Friday weigh in and the cell phone drama

Well I guess I was consistent this week and maybe the Friday weigh in isn't really helping.  I don't know I just can't seem to buckle down and be clean all the time.  I really want to hang around 181 for a while.  I just gotta buckle down and do it I guess.  But at least I pretty much just stayed the same this week.

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I have been running and following Hal Higdon's training plan for the 15K.  This was a step back week so not too much to report.  So far I've done two 3-mile runs on the treadmill.  I have a 4 mile run this weekend.  Last night's run on the treadmill was one of my best feeling runs since I started running after my illness.  I'd really like  to get my fitness level back and be able to run consistently without any walk breaks.

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There's been some cell phone drama going on.  I have three lines on my Sprint account: me, my husband and my mom.  And we were due for upgrades.  And we could still get a subsidized phone on Sprint and get another 2 year contract.  All phone providers are going to the lease a phone, no contract options.  So we upgraded last Friday and got three Samsung Galaxy S6 phones.  And we hate the battery life.  I adore the freaking phone but despise the battery life.  And so that makes me worry what it will be like in 6 months. . . 12 months. .  the whole second year of owning it?  So we are pondering switching to Verizon just for the Motorola Droid Turbo 2.  It is shatterproof which is amazing.  But I've only own Samsung smartphones.  And I've only ever been with Sprint. So there's some anxiety in switching and I don't know which way I want to go. This is causing arguments with my husband and I.  And tears of stress with me.  Just over a phone.  Honestly though for me, the issue is really that my life is pretty stressful and sucky that the little things are stressing me out more.  What to do?  I have unlimited data on Sprint.  Should I really switch and pay more/same for LIMITED data?!  AH!!!  Any advice is welcome. :) 

Friday weigh in & reflections on a birthday

Monday weigh in's are over rated.  Weighing in right after the weekend is tough cause you gotta be perfect. I'm more apt to be perfect M-F than F-M. :)   So here it is, the first Friday weigh in.  Kind of sucks, but I was off work on Wed and ate out.  Yesterday was my birthday so of course there were sweets.  But no time like the present to be accountable.  So here it is.

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As I said, yesterday was my Birthday.  They are also over rated.  Except for one thing this year - I'm finally no longer 36.  I don't remember if I posted about this here on my blog.  I have long felt like 36 would be a bad year.  My aunt passed away at 36 (leaving behind a 3 and 5 year old).  I have always felt like I took after my aunt in many ways of life.  And I've been afraid of 36.  I turned 36 and time went by and I kind of forgot about it.  Until I got slammed with that crazy undiagnosed illness.  I was scared. Here it was - the 36 year old curse.  I got better though thankfully.  And here I am - 37.

I'm not one to play the "it's my birthday" card, but I wanted to last night.  My husband was an ass.  There's no other way to say it.  His tractor broke down and it will likely be a large repair. I get that it sucks. But don't take it out on me.  But he did.  He was in a pissed off mood.  He tells me his left arm has been bothering him for 2+ weeks - he can't feel it.  What does that mean?  But I say what are you going to do about it.  And that leads to this tirade on insurance and Obama.  *eye roll*  Give me a break.  I get you pay for health insurance.  I get that it went up.  But what I also get is that you pay a premium and you go to the Dr and you then pay the negotiated fee.  This did *not* change.  Nope. Not at all.  And he's bitching about having to pay the Dr.  Really?  I mean do you expect it to be free?  It's never been free!   So I flat out told him to shut it because I didn't want my night ruined.  But it already was.

I showered and left and went to my brother's house.  My mom was there helping my brother with the kids (he had a work accident and cannot manage both kids right now during recovery).  My SIL was at a meeting.  My nephew called me and said he had a gift for me. My mom had my gift with her.  So I left my husband at home cause I want not bringing Mr. Cranky Pants with me. I was there for about 2 hours and came home and slept on the couch.  Happy Birthday to me!

But. . . the highlights were that when my coworker found out it was my birthday he bought some of those yummy Lofthouse cookies when he went out the get lunch.  How nice!  I love those things.  And someone at my barn made this awesome smores brownie concoction.  My barn owner gave me a can of Ski when I got there and I ate 2 piece of this yumminess.

So not was all bad, but it could have been better.  Such is life though and I really need to decide how long to continue with this relationship that has the same unresolved issues over and over again.

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The drama of the week (or the past couple weeks) is that my cell phone contract is up on the 27th.  I have Sprint and I've had Sprint for 17+ years.  I brought my husband from Verizon . .  back when we were dating maybe?  Or engaged.   And we got a share plan.  My mom is my 3rd line.  And I'm trying to frantically figure out what to do about the phones.  It's complicated and this new rent-a-phone idea everyone has is not in the best interest of the consumer.  This is also causing stress with my husband.  Why?  I have no idea.  I pay the phone bill and I'm trying to find the best deal.  I had a call set up with Sprint last night and when they called me my husband started mumbling and grumbling "just get the free phone and be done with it". I couldn't hardly hear the lady on the phone.  He was acting like a child.  You know what? If I want to ask Sprint to do something for me given that I've been a customer for so long, then what's it to him?   But boy oh boy is this causing him to get pissed off.  And then he says he'll just go get his own phone.  Well I'm tempted to let him.  He can go get his own plan cause I'll likely renew a 2 year contract with Sprint, and I'm starting to wonder if he and I will be together for 2 more years.  And splitting the plan apart might be a pain.  So maybe I should just let him go off and figure this out for himself.  Cause phone plans suck. The math is confusing.  And I have a degree in math!  I told that to the lady at the Sprint store a couple weeks ago.  I said "I have a degree in math and this makes me feel stupid".   

Have a great weekend to whoever reads this little blog! :) 

A different weigh in day. . .

I don't think Mondays are the best day for me to weigh in.  I tend to drink less water over the weekend and if I cheat it's usually a weekend day. So I'm artificially up on Mondays.  However, here it is - big ol gain. . . I gained everything back.

This is beyond discouraging.  HUGE.  I ran 5 miles on Sat.  I was up a bit on Sunday.  I expected it.  A run can push me up.  And I didn't eat the best, but I was very active that day - walking a huge craft fair with my mom.  I was on track yesterday but I still went up. So I don't know.  I need to get this under control before I pack on *more* weight over the holidays.  I'm thinking of doing the Advocare 10 day cleanse again.  I just ordered one to have on hand as I sold the one I had.  I could start Friday.  I'm off Wed.  My birthday is Thurs.  So I don't want to start before then.

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Like I said, I went to a craft fair this weekend. . . this was my favorite purchase!!!

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I love snowmen.  I keep them out all year around in my house.  It's never the wrong time for some snowman love.  This guy is sitting on the shelf of a new floor lamp we got a few months back.  Perfect spot.  He's so freaking cute!!!

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At the end of last week I finally finished the crochet afghan I'm sending to my friend in TN.

As far as I know she doesn't read this blog.  I hope! :)  I'm not going to lie, I'd have loved to keep it for myself.  I hope she loves it!  I bought more yarn this weekend to start my next project.  A baby blanket for my brother's girlfriend. 

These are the colors that I chose and now I need to find a pattern! :) 

Finally some progress!

So I buckled down as best as I could last week and told myself that I would not mess up this weekend.  And finally there's progress on the scale!  That being said I should say that I got a 24 hour stomach bug on Saturday night and threw up once.  That definitely helped the scale.  The next morning I was down 2 lbs.  Then yesterday (Sunday) I ate a lot of crap.  All I wanted for lunch was waffle fries from Arby's.  Don't ask me why, but I got them and a Jr roast beef sandwich.  Yum!   I had ice cream for dinner.  The scale went up but not too much.

That's a loss of 4.6 lbs.  I would bet a bit is artificial.  We'll see what happens this week.  I'll take it for now and hope to carry it forward.  My fat % went up which I thought was interesting.  So many things affect that fat monitor though including dehydration and I suspect I am a bit dehydrated.

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I got to ride Eli on Saturday before I got sick.  I put his Back On Track blanket on for 30+ mins before riding.  I've never been able to implement this well enough to know if it's helpful.  He's not making much improvement and I'm tired of sending the vet more videos.  He just requested more last night.  I'd rather just take him back for the bone scan.  That would be the next step.  It's hard to keep making videos of me riding.  I need another person.  And it's been a month since we had the neck injections and there isn't really any progress to be had.  So I'm ready for the next step.

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I won these mums from a local orchard on FB last week.  Who knew someone actually won those things? :)  I haven't bought any mums so this was great!

2 weeks of no progress. . .

I don't know what's going on.  I'm eating better. . . I'm running more.  On Saturday morning I saw 185.something and this morning I'm back over 188.

I know I didn't eat the best on Saturday.  I worked the horse show at my barn.  I was there from 7:20 am - 6 pm.   I had an Advocare shake for breakfast.  Lunch was a brat and a "few" nachos - really just a few.  Hubby and I had a frozen pizza for dinner.  But I was on my feet all day and I was exhausted and sore.  Surely I didn't lose weight, but I blew up 2 lbs.  I did *not* eat 2 lbs of food.  I likely didn't drink enough water.

Sunday morning I ran 4 miles.  Again an Advocare shake for breakfast.  Lunch was 2 eggs and turkey sausage.  Dinner was at McAllister's.  I had a cup of chicken dumplings and half a club sandwich.  Nothing here is HORRIBLE.  But clearly my body doesn't like it :(  This is pure sadness for me.

So today I'm back trying to be beyond good.  Like perfect.

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This weekend I went to visit my brother at a hospital in St Louis.  He cut open his leg at work last week, severing a nerve and losing upward motion of his foot and toes on that foot.  They are doing a second surgery today to try to repair it.  Fingers crossed!  He's really bummed about this.

Afterwards we went to Trader Joe's for our annual purchase of pumpkins on a stick. 

These are really ornamental eggplant.  Who knew?  Every year I buy one bunch for me and one for my mom.  I buy one bouquet off fall flowers for each of us.  I combine them into an arrangement.  It's so fun!  I love them. :)  Maybe I should grow my own? 

Encouragement needed

I've gained a solid 10 lbs since I got sick.  I was around 178 when I got sick.  I'm now 188.0. 

I really wanted to kick, scream, cry. . . throw a two year old temper tantrum this morning.  But this is *my* fault.  I own it.  I've been eating like crap.  I've been drinking soda.  I'll do go for a day at most and then it's back to crap eating. 

I don't often use this fat monitor, as you can tell by how dirty the screen is.   I was running late for work (as always) so I didn't feel like making it pretty for a picture.  But I'm up about 2% I think.  Again I don't use this thing that often, so hard to know what my lowest was.  But I don't think I ever got below 30%. 

And this is why I'm gaining weight. . . I'm doing things like this.  This is a Gus' Pretzel. . . it's a St Louis thing - they've been around since 1920.  And that's a Shock Top in my hand.  And yes it's a playoff game.  And yes, it's the Cardinals and the Cubs.  It's historic.  But whatever.  I can't keep eating like this.  So I've got to buckle down.  I have another playoff game Thursday (if we make it that far).   My goals are to be pretty damn perfect between now and then. 

I welcome all advice for how to get back on the wagon.  I know people struggle with this.  I know that this isn't rare.  What do you do to get back on track?  Cause I gotta stop the scale before it hits 190.  I've worked hard for this!   I can't let it slip away. 

To step off on the right foot, this is breakfast:

Vet trip to Mizzou

Last week Wednesday, we loaded up Eli and headed to University of Missouri in Columbia MO.

Now for all you non-horse peeps (cause I was asked), that is not a blindfold.  It's a fly mask.  Eli can see through it.  It's to protect his eyes from debris, like the hay that's right there in his face, from flying in his eye.  Eye injuries in horses suck.  So better safe than sorry. 

We had a 10 am appointment so we left my barn at 7 am.  This was an early start.  We stopped about halfway at a rest area.  All was good.  We hit the road and not too long after that we hear "bang! bang! bang!" about 5-7 times.  Eli never moves much as we are traveling.  When we stop he might move around and adjust himself.  But on the interstate?  Nope.  My hubby was driving and could see his nose poking out the window so we knew he was still standing (my fear is a horse going down in the trailer).  We keep driving and we hear more . . . not as much but it sounds like a stomp or kick here and there.  We stop at the next exit.  Eli seems fine.  I get in the trailer and look to see if there's something in there bugging him (a horse fly or wasp, etc)  I see nothing.  So we continue.  He keeps randomly making the noise but we have no choice but to continue. We arrive and he's fine.  But I'm shaken up by that. 

Our appointment is with Dr Keegan.  He invented the lameness locator.  This is a computer system with three sensors that are hooked to the horse (top of head, top of pelvis and right front foot).  you trot the horse down a concrete hallway and the computer determines where the horse is lame.  It was really interesting and since I do software development I was intrigued by the math and algorithms that are going on in the program.   To make a long story short the locator indicated a right front lameness.  The vet thought he saw a left front.  We blocked the left front and tested again.  No change.  We blocked the right front and tested again.  No change.  Then we proceeded with neck xrays as I was originally thought this was a neck issue.  The problem is that neck issues are rare in horses and don't respond well to treatment.  The xrays showed some arthritis and we did a block/steroid combo on 2 joints and did them on both sides of the neck.  We inject C6/C7 first.   This was done guided by ultrasound.  We tested with the lameness locator again - no change.  We then injected C5/C6 and tested with the lameness locator.  We got a change on the straight line.  The locator indicated that Eli was no longer lame!  However, we had also been testing on the lunge.  That was showing left front lameness going left and right front lameness going right.  We did decide though that maybe this was Eli's way of going or a different lameness and we were going to stop at this point and see how the neck responds. 

I just want to say that Eli allowed the vet to inject four joints without any sedation.  My boy stood like a rock.  He didn't move a muscle.  It was amazing.  Everyone said (many times) how good he was. They said they wish they had patients like him every day.  The vet didn't want to have to sedate him cause sedative can mask lameness.  But I think everyone though he'd need some sedative.  The intern vet said she had seen neck injections only once before and that horse had to have the "shit sedated out him".  Eli is amazing.  I got all teary eyed watching him be so good.  I get teary eyed every time I think about this.  I love him so much and he's just so amazing - the best horse a girl could ever ask for. 

These pics were taken the next day at home.  Eli had to be shaved and cleaned (really *really* well) in order to have the ultrasound guided injections.  I joked that I'd kind of like to take my clippers and turn those into hashtags!  Ha ha.  #horse

It was 7:30 at night.  I was exhausted from standing most of the day, waiting and having a small level of stress all day.  Neither my husband nor I really wanted to drive home.  It's dark at this time and thinking about how Eli got restless on the drive there, I didn't want to risk having a problem in the dark.  So we opted to stay.  I helped get Eli settled in his stall and we left at 8 pm to find a hotel. 

We got to the clinic at 7am the next morning to hit the road.  I really wanted to get to work as I didn't plan on taking 2 days off for this.  Plus I knew we might have to go back.  So I wanted to save that PTO.  The ride home was normal and Eli didn't doing any banging around. :) 

I was allowed to ride Eli after 48 hours.  I rode him Saturday morning and again Sunday morning.  I'm so sad to say that there is no change in his head movement that he does under saddle at a walk. So now we can to the bute protocol: 2 grams twice a day for 2 days, followed by 1 gram twice a day for so many days. . . tapering to 1 gram once a day.  I will try this to see if it helps.  The next veterinary step would be a bone scan.  At this point I feel like if that's the last step then I might as well go for it.  Why go this far only to turn around at the last step?