I’m Working on It

I haven’t posted in a few days because I haven’t felt like me for a few days, I still don’t really. I’m not sure what it is, but I just feel in a fog. I’m so tired, bone fucking tired no matter what. No amount of sleep or coffee fixes it. I don’t want to get up. I don’t feel like I’m accomplishing anything during the day, like I’m running in circles just cleaning the same mess over and over again while everything else just piles up. And I just want to cry. I want to lay on the floor and ugly cry uninterrupted for like 10 minutes, but all day long everything just makes me want to cry. And I feel like throwing up constantly, nothing sounds good. This all sounds really negative and I’m really not trying to be. I’m trying to be positive; I’m meditating and working out and reading and listening to podcasts, but nothings really helping. I don’t know, I’m having a hard time shaking it. I don’t feel like me. I don’t feel like much of anything.

I fucking hate social media, like not as whole, but I hate the fake ass personas people feel the need to project on them. I follow a bunch of different fitness and health folks online and while they’re helpful they drive fucking INSANE. Not one of these people strike me as being just a genuine human being. The health food lady making healthy shit for her family, the fitness chick with 4 kids, the child psychologist chick with 3 kids. WHERE’S YOUR STRUGGLES WHY DO WE ONLY POST THE POSITIVE SHIT?! Fuck yeah you look good ma’am, but where are your stretch marks? Hell yes that looks delicious babe but how the fuck did you get your kid to eat that? Your kids look like angels, but do you ever just freak the fuck out?! Like yeah I love that we’re trying to sell the idea of perfection, but it’s not realistic and I don’t think most people get that. And I think that’s messing a lot of people up because they assume these perfect lives the people they look up to put out there are attainable and when they can’t achieve it then they feel like failures. I just want someone to be brutally honest about how hard it can be, that success isn’t necessarily easy, and that everyone has a tough day every now and again. I want to hear about your insecurities, I want hear about your wins, I want hear about the lessons you’ve learned. I want to know that you’re human and that I’m not abnormal for not being the image of perfection y’all portray. Social media has too many people posting their best life hiding behind a screen while sitting at home feeling like a failure because they don’t actually feel like the person they’re pretending to be. When I post online I want to be a ray of hope for people. I want people to know where I am and where I’ve come from. I want them to know that I’m doing well and I’m happy, but that there are struggles because I’m not perfect. I don’t ever want to pretend that everything is always butterflies and rainbows. I’ve worked really hard to get to where I’m at today and I continue to work really hard to keep moving forward. I want everyone to know that I’m a real person, with an imperfect life and that’s okay. There’s no need to pretend to be anything you’re not. I’ve put in a ton of work to get everything I have today. Anything you want in life is totally attainable if you work for it. I am a genuinely happy person with nothing short of a pretty average life. I try my best to model the best behavior for my kids, but I make mistakes and I talk to them about it. I work out daily m, but I still have loose skin and stretch marks. I try to eat healthy but I’ve got a real problem with chocolate and I can’t convince my kids to try anything other than pizza and chicken nuggets. I have a great relationship with my husband, but we still fight and I sometimes want to headbutt him in the face. That’s just life. No one’s is perfect. Don’t expect perfection. All good things take time and work. Don’t discredit your process because it differs from someone else’s. You got this.

I lost my faith in “God” a long time ago and was steadfast in my disbelief for a long time after that. After all I saw and had been through I thought there was no way there was a god and if there was I wanted no part of it. The way I had pictured “God” before I feel like is the way a lot of people might picture it; some dude floating around in the clouds damning sinners to hell while watching us fuck each other up as a part of their whole sick master plan. I have since found my faith and a prefer not to use the term “God”, I prefer to call it “the universe”, because I feel like the term “God” puts too much pressure on the word. I feel the universe is not a being but a divine, omnipotent, and benevolent energy. I believe the universe is kind and just. I believe that it has a beautiful life planned for each and every one of us, but we have our own free will to deviate from that plan if we so choose. We can either live a shittier existence, go right on course, or live a better existence than the universe even planned out for us. I believe that when you deviate from the course toward something worse the universe tries to get you back on track and matches the energy you put out into the world. You want to do wrong then shit shall flock toward you. If you try to stay the course or even outshine it’s plan for you it matches your energy and good things flock your way. I believe that the universe constantly tests you in ways, but it never throws anything at you that you can’t handle. Everything in your life is a lesson, if you’re willing to listen and learn from it. I believe the universe answers prayers, but prayers must be matched with action. The universe doesn’t simply grant wishes; if you pray for it you must also work for it. The way that makes most sense for me to explain my faith is using the wind and gravity. You can never actually see it, but you can see it at work. For example you see the wind blow on a tree and the leaves are pulled off and blow around for a while before gravity acts on them and they fall to the ground. You know it was the wind and gravity that both lifted and then dropped the leaves. Why do you know this? You didn’t actually see anyone out there taking the leaves off and waving them around before throwing them on the ground. You only saw the leaves everything else is up to your faith that it was the forces of the wind and gravity even though you can’t actually see them. The universe is just like that; it is an ever present and continuously acting force. The universe doesn’t want bad things to happen and it certainly doesn’t just make bad things happen; we as people with our free will do. People tend to blame “God” for all sorts of unreasonable things. You’re in active addiction and you pray daily for your life to change, but you keep doing all the same shit without actually changing anything. Then one day you get arrested and blame God as you sit in jail detoxing when in reality your arrest was your blessing. You weren’t willing to do the work to change, so there was divine intervention, whether you are going to understand and utilize that blessing is entirely up to you. Sometimes things happen in life that are completely out of our control, but if you can find the lesson in it you can always come out stronger. You can’t blame god, the universe, or whatever you want to call it for the wrong in your life or the wrong in the world. You put yourself exactly where you are in life and the universe is giving you tools to keep moving, if you keep cursing your blessings in disguise you will never go anywhere but where you are right now. Find your faith, quit blaming god, and start thanking it for this life you’ve been given by finding your daily blessings.

One thing I truly do not understand is people who have any kind of hate in their heart toward lost and broken souls; those who judge and look down upon the homeless, convicts, and drug addicts. I think it’s because they do not understand. I get it starts with a choice, but that choice stems from unimaginable pain. And god bless you for being lucky enough to not understand the type of pain you have to be in to continue inflicting that kind of abuse on yourself. I’d like to come out and say fuck you, how dare you sit and judge that which you don’t understand and how dare you judge without attempting to help. Not all who wander are lost, but let me say from experience most are. My name is Taylor and I have been a lost and broken soul. I am an addict. I have been homeless. I have been a criminal. I am a convict. I am a felon. My name is Taylor and I have hurt people and I have been hurt. I am mentally ill. I am a survivor of sexual assault. I am a survivor of domestic abuse. My name is Taylor and I am someone. I am someone’s daughter. I am someone’s mommy. I am someone’s sister. I am someone’s friend. I am someone’s spouse. My name is Taylor and I am a person. I am a child of god. I am a spiritual being. My name is Taylor and I have made terrible choices, choices which have had consequences, but I have endured that which I didn’t deserve and I definitely don’t need your judgment on top of it. My name is Taylor and my past doesn’t define me nor do my present circumstances. My name is Taylor and I have future and so do you. I am loved and so are you.

I’ve had so many people tell me I should write a book and I generally just laugh because what the hell would I write about? I know my own life and my own experiences would be a good place to start, but I never thought that would hold any meaning to anyone because I’m not exactly where I want to be in life. You know you read self help books and books about people’s lives and they’re sitting pretty well in life at the time they decided to write a book, they’ve achieved their goals and now they’re writing from their experiences on how to get to where they are. I’ve been thinking I’ve never read a book from someone on middle ground, you always read books or listen to podcasts from people at the top. And yeah that’s empowering, but what about hearing from someone that’s come up from rock bottom and still working on getting where they’re going? They might be out there, but I haven’t found one and I think there’s a market for it. A book for the down trodden people. A book from my perspective about how you can come up from the bottom, that I’m no where near where I want to be, but I’m on my way and far better off than I used to be. I’ve learned you don’t need to be in the ideal position to share your experience. And sometimes I think it’s helpful to hear strength and hope from someone you relate more too, someone that doesn’t seem like they have a currently unattainable life. I’m not saying my bar is set lower, my bar is high and I haven’t even reached it yet, but sharing my journey and my goals as I go through them might help some people that are overwhelmed with where they’re at. I’m not entirely sure how this will go, but I’m going to start writing and we’ll see what happens. I mean it can’t hurt to try, I’ve got nothing to lose. I’m going to start writing not only on my blog daily, but I’ll start writing a book and I’ll share it once it feels done.

Only one thing is certain in life and that is death. Imagine you’re on your death bed. You’re laying in the hospital and you know that you aren’t going to get a tomorrow. As you look back on your life do you smile? Or do you have a lot of regrets? Do you wish you would’ve been more daring? Do you wish you would’ve quit that that job you fucking hated and started that business you always dreamed of but we’re too scared to try? Do you wish you would’ve taken better care of your body? Do you wish you would’ve worked less and spent more time with those you love? Do you wish you would’ve actually read that pile of books on your nightstand? Do you wish you would’ve gone back to school and gotten your dream job? Do you wish you would’ve taught your kids everything you were too busy to do? Do you wish you would’ve traveled more and seen the world? Who would you have by your side or who would you want there with you? Do you wish you would’ve forgiven that family member for that petty argument? Do you wish you would’ve kept in contact with your old friends? Do you wish you would’ve gone to more family reunions? Could you have been more kind? Could you have been more understanding? Could you have been more forgiving? Could you have been more honest? When they read your eulogy what are they going to say? Did you live your life to its fullest or did you merely get by? If you were going to meet your maker today would you be proud to show them everything you’d done in your life? If not, it’s time to consider making some serious changes. Tomorrow is never guaranteed, the only thing certain in life is death and it can come so unexpectedly. So, don’t wait for tomorrow, don’t wait until new years, don’t wait for the time to be right to start. Start right now. Start living a life that you’re proud of. There’s no time like the present.

This is something I don’t talk about a lot, but it’s a major part of my life and who I am as a person. I am the stereotypical chick with daddy issues. My parents divorced when I was small and I bounced back and forth between their homes until I was 4. When I was 4 my “dad” was supposed to pick me up and he never came. I tried to call him the next morning thinking it was a mistake. When I called his girlfriend answered and when I asked to talk to him she hung up on me… I remember every moment of this like it was yesterday, I still get that knot in my stomach, and I can feel the ugly cry stuck in the back of my throat just waiting to rip it’s way out. Maybe he thought I was young enough to forget about him, maybe he thought I’d never remember it, maybe he thought I’d get over it or move on. I can say that none of that is what happened. I can tell you that I had night terrors for years. When I went to kindergarten I cried every day after school because I thought my mom was going to just leave me there. This permanently affected my entire life and every relationship I’ve ever had. I lived most of my life thinking in the back of mind that there was something wrong with me, that I wasn’t worth love, that eventually everyone would leave me. I mean how could I not? I was a little girl and even my daddy didn’t love me enough to stay so why would anyone? Through years and years of therapy and introspection I know this isn’t true, I know it wasn’t me that was damaged, that it was his problems not mine that caused him to leave. I still, as a 27 year old adult and parent, have a hard time making sense of him leaving without a trace or second thought. It doesn’t make sense to me. There’s no scenario on the planet where I could justify it. I flip flop back and forth between being indifferent about it and be incredibly and violently angry about it. I don’t feel my mom handled the situation wrong at all, she did everything she could for me and she’s amazing. But how do you fix that? You can’t. As a parent there’s just some wounds you can’t heal for them. I know if I were in her shoes I would’ve handled it differently…probably much worse. I’d have hunted him down and burned that fucking house to the ground with him in it. I’d rather spend of day of the rest of my life in prison than let my child grow up thinking that there was something so wrong with them that even their dad didn’t want them. See, I’m not actually indifferent about it. I hold a lot of anger and hide it behind a facade of indifference. But I don’t know how to let that go. I don’t know how to not be mad when I know that he left me to start a new family and he’s never once tried to contact me. I have so many questions. Why would you do that to me? Why wasn’t I good enough? If you could do it again would you do anything differently? I want to scream at him and spit in his face. I want to tell him that he better cherish his other kids and he better never let them feel the way he made me feel nearly my entire life. I hope that he is truly unhappy. I hope that his existence is agony. I hope that he knows that there’s a special place in hell for people like him, for people that willing induce suffering on the innocent. I hope he knows that I hate him. I know forgiveness is for yourself and it should be freeing, but I don’t know how to do that in this case. Until then I am indifferent.

You know how I’ve been preaching and practicing positive self talk? Well, I’ve been listening to this book (Unfuck Yourself by Gary John Bishop) and in it he’s been talking about how no matter how hard we try we cannot completely eliminate negative self talk. That being said, your thoughts don’t define you, your actions do. This also coincides with what my therapist has always told me to do; opposite action. Meaning no matter how bad you feel, just do what you need to. Most the time we’re our own worst enemy. We beat ourselves into submission with our negative self talk or we sit there waiting for the proper motivation to do whatever it is leaving us sitting in a puddle of self pity doing absolutely nothing but confirming those negative thoughts. Positive self talk is great, you should always work on talking to yourself with love and kindness. BUT even if you’re struggling with that just get up and do it any way. Negative self talk can only hold you back if you let it, but if you get up and take care of business in spite of those negative thoughts then your actually disproving those thoughts with your actions which actually ends up correcting those thoughts. After listening to this book I realized I actually do this A LOT without even thinking about it. Most mornings I don’t just wake up shitting butterflies and rainbow; I get up more like a boggy swamp monster and I have to catch the butterflies and rainbows. What I mean by this for example; my daughter has been sick, she wakes herself up coughing and crying and then her crying wakes up her brother, so for the last week or so I’ve gotten very little sleep. When my alarm goes off at 7 to get my son ready for school my first thought is fuck that I could just shut it off and keep sleeping since both babies are still asleep, but I shut it off and get up. In spite of every negative thought; I get up, I get his clothes, I get him breakfast, I drink my coffee, I work out, and I prove that those negative thoughts don’t define me or how my day is going to go. I get up and get it done. I accept those negative thoughts for what they are, just thoughts and thoughts don’t have to define your actions. Your actions can change your perspective, you can prove yourself wrong. This is your call to action. Don’t wait for the right moment, don’t wait for the proper motivation, don’t wait for your self talk to improve; just fucking do it.

5 weeks postpartum and I have met my goal!! I said from the beginning that losing weight wasn’t necessarily the goal; my goal was to eat healthier, work out, take care of my body, and losing weight was just a natural part of that. Well today I measured myself and I officially fit into a size 4! Before pregnancy I was a solid size 2, sometimes smaller. Making sure I stayed thin used to be my primary goal, because somehow my value as a person depended on my size. Obviously, that’s not true and I realize this. So, here I am. Five weeks postpartum, 5’3, 133lbs, dress size 4 and the healthiest and happiest I’ve ever been. Just because I reached my goal doesn’t mean this is where I stop, I’m going to keep doing what I’ve been doing, but the goal now is building muscle and toning what I’ve got. I’m going to start posting updates biweekly now. LETS GO 💪🏻