Tomorrow

Tomorrow we're heading to the big city (or near it) to get my HCG potion.  That means it's really going to happen again, huh?  This will be the sixth round.  Sadly, I'm at the weight I was after the first round was over.  How lame is that?

I gained it back (again and again) mostly because of surgeries, once because my doctors gave me bad advice: four cycles in a year is WAY too much, especially with my history of thus far inexplicable rapid weight gain cycles (those are so not fun).

I am feverishly hoping this time, having no surgeries scheduled and it being just one cycle in a year, that my body will accept the lower weight and just chill.  It better, as I'm going to do a long cycle and those SUCK.  If you're interested in the HCG diet, don't believe the hype that says you won't feel hungry, you'll feel good, and you'll lose 1-2 pounds per day.  None of that is true.

But for me, it's been the only way to get any off at all, though, as Isildur said in Lord of the Rings, "I buy it with great pain."  Even so, thinking that in a couple of months, I'll be down quite a bit again makes me smile.  Thinking of my cracked and bleeding hands (no lotion of any type allowed on the diet--in the winter) does not.

The holidays

A little late, but Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.  I hope you had a pleasant day, however it shaped up.  :)

Pretty mellow day here.  We cooked, and cooked, and had my dad and his two sweet pups over mid-afternoon.  We had a fire.  Anna and my dad played chess.  We took a walk after dinner.  It was nice.

Hope you have a great holiday season!

It sounds whiny...

...but I don't mean it that way.  It's just that it's occured to me that I really can't remember, in any kind of tangible way, what it feels like to be "just" tired.  Yeah, I'm tired.  Most of the time, actually.  But because of my weird health issues, I'm in pain all the time.  All.  The.  Time.  It's hard to imagine, isn't it?

It is.  Even for me.

Let's see....

Two days of scrab free.  I'm going to go weigh now and see if yesterday netted any further progress.  Wait for it....be right back....

Stupid time for the battery to die on my scale!

So, never mind.  As you were....

Post steak day aftermath

Feeling better today, though hungry.  Had a whopper of a headache last night; sugar detox, I expect.  So far today I'm scarb free.  I'm hoping perhaps for more weight loss tomorrow.

Lame steak day

I've had awesome results in the past; not this time.  :(  Why?  Donno.  But it was a whole lot of discomfort for very little result.

Not enjoying the steak day

As weird as that sounds... It's misleading, really.  If one got to eat steak all day, not so bad.  But starving all day, eating a steak and apple, then being hungry a couple of hours later and then the rest of the day...  Anyway, I made it 'til dinner; it was a near thing.  I didn't get shaky, but felt weak as a kitten on Valium.

Now I have a headache; probably sugar detox.

Tomorrow I hope to find it was worth it, and be back in the Decade Above X.

Now I've got to haul my headache into the kitchen and clean up.  Thankfully, I have a little more energy now that I ate; not much, though.  Still feeling pretty wiped out.

Tomorrow a friend is having me over for tea.  I'm looking forward to it!

Steak Day

Well, I forgot how much these suck!  I'm not sure I'll make it.  Before, generally when I did them, I'd have had no scarb (simple carb/aka sugar) for a long time, so my blood sugar would usually make it at least until 4:00.  Today, not so sure.  So if I end up with violently shaking hands before late afternoon, I may have to abort the mission.  For now, I'm on an herbal tea IV.

Probably not the best day for me to have given four tubes of blood at the hospital, yes?  But I'm trying to divide and conquer.  This was the most, er, convenient day to do one; and with my weight continuing to creep up, I'm trying to do something to stop it, or at least slow it.  I finished the last of the cortisol tests (save one more midnight saliva test coming up tonight--which only takes a few minutes) this morning.  That required running in to the hospital.

So after tomorrow morning, when I can mail all my remainig stuff in, I can chill out a bit--at least until my pending doctor visits (one in November, two in December).  Answers?  Yes, please. 

Steak Day

It's been a long time, but I'm going to do one.  Ok, I'm planning to do one on Wednesday.  The weight keeps creeping up there (I thought I had stabilized.).  So I hope it stops it, and yes, takes a bit off.  I hate them.  Steak/apple days are only ok during the 15 minutes it takes you to eat your dinner.  The rest of the day stinks.

I take some comfort as my pants get steadily tighter that in January, I'll be stopping and reversing.  It's lame it requires such extreme and uncomfortable action on my part, but at least, for awhile, my weight goes down, not up.

It's also a good opportunity to detox and reset eating habits.  It's a very long 10 weeks, though (especially the seven on the no-food diet).  I even consider that a blessing.  Unlike most Americans, I can say, I really DO know what it's like to be starving for weeks and months on end.  But I do know my situation (when there) is temporary, and my choice, however unpleasant it is.

Getting to the end...

...of my tests.  One more series and then I ride out three more doc visits (barring any unforeseen illness) over the course of the next six or seven weeks left of the year.  One with the HCG doc near Tacoma (she moved).  One with the pituitary/endocrine doc in Seattle.  One with the throat guy. 

My singing voice hasn't come back since I recovered from that insane bout of laryngitis.  They'll do the awful testing (nothing says fun like a tube down your nose and throat).  I'm hoping to hear the residual vocal cord paralysis is gone and I just need some exercises.  I LOVE to sing.  It's been difficult to not be able to do it properly.  Having a loss of vocal command and pitch control, let alone stamina, makes me very sad.  It was one thing I could do no matter what the rest of my body did.  Yep, makes me sad.

Looks like the HCG will launch in January.  Last time I did a short (3 week) cycle, which went perfectly.  This time, I'm going for the long one again (7 weeks).  It's tough, but it's what's worked.  I hope with no pending surgeries we can keep the progress going and not gain it back again.

I'm still 40# less than when I started this craziness nearly 3 years ago.  While that's fine and nice, at one point, I had lost 100#.  Yes, indeed.  That was better.

Tests and hcg prep

I'm working on the sets of tests to be done before my appointment with the big brain doc in Seattle.  Rather a pain, but worth if it we get any useful information.  It's a no-brainer I'm tired of doctors telling me that my symptoms and problems are weird and well, sorry, we just don't know.  I suppose I'm not really holding my breath that this time will be any different; I can wish, though. 

It's hard to face it that I won't make it (get healthy--or healthier) in time to have another child.  I'm 43.  Even if I were healthy, that'd be pushing it.  All sorts of complications and problems occur at this age.  And the last time I was pregnant, at 39, it was a cluster f---, ending in disaster.  Heck, being pregnant at 31 was a health tsunami for me.  To say my pregnancy and delivery with Anna was fraught with problems is like saying the Pacific Ocean is a little pond.

Don't get me wrong, I'm happy I was able to have Anna.  For a long time, we thought we'd never have a child of our own.  And she's great!  There are lots of people who never get that blessing.  And I know that.  It's still hard, especially when confronted with women who shoot babies out like pez dispensers.

I still want to get healthy, though (duh).  I hope that can happen.  But, really, what are the odds?  I'd keep my money in my pocket if I were you.  I'm still going to try, though (duh).  So, I'm going to see my old hcg diet doc in a couple of weeks and pay up for my potion.  Planning an early January launch date.  Stay tuned to this channel for further updates.

Last time it went well.  I lost a bit more than average and stabilization and maintenance went perfectly well.  In fact, I was easing down a little more on my own and then surgery happened.  As per usual, it threw my system into chaos and I went into another rapid weight gain cycle with all the accompanying Cushingoid symptoms.  I'm hoping as there's no surgery on deck, this time I'll get more of the (same) weight off, and that it will stay off. 

Ideally, the doc will figure out the root cause of my problems and we can fix it.  Were it fixed, my weight issues would melt away on their own, so to speak.  But again, the odds?  Never tell me the odds.

Rather a long and odd week

Still sick, but I suppose I'm somewhat better.  My symptoms got weird, so I was badgered into going to the doctor again.  Of course all my regular folk were not available, so I had to take luck of the draw.  What a lame waste of time that was!  So, yeah.  I'll come back in if I get worse.  Thanks for that.

This week has just seemed endless.  It's been a series of strange and difficult occurrences, mixed in with the occasional bit of joy.  Anna got her feelings hurt.  I got my feelings hurt.  Mark got his feelings hurt.  I guess it's a week where our family has felt a bit like pinatas.  We've all struggled with various and sundry sicknesses.  For the first time in I can't remember how long, we didn't get all our school work done this week. 

That was a tough pill for me to swallow.  I pride myself on really being on the ball with school.  But between sickness, a pseudo-holiday, and just life stuff, we didn't get it all done.  For me, like I said, that's a wow scenario.  But, I realized (and was affirmed by my husband), regular school teachers have that happen pretty much every week, so I should let up on myself.  Yeah, sure.  I can do that.

Maybe.

I donno.  Giving up, or letting myself off the hook just doesn't come easily to me.  Maybe it's because of my health, I feel like if I give any ground, I'll fail.  I am learning to loosen up a little bit.  A little.  So, anyway.  I'm rambling.  Thankfully, we have a rare weekend where we can relax at home.  Yeah, there's stuff to do, but I can take it at a leisurely pace.  Unless I get sicker.  Then I have to go back to the doctor.  I'll get right on that.

Mystery

The doc's office called and said I don't have a kidney thing.  BUT, how does that explain my symptoms and the pain, er, in my kidneys?  Of course that doctor is gone for the weekend.  I'm thinking of going to see my other doctor.

But that totally conflicts with the plans I had for when Anna's in sewing class this afternoon: eating a cupcake and watching Star Trek.

Why do these things happen on a Friday?  Really!

Not feeling awesome

Still suffering from a weird bladder/kidney thing.  At the risk of offering TMI, it's strange.  It didn't fall under the usual symptoms one gets.  I just had a lot of stomach type pain and extra fatigue for a couple of weeks.  The antibiotics are starting to work, but they're heavy duty, so they make me feel kinda sick as well!  So add that to some other stuff going on, and I do feel rather :(. 

Yes, I know.  You'd be fair to think I should just shut it, that I'm not in the flood zone (stupidly named Hurricane!), and I do realize that.  So I'm not wallowing, and I appreciate my life.  Even so, feeling a bit sad and sick.

But I'll rally!