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Jan 5 – Day 5 – Deliberation
Well, today is much better than yesterday. I actually got some things done and it’s not 10:00pm and pushing my limits of sleep seeing as I get up every morning at 4:30. Today was a great day as I woke up feeling better. That might have something to do with the fact that I burned 400 calories yesterday and pushed my body a bit. I also didn’t eat as much for dinner as I usually do and balanced it all out a little. The beauty of all this change is the small steps I’m taking to turn my gigantic Titanic life away from the iceberg of death. It’s like matrix time and at the end of the movie I won’t end in magnificent let down and failure. Matrix Revolutions I’m talking to you and that insanely long death scene.
Resolving to be Resolute in 2010
2010 is just days away and it’s that time. The time to try and come up with something or anything that will help me be a better person over the next 365 days or so. The time to ask myself if I do indeed want to simply be the same as I was this year or do I want to take a flying leap into the unknown?
I think this year calls for a flying leap. The years are growing on me and within the next two years I’ll be dangerously close to turning thirty years old. As thirty is a stones throw from forty I figure I should do everything I can to be the man I want to be this year. It’s an effort to look at my future through a very long lens.
As I grow older I see the benefits of changing habits and life choices. As a stroke survivor this line of thinking is magnified thousandfold. With the risk of a second brain malfunction hanging over me in the wings I’ve got to take the reins on the horse of life and make it my own. The time is now. It all starts here. And I can do it.
It all starts here
The time is now. Such words are often said every year around this time. Each of us decides if we’ll take up the resolutions that we fail at just about three days into the New Year. I used to be a guy that made half hearted resolutions that I didn’t really follow and at the end of those years was filled with mild regret at having not made any progress on some really pressing matters. I would quietly bury the guilt and move on.
This year I’ve got a few things on my plate that I didn’t have in previous incarnations of this tradition. I had a stroke last April. I’ve had a few other health concerns that have been directly tied to my unhealthy habits and current state of the once shining temple of a body I inhabit. On top of this I’m back into the dating world for better or worse and I’m consciously realizing I want to look better than the rotund tumbler that I currently resemble. The straw that broke the fat camel’s back is the impending nuptials in which my brother will be marrying his fiancé in 2011 on the 1st of January.
I don’t know about you, but weddings are one of those things you really want to look your best. Due to the fact that there will be numerous people from my past and present there (including family), I’ve want to be a sharp dressed man. And as you well know from ZZ Top, every girl is crazy for one. Tubby with several spare tires doesn’t really a rock song about hot guys make. Just saying.
NaBloWriMo Day 19 – Aha!
I can’t say enough good things about my friend Pam. Her story is a pretty cool one. Check out her website to read more about her. I’ll give you the short inspiring version.
Pam used to weigh a lot. She was big. Overweight. You can see before and after photos here.
My friend Pam decided she’d had enough. She wanted to be better. She needed to seek a way to return to where she controlled her life again. She had the surgery. Some people view the surgery as a quick fix. Not Pam. She went to the classes. She made sure this was the right decision. She invested time and effort to make this happen. It was hard work coming out of the surgery and adjusting to the new life she had created.
Pam wouldn’t take the easy way out. She decided since she’d been given a second chance she was going to own it. She began to train. Run. Hike. Adventure Race. Pam took control of her life once more and showed everyone that she could indeed kick (pardon my language) ass. Pam lost over 400 pounds as a result of the surgery, hard exercise and work.
She could have slipped back into her old ways and given up that second chance. She refused.
The first time I saw Pam after the surgery I was floored. She looked amazing. She looked vibrantly alive. And for what was probably the first time she was truly happy with her life. She had done this. She had beaten it down with a big stick. And for that I was proud. Pam’s gone on to do some pretty cool things and I don’t think she’s finished. She’s had small doors closed on her but she usually manages to bust a few more down with a running leap.
It is for that reason that I encourage you to vote for Pam in the AHA moment sweepstakes. Because she realized exactly what it would take to live her dream again…and she did it. It is her victory and those around her that have supported her.
I’m proud and honored to call Pam a friend and I’m proud to personally ask for your vote.
Lose it or Die – Day 12 “Back in the Saddle”
Man. Working out is hard. Gosh.
I only did 15 minutes today because I felt lazy. Yes, I admit it. I’m lazy at times. With my exercise I’m just terrible. Mind you the excuse my mind was saying as I pressed the red “Stop” button is that my body needs to build up endurance. So instead of forty five minutes, I’ll simply do twenty.
Somewhere my mind developed a…mind of its own and took over my body. I walked out after such a short workout and somehow the brain managed to overrule the heart and get me home and plopped into my comfy office chair.
In some countries (and one universe) The Comfy Chair is a torture device.
My comfy chair is not however and it is quietly holding my glutinous muscle in a resting position.
I’ve come to accept the fact that this week will probably be hell for my body and me as I get used to working out on a regular basis again. I’m aware there will probably be angry words bouncing around my cranium as the muscles, tendons and everything else burns with intensity of a thousand and one suns.
But it will be worth it. If I can keep to this (and I shall endear to do so!) I can start losing the weight and my “man boobs” will quietly fade away into the night rather than screaming at me every morning when I see them in the mirror.
They scream. I throw up a little in my mouth. Fun for the whole family.
So what happened in twelve days of not doing anything to prevent my death at an early age? I lost one pound somehow and have felt pretty fat over the last week or so. So, this will be me throwing my rebellious body and mind onto the machines and like Darth Vader torturing it until it gives me what I want.
And there will be no one to stop us this time!
Lose it or Die – Day 1 “Back on the Horse”
I won’t lie to you. There’s a deep seeded part of me that knows full well the next week is going to be the most painful week in a long time. You see back in the day (read: three months ago) I was going to the gym nightly. Getting my excercise on. Then I fell off the wagon, hit my head on a few rocks and lazily got up and walked the other way.
When it comes to excercise walking away is the worst thing you can do. I was getting up on my endurance and I was looking and feeling better. For the first time in ten years I was happy with myself. I was doing better at work, at home and just about everywhere. Coming to a dead stop was a death knell to my progress.
I worked out today for about an hour and it felt good. I burned around 450 calories or so. I know that I’m going to feel this in the morning and I can guarantee you that tomorrow when I go into the gym I’m going to have that first fifteen or so minutes where I curse everyeone around me silently because getting back on that machine is like asking someone to hammer all your appendages at once with extra effort on your lungs and heart. It’s the euphoric rhythmic harmony that forms when your body is warmed up and suddenly everything is firing at once on all cylinders and you’re sweating to the oldies.
And loving every minute of it.
Today I weighed 220 pounds. I worked out for an hour and burned 450 calories on a running machine. Tomorrow the adventure continues. Onward!
Lose it or Die!
You want to know how bad it’s become? I weigh a shocking 230 pounds. I’m 5′11. That’s unreal to me.
I’ve struggled with my weight for a long time and most of it was even pre-stroke. It started when I went overseas to the Philippines and found myself eating to excess. When I came back I simply continued in this habit. It’s become worse in the last year as I’ve gone back and forth with my gym membership and moving into a new placed coupled with job stress.
I’m not happy with how I look and I’ve got to double down. Every month I go without getting back on the train is another month where I am living unhealthy and threatening my future with all kinds of potential maladies. It’s time. I’ve got to lose it or I will most certainly leave this earth earlier than I ever intended. Combined with my stroke, sleep apnea and everything else I can’t do what I’m doing anymore.
So every day I’m going to blog about what I did to avoid the acceleration of my doom. Some of it might be funny. Other times it’ll be heartbreaking. And some of it will probably be boring. But it must be done. My future depends on this.
Returning
Well hello everyone out there on the internets. It’s been a while since I sat down to write something of substance that qualifies as a “post”. I blame vacation for the last two week but the other months? I have no idea. I could blame writers block or my busy as a bee life. I could. But I won’t. I’ll be honest.
I’ve lost my rhythm. I’m not sure how but it’s gone. I know there’s plenty to write but my focus has been on other things. Things that mattered for a little while but didn’t have the same payoff as writing does in my life. I’ve got my priorities mixed up and now that I’ve thrown all 52 cards are in the air I’ve got a chance to pick it all up again.
I’ve got to get back to exercising. My weight ballooned before I went on vacation and I didn’t help matters over the two week period as I traveled, ate and traveled. There was more eating in there as well if you haven’t guessed. I’ll be blogging about that struggle as well.
The other is my faith. I need to focus back on God again and my relationship with Him. I’ll detail this more in future blog posts as I get back in His Word.
I also need to get out more. I need to find someone to spend time with. I’m on the “Eharmony Plan” and working through that is interesting. I’ve already been knocked out of a round 1 and threw myself back in to Round 2. We’ll see how that goes.
All in all I need to push myself. With God, with my body and with this place. I have to start owning my future and all that it entails.
More to certainly come on this.
Was it the Sleep Apnea?
For the longest time, I’ve had to struggle with the knowledge that I had no idea what had caused my stroke back in April of 2008. For the six days that I was in the hospital I was tested in every way imaginable (and a few more) to figure out what exactly had caused the malfunction within the brain inside my head. Over the last year I’ve tried to explain it away with the stress I had at my former job in the call center together with the unhealthy life I was living.
While I accepted this explanation I still felt there was something missing from the confounding puzzle. My aunt recently called me after discovering there was a connection between strokes and Sleep Apnea. She was recently diagnosed and multiple members of my extended family suffer from the affliction. With her motivation (and my mother’s insistence) I setup an appointment for a sleep study at a nearby hospital.
I won’t lie to you, I was increasingly curious as I read more into the correlation of why Sleep Apnea carries the risk of heart attacks and strokes. It would make sense. I often complain of being tired as the day is just getting started even if I get more then acceptable amounts of sleep. I’ve also had more and more bouts of insomnia over the years that it is starting to become an unbearable problem.
1 year 1 month and 4 days
That’s how long it’s been since my stroke.
Today was the first day that I actually felt as if I had returned to myself pre-stroke. It’s not been easy. I have a schedule book (seen here) that I’m using to keep track of my day and my tasks. My workout regimen has given me 12 less pounds since I began on March 25. I feel better each day. I can do more each day. Without question, I’m doing much better than I was six months into the stroke.
I was able to do so much yesterday that for the first time, I felt as I had done my job and put everything I had into what i was doing. It was an odd moment where I realized this, but it felt as I had actually accomplished something beyond my regular day to day existence. I had made a difference in my life in so many smaller ways that suddenly the big picture was no longer cloudy but becoming clearer.
I start it all again today and hope to continue this upward climb.
Tally ho!
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- Half hour to go until #wwedenver starts. Going silent to enjoy the show. Still hoping for a @realkellykelly shout out ;)
- Some kid was just doing Shawn Michaels "sweet chin music" in line. Tempted to give him an Edge Spear. #wwedenver
- @JustinCasias1 I keep forgetting about the colesium show. I missed it due to work.
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Live from the 303 by Aaron DeLay is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. -
