Emily Rose: The Reboot

[Emilyrose]

Lads, it's been an absolute whirlwind of a week. I haven't had a chance to breathe. But it's been fabulous.

Sunday I did get up and go for that run and played tennis in the evening with my usual crew. I had dinner at home beforehand. It definitely cheers my mum up when I'm around.

Monday I had an epic hour and a half session with some of my faves in the tennis club. I felt so, so good afterwards. I got a great workout in and we had so much fun.

Tuesday I had the dentist, and while my gums are still bleeding a lot, no fillings or anything else required. I call that a win. I also had dinner at home again - roast chicken this time, really nice.

Wednesday I was meant to be playing my first match in a tournament, but there was a mix-up, so the captain gave us tea and cake for free as an apology. Fab.

Last night, I won my match! And I had an amazing day in work as well. The guy we played against was lovely, he sat with us for a while and had a few beers, it was really nice.

Today, I got a lovely card and voucher from my boss, and had another game this evening at the club. A gang of club members were playing before my crowd went on, and it was so cool, because we all kind of know each other now, and we were chatting about my win last night and trips taken up the country, and it was so lovely. I love when you start to get to know people and really get comfortable with them.

Anyway, all in all, fantastic week. I'm drinking wine now, because I need to decompress after the madness, but I haven't drank since last Friday, which is a great achievement. I haven't had time!! I feel really good. (I actually had one victory beer last night, forgot that, but still, good going.)

 

[Cate]

That sounds like a lovely week, Em. So good, so good

 

[Marsia]

Sounds like a fabulous week, with good celebrations and love how you're feeling so comfortable and included with your tennis buddies! I so miss having a group like that, and I feel so so happy for you!! Congrats on the win!! And it puts a smile on my face hearing how your mom cheers up being around you, and how much you love being home. A wonderful week all around.

 

[Emilyrose]

- Thanks Cate.
- Thanks Marsia, it really was.

And it doesn't stop there....

I've made my first semifinal of a tournament. The Emily Rose Training Academy has been a fantastic success. I feel like this isn't real life, it's too good to be true!! Hahaha. We've had two very close matches to get this far - we start out poorly and looking to be hammered, and suddenly, we come back to life and start playing great. I'm ecstatic about the whole thing.

I was serving to win the match tonight and there is that pressure there not to crumble, and I started to think to myself of how many hours I've put into this crazy game, and that this was my chance to seize! Carpe diem. And we won the match! How refreshing to finally have some positive self-talk swirling around in my brain, after years of berating myself and giving myself a hard time. That for me is the biggest win of all.

Win or lose in the semis, I am absolutely delighted with myself. I am going to build on this, and I'm really going to start putting my health back at the top of the list. I have all the tools I need to start looking after this beautiful machine properly - it's just a matter of utilising them.

It's been a very hard couple of years for the family - not our first hard couple of years either. But my parents were there tonight, clapping and cheering me on, and that made all the difference in the world. I am really blessed.

Tomorrow will be a recovery day and then September will be here, and hopefully, a brand new chapter in my life will begin...

Tonight is a night for disco if there ever was one...

 

[Cate]

How refreshing to finally have some positive self-talk swirling around in my brain, after years of berating myself and giving myself a hard time. That for me is the biggest win of all.

Win or lose in the semis, I am absolutely delighted with myself. I am going to build on this, and I'm really going to start putting my health back at the top of the list. I have all the tools I need to start looking after this beautiful machine properly - it's just a matter of utilising them.

That's fantastic, Em!
It's lovely that your parents were there cheering you on as well. This could be the turning point for you, Em. You are making such positive changes & it is paying off!

 

[Marsia]

So fantastic! We just watched Dead Poet's Society last night because we had "Carpe diem" as a vocabulary phrase in Latin class and we just wrote poems. And I was just thinking about how people say that the most valuable thing we have is time, so how do I want to use my time so I fit in many happy things? Anyway, it sounds like a pivotal moment and wonderful win!

Win or lose in the semis, I am absolutely delighted with myself. I am going to build on this, and I'm really going to start putting my health back at the top of the list. I have all the tools I need to start looking after this beautiful machine properly - it's just a matter of utilising them.

To tell the truth, I got sad hearing about how you were treating your body, and I'm really glad you are having this whole positive experience of winning on so many levels!!! So happy you about ERTA paying off in spades and all the great enthusiasm it's sparking in your life!

 

[Emilyrose]

- Thanks Cate. There's a long road ahead but I will keep tapping on that glass until it breaks!
- Thanks Marsia. Please don't be sad though - I'm still young enough and it's not all bad.

Well guys... today.... I played my first FINAL!! We lost but I got a sports voucher as a prize and got my photo taken. I've had an absolute blast of a week, got on great with Paul my tennis partner, and my parents were thrilled. My dad slept for 12 hours last night because he's been on such a high all week, he barely slept at all!

Then I played another tournament match this evening with a different guy - got trashed. Lost 0-6, 0-6. What a rollercoaster. Haha. I won't be getting too big-headed anyway. Things came crashing down again fairly fast.

Weight is also a bit better - just under 198 this morning. Hopefully that continues! I have another match in the morning - my confidence is a bit knocked from the earlier trashing today, but on the other hand, I just made a final, so I can definitely play tennis! I'll just have to put today down to a mismatch of partner and opponents who were at the top of their game. They were so good. Not one waiver. We didn't have a hope.

The week has flown by with all the excitement. I really love this time of year. I'm doing a bit better on the food front - trying to just get back to eating regular meals again, which makes such a difference to your digestion, by the way! This week won't be as manic, so I will have time to get my breath back and get organised again. Prepping my lunches at home and a lunchtime walk at work are key, as well as porridge in the morning. Even doing those things the last few days has seen the weight start to drop a bit.

That's kind of it for now. Hoping to redeem myself in the morning. Going to switch off now with some Netflix and try to get a good night's sleep.

 

[Marsia]

That's amazing you made the finals your very first season! I hope you're very proud of all the hard work and dedication! (Love the rollercoaster comment! I think sometimes it's better to go up against someone who you can't hope to beat instead of losing by a whisker. And now you have an awesome player's skill level to aspire to for next tournament season.) Great you are doing so well weight-wise, too! I am matching you in weight, so hopefully we can inch our way back down together! Your plans for walks and packing lunches sound really good, and hope you get lots of well earned rest!

 

[Cate]

Well done on playing in a final, Em. That ERTA is really paying off! Yay for planning your meals, walking in your lunch break & seeing the results with your weight coming down. I hope you are getting that good night’s sleep. I think you’re in a good place right now

 

[Emilyrose]

- It's actually my second season Marsia, but to go from winning 0 games last season to getting to a final this year was certainly unexpected. There's a little silver medal on my profile now. I'm thrilled.
- Thanks Cate. I am sort of in a good place. Up and down.

Yes, it's the inevitable comedown today after all the excitement of the last few weeks. The weather is crap, work was dull, I ate badly, etc etc. Worried about the future.

I was trying to comfort myself earlier with the fact that I've had such a great year in terms of achievements and reaching goals. I was in my first film, I performed on stage in a very successful play, I wrote a wonderful scene for that play and got great feedback on it. I won a huge award at work, I got to a final in a tennis tournament... I mean, it's been a blistering success really. And I still have 4 months to go! So, I guess I'm trying to feel proud and happy about all of those things. They are things I've worked on and I've really reaped the rewards.

But I guess time is moving on - at 36, I have no man, no house, and no particular goals career-wise to focus on. I'm having a lot of dreams about having a baby lately. And yet, there's so much I still want to do in my own life with acting, music, writing, tennis... how will I fit a relationship and a baby in with all that? A friend of mine gave up her life to raise her kids while her husband ran around going to fancy work dinners and making money and treating her like the scullery maid, and I have this huge fear that that will happen to me. The idea of domestic life has never really appealed to me. But I also would love to be in love with a wonderful man and have a little family to potter about the place with. I just want time to stop for a while. But of course, it's not going to stop for me.

Covid hasn't helped matters. One minute I was early 30s, now I'm almost late-30s. It's been really tragic for me in that way. These are key years, and they are slipping by. No wonder I've turned to wine to comfort myself! Poor me, poor me, pour me another drink... Ugh. But yeah, I need to start making changes, and it needs to be pretty soon, otherwise I'll have missed my window. And the window is closing too fast for my liking...

I just had a read back through my diary on the same date the last few years, which is something I like to do at times. It seems 5th September is often a day that I self-reflect. This bit is from 2018, ties in quite nicely with what I was saying earlier:

I was thinking earlier about all the good things in my life and all the stuff I'm doing now that I have wanted for so long. Here's the list:
- I am a core member of a drama group, something I have wanted for years, and we have an upcoming production for 2019.
- I am working in a yoga centre, something years ago I would have thought was a thing only ''cool'' people do. Guess I'm cool now, hahaha.
- I work in marketing, which was the team I wanted to join in my old company, but there wasn't really an opportunity.
- I can drive, swim, cook, clean. All good skills to have. At one point, the thought of driving terrified me, I actually thought I wouldn't be capable of it, and now I absolutely love it.

I guess those are all achievements of some sort, but while I was focused on hating my body, I managed to get all that stuff done sneakily in the background! It's not all bad! Something I often lose sight of.

The things that are still eluding me (love, healthy body) are the things I want the most, so of course, they're not going to come easily. What will I do with myself when I finally have them? At the rate I'm going, I'll probably be an 80-year-old with abs and a 35-year-old toyboy on my arm. Haha. Oh God, I pray it doesn't take that long.

 

[Cate]

I think you are already making changes, Em. I can see it anyway. That picture-perfect relationship & family so often does not translate into reality. I think being a parent is one of the most demanding gigs in the world. You never stop worrying about them. I hope that you do meet a man who will make you happy. I have been fortunate & I wouldn't have anything different, but I know luck came into our meeting & we have been through many ups & downs. Love is a wonderful thing & I really hope you find it or it finds you.

 

[Marsia]

I agree about the relationship thing. Some people I know who were childhood sweethearts and looked so perfect broke up over cheating and other things where they took each other for granted. You are more mature now, so may have avoided all sorts of immature men who maybe weren't the best partners. It's really not good to compare yourself to an ideal - the ideal is nothing like most people's actual lives. It took me 40 years to find my partner, and it is good I matured enough to realize he was the right person for me. We're very different, so if I had met him earlier in life, I probably wouldn't have recognized what a good match we are in many ways.

That's cool you are dreaming about having babies! That usually represents new things coming into your life, or new aspects of yourself emerging. Taking care of just my one kid is fabulous and wonderful, and I am immensely grateful that I had her, but it also takes up a good deal of my waking life and has for the past 15 years. I am very much looking forward to having time for myself again, though I will miss her with all my heart when she goes off to college.

Anyways, so nice about the silver metal on your profile, and I can't believe how fast time is flying. I do remember now that this is your second season, it just seems like maybe a couple of months ago when you were invited to play in them!

 

[Emilyrose]

- Thanks Cate. I guess you are always curious about the thing that eludes you. I just find it fascinating that other people find it so easy to jump around from relationship to relationship.
- Yes, time is flying by, Marsia! Giving up the 'me' aspect of my life would be incredibly difficult and take some adjustment, but I do love kids and I think it would be amazing to watch someone learning all the stuff about the world for the first time, and would bring a stronger appreciation of life and the world and universe and all the amazing things we have here to me again. But anyway. Who knows if it is still possible...

I'm incredibly tired this week and in bad form, it has to be said. I'm in a low mood. I haven't taken it out on anyone or been crabby at work, which is always a plus. It's just been an internal struggle. I feel flat, my life feels flat. And, you know, that's okay. Last week was a total UP week, which isn't sustainable either. I don't like things being too manic either, because I get exhausted from that also.

I suppose the best way to describe it would be that it was a lonely week. I went to a gig on my own tonight, and then a very kind girl asked to bum a cigarette off me, and then said that I could join her friend group for the evening, and it turned out that I knew one of them through another friend, so I didn't feel as awkward. But still, I don't love going to things on my own. Still, I guess it worked out quite well.

Alex the painter also texted me full of remorse, and said I was nice and kind and intelligent and pretty and it was a pity that we had so many arguments. So that cheered me up considerably. And I had one girl ask me to partner with her for a tennis tournament and another woman tonight asked me to join her usual crew for a doubles game, and all those things made a difference and helped me to feel better.

I really need a good night's sleep tonight and hopefully, I will start to shake this lonely feeling a bit. I guess what I was saying before about being worried about my future prospects is not something I can easily shake. Change is hard and I really need to change in order to live the sort of life that I want to live. I am very closed off in some ways and I feel like I am only making progress in the areas that I find it easy to make progress in. I just think loving my body and loving somebody else are so closely intertwined and I hate that I refuse to let someone in because I am so unhappy with how I look. In some ways, I think I look okay, but when you bring intimacy into it, I just can't bear it. Or is it bare it?

Anyway, that's it for now.

 

[Cate]

I see another very positive improvement, Em in not taking out feeling low & crabby on anyone around you. That can be very hard. It's another good quality that you don't want to flit from one relationship to another. I hope the next week is more balanced for you

 

[Marsia]

That's great you had people invite you to tennis and include you for a night out, and always nice for an ex to think of you kindly. I really feel you about wanting to look nicer for a potential partner. Lately I do not look toned up and am feeling rather disappointed in myself about it. I am really going to work on that. It's great to hear you are able to feel all those crabby feelings and they don't overspill. I still work on this, but am also getting better at it. Change is hard, but I think you are doing marvelous on so many levels!

 

[Emilyrose]

- Thanks Cate. Not quite found the balance yet, unfortunately.
- Thanks Marsia. Change is so bloody hard!

Okay. I have a goal in mind that I want to see happen. I really want the short film that I made to get accepted for a film festival happening in London in January. I have friends over there that I have been meaning to visit for so long, and it would be the perfect excuse for me to go and watch the premiere of my film! But... it has to get accepted first. So, I am willing with all my might that the Universe will grant me this wish.

I will be in London in January 2023 for the premiere of my first ever short film.

This is a goal that I really have no control over, but I do have some kind of trust in the Law of Attraction and manifestation and all that, and this is my attempt at that. I am also going to work on losing 35 pounds by then. It's doable, 2 pounds a week, which isn't crazy, considering I have no control over my eating habits whatsoever these days. Any day that I rein it in slightly, the scales start to respond. So I know it's possible. I think it's good to work towards this premiere, and then, even if it doesn't happen, I'll still be back to a normal weight by January. It's exciting to think about really.

I've actually had a good enough week overall - played some nice tennis and caught up with a friend at the weekend who I haven't seen in a while. We went for food and to the cinema, it was lovely. I also went to watch a friend from the club play a match tonight and met another woman from the club who is going through a tough time at the moment, so it was nice to have a chat with her as well and provide a listening ear. It all helps when times get a bit exhausting and overwhelming.

I have a lesson tomorrow with the cute coach, but I am really tired and just praying that work tomorrow goes quickly. I'm worn out, to be honest, and I have a lot on with work next week also. So this weekend is all about relaxation and regenerating. I know that I can bounce back quickly, I'm just not really giving myself a chance to. So just one more day and then I am sleeping and eating well and nurturing my body and soul.

 

[Cate]

- Thanks Cate. Not quite found the balance yet, unfortunately

Me either!

So just one more day and then I am sleeping and eating well and nurturing my body and soul.

Sounds good. Let's do it!
*sigh*

 

[Emilyrose]

Haha, I had to laugh at the sigh, Cate. I totally understand the frustration.

I had a lovely evening tonight - had a group lesson with the nice coach. I was trying to work out what I find so appealing about him, and I think it's the fact that he has such a lovely, beaming smile. So inviting. He said he would be around for the tournament starting next week, so hopefully I will get to chat to him a bit more then. He was really smiling at me at the end there! Who knows?! Maybe he's the man for me. It would be surprising (he's about 10 or 12 years older than me) but I guess life is full of surprises. Oh no, there I go, getting carried away again over a smile. Lol. No wonder I'm single. I'm like one of those Regency singletons that Jane Austen writes so well with no prospects but lots of pluck. Hahaha.

Anyway, we played on after the lesson. I'm very happy with how I'm playing, especially with my mixed doubles partner, so I am feeling quietly optimistic. My ladies doubles partner is a really nice, kind lady, but I feel she has no focus whatsoever on the court, which can be kind of annoying. She's a big talker, which is fine, I love a chat, but when I'm on the court, I really just try to save all my energy for hitting the ball well and shutting down all the stories and stuff going on in my head. This will seem like an incredibly cocky remark, but that's how I know that I will eventually be really good. I'm not naturally gifted at any sport really, but I am so determined when I set my mind on something. It's a quality that I need to start to employ for weight loss also! I just can't seem to tap into it for that. But I will. I know I will reach my goal weight. And then immediately get pregnant. That's honestly what I foresee happening, hahaha. Obviously, that means the clock is ticking for me to get my bloody act together!!! I'm just trying to ward off a life of responsibility as long as I can.

Tomorrow, I am just going to sleep for as long as I can, play tennis at 6pm, and eat as well as I can. Sunday is a gym day, possibly meeting my friend for lunch and a walk, and then another tennis game at 6pm. And then it's Monday again. Sigh.

 

[Cate]

I love all of the above, Em. I did eat much better yesterday.

I'm not naturally gifted at any sport really, but I am so determined when I set my mind on something. It's a quality that I need to start to employ for weight loss also! I just can't seem to tap into it for that. But I will. I know I will reach my goal weight.

I can be so determined too. Hopefully, we'll both tap into that!

 

[Emilyrose]

Thanks Cate.

Had a very good day today. Well, it started with an abysmal weigh-in, but I shrugged it off and went for a run. It was a really beautiful morning and where I ran, there were little ducks and swans parading around, and lots of people sitting on benches eating their breakfast, and it was just good Sunday vibes all round. I also had the best sleep I've had in ages last night - collapsed into bed at around 8.30 pm and woke up at 10 am this morning. I really needed it though.

After my run, I came home, had a shower, read the paper for a while, and then I went to meet my friend for lunch at a nice hotel in town. I got the seafood chowder with one slice of bread, and a cup of coffee after. We went for a shortish walk and then I went home again to get ready for tennis. Ended up playing tennis for 2 and a quarter hours, which was a lot more than I planned. I played mixed doubles first, but then one of the other lads had texted me for a hit-around afterwards, and two of the men stayed. So I ended up playing with the 3 men for the next hour and a bit. I was delighted, because I held my own, and obviously, the men have a lot more power and it's a harder game, but I did really well. So very happy with that. They're also all just really sound, which makes it even better, haha.

I have such a busy day tomorrow in work and more tennis planned for after work, but I might have to cancel if I don't get through enough of my task list. I'll just have to gauge how it's going. I have tennis on Tuesday as well, but I might also cancel that if I feel too under pressure. There will be plenty of people willing to step in anyway, because there's a tournament coming up.

Not a lot else to report really. My legs are very sore after all the exercise today, and my hip is acting up a bit again, which is worrying. I really hope that the scales are kind in the morning. I nearly caved and bought wine this evening - I even stood looking at the wine fridge for a bit, but I managed to overcome it and went home empty-handed. Phew. I am so happy with my decision now, let me tell you that.