Week 152 Update

The temperature was 40º, with the humidity up to 88% at 04:30 when, happy to be back in Vancouver, Washington, I stepped up on Mr. Scale, who said, “184.0 pounds!”

The emotions continued to run high this week, but at week's end, Mom is recovering nicely, safe and sound in a rehab facility of her own choosing, close to her home, and her husband Jim is at home receiving 24 hour care, while Dotti and I are back in our home, recuperating from the past 2 weeks.

Saturday, the doctor told my Mom that they would be holding her for "a couple more days." So, we continued in our holding pattern waiting and watching. Mom was feeling much better, and all of the stroke symptoms seemed to be completely gone. Sunday our waiting continued, with no change. The hospital speech and occupational therapists release Mom, but the doctor was still waiting. Monday, the doctor finally said that Mom could go home the next day, which we were all happy to hear.

Mom and Jim had finally decided that Mom was going to go to rehab rather than going home. So, Tuesday, after loading up our car, Dotti and I picked up Jim and his car (it had been fairly useless for his stay in Eugene, because he can't drive in his condition), and went to the hospital to pick up Mom. Dotti drove Jim in Mom and Jim's car, and I drove Mom in our Toyota, as we headed south to Roseburg. It was an uneventful trip and it passed far too quickly, as I was visiting with Mom. We got Mom all settled into the rehab facility, and then headed on to Mom and Jim's house. I took over the driving duties for Jim, while Dot took the Toyota for that leg of the trip. (We had our walkie-talkies that we purchased for our CFHC hikes, and we used them for communication in the back areas where our cell phones wouldn't work.)

When we got to their house, we got Jim all settled in with his caregiver. Dotti and a local longtime friend of hers straightened up things around the house, and also got the caregiver's room ready. Dotti grabbed a number of things for Mom that she needed, and in the meantime I had taken Mom's computer from upstairs, and moved it down to a spare room on the first floor. That way Mom would not have to go upstairs to use her computer. (This is important for two reasons. First, after her heart surgery, the doctor doesn't want Mom overdoing it by going up and down stairs. Secondly, Mom has already taken a couple of falls on those stairs and we don't want to see any additional, and potentially catastrophic, falls in the future.)

After we got everything set up, Dotti and I headed back to the rehab. We had originally intended to stay at Mom's house to take care of her for her first week home, but since she decided to go to the rehab instead, that function was not required. Jim had his own caregiver already in place, so it freed us up to go home. We stopped by the rehab and dropped off the things Mom needed, and said our goodbyes. It was pushing 10PM by the time we hit the road, with 3 hours of driving ahead of us. We pulled in sometime after 1 AM on Wednesday morning, physically and emotionally drained.

We spent a lot of the time sleeping on Wednesday, though I did start my return to walking that was very much needed. Thursday Dotti was up to going to her bowling league. Friday we were able to do some shopping, and we were feeling just about ready to get back to our normal routine. The temperature was beginning to creep up, and I put in the air conditioner for the living room, preparing for the hot weather ahead.

Week's Journey Highlights:

During the time that I was focused on my Mom's condition, I was mostly running my weight control journey on "autopilot." I weighed in the mornings, and I ate more or less as required based upon that weigh-in. Since the scale didn't move up too drastically, I didn't really have to worry about what I was eating too much. I just logged it down as I ate what my appetite dictated that I needed. This week I had 2 high point days, but they were balanced with lower point days, and in the end I averaged eating right at my maintenance level of 50 points per day. For my exercise, I finally got back to walking after not walking at all from the moment I got word of Mom's stroke the morning of April first, until Dotti and I got back home six days later. I didn't reach 26.2 miles but I was happy with what I was able to accomplish in the 3 days I had available to me.

Eating and Weight – Saturday I weighed 185.0 pounds. I had breakfast in the hotel room, and then for lunch, Dotti and I dropped by a little restaurant that we found in the mall. There were a number of very interesting items on the menu, and we were debating on whether to try a Mexican dish, of which there were several, or to go with the French Onion Soup. We tried the soup, but it was so spicy that it overwhelmed us, and we didn't eat too much of it. In the evening, Jim's niece and her husband, who live in the area, invited us over for a steak dinner. Even though we were feeling fairly stressed before the visit, we found that the visit really did us a lot of good, and I felt much more relaxed afterwards. By day's end, I had eaten 77.0 points.

Sunday, I was still sitting at 185.0 pounds. We slept in a bit that day, and we ended up only having 2 meals, because we ate breakfast so late. I had 44.5 points for the day.

Monday, I was up to 186.0 pounds, no doubt from the splurge on Saturday. I held my points down to 34.0 for the day, using a nice low point lunch at Subway to assist me, followed by a half-sandwich and soup meal at Shari's in the evening.

Tuesday was a very long day. I woke up and weighed-in at 186.0 pounds at 06:00, before packing the scale, and all of our other items that were in our hotel room, into the car for the trip that would be taking Mom and Jim to their respective destinations. I had a quick breakfast, grabbing a bagel and some coffee. For our late lunch we stopped at Subway after dropping Mom off at the rehab. We didn't eat our third meal until after we had dropped Jim off, and gotten back to the rehab with Mom's stuff. It was after 10 PM, and we didn't want to waste time with a sit down meal, since we had 3 hours of driving ahead of us. So, we hit McDonalds, and then the road. At the end of the day, my points had added up to 60.0.

Wednesday I woke up at 09:00, with my phone ringing. I weighed 185.0 pounds, which was nice considering how things had gone the day before. I was back in my own environment and I ate normal meals once more, and I consumed 43.0 points for the day.

Thursday the scale dropped to 184.5, even though I weighed-in 3 hours earlier than I had the day before. All my meals were eaten at home once more, and I ate 47.5 points.

Friday, Dotti and I grabbed lunch at Sweet Tomatoes, and it was really nice! (We had missed having that restaurant available all during our trip to Eugene.) I only ate 46.0 points for the day, but I did have some popcorn in the evening, which I normally don't like to do before weigh-in. However, I didn't even think about that aspect of things until after I had already eaten it. Even so, the scale dropped to 184.0 this morning.

Exercise – Better late than never, seems to be my motto this week. I didn't do any walking until we got back home on Wednesday. Just before lunch I checked with Dotti to see if she was going to be up for a walk later on in the day. She was still recovering from our ordeal and opted out for Wednesday's walk. So, I decided to do a double loop and walked 3.1 miles, first in one direction and then the other. The temperature was in the upper 50s, and so I didn't wear a coat. The first 3.1 miles took me 41:55 to complete, while the second took 43:12, giving me an overall time of 1 hour 25 minutes and 7 seconds. I averaged 13:44 per mile (4.37 mph) and earned 19.89 aerobic points. Since my basic goal for the week is to walk 15 miles and earn 35 aerobic points, this one walk gave me 6.2 miles (10K), or 41% of my goal for miles, and 56% of my aerobic points goal. However, I also have a goal that I have started shooting for, of doing 26.2 miles each week. That goal was still 20 miles away after Wednesday's walk.

Thursday, I had some free time in the morning while Dotti was at her bowling league. I decided to do an extended walk. The temperature was a bit lower than it had been on Wednesday, and I was planning on walking at a slower pace, so I wore my coat. I think I would have been better off not doing so, but C'est la vie.

I set off with my GPS in hand. I first headed for our gym, just to see how far away it is. Along the way I passed a batting cage that was almost exactly 1 mile from our house. (I haven't gone there to bat yet, but I hope to one day.) When I reached the gym, I found that it was about 1.5 miles from our house. I continued on, until I came back out on the main road, and headed south. I finally made a turn to the east to head down what looked to be a fairly long back road. I hit the 3.1 miles (5K) mark at 51:21. I continued to walk in that direction until the GPS read 3.5 miles, and then I turned around, and retraced my steps. I hit 6.2 miles (10K) at 1:42:12, and completed the 7.0-mile walk in 1:55:18. Since I was feeling a bit tired and sore from the previous day, I held my speed down for this walk, and I took 16:28 per mile, and averaged 3.64 mph. As a result at 17.49, I earned fewer aerobic points that the day before, despite the longer distance of the walk. Still, that brought me up to 37.38 aerobic points for the week, already surpassing my base goal of 35. Also, I was now up to 13.2 miles, which was only 1.8 miles from my goal of 15 miles for the week. And I still had my walk with Dotti to do in the evening!

Dotti and I did our 3.1-mile (5K) walk in the evening, and it took 1 hour and 13 seconds to complete. (19:25 per mile and 3.09 mph.) It was Dotti's first walk in a while, so we held the pace down. It was great weather for walking and we had a very nice walk. That distance and time earned 5.47 aerobic points, and brought my totals to 42.85 aerobic points, and 16.3 miles; just less than 10 miles from 26.2.

Friday I made the decision to just do the 3.1 mile walk in the evening and call it good for this week. Dotti was eager to do a faster time this time around and so we were moving along much better. We finished the walk in 53 minutes and 33 seconds, for a pace of 17:16 per mile, or 3.47 mph. That was good for another 6.66 aerobic points, and brought my final totals for the week to 19.4 miles, and 49.51 aerobic points.

Looking ahead for the rest of the month, I am still shooting for at least 100 miles. That leaves me 80.6 miles to go, with 21 more days (including today) to do them in. I will have to average 3.84 miles per day (28.7 miles per week) to get there, but that should not be too hard to do, if I stay with it. I will be getting 21.7 miles in each week with the evening 3.1-mile walks with Dotti. That will give me an additional 65.1 miles for the month, leaving only 15.5 miles to go. I have 15 working day during that time, and if I do my 2.3 or 2.4 mile walk each one of those days, I will add at least another 34.5 miles, putting me well over 100 miles for the month. And that is assuming that I do not do any other walking on the weekends. So, I am positioned to reach my goal by the month, without resorting to any "heroic" measures.

Water – For water this week I drank at least 6 cups on every day except Wednesday, when I only drank 3 cups. I averaged 51.43 ounces (6.4 cups) per day. That is on the low end of my minimum range of 6 to 8 cups per day, but that is okay.

Week's Evaluation – I am very happy with this week, and I consider it a success. My weigh-in was only 1 pound below my target, and my average weight for the week was right on my target. I averaged eating 50.43 points-per-day, back to my old maintenance level. I averaged drinking enough water, and reached and exceeded my exercise goals of 15 miles, and 35 aerobic points. I hope to do even better on my exercise next week, when I should be back into my normal routine once more.

2 years, 334 days OP; a lifetime to follow.

-Al-

6 '3" 239.5/184.0/180±2/BMI:23.00/WK-152
GRAPHS: Weight Loss/Year 1 Maint./Year 2 Maint./Year 3 Maint.
                Success Story