Sometimes it's possible to question a doctor's opinion. Those instances can lead to follow up questions, corrected miscommunications, a healthy and fun exchange of ideas, learning more than you thought possible about the topic at hand.
Today was not that experience for me.
See, my weight loss is going GREAT. I'm thirty freaking pounds lighter now, even after Great Gravy Day. My clothes are bagging off my body and I'm beginning to see the hourglass emerging from the snow globe. Problem is, I'm FREEZING all the time. Duh, symptom of big weight loss, right?
Sure. So I went researching online (because that's just what I do when I want to know stuff) and came across one of those sites where professionals volunteer their time to answer questions in their fields of expertise. I figures, Yay! Free info! And I typed in my question, full of detailed facts and all pertinent information.
My question was what to do about the internal cold stemming from my ongoing weight loss.
That's what I wanted to know. Are there supplements that might kick my internal thermostat back into gear or is my only recourse piling on more sweaters and socks? Simple, right?
The PA who answered me asked questions to find the source of my sudden coldness. Questions about cardiovascular exercise for circulation, if I am a smoker, or if it's possible I have hypothyroidism. That's fine, questions to rule out possibilities are great. Then she went on to say that my coldness is not caused by losing 30 pounds, especially since I still weigh 195 pounds. If I weighed only 100 pounds she could understand the cold and it would be due to malnutrition.
Anyone else just crinkle their brow and say, "Huh?"
So, okay, I filled her in on her questions: plenty of cardio, no smoking, no thyroid problems. Check. And then let her know that lots of women who lose a chunk of weight get cold. Even women who still aren't yet skinny. To which she took exception.
Apparently she is disappointed when clients don't like her answers and "argue" with her. She hopes I find the source of my problem with my own doctor and that I can manage to find a way to stay warm this winter. And then she blocked me from further follow up.
Hmm. Her suggestion to speak to my own doctor was good advice. I called her office, reported my weight loss and internal frozen temps and she said, "Of course it's because of the weight loss. Pile on the sweater and let's hope you adjust. You got forty pounds more to go!"
Why didn't I just think to speak to her in the first place? Updated pics coming soon.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
The Sounds of Silence.... Or Not
While I'm enjoying my time off and lying around the house doing NOTHING (yay!) some thoughts passed through my mind and I thought I'd share.
I added a new song to my profile page. It is The Foo Fighters song "The Pretender," and it's awesome. Like, Captain Awesome. (Anyone else watch "How I Met Your Mother" and just saluted Captain Awesome just now? No? Just me, huh?)
So... The Pretender. The chorus throws me into Sesame Street in my head every single time I hear it. It cracks me up. As soon as that chorus powers up, here come Bert and Ernie and Mr. Snufalupagus wandering through, headbanging a little. I won't say exactly why so you can go listen and report back on your own findings.
In other music news, my son has started a band. Sigh. The boy is the guitar player, his Girl FRIEND (uh-huh, so he says) is drumming, his buddy Tyler is singing, and their buddy Hippie is playing something. Tonight Kevin and Tyler are banging around the house here and have created a song, written it down, and are upstairs right now with Rich getting it recorded.
I have to say how ambivalent I am about this, if only because of the number of musicians I dated in the past and how incredibly selfish and unaccountable they can be. My heart kind of freezes up when I think of Kevin playing in a band. But he's a good musician and it's all kinds off fun for them and as long as they don't mind the Mom Supervision, I'm all right with it. Mostly. They do have an incredibly good name for a first-time group of kids. Go check them out over on their myspace page:
www.myspace.com/fallingfaster911.com
Strange the things that make you feel older than you should.
May all your listening be easy... and enjoyable.
I added a new song to my profile page. It is The Foo Fighters song "The Pretender," and it's awesome. Like, Captain Awesome. (Anyone else watch "How I Met Your Mother" and just saluted Captain Awesome just now? No? Just me, huh?)
So... The Pretender. The chorus throws me into Sesame Street in my head every single time I hear it. It cracks me up. As soon as that chorus powers up, here come Bert and Ernie and Mr. Snufalupagus wandering through, headbanging a little. I won't say exactly why so you can go listen and report back on your own findings.
In other music news, my son has started a band. Sigh. The boy is the guitar player, his Girl FRIEND (uh-huh, so he says) is drumming, his buddy Tyler is singing, and their buddy Hippie is playing something. Tonight Kevin and Tyler are banging around the house here and have created a song, written it down, and are upstairs right now with Rich getting it recorded.
I have to say how ambivalent I am about this, if only because of the number of musicians I dated in the past and how incredibly selfish and unaccountable they can be. My heart kind of freezes up when I think of Kevin playing in a band. But he's a good musician and it's all kinds off fun for them and as long as they don't mind the Mom Supervision, I'm all right with it. Mostly. They do have an incredibly good name for a first-time group of kids. Go check them out over on their myspace page:
www.myspace.com/fallingfaster911.com
Strange the things that make you feel older than you should.
May all your listening be easy... and enjoyable.
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
The UnMerry Maid
Housecleaning sucks. I know I signed on to do this voluntarily and I know it's for a good cause. Turns out, I'm pretty good at it, too, if a little slower than I should be, but I can work up the efficiency. Thing is: it hurts.
My feet hurt, my knees are bruised like I'm a five year old in the summertime, my right hip aches for reasons passing understanding, my lower back is about to revolt, and my right hand is demanding my left hand learn how to scrub. I have blisters on my palms and I smell all the time of bleach and lemon-scented PineSol.
Worse than this, though, is the continuing physical exhaustion. It's eight-fifteen right now and I'm pondering how soon I can logically go to sleep. This has been going on for weeks now and I'm tired of being tired.
Surely, my body will acclimate, right? I mean, I never considered that a forty-five minute daily workout might not have prepared me for eight hours of actual, physical labor. But the truth is irrefutable. I'm a weenie. And a whiney weenie at that. A weary whiney weenie.
And, sadly, that's the best writing I've done this week. Too tired to stay up till eleven is one thing, but too tired to WRITE is a problem.
Thank God for a five day weekend, starting NOW!!!
For this evening, I'm going to make popcorn (real popcorn, not that microwave stuff...) and read a Nora Roberts. Her heroines tend to make me feel more aggressive and capable. That can only be a good thing.
Happy Thanksgiving to all, and to all my English friends: enjoy Thursday!
My feet hurt, my knees are bruised like I'm a five year old in the summertime, my right hip aches for reasons passing understanding, my lower back is about to revolt, and my right hand is demanding my left hand learn how to scrub. I have blisters on my palms and I smell all the time of bleach and lemon-scented PineSol.
Worse than this, though, is the continuing physical exhaustion. It's eight-fifteen right now and I'm pondering how soon I can logically go to sleep. This has been going on for weeks now and I'm tired of being tired.
Surely, my body will acclimate, right? I mean, I never considered that a forty-five minute daily workout might not have prepared me for eight hours of actual, physical labor. But the truth is irrefutable. I'm a weenie. And a whiney weenie at that. A weary whiney weenie.
And, sadly, that's the best writing I've done this week. Too tired to stay up till eleven is one thing, but too tired to WRITE is a problem.
Thank God for a five day weekend, starting NOW!!!
For this evening, I'm going to make popcorn (real popcorn, not that microwave stuff...) and read a Nora Roberts. Her heroines tend to make me feel more aggressive and capable. That can only be a good thing.
Happy Thanksgiving to all, and to all my English friends: enjoy Thursday!
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Can't Life Always Be a Beach?
So the week at the beachhouse with twenty-five other women writers (and Roger)? Totally wonderful. The best thing I've done for my writing career to date. My hero, The Cherry, was charming and fabulous, just as reported. Each of the teachers gave out such good information that I've rushed right home to play with. Plans for next year are a go.
In short, there are no superlatives strong enough to say how fun and beneficial last week was. Who knew you could throw so many women together in a house and have them all come out friends? In the past, this has not been my experience. But last week, if three of us were gathered together, you could be sure there was a murder being plotted or some poor guy was being roped into fatherhood with his dead brother's baby. Fashion choices for our heroines were paramount, while our own clothes ran the gamut from cherry print pajama pants (me) to cute, girly tops with jeans (Allison) to lovely, long beach-walking skirts (Jenny). Food was good, margaritas were plentiful, Diet Coke flowed morning, noon, and night, and chocolate candy kept our blood sugar stabilized throughout the afternoon sessions. It was heaven.
At the end of the week, I returned home into a cloud of testosterone produced by the men in my household. Dog hair and dirt clots and ketchup stains, oh my. Halloween II on DVD, marching band competition, hot peppers, bicycle grease, skateboard tape, loud music, no conversation, hair products, dirty socks under my pillow (from Marlo, no less, the estrogen bond doesn't extend to dachshunds), hot dogs and tater tots, burping skills, Japanese movies, and video game stories.
The mild depression only grew with my return to my new housecleaning job. Bedmaking, vacuuming, streakless shines on mirrors, squeegie on shower doors, dust corralled and microwaves scrubbed clean. Suddenly, instead of simpatico storylines and genre-bending plot twists, my back ached, my feet hurt, and my fingernails began to break. Too tired to watch prime time and too addled to write, I started to wonder if I would ever snap out of the non-writer-crowd doldrums.
But last night as I was going up to bed at 9 pm, I heard guitars and poked my head into Rich's recording room. He and Kev were playing together, singing in harmony one of my favorite Concrete Blond songs, "The Darkening of the Light." My heart flipped over and I was at peace, back in Wife and MommyVille, and happy to be here.
Maybe it is possible to have everything. Each in its own time.
In short, there are no superlatives strong enough to say how fun and beneficial last week was. Who knew you could throw so many women together in a house and have them all come out friends? In the past, this has not been my experience. But last week, if three of us were gathered together, you could be sure there was a murder being plotted or some poor guy was being roped into fatherhood with his dead brother's baby. Fashion choices for our heroines were paramount, while our own clothes ran the gamut from cherry print pajama pants (me) to cute, girly tops with jeans (Allison) to lovely, long beach-walking skirts (Jenny). Food was good, margaritas were plentiful, Diet Coke flowed morning, noon, and night, and chocolate candy kept our blood sugar stabilized throughout the afternoon sessions. It was heaven.
At the end of the week, I returned home into a cloud of testosterone produced by the men in my household. Dog hair and dirt clots and ketchup stains, oh my. Halloween II on DVD, marching band competition, hot peppers, bicycle grease, skateboard tape, loud music, no conversation, hair products, dirty socks under my pillow (from Marlo, no less, the estrogen bond doesn't extend to dachshunds), hot dogs and tater tots, burping skills, Japanese movies, and video game stories.
The mild depression only grew with my return to my new housecleaning job. Bedmaking, vacuuming, streakless shines on mirrors, squeegie on shower doors, dust corralled and microwaves scrubbed clean. Suddenly, instead of simpatico storylines and genre-bending plot twists, my back ached, my feet hurt, and my fingernails began to break. Too tired to watch prime time and too addled to write, I started to wonder if I would ever snap out of the non-writer-crowd doldrums.
But last night as I was going up to bed at 9 pm, I heard guitars and poked my head into Rich's recording room. He and Kev were playing together, singing in harmony one of my favorite Concrete Blond songs, "The Darkening of the Light." My heart flipped over and I was at peace, back in Wife and MommyVille, and happy to be here.
Maybe it is possible to have everything. Each in its own time.
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