So I’m in Taco Bell. I’ve decided this’ll be my Sunday splurge. That and an ice tea from Dutch bros. Taco Bell is SLOOOOOOW in getting out the food today. People are pissed. Throwing looks everywhere and mumbling. There was a time I’d be one of these patrons. But what’s the point? The guy behind the counter is making all the orders by himself.  He looks miserable. Prob making minimum wage. He has like 6 people staring at him angrily. Personally, this would not motivate me to work harder. I’d be stressed out if I was this guy. People…. ITS TACO BELL. Chill out. I’m hungry too but instead of focusing on how loooooooong the wait is, I’m wring this blog instead. I get that fast food is supposed to be fast. But in all reality it’s still faster than going to a sit down restaurant. Calm down. If the worst thing we’re waiting on is fast food, your in good health, your not preparing to bury a loved one, then it’s a GOOD DAY! Let’s take a day to be thankful! Great job to the msn making my burrito and is prob hot and miserable working at Taco Bell. 
~B

I have diagnosed myself with Obsessive Compulsive Eating Disorder. I’m going to guess that’s when you obsess about all the food that goes into your mouth. I haven’t exactly researched this and I don’t know if this is a true disorder but from what I can gather in my head I totally have this. So here’s what I’m going to do. I took off my fit bit, cancelled my weight watchers subscription, I’m not going to use myfitnesspal or any other calorie tracking device for a while. You know why? Because it’s NOT WORKING!!!! It’s not from lack of trying that’s for sure. Here’s what I do think; I think that at 39 years old I need to learn to love myself against all odds. Meaning? I need to love myself despite my weight, despite my current mental oddities. We all struggle with SOMETHING. I struggle with thinking that my worth depends on my waist size.

Today, I had sex with the lights ON! You know what? It didn’t occur to me what might be jiggling! I’m deciding at 39 to take my life back. My entire adult life has been consumed with the number on the scale. The number on my scale determined my self-worth for the week. How horrible is that? That a NUMBER on a SCALE could determine how I loved myself or not? I SAY NO MORE! I am no longer going to be a slave to the scale. I am going to do my best to eat healthy and live healthy but I am going to try hard to not allow it to consume me. I have to say NO to the obsession. I am good enough, I am smart enough, I am likable, I am genuine, I am reliable, I am fun. All of the things that make up who I am far outweigh the person who I have been convinced that I’m not. My husband still wants to have sex with me and thinks I’m beautiful. I didn’t have this type of marriage in the past. My first husband told me that if meth wasn’t addicting or could kill me, he would suggest it for weight loss. Who the fuck says that? Someone who wants to love an image not a person. Someone who is shallow. While I sometimes miss Craig I have to remind myself how incredibly shallow he really was at the end of the day.

I’m going shopping this week for clothes that I need, I am going to go with an open mind that I can find cute clothes that make me feel confident about myself. I am going to be ok. I will be ok at a size 14 and I will look in the mirror every morning knowing that I am the human God made. If God wanted my weight to be easy  he would’ve made it easy. Positive self-image is not easy. We are our own worst critics. God loves me, my husband loves me, my children, family and friends love me. What else can I really ask for?

Right now, I could be eating potato chips, and getting ready to stuff chocolate chip cookies into my mouth. I have seen 125 pounds and I have seen 198 pounds. My problem TODAY is not allowing my self-worth weigh (ironically) on my weight. My first husband once said to me “I would encourage you to use meth (to lose weight) if it wasn’t so addicting and could kill you. Mind you this is before I really knew what meth was. Awesome huh? I married that guy. The same guy who would fix me an incredible dinner and then encourage me to go throw it up or take a laxative. F-A-T is the one word I don’t tolerate from anyone else in my life but it’s what  I tell myself everyday. Everyday I compare myself to someone else. If only I could have smaller boobs, hips, thighs etc. I’m trying to remember that right now life is what it is. I am who I am, and I should be proud of myself, and focus on the positive. I have an incredible business that I have worked very hard at. I have a husband who loves me and would do anything for me. I have two beautiful, healthy children who do well in school and have a drive to do well in life. THESE are the things I need to be focusing on, NOT what size my pants are. Do I want to be healthy? Of course I do, I’m just at a pit stop in my life where I’m supposed to learn something. I think this pit stop could be titled “Self-Love.” I have never been great at self-love or self-care because I never really knew it existed. About nine years ago I was diagnosed with bi-polar II, mild depression, and borderline personality disorder (BPD). Self love was never in my vocabulary. I loved myself a lot over the years through a unhealthy relationship with food. I typically eat out of boredom. I typically graze all day so I’m never really “full.” I think my obsession to be able wear clothes off the rack in small sizes has me a bit on the OCD side at the moment. I/m being vulnerable here so please bear with me. I was forced to go shopping last week for some capri’s and some shorts as I had a trip coming up and yoga pants were not going to make the cut. With all the bravery I could muster up I went to the clearance racks and looked for some clothes. I was very fortunate that I found a couple of pairs of capris and a couple of cute shirts. I looked in the mirror and didn’t completely HATE the person looking back at me. My self-worth must stop feeding solely of my weight. The way I view myself has ruined trips, events, etc. I tell myself “I bet she’ll just look at me like ‘how can she be so big?” But in reality I know that person is struggling with their own issues. Quite honestly, it would surprise me if anyone thought anything about me at all like the way I do. I’m no one special (in the sense that I should feel like people are talking about me). I’m tired of being hung up on myself. Am I pretty enough, thin enough, funny enough, do people like me?

I recently decided to wean off my anti-depressant. SCARY. Last week was a great week but this week is a little iffy. I’m noticing patterns in myself that occur in people with bi-polar and BPD. I will sleep for 4 hours and then BING, I’m wide awake. The next week I will sleep my life away from being so unstable the week prior. This is an exhausting pattern.

I think what I am supposed to learn in my journey is self-love. To love myself no matter how many clients I have in a week, what my pant size says, just to love myself for me. I will tell you a hard cold fact. Self-love is hard no matter who you are. For me, adding in all the mental components are a real humdinger.  So here I am, today, fighting the urge to go grab the left-over chocolate chip cookies we took camping and practice self-love. Fuck it~ I’m getting a cookie.

Love,

~B

46 weeks until I’m 40. I’m going to do this right. Well I’m going to try anyway, I won’t be perfect, I’ll decide at some point no one cares that I have 47 weeks and counting until I’m 40 but then I’ll remind myself that at the end of the day I am publishing this book for me. Noone else but me. I’m still convincing myself of this because what’s a book if no one reads it or buys it. FEAR, has driven me my entire life. If I don’t start now I never will. This is my dream. To write a book. Funny, heartwarming and totally stupid at times I’m sure.

Once upon a time in a place called Medford, Oregon lived this bat-shit, crazy nail tech/wife/mom/friend/daughter/sister….well you get the point. I think everyone thinks ,y niche is being a nail tech. Like thats how I’m creative and passionate. That’s a giant lie, I have never even pretended that was true. Anyone who has ever listened to me talk about how I got into nails in the first place already knows this story. Which of that happens to be you then you can probably skip to a more relavant chapter, OR you can relive again.

We all have a past. I can tell you where I was born and raised and blah, blah, blah, but none of that is really interesting. I actually don’t know where to start, well actually I do, but its an awkward place to start. Honestly everything before it was just your typical twisted, I cam frim a broken home, kinda family stuff. Typical. I guess. I’m going to bounce around a lot, but I know I’m a good writer so you should be able to follow along. Especially if your ADD them this book will be TOTALLY up your ally.

About eight years ago I was diagnosed with bipolar II, borderline personality disorder, PTSD, and depression. A FUN cocktail of mental disorders! Can I get an AMEN!? It’s been a struggle. I was in denial for the first five years. It wasn’t until it started to affect my kids and my work life that I decided I needed to get help. I left my first psychiatrist, mainly because he was retiring and a total asshole, and found my new psychiatrist who’s kinda hippy-ish but so incredibly awesome. She spent a solid hour with me going over my history. My first psychiatrist barely gave me the time of day; he just threw me whatever prescription of the month he thought would help me. Because I din’t trust him I rarely took my medications a prescibed. I litterly loathed the man who said I had these disorder but acted like he could give a rats ass about how I was doing. So after awhile,  I would go in for my monthly visits and tell him things were perfectly fine. I was done feeling uncared about nut it never occured to me to find another psychiatrist until I was forced to when he retired. What an incredible GOD SEND! My new doctor has fed me a cocktail of medications trying to figure out what will work for me. The problem is that they work for about three to six months and then they just seem to stop working. In saying this, she is constanly listening to me and genuinly cares about my well being.

Lets start when I was 12. I was molested and my life changed forever. Why? Because when something like that happens to a child it just flips a switch and everything is forever changed. This is relevant because I feel like I have linked this experience to my inability to trust men, hell even women. Now, if you know me, then you think I am WONDERFUL at making connections which is true. What is also true is that I have a hard time finding and keeping deep rooted connections. I KNOW a lot of women, and I love many of them dearly, and if their lucky (or unlucky) they might find their name in this book along the way. All of the women I have encountered in the last seven years have changed my life for the better, Seven years ago I became a nail tech. I was in school to be a psychologist as well, but I needed to make money while I was in school. I was “let go” from my job as an insurance agent. I did that job for six years. An answer to prayer in many ways and without that leas I would not be sitting here today writing this memoir. Now where do I go? OK, I’ll skip through some mumbo jumbo. I was 21 and new to Medford when I got pregnant with my son (more on that in his chapter). I was 23 when I got prego with my daughter and swore my world was ending. Youknow how I found out I was pregnant with Victoria? I was going in for a breast reduction and did a quick pregnancy test two days before I went in and BOOM! No breast reduction for me. I had VERY large breasts. I think they’re smaller now, honestly I can’t remember. But I DO remember being very pissed that I was no longer going to be able to get smaller breasts AND I was going to have another baby when at 23 I was practically a baby myself. Serioulsy, I know more than my fair share of, young, scared,  inteligent, underpridledged single mommies. Almost ALL of them are more mature at this whole baby thing than I ever was. The moment I realized my mom and their dad didn’t care if I left the babies at home while I hauled my ass down to Ground Zero Dance club (remember that place Medfordians???). Fun times right there. Now I know I should look back and feel a little guilty for going out while my kids were at home sleeping but thats exactly what they were doing….SLEEPING. What was I supposed to do? Watch them sleep? Boooooring. So I went with my friends to Ground Zero and danced aways most of the weekends all while never buying a drink for myself. Now I’m over here at almost 40 watching girls who were my age being WAY more responsibnle and taking their kids to the park, hanging out at home. Now mind you, I didn’t have, facebook, instagram, twitter, or snapchat to pass away the time at that age. I had the internet, AOL, chatrooms, and online games like cribbage. So this alone tells you how old I am! I had to go OUT to socialize. There was no TindR, plenty of fish, match.com etc to “hook up” or even try to find a date. BACK THEN we had to LEAVE THE HOUSE to meet people. I don’t even know how we did it. Anyway it was just a matter of time before Match.com came alonf and I met my now husband. But he’s irrelevant until much later. Well kind of. He was relevant when we hooked up in 2004, but then nothing more happned until 2007. More on that later.

In the last 39 almost for years I have had several life altering events happen. All in which I will get to eventually. So, if you’ve read this far and feel so inclined to stay, I would love to share the rest of the journey with you. Because that’s what life is. Life is a jouney.

15 years old. A heart so pure and true. You believed him when he said “I love you. 15 years old. Love is new. You believed it yourself when you said “I love you too”

15 years old not a little girl or a women. Caught somewhere in between for a moment. 

15 years old; not quite old enough to know better, definitely to young to care. Oh how this world will devour you like bears. 

15 years old your broken hearts hurts oh so bad. Nothing your mother can do to not make you sad. 

30 years old, someday you’ll ask me; momma? What was I thinking? I’ll wrap my arms around you so tight and so firm. I’ll reply I’m not quite sure my angel, but it’s been quite the fight that’s for sure. 

~B

Positivity. 5 syllables. Easy. Positivity. Negativety. Also 5 syllables and also easy. Which one is easier? Glass half empty or glass half full? My ENTIRE life I’ve been a “worst case scenario” person. Glass half empty. I’m not sure there is anything to blame. I mean I’m a psych major so one could say my line of thinking is contributed to my childhood environment. Another theory could be natural personality. 

I WANT to he a positive person. To always look at the brighter side of life. My dream is to become a motivational speaker and author. 

I started taking medication for bipolar II and BPD. While these medications have helped save my sanity, I no longer have a passion for creativity. It’s kind of like I’m  on autopilot all the time. Compared to what I used to be like? It’s very boring; I’m not going to lie. I miss the bright ideas I used to have. Coming up with incredible ideas for my book and topics to speak on for public seminars. I believed in myself. While this medication has greatly improved my relationships and calmed me down I can’t help but feel like a part of my soul has been stolen. 

Dear clients, and friends, and extended family members. My husband and I got into a conversation this morning that made me think. 

We are essentially like a family. An extended family essentially. Cousins, aunts, sisters, nieces, best friends….etc. In some way, shape, or form EVERYONE who has walked in my door has impacted my life in some way. Some impacts have created life-long friendships. Some impacts have hit me causing me to fall to my knees in despair. 

I LOVE deeply with no judgement. We live in a world where it’s essentially weird to love “thy neighbor” and I simply can’t help it. I won’t say I like everyone who’s walked in my door but there’s generally a mutualism in this. When this happens one of two things happen. It becomes an interesting relationship of time, or that person walks out and I never see her again (generally). God (or whatever higher power you believe in) has this funny way of working on relationships between people if given the opportunity. I LOVE my opportunities! Everyday is a day that I get to fall more in love with the uniqueness of each person who sits across from me. In the 7 years I’ve been in this business it’s only been about the last 2 years that I’ve literally LOVED my job. I quit focusing on the fact that “doing nails” isn’t my dream job.
 

God knew what he was doing. God knew I needed a career based on relationships with women that changed lives. Mine and theirs. It’s why I wanted to be a women’s therapist. I get to DO THIS EVERYDAY! It the COOLEST job ever! I get to sit and be relational everyday. I’ve been given the opportunity by God to make amazing friends and extended family. I say “by God” because I BEGGED him to put me in a job where I would work with women everyday. It wasn’t the job I had lined out for me but it was the job He lined out for me. 

A little fact about me…..I HATED this job for YEARS. I went to school and I have my BS in psychology. I was working on getting into a program for my Masters and PhD. I was going to be a psychologist for women. It was my DREAM job. It was THE JOB I knew I was supposed to do. But God had a different job title for me. I wanted the fancy title Dr. Bridget Wehde PhD. But I have something BETTER. I have a title I’ve EARNED. Bridget Wehde- Nail tech, friend, sister, aunt, cousin, whatever it becomes (because it ALWAYS becomes something). And this is where I should apologize. 

Why am I apologizing? Because as the weeks, months, and years go by, one of us will do something that’ll hurt a little. Not even on purpose. I have so many examples I wouldn’t even know where to start. The problem with hurt is that no one wants to confront it. People WILL confront it over TEXT. I don’t advocate this in the slightest. If possible always a phone call or wait till we can be in front of each other to address it. If I hurt your feelings I will OWN it. I will put it on as armor and then apologize with the hopes that we can win the battle together. After that, I can take off my armor and we can move on in our relationship. In some instances it’s like a marriage. Love, confront, work through it, move on. My relationship with you is really no different. 

Some of you KNOW me better than my own biological extended family. Why? Because if I’ve told you something personal about me it means two things:

1. I trust you with that information 
2. I look at you and see more than $35 in my chair. I see my FRIEND. Someone Ive developed an equal trust. 

Some relationships are just starting while others have been in the works for YEARS. 

To the amazing women in my life; THANK YOU. Thank you for the incredible friendships! To the women I’ve yet to meet; I look forward to meeting you. I’m perfectly imperfect. I have lots of flaws. I’ve made lots of mistakes. I look forward to the years ahead we have together.

embracing the journey one person at a time