Sunday

My day started off with my sister and her husband making sure I have had everything I needed, giving me love, advice, and driving me to the airport. I got to my gate and instantly started having overwhelming anxiety. I did not allow myself to go down that rabbit hole and took one of the emergency anxiety pills my doctor prescribed for just this situation.  As the medicine kicked in I was calm centered and then slept the complete one hour flight to Burbank.

As I landed I remembered being at the Burbank airport when I was a little girl.  The first flight my sister and I took by ourselves to our Grandmothers house was from that airport to San Jose, funny how being somewhere makes your remember things. I got off the plane walked out to baggage, which is still outside, and saw the beautiful smile of one of my best friends, Cara! She ran up to me and hugged me. We found my luggage ,walked to her car and were off!

We instantly started talking about everything, her family, my family, her kids, our mutual friends, we have not seen each other in two years and it was like we had spent no time apart. We went and had lunch and she gave me all sorts of tips and readied me for arrival to the resort. When we left lunch and headed up the mountain my tummy was nervous but I felt so safe and calm with Cara by my side.

When we arrived there was a very friendly trainer who took my bags from the car and told me to go ahead and get registered. After some paper work I was off to get weighed in. Cara came with me and as he walked through the resort she would see people that she had met when she was here 3 years ago and they did not recognize her because of her 120lb weight loss. It was fun to see her success in action.  I went into the room where you weigh in and there was a delightful woman who had me stand on the fanciest scale in America. It took all sorts of measurements and played classical music while it measured you. I am sure this is supposed to calm you in someway but I just felt like I was somehow using technology of the future to measure my body. After the music stopped I got a little chart saying how much I weighed and how much each part of me weighed. The number that stuck with me though is I am 52.5% fat.

 52% of what I carry around each day is made up of stuff I don't need. I think this is very telling about this journey. That it's not just about weight loss it's about figuring out what I can get rid of to live a life of intention. So Cara and I talked and on Sunday when I check out I am going to see what that number is and then set a smart goal to reduce it by December. The number on the scale is not great but I am less worried about it, I want to be made of stuff that works instead of stuff that just hangs on and weighs me down.

After checking into my room, by the way I have the best room in the whole place it's the only one with a private deck and sits at the end of a row and is super quiet, I had a trainer walk me back here as well as one of Cara's friends who came to visit her who leads hikes. Cara's friend stayed for a bit and chatted and then as I unpacked Cara went through my schedule and gave me some tips on what to do and how to do it.

We then went to dinner and it was like any time you meet a room full of strangers. Mostly everyone was lovely. Because literally everyone here at this point is a stranger I am not going to talk about them in this blog, this week is about me and my journey, and there journey is for them to tell. Dinner was delish and totally filling and after dinner we all had to go around and say our name, where we are from and a goal this week other than weightloss.

Cara went first and talked about her journey and about how excited she is that I am here and how she hopes I will get out of this week what she did. It was in that moment when I realized that I am never not part of a community. I stood up and said, "Well Cara already introduced me, but I am Sarah and I live in Little Rock, Arkansas and I work as an Executive Director of a non-profit and my goal this week is to focus on me, in a good way. Then everyone went around and introduced themselves followed by orientation. Then I promptly went to the store and bought all the things they talked about in orientation because marketing always works on me!

 As I lay here in my little cabin I am overwhelmed by the people who are rooting for me. The notes, emails, text messages, and facebook messages/posts. I have always been a public person when it comes to love and care of others, but rarely when it comes to loving and caring for myself. What I have already learned is that if you simply tell people that you are trying something and you are honest they will react in big and small ways that will make trying easier. These actions have given me more inspiration, strength, and encouragement than I could ever imagine.

Yesterday I said I would stand up and introduce myself as just me, but instead I was introduced by someone I love and respect. Today I was introduced as a friend a title that I take great pride in, and I am so lucky that part of this journey is learning that I have so many friends and I can grow and learn with you. Thank you Cara, and thank you to my overwhelmingly kind and loving community. I am blessed beyond measure.

Goodnight, tomorrow I start getting rid of the 52%!

Also I have no cell service here so if you need tor each me or feel like inspiring me please email or facebook message me.