Maybe I’m an Imposter
As a kid I always thought that when you become an adult, you just “get things.”
You know what I mean, I think. Like adults just automatically like vegetables and know how to cook things like casseroles and beef stroganoff. Adults know how to make sure their bills are paid on time and remember to send thank you notes.
I’m still waiting for that adult switch to turn on. Maybe it has, somewhat…partially. But all in all, on a daily basis, I feel like an adult imposter that at times fantasizes about being back at my childhood home on the couch eating a Pop Tart (without worrying about macros or nutrition content) and watching MTV.
Life has been happening but then — life is always happening.
On April 21 my one year old puppy died in a freak accident. I’ve talked about this on other platforms so I won’t re-hash the story. But truthfully, I am still reeling from the whole incident, and still grieving.
And so we got another puppy. Of course this puppy will never replace our sweet Solo, and she is completely different (and in some ways the same), but she keeps me up a lot at night and makes it hard to sit down. I’m exhausted. I feel guilty leaving her to go to the gym. I struggle to get in my steps. I find it harder to remember to track my food.
This may all seem like one big fat excuse, but it’s true. I feel like we have a newborn baby that runs around chewing on books and sometimes bites.
I’m still in a mini-cut that should be ending in a couple weeks (ahem, glances over at my coach). And with that I am looking forward to a build again. I’m feeling motivated to eating more, to lift heavier, to feel stronger. Not that I am feeling particularly bad, but I am looking forward to feeling a little more…whole.
Except a part of me wonders if that really happens?
Like will me eating more food and lifting more necessarily equate to feeling different? I will still have this puppy. I will still possibly be getting up at 1 am and 4 am to let said puppy out to pee and dig in the mud. I will still be feeling anxious about the timeline of an impending empty nest and worried about paying all of my bills on time.
I will still not inherently know how to make vegan beef stroganoff. I will still wish I was on my parent’s couch in 1991 and eating a Pop Tart.
I’m kind of an imposter, I think.
As a kid I had these things called Fashion Plates. It was a plastic board with raised stencils of women. Each part was sectioned off — the head, the middle, the bottom, so that you could swap out tops, bottoms and heads. One quick switcharoo and you could have short trendy hair with a blouse and gaucho pants and boots, and then flip it to a woman with long curls, a sundress and sandals.
I think a part of me — a small part of me — thought that by following a plan and being consistent, I would automatically fall into some sort of fit person mold. That I could switcharoo into this and become that. That I wouldn’t crave chocolate chips out of the bag, and that I would suddenly get up and start drinking lemon water and smoothies with kale and beets.
I can still do those things. I can work to be that person who does those things, if that’s what I want. But it doesn’t just happen, just like being that responsible adult doesn’t automatically snap into place like Fashion Plates.
Maybe that’s the part of being adult that comes with time. We realize nothing comes without time and action.
So life is happening. Life will continue to happen. Hopefully at some point the puppy will sleep through the night. Maybe I’ll start adding lemon to my water. Maybe I can find a recipe for vegan beef stroganoff.
And maybe I will buy some Pop Tarts and stream TRL on Youtube. Only time will tell.