Day one...

At what point do most people wake up & say that they aren't satisfied with their life & they are ready to make a change? OK lets me qualify that statement by saying "they aren't satisfied with their life & they are ready to make a change" and really are willing to work on changing. There have been a ton of times in my life where I was not happy. What did I do? Usually nothing; wallowed, felt sorry for myself, there was even a time where I just took more drugs... But at 40 years old and Vicodin free for almost 6 years I have found that when I make an effort to change, surprisingly change happens. Not always over night, & not always something anyone but me would notice, but I do. Examples you say, "Give us examples". Well the most obvious, I was fat. Not super obese, but fat. And I did not like it. I talked in my head every day how someday I am going to look like Stallone from the Rambo movies.... Someday. But then when it came to doing the work, I just didn't. So last year I was sitting looking at my beautiful wife who herself had managed to lose about 80lbs herself at that point. And I thought of a goal that I could set for myself that would help me lose some weight. Being my 40th birthday was coming, I decided I wanted to get my fat ass across the finish line of a 5k run. Easy enough, just run a little each day & shazam, you are race ready in a few weeks right. Fuck was I wrong. The first week I was able to run in increments of about 50ft before I had to hold my gut & hobble for 5 minutes in prep for another 50 ft crawl/run. It took a good month before I could even finish a mile without walking... I kept at it though & before too long I had managed to get myself ready for my first 5k. Sadly I walked about 75yds during the race, but I finished none the less. I was determined to get thru the whole race next time without walking, I didn't! It was the third run I completed before I was able to make the full 3.1miles without nare a foot of walking. It felt great & I had shed about 20lb's in the process of training for this goal. I added to my run regiment a little weight training & heavy bag punching 3 days a week & now less than a year later I am closing on the lightest weight I have been since high school. I feel pretty good about that, & hence, I see change that was achieved thru me doing something. Another example... I have always gone to work, busted my ass above and beyond everyone else, collected a pay & went home. I wasn't being paid to make friends, so I didn't. Then I resented everyone at work for getting along. Why are they not talking to me? What is wrong with me? Must be because I am an addict, or maybe I'm too ugly, or they think I am too stupid to communicate with them...the list goes on. The problem was that list was fabricated in my head.. thru a lifetime of allowing myself to feel less than I had set myself apart from them. What could I possibly due to change this... I started small, and just started eating lunch with my coworkers rather than alone in my car. I made a little small talk, but I was by no means a chatty Kathy. Each day I made a point of talking to someone in the lunchroom for a little bit. Today, people actually ask me how my wife is, how my kids are(even asking about them all by name). It feels good to feel apart of, rather than outside of. And yet another example of making a change in myself bringing a change in my life. I'll finish with the most important change I have been making in my life. I am trying to repair the marriage that I have allowed to disintegrate before my eyes. I mentioned this amazing woman earlier, and she is more incredible than I can qualify with words at this time. But as much as I love this woman, I have been less than a loving, caring, compassionate partner to her. In many ways, I did not even know how to begin to be any of those things to her. My blueprint for a healthy marriage came from an alcoholic, abusive, self serving father who himself managed to neglect the woman he loved for over 30 years before dying in a marriage that had devolved to less than a friendship. I was following in those foot steps and blaming the lack of any closeness in my marriage on my wife not trying hard enough. Not giving me sex enough, because to me I felt that was the litmus paper by which a healthy marriage is measured. Never mind that I wasn't talking to her, wasn't helping her when she needed it with our two boys, and wasn't interacting with her in any more manner than was needed to get us thru the day in a semi functional fashion. One might, and she did, confuse this with me wanting out of my marriage. Compounding this belief would be my dumb ass threatening divorce every time I felt I was not being appreciated in my efforts to be a good spouse. See to me, threatening divorce was a way of getting my wife to realize that she may be without me if she didn't straighten up. This behavior most certainly should make a woman love you even more right? I was a total fuck up & Erin had every right to leave my ass & never look back. But thru the grace of a power greater than myself(lets call her GOD) she stayed with me, even when she had second thoughts, she stayed. That is the first block that I lay in the bridge to get back into my marriage. With that block, I am trying to build the fucking golden Gate Bridge of reconciliation with this amazing woman. Now I would like to spell out all the things I have changed to bring us back together into the perfect loving marriage where we both confide in each other, gain strength from each other, love each other, co-parent with each other, respect each other, open up to each other, talk to each other, and spend many an intimate nights falling asleep in each others arms after long nights of intimacy better than anything we ever have experienced. But we are just hanging on right now. I am talking to her as much as she allows. She opens a little to me, and I soak up every word she is willing to give like a sponge. I am her advocate with the boys, but they still are not the respectful gentlemen to her that she deserves. I am working on being available to her yet not smother her. I will share in future posts things that are improving, and how I am growing as a man to help facilitate this. I have a woman worth fighting for, and fight I will do. But in fighting for this relationship, I am finding things out about myself, that I am enjoying exploring. Who knew that i could get so much enjoyment out of reading. There are other things that, as an adult, I am finding more stimulating mentally than playing another version of some xbox war game. Lord knows I will never get back the countless hours I have donated to saving so many virtual cities... So stick around, I have so much shit to blog about that everyone will find something of interest. If you don't, then fuck you... you are probably pretty lame anyway!