Let's Try This Again - Health Update...

This week, I saw my counselor, dietician, and orthopedic. My counselor gave me the hard news - she has to leave the practice as her husband has as new job out of state. That makes me sad. I feel I have a lot of trust built up with her and now, I have to start all over with someone new.

As for my dietician, I gained about 2.2 lbs. Last month, I gained 4 lbs., so total of 6.2 lbs. Not happy with that, but stuff going on in my life has not been the best. I was not journaling myself to keep myself accountable for what I was eating/drinking. I have a new journal that I have started. The previous one was completed, so I did achieve that goal - completing one journal. Now, I need to work on completing this journal with the information regarding my lifestyle change.

My current goal is to get under 300 lbs by end of the year. This is an feasible goal and I know I can accomplish it. After that, the next goal is to get to under 250 by mid-year next year. I still feel that is feasible. At that point, I will report back on how I am feeling, especially in regards to my back, knee, and leg pain. The pain really detracts me from doing any sort of low-impact exercise. However, I am going to try to do "something" that gets my heart rate up and burns fat. I am doing this for me - no one else. That is the most important part.

Now, as for my orthopedic, he renewed my prescriptions, but he still seems to regard me in some disgust. I am offended that he still keeps harping on my weight and that I should lose weight. The reason for my offense is that I have already lost 28 lbs since December 2017 and this guy's practice does not even weigh me. So, to act like I am doing nothing is really offensive to me. Furthermore, he just won't do much to help with the pain. That is all I am asking for him to do is find something that will reduce the pain, so I can just walk without the pain.

You know, I still have a herniated disc and that is not going to heal itself overnight. When I walk or stand for awhile, the pinching pain in my back is tremendous. It is not fun. When I sit or lie down, the pain goes away. Oddly enough, when it is really nasty, the movement of sitting down can be so excruciating, then once seated, the pain slowly goes away. So, I know many doctors will be judgemental regarding overweight patients. However, that attitude does not help the patient. In some cases, shaming them makes the problem worse and that is a real problem.

I am planning on looking into what orthopedics my insurance company will cover and look for someone else. I will even discuss it with my PCP, who has been very supportive of me. Even my OB-GYN is very supportive of me with this journey. She will tell you - weight loss is not going to make your problems go away. In fact, it may cause other issues. That is a hard truth that no one discusses. It may help some of your health issues go away, but the rest of it, if you have self-conscious or anxiety issues, losing the weight may not help that. That is why I have also engaged a counselor. Help me through the changes and get me through those areas that trigger bad habits.

I did order my Pandora bracelet last week. While I know I have gained weight, that is fine. I still need to reward myself for having lost the 6 lbs I did in July. So, for October, I can wear the bracelet to remind myself - "You lost 6 lbs - you got this and can do it again!" That will help me mentally to stay on track along with journaling to keep me accountable.

Lesson - you can follow all sorts of diets, but bottom line, you have to make a "lifestyle" change if you want to keep things permanent. 

Next update in October!

Health Update - Thus Far...

I admit, my health is an up and down situation. I find myself in stressful situations or not having enough time to devote to "self-care", it takes a dive. It is something I am not proud.

Around April, I took on managing production along with development. Not the best situation, but I was concerned with keeping my job. The company is on a lay-off spree or looking to move jobs off-shore, so I am trying to be on my toes. Just that alone is so stressful. You worry for yourself and have concerns for others that are affected by these decisions. 

What I have done is tried to journal my health journey. I have my pitfalls - such as the month of August and most of September lay in waste as I never seemed to have time to concentrate on me. The other part is the chronic pain with my back, legs, and knees. I do well to just get Bo outside for a quick walk. I have to stop and sit for a bit before we complete a good walk around the lower end of the complex. I hate it, to be perfectly honest. Walking with ease was the one thing I valued so much and it has been ripped away from me. I just do not get it.

I am trying to get back on the wagon to lose weight. I was pretty proud of myself for losing the 6 lbs, but I am sure I have gained it again. I just need to crack down again and stay there. I think with clearing some of the chaos out of the way in the apartment, as I am doing this week, that may help. Just to clear my mind and be able to focus on doing more "self care" regarding myself.

My blood sugar and such are high and that is another reason for trying to change my lifestyle and crack down on my "self-care." I am getting rather tired of hearing how my A1C is no longer accurate as I have kidney disease. Thanks, doctor for making me feel worse about my situation. I will say, my kidney doctor is a bit more positive - I am stable and he likes that.

I have a new primary care physician. I like her a lot and she has been really helpful with getting me out of my depression. I do not feel quite so anxious about things, but more helpful is the ability to just not care about the little things. I was getting so caught up in this little issue or another. It was just time to let that go - life is too short to care - if it needs to get done, it will. I am only one person and people need to recognize that.

As for the chronic back, leg, and knee pain, I ended up with a new orthopedic who basically is just writing out scripts for pain meds that do not work. I was also told to lose weight. Other than that, he is not doing much other than being condescending. So, that was another motivator for me to lose weight because if that did not fix my issue, I was going to slam him as a "quack."

My other solution is to contact Massage Envy and discuss with them about getting deep stretching. I read where others were having issues with chronic lower back pain and doing the stretching helped them. At one point, therapy was starting to help my back, but then, my knee went out on me. I do think that this is a good thing to look into, so I plan on calling Massage Envy to find out cost and so forth.

At this point, that is all the update I have. I will say, I do have a reward system for losing weight. Each month that I lose 4+ lbs, then I will add a charm to a Pandora bracelet. I need to buy my bracelet and first charm. From this day forward, work harder to lose the necessary weight, so I can look at my bracelet and feel proud of the work I have done.

I will keep you updated with how I am doing with journaling as well as the progress.

Home Office 95% Complete...

After spending a day working on my home office, I must say that I am really close to having completed my set up as I wanted. I still have some things that I need to sort out, but that is the small stuff. It was the major moving of the systems, setting them up, and making sure everything works . I have that part pretty much done.

One thing I should note - I have a lot of keyboard/mouse combinations where the USB dongle is missing or does not work. I will be trashing a lot of that because what is the point? Last December, someone stole the port replicator off my desk and it contained two USB dongles and pretty much shutdown my ability to work on my laptop. 

First, people that steal from the company stink. Second, a port replicator? Really?

Anyway, that person's action required me to report the port replicator stolen. Next, the keyboards and mice I had were useless. While I can replace those items, it was just the fact that someone was so mindless about how their actions would affect another person trying to do their job.

Enough of that rant.

So, I will probably look for another keyboard/mouse combo to work on my Linux server as well as for the Raspberry PI I have. I already checked Office Depot and found one that would work. I am thinking of getting a smaller keyboard for the Raspberry PI that will work nicely.

The other thing that I have twisting in my head is that my current Dell laptop will be 10 years old next year. It is already showing signs of age. For example, when I stream content to my laptop, out of nowhere, the system will just shutdown - no blue screen of death - just black screen and it has been powered off. Not really reliable.

I saw where one that is comparable to what I already have with updated equipment and ability to expand to 32 Gb of memory is on sale at a reasonable price. I have two hesitations:  1. I really do not want to let go of the money to purchase it.  2. It is another Dell system. I have had really bad experiences with Dell systems.

My very first Dell I bought was in 2001. I purchased it directly from Dell. I was so proud of myself to have my own laptop. However, it was nothing but a heap of junk in the end. It would lock up constantly after 20 minutes. I had such a difficult time with that laptop and my father tried fixing it several times. Let's just say, I had a lemon for a computer. Not a happy customer.

I was taking my first course at UTD and tried using my laptop in class. What did it do? That is right - locked up and continued to lock up through out a lecture one day. I was so frustrated. My boss at work told me about how he had purchased a new HP system from Office Depot on credit. Not only could I get a discount on the laptop, but if I purchased on their credit card, I could get it interest free for 12 months if I paid it off before that time.

I thought about it and went down to purchase my first Toshiba computer. I opened up an Office Depot credit card and was able to purchase the laptop with 12 months interest free. I made sure I paid off the computer with my bonus 4 months later. That little system never locked up on me. Even today, the laptop is very reliable and I could not be happier with it. However, I allowed my father to borrow it to help a girlfriend out with something and it ended up with a virus. I had to replace the hard drive, but that was not the computer's fault.

In 2008, I saw these mini computer that Dell and others were developing. I saw Dell's and thought about it. A friend had one and she could not say enough about it. I thought it would be nice to have it for taking with me to Starbuck, work, and class because it was small, quick and convenient. So, I got credit again from Dell and purchased it. The only problem with the 8" computer was the keyboard - some of the keys were not where they should be for a QWERTY keyboard. Later, the 9" models were better. However, I will say, the computer never locked up and performed pretty well.

So based on that, I was spending a lot of time taking care of my dying mother. One of the things I would do to try to reduce stress was play video games. However, my Toshiba was not a gaming system - it could not handle the needs with the graphics adapter it had. So, I went back to Dell to look for a new system.

Mind you, the deal I had with Dell credit was similar to the Office Depot credit - I got a 12 month interest free as long as I paid off the bill before 12 months. I purchased my current personal system. The desktop I had was having some hard drive issues and when the hard drive went out, I was crushed. So much music I spent time loading into iTunes and *poof*, it was all gone.

This time, with the Dell, I moved the iTunes library over to a portable drive and I have some other removable drives for doing backups.

This Dell has had its share of issues, so I am not sure if I want to get a new one or not. It was probably a bad idea 10 years ago to purchase a brand new 64-bit system. Those had just been released and it could be that this system still had bugs.

So, I think I will reside on the fence for a bit before getting another system. I would rather upgrade another desktop and set up a fancy backup system and not purchase another laptop. However, we will see what happens around March next year. Research if what I want to upgrade comes out cheaper than a laptop.

Right now, I am happy with my extended space in my home office. Bo has found his dog bed from when we used to spend a lot of time in here and he actually sleeps in it. He did several times today, which was nice.

Next, tackling getting back in the habit of bullet journaling my health journey and how to better manage my time for doing art, learning, and relaxing.

Allo! Returning From the Great Beyond...

Holy cow! It has been almost a year since I have provided a proper update here. I apologize, but life has been so insane. Hoping that I am able to turn some of the things around in my life and provide more regular updates.

This will be a short update at this time. Sort of a funny one, actually.

For awhile, I had gotten kicked out of my home "office" for a number of reasons. Mostly, it had become a junk room and in March I had to clear out a lot of that. I have started to turn some of this stuff around by moving my personal and work laptops back into my home office area. 

What actually really motivated me, other than the junk clean out was the fact that the 19" monitor I was using at my dining room table finally gave out. It just was no longer going to display anything anymore. I thought it was the KVM switch, so I could switch between the two systems. By disconnecting from the switch and connecting directly to the laptops, the truth was that the poor monitor just was no good anymore.

I will have to take it and another monitor over to Best Buy and perform a quaint funeral service by dropping them off for recycling. They were good monitors.

I got extremely lucky and found a 32" monitor on sale about the same time. It had DVI, HDMI, and VGA connectors in the back. Rather than using the KVM switch, I have connected the Linux server I built a few years ago to use the monitor in VGA mode. My personal laptop is connected using the HDMI cable. All I have to do to switch between systems is press the button on the monitor.

However, the more tricky piece is the keyboard/mouse that is connected. I may have to get two separate keyboard/mouse combos, but I am taking my time and checking my options. I have another monitor that I plan on connected my work laptop using the VGA connector and my Raspberry PI on the HDMI connector.

It is nice to be back in my office area to be honest. I spent many a night in this room, either doing homework for university courses I was taking or simply doing work. I have a really nice chair that my parents got me and it is pretty spacious. I prefer working in this room than in the living room/dining room area. I just want to be able to separate everything and be able to walk away from work to relax more.

I will update all of you in the next few days on my health and some of the changes I have had to make.

Later....

Lessons in Life...

"Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned." -- Bodhidharma

Anyone that knows me gets that I am not that deep.  However, I saw this quote posted and I stopped to think about it.  It made me realize that no matter how old I am or what I have gone through in life, I still have a lot to learn.

It caused me to reflect on the relationships I have in life.  While Facebook shows I have close to 500 friends, reality is that so very few actually reach out to me personally.  Those are people I know from elementary, middle, and high school, as well as relatives.  I also have some friends I have remained in contact with throughout college and work.  What do a majority of them all have in common:  They never really reach out to me to get together for lunch, dinner, a shopping trip, attend a new movie, and etc.  I am usually the one that reaches out to them.
 

I am not very close to any of my relatives due to my family always living far away from their own families.  I do have a cousin that lives in the area with his family, but for the most part, he never makes an effort to reach out to ask me over for dinner or what have you. Again, I am the one that reaches out to them.  Of course, they are always busy and that is how it is, right?

This year, I realized something about one friend, but it came too late.  When I was really frustrated and needed someone to vent, I learned that person was no longer there for me.  It hurt and the words still sting.  However, as I looked back upon it, I realized, I was getting pushed away and I should have seen that.  I thought best was to wrap up my loose endings with the friendship and let it go.  I still hear the words in my head and it hurts, but you have to respect that and move along.

A month ago, I found myself worried that I would have a job.  Every year, the company goes through a "cutting" of the staff.  In the past, I had felt confidence that my job was okay.  This year, not so much.  

I reached out to another friend who had gone through this herself.  Every time she went through this, she would reach out to me going on about how she needed her job and her fears.  I would take her out to dinner, listen, and try to remind her how appreciated she was in her job and that it was not possible to dispose of her.  Each time, her job was saved.

I reached out to this person to get some support and felt nothing but a cold end.  "Well, that is too bad."  "Sorry to hear that."  "Let me know what happens on that - I need to go so I can watch such and such show."

Wow...here, I had been there for her.  We went out to dinner a couple of times, but even after that, I felt no real compassion for my situation.  Now, I do not hear from her, so I figure I have the "disease" - She was on the list to be removed - stay away or you might get removed.

Again, I was deeply hurt.  

I never wish harm on anyone and know I am no saint or perfect.  I usually get along fine alone because it is what it is.  I do have some close friends and I appreciate their friendship.  Just that sometimes, it is hard being alone.  I tell myself, "You know, there are some people in this world who simply could not exist if they had to live as you do.  You make it work where they cannot.  It is what makes you stronger."  

That means, I go out to eat without fear of being alone.  I will go to the movies alone.  I will do what I want - alone.  Would I like for others to join me?  Sure, but if I really want it, I will do it alone.

So, how does that quote fit into all of this?  For all I can do, I cannot make people like me or want to be with me.  I have to learn not to be upset with them because it is what it is.  Forgive myself and learn to move on with life.  However, never forget how someone made me feel because someone else out there is probably feeling the same thing.  Just learn to be better.
  

YouTube Content Creators Representing Dallas...

So, on some level, this is probably out of my demographic.  Yet, I am a single woman and I love makeup.  There is no denying that fact.  I was not born and raised in the DFW area, but I have come to call this place home.

I have spent a good amount of time watching various videos on YouTube.  Long enough to form an opinion about a few of the creators.  One in particular really gets under my skin, so much so that I had to unsubscribe.  She lives in the DFW area, but man, she does nothing but complain about how Dallas does not have this or that.

This lady is much younger than me, has kids, and on the search for that elusive "Prince Charming."  When she goes out, she takes the viewers out to swanky places in Dallas that are prime "seen and been seen places."  On the flip side, she will go on and on about how she is not happy here.  For all the swank, she never goes out of her way to really find the cool hole-in-the-wall places.  Not even sure she made it to the State Fair, which in itself, is a pretty interesting thing to do this time of the year.

She has had good fortune on obtaining an invitation to be part of a team that is developing makeup for one of the beauty companies in the area.  However, when watching the team introduction, she mentioned that she was from her hometown, living in Dallas.  *sigh*

I get being homesick.  Most people go through all of that - I had more than my fair share of it when I was a young child.  However, you spend your time wanting to be wined and dined, but never get out to see the things that the city and surrounding communities have to offer.  I find that so sad because there is Bishop Arts, Deep Ellum, Plano, Frisco, The Colony, Fort Worth, Grapevine/Southlake, Lewisville, Denton, and so many other places that are full of so much art, culture, and activities.

I would love to find someone who was her age and really showing off the various places in the area.  I would like to see this young woman get out of her shell and honestly become friends with more people.  Perhaps, that would help her get better adjusted and see the city for the good that it has.  Not just can it at every corner because it not like "home."

Remember:  "You're not in Kansas, anymore."

Possible New Hobbies Coming Together...

Taking a quick break from my normal day.  I have played around with creating a YouTube channel specifically for keeping myself accountable for working on weight loss.  Also, I wanted to make it a bit more interesting by either using it to go over various make up products that I have or trying new looks.  Not really expecting much from it, but I thought it might be fun understanding how to create and edit content.

I really did not want to have to spend a whole lot of money to start.  I have a camera that my father bought me for my birthday in 2012.  It is a Nikon J1 - it has the ability to film in HD, but it is not quite a fancy as some of the cameras I see other content creators have.  Still, start with what I already have and build on that.  No sense in spending a lot of money on equipment and such, then not really getting into it.

I know I am missing a few pieces on my camera.  I purchased two batteries and two battery chargers.  I have some extra ones that did not work lying around the apartment.  However, the last two, I am taking back to Best Buy to get that off my credit card.  I think I need to look for a tripod and ring light, but I will work on getting the best lighting as I can before going down that path.

This will also enable to me to put my MacBook Pro to some good use.  I purchased that computer and rarely use it.  I have been in the process of switching my iTunes library to be stored on the Mac, than the PC.  When I got my current Dell system, I had upgraded to using an iPhone and had a headache just getting the phone set up and so forth.  I figure it would be easier to store everything on the Mac.

I charged a battery the other day and got the J1 out to play around with it.  The camera does make some really clear videos.  I just need to set up some books or something as my tripod.  Hope to clear out a cubby hole that the apartment has set up between my bedroom and walk-in closet.  From there, I would do filming.  Planning to move out the videos and store my makeup palettes and such in the DVD cases that would be sitting behind me.  Nothing fancy, but everyone has to have a start.

Will let you know when all of that comes together and I finally upload my first video.  Next, I would like to buy a guitar and learn how to play it.  I saw a very awesome advertisement from Fender where you can buy on-line lessons.  That would be extremely cool to use.

Time to head back to my regular work day.  This is getting pretty exciting.