Category: health

Sunday Night Pain

Rob’s writing about pain on a Sunday night. Why? Is he watching Fear the Walking Dead or something? No. That’s not for a couple of weeks. We are still safe.

No, I’m talking about exercise. I still have 24 minutes to do today and I only have 2.5 hours left. My legs are killing me. My back is killing me. Everything is killing me.

Fear isn’t on, but the main show is on. Shits getting weird at the Commonwealth, right? There is 25 minutes left in tonight’s show so I can probably finish my 24 minutes of exercise during the commercial breaks. Har Har Har.

Work was rough on Friday. It spilled over into Saturday. I didn’t hear anything today. Hopefully nothing happened. I’m out tomorrow because I’m taking my mother to a doctor’s appointment. That means I’m worried about work and worried about her at the same time. It could be a fun morning, right?

I don’t feel any negative effects of Covid-19 vax shot #4. Here’s hoping it stays that way.

Okay, the Zombies are back on. No spoilers, but who woulda thought that Daryl was Rick’s father. What a twist!

Another Request for Happy Thoughts

I think this is the third time in two weeks that I have had to ask for this, but if you’re finding you have some cosmic positivity lying around that you can spare, could you send some my mother’s way today? She’s in the hospital right now. This one isn’t directly related to the last two trips, but maybe it is. I don’t know.

I’m a little late to the happy thoughts request this time. She got to the hospital while I was on the road to work and it sounds like they are already prepping her for discharge. There doesn’t seem to be anything wrong this time, which is great, but it’s still really scary. Every little bit helps, right?

Thanks, internet people. It’s appreciated.

Getting Close

It seems contrary to everything else, but during this period of preparing myself for weight loss surgery I have avoided weighing myself too often. At my first consultation appointment they gave me a goal weight. They wanted me to drop 5% of my tonnage in order to make the surgery a little easier to perform. I have my second appointment with the dietician tomorrow so I figured today would be a good day to step on the scale.

If the rudimentary math skills I acquired during my days earning my Bachelors Degree are correct, I have lost about 4.2% of my initial bulk. I don’t feel any different, but my jeans do feel a smidge looser. I haven’t been doing a very good job with all of the things the dietician asked me to do during our first meeting. I have been trying to implement new things one at a time so that I don’t drive myself nuts and lash out against it by eating the whole town. Unfortunately, one of the things I started working on was really difficult and took me a while to get used to. Then we spent two weeks without a kitchen. I’m trying to track my meals but I’ve failed the last few days.

I don’t expect that tomorrow’s meeting with the dietician will clear me for surgical take off, but I am hoping it won’t be too long before I get the okay. I am thinking another month, but not being a dietician and never having been through this before, how the hell would I know? It doesn’t really matter though. The point is I am getting closer. I feel pretty good about that.

Sleepy

I stayed up really late last night. I didn’t want to, but I was so busy all day that I never had a chance to do some of the things I wanted to do (laundry) and I ended up doing it all after Jen fell asleep. I finally fell asleep around 1:00am and given that I can say without any hesitation that I am ridiculously tired right now.

While I was up last night Harry sent me a text saying that he listened to a Rush album and really liked it. It was Moving Pictures, of course. It was one of the happiest moments of my life. Harry could be a Rush fan, oh glorious day!

He sent me a text a few minutes ago asking me which Rush records to listen to next.

My response was a 100,000,000 word essay.

As I said earlier, oh glorious day!

Here’s a summary of what I told him:

  • You’ve listened to Moving Pictures, now go to Permanent Waves. They both had a similar focus on trying to shorten their songs without sacrificing any musical craziness.
  • Most people who don’t think Moving Pictures is the best album think that 2112 is. It’s heavy and Geddy screams a lot, but it’s pretty much perfect.
  • For 80’s synth Rush go with Power Windows. I wish I could say Hold Your Fire, but the last two songs don’t really cut it.
  • For the 90’s they got heavy again. Go with Counterparts.
  • Clockwork Angels might be my favorite of all Rush albums.
  • Fly By Night is mostly a straight ahead rock record.
  • Hemispheres is amazing end to end, but it’s worth it just for La Villa Strangiato.

Tough Weekend

Going back to Friday, my mother went back into the hospital again, though she was discharged quickly. I put new blinds and curtains onto the dining room window. Saturday included a trip to IKEA at the crack of dawn and a whole entire day of assembling and hanging a big ass cabinet/counter thing in the kitchen. Sunday saw us putting another, smaller, piece of IKEA furniture together along with a little time at my parents place. My mother was having a tough time and I was able to help a little. At least I hope I was helpful.

I’m a big, fat, severely out of shape, hurtin’ red head today.

This week is going to be nuts too. We have some organizing in the kitchen to do before the contractor comes back for the next step in the project. By the weekend the kitchen should be wrapped up, but then I have to start looking to the cellar. We’re not entirely redoing the cellar, but we were talking about it while the contractor was here last week and he asked if he could give it a shot. Fine by me! He’s going to try and fix the floor first. That would be huge.

Also, work. Also, my second dietician appointment. I haven’t been the best at what I’m trying to do over the last two weeks. I need to straighten my dietary shit out.

Right. Off to work now. Have a good one, folks.

Perfect Week

With all the work around the house we did this weekend, and all the pain and soreness and exhaustion that went with it, this weekend’s exercise rings were the hardest to close I’ve done yet. Ouch.

Tonight’s episode of The Walking Dead was really excellent though. That helped a lot.

Need More Help

Remember a few days ago when I said my mother could use a little positive energy and I asked you to send any get well vibes you could spare in her direction?

I need to ask again.

I don’t have any details yet. My gut, which has no medical training beyond knowing how to apply a band-aid, tells me that it might be something with medications interacting in a weird way. Here’s hoping.

Do what you can, oh internet/universe. I appreciate the help.

19 More Minutes

After stress-filled work followed by stress-filled* hospital visit followed by stress-filled start to putting the kitchen and dining room back together, I have only managed 11 minutes of exercise today.

My back is killing me and I don’t know how I’m going to finish before I keel over…

…but I’ll get it done. Somehow. Bet on it.

*The hospital trip wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been. I got there at 1:00pm and she was discharged by 3:00. Most of the time in between she was snoozing. My sister and brother both had a rough time on their days and my day was easy in comparison. It’s not fair, but I do appreciate what they did. Always.

Super Stressed

Between the weight loss stuff and work and the kitchen remodel and Covid and my mother being in the hospital, I am super stressed. I feel like a rubber band that’s stretched out as far as it can go.

I need to punch in to work at 9:00, go to 3-4 meetings until noon, then go sit with my mother. I am going to be balls to the wall all day until they kick me out of the hospital room. Then I’ll come home and see the latest in the kitchen. That will relax me a bit. The contractor could be finished today. The other contractor will be finished tomorrow. Then it’s time to get into the pre-fab stuff. The contractor/Covid/Stranger-in-my-house-during-a-global-pandemic stress will be gone, but the building and hanging kitchen stuff will replace it.

If I seem a little punch drunk over the next week or two, all that combined is why.

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!