I’m Alive!: Sorta

This pass week reminds me of the story of someone facing tremendous danger. They said: "My first fear was that I was going to die. My second and greater fear was that I wasn’t."

It’s been a tough week and not wanting to leave any suspense on the blog, and I been fairly quiet except on obesityhelp.com. A week ago, I had a chest X-ray and it was followed by an upper GI, blood work and abdominal CAT scan. My mysterious pain started right below my chest, spread to my tummy and by last weekend, I had pain from my fingers to my toes and several days of fever.

My week started with SupaDoc and ruling out any problems with my lap band and it ended with Reality Doc finding a path to combat anemia – the only for sure thing ailment presenting itself.

Oh, Reality Doc = Eric Melancon – not melon cone!

SupaDoc = Karl Leblanc - not la blank!

After ruling out just about everything imaginable, we were left with extremely iron-related blood levels. Dang, I thought I was doing so well!

I am using vitamins, nutritional supplements and lots of prayer, but I need more (the prayer too). It’s a case of not holding on to enough and becoming anemic.

Funny, my PCP also says my pain will improve when I lose some weight. I have regained a few pounds lost in some 2-weeks of yo-yoing, but I’m still down at least 51 pounds by his chart and scale. That’s OK, I’ll bite, let’s lose some weight.

Anybody out there got any suggestions on anemia? I’m taking a big huge horse pill twice a day, trying a liquid diabetes medicine and the other stuff I talked about last week.

Oh, all you exercise ‘gym rats’ out there: I do realize the importance of exercise and I do walk and I’m really hoping to move up to health club-like activities when I’m not incapacitated with pain and anemia. It’s been really bad and it’s always lots of fun when someone opts in, "hey, ever thought about exercising?"

It’s a common myth I’m seeing. Most people think that people have weight loss surgery because they are against diet and exercise. Be warned, I’ll have PMS next week and I won’t be responsible for any folks mowed down by a late model red SUV. (If I’m chasing you on foot, you do stand a fighting chance, though.)

Truth be told, weight loss surgery without a lifestyle change in both diet and amount of exercise will probably not be successful. It’s not the easy way out, it’s just the "only" way for many of us.

The pictures through out this entry are from our walking tour of the Baton Rouge zoo. My exercise included pulling Pink Power Girl away from the talking bird exhibit. And yes, I feel as bad as I look, sorry.

I’m beginning to worry about my Valentine’s Day goal of lowering my body fat percentage by five points. My journey to wellness now includes raising my iron count to double digits and getting the minimum levels of hemoglobin.

Well, at least I do a better job with Cecilia.