So a few days ago, I promised to share my 2023 Word of the Year. And here it is…FAITHFUL.

So let me tell you how I “found” this word. One of my FB friends posted about how difficult 2020, 2021, and 2022 have been. My comment to her was that these past few years made me very appreciative of biblical Jews as they struggled through very difficult circumstances for hundreds of years and yet they never lost their belief that God is FAITHFUL.

I thought about how the Jewish people remained faithful during those 400 long years when they heard nothing from God. There were no prophets to bring them God’s Word, but they remained faithful that God was faithful.

So FAITHFUL is my Word of the Year.

I want to focus on the fact that God is faithful even when life is difficult, even when life doesn’t go the way we want, even when we can’t feel Him.

Here’s a few verses that I came across about God’s faithfulness.

Deuteronomy 7: 9

 Know therefore that the Lord your God is God; he is the faithful God, keeping his covenant of love to a thousand generations of those who love him and keep his commandments.

Hebrews 10: 23

Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful.

What beautiful verses!

Happy New Year! May God bless you in the coming year.

So writers like to do nerdy things like have a Word of the Year that they focus on as part of the Bible meditations. Last year, I had planned on NOT having a word of the year.

No particular reason, I just wasn’t feeling it. But in between Christmas and New Year’s, I was walking on my treadmill and a word popped into my head.

HEALING

And there it was my word of the year. Now being a flawed human being, I thought that word was about ME and my healing.

After all, I live with bilateral brain tumors, had recently started back on treatment for them, and have more than enough struggles to make my days interesting.

But I was wrong.

As the year went on, I developed more compassion for other people’s suffering, especially physical suffering (something I know about). My prayer life began to reflect that compassion.

I wish I could tell you that I’m ending this year healthier (physically) than I began it. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. And that brings me to 2023’s Word of the Year which is…

I’ll tell you soon!

Oh my goodness, it’s been a while since I’ve been here and I apologize for that. I hate to admit it, but I’ve been struggling as far as my writing goes. I submitted two stories to my publisher back in May and then BAM! I seemed to have lost all interest in writing. I would start a story but stop after a few pages, then I’d try a different story with the same results.

I just couldn’t focus on writing or anything to do with writing.

And that made me feel somewhat lost but…I decided not to panic so I took a break.

About a week before Christmas, I opened my email to find a letter from my publisher offering me a 3-book contract for a series I’d forgotten I’d even submitted to her along with contracts for the two stories I submitted in May. So that’s a contract for FIVE different books!

A few days after the contracts, the one story I was having trouble with came to mind. And in like a 30-second window, I saw how I needed to change the story to make it work so…I’m writing again.

And that makes me happy!

Life is often like that. We are way too quick to panic when something goes wrong or doesn’t go the way we expect. Instead of panicking, we need to take a step back, take some deep breaths, and focus on God. It will work out one way or another, panic, worry, and depression make nothing better.

So as we enter into a new year, let’s make a commitment to focus more on God and less on anxiety, worry and depression.

I know this is a longer post than usual, but I hope you’ll find it interesting enough to read to the end.

Before I get into my story about intermittent fasting (IF), let me explain very briefly what IF is. It is a period of time when you do NOT eat or drink anything. You can drink water, black coffee or plain tea. No diet drinks. No flavored coffees. Nothing with calories can be consumed during your fast. Period.

Eating or drinking calories is the opposite of fasting.

If you want to learn more about IF, I highly recommend Gin Stephens’ books. Fast, Feast, Repeat and/or Delay, Don’t Deny. Both books will tell you the science behind IF and why it’s such a healthy way to live.

I started Intermittent Fasting (IF) on April 7, 2021. And as with life things didn’t go exactly the way I’d planned, but I’ll get to that later.

I had several goals. One and what seemed most important at the time was to lose ten pounds. My second goal was to normalize my relationship with food. And my third goal was to boost my metabolism.

Let’s start with the last goal first. After ten years of being on a fairly strict diet most of those ten years, it seemed to me that my metabolism was way low. I don’t have any scientific proof of that but any time I would eat more than salad, a piece of chicken, and some fruit for dessert I’d gain weight.

I was so, so, so tired of not being able to eat like everybody else. So, I’d restrict my food intake and then have my cheat days where I would binge, which brings me to my second goal of normalizing my relationship with food.

I wanted to not be obsessed with food. I wanted to stop worrying about every bite of food I put in my mouth. I wanted to make healthy choices but still enjoy eating.

When I started IF I wanted to lose 10 pounds. I was a lifetime member of a certain weight loss organization and was about 10 (9 actually) pounds over my goal weight.

So those were my 3 goals. Gin Stephens recommends starting with a 28 day plan where you don’t weight yourself and all you worry about is making sure you clean fast every day.

No calories to count. No points to calculate. Just using your own good sense when eating. I must say I threw out my good sense and ate—a lot! After the end of the 28 days, I hadn’t lost any weight, but I hadn’t gained either—and I really did eat a lot! I was happy!

And that’s what I did for the next few months. I ate what I wanted but would fast anywhere from 18 to 21 hours every day. And I still didn’t gain any weight—amazing!

But then I decided it was time to start making healthier food choices so I could lose that ten pounds. I decided to go back to that weight loss organization. And in the first month, I lost 5 pounds.

HAPPY DANCE!

And then life happened. I’ve had bilateral brain tumors for the past ten years but they’d been stable since 2016 without any need for treatment. But that all changed in August when we discovered one of the tumors was growing again and that I would need treatment.

My plan was to stay with my weight loss meetings, IF, and do my treatments. I really wanted to lose that last 5 pounds. But the day after my first treatment, I realized my plan wasn’t going to work. I

So I gave up on the weight loss meetings, but I’ve been doing IF consistently (except when I’m not feeling so good.)

So let’s take a look at my three goals.

I quickly gained back the five pounds I’d lost. Thanks to the treatments and the holidays. As of today, I’ve lost 3.6 pounds and only need to lose 5.6 to get back to my goal weight. But here’s the amazing things, I’ve lost 22.5 inches off my body–5 off my waist and 6 off my hips. If you want to know how and why that happened, you’ll need to read Gin’s books. I’m not scientific enough to explain it.

I have eaten A LOT this past year. Healthy foods. And pizza. And lots of my favorite things—namely pastries of all sorts. I pretty much eat what I want during my eating window. I haven’t lost all of the 10 pounds, but I know that’s because of my food choices, not because IF doesn’t work.

It obviously does work. If I’d eaten the way I have the past year and not fasted, I would have probably gained at least 25 or 30 pounds.

So what’s next for me amd IF?

I plan to start making healthier choices when eating so that I can get back to my goal weight. For me that means lowering my carb intake and especially cutting back on the “sweets.”

I’ve also added the spiritual component of fasting into my life, which has brought a new level of understanding and commitment to the act of IF.

I’ll keep you posted when I get back to my goal weight which hopefully won’t take a full year. I know this has been a long post.

Thanks for listening!

God Bless and Good Reading!