Blog Challenge catchup Days 10-14

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Day 10 - A picture of your closest friend

My husband is my very closest friend. Now that he's retired we spend even more time together and we are happy that way. He's my playmate, my confidante, my helpmate, my supporter & my defender. I couldn't have made a better decision 25 years ago! I also have a BFF, who is my most trusted friend in the world, but my DH is my closest if I have to put them side by side.

Day 11 - A picture of your IPOD or other music playing device on shuffle, and then list the first 10 songs that play.
Don't use one, so have no picture for this. The closest I would have to a music playing device is the one on my Wii Walk It Out Game, which has a few hundred songs that play on shuffle, minus the ones I've removed from various categories (I like some to walk fast to, and some to slow down to).

Day 12 - A picture that defines you

There's no historical figure that is equivalent to a female Don Quixote that I'm aware of, so a female Amazon warrior like Xena is probably the second way that I've always envisioned myself, both in the world and in my psyche. I think I was a Native American warrior princess (yes, some tribes actually did have such things, it's not just a Halloween costume) in another life. Every time I read any historical information about them it's like my whole being reverberates on another plane. Very surreal.

Day 13 - A picture of your favorite band or artist

There are so many I could have chosen, Dolly, Randy Travis, George Strait, The Statler Brothers. But Wynonna especially strikes a chord within me (no pun intended, actually). Their harmonies get deep into my soul and touch places a lot of music today does not. Actually I love beautiful harmonies. That's why I love the Statlers & the Gatlins & others with tight harmonies like the Judds. Also unique voices like Randy Travis & Adele.

Day 14 - A picture of you now

This is the second most recent picture of me. It was taken the first of May. Since then I've gotten my Arizona driver's licence with a pretty good picture, for a change. But I had no way to get it to Sparkpeople without serious machinations. So this is the one you're stuck with for now. :)

  Member Comments About This Blog Post:

Days 07-09 of May Blog Challenge (playing catch-up)

Saturday, May 14, 2011

Day 07 - A picture of your most treasured item

I'm not much on "things" any more. When we downsized our possessions (with the help of a professional organizer) and sold most of our possessions and our 4 bedroom house to move into a 40' RV, you decide really quickly what's important to you. I got rid of so many things that used to be important to my life and don't miss them. But this tattoo of my soul puppy is probably the thing I treasure most in the world. Even my wedding ring set I & my husband decided were too flashy for the two of us any more and he wears a simple gold band now & I wear my mom's wedding band from her marriage to my dad. For years I went without a wedding band because it wasn't that important. But Scootie sits on my right shoulder & I see him everyday & know he's watching over me.

Day 08 - A picture of your favorite color

This is the color purple that I and some friends sponge-painted the master bedroom of our former house to surprise my husband when he got home from a business trip ala "While You Were Out." The color was a little deeper and richer purple than this, but you get the idea.

Day 09 - A picture that motivates you to do more

This is a picture of some of the people who were in the fibromyalgia support group I used to lead in Seattle. Because of what I learned from them, and the need I found, I became a health educator for FM/CFS and a patient advocate. There were so many opportunities to educate people in Seattle, where doctors were actively engaged in FM/CFS research. Coming here to Arizona I feel like I've taken a step back ten or fifteen years. Doctors don't treat it, they don't know about it, there aren't support groups in every community. I'm appalled. And I came here to retire. Clearly that is not yet my Higher Power's will for me.

  Member Comments About This Blog Post:

Was offline because no internet service, but I'm back with Days 4-6 of Blog Challenge for month of

Thursday, May 12, 2011

Day 04 - A picture of the cast of your favorite TV show

I love The Big Bang Theory. I know people like the "geniuses" on the show, which makes it all the more fun. The humor is at so many levels. There's humor that only really smart people would get because it's about quantum physics, but there's some really base humor, as well (pun intended). Everyone I've suggested the show to really loves it.

Day 05 - A picture of your favorite animal

This was my Yorkie, Scooter. He and I shared a really special bond, which would take me reams to fully explain. There were times I swore I knew him from another lifetime, he was so deep. This was his favorite position, sitting on my neck like a cat. Didn't matter if I was at the computer, driving the car or watching TV, he wanted to be on mom's neck. Didn't always get to (not safe in the car, e.g.), but that's where he wanted to be. He died of necrotizing encephalitis at only ten years of age. Not a day goes by that I don't miss him more than life itself.


Day 06 - A picture of a person you'd love to trade places with for a day

This is a picture of me when I was 25. I'd love to trade places with her for a day. I'd love to be able to tell her how beautiful she is, inside & out. That she is not fat, she is not damaged, she is not all the negative things people have told her all her life. She has so much potential & could do so much with her life. I have been successful in my life, but was held back so much by my fear of success, fear of failure, inability to start something because it couldn't be done perfectly and therefore shouldn't be tried at all. She had so many opportunities she didn't take out of fear. Because she didn't expect to live past 30 she didn't take care of her body, punishing it by binging, purging, exercise bulimia, yo-yo dieting, as well as the Navy's physical training program. I'm a physical shell of the woman she was...as I write that I see how ironic it is. I weigh almost 90 pounds more than she did. But my body is broken by fibromyalgia, arthritis, heart disease, thyroid disorder, migraines, plus other conditions I won't bore you with. Because she didn't heed warning signs, didn't take care of her body, was a victim of the "No Pain, No Gain" mentality, I am barely able to walk some days. I've been fortunate enough to warn my nieces & nephews & great-nieces & great-nephews of what awaits them if they continue down that road. Whether they listen is up to them. I had no one to warn me. That's why I'd like to trade places with her for just one day.

Tomorrow I'll catch up on some more of the Blog Challenge for May.

  Member Comments About This Blog Post:

Day 03 - Blog Challenge for month of May

Tuesday, May 03, 2011

Day 03 - A picture of your inspiration for weight loss



This is a picture of my nephew Butch dressed up as an angel for a Christmas pageant at his church. He always said he was the male me and I was the female him; there were 20 months difference in our age, which bugged us when we were young, but bonded us as we grew older. He and I took different paths to escape the insanity of our childhoods - he through his church and I through the Twelve Steps and rehab. Butch is a real angel now. He had his first heart attack when he was 45, lost 100 pounds, started running & biking. It was on one of those runs at age 48 that he dropped dead of a heart attack. As a chiropractor he believed in doing everything naturally, eschewing modern medicine. He had also embraced his version of the Atkins diet (all butter and bacon all the time). He lost the weight, but also his life.

I miss him more than words can tell. Thanks to Facebook his daughters and I are closer than ever. He and his wife did a fabulous job raising them so that they didn't suffer from any of the scars he and I live(d) with. What a blessing that is.

I lost my mom when she was 65 to heart disease, my dad at 59, my brother at 49 (he'd had a triple bypass at 34). My other brother has 3 stents, my sister a double bypass. Her daughter died of an aneurysm in her 30s. I had a stent placed in my right coronary artery when I was 48. The brother who died was also a Type I diabetic. My dad & other brother are type II diabetics. All of us have high blood pressure (although mine is normal when I'm under 200 #). So losing weight is no longer optional for me. Even if my arthritic joints weren't screaming in pain from the time I get up until I go to bed I have so many other reasons and still so much to live for.

  Member Comments About This Blog Post:

Horrible Doctor's Visit Today

Monday, May 02, 2011

One of the problems with 1.) moving to a new city and 2.) having been on the road since July 2010 and without medical care for 10 months is that I have not had access to a regular doctor. So today I had an appointment with the doctor that Bob saw last month and really liked. The doc is a GP and told Bob that although he didn't know alot about fibromyalgia he was willing to work with me to get me the care I needed.

So I thought that meant that he would be kind and respectful and listen and pay attention to me and treat me like I knew what was going on in my body. I was wrong. All he could focus on was how many medications I was taking. He said at least 15 times (no exaggeration) "I don't know why you're taking so many medications. I can't imagine why your doctors would put you on so many meds. I'm sure they felt they had their reasons, but it doesn't make any sense to me. I just can't believe you're on so many medications." Geez. All right, I get it. But with twelve specialists for numerous overlapping problems I've been given a bunch of meds, some of which have worked and some haven't and this is the combo that has. But he never gave me an opportunity to say that. What he did say is that as far as he is concerned we need to "shave this number down by half." Direct quote. Which ones? My heart drugs? Thyroid? Fibro? Arthritis? Asthma? Allergies? Migraines? High blood pressure? COPD? Lymphocytic colitis? Cystitis? Rosacea? Yeah, it looks like a lot of meds. It is a lot of meds for a 55 y.o. woman. I've cut the number of supplements I take in half, and before we went on the road in our RV to travel around the country I made the round of my specialists and talked with them about what we meds we could get down to the bare minimum of.

Did he listen to any of that? No. he was too busy poking things into his little netbook & muttering under his breath about how many meds I was taking. Geez.

When Bob asked him about the trouble I was having with weight loss he launched into this spiel about calories in/calories out & people don't understand that 30 minutes of cardio/day isn't enough to lose weight. Did he ask me what I know? No. When he finally stopped to take a breath I did manage to slip in that my bachelor's degree was in Nutrition and that I was doing upwards of 2 hours of cardio/day and eating between 1000 & 1100 calories/day & feeling stuffed on that. He looked nonplussed, saying that most people wouldn't feel full on half again that much. My point exactly! SO WHY THE HELL AREN'T I LOSING WEIGHT, A$$#@(E? He said maybe the endocrinologist could figure it out. YA THINK?

By that time I was in so much pain I literally couldn't think straight. I hadn't eaten breakfast (appt. was @ 10:45) so that I could get my labs drawn, and I hadn't taken my morning meds yet, without which the pain starts within literally an hour of missing a dose. So when I told him which labs my group of docs usually ordered for me he refused. He said he'd order a basic CBC, chem & thyroid (not the advanced thyroid I needed), and not the heart tests nor A1C I need, saying the glucose in the chem test would be sufficient. Geez, Louise, I've been doing this for 30 years, doncha think I know what my specialists are going to want by the time I get to their offices? So for each of the twelve specialists I'll end up seeing I'll have to get stuck twelve separate times. Give me an f'ing break! Oooooh, I'm so mad right now I could spit.

He did go into a spiel about how someone with all the problems I have is usually seen by an internist, not a (poor overworked) GP like him. He then took the time to tell us that he's the only doctor in the office, when there should be two, he's seeing XX number of patients/day, he only gets 15 minutes per patient, blah blah blah, and I need more time than he can give me. Yep, he said that.

At no time did he ask me what I knew about my conditions. I started to explain to him about being on the road & managing my conditions with my doctors blessings, and he cut me off and went off on another tangent , the crux of which was either I was taking too many meds, I was going to be too difficult a patient to deal with, or there were going to be a whole bunch of referrals he was going to have to make. Oh, for crying out loud. I told him to just make the most important ones first and we'll get to the secondary ones later. Get me to a rheumatologist so you'll get off my back about those meds, get me to a cardiologist, get me to an allergist, an endocrinologist, a neurologist and a dermatologist. I'll worry about GYN, pulmonology, gastro, sleep, orthopedist & physical therapy later.

On our way home we had to stop & pay our rent & water bill & the massage therapist is right in the same complex so I stopped in to see if they could take a walk-in. They were closed. So I'm going to call & make an appointment. I deserve it. This time I'm not going to talk myself out of it.

Okay, I'm calm enough now to go on to other things.

  Member Comments About This Blog Post: