Tuesday, November 30, 2010

why am I so boring?

I know that I am a boring person, I don't have allot of 'real life' friends and now it feels like the blog family is following suit. I may just be feeling sorry for myself but I don't seem to have a very interesting life. One that I don't even want but my must endure.
I'm not feeling any love at all at the moment, from anyone, except the mother of course, she tells me every day, but what happens when she is gone? I will have no purpose anymore.....

Sunday, November 28, 2010

Time is flying

I can't believe we are 27 days from Christmas!

I have brought 1 present and have 23 people coming over for the feast! I like to have a present for each and everyone that comes to the house, some will get money some will get an actual present. Why does it seem to be harder every year to buy a present?

We have a new challenge happening at work from Monday of the weight loss type. Should be interesting. I am hoping I will have a foot up with all the additional information I learn from my blog friends.

Health of the parents continue to be an issue, one that I will just have to continue to challenge myself with. Mum thinks she is counting down the days until she dies with her blood clot, tried to talk some sense into her, she should be home this week sometime. I have tried to tell her that if the hospital and doctors thought that the blood clot was going to end her life and would require intervention from them, they would not release her. I think it has slowly sunk in, she is starting to plan for Christmas as well. Guess who will be sent to buy the presents? Of course that would be me.

Dad is handling himself quite well after the shock of the heart attack, he tells me he is feeling much better and hasn't had a headache since the heart attack, which he had been having everyday for at least a year.

I am amazed myself that I do not have high blood pressure from all this stress and running around. I think that I am pretty healthy and plan on staying this way. There is no way I want to be like my parents when it come to health issues. As people though they are generous to a fault. Stubborn when they have an idea, and sometimes even cruel to each other. But in the end, they stick together and will not let anyone go without.

Well on that note, I must wake 'the husband' and subject him to shopping at Ikea......

Friday, November 26, 2010

Happier today

Today I am happier than I have been for a little while.

Weight this morning was good, which is a pleasant surprise.

Dad had surgery yesterday after much woo haa, he argued with the doctors, threatened to leave early but in the end had the surgery and found that he had 3 blockages, they have placed 2 stent's so far, its dangerous to do 3 in one go, and will have to return to do another procedure in about 6 weeks. That makes me feel like he was a ticking time bomb. Mum is relieved as well so that's good. However mum is still having troubles, her blood clot is on the move, the blood thinners are making her life a little harder as she has skin tears all the time. Still in isolation because of the shingles as well. She is starting to get really down, thinking that the blood clot is a death sentence, I have printed out some info that shows only 3% chance of a bad outcome, and since she fought for her life back in December 09 and won, I think that she has a few years left to live.

As for me again, exercise was very little however the running around work and the hospitals must equal quite a few kilometers per day. Weight this morning was down at 200.4 which is GREAT compared to my last weigh in.

That's it for me, short and sweet, have to get the house work done before tomorrow when the craziness of my life starts again. Have a good one

Thursday, November 25, 2010

quick update

Well both parents still in the hospital.

One's resigned to the fact she'll be staying until at least next week.

The other, well he is being painful. Dad was told in emergency days in hospital, that was Monday night, which to my calculations means something like Saturday. We have to vote on Saturday. He gets told by another doctor Friday and he is sticking with that day. He has had a fight with the doctor, with fingers flying, accusations being made left right and centre and now he refuses to stay even to Friday. He wants to be taken home tonight, Thursday, again my calculations that is day 3.

So I have already started negotiations with him and the nursing staff that are trying to save his life, to try and talk him in to staying but he thinks he knows best and can control the public health system.

Monday, November 22, 2010

I give up, stick a fork in me, I'm done

OK, food is not going good.

As you know my world has been rocked by mum going into hospital and changing any plans I may have had, well brace yourself.

Dad's also in hospital as of tonight, the verdict.

Heart Attack!

People stick a fork in me, I'm done!

How much more can these poor parents take?

And the killer for me is that they are on 2 different levels at the hospital, at each end of the hospital.

So, my food for the past few days have been what ever I can grab at the hospital cafe, not great, but some days its all I fit in. Water, Pepsi Max, Coffee, all not great. Sorry, I even failed at the weigh in at 203.5 which is up in last week. Maybe I should just bow out gracefully?

I don't bloody know anymore, I'm just over it for now. Time to collapse into bed. Bye for now...

Sunday, November 21, 2010

Life changes

That's right, my life is changing for a while. Mum's coming to stay at our place once released from hospital. There is allot of craziness at her house at the moment that she doesn't want any part of so she will be staying here. So that has meant kicking 'the husband' out of one of the rooms he uses, he says for guitar building, I say for crap storing to make room for a new bed to go into the room. It took awhile to get the crap/guitar building stuff out and we are picking up the bed today for the room and setting it up. Mum is/should be released on Monday so it will be all ready for her.

I've been my busy self, going to the hospital daily to see her, no one else has, they are all scared of catching her shingles however unless you come into contact with the fluid from the wound or touch her were she may have coming into contact with it without washing her hands of it say, you can not catch it. If anything, if you haven't had the chickenpox, you could catch that if you came into contact the said fluid. I think its all just an excuse, my family is shit when it comes to looking after mum. I am the youngest and am always 'on call' as it may be.

So in saying how busy I have been, my meals haven't been great, not that I have had over indulgences, I have had eaten on the run, what I can when I can, fluid, well I have tried and tried to remember to drink, but sometimes I think my intake has been less than required. Exercise, well, I have been walking allot, around the hospital and car park, the corridors in that hospital are a killer! But not in the treadmill for at least a week and a bit form when I was ill and now with mum, forget about it.

Yesterday while nicking down the store for my dad, I couldn't believe my eyes but Santa came into town with all his hoo haa of a band playing, fairies and the like on stilts, for God sakes people its still NOVEMBER!

I have done nothing in the way of Christmas shopping, will probably end up waiting for a week or two before the big day for the pressie shopping, I hate that though, normally I'm so very organised but feel a little out of control here........

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

flying post

not much has changed in my world. Mum's still in hospital, hopefully out before the weekend. New developments are she has some liver function issues to go along with her kidney function issues, as well as developing a blood clot in her leg, Deep Vein Thrombosis. Much joy going around, now she wants to plan her funeral since she has something wrong with just about every organ in her body. I can understand that but obviously don't want to face the fact that she could be right.

I also came to the conclusion after starting my 3rd 1 litre bottle last night that I don't think I am drinking enough water. At home it wasn't such a problem but at work I can't have a bottle straped to my face all day. So I have to put in a conserted effort to make sure I am DRINKING enough.

Ok, off to work again, be good and play safe

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

3.02

That's right, 3.02am, in the morning, still dark, everyone in the place is sleeping, except me!

Don't know if its stress thing, I do tend to stress over money all the time, never have enough in the bank/wallet, however on paper there should be heaps of the stuff. Maybe its the mum thing, always stressing she's not being treated well and how to get her out of the situation.

Just want to sleep ................

Monday, November 15, 2010

Hell of a week

This is going to be right up there with the other hell weeks that I have when mum's in hospital. I will go to work7.45am , knock off at 4.30, hit mum and dad's by 5pm, pick up washing and ironing, head to the hospital to see mum by 6pm (through peak hour traffic) leave the hospital by 7.30-8pm when visiting hours finish, head home, cook tea, do dishes, do washing and ironing, put it in 'the husband' car to drop to 'the nephew' to take home (they work together). And then it all starts again for another day!

So forgive me if I don't post allot this week while mum's in the hospital :{

Sunday, November 14, 2010

Not much to share so .....

I'm going to show you some things I'm going to show the new cherry tomatoes that I'm growing in the efforts to be self sufficient ....

Also I made 2 lots of tomato sauce the other day, 1 was spicy and the other was more a sweet ketchup.Today I weighed in at 201.9, which isn't bad by all accounts since I started the DDC2 challenge at 203 pounds, so that's a loss of just slightly over a pound, could have been better but I'll take it.

My throat is still sore and makes me cough a fair amount so keeping her nice and lubricated by drinking bucket loads. Exercise has been a little none existent for the last couple of days with the sinusitis, breathing has been an issue as you could imagine. Now with mum back in the hospital, well, the corridors are really long .....

Yesterday when I got to the hospital, mum was still in emergency waiting for a room to become available, since she needs to be isolated due to the shingles still being contagious, she needed a single room, she still hadn't eaten or drunk anything but water since I had left the day before, remembering that I took her to the hospital at approx 4pm and I arrived the next day at 11am! Lucky I stopped off to get her a feta and spinach twist from the bakery. Once I knew her heart rate was back to normal I proceeded to buy her a coffee, well actually 2 coffee's, she loves her coffee. As I was going back to her room, the ambulance drivers were like 'it must be my lucky day' and 'oh thanks for the coffee', of course I laughed about it. But before I even made it to mum's room, the nurse said she couldn't have coffee! They had tried for hours last night to get her heart rate back to normal and weren't taking any chances with the coffee. Fair enough, so it became the ambulance drivers 'lucky' day. After all I couldn't drink 3 coffee's! I think they were astonished that someone would bring them coffee, they had nothing to do with me, hadn't saved me or my family from some horrific accident, but you know what, they probably did that morning or were going to some time that day, a little bit of kindness goes along way I think.

Well that's it for me today, or until something else happens today that I think is blog worthy. Have a great day and read you soon

Saturday, November 13, 2010

You just won't believe my life - DON'T LOOK IF YOUR EATING!

So I went down to mum's yesterday, I knew the doctor had told her she had shingles, its been about 3 weeks since they told her, it is contagious but I was with her before she even found out about them so if I was going to catch it, it would have happened by now. So she has been complaining about the pain, she also has cellulitis on one of her legs so finding everything very uncomfortable.

When I got there and saw under the bandage I couldn't believe the difference from the water blisters to this! Coupled along with her breathing, I was not taking any chances and funny enough, she was quite compliant and came to the hospital with me. We thought that she was going to be coming home but the bloods told us otherwise. Her kidney function from 2 weeks ago was 33, last night was 23, her potassium was too high also and she was in Atrial fibrillation (AF), causing her heart to be 'disorganized'. So again I had to leave her there, again.

What makes me mad is that she was at the hospital 2 days before to get the dressing redone and the nurse said "I don't like those black spots" but did nothing! It all started, she has been told this is a coincidence, the day after she placed 'Deep Heat' on her hip to sooth some joint pain, she has used it a million times and not had an issue, the day after it raised up like burns. Hence why she didn't think it would be anything contagious. Even last night whilst they were looking at the shingles, keeping her isolated, no one bothered to look at her leg, for all I know that is infected and maybe where all the infection is coming from. I never got to see the leg as it was already fully wrapped up. I left the hospital after 9pm last night and am calling the hospital whilst typing this post.

Ok, the hospital advise that they want to do a cat scan and ultrasound of her abdomen due to the blood clots on her stomach wound. They are still yet to look at her leg, just wanting for the medical team to come around. They want to further investigate her chest after the chest x-ray that was preformed last night. They still have her in Emergency as she isn't stable enough to move her to a medical ward, oh and she is still in AF.

Phew, and I just thought it was a little infection from the shingles.

We live in such a lucky country when it comes to illness. Mum's been admitted to hospital 4 times this year alone, we do not need to pay for anything at all. We do not need to worry if we have insurance or if they would cover the tests. We have Medicare in Australia that looks after all that.

As for me, well the sinusitis is hanging on as long as it can, water intake has been pretty good, although I wasn't great with tracking it, I know I would have drunk my allotted amount if not more. Food on the other hand was not great but would have been well under my allotted 1650 calories. Well better be off to drink more water and maybe even eat something.

Friday, November 12, 2010

Back in the land of the living

It feels like the sinusitis monster has finally moved on...

could be lurking around the corner waiting for the cough from hell to arrive

but at least he is around the corner for now and something to celebrate!

So I am off to work today after 3 days at home, at least I have been able to monitor my drinking over the last 3 days and now know that it is not impossible to drink what I need to, to enable the weight loss.

I am a little depressed though over some money things and the fact that it is make my trip to the States difficult, but I will continue to forge through.

Wednesday, November 10, 2010

Wednesday food and FLUID

Todays fluid intake was huge and still going. Before 'the husband' tipped out the jug of water I had been measuring I was at 3.8 litres and opened a can of Pepsi Max for another 375ml so that takes me over 4.2 litres (142 oz) today and with this throat, there will be more to come that's for sure. Food has gone over slightly today, but I think I can make that up over the next couple of days. I haven't felt up to exercising today so will give it a miss but make that up also over the next few days. I hope everyone else on the challenge had a great day and those not on the challenge as well.

Breakfast Calories


Generic - Coffee With Skim Milk and Sugar, 18 to 8 oz 90



Tomato - Raw, Red, 4 slices 44



Eggs - Fried (whole egg), 2 large 185



319



Lunch
Generic - Coffee With Skim Milk and Sugar, 6 to 8 oz 30



Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup - Pho, 1 Bowl 367




397



Dinner
Woolworths (Aus) - Beef Sausages With Herb and Garlic, 2 Sausages (170g) 445



Generic - Baked Potato - Jacket Potato W/ Skin, 1 medium (173 g) 280



Veg - Frozens Peas, 2/3 cup 70



No Name (Superstore) - Whole Kernal Corn, 1/2 cup 80



Butter - Salted, 1.5 tbsp 153




1,028





1,744






Here's a picture of my sandstone monk from our front garden
















so sick

OMG I can't believe how sick I am at the moment. My sinusitis is kicking my butt! It all went down hill Monday night after eating a really nice meal I cooked of Thai style chicken on a bed of basmati rice, 1 lemonade icy pole later, and bang, 8.30pm my throat closes over and the face starts to hurt. The next day its all over red rover. Fully blown sinusitis out of the blue, kicking you fully in the butt. I even got up this morning at 2am cause I couldn't sleep. My throat was so sore since I'm breathing through my mouth through the night cause I can't breath at all through my nose at all, nasal spray, tissues, cough lollies (damn I will have to check the calorie count in the lollies) and some water and I'm able to go back to sleep for a bit.

My fear again has come back on the treadmill. No matter what I do or how many times I do it, I just can't seem to run on the treadmill. Before I know it, I've increased the speed, slowly jogging, and then I'm standing on the side of the treadmill again. I try to talk to myself to keep it going but again and again I did it yesterday. Maybe its cause I'm sick that I don't trust myself?? Maybe its just that and I have to wait until I'm a bit better to try running again.

Water, well lucky enough, water and fluid has been my friend since I'm sick and when I look to the Phase 2 list of fluid, I must admit I don't have it as bad as some others on that list at 200oz, when I only need to drink 96oz to lose the weight at 111oz to max it. I worked out that 96oz is actually 12 cans of Pepsi Max, which of course I will not only drink but when you put it that way, sure I could drink that much *cough grumble grumble* but it also is only 4-5 of my water bottles which isn't that bad either. I just went to make myself a hot coffee and decided for today at least to fill a jug with the same amount of liquid I am having in say the 2 coffees I have had so far today and I have had up to 700mls (23oz) thus far and its only 9.13am, I think I can kick 96oz in the butt as well. Here I was originally reading Allan post about having to drink this whole heap of fluid and I must admit I was panicked. I thought there was no way, but now that he has worked it out for us its not that big a mountain. Thanks Allan.

So off I go now to lounge on the couch with a box of tissues and my fluids. Oh and yesterdays food is below:

Breakfast Calories


Generic - Coffee With Skim Milk and Sugar, 6 to 8 oz 30



Eggs - Fried (whole egg), 2 large 185



Tomato - Raw, Red, 4 slices 44



Easiyo Yoghurt - Strawberries and Cream, 0.1 cup 22



281



Lunch
Salad - Greek Salad W/ Fetta and Tomato, 1 container (3 media ea.) 450



450



Dinner
Red Rooster - Classic Roast , 560 g 644



644



Snacks
Nuts - Cashew nuts, raw, 10 g 55



Nestle - Icy Pole - Lemonade, 80 g 45



Generic - Almonds - Raw, Whole, Each , 15 each 110



Generic - Walnut Halves, 5.6 walnut halves/1 0z 76



286





Total 1,661











Monday, November 08, 2010

Todays food :)


Accountable - I'm really happy with my choices today, still have some calories left and haven't even exercised for the day, but will jump on the treadmill tonight and see how I will go with the running again.

Breakfast
Calories



Eggs - Hard Boiled Egg (Large), 2 large egg 140




Twinings - Lemon & Ginger Tea (Correct), 1 bag 2




142




Lunch

Aldi - Bakers Life - White Sandwich Bread, 2 Slices 144




Kraft - Singles American Cheese Sandwich Slices, 1 slice 80




Lettuce - Green leaf, raw, 2 cup shredded 11




235




Dinner

Meat - Chicken Breast, Skinless, Boneless, 0.4 pound 199




Homemade - Basmati Rice, 150 gr 524




723




Snacks

Twinings - Lemon & Ginger Tea (Correct), 1 bag 2




Generic - Coffee With Skim Milk and Sugar, 18 to 8 oz 90




Generic - Strawberries - Fresh, 80 g 40




Easiyo Yoghurt - Strawberries and Cream, 0.4 cup 89




221







Totals 1,321




Your Daily Goal 1,661




Remaining 340


Sunday, November 07, 2010

PROUD

I just ran on the treadmill! This is a fear I have had forever cause I thought I would fall off and injure myself, but I did it, I ran at 7 km per hour for 1 minute, twice!

I'm really happy and this gives me something to work on, to better myself and my endurance.

So in honor of my 'I can't freakin believe I ran on the treadmill', here is a happy dance........


Another night out

This must be the beginning of the silly season. I haven't been out so often in years. Last night was to The Comic's Lounge where we saw Hung L (he was in the original Wog Boy movie) and was extremely funny, as we Gab Rossi and Drew Rokos. It was all in aid of Miss Patty's birthday. Dinner was first at a little restaurant which I got to see the menu in advance at work and couldn't get the idea of a roasted vegetable pizza out of my mind, so of course I ordered it. When it came I was slightly disappointed. It did not live up to my expectations. Someone said, don't worry the taste will knock your socks off. Well they were wrong!
I don't know how many calories were in that but what ever they were, I don't think they were worth it. In saying that the pizza was a very think crisp pizza with little tomato sauce and a spare amount of sliced zucchini (not even long ways like my imagination told me they would be) less than 1 red capsicum was used to make the roasted capsicum portion and the egg plant was, well it just was. I drank water there at the restaurant and only had 1 missed drink at the show of Tequila and lemonade, 2 cokes and water when I got home.

It would have been a good food day, had my mother not come over. I can't help but indulge my mother. If she wants something, I will bend over backwards to get it for her. It used to be roasted vegetable focaccia with Salami, then it went to the Pizza Sub and Subway and now its potato cakes from my local 'fish and chip' shop. Needless to say, 3 potato cakes later.........

I have been drinking allot of herbal tea lately, the newest being Twining's Lemon and Ginger, as far as tea goes, its quite good, its 5 calories to a cup and I do believe ginger is a good thing for helping with metabolism as well, don't know about it's help in tea but its all worth a go.

Next week we don't appear to have any engagements but the week after that we have another wedding, this time it's a New Zealanders wedding so that could spell disaster for the the diet, as they are known for the hangi, the drinking, the huka and the Eskimo kiss's. Then the next day is a Tupperware party and you know that there is always going to be too much food, although the host is also on a diet so maybe that will be OK.

1 week later its the work Christmas party which still unsure if I will attend as its 'without' partners.

2 weeks later it is my birthday, which I haven't anything planned for at the moment.

Exercise is going good, as I previously stated, I have cleaned up and off the treadmill and she's getting used daily, along with my resistance band. All guns are now blazing.

Thursday, November 04, 2010

getting serious

Today I feel like a truck has hit me and I am hoping that its not just because I jumped on the treadmill last night because that would show just how unfit I actually am. Although I have been exhausted allot lately it could be something coming on. But as I decided to stay home and rest it up, I thought I would really give the food a good write up for today.

Breakfast consisted of a cup of coffee, half a bottle of water, 2 weet-bix that have been in my cupboard for a lonnnnggggg time, so hope that doesn't come back to haunt me later, with 1 cup of skim milk, so far this is 392 calories.

I was going to have a bowl of my homemade minestrone soup but lunch came and went. Although I was a bit picky about an hour before lunch so made 2 boiled eggs blitzed and on a piece of toast. Since then I haven't felt like eating at all. Which now takes my calories in to 596 with a remaining 1065 to go.

I have also broken out my resistance tube for some exercise except I can't even remember what I was supposed to do with it so have had to watch a few youtube vid's to just get an idea.

Wednesday, November 03, 2010

Out of retirement

That's right, tonight the treadmill came out of retirement.

So now it is not just a cat sleeping bed or a clothes rack in the lounge room but a fully fledged exercise equipment. Although I think 'the husband' was trying to sabotage my efforts by unplugging and taking away my power board. Probably waiting to see how long it takes me to plug it back in.

I have been really tired this week, nothing to do with diet ie food but more to do with not enough sleep no matter what I try. Tonight however I did get on the treadmill for a short time and hope that it will help me sleep once I hit the sack in about 15 minutes.

Food wise I have been eating pretty good, keeping below my calories but I think the lack of sleep is affecting my weight loss which is disheartening. I have been trying to get as much water in as possible but need to get more Pepsi Max as still only the coke in the fridge. I also want to cut down on the coffee, not only for the empty calories but to stop my teeth looking dull.

On a high side I did manage to purchase off eBay a upright freezer so can't wait to fill her this weekend. Also brought some drawers which 'the husband' has been putting together for me, except that they didn't actually fit where I wanted them to go so he had to modify them to fit, too bad if I want to sell them later on.

Also after attending the wedding on the weekend and seeing some of the photo's, the dress and shoes I wore have ended up on eBay, 'the husband' asks why, I don't understand, he obviously saw the photo's, why ask such a stupid question? That dress made me feel and look like I was a ten ton tessy, although I did have to bend down to the brides level which didn't help the 'size' of me but look at that arm, Jesus, does that belong to me?

So my plan for this week is to continue drinking heaps of water, watch my food intake (doesn't help that I went and brought $10 worth of candy for Halloween and no one turned up, bad weather).

This week we also had 'the race that stops a nation' which is the Melbourne Cup. I had to work as it is only a Melbourne Metro holiday and I work in a national call centre, so to go along with it we had dress up and a horse race of our own. Since I had to work and I was going to dress up, I went to the send hand store to find me a dress. I liked it there in the 'old' sizes, where I still fit into a bridesmaid dress that was a 14. I won 'fashions on the field' in my $5.49 dress.


Note: here Allan, behind me at my desk, my 1.5 litre bottle of water???
I like this second photo as I think it makes me look skinner.

By the way, the horse that won the cup? Americain, I didn't bet on him but should have just because of the name, since we are American bound next year!