Thank you everyone for all the well wishes on my neck! I’m doing much better and can actually turn my head to the left again! I’m still sore, I know that will last a while but seem that 4 days rest really helped.

Now, all that rest didn’t do much for getting me on track for the New Year. Yes, I know I needed it but needs and desires are different animals. And I desire to make 2013 my best year ever. That was on my mind heavily while my tuckus grew roots. My body wasn’t doing much the last 4 days but the old grey matter was working over time.

Then yesterday, during my first walk in days, it hit me. I’m nothing more than an “old” kid. I wear pig-tails and funky colored hair extensions (or dye as my mood deems). I like orange and purple nail polish. I have stuffed animals with a few that sing. I like cartoons and play video games. I laugh out loud. I sing (badly) in public if I like the song. I dance when and where I have room! I get on the ground to play with puppies. I splash in puddles and throw snowballs. I am not a grown up. I have “grown-up” things I have to do (work, bills, etc) but I am certainly NOT a grown-up. And I don’t want to be. I don’t want to grow up. Know what, I don’t have to and I’m not gonna!!!

When I hit that realization and made up my mind this is me it felt like I instantly lost 50 pounds off my neck and back. I felt lighter, heck – I felt like dancing (I did a bit). See, growing up has been part of the Drama Llama I’ve been dealing with. My dad’s wife, my kid sister, and members of my mom’s family don’t approve of me. I caught a ton of flack over the years for the way I am. They have made fun of gifts that I really liked. Told me I was a bad wife and mother. That is was my fault that my first marriage didn’t work and of course he was mean to me – he wanted a wife not a child. My make-up was wrong, my clothes were wrong, I WAS WRONG.

Add "friends" who "look up to" me and hubby as long as we behave they way they see fit. That we do for them they way we should! Add the catty back-stabbing women here at work who have NOTHING nice to say to me from how I look to the music I listen to to the way I act. Re-enforced the idea that I’m wrong.

I have tried through the years to be “right”. I really put an effort into it this year after all I’d lost weight, I was running (my sister’s hubby is a marathoner), started my own business, and was getting a good grip on things. I asked for proper gifts for Christmas, bought a skirt that comes to mid-calf, wore plain dress boots and a pretty green sweater. Had boy child and hubby dress the same way. We were 100% all American normal.

And I still caught flack! My hair is too dark, I should be going lighter at my age and adding highlights and my cut should be shorter (remember – I’m still trying to grow out the awful cut of mid-November). What is with all the earrings – even silver studs look stupid. And on and on and on. Not one compliment on my weight or notice of the changes I’d tried to make. I still needed way too much fixing to be presentable.

Now my dad did get me all my running gear, which I was thrilled with. I found out yesterday that he got me all that because he couldn't find anything else on my list that "felt right". And I have one cousin who made certain I had Visa gift cards I could use anywhere in the big family grab bag (she's on my dad's side of the family). And then my dad's family noticed my weight loss, teased about the "holes in my head" but it was good natured.

So I’ve been struggling with all of this for several weeks. Bouncing from Goth vests to cable knit sweaters. Pig-tails to hot rollers. I was watching people around me trying to see how they act/react so I could get it right.

But yesterday, in that moment during my walk I realized it didn’t matter. I don’t want to be anything like the people who pick on me! I don’t like them. They are depressing, nasty people who never have a good thing to say. They complain about everything and are never happy. They argue constantly. From everything I can see – they are miserable! WHY do I want to be accepted by people like that?!?! Guess what, I don’t.

I like me – the real me! It is hard but those that can’t accept don’t need to be here. I like being a kid. I like being silly. I want to have fun. So that part of the Drama Llama can find a new home. And I think I’m finally good with that.