Day one for a virgin blogger...

Good evening and welcome to a peek into my life. I was born in 1970, so what birthday year does 2010 bring? The big 4-0...yee-fucking-haw. Is that the birthday people buy the black decorations and tombstones and RIP things for? God, I hope not. I hope to push that off until year 5-0, if you please. My birthday isn't for another two months but since all my friends from high school have begun to one by one turn 40, it is clear to me that this IS coming and I have no choice but to own it. One good thing is most people find out I'm 39, ahem..er...almost 40 and they say "Oh wow, I wouldn't have guessed that, you look much younger"....either they are bullshitting me or somehow I am aging well.

I have done a good job fighting off my elder years in the last years since I began having my kids. I don't remember ever really thinking about my weight or health until I saw it balloon up to the 200s during my first pregancy. THAT freaked me out and as soon as I had my Lil Lady I began to work at taking off those 50+ lbs I had so easily packed on the previous 9 months. My husband never complained but then he was not that into me physically to begin with (hence his current title "the ex") so he also didn't care or help with the restructuring of my overbloated body.

I did breastfeed my Lil Lady, but only for about 3 months since I felt chained to her and she wasn't satisfied from day one and she always was supplemented on the formula anyway. This also is my first glimpse into her now-famous complicated persona, but more on that later. I walked her mornings in her baby stroller, along with Maxie the dog, and then walked her again in the evenings. Before long I shed most of the 50lbs without much more thought to it. The last 10 were stubborn and needed me to diet more strictly along with my walks and then I even began running alone to just feel the fat and water weight sweat out of me. By her first birthday I was better than my pre-prego physique.

My second baby girl, my Chillgirl, came along with 60 extra lbs that I didn't need. Being in my early 30's with this one, the lbs came on too easily and took more effort to come off afterward. I was chasing a 4 year old and trying to breastfeed the new baby and I think I quit the breastfeeding with her by 10 weeks in. Both my girls have always been exceptionally healthy and happy, not even an ear infection, so all those Leche people out there, suck it..haha, pun intended. Anyway, I went back to work sooner with baby#2 so the weight took a while to come off. But it did. Finally I was able to show my face, and my ass, back at the gym with my volleyball playing pals on my regular Tues/Thurs evening free play nights.

So where was I going with this? Oh yeah, turning 40 but feeling better than at 30...after my Chillgirl turned 3 1/2 I decided to lose those last 10lbs that had stayed with me so I joined Weight Watchers and got up and started my running again and got a beat up mountain bike from my sister and started riding the trails near my house. Within 3 months I'd lost 18lbs and found a whole new respect for food and how to control, or try to control what was going in my mouth and how to work out this aging body of mine so that it never gets stiff or weak. I work with the elderly and see all the downsides of aging and how some people at age 90 can look younger than others at age 70. Its all about what you do with yourself.

Nowadays I've given up the volleyball nights but still coach my youngest and her team but after dabbling the last 3 years in triathlons, I've found a sport to love-- CYCLING....my mecca, my church, my happy place, my yoga...on the bike, in the saddle, with the wind whipping by me, taking in the sights of new neighborhoods being constructed, rolling hilly roads, or livestock on farms at the outskirts of town, and working over every inch of my body and keeping my heart about 145 beats/minute for hours on end. It is my most sane place to be in my busy life, and I cherish every minute out there.

As a single mom with an ex that does as little as is fatherly possible to help me out with our children, my life is not my own. I steal the hours on my bike or for my gymtime. Literally steal them. If my kids are with the ex, I plan my days around my rides or gym classes. If I have the kids, I longingly think of my cycling friends out on Saturday AMs rolling away, while I am getting sleepy girls ready for our volleyball game or a trip to the grocery. I will give up a spin class to make sure I'm home for the homework time necessary to make sure my 5th grader passes the damn TAKS test (Texas mandatory standardized bastard of a test)...I stay at home on a perfectly sunny, no-wind day and mow the lawn and pick the weeds many weekends with the kids nearby.

I'm not complaining about mothering my own children. Don't get me wrong. I love them and ache for them when they are gone from me. I worry more than most about their mental well-being having gone through a divorce at ages 4 and 8. I kept them in the only house they know, in the school theyve been in since Kinder, going to the same church and religious ed classes, with the same friends theyve known since babyhood. I've been in the same job, same office, same position for 15 years to keep a stable paycheck coming home so they want for nothing. I've coached their sports teams, and taught their RE classes, and taken them to shows, and birthday parties, and events at the University here, and playdates, and parks, and Build-A-Bear, and pretty much anything that will help them grow and have great childhood memories. Call it "mommy guilt" or better yet "single working mommy guilt" but it is all I know how to do. Ive never not worked, and never not controlled every aspect of my life and my kids' lives. My ex let me do it all because he didn't know how and didn't want to know how to be the leader. And yes, he was shocked when I was finished with having a 36 year old child as well as the two little ones and asked him to pack his shit and leave the house I paid for.

So the girls are well-adjusted kids with good grades and friends, and a good relationship with both of their parents, so after all that, what is wrong with me trying to go for a massage, or a yoga class, or a ride to shake off the crazy that comes with the previously mentioned well-adjusted kids. If I'm hanging on to my own well-being with a thread, I feel I owe it to myself to braid that thread into a rope and climb up it to be a stronger, healthier mommy.

So in my 40th year, when I am truly "on my own" (went from marriage to exclusive love-of-my-life relationship in 2.2 seconds, but that's over now too) I have to venture out and find my own damn self. I've spent all this time defined by what I am to others: wife, mother, daughter, sister, friend, teacher, coach, girlfriend, employee, mentor, counselor, listener, problem-solver....

In the next 40 years...which could be the last 40 I have...I am going to continue to be all of the above, but will learn to understand ME, and define myself by what I am to ME.