a difference within a few days. The world was brighter, I was seeing nature, like cloud formations, flowers and animals I hadn't seen in a long time. It's taken an edge off that I didn't really know was there. I only wished I had done this sooner. I knew something wasn't right, but kept thinking it will get better when xyz happens. But it would happen and I would look to the next xyz to make things better. Vicious. Cycle.

I got back to my daily Alanon readings and I am sharing my thoughts on the readings with others every morning. It's opening a dialogue about my higher power, my defects, hopes and fears. I grew tremendously as a person when I first found Alanon and like an onion, I'm peeling back another huge layer. I also shared openly and honestly with my home group about my struggles and have been going back to more meetings.

I've been reading an incredible book called "Daring Greatly" by Brene Brown at the suggestion of my coach. I've never read a book that could make me burst into tears after reading certain passages. Not tears of sadness, tears of realization. Tears of joy that someone is putting into words what I've been feeling or struggling with. It's a great read and could be a fast one, but I'm taking my time reading each chapter. Really taking time to reflect and process as I feel like I'm in a maze of rooms and each chapter allows me to unlock another room getting me closer to freedom. I've come to love conversations with my coach after every chapter about the lessons I can gleam from the readings and the things I've learned about myself. One of my favorite quotes so far and I still tear up every time I read it: "Only when we're brave enough to explore the darkness will we discover the infinite power of our light."

I'm working so hard to talk positive to myself. If I hear something negative in my head then I stop myself and change it into a positive. I find myself giving a damn again, trying to put more effort into getting ready in the morning, drying my hair, getting out makeup.

I'm going back to basics. I've packed away all my race bibs and need to scrape the 140.6 sticker off my car. I want to go back to the very beginning of this journey and start from scratch. It's hard to not want to compare my workouts to what I used to be able to do; therefore encouraging negative talk. But if I don't take away the evidence of that I'll keep beating myself up for not being at that level. So I'm pretending I'm new to everything. I'm learning to run again, to bike and swim again; starting back at low distances and building. To fall in love with triathlon again. I just started running with shorter strides so I can hit properly mid-foot. I even learned how to properly tie my shoes prior to a run hahahaha. While my distances are not long, I am running faster than I ever have, even when I was my strongest in the 2014 season. I'm a few pounds heavier and have lost a lot of strength since then; so what's the difference? I'm talking positive to myself during the runs, it really is such a mental test not physical. I'm learning to incorporate balance to my life as I build back my endurance, taking time to read, relax and socialize with friends; I want to be around people again.

I'm working on a low-carb lifestyle. I'm not perfect, nor do I ever think I will be. But I'm making better decisions, I'm changing habits and trying to break the cycle of turning to food when I'm happy, mad, sad, disappointed, anxious, well you get the point.

For so long I've been chasing this idea that if I just get to my goal weight already I'll be happy. Beating myself up that I can't quite figure out how to get to my goal weight. After reading some of the "Daring Greatly" book I've finally realized that I can never achieve that goal if I don't dig deeper and first build my self-worth. That's the rock I couldn't find to turn. Until I build self-worth, self-esteem and love myself, I'll never get to the rest of the things I want to achieve.

It's a lot of work. I'm not going to lie. But I keep thinking "if you keep doing what you've always done you'll always get what you've always got." It feels weird to do something different. But a good weird, it feels exciting and often exhilarating.