Honeymoon Pics -- San Fran and Monterey

Shutterfly -- Pictures

Our pictures are up on Shutterfly.
http://mrandmrsmyers.shutterfly.com/
Password: wedding

RnJ

PICTURES & News

Sorry, it's taking forever for us to get the pictures up. There are just so many! We will finish this weekend. Also, if you haven't received a thank you in the mail yet, it's not because we aren't thankful. We're just busy busy!

We're moving April 18! When we have pictures of the new place. We'll put those up too! We love you all.

Stay tuned!
JM

Write

Hi. I like to write. The end. 

You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you. ~Ray Bradbury

Move

Hi again. This is an update. I still move. Still love that guy. Actually moved to Portland, OR, where we now live. It's awesome. Want to hear my ever so dramatic (not nearly as much as I once thought) story as I wrote it when starting this site? Cool. Here it is...

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movement. -noun. a series of actions or activities intended or tending toward a particular end.

By belief in absolutes you deny all movement, evolutionary or otherwise. When change occurs, your universe collapses.

Hi. I'm Jasmine. I'm 27 years old, and in that short time my universe has collapsed a couple times already. Sounds dramatic, huh? At the age of 20, I got married. At the age of 22, I was 343 pounds. At the age of 24, I was 142 pounds. That same year, I was divorced. 

When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us. 

Twenty-five days after my divorce, my friend introduced me to a boy. And, I liked him a lot. A whole lot.

I was divorced, bitter, and working at destroying my body with binge, purge, and water pills. It wasn't the right time. Our relationship was tumultuous, at best. I knew I needed to change.

For the first time in my life I wanted to figure out who I was without all the crutches I'd used in my life. Namely, food and men.

I threw my clothes and shoes in my blue PT Cruiser and set off into the sunset. Literally.

In 2007, I dedicated myself to positive, forward movement. I left my homestate of Indiana and started a new life in California. I built that life brick-by-brick on my own. I was alone, and finally, that was okay.

All things change, nothing is extinguished. There is nothing in the whole world which is permanent. Everything flows onward; all things are brought into being with a changing nature; the ages themselves glide by in constant movement.

Since that time, change has been the name of the game.

The boy followed me. Yes, that's right. Six months later, he joined me in Cali. Just as you can't escape change, there are certain fates that will follow you no matter how you cast them off.

In March 2009, Ryan and I married. He is my hero, my biggest fan, and the best, most positive example of a person dedicated to forward movement I've ever known.

 Change is not always growth
just as movement is not always progress.

The job I took when I first came to California was a corporate marketing job. After two years, I knew it wasn't the right place for me. They say to follow your bliss, and the stress and structure was dangerous to my creativity. I am now a self-employed freelance writer, and I absolutely love it.

I'm also a student. Dietetics. I love nutrition, and I sincerely want to help the super morbidly obese. It was the darkest place I've ever known. I want to "pay it forward" by living a life that makes a difference.

So, like I said, I'm dedicated to forward, positive movement in my life. That means mental, emotional, and physical movement. I strive for daily exercise, even if that's just a walk. There was a time in my life when hours in the gym was a possibility. I have more important priorities now.

I have committed to live the life I love, and right now I don't love hours upon hours in the gym.What I do love is spending time with my husband, reading, writing, blogging, and staying physically active in whatever ways my heart desires.

If you wanna make the world a better place,

take a look at yourself and make a change.

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Eat

Hi. I'm Jasmine, a jewelry artisan and freelance writer/marketer in Portland, OR. I opened this blog in 2008/2009 and eventually went on to create a standalone site. This site sat reader-less for years, and I rediscovered it in 2013, by which time I had quit blogging. I've quietly started writing here again in a journal format. 

I'm older and not quite as energetic as I once was, but it sure is fun for me to look at this blog and read about my adventures. If you want, read below the dotted line to see the story as I wrote it in 2009. I believed back then that I was an "after." I know now that there is no such thing. There is only the process. Cheers...

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I am flesh and blood proof you can change your life with a little courage and a lot of hard work.

Hi! I’ve had a complicated love affair with food since childhood. By the time I was six years old, I was wearing my mom’s jeans with the legs rolled up. I was a fat child, a fatter teen, and, eventually, a super morbidly obese adult.

At the age of 22 years old, I made the decision to undergo gastric bypass surgery. At 350 pounds, I was more than 200 pounds overweight (I’m only 5’1.). It was a drastic choice that I made after nearly a lifetime of dieting. I knew then that dieting didn’t work, but I didn’t realize what would.

It took me two years to lose the weight. I lost it faster than others because I worked out 2-3 hours a day and ate as few calories as possible. I took in maybe 7-800 calories a day at the time. All I cared about was my eternal quest to be “skinny.” I didn’t even know what skinny would feel like. Before I could walk, I was overweight.

Down 40 pounds.

On my 24th Birthday. Down 180 pounds.

My quest to lose the weight changed me and took a toll on my marriage. I survived my caloric stupidity, but my first marriage didn’t. I had married a wonderful man, but I was no longer the same person.

Divorced and still not “skinny,” I hit my lowest point. From there, I began to get real with myself. I started to study nutrition, and I began to consider my health. My whole health. The kind of health that includes your emotional well being. I realized that I’d lost all the weight, but I was still as shattered and insecure as ever.

I decided it was time to eat the right way, to make a move for me (a cross country move, in fact), and to focus on my writing.

In July of 2007, I moved to San Diego, CA.

July 2007. San Diego. Down 200 pounds.

Since that time, I have dedicated myself to EATing well, to exercise and positive, forward MOVEment, and to becoming the best WRITEr I can be. I now eat better than I have at any time in my life. In March of 2009, I married the love of my life. And, in August of 2009, I left my full-time job to pursue my greatest dream: I am now a 100% self-employed professional writer.

My own journey has inspired me. I believe that anyone, at any moment, can change their life. All they have to do is re-write their story.

What's your story?

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Read about my life philosophy at MOVE and my writing life at WRITE. Want to contact me? [eatmovewriteATyahoo.com]