Share Your Day
Replies
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Oh, Bella. Such very tough news. But somehow it seems as if you felt this coming sooner rather than later. So many tough decisions for your sister - with no guarantees which would be the better choice. I hope you are able to share some good moments with her. That seems the most important thing to focus one. Making every moment one worth living. She is lucky to have you in her corner. I get the feeling you will envelope her in positive energy and love. And that is the only thing of true value now, for both of you.1
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Yooly: I'm finally confirming that you would have been a very very young mom for me! 😉 I do hope you enjoy your time on San Antonio without any cake worries! And happy birthday 🎁🎈🎉1
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Bella, I'm so sorry! I'll be thinking of you and your sister.
Happy birthday, Yooly! I hope I'm having as much fun at 75 as you are!
I have slept a lot today. I'm not sure why I'm so tired, but I am. Went out to pick up the meds and got the cheese sauce so that I could make the arroz con pollo for lunch freezer meals for Girlfriend and I. I had the rice made, I had the chicken grilled, but no cheese sauce. So I have four meals (weighed and measured out) in the freezer, and she has five, as she often has a weird sleep schedule and has a need for a lunch at midnight. So now I can choose between the arroz con pollo and chicken stirfry for my lunches on the days he works, and that works for me. I'm trying to get stuff done when he's out of the way, and having something safe and easy to heat up when I do get hungry works better than stopping to make a sandwich.
I have elderly bananas so I'm going to make banana muffins soon. I do not know if I am making them tonight or tomorrow. We'll see how my energy goes.
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Thanks for all the birthday wishes. It was a fun day spent with my friend and hubby. Son popped over for a quick hug for me too.
Bella, I am so sorry about your sister. Facing ones mortality and being betrayed by your body comes to us all. May she prove the doctors wrong.2 -
Oh Bella. I am so sorry and sad for the both of you especially as the options narrow. (((HUG)))2
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Bella, I am so sorry to hear about your sister's news. I hope for both of you that she has some good time remaining and that you are able to make some memories together.
And happy belated birthday, Yooly!3 -
Thank you Jennifer! Hope you’re doing well and getting ready for your musical adventure.3
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I don’t know? Is it me? Where did everyone go? I need my support system! Guess it’s the final days of summer - which I can’t wait to be over. However I fully understand for some those waning warm days are kind of sad and a precursor of the cold days ahead.
And of course everyone (much younger than me) is working and doing LIFE things.1 -
Good morning, Yooly!
I'm here - in my little quagmire. Always sending positive thoughts your way.
TODAY
Today I begin logging again. Just hit me. No trepidation. Poke around in my mind a bit to see if it (the hamsters) were fooling me and they are all fine with this. No complaints or worries.
That could be because we (me and the pups) have been installing new baseboards/door trim in the office the last few days - and it was hot (not by your standards Yooly but hitting the feels like 100 a few times. Yes I have air conditioning - but the wood sealer was sooo stinky I had to open the windows and the heat just hit you like a water balloon hot spring. My body felt sooooooo heavy - bending down, squinching over, up down up down a million times. Great reminder that lighter is better!2 -
That stinks!
Too much 💩 around here🙀
But all good😹1 -
💩?!1
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Your house stinky, in an odoriferous manner closely matched my proximate "happenings" which are currently stinky in a metaphorical manner. Thus I term them a pile of 💩 Nothing as serious as the life stuff that is befalling other people. Just your garden variety of daily 💩 !
Hence: all good!
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I’m just going to pretend everyone is still out there but just being quiet. I know Laurie is still with me, and PAV sort of.
Busy day running errands, meeting with friends, a little housework. Took hubby for a stress test at the cardiologist to check out some minor abnormalities. 💝 He was told it all looks okay just low blood pressure. We should all be so lucky.
My scale is still showing gains. I think it’s just water 💧or something from the mega antibiotics working their way out of my body. Feeling puffy! So I had a “what the hell” bowl of ice cream 🍧tonight. Yeah, that’s a stupid thing to do but tonight I’m tired and weak. 👿
Tomorrow will be better. Medical retests will be in two weeks. Hopefully I’ll be back to my svelte 🦵self before I have to face the doctors 👩🏻🔬scale.1 -
If you're feeling puffy, for real, then you already have your answer and you know you are experiencing water retention.
I am glad that your "bargain hunting" "better half"
has no serious issues and 'only" has low blood pressure to content with! I am sure he can hunt down vittles such that they can increase one's blood pressure... and they will probably be on sale too! (cheetos here he comes)
You will do fine if you stop thinking about it!
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Definitely puffy - no major swellings but definitely have the fat fingers syndrome. Thanks PAV for the kind words. Sometimes I’m just impatient and I sure don’t want to regress now.
Hubby is off to the grocery store tomorrow. Heaven help us! He’s been told to eat more salt. Can’t wait to see what he hauls home. Stress test was fine but he does have a bit of arrhythmia.
I plan on working off some of this puffiness by scrubbing floors tomorrow. Did I mention we’ve had some substantial rain with more forecast? And finally some days in the upper 80s.1 -
Glad it is cooling for you Yooly. I'm sending all the patience I can spare to help you deal with weight anomaly. That kind of thing makes me crazy - glad you are holding on like a sane woman
I'm thinking everyone is out there, too. Just being quite.
My first day in ??? of logging was okay. Kept me conscious of what I was eating. I wasn't trying to do anything - just eat normally. That will be my goal for maybe the next week???
Baby steps.2 -
I'm still here, but keeping quiet at the moment. I'm having daily phone calls with my sister for upwards of two hours at a time that are draining and wrenching - it's emotionally hard to hear her sobbing with pain and fear, hearing her regrets and recriminations about the years she feels she's wasted nurturing grievances and grudges, worrying about her weight but not addressing it, allowing friendships and family relationships to wither from lack of effort...
I've driven to see her twice in the past ten days at her request (400 mile round trip) but when I get there she's wiped out after fifteen minutes and has to go for a lie down. It's hard to know how to support her - she's full of anger, fear, regret...and naturally in lots of physical pain too. I've been trying to do practical things (grocery shopping, household chores, washing her hair etc.) to help her husband out a little, but frankly I feel pretty useless at the moment.
Plus, what she's facing has given me lots of things to ponder, and left me feeling unsettled and conflicted about my own life's priorities and goals. I'm increasingly aware that my life is unbalanced, with health/fitness/weight control taking up far too big a proportion of my mental and physical time and energy. I need to redress the balance, but that's scary too because I don't want to undo my hard work. Crises like these are all part of life's rich tapestry, and lead to transitions and upheavals that can bring positive changes as well as negative...but they feel tumultuous when you're living through them!3 -
Just a thought from someone with perhaps a few more of these gut wrenching life experiences.....
First, do not make any drastic changes to what you must do to care for yourself. For most of us weight control will always be a bit disproportionate because not doing so results in regression.
Second, all you can do now is provide support. Your sister is in shock and grieving. This eventually levels out because it’s unsustainable. Calm comes back when a day to day routine is established with doctor visits, meds, rest.
Third, you can’t FIX it. It’s life and we all have to face our mortality either railing against the gods or in peace. I’ve experienced both styles with family and friends. I hope when my time comes I can do it gracefully.
Take care of yourself and check in when you can.2 -
Bella. I can't put myself in your shoes really - I don't have any siblings. Intellectually, I can put together the pieces, but that only goes so far.
Yooly has shared some great thoughts.
All I can add is that you seem to have taken a great deal of pleasure in the process of increasing your fitness and health, and that should not be undervalued. Keep on taking care of yourself. It is really important for you and for those that you love/love you. Part of that is being kind to yourself. Sounds like you are being an amazing support for your sister and her husband.2 -
Thanks both....
I keep reminding myself of my little mantra: I am a person with a chronic health condition (disordered earing) that requires daily management and vigilance in order to prevent flare-ups and unpleasant symptoms (gluttony, weigh gain etc...). I also keep reminding myself that managing my husband's chronic and multifarious health conditions has absorbed a vast amount of time and mental energy for 29 years now, since his kidneys failed in 1994, and not a moment of that time has been begrudged or resented.
And lastly I also remind myself that management of those spousal health conditions couldn't be shirked, shelved or sidelined during other life crises such as when my brother committed suicide, or when my parents died...life had to fit around those health conditions, not the other way around.
Just because my personal health condition (disordered eating) isn't immediately life threatening doesn't make it any less important or any less deserving of careful management even when the rest of life gets in the way.
All of this makes perfect, logical sense...but I still have to remind myself of it about ten times a day when the hamsters are in full-on revolt.5 -
So yesterday Sergeant Pickles went to the vet. He is "Friendly but strong and wiggly." Yep. That's why my shoulders and back and core ache from holding him still long enough for the vet to get him vaccinated. Before we have to do this again he will be learning how to stand still on command.
Then that afternoon we had a landscape architect come and look at our fence problem. If it was just the fact that the fence needs replaced, that would be one thing. But there is a stream that runs along one side, enters the yard diagonally to section off the top right-hand corner, and then runs along the back fence for a bit. It is not possible to fill it because the water has to go somewhere, and at least this is not in my crawl space. And unsurprisingly, it has eroded and undermined the fence that currently exists. So he made some recommendations within our budget, and will get us a quote for his company to do the job. He'll probably subcontract out the fence installation itself, but as I said to him, he's an architect. It's his job to generate the plan, not to make it happen.
It would make us all feel better if we could just open the door and let the dog out, and not have to mess about with the long line that he keeps getting tangled on things. Plus, once we have the new fence in place, I can think about landscaping what we have so that we can have a pretty yard to look at. I realized that I had sort of mentally put all that on hold until the fence was fixed.
But the upshot of all this is a lot more sheer physical work than I am used to, and so today I am sore. That's impacting my day and what I get done, unsurprisingly. It's annoying, as I have some baking to do and I want to stage the spare room so that we can take pictures to rent it out.2 -
You'll get it done slowly but steadily Alexandra1
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Bella. You have it. What you have written is so very true. For you and for all of us. Thank you for sharing. Sending you strength.0
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Garfield.... yes/no
Actually Yooly pretty much nailed it.
I wouldn't, personally, go as explicit and detailed as you have re health conditions and management etc etc.
But the upshot would be the same. So is the framework you describe helps you more the power to you!!!
We have all proven throughout our lives that weight management is not a minor consideration for our individual n=1. We would not have become obese if it weren't so. And long term success rates prove that we are not dealing with a fire and forget situation
I have also figured out (and I suspect that most of us who have achieved some measure of success at dropping weight may have had a similar experience) that a reduced weight really does make a lot of things in life more fun, worthwhile, and, frankly possible.
This benefit, for me, is enough to fully compensate for the level of care I have to provide to maintain the situation.
So (and this is maybe too frank) but if I would resent anything it would be the things that take away my focus, not the things I choose to do to maintain my focus. By preference, of course, I would not resent anything. Because I do expect that things will never go 100% as per plan
And since priorities do intrude and do interrupt, that's why I always advocate low barriers to returning to normal defaults -- the defaults that are conducive to successful weight management.
Make it as easy as possible to do the right thing and make it the default.1 -
Hang on to those self protective skills Bella. You need to remember your well being matters too.
I got so lost in caregiving and worrying about everyone and everything, I ended up over 300 pounds for years. It took serious mortality reminders from the doctors to finally scare me 😳 into better care for myself.
Previously I had lost significant weight only to repeatedly sacrifice myself to insidious stress eating. I’ve done permanent damage to my health.
I cannot do that again. And neither should you.
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Gym this morning cause it’s still hot and muggy. It’s a holiday so going out to lunch with hubby and son. Way too much going out lately. It was easier during the pandemic!
Today it’s a middle eastern buffet. I’ll have to navigate carefully.2 -
Very carefully! Hope you enjoy!2
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Too much middle eastern buffet! Cuz it was ALL good. Skipped my evening meal but still over. Falafel, kibbe, tabbouleh, eggplant, gyros, baklava .... oh my! Mercifully we don’t go there but once or twice a year. There will be no buffets any time soon.
A taste of this and bite of that all adds up. I gave up trying to log and just called it 500+ calories over my deficit. It was a combination birthday and 48th anniversary celebration so I’ll forgive myself.2 -
Oh, oh, oh, oh: CONGRATULATIONS on the 48th Anniversary!
Woohoo!
Yes, the kibbe I try to hide from... because I LIKE them! The falafels I find a bit too "spendy" for my tastes. The rest of it... hard to win if you're not trying to find some extra calories! 
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I am here but I’m not….sending warm thoughts to you Bella and thinking of you….
Happy Anniversary Yooly….we will celebrate 47 in Nov.
Hello Alex, Pav, and Laurie and everyone else….
My leg is still swollen and sore….have not gotten out much and I am very bored= eating too much!…I have read a lot!
My grandson will be 17 next weekend….oh, to be that young again!…his culinary wizard g/f is still with us and bought a pasta machine….just what we need!…she is 5’ 2” and very small….she said she has gained weight since she has met the family….I told her to stick around and it will get worse!…I should have encouraged her to “RUN”….
Thinking of all of you3
