Appendicitis, Hunger and Watermelons

“How soon can I eat?” I asked.

That was definitely not the question he expected at that time.

‘He’ was the surgeon who walked in ready to take out my appendix two weeks ago. I had just begged the anaesthesiologist to give me general anaesthesia after two unsuccessful tries to find a gap between my vertebrae. My rational mind told me it was safer to have the spinal tap, but I was done being rational. Any rationality I had maintained in the midst of the pain of the appendicitis which had come upon me suddenly had been lost with the final straw of doctors and nurses having poked my veins six times within the space of two days to set IV lines. He succeeded with the spinal tap on the third try with what I imagine was a humongous needle. As I felt my legs go numb, the surgeon walked in and asked if I had any questions. So I asked “How soon can I eat?”.

Y’all know that I enjoy food as well as the next person, but I admit in hindsight that it might have been quite an odd question to ask when one is about to be cut open and a portion of their digestive tract (albeit redundant) taken out. In my defence, I had been scheduled for surgery the previous day so I did not eat anything until I was told in the evening that I did not present as a classic case of appendicitis and therefore would not be operated upon. Eating hurt so I only had a few spoonfuls and then they had the brilliant idea of stimulating my appetite by shooting Vitamin B Complex into my IV bags all through the night. Unfortunately, following excruciating pains that lasted all night, surgery was then on again the next day. I had just gone through two nights and two days without sleep and food and the doctor’s response to my question was “Can’t you fast?”. Dear doctor, perhaps you can try stimulating your appetite before your next fast and let me know how it goes :).

The surgery went well I guess. I watched as they sliced, pulled, prodded, cut and sewed me back together. Coming off of surgery you’d have thought I’d be in pain but the hunger … ah the hunger. The next day I was allowed to start eating and was eventually discharged with strict instructions to eat lots of fruits. Since watermelons are in season here, I got quite a number from friends and my mom made sure I had them practically everyday. I am sure that I have eaten more watermelons in the past two weeks than all my lifetime combined. If I never eat another watermelon it would not be too soon. Aside from the watermelons, I am back to a mostly normal diet.

A friend from work called complaining about the frenzy and envying me for two weeks of not having to deal with work drama. Believe me, I’d rather have my health back and work long hours than go through this – dealing with pain, unable to do what you’d have normally done for yourself , eating watermelons and having concerned people ask you embarrassing questions about your bowel movements! Oh the things we take for granted when we are healthy. I am again reminded to be grateful for every day full of renewed mercies and grace.

I’ll head back to work tomorrow and see how I get on. Then I’ll go see the doctor again for a check up on Tuesday. I reckon he will not quickly forget what could be the hungriest patient he’s ever had.

 

 

 

Arrrgh Insomnia

Hi everyone, been ages!

So let me give you a rundown of everything that has been happening in summary – LIFE!!! Just when you think it can’t get any more hectic, somehow it does.

And for someone who loves to sleep you’d think I’d get home and zone out – but the past few days have been torture. Repeated bouts of insomnia – at some point past midnight my brain became hung up on Newton’s Laws of Motion and the Laws of Thermodynamics. I am not a physicist…and that has to be one of the most random things to be thinking about in bed.

Anyway, just passing through…hope y’all are doing great. It’s a new year (ish) – live life, have fun, and make a positive impact!

“strength grows through struggles, courage develops in challenges and wisdom matures from wounds” – Nicky Gumbel

Clean 9 – The Verdict

So I promised to give you a rundown on my progress yesterday but I was so knackered after four hours driving to and from my parents’ place. Anyone who says driving is not exercise should try driving a stick shift for that long while playing minesweeper with potholes/ditches that threaten to take off your bumpers.

I had the last supplements and aloe vera juice yesterday – twice. I wish I could say the aloe juice got easier, but my face did an involuntary scrunching thing every time I took it. Now for my experience with Clean 9:

Skin – People have mentioned that skin feels better and I have to agree. My face had been pretty rough over the past few months from eating junk and has cleared up considerably.

Energy – there is this feeling of being lighter, moving more etc that comes with eating cleaner but I also had trouble sleeping at night for some reason.

Digestive system – the first few days were good possibly because I was drinking aloe juice 4 times a day. I read reviews of people who had constipation and i wondered how that would be possible seeing as almost everything is in water. I however experienced it by the 7th or 8th day even though I had servings of fruit and vegetables almost every day. I guess  the fibre packet is not sufficient. However the bloating which usually accompanies drinking of soda and other such stuff is gone..

Weight and measurements – I lost 3.1 kg in total with the most lost in the first three days. As I said it’s possible either the food I’d had the previous day or that ‘time of the month’ had increased my weight by about 0.9kg above what it had been prior to when I started. Even at that, 2.2 kg in 9 days is remarkable. I lost from 0.3 cm around my arm to 3.6 cm around my abdomen. Clothes fit and look better.

Attitude to food and exercise – Being able to do this gives one confidence that they can actually make the changes necessary to lose weight and live healthier. I proved to myself that I could wake up early and put in 20 mins with Nikki and another 40 mins later in the day walking or dancing. I didn’t drink soda for over a week and I chugged 8 glasses of water most days.

So the verdict? – The program works, but I reckon so would reducing portions, eating healthier, exercising and drinking more water in the long run. Clean 9 is marketed as a first step towards that lifestyle change.

Would I want to continue with the FIT 1 which follows?  – probably not. I would prefer to regulate my calorie intake and eat healthier meals without swallowing massive capsules and drinking aloe juice.

Is it possible to gain all the weight back? – definitely. But those who do cannot blame it on the program, as with any effort at weight loss, you get out of it what you put in and beyond.

Today’s stats – 39 mins of walking, 20 mins of full body workout, 9,300 steps.

Clean 9 – Day 9!

Final day y’all!

It’s been good – usual aloe juice, supplements and shake for breakfast, barely had enough of the vanilla shake to get half a scoop for the lunch shake so I added some soya milk, had the fibre snack and knocked leftovers together for dinner. Dinner was moi-moi, char grilled chicken, a spring roll and a samosa.

With 40+ minutes of Zumba and 33 mins of step aerobics on EA Sports Active my cardio was pretty much sorted in the morning. I asked Nikki the digital personal trainer to put together a hard core workout for me and quickly learned that I have no core strength and happily stuck with cardio. Will need to work on that later.

As per the program I did the weigh in and measurements today, but I think it would have been more logical to do it tomorrow after the whole thing had actually ended? Either way, I lost an additional 0.4 kg. I have some Garcinia and Therm caplets from the day I missed them at work and so I will use those tomorrow. I also have some of the fibre and aloe vera gel (go figure) leftover  so tomorrow will sorta be like an extended Clean 9.

I took 10,667 steps, got in 81 active minutes and drank 7 cups of water. I will give a full recap of how much weight and centimetres I lost and any other effects I noticed during the program tomorrow evening.

Good night guys and thanks for stopping by and liking my posts on this short adventure.

Clean 9 – Day 8, Cake Conspiracy

Hi everyone I did it!

I resisted the birthday cake and small chops at the birthday party today! I did take my portion to put away in the fridge and will have it on Sunday in celebration of completing Clean 9 (yes, I do see the irony in that). But I am realistic with myself, there are things that I like, and much as I work towards the self control to limit my intake of the less healthy ones, I cannot say that I am going to go through life drinking Aloe juice and never eating another pastry.

So while everyone in the office had their cake and chops for lunch, I went and got mine: char-grilled chicken, vegetable stir fry and moi-moi (which is basically steamed or baked spiced ground beans). I don’t know what those guys put in the stir fry but carrots, green beans, cucumber  and cabbage have never tasted so good. I also had the proteins from the party pack – a chicken wing, fried gizzard and a mini meatball.

I got home and guess what? My sister had been baking and left me some cake – one chocolate and another vanilla. The chocolate one is just begging to be had with ice cream. It’s like there is a conspiracy to trip me up with cake and I ain’t succumbing.

Exercise today was lower body work in the morning and 20 minutes of zumba after work with walking to and from the office. Today was a bit wet and a colleague asked me to help him set up his new tab so being the techie at heart that I am, I spent my lunch time doing that instead of my usual walk. My back and chest muscles are still sore from yesterday’s upper body work out, I’m so not looking forward to the lower part of me joining in tomorrow.

1047 calories consumed, 61 minutes of activity, 9,336 steps and 9 glasses of water sums up my day.

Just one more day to go!

Clean 9, Day 7 – Pasta palaver

It’s 7pm and I am ready for bed…I’ve had a shower, had the Garcinia tablets and vanilla shake, and taken my 8th cup of water. I’m lying on the couch under a blanket watching Dark Matter and badly craving a handful of peanuts. Funny enough I do not even like peanuts that much, I guess I’m just getting tired of eating/drinking the same things.

Today went well, I had the usual clean 9 stuff, an apple as a snack, wheat spaghetti with mixed veggies and chicken in tomato stew for lunch. Dessert for lunch was the 0% version of my normal yogurt…it wasn’t bad, but oh, how it fell short of the creamy goodness of  the original. Figuring out calories in spaghetti turned out to be trickier than I imagined, I made the mistake of weighing after cooking then realised I should have weighed it dry as you get different end weights based on how long you cook it, how much water it has absorbed…Do you know that some people have actually carried out experiments on weight conversion of dry pasta to cooked? I was comforted to know that there are others like me out there…seeking direction…to answer the all important question…“how much pasta did I really eat?” 

In all I consumed about 1000 calories, did 20 mins of upper body work with Nikki in the morning and 50 mins of walking at lunch time and took 12,216 steps.

Two more days to go and there just had to be a birthday at work tomorrow to test my already flailing resolve.

Good night everyone.

Clean 9 Day 6 – The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

Today was a mixed bag, things didn’t go as planned and it’s looking like Clean 9 might become Clean 10. Here’s a summary-

The Good

• Weigh in day – I had lost an extra 0.8 kg and some more centimetres around my abdomen!!! The Wii Fit thingy was actually concerned at my rate of weight loss.
• Aloe Juice, shake and supplements taken in the morning
• 40 minutes of Zumba for the morning workout (today is rest day on EA Sports Active)
• A nice lunch made up of approximately 60% salad -(little bits of a lot of stuff -tomatoes, kidney beans, corn, lettuce,apples,tuna, eggs) , a scoop of rice and a chicken drumstick in very little white sauce. I had the food in a small plate to control my portion size.
• 9,600 steps taken and 49 active minutes

The Bad

• I was out at a work event and couldn’t take the supplements before lunch then I had to go to church after work and I’m just getting home tired. It’s too late to start taking the Garcinia tablets and drinking the shake.
• Drank 5 glasses of water

The Ugly

• I went to get some papaya for desert at lunch and returned with a piece of cake 😦 I figured since I had a good lunch and skipped my usual fruit snack…who am I kidding? It looked interesting, a light sort of marble/sponge coated in what might have been white chocolate and I couldn’t resist.

I still ended the day below the calorie limit, I think; it is a bit of a gamble eating out when you have to estimate what’s in the food and how much of it you’re actually eating. Anyway, two thirds of the way already, three (or four) more days to go!

Clean 9 – Day 5, Waterworks

Picture this, works starts at 7 am and by 10:30 you have been to the bathroom…thrice! No surprise there when one begins their day with 22 fl. oz (650 ml) of aloe juice and vanilla soy shake followed by an equal volume of water trying to achieve 8 glasses a day. I guess it’s a good thing I don’t have any field work planned for this week, would have been difficult to find plumbing off the beaten track.

I was a bit bothered about today, doing active thinking and working with data is usually equated with a cup of coffee and snacks for me. As it stands, I haven’t had a cup of coffee since Friday. I got through today ok (not without temptation :)) by chugging water, eating an apple which is one of the free foods, and taking the Forever Living Fibre (also in 8 fl. oz of water of course). Lunch was made up of equal amounts of steamed vegetables and leftover basmati rice with chicken and …wait for it…tomato stew!

I switched from Devon the digital trainer to Nikki – still a digital trainer – and did 20 minutes of lower body and core exercises in the morning from the Day 2 of the EA Sports Active Cardio Kick-start program. This time around, I opted for the hard intensity version. I followed that up with walking to the office, a 40 minute walk at lunch time and a walk back home. I took 11,077 steps with 83 active minutes, drank 8 cups of water and consumed almost 1000 calories.

The highlight of the day was a colleague mentioning that whatever I was doing was working, that she had noticed changes…yay…bring on the aloe juice! Day 6 is another weigh in and measurement day, let’s see what the tape and scale say tomorrow.

I will be out of the office at an event tomorrow, I must remember to seat close to the exit for when the waterworks start…

Clean 9 – Day 4, Food Shopping

I have been sitting in front of the computer thinking of how to start, I’m quite tired as I didn’t sleep well last night for some reason.

I am still sticking with the Clean 9 program and it has been going well so far. Today was a bank holiday so I had  time to get in some good exercise after the morning aloe juice and shake. My workout consisted of 20 minutes of a full body workout from Wii EA Sports Active and 40 minutes of Wii Zumba and I felt full of energy. For my lunch I had hard boiled eggs, basmati rice and tomato stew with my fave apricot yogurt for desert. I typically make a pot of tomato stew and store in the fridge and freezer as it goes really well with everything so you will probably see it appearing in most of my meals.

I eventually went food shopping after lunch and got more rice, beans, couscous, apples and pears, beef, chicken, mixed veggies and the low fat variety of my usual yogurt. I do hope I will have the drive to actually cook them with work starting back tomorrow. I have some leftover rice so I might just have that tomorrow with chicken and veggies.

I got 8,889 steps in, 56 minutes of activity, consumed about 900 calories and 8 cups of water. I have needed much more willpower tonight to drink water instead of having a snack that would throw me off the plan especially since I tend to eat to keep awake when I am exhausted.

I’m running low on willpower soooo… good night guys, almost halfway gone :). See ya on Day 5.