Thursday, October 23, 2014
Back on the Horse, so to speak...
I haven’t written here in a long time.
The truth was, I lost my courage to write about my lack of courage. It’s kind of funny if you think about it.
The fact of the matter is, my self-esteem has been in the toilet. Yes, for three years.
And now my knees are in bad shape. Really bad shape. As in, at the tender age of 38, I was advised that both my knees need to be replaced bad shape.
Problem #1: Knee replacement prostheses have an average useful life of 10-15 years when replaced into an otherwise healthy body. So unless I plan to croak at 48-53 (I don’t), I would be looking at multiple knee replacement surgeries in my lifetime.
Problem #2: If said prostheses were placed into my body as things currently stand (at a weight of over 360 pounds on my 5 foot 4 inch frame), my orthopedic surgeon, Ortho God, estimates that they would only last about 3 years.
The time has come to have tough conversations, he said.
So, on October 1, I made the decision to restart the Carbohydrate Addicts’ Diet. I had bought the book and the associated cookbook a few months before and was going to start May 1. Then June 1. Then July 1. Ad nauseam. Until Ortho God forced my hand. I’ve had a couple of slip-ups along the way but I’m back on and working the plan.
So that’s where I am now.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
gestational diabetes
I had my one-hour glucose test on march 1. It came back at 148. Anything above 140, and you have to have the 3-hour test. The 3-hour test is actually four draws: a fasting draw, and then repeat draws after 1, 2, and 3 hours. I had that done on Friday, March 4. It was brutal. I felt so sick afterward.
It came back positive for gestational diabetes. I found out last Tuesday, March 8. I looked over my numbers and they seemed borderline to me. The family medicine doctor I met with on Thursday, who is following me for the GD, admitted that they were, but that if two of the four draws come back elevated (and by elevated they mean at the upper threshold or even 1 mg/dl over) it's a positive test. She gave me a glucose meter and told me to start journaling my food and checking my blood first thing in the morning (fasting) and one and two hours after each main meal. She said just to eat like I normally do for a few days and then really try to keep the carbs in check and see what happens.
Well, I've kind of been in denial about the whole thing. I talked to my aunt, who is a cell biologist and has worked in the pharmaceutical industry for almost as long as I can remember (she lives in San Francisco and I called her Friday, afraid her house was going to get swept into San Francisco Bay because of the tsunami warnings) and she agreed that my numbers were, in fact, borderline. The glucose checks have all been really good. Most have been within the guidelines that the doctor set, except for my fasting ones in the morning. I've tried to eat according to the doc's guidelines, and I'm using sparkpeople.com to track my nutrition because it counts the calories, fat, protein, and carbs for me.
But Sunday and today I was pressed for time, and had sugary, high-carb breakfasts (today turned out to be worse than Sunday). And today, not only were my glucose numbers high, I felt sick. Sweaty, shaky, couldn't concentrate...so I'm not in denial anymore.
I need to stop this post here because I promised Melanie a trip to the Family Resource Center to play and John is trying to put the crib for baby Marc together and Melanie is getting in the way.
so more later...
It came back positive for gestational diabetes. I found out last Tuesday, March 8. I looked over my numbers and they seemed borderline to me. The family medicine doctor I met with on Thursday, who is following me for the GD, admitted that they were, but that if two of the four draws come back elevated (and by elevated they mean at the upper threshold or even 1 mg/dl over) it's a positive test. She gave me a glucose meter and told me to start journaling my food and checking my blood first thing in the morning (fasting) and one and two hours after each main meal. She said just to eat like I normally do for a few days and then really try to keep the carbs in check and see what happens.
Well, I've kind of been in denial about the whole thing. I talked to my aunt, who is a cell biologist and has worked in the pharmaceutical industry for almost as long as I can remember (she lives in San Francisco and I called her Friday, afraid her house was going to get swept into San Francisco Bay because of the tsunami warnings) and she agreed that my numbers were, in fact, borderline. The glucose checks have all been really good. Most have been within the guidelines that the doctor set, except for my fasting ones in the morning. I've tried to eat according to the doc's guidelines, and I'm using sparkpeople.com to track my nutrition because it counts the calories, fat, protein, and carbs for me.
But Sunday and today I was pressed for time, and had sugary, high-carb breakfasts (today turned out to be worse than Sunday). And today, not only were my glucose numbers high, I felt sick. Sweaty, shaky, couldn't concentrate...so I'm not in denial anymore.
I need to stop this post here because I promised Melanie a trip to the Family Resource Center to play and John is trying to put the crib for baby Marc together and Melanie is getting in the way.
so more later...
Monday, February 14, 2011
stress and re-vamping february goals
So...
As I previously mentioned, my father-in-law spent some time in the hospital earlier this month and had to have a heart catheterization procedure done and a stent put in. Now I'm not using that as an excuse to abandon my goals, but, I think, due to not being on my normal depression/anxiety meds due to being pregnant, I wasn't handling the stress particularly well. In fact, I was lapsing into some old self-destructive thought patterns, although I fought like hell to keep those thought patterns from translating into self-destructive behaviors.
I did have a little labor and delivery adventure last Monday. The hospital where I will be delivering baby Marc does not allow vaginal birth after Cesarean (VBAC). Since my daughter Melanie was born via Cesarean in May 2008, baby Marc will also be born via Cesarean due to their policy (I checked out some of the VBAC-friendly providers, so called, in our area, but it seems if you're a Medicaid patient and as overweight as I am your likelihood of going VBAC is slim to none regardless, so if I was going to end up with a c-section anyway, I wanted to stick with a doctor I trusted). Therefore, the OB docs at my practice do not want their repeat c-section mommas going into labor. At all. Ever. So they give the advice beginning at 20 weeks if you have more than six Braxton-Hicks (rehearsal) contractions in an hour, to call the office, and they'll likely send you down to labor and delivery to be monitored. Well, I had what I thought were thirteen Braxton-Hicks contractions in an hour (I called the office after the eighth one, and left my accounting class) so I ended up going to L/D by ambulance. I couldn't keep the doctor's office on my cell phone because service is notoriously spotty up here on campus, so I finally ducked into one of the offices and asked a secretary to notify public safety that I could potentially be having preterm labor. I get to the hospital and the nurse asks me to tell her when I'm feeling the contractions and I do, and she kept telling me, "Oh, honey, these aren't contractions, that's just the baby moving." So I'm assuming that he's just an aggressive mover and unless I see signs of real labor beginning (mucous plug, water breaking, things of that ilk), I'm just going to assume false alarm.
So I'm keeping my household-related goals, and the goal of drinking 64 oz of water a day. Staying hydrated helps to minimize the amount of Braxton-Hicks contractions I have. But for now, I'm dropping the food journaling until next month. We'll see how the goals go for this month.
Love~
Elizabeth
As I previously mentioned, my father-in-law spent some time in the hospital earlier this month and had to have a heart catheterization procedure done and a stent put in. Now I'm not using that as an excuse to abandon my goals, but, I think, due to not being on my normal depression/anxiety meds due to being pregnant, I wasn't handling the stress particularly well. In fact, I was lapsing into some old self-destructive thought patterns, although I fought like hell to keep those thought patterns from translating into self-destructive behaviors.
I did have a little labor and delivery adventure last Monday. The hospital where I will be delivering baby Marc does not allow vaginal birth after Cesarean (VBAC). Since my daughter Melanie was born via Cesarean in May 2008, baby Marc will also be born via Cesarean due to their policy (I checked out some of the VBAC-friendly providers, so called, in our area, but it seems if you're a Medicaid patient and as overweight as I am your likelihood of going VBAC is slim to none regardless, so if I was going to end up with a c-section anyway, I wanted to stick with a doctor I trusted). Therefore, the OB docs at my practice do not want their repeat c-section mommas going into labor. At all. Ever. So they give the advice beginning at 20 weeks if you have more than six Braxton-Hicks (rehearsal) contractions in an hour, to call the office, and they'll likely send you down to labor and delivery to be monitored. Well, I had what I thought were thirteen Braxton-Hicks contractions in an hour (I called the office after the eighth one, and left my accounting class) so I ended up going to L/D by ambulance. I couldn't keep the doctor's office on my cell phone because service is notoriously spotty up here on campus, so I finally ducked into one of the offices and asked a secretary to notify public safety that I could potentially be having preterm labor. I get to the hospital and the nurse asks me to tell her when I'm feeling the contractions and I do, and she kept telling me, "Oh, honey, these aren't contractions, that's just the baby moving." So I'm assuming that he's just an aggressive mover and unless I see signs of real labor beginning (mucous plug, water breaking, things of that ilk), I'm just going to assume false alarm.
So I'm keeping my household-related goals, and the goal of drinking 64 oz of water a day. Staying hydrated helps to minimize the amount of Braxton-Hicks contractions I have. But for now, I'm dropping the food journaling until next month. We'll see how the goals go for this month.
Love~
Elizabeth
Saturday, February 5, 2011
overwhelm
I know that when I started this blog, I declared an intention to post weekly.
Life has intervened.
On Tuesday, January 25, my father-in-law woke up sick to his stomach. A trip to the doctor revealed a flare-up of his diverticulitis. Antibiotics helped that, and I thought we'd really dodged a bullet.
Then last Sunday, he started having chest pains. We called 911 and rushed him to the hospital. Testing revealed a blockage and a mild heart attack. He had a heart catheterization procedure on Thursday, and was finally allowed to come home yesterday.
I haven't done crap with my goals. On February 1, I evaluated my goals for January (the only real weight-loss related one being not to drink any Coke) and decided that I've effectively kicked Coke. I did have a soda last Saturday when we had pizza for dinner (we were out of Hawaiian punch, and I just have to have something with flavor when we have delivery pizza), but just the one. I went right back to my soda fast. I decided that for this month, my goals were going to be to drink 64 ounces of water every day, and journal my food. I have friends who journal and enter their stuff into SparkPeople or Fitday and record their calorie content and everything. My goal is a little simpler: just to be mind*full of what I put into my mouth. I have noticed a pattern of not having dessert lately. Not even a Hershey kiss filled with caramel, which seem to be my craving of choice this pregnancy. Tonight I found myself wanting something sweet, and I've decided to have a chocolate covered chocolate-chip granola bar. This is not the old Elizabeth's idea of dessert. Well, it is, sort of, in that it's chocolate. But my old idea of dessert is cakes, candies, cookies, ice cream. Definitely not a granola bar. So I'm improving. Gradually making healthier choices. And that's the eventual goal. Slowly transition to a healthier way of eating and moving.
On the moving front, I didn't get any strength training or yoga done this week. At all. I've been a slave to my computer, playing games on Facebook. Today, I just decided that I'd had enough. The graphics on the games are so intense, they overheat my 3-year-old laptop and make it shut down without warning. They overwhelm my tenuous wireless connection and kick me offline, and just get my blood boiling. And that is most certainly not healthy.
So that's where I am. I gratefully also meet you where you are.
Till next time...
Elizabeth
Life has intervened.
On Tuesday, January 25, my father-in-law woke up sick to his stomach. A trip to the doctor revealed a flare-up of his diverticulitis. Antibiotics helped that, and I thought we'd really dodged a bullet.
Then last Sunday, he started having chest pains. We called 911 and rushed him to the hospital. Testing revealed a blockage and a mild heart attack. He had a heart catheterization procedure on Thursday, and was finally allowed to come home yesterday.
I haven't done crap with my goals. On February 1, I evaluated my goals for January (the only real weight-loss related one being not to drink any Coke) and decided that I've effectively kicked Coke. I did have a soda last Saturday when we had pizza for dinner (we were out of Hawaiian punch, and I just have to have something with flavor when we have delivery pizza), but just the one. I went right back to my soda fast. I decided that for this month, my goals were going to be to drink 64 ounces of water every day, and journal my food. I have friends who journal and enter their stuff into SparkPeople or Fitday and record their calorie content and everything. My goal is a little simpler: just to be mind*full of what I put into my mouth. I have noticed a pattern of not having dessert lately. Not even a Hershey kiss filled with caramel, which seem to be my craving of choice this pregnancy. Tonight I found myself wanting something sweet, and I've decided to have a chocolate covered chocolate-chip granola bar. This is not the old Elizabeth's idea of dessert. Well, it is, sort of, in that it's chocolate. But my old idea of dessert is cakes, candies, cookies, ice cream. Definitely not a granola bar. So I'm improving. Gradually making healthier choices. And that's the eventual goal. Slowly transition to a healthier way of eating and moving.
On the moving front, I didn't get any strength training or yoga done this week. At all. I've been a slave to my computer, playing games on Facebook. Today, I just decided that I'd had enough. The graphics on the games are so intense, they overheat my 3-year-old laptop and make it shut down without warning. They overwhelm my tenuous wireless connection and kick me offline, and just get my blood boiling. And that is most certainly not healthy.
So that's where I am. I gratefully also meet you where you are.
Till next time...
Elizabeth
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Greetings and Welcome!
Hi there!
My name is Elizabeth, and I've been overweight since I was six years old. I'm thirty-five, and I live in upstate New York with my husband, John, my two year old daughter, Melanie, and my in-laws, John and Barb. I'm currently 23 weeks pregnant with my second child, which the ultrasound tech gave a 90% guess is a boy to be named Marc, and, as of my last doctor's appointment on December 29, weighed 364 pounds.
I've yo-yo dieted frequently throughout the years, and during a period where I was going to Weight Watchers, and going to the gym every day, but not being particularly concerned about what I was eating (ie I ate at Friendly's EVERY SINGLE DAY), I started working with a book called The Artist's Way, by Julia Cameron. The year was 2003. One of the most important steps on the Artist's Way path is something called morning pages; three longhand, stream-of-consciousness written pages daily. Every day. Without fail. After doing this for about six weeks, I hit on a major realization.
I was terrified of being thin.
I'm still processing this as a feeling.
I thought about actually writing a non-fiction book about finding the courage to be thin. But I decided that a blog would work better for me.
So what I'll be doing here is sharing my story and my journey. If I find an article that I think is relevant, I'll pass it along.
I can't do a lot of actual work with weight loss, per se, right now, being pregnant and all. But I am working hard to increase my activity (I didn't get to 364 pounds being particularly active). I wear a pedometer. I strength train with very light weights three times a week. And I theoretically do a prenatal yoga DVD three times a week. (Right now I've got the yoga scheduled for Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and so far this Monday and Wednesday, I didn't do it.)
I plan to post at least once a week. If you have suggestions for what you might like to see, please let me know!
Thanks for stopping by.
My name is Elizabeth, and I've been overweight since I was six years old. I'm thirty-five, and I live in upstate New York with my husband, John, my two year old daughter, Melanie, and my in-laws, John and Barb. I'm currently 23 weeks pregnant with my second child, which the ultrasound tech gave a 90% guess is a boy to be named Marc, and, as of my last doctor's appointment on December 29, weighed 364 pounds.
I've yo-yo dieted frequently throughout the years, and during a period where I was going to Weight Watchers, and going to the gym every day, but not being particularly concerned about what I was eating (ie I ate at Friendly's EVERY SINGLE DAY), I started working with a book called The Artist's Way, by Julia Cameron. The year was 2003. One of the most important steps on the Artist's Way path is something called morning pages; three longhand, stream-of-consciousness written pages daily. Every day. Without fail. After doing this for about six weeks, I hit on a major realization.
I was terrified of being thin.
I'm still processing this as a feeling.
I thought about actually writing a non-fiction book about finding the courage to be thin. But I decided that a blog would work better for me.
So what I'll be doing here is sharing my story and my journey. If I find an article that I think is relevant, I'll pass it along.
I can't do a lot of actual work with weight loss, per se, right now, being pregnant and all. But I am working hard to increase my activity (I didn't get to 364 pounds being particularly active). I wear a pedometer. I strength train with very light weights three times a week. And I theoretically do a prenatal yoga DVD three times a week. (Right now I've got the yoga scheduled for Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, and so far this Monday and Wednesday, I didn't do it.)
I plan to post at least once a week. If you have suggestions for what you might like to see, please let me know!
Thanks for stopping by.
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