This Is Not Going To End Well & Replacements

The move to Utah at the ripe age of 11 proved to be brutal on so many levels.

Utah is a beautiful place.

Beautiful.

I've now lived here for 33 years and the mountains define "home" for me.

The snow is blindingly stunning... from a distance.

The seasons are truly spectacular.

I felt like my brother, just one year younger than me... you know, the one who legit stole my birthday from me... faired the best.

B has never been much of a "I have to fit in," kind of boy.

But he made good friends and those friendships stuck through today.

He is the smart one in the family.

No matter what subject, he seems to have a photographic memory and doesn't have to study for anything.

He just shows up and aces pretty much everything.

He's the favorite. Always has been.

He IS bald, though.

So, there's that.

Anywho...

Utah for me, and for our youngest brother, was a bit more rough.

Dad went back to coaching right away.

The problem now was that the boys he was coaching were much closer to my age and that continued right through his retirement.

So, not only was his time and attention on these boys - but so was mine!!

I used to get their phone numbers off of the registration paperwork that sat in piles on our kitchen table and then dial those numbers and HOPE that the cute boy on my dad's team would answer, then quickly hang up.

Do not sit there and say that you never did it!

To this day, the last four digits of one of those phone numbers is my pin number for EVERYTHING.

True story.

Someone kill me now.

There was a boy in our neighborhood that had "a crush" on me. 

He was in ninth grade when I was in seventh.

We rode the bus to school everyday together.

It was a 45 minute bus ride each way.

He was "cool" and sat in the back of the bus.

I was uncool and sat in the very front seat because the bus driver - Linda- was my only friend.

Literally my only friend.

From the back of the bus, he and his friends would throw things at me every day - the entire 45 minutes.

Deodorant, combs, food... it didn't matter... it would all hit me square in the back of the head.

I would feel a material object hit my head seven or eight times on the way to school and on the way back home... followed by laughter.

All year.

Every day.

I would cry and cry and cry.

I would get to school, try to wipe it all out of my hair, that I didn't wash for a week because the "greased down" look was in at the time.

Don't wash, then apply extra Aqua Net hairspray - that was the rule.

Unfortunately, I didn't look like Christina Applegate or Alissa Milano when I applied this rule.

I would go home after school every day and eat a BLT.

This was after I already had lunch at school, breakfast at home, and just before dinner.

I had graduated from home-sewn clothes to store-bought.. but the store-bought included two pairs of corduroy pants and three BLOUSES.
The silky kind that rich old ladies wear.

WITH a broche. 

If you could only see my school pictures.

My life was getting worse by the minute and now I was eating away my feelings - my embarrassment, my humiliation, my insecurities, my fears, my sadness, my anxiety.

Eating it everyday with multiple BLT sandwiches.

When spring and summer came, there were boys everywhere again.

And Dad was busy with coaching, meetings, tryouts, fundraisers, and shouting the biggest hurrahs to the cutest boys that I was sure had ever been born.

My life sucked.

Royally.

Fast-forward to today:

Addiction doesn't just get cured and then you're good.

I wish!

But, that's a big, fat NO.

Addiction has to be discovered, and then there are steps (purpose of the 12-step program) to help you become completely aware of your addiction and then move forward.

It is imperative that your addiction is replaced by good behaviors, different hobbies, different things to occupy your time.

Without that, you're going to remain stuck in what you've been doing.

My replacements include going to the gym, yoga, meditation.

Reading.

Going to baseball games with my Braxton.

Sitting outside.

Playing games with my boys AND winning!

Baking.

Playing with my nephews.

Blogging.

Coloring.

Whatever it is, we must replace our addictions with things that are worthy of us!