Thursday, January 28, 2010

The Ugly Truth

Yesterday, I was finally able to get in touch with my doctor's office to receive my lab results. As expected, my cholesterol was too high. I was instructed to take fish oil (gross) and avoid high cholesterol foods. I have this favorite food that I call fried lump. Basically, fried lump is anything that is breaded and/or battered, fried, often covered with cheese and bacon, and always dipped in ranch dressing. There are many variations of fried lump, but I am fairly certain that they are all considered high cholesterol foods.

I also discovered that my vitamin D level is too low, which most likely explains why I have been so tired lately. During my physical, I tried in vain to get my doctor to give me a B12 shot, but she told me I was about 30 years too young. I remember these shots from my days working as an activity director at a dementia and Alzheimer's care residence (and yes, that job was as glamorous as it sounds). Every month I would watch with envy as the residents eagerly received their B12 injections. They would hobble up to the nurse's office, get their hit, and happily skip back to their rooms. For the rest of the day, my job to keep them occupied and stimulated became much more interesting. I believe that in addition to B12, these injections also contain a serum of liquid happiness and pure energy. I am not a medical professional, this theory is just a working hypothesis.

As a newly dutiful patient, I purchased fish oil tablets and 1000 mg tablets of vitamin D. My choices of fish oil were original or odorless--the odorless bottle actually said " proven to reduce fishy burps." The odorless fish oil cost $5 more than the original. Consequently, I chose not to reduce the fishy burps. I took the vitamins for the first time today. I will let you know if my energy level comes back and whether I am experiencing fishy burps--this is my attempt to build suspense for my future blogs.

I was not able to walk for 3 miles today as planned due to the havoc last night's yoga session has reeked on my body. Although I did enjoy my yoga work out, I would not exactly call it relaxing. It involved a lot of shaking, stumbling, and laying face down on the floor willing my body to move. At no time during this work out would I describe my moves as graceful or flowing--especially not when I kept falling over sideways during my warrior pose. This morning, I rolled out of bed and immediately crumpled to the floor in pain. I am not exaggerating when I say that every muscle in my body is stilling hurt 24 hours later. I think my ab muscles are in the most agony--which I was reminded of every time I moved throughout the day. During a counseling session today, I actually had to ask my client to help pull me out of my chair because my muscles hurt so much that I could not get up by myself. This is not the impression of professionalism for which I have worked so hard.

Today I discovered first-hand that, between fishy burps and incapacitatingly sore muscles, this journey is not going to be a glamorous one.

4 comments:

  1. I had fallen behind in my blog reading, and just read 7 in a row (this is rather like a Grey girl DVR catchup.)

    I'm running in the Shamrock run! I have to swim a mile each class in my swim conditioning class.. that will have to do for my training. Taking a PE class should keep me more accountable in my workout schedule, however, it might just result in procrastinating exercise and skipping class.. you know how I love to kill two birds with one stone.

    I am SO proud of you!! ..btw this is the funniest blog I have ever read.

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  2. Don't get discouraged, Lynne! You know I hate it, too. We can both do this!!!

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  3. You know Lynn---I like calling that stuff "fried lump"... has a way of making those calories and fat grams less attractive and tempting! Hope the yoga induced muscle aches are gone by now. You are doing such a great job... keep up the good work. Love you...

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  4. Lynne--I have concluded that no matter how well you do on the Wii Fit, it will always tell you that you should be doing better. Shouldn't there be some praise built into that overly-critical machine? Throw us a bone, little man in the Wii!

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