Tomorrow, February 15th, will be my 29th birthday. I know that culturally, the New Year is our time for wiping the slate clean and starting over, but personally I've always felt more resolved to make changes on my birthday. I mean, think about it-- it's my own personal New Year, right? Makes more sense to me than to do it on some random day that's only been chosen based on where it falls in whatever calendar our society is using, But that's just me.

This past week has been brutally atrocious-- school and work have been ridiculously stressful (my very last class before my externship, and of course it is about public speaking, and finding an externship site is proving to be a longer ordeal that I had hoped), I have felt rotten health-wise (probably due to my eating habits this week, read on), my sleep has been almost non-existent, and I've been living off of 400-500 calories per day, most of them empty so I know I haven't been getting the nutrients I need. All this has only added to my self-hatred and depression, and has made coping with all this even more challenging. And I now say ENOUGH. I don't know if I deserve to to be happy, but by God I am sick of feeling This ******. My birthday is tomorrow, and in celebration of the fact that, by some crazy miracle, I am still here on this earth, I am going to make some changes. I am going to start reinforcing the positive aspects of my situation-- gratitude for what I have and for what it out there for me. I am going to start actually listening to my nutritionist and getting back into counseling. There's more I could do, but those starting points are appropriate, I think. Today's goal is to stick to the meal plan I made instead of changing it mid-day to lower the caloric content to 500 instead of 640. It's still inadequate I know, but better than what I've had recently, and you gotta start somewhere, right? And I exercise 5 times a week, so I know nutrients are a requirement. Again, I don't know what I'm worth, but I know when I am fed up, and I've reached that point. It's not about what I deserve, it's about what I NEED. If anyone has ideas for other positive changes, I would be interested to hear them. Happy birthday to me.