Santa came early this year

When my mom and sister came to town for Thanksgiving I somehow talked them into posing with Mall Santa. Mall Santa was a good sport and even had my mom sit in his lap. When he asked me what I wanted for Christmas, I said "a job".

Thank you Santa! For the past two weeks I indeed have had a job. I am working now as a psychologist (hooray!) at a residential treatment program for adolescents with eating disorders. It is not a place I would have expected to be, but I am finding it quite to my liking. The girls (hell yes, it is all girls) have either failed out of lower levels of treatment or just come from psychiatric hospitals and aren't ready to go home. I see them for individual therapy 3x/week, family therapy 1x/week, and group therapy 5x/week. This doesn't include all of the other psychoeducational groups they attend that I'm not involved in, like nutrition, body acceptance, self-esteem, etc.

I'm having fun! I get to do all the things I like- individual, family, and group therapy. I get to be a bit of a boss, as I'm one of only two psychologists. I get to be called "Doctor M___", which is fun. I feel so lucky to have fallen into a job that I really like, when I was simply looking for a job I wouldn't hate!

Of course, Captain Awesome and I are still pursuing our place in the California Brain Drain, but that won't happen for at least another year. Until then, you'll know where to find me!

The 500 calorie breakfast

Today I bit the bullet and joined Weight Watchers. Yes, I did. In the past 8 months I've gained back 10 of the 30lbs I worked so hard to lose, so I knew it was time for a different approach. I thought maybe some added information and accountability would be a good start.

I am now the proud owner of 20 "points" per day that are mine to play with. As the meeting ended at 1pm, I immediately came home and calculated my breakfast into my daily equation.

REALITY CHECK!!!!!!!!

What I thought was a pretty healthy breakfast- well, I guess it still is in some respects- ended up costing me 12 of my 20 daily points based pretty much on the high number of calories. I usually eat about a cup of Kashi cereal (basically Grapenuts), some slivered almonds, and some blueberries with 1% milk. I'll admit my own negligence- I never looked at the calories on the Kashi. Did you know that shit is 210 calories per half-cup???

The moral of the story is to read labels. And to ask for help when you need it. And world peace.