Failing MISERABLY

I really didn't realize how much walking improved my mood until I couldn't walk any more.

Here's the thing: I NEED to lose some weight before I have this hip surgery. The surgery will be less complicated and the recovery will go more smoothly if I weighed less.

My excuses are all good ones:

• NO exercise – don't believe what you read about exercise not being a factor in weight loss.
• Along with that, those endorphins aren't getting released and I'm in a funky mood most of the time.
• I'm bored, bored, bored – and I eat when I'm bored.
• Motrin relieves my pain better than anything else, but makes my stomach hurt.
• Eating makes my stomach not hurt.

Maybe they're not such good excuses, but they're the ones I'm using, to my detriment.

My future physical therapist, who also is a friend, tried to reassure me that the repair will work and I'll be raring to go, once the recovery period is over. I have, maybe, used that as an excuse as well. Delay, delay, delay … hey! She's a professional!

At any rate … something needs to change. I have to rest a lot (to minimize the pain). But I don't have to rest and eat snacks.

I just had breakfast half an hour ago. My stomach is growling. What would you do?

GRRRRRRRR.

Day Three DONE

In addition to taking on a Whole 30 this month, I'm making every effort to walk every day. Yesterday truly was an effort, as it rained nearly all day.

I started out during a lull in the precipitation action, but before I'd gone even half a mile it started back up again. And it rained off and on for the entire five miles. I wore a waterproof hooded jacket, but was still pretty soaked by the time I got back home.

HOWEVER – I've already logged 15 miles for the month. In three days. [Patting myself on the back here.] It would be way cool to get 150 miles for April, but I doubt if that happens.

Anyway … walking in the rain is, in my opinion, more tiring and takes more energy than walking in good weather. I had tuna salad (this one made more traditionally with mayonnaise, rather than yesterday's version with avocado) when I got home and rested for a bit.

Paleo plan followers are supposed to eat enough at each meal to not need between-meal snacks. And generally that holds true for me. I eat a lot of protein and fat, both of which fill you up. But I guess the combination of a long and somewhat difficult walk combined with a light lunch resulted in X-treme hunger. At about 2 p.m. I was stomach-growling hungry.

I don't eat enough vegetables. I really don't. When I went to the grocery earlier this week, I bought a wide variety of them, more than would fit in the crisper drawer of the refrigerator. So – pushing the
season more than a little bit – I pulled out this, that, and the other and made gazpacho. Two quarts of it. Enough so that when I get stomach-growling hungry again, There Will Be Food.

This was super-simple to make. I roughly chopped three large tomatoes, a red pepper, a peeled cucumber, an unpeeled zucchini, a seeded jalapeño, and an onion. Working in batches, and adding a peeled garlic clove, the juice of half a lime, and about a cup of V-8 juice to each batch, I pulsed the mixture in the food processor until it was, um, slushy-looking. Not smooth, not chunky.

It turned out great – took care of the hunger in a most tasty way. The jalapeño added just enough fire to make it interesting without being overwhelming.

While I was in a chopping-vegetables mood, I made a chicken stir-fry for dinner. I do believe yesterday's vegetable quota was achieved.

Today we're having my absolute favorite entrée for dinner: chicken strips wrapped in bacon, dusted with chili and garlic powders and baked in the oven. Along with a combination of roasted cauliflower, broccoli and carrots, I think I'm on my way to a well-done Day Four.

A first

Yesterday was an unusual day for me. I was hungry All. Day. Long.

That hasn't happened since I began the paleo plan. In fact, I would say I'm rarely hungry, and when I am the hunger is appropriate: I haven't eaten in several hours.

Meals over the weekend were fine, but I ate fewer eggs than I usually do. Eggs fill me UP, and I need to put them back on the breakfast menu. I ended up skipping breakfast both Sunday and yesterday, and while I don't necessarily subscribe to the breakfast-is-the-most-important-meal philosophy, I have learned that I'm less hungry and more energetic when I eat it.

My husband and I drove to a nearby town to meet with an insurance agent and buy a short-term health plan for me. Aetna, which had been providing my coverage, is pulling out of the individual policy market here in WV (and in several other states, as well). I'd thought the last day was September 30, but it turns out it's Sunday. This coming Sunday. So we had to scramble a bit to get it taken care of.

It turns out to be a tiny bit better coverage with a significant reduction in the monthly premium. And it will tide me over until the health insurance exchanges go into effect January 1, 2014. You can begin the application process for those on October 1, and I will be first in line.

If ONLY the United States had the political will to pass a Medicare-for-all, single-payer plan. As long as insurance companies have lobbyists, though, that's not going to happen.

BUT IT SHOULD.

Insurance is the biggest gambling game around. You throw money in the pot every month, but the only way you win is if you get sick (health), have an accident (auto) or die (life). I'm not a big health-care consumer at all. I've paid thousands of dollars to Aetna since we lost my husband's employer-based coverage when he retired. I can count on my fingers the number of times I've seen a doctor since then.

And my policy didn't even cover office visits.

I take a Lasix a couple times a week for intermittent swelling of my ankles. Generic Lasix is one of the cheapest drugs on the market, so I don't even use my prescription benefit to buy it – it's on the $4 formulary at Tiny Kroger Pharmacy.

So six more months and health coverage should improve, premiums should go down (or, in my case, I think it will stay about the same as it is for the new short-term policy) and millions of U.S. citizens will still be without health insurance. If you live in a state in which your governor has decided not to expand Medicaid, well, I'm sorry you elected him or her. This map shows who is still on the fence.

It wouldn't hurt to make a phone call. Or 10. The more citizens who participate (Medicaid expansion will provide subsidies to lower income people), the lower ALL our premiums will be. And, theoretically, we'll be able to nip health problems in the bud, instead of waiting until it's so bad we have to visit an emergency room.

Or die.

Friday Quote Day

Discipline is making the choice

between what you want now

and what you want most.

~ Author Unknown

I'm not so sure I like the word "discipline," but I like – and am comfortable with – the concept of choice. I'd rather think not think of myself as an unruly delinquent. Discipline belongs in middle-school classrooms, not grown-ups' kitchen pantries.

Last night we did indeed have pizza, and it was my favorite variety: pesto sauce with mozzarella, fresh sliced tomatoes, kalamata olives, onions and grilled chicken, sprinkled with feta. I had just one slice.

By 8 p.m. I was a little hungry. I'd been alternately knitting and playing BlackBerry solitaire while watching television multitasking. I wished for ice cream, but none appeared, so I had a half cup of applesauce with a little cinnamon mixed in. By 9 p.m. I was ready to read for a while and go to sleep, still a little hungry but not uncomfortably so.

It's okay to be hungry. Meals are so much more satisfying when I am ready to eat, rather than when I eat by the clock. But I'd rather not go to bed hungry. I think maybe I need to eat dinner later in the day (we usually eat around 5:30). I'll have to convince my husband that scheduling dinner for my needs is more important than watching The Ed Show.

Or Colbert Report reruns.