How are you and how was your week?
What are your goals for the coming week?
Goals were
- no use of a particular unhealthy coping skill: check, now 22 days in a row
- journal daily - check
- visualization skill practice daily - 5/7
- get enough calcium daily - I did most days
Goals for the coming week are the same as last so I can report day 29 next week!
all goals met Mon though I had a tough dayā¦ but 23 days in a row
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all goals met Tues. 24 days in a row
all goals met Wed. 25 days in a row
@madMike100 how are you? @Kamarooka336 how are you? @Chowders how are you?
Feels like Iām getting nothing doneā¦although I am. But I havenāt been dieting very much, and my ālose weightā-focus phase will end in about 10 days. Iām almost half way down to the highest possible weight for the Iron on Sept. 19th.
PT (at home) is going reasonably well. (Iām very rarely missing days.) The right shoulder can do things it couldnāt do before. Now I need to see how it feels while swimming.
Yesterday my son and I got the resistance on the trainer fixed, so Iāll be doing a lot more biking.
Very little running, although a few days good distance on the treadmill, mostly while doing academics, which have absorbed too much of my time lately. (Iām trying to get too much done academically this summer, but donāt want to admit to myself that it canāt get done in the time frame desired.)
I HAVE been organizing a lot, as well as dealing with a lot of things for the kids (which they always tell me about after the last minute), as well as issues that have been developing with 3 cars (2 are old), 2 rentals (Maryland tightened laws), plumbing problems, A/C, kidsā medical insurance (āsystem problemsā), and a state agency (unclaimed property) that is taking its sweet time returning a bunch of my money, which is really needed since 2 of my kids are taking college classes. So the whole summer has felt like being a bull rider on the bull ride of life.
In short, things are reasonably good, just they could get better, and progress isnāt what Iād like.
Coming up:
Work on a lot of different things each day.
Weight loss through diet and exercise (focus is on diet and distance for the next 10 days, with speed no object)
Continue PT daily, as well as see what the shoulder lets me do for swimming (and violin).
Finish my review of E&M, as well as continue other studying.
Finish office organization (within a week), A/C fixed (scheduled today), 1 car fixed (scheduled next Thursday), 1 rental inspection finalized (pending), sonās medical insurance registration issues (today if heās available), youngest to music camp starting next Monday (2 weeks, 2-3 hrs driving per day).
Figure out what to do for (August) vacation. (We havenāt had one for years due to different schedules for the kids.)
Only really got to the sports today, but got in 15 miles brisk walking (mostly uphill on the treadmill) and 11 miles on the trainer (which reverted back to high resistance), as well as the usual PT. All told about 2000 cals spent, with only 600 taken in. (Although Iāll allow myself a Premier Protein now.)
all goals met Th.
26 days in a row
re: trying swimming - donāt be afraid to try different strokes. If free hurts, backstroke might not be because of the lack of neck rotation to breathe. Sidestroke can help build some fitness. Fins can take some pressure off your shoulders. A pull buoy, by fixing body position, can make shoulders feel a little different.
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Thanks!
Hi @Dr_Tigerchik!
Thanks for asking ā¦ a mixed bag.
Sisters cancer treatment is going ok but she has some related mobility issues which are proving a big challenge to overcome and healthcare support for these has been poor. The final and highest risk / reward stage of her treatment begins next week.
We had to put our 14 year old dog down yesterday. It was a blessing that my son (back from studies overseas) and my daughter were both able to spend a little time with her and say goodbye.
Hopes of qualifying for 70.3 worlds were dashed my a hamstring issue which reared its head halfway through the run. I was able to walk to the finish, which brought its own joys (but please never shout āvamos Paul!ā to me). PT might have figured out the cause of the hamstring issue (a pelvis alignment problem) - it feels resolved - I have been doing a bit of faster running - in fact running feels better than it has for years. I have done an Olympic distance race since - which was a terrible performance in other ways - but the hamstring was fine.
I have been trying to resolve ingrained swimming technique flaws, with a degree of success. I will spare you the details but itās been interesting and rewarding and is not nearly complete. My swim āfitnessā might be terrible but I can do 25m lengths with long rests and improved DPS like a champ!
At age 56, I had my first experience of a non-mainstream therapy. Itās called Applied Movement Neurology. As far as I can make out, it has no supporting evidence, beyond a few online testimonials. Itās hard to discern exactly what it is as online descriptions which appear on the websites of practitioners seem to be based on the same, vague source. There are, of course, training courses which enable you to become a practitioner. A bike-fitter I saw uses it to resolve wonky movement patterns which have developed post injury / life movements. He offered a session. It was no more expensive than a physio appointment. I have spent a lot of money on physios and invested a lot of time on rehab / prehab and I still get injured all the time, so I thought why not. I decided beforehand not to ask any questions, as I suspected the answers would erode what little belief I had. And I know enough to know that belief matters with these things. He did a thorough assessment of which muscles he thought were firing and which not. He did some balance tests and various other assessments. There was some ātappingā and some eye movement exercises (I have to do these twice a day, for 3 weeks, which is the only homework). And you know what? I feel like Iām moving better than I have for years. My wife thinks Iāve been hypnotised. It got slightly weirder just at the end. He believes that proximity to certain plastics acutely affects the nervous system (and hence power on the bike); and donāt get him started on signals from wearable devices. After some testing, my bike levers, watch strap and cleat covers were identified as culprits. I will not be leaving these at home. Iām very happy with his bike and shoe fitting work. And life is always enriched by a little bit of weirdness.
Next up: feeling happy and guilty all at the same time about all the things we can do now we donāt have a old dog with separation anxiety, and hoping that older family members donāt find this is their moment for debilitating illness requiring the care of those close to them. 
Iām glad the alt med is helping.
Ask me anything about swim technique if you like.
Iām sorry about the dog, and I send best wishes for your sisterās treatment.
27 days in a row
5/5 week on all goals
I have been a bit slack posting lately.
The last 2 weeks have gone well training wise. Previous week was very wet 120 mls of rain on one day. School holidays so some grandson duties. We also had my wifeās friend with early onset dementia staying. Nevertheless I squeezed in 2 mtb rides of 2 hrs plus, 1 kayak 90 mins, 4 hike runs totalling over 6 hrs plus 2 weight sessions. Also a great Michael Jackson tribute show.
This last week was solid training wise 2.30 mtb Monday 1.30 hike and run Tuesday 40 min kayak and 1 hr mtb Wednesday 1.10 hike and run with 20 x150 m hills Thursday, 2 hr mtb Friday, 40 m kayak and 1.20 hike and run Saturday, 60 min hike and run inc a 3 k club race yesterday. Weights on Monday and Friday.
We are still doing a lot of stuff around the house, not much yard work as everything is pretty wet and it has been cold. For the first time since we installed it our 110,000 litre water tank is full. We are dependent on tank water so it is very comforting to have it full. My daughterās 30,000 is also full.
interesting to see someone describe rain as a volume! We usually say āthree inches of rainā
It was described in inches when I was a kid and a lot of older people still use inches to describe it. It is always officially described in mls here.