Category Archives: Health

Seeing My Therapist (or Building Habits)

Posted on June 23, 2016 | 2 comments

I saw my therapist earlier this week. This was the first time that I had seen him in 6 months because he has been feeling like I’ve been doing a pretty good job lately. So he trusted me to be ok with a 6 month gap between appointments but let me know that if anything changed I could see him sooner if I needed to.

I had been feeling pretty good about this appointment lately. After my interview for the audition recently, I have really realized how much progress has been made and I knew that my appointment would be filled with positive news.

I had brought a couple of things with me to my appointment. Usually, I bring my happiness checklist, but I’m now using an app to track that so I made sure my phone was charged so I could show him if he wanted to see it. I also brought my Spark Planner with me. I’ve been tracking so much stuff in there lately and I wanted it to remind myself of anything as well as proof to show him if he wanted to see it.

The first thing discussed in my appointment was how I was feeling about Vyvanse. I think I’m doing pretty well on it and there was only one minor concern about things. I’ve been taking my larger dose in the morning and smaller dose at lunch, but I feel like maybe those should be switched. There is more time between lunch and bedtime than there is between breakfast and lunch. And since I’m not having sleeping issues with Vyvanse, I’m not worried about a slightly larger dose at lunchtime. My therapist agreed with me completely and my new prescription bottles will reflect that (for now, I just take the afternoon medication in the morning and visa versa until I’m using my refill).

After that check in, we discussed how I’ve been doing with my happiness checklist and other things. I told him how I had been using an app for the checklist since it’s easier and I always have it with me, and I think his biggest surprise is that I’ve continued to keep it up. He wrote down the name of the app (HabitBull) so he can tell other patients as well, so that made me feel pretty awesome.

And then we talked about my Spark Planner. I told him how I had been tracking a lot of stuff in there this year and I was showing off the various sections of it. I showed him where I can track my annual goals, monthly goals, and weekly goals and I think he was impressed that there is such a big focus on goal setting. It’s good for me to have goals to reach toward, so the more I can focus and have to think about my goals the better.

But what my therapist was most impressed with were the monthly challenges that are within the Spark Planner.

30 Day Challenges

I showed him the monthly challenges I’ve been doing and let him know that I’ve basically had 100% success with keeping up each challenge even beyond the month that I set the challenge for (the only one that hasn’t been 100% has been weighing myself in because I can only do that at home and I was in Santa Barbara for Rayshell’s wedding without my scale). And I know that I can’t do 100% perfection with all challenges for the rest of my life, but even if I only keep them up part-time these are all good habits that I’ve been building and that’s just awesome.

And habit building is exactly what my therapist wants me to focus on over these next 6 months. The more I build positive habits in my life, the more likely that recovery from my eating disorder will become a positive habit eventually. While the individual habits are sometimes recovery related, even the non-recovery ones are helping me get into a better space in my life and to build my habit building muscles up so that I can use them for whatever I need to.

I knew when I bought my Spark Planner that it was going to be a good thing for me, but to know that my therapist thinks that this is what will help me get to recovery one day is amazing. I’m still figuring out what recovery really means to me (and that’s something I did discuss with my therapist), but I’m feeling even better that recovery is in my future one day.

At the end of my appointment, I felt incredible and on cloud 9. My therapist even said that in some ways, I’m doing better than he is and he needs to get better and doing some things like I’m doing now. For me, so much of my habit work is having something to remind me to do it. I have so many alarms/reminders set on my phone so I know to do something. If I didn’t have that, I would easily forget and that’s what life was like before. There’s no shame in needing to be reminded to do something, but for some reason I was not willing to do that before.

But now that I’m fine with the dozens of alarms on my phone, I’m making sure I’m getting my new habits done and I’m excited to see how I’ll be doing in 6 months when I see my therapist again.

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Default ThumbnailA Good Therapy Check In (or Focus On The Good) Default ThumbnailMay Challenge Recap (or It’s Time For Meditation) Default ThumbnailAn Easy Therapist Check-In (or Virtual Appointments Make Things Easier) Default ThumbnailOver A Month On Vyvanse (or A Meeting With My Therapist) Default ThumbnailAnother Therapist Check In (or Showing Off My Happiness Checklist) Default ThumbnailI’ve Made Progress (or I Think My Therapist Will Be Proud)

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Posted in Fun Stuff, Health, Weight Loss

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I’ve Made Progress (or I Think My Therapist Will Be Proud)

Posted on June 16, 2016 | Comments Off on I’ve Made Progress (or I Think My Therapist Will Be Proud)

Yesterday, I had a phone interview/audition for a commercial about people who have binge eating disorder. I actually had auditioned for this commercial last year when it was slightly different, but when I saw they were shooting again I submitted myself.

Typically for auditions you don’t have a phone interview, but since for this project you have to prove that you have been diagnosed with BED by a doctor and meet other requirements that aren’t normally an issue with commercials, the phone interview is the first step.

I’ll start by saying that I’m not going to get the audition for this because they need to fit certain age and size requirements right now, and I’m not a match for that. It’s not a big deal and I’m totally ok with not being able to audition because I got so much out of this phone interview.

The woman I spoke with yesterday was actually the same woman who I spoke to last year for the phone interview and audition I had. It was nice to catch up quickly with her and she was excited that I had submitted myself again for the project (I was afraid that they wouldn’t want me to since I didn’t get it last year, but I figured it was better to try than not to).

The phone interview first covered a lot of technically stuff. You do agree that you are willing to share medical information with the production team (if you got the commercial, it wouldn’t be public so your privacy is protected) and you have to agree that you are ok with sharing the fact that you do have binge eating disorder. Since I share that on here, I have no issues with saying that in a commercial. I think that most people aren’t as comfortable being public with things as I am, and I understand why the casting team wants to check with the people they are talking with to make sure they know how public it will be.

After going over that I was diagnosed by a doctor, we went over what treatments I’m doing for my eating disorder. I mentioned that I’m still taking Vyvanse and that I’ve finally been seeing some progress with it. I think a lot of the progress is due to some personal development I’ve been doing along with the monthly challenges in my Spark Planner. But to be honest, until I had to share what things were like before versus what they are like now, I didn’t realize how much progress I’ve made.

My eating disorder is not gone (I still wish it was and I know that it is not a totally realistic goal to have), but my episodes are less frequent. The reduction has not been as much as I would have liked it to be, but anything is better than nothing. I’ve also had more clarity lately about things. I’m not letting myself stay down about stuff as long as I would have in the past. If I have a bad meal or bad day, I’m getting back on track a lot faster than I would have before. I’m not waiting until the next week to fix things.

I haven’t seen my therapist is almost 6 months now. When I last saw him, the plan was to go 6 months and to see what that brings. Of course, if I felt like I needed to see him sooner I could have made an appointment. But the past few months have been pretty awesome for me. And when I see my therapist again next week, I think he is going to be pretty happy with the progress I’ve made and hopefully he can help me plan out how to not just continue with what I’m doing but to continue making steps toward whatever recovery will end up being for me.

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Default ThumbnailA Year On Vyvanse (or Help Is Expensive) Default ThumbnailMoving Forward With Therapy (or Educating Myself) Default ThumbnailOver A Month On Vyvanse (or A Meeting With My Therapist) Default ThumbnailAnother Therapist Check In (or Showing Off My Happiness Checklist) Default ThumbnailAnother Therapy Check In (or Someone Sees Progress) Default ThumbnailSeeing My Therapist (or Building Habits)

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Taking Things A Bit Easier (or No More Injuries)

Posted on June 13, 2016 | Comments Off on Taking Things A Bit Easier (or No More Injuries)

This past week of workouts ended up being a week of being cautious. I have no clue what happened, but on Monday morning last week I woke up with a very stiff knee. I didn’t do anything over that weekend that should make things hurt, so I’m wondering if I slept in a position that tweaked something. The knee pain is almost only at night (it wakes me up if I shift positions at night) and hurts a little in the morning when I get up. So since I was dealing with that, I didn’t go as crazy during my workouts because I didn’t want to hurt myself more.

Monday was a partner workout which was awesome because my friend Dena came try her very first Orangetheory class! So she and I partnered up together for the workout. During the partner time, the person on cardio controlled the switching. The cardio person did a 200 meter row and a run on the treadmill at inclines. The run was supposed to be .2 miles, but I know I can’t run that long nor did I really want to run on hills. So I decided to walk at inclines so I was only doing .1 miles each time. On the floor, while we waited for our partner to be done with their cardio work, we did arms, chests, lunges, and abs. We kept going the floor work until our partner came over and switched us out.

I have to say that Dena and I made pretty good partners for this. We were pretty equal on time for cardio, so neither of us was stuck on the floor waiting for too long. I was working on using some heavy weights on the floor, so I was mainly using the 20 pound ones for my work. At the end of the partner time, we had a small block that was like a normal block. While it was still hills on the treadmill, I did run during the 1 minute all out at the end so I got a little bit of running done.

Wednesday was an endurance, strength, and power day that didn’t switch between the blocks so I was on the treadmill for 30 minutes straight. It was an interesting day because all of the blocks were pretty short. Again on the treadmill, I walked for most of the time. I did run for the all outs again which were a minute each time. Running for a minute is getting a bit easier for me, but my heart rate is really high during it and I have a bit of trouble catching my breath after. I know that this will be worked out the more I run, but it’s a big adjustment to get used to.

During the floor, we had some lunges and arm work, but the big thing to me was the timed row blocks. We had 2 blocks where we had timed rows. One was for 3 minutes and one was for 2 minutes. I really wanted to do well, but I was also so tired after the cardio time so I knew that I wasn’t going to be hitting my best distances during those times. So I just wanted to get the minimum of what we are supposed to do, which is basically 100 meters every 30 seconds. For the 3 minute row, I got 606 meters which met my goal. But for the 2 minute row, I was just too tired to keep my momentum going and I only got 355 meters in. I know I could have probably gotten to 400 meters if I really tried, but my legs just weren’t having it (and a majority of rowing is leg power).

Friday was another strength day, but fortunately we were switching between blocks. Again, I walked almost the entire time on the treadmill. Since it was a strength day there were plenty of hills to work with and I really tried to keep my inclines where they needed to be. I did run during the all outs (either 30 seconds or 1 minute long), but while runners were supposed to run at a high incline, I kept it at either 2% or 4% (4% is the flat road for walkers). I’m really not ready to try to run at an incline where I’m still struggling to run at all.

The floor ended up being a really great day for me. We did have a 400 meter row, but rowing wasn’t a big part of the day. I was using 20 pound weights for my arm and chest work (including bicep curls) and during the burpees we had to do I was always adding in pushups. We also had an entire block just using the TRX straps. Most of the strap work was core work, so I was feeling pretty awesome t the end of class.

My knee did hurt throughout the week, but again it was almost only at night. I woke up almost every single night with pains in my knee while I was moving. In the morning, I would be very stiff but after an hour or so the pain would end. I never felt pain during the workout (that’s a good sign) but it wasn’t getting better or worse through the week. I really have no clue what I did and I doubt doing to the doctor would give me any guidance. There’s always a chance that my hip issues are causing the knee pain, but again, I can’t really do much to fix that. Over this past weekend, I pretty much did nothing to try to rest my knee and that seemed to help.

I’m hoping that this week, things will be a bit better for me. I would like to try to push myself a bit more in my running because Peak Performance Week is coming up soon. I know I’ll be doing the 1 mile challenge day, but I don’t think I can do the other treadmill challenge days because of my schedule. So I’m trying to focus on what I can do to prepare for that day and making sure that I have the best workouts possible leading up to it.

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Default ThumbnailMore Progress And Steps Back (or Trying My Hardest) Default ThumbnailA 4 Workout Week (or Only A Few More Weeks Of 2015 Workouts) Default ThumbnailA Full Workout Week (or Sticking With My Plan) Default ThumbnailBusy Workout Week (or Maybe Overdoing It A Bit) Default ThumbnailUnexpected Injuries (or I’m Still Doing My 5K Tonight) Default ThumbnailStill Taking This A Bit Easy (or Not Going To Push Too Hard)

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Posted in Fitness, Fun Stuff, Health, Tough Stuff

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May Challenge Recap (or It’s Time For Meditation)

Posted on June 1, 2016 | Comments Off on May Challenge Recap (or It’s Time For Meditation)

We are getting close to the halfway point of the year! I’ve been keeping up with using my Spark Planner and I’m loving it so much! It’s such a great accountability thing and I’ve found new ways to keep myself on top of the tasks I want to get done. There’s still a ton more I think I could do with my planner, but I figure that I can figure those out in time. If I don’t do it this year, there are many more years to come to make sure I do.

I had a lot of goals for May, and unfortunately I didn’t get a lot of them done. I got about half done this time. I did push myself to do a bit more (like wanting to try new recipes or to do more yoga at home) and I know I could have done the things I wanted to do if I had managed my time better. Time management is on my list of things to work on, but it didn’t quite happen in May.

But of the things I did get done in May, I’m happy with what I did! I did 15 workouts at Orangetheory, I went out to 2 dinners with friends, I cleaned out my closet (I had way too many workout clothes and tank tops), and I read a non-fiction book (I read “I Thought It Was Just Me” by Brene Brown).

I also had 100% success with my monthly challenge for May. I wanted to search the acting self-submitting sites every day. I set an alarm that went off on my computer and phone every day to remind me to look to self-submit. Most days, I would forget to do it until the alarm went off so it’s clear I needed an alarm for this task. I have no intention of getting rid of this plan, so my alarm is set to continue indefinitely. Every single challenge I’ve set for myself each month has been something that I’ve continued every day without fail. I know that won’t happen forever, but to know that I’ve gained 5 new positive daily habits so far is pretty amazing.

I’m definitely starting to struggle with what monthly challenges I want to do each month. There are a bunch of things I’d love to do, but I know I can’t do them for an entire month (at least not yet). I also want to focus more on adding things to my life rather than trying to avoid things in my life. I did have the one challenge to not order delivery food for the month (which I’ve kept up), but I didn’t feel as empowered by that as I did with others. Not doing something is much more passive than trying to do something every day.

After some thought for the past few days, I found what I want my June monthly challenge to be: I want to meditate every day in June. I’ve tried in the past to meditate, but it hasn’t stuck. I know it can take a month or so to create a habit, so making this my monthly challenge is perfect! I have 2 different meditation apps on my phone, but after checking out both apps a bit more this past week I think I’m going to focus on Stop, Breathe, and Think.

Meditation

The mediations on there are free (you can pay for some, but there are a bunch of free ones) and they all seem to be pretty short. I have 2 alarms set every day for this, one in the morning and one at night. I don’t know if I will like to meditate during one time more than the other, so I’m setting myself up for success either way. I have a bunch of friends who meditate and I’ve only heard positive things about it. It can help to keep my anxiety and panic down, and anything that has the potential to do that makes me pretty excited! Worst case scenario, I don’t love doing this every day and I don’t continue it after June. It’s only going to take a few minutes each day so it won’t be a time waste. But if I love it and it makes a ton of positive changes in my life? I’ve got to try this out seriously to make an informed decision on if meditation is right for me or not.

I’m still working on the rest of my June goals like how many workouts I want to do and maybe even setting a goal related to running! But for now, I’m excited that I’ve set up my monthly challenge and I’m ready to start!

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Default ThumbnailAnother Monthly Challenge Down (or July and August Challenges) Default ThumbnailRecapping My June (or Still Thinking Up New Monthly Challenges) Default ThumbnailAlmost Through A Year Of Monthly Challenges (or Picking A Good Challenge For November) Default ThumbnailReflection on April’s Challenge (and Looking At May’s) Default ThumbnailNot Perfect This Month (or Challenged With The Monthly Challenge) Default ThumbnailThe Artist’s Way Recap (or 12 Weeks Later)

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Home Cooking (or Getting Into A Routine)

Posted on May 25, 2016 | 1 comment

I haven’t really written about food on here lately. Meals used to stress me out so much and I knew I needed to work on it. So many nights I would either forget to go to the store to get groceries or got home so late that I was too lazy to cook. So I’d order delivery food or get some take out from a quick service type place. I know that I wasted a bunch of money (and ate a bunch of calories that I didn’t need) doing that, but I just couldn’t get into cooking.

I tried cooking a bunch of different times and different ways. I thought meal planning would work for me, but I ended up losing inspiration or not feel like eating what I was supposed to eat that night. Bulk cooking worked for a bit, but I got really bored with it and if I didn’t have time to bulk cook I couldn’t seem to get back on track. I would hear about what other people would do, and it would seem so simple. But for so many reasons I just couldn’t get into cooking. A lot of it does have to do with the amount of work and cleanup required to make a meal for just me, but that really is laziness.

I knew something needed to change and I set my monthly challenge in March to be to not get delivery food for the entire month. The last time that I ordered delivery food was actually in the middle of February and I’m happy to say that I haven’t gotten delivery food since. I have gone out of dinners and I’ve gotten take out from places like Chipotle or a salad place, but since delivery food was the bad habit I wanted to break I’m pretty happy that it’s been this long since I’ve gotten it. There have been a few times where I’m feeling super lazy and think it would just be so easy to order something in, but I have been working really hard at keeping easy to put together foods or ok frozen dinners at my house for those nights. While frozen dinners aren’t the best option, they are significantly better than anything I could get delivered to me.

My cooking hasn’t been anything too crazy. Most of my dinners have been a turkey burger and some veggies like broccoli or sweet potatoes.

Healthy Dinner

If I start cooking the potato in the microwave and finish it in the toaster oven, I can put that meal together in less than 20 minutes. I also do make more recipe type dinners from time to time. A lot of time I make meatloaf because it’s pretty basic to put together. The last time I made it, I did about half meat and half chopped veggies so it made a lot of meatloaf for not as many calories.

Meatloaf

I make meatloaf in muffin tins so it’s easy to portion out and put some aside for leftovers for the next day or so. After the prep work, there’s not that much cleanup since the muffin tin is a disposable one. So I’m usually able to clean up while the meatloaf is in the oven and I don’t have to worry about cleaning up after I’m done with dinner.

I have no clue what really got me to cook more often. Nothing really has changed in my life, it just happened. But I think a lot of things in my life have happened that way. I would have been trying to kick a habit that I didn’t like for years (like chewing gum or drinking soda) and then one day it stops and I don’t really think about it. I don’t missing chewing gum at all, but there are the rare occasional times that I do miss soda. Fortunately, that craving goes away pretty quickly so I’ve been soda free for several years now.

The same thing happened with cooking. I was trying to force the change to become a home cook for a long time. And while I would get into a habit of it for a bit, it never stuck. This time, it just feels natural and right for some reason so I don’t see any reason for me to stop. I do still have so many changes that need to be made about my food habits, but I’m so glad that I’ve been able to make this change now and hopefully other changes will fall in line too.

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Default ThumbnailBaby Steps With Cooking (or I’m Cautiously Optimistic) Default ThumbnailCooking Routine (or Adding Flavor) Default ThumbnailHome Cooking (or Getting Used To Making What I Eat) Default ThumbnailLack Of Planning (or No Home Cooking This Week) Default ThumbnailCooking At Hipcooks (or Remembering Cooking Doesn’t Have To Be Hard) Default ThumbnailStill Cooking (or It’s Almost A Habit)

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Posted in Food, Fun Stuff, Health

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Reflection on April’s Challenge (and Looking At May’s)

Posted on May 4, 2016 | 1 comment

I’ve been keeping up with the monthly challenges with my Spark Planner. Even though I do weekly and monthly goals in the planner, the monthly challenges are nice because they are something I want to do every day and for each of them (100% accurate food tracking, daily gratitude lists, and no ordering delivery food), I’ve been able to maintain those habits since then. I’m sure that eventually I will not be doing everything 100% perfect, but it’s nice to know that I’ve added some great daily habits into my life that I’m keeping up.

For April’s challenge, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do but I eventually settled on doing daily weigh-ins. I have such a love/hate relationship with my scale and tracking weight can be so emotional for me because it’s a black and white status. If I gained 6 pounds because I ate something really salty, it upset me and any weight tracking things I used made it look so horrible.

So once I knew that I would have this as my challenge, I looked for a new way to track my weight. Weighing in every day is great, but if I don’t keep records then there is no point of doing it. After searching in the app store, I came across Happy Scale. You still track your weight similar to any other app, but in the tracking it shows trends versus just the current number. So if you are overall down 10 pounds but you happen to gain a pound, it will still have a line headed down. It also shows you what you will weigh by a certain time based on the trend that you are currently on. This app really helped me to focus on the overall view and not just pinpointing this particular moment.

As far as my monthly challenge goes, I wasn’t 100% this time. I didn’t bring my scale with me to Santa Barbara, so on Sunday and Monday that week I didn’t weigh in. But every single day beyond those I weighed in (I set an alarm to remind myself but I didn’t really need it). I’m fine that it wasn’t 100%, and now I’m trying to figure out how I want to continue in the future. I don’t know if I love the idea of daily weigh-ins, but I don’t know if weekly ones are good enough if I’m tracking a trend. I’m going to play with the frequency of the weigh-ins and I feel really confident that I will find a happy medium.

For my May challenge, I decided to change things up a bit. Most of my challenges have been related to my health or eating disorder recovery. I love that I’m making great strides in that, but I also want to improve other aspects of my life. And one thing that I feel has been falling behind is my acting career. I’ve had some great things so far this year with the short film I helped a friend with and the new short film that I’ll be starring in (don’t forget to donate to our Kickstarter!).

But I know there is so much more that I can do. And I can’t think that my agents will do 100% of the work for me. I need to be proactive and work on finding great parts to audition for as well. So for May, I’ve set my challenge to search the various self-submission acting sites every single day. I can’t guarantee that every day I will submit myself for something because there isn’t always something that matches me. But every day I will check to make sure. I used to be really great at doing this, but lately I’ve been slacking.

I’ve set an alarm to go off every single day to remind me to look on the self-submission sites. It does come in handy to have the alarm because it’s so easy to forget. But this way my phone (and computer) will keep reminding me until I click that the task is complete. So far, it’s been pretty easy to remember to self-submit but I know there will be days that I completely forget until the alarm goes off. But that’s exactly why I have the alarm and there’s no shame in needing to be reminded to do something.

Hopefully out of doing self-submissions checks every day, I’ll get some more auditions this month. Getting auditions isn’t something I can control, so I’m not focusing on the results (just the action). But having results would be awesome and I know that every opportunity I have to audition is another day that I get to live my dream and be closer to my dream career.

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Default ThumbnailDecember Monthly Challenge (or Wrapping Up For The Year) Default ThumbnailEnding My Challenge Early (or I Guess I Made A Mistake) Default ThumbnailReflection (or I’m Totally Living My Dream) Default ThumbnailGetting Weighed In (or A New Orangetheory Challenge) Default ThumbnailAttempting To Go Scale-Free (or A Personal Challenge) Default ThumbnailNot Perfect This Month (or Challenged With The Monthly Challenge)

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Posted in Acting, Fun Stuff, Health, Tough Stuff, Weight Loss

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Busy Workout Week (or Maybe Overdoing It A Bit)

Posted on May 2, 2016 | Comments Off on Busy Workout Week (or Maybe Overdoing It A Bit)

I had a 4 workout week this past week. I totally needed a 4 workout week (it was actually the only 4 workout week I had for April), but I think that some of my activities on my off days (or before my workouts) made it seem a bit tougher than it usually feels. Of course, I also might have felt it more because it had been way too long since my last 4 workout week and I’ve learned that I need to make sure that I’m doing them more often so I don’t get out of the habit of it.

I think my Monday workout went pretty well. It was a day that had endurance, strength, and power and those can be really fun. It was a switch day, so I was never on the treadmill for that long at a single stretch. The endurance block was full of longer push paces, but those weren’t too bad for me. The one treadmill thing that got to me was the strength section. Strength on the treadmill means hills and sometimes the power walkers are expected to go much higher on the incline than I’m ok with right now (I’m wondering if my calf will ever feel back to normal again). I tried my best, but I’m really not ok going above 8% (or on really good days 10%) on the treadmill. So I had to keep my inclines lower than I would have liked, but I tried to bump up the speed when I could.

The floor work wasn’t too bad, but my body wasn’t loving the pop jacks or knee tucks. Knee tucks are much easier for me, but they can be a struggle when I’m tired or my hip is feeling ready to be done. But what I liked the best about this workout was that the end was the endurance block that was a partner challenge. So I felt extra motivated then because I had a partner counting on me and the treadmill part of the partner workout was a 1 minute push to all-out on the treadmill so it was pretty fast.

Wednesday was a tough day for me at first. I had gone to Disneyland after the workout on Monday, and I might have overdone it a bit with the walking after a workout. Tuesday I was really sore and Wednesday I was still feeling a bit off. I tried to do some stretching work to make my legs and hip feel better, but when I’m having an off day sometimes there is nothing I can do to make it better. So when I got to the workout, I was happy to see that it was a run/row day. All the treadmill blocks were pretty short (I think the longest I was on the treadmill at a time was under 4 minutes), and the rowing wasn’t too bad. The rows were between 100-200 meters each time, so that was basically under a minute of rowing. I tried to take a moment between the treadmill and the rower to catch my breath and make sure I wasn’t pushing my hip too much. I think I did ok with that because when I got to the floor block, it went really well for me!

I was doing my squats with 20 pound weights in each hand and managed to do all my arm work with the same weights! I’m getting close to being able to move to 25 pound weights for my chest presses (somehow that is where my upper body is strongest), but I’m still doing great with 20 pounds and the last few moves of each set can be a struggle. But knowing that I’m getting close to moving up to the next weight makes me feel pretty awesome. We also had lunge work to do that day, but I wasn’t able to do my lunges how we were supposed to (with our back leg on the weight bench). So I did my regular lunges instead and didn’t feel too bad about it because I was feeling so great about the weight work I had already done.

Friday was an interesting day. Before the workout, I had put a challenge out online that for every donor we get on the film Kickstarter, I would do a burpee before the class. I really was hoping we’d get a bunch of donors, but we only got 2. But then again, that meant I only had to do 2 burpees. I’m not the prettiest doing burpees because of the hip issues, but since I was filming this to share online I tried to look awesome doing them. Sadly, trying to look awesome also made both of my hips hurt so badly (even with only doing 2 burpees), so I was already feeling a bit sore before the workout even started.

Friday was a solid 30 minutes on the treadmill to start. We had a couple of 2 minute pushes, and those felt like 3 minutes or more to me. But I managed to get through it. When we had to do hills, I had to keep them pretty low (I basically stayed at 6%), but I did bump up my speed to balance it out. On the floor, I got to use the 20 pound weights again for my chest and arm work and we had some shorter rows. By the end of the workout, my hips were feeling a bit better than they did right after those 2 burpees (I’m so grateful the workout didn’t have any burpees in it!). But even though I was feeling a bit better, I knew that Saturday was going to have to be a bit of an easier day for me.

Saturday I was using the bike instead of the treadmill. The cardio blocks were back to back so I was on the bike for 30 minutes straight. It technically wasn’t a distance challenge day, but we were given a distance to try to get to in class. The runners on the treadmill were supposed to do a 5K (3.1 miles) or better in the 30 minutes, so I figured on the bike I should try to go 12 miles since for run/row days the bike has to do 4 times the distance of the treadmills. We had a lot of long pushes between the treadmill blocks. It seemed like a majority of them were between 2 or 3 minutes and I was feeling pretty tired by the end of the blocks. But once we were told to switch to the floor, my distance on the bike was 12.1 miles, so I was pretty happy about that.

The floor work was a lot of should work and we had some longer rows too. One block was an 800 meter row and the other was a 400 meter row. I managed to do both without having to take a break, but it wasn’t easy. And I was under the time that we were supposed to be under for the rower, so that was pretty awesome. At the end of each floor block, we had a 1 minute plank challenge. I still have to do planks on my knees (on my toes hurts my calf), but being on my knees also allows me to focus much better on my form. I could feel the planks in my core a lot, but I was able to keep going for the entire minute both times.

This week, I know I’ll be doing 3 regular workouts. There is also a dri-tri on Saturday that I’m debating about doing. I know I’ve felt left out in the past when I didn’t do the dri-tri, and I think that maybe I should just push myself to do it. But I also somehow don’t feel ready for it yet. I’m hoping that by tomorrow I will have a decision made on whether or not I will go for it. This dri-tri is the preliminary for the regional dri-tri, but since I know that I will not be a contender for representing my studio if I do it my focus will only be to finish and not to beat anyone else. I know that if I do it, the chances of me being the last person to finish is really high, but if I go for it I think finishing is the only goal that I’ll have in my head.

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Stopping A Panic Attack (or Only One Health Issue At A Time)

Posted on April 28, 2016 | Comments Off on Stopping A Panic Attack (or Only One Health Issue At A Time)

I’ve been pretty lucky lately with my panic attacks. I was warned that with taking Vyvanse it can make panic attacks more frequent or more severe. But I’ve almost experienced the opposite. My random panic attacks aren’t really happening right now (which I am so grateful for) and my expected panic attacks (like at the dentist) are the most mild they have ever been. I’m very happy with this side effect and it’s been really nice to not have to stress or panic about a panic attack happening.

Then the other night in the middle of the night I had a gallbladder attack. It was pretty awful, but fortunately not the worst one I’ve ever had. But they are pretty painful no matter how mild they get. I was in a lot of pain and couldn’t really see straight. My vision was going in and out (it almost felt like I was going to faint at times) and I stayed on my bed to stay safe. The pain was so uncomfortable and I couldn’t find a position to put my body in to make things feel even the smallest bit better. And I’m not sure if this is a part of the gallbladder attack or a reaction to the other symptoms, but I couldn’t stop sweating and was having trouble catching my breath.

In the past, my gallbladder attacks have brought on panic attacks. It makes sense to me because you do feel like you are dying when you are having a gallbladder attack. I really was wishing that I would pass out so that the pain could happen without me really knowing about it. I wanted it to end, but it wouldn’t. If I had a panic attack, I would have felt that it was totally normal.

But somehow, I was able to rationalize with myself in that really bad moment. I knew that it was a gallbladder attack and that it wasn’t a heart attack or that I was dying or anything. I knew that it would end eventually and when they do go away it usually is sudden for me so it could be going away any minute. And I knew that I had a choice to go to the doctor’s soon if I wanted to get my gallbladder out and never have to deal with this again (I don’t do that yet since my attacks aren’t that frequent and it’s a surgery that isn’t necessary yet).

I found a way to lay on my bed that was a safe enough position for me (I wasn’t at risk for falling off the bed if I did pass out) and I was working on focusing on my breath. I was trying to do counts for each inhale and exhale and was putting the counts in the front of my mind and not the what felt like endless pain.

Finally, the attack stopped pretty much as quickly as it came on. I tried to get as calm as I could and focus on getting back to sleep. The entire thing was about an hour long and the next morning I found it pretty funny that when I looked at my sleep tracking from my Fitbit, it was clear when the attack was happening.

Sleep Tracking

The pink lines are when I’m awake so you can see that chunk of pink in the middle of my night. That’s when I couldn’t stop moving because of the pain but you can also see that the entire night was a bit restless for me (the restless moments are the blue lines).

I know that I have the option of getting my gallbladder removed, but like I said above the attacks are pretty rare so I don’t think that surgery is a good option for me. I’ve had a couple of ultrasounds in the past and they have always told me that until the attacks are frequent enough that they are affecting my life, I don’t need to have my gallbladder out (the attacks aren’t good but they aren’t damaging my health in any other way right now). I’m just glad that my attacks are rare and they seem to be over within a few hours each time (from my research it seems like some people can have them for a day).

While it sucks that I had the attack, I’m so glad that I was able to prevent the panic attack from happening at the same time. I think that helped me get through the attack much better and I’m thinking maybe it helped it end faster than they have in the past.

Obviously I don’t want to have to go through this again, but I know realistically that it will happen again but I’m glad that somehow I was able to control the panic attack from coming and whatever skill set was in my subconscious to do that is able to be used in the future.

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My Medication Routines (or Feeling Like An Old Lady)

Posted on April 22, 2016 | Comments Off on My Medication Routines (or Feeling Like An Old Lady)

Growing up, I didn’t take any medication or supplements on a regular basis. I took medication when I was sick (and since I got strep throat multiple times a year that did feel like a regular medication), but beyond when I was sick I didn’t take anything. Not even a multi-vitamin. It just wasn’t something that my family did and since I ate a pretty decent diet there was no need for any supplements.

The first time I had to take a medication on a regular basis was right before I turned 18. When I was getting ready to leave for college, I had a doctor’s appointment where I was checked out and got up-to-date on immunizations. One of the things they check for is TB. This is done by a skin test where they inject a little amount of a TB protein under your skin and then you return a few days later and they measure the bump. My senior year of high school I did tutoring at low-income schools and I must have been exposed to TB because my test came back positive for TB exposure. Even though I had my tutoring job, it was pretty unexpected that I would test positive for exposure and since I was leaving for college soon we had to get everything in order quickly.

I had a chest x-ray and tested negative for TB (most people with exposure don’t have the disease), but I was still required to take a year of medication to make sure that my exposure remained dormant in my body. That was a year of medication (which my body didn’t react well to) and a year of a B6 supplement because the medication can cause a deficiency. I had to do this the first time I was living away from home, so I took it seriously and never missed a dose. I knew that I needed to take the medication for a real reason and I didn’t want to make any mistakes or have to extend how long I was taking it for any reason.

Since then, the only other medication I took on a regular basis outside of painkillers for my hip was birth control. This of course changed when I started on Vyvanse. Then I was taking 2 medications in the morning and that wasn’t too bad or difficult to manage. Then my Vyvanse dosage increased and I started taking one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Once I started the afternoon dose, I had to add melatonin to my routine and take that before bed (the Vyvanse can make it difficult to sleep).

Taking medications 3 times during the day isn’t always easy to remember, so I have an app to remind me to take my mid-day and nighttime things (it’s easy for me to remember my morning stuff). It’s actually pretty nice to have an app to remind me especially at night because it’s a reminder to turn off the tv or stop doing whatever I’m doing and start getting ready for bed. Since using the app, I’ve been able to get to bed earlier on a regular basis and I know that even without the melatonin I’m sleeping better now (so that’s a bonus!).

But lately I’ve been working on other things that can help my health and that has included taking supplements. I’ve tried many times to take a multi-vitamin, but my stomach can’t really tolerate them. But I discovered that I don’t have the same stomach issues with the gummy ones, so I take those now. My mom recommended that I start taking Zyflamend and some sort of oil, so I started those. I tried fish oil, but my body wasn’t feeling good on those so I switched to flax oil. And then the new hip surgeon recommended I add glucosamine so I got some online and started taking them yesterday.

My mid-day and nighttime pill routines haven’t changed, but now I’m taking so much stuff in the morning to keep me at my best.

Morning Medicine

I know that some people don’t believe in supplements, but I don’t think they are doing any harm to me so I figure that even a minor benefit will be worth it. And it takes me so little time in the morning to take everything so it’s not a big inconvenience to my life.

But I never thought I would be someone who takes a ton of pills each day. That always seemed like an old person thing and I don’t think I’m that old yet. But it seems that more people my age are looking into more supplements now than people did when I was younger, so it makes sense. Hopefully all of these things will help me as I’m working on my recovery and will keep my body at its best for as long as possible.

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Another Year Another Orthopedic Surgeon (or Not Worrying About My Hips As Much)

Posted on April 21, 2016 | 1 comment

I wrote last year how I was meeting a new hip surgeon because my original hip surgeon had left the hospital I go to (I loved my original surgeon and wished he was still with Kaiser). At the appointment last year I was told that some of the issues I had been told I have in the past weren’t quite correct and there were other issues that I needed to worry about.

I left that appointment a bit confused. I tried to be ok with the idea that I had the wrong diagnosis originally and that there was a new plan in place. But the more I looked up hip dysplasia (what the new surgeon told me I had), the less it made sense to me. I don’t have the same pain and walking issues that dysplasia patients have. I know that I had bone spurs and torn cartilage because it was seen on the MRI and that is the surgery I had. I couldn’t understand how my original surgeon could have missed something so big when he operated on me and examined my hip so many times. And lastly, I hated the surgery options that the new surgeon gave to me when I looked more into them. One of them had a very extensive recovery and it still would be a hold over until I had a total hip replacement.

With all this confusion in my head, I decided that I really wanted to get another opinion and another treatment plan figured out. My Wednesday Orangetheory coach, JZ, has a similar hip issue that I have (but hers is much less severe and she was able to treat it with stem cells). She was going to refer me to her doctor, but he wasn’t Kaiser and I wasn’t going to go outside of my insurance. But then JZ told me that a guy who sometimes works out in her Wednesday class is an orthopedic surgeon at Kaiser and introduced us. He doesn’t specialize in hips, so he couldn’t meet with me. But he got me a referral with the hip specialist at Kaiser Panorama City (where he works). While I don’t love having to drive so far to meet a doctor, I figured that it was worth my time to see what was going on.

I had my appointment this week on Tuesday and things couldn’t have gone better for me! First in my appointment was another set of x-rays. The x-ray techs were super nice to me and laughed because I knew exactly what positions I had to get my body into for the next x-ray (I had 4 taken).

After the x-rays, I went back to the exam room and waited for the doctor. It seemed like it took forever for him to come back and I started to panic a bit. I was worried that it was taking so long because there was something really bad in my x-rays and he was trying to figure out how to break it to me. But when he finally came into the room, he seemed to be all smiles.

He started by asking me my history and what my original and secondary diagnoses were. We discussed the surgery I had (which was almost 10 years ago!) and the treatment plans that I got from the original surgeon and the one I met last year. Finally, he asked me about the pain that I’m feeling in each of my hips and he did a quick exam to test the rotations on my hips.

After that, he brought up my x-rays and said that my right hip specifically looks much better than it did last year which is not something that he would have expected to see based on my history.

Hip X-Rays

(last year is on the top and this week is on the bottom)

He said that the arthritis is still showing in my right hip and you can see where the points are that are worse off. But he said that if I did have hip dysplasia, it is so mild that I don’t need to treat it. He pretty much agreed with what my original surgeon said felt like I was doing a pretty great job so far. My hips look as good as could be expected (or maybe better since the space in my hip socket is better now than a year ago). He did discuss how I need to lose weight (I know that and explained to him that I’m working on recovery from an eating disorder) in order to keep my hips as healthy as possible. He also discussed potential knee issues that I could have down the line, but honestly right now I’m only worried about my hips.

This surgeon said that the only surgeries that he could see me needing in the future are hip replacements (no alternatives to total hip replacements will work for me). But he doesn’t see me needing them anytime soon so I don’t need to worry. When I feel like I’m in so much pain that I can’t keep going, then replacements will be the next step. But for now I can keep doing what I’m doing, keep taking my anti-inflamatories (I take ibuprofen for pain and Zyflamend as a daily supplement), and I’m going to start taking Glucosamine to see if that helps. But this surgeon pretty much said that he expects that he will be retiring before I need my next surgery so it’s likely that this will be the only time I see him.

I left Kaiser feeling better than I have in a while! I don’t have any negative feelings toward the doctor from last year, but I’m glad that he wasn’t right in what he said. Knowing that my original diagnosis was correct and that I’m not in need of surgery any time soon is a great feeling! Of course, I wish I wasn’t in any pain and didn’t need any surgeries but that isn’t my reality.

The only thing that bugged me a bit is there really isn’t anything for me to do know for the pain I feel. The pressure and pain that I feel in my right hip is from the arthritis and that will be that way until I get the replacement. It would be awesome if the doctor had said that there was something I could do now or a medication that I could take to make all the pain stop now.

Overall, this was exactly what I wanted this appointment to be. I was told that my original plan was the right plan and that I’m doing everything right for now. This took such a huge weight and stress off of me and I’m just so grateful that I can put my hip fears out of my mind and just focus on pain management when needed and continuing to be as active as I can!

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