A New Beginning

WARNING: THERE ARE PICTURES IN THIS POST THAT MAY BE DISTURBING TO SOME, BUT I WANT THE WHOLE STORY TO BE TOLD. 

This isn't my first rodeo. This I say on many levels. I have had so many blogs in the past. Some I abandoned on my own when things got tough or life got busy. Others were hacked. Its taken nearly a year to start this one, but i need all of the support and accountability I can get.

I've also struggled with my weight for most if not my entire life. I've had some success - I lost 100 pounds back in 2009, but it slowly crept back up and brought friends. I never had any major health problems with the exception of high blood pressure diagnosed in 2007, but after regaining the weight, my health began to deteriorate.

The longer I maintained my weight in the 300's, the worse I felt. My activity got less and less until one day I realized that my days consisted of getting out of bed, making my way to the living room couch where I'd sit all day long. Every now and again, I'd go see my parents, or shop, but the minimal activity would drain me for days.

My legs began to swell and over time, got blisters on them, that would break and weep for weeks. I'd go to the doctor, they chalk it up to poor circulation, give me a diuretic and send me on my way. Eventually, this was no longer helping, and I tried one last time. This time the doctor told me I was having congestive heart failure. After multiple testing by cardiologists, this was debunked, especially after they were able to get a lot of fluid off of me with stronger meds - I actually lost 67 pounds of water in just a few weeks. I was encouraged....until I started going downhill again.

It used to be that when I was forced to get up from my sedentary lifestyle that I would actually start to feel a bit better, and yet i would always regress afterward. We were dealing with the sudden illness my of Dad and his passing about a month later in May, and for the first time, the more I did, the worse I felt. I kept a few doctors appointments and watched my weight spiral out of control to 439. It was evident when we snapped a picture of my sisters and mother....

  Fast forward to later this summer, when went back to the cardiologist, who focused on my legs, saying I have venous insufficiency and sent me to the wound care specialist in their group. I was prescribed a round of una boots.....

 I could barely walk with them and had to go weekly to have them changed. While I initially had some positive results, it didn't take long to get discouraged with these, too. Next step: a vein ablation. This procedure would strip the vein and reroute the blood low to healthier veins. Sounded like a winner to me so I went into with hope.

It was a painful procedure that let my thigh pouring excess water for days - I couldn't even leave my home because it wet my shorts to badly. This was done on August 20th. I naturally signed o on a bunch o papers that I understood the risks even though they were highly unlikely. I was fine with signing as I was being told that there would be almost immediate relief.

Instead of relief, every morning I woke, I felt a little worse.I had already resorted to sleeping on the couch because I couldn't get up in my bed any longer, so I was not resting well and quite exhausted. But this was different. Finally, on September 3rd, I got so winded just walking the length of our hallway that I knew something was terribly wrong. I told my hubby I needed to call for an ambulance because I needed to go to the hospital but there was no way I was going to get to the van to have him take me.

The next while was a blur. I had no idea what was going on, other than  being put on a ventilator....

But I remember well the day that the doctor came in to talk to me. I had blood clots in both of my lungs, cellulitis  in my legs along with an infection, an infection on the skin on my stomach, my kidneys were nearly not functioning which caused one side of mt heart to overwork and enlarge. He told me they did all they could do but they couldn't wean me off of the vent. He could either discharge me, but I would be back in three months or less, and I'd be in worse shape. They'd fix me up and I'd be back again until they finally couldn't fix me any longer. The other option - a tracheotomy. Once I was off of it, I need gastric bypass.

So, I agreed to the trach....

 Thus started a marathon hospital tour, moving from one facility to another, then yet one more, until I got strong enough to come home on November 9th. Today, 52 days later, I am walking on my own without the aid of a walker, and my battle scars are fading - the one on my neck and the ones on my right arm where I had a pic line inserted (there was a time when I had 9 IVs in me at one time).  The best news was that just after Thanksgiving, I weighed 335 pounds - I was already down 104 pounds! Gastric bypass be damned!

 I have gained some over Christmas, but this is going to be my year. My year to finish getting my life back. I already threw three years away and its got to stop. I don't ever want to put my loved ones through anything like this again, and I want this blog to serve as a reminder. To remind me of what I put my husband through, as he spent part of every day that I was in the hospital by my side, logging over 6,000 miles on our van in 67 days. To remind me how my heart broke, hearing about how my Mom, who just buried my Dad only 5 months earlier, was planning my funeral as my nephews and niece tried to comfort her. So much more that I couldn't even begin to list them all in one post.

Still, I'll be sharing more hospital stories over the next while, just to keep myself walking faster away from the potential death of myself until I run full speed into the arms of my healthy strong self.

Here's to 2016! Ready or not, here I come!

Dusting Off The Cobwebs

Well, well, well, look who just showed up!

It took me about an hour before I could post – I had two hackers and multiple posts I had to get rid of, not to mention 20 updates and hundreds of spam, so if you have made a comment and don’t see it, my apologies – it most likely got caught up in the clean up,

I plan to reclaim my posting, as only by the sheer power of prayer and willingness of God that I am here, in my cozy home with my beautiful family, writing this. I will get into specifics in my next post. In the meantime, hug your loved ones and don’t forget with all of the steps you take each day, be sure to spend enough time on your knees. Love you all!

Putting My Foot Down in My 1000 Mile Journey

 

I’ve heard the about quote my whole life, and decided it was time for my finally journey to getting healthy. 

 

I’ve toyed with it in the past, gotten to the outskirts of my destination, but always ended back at my starting point, if not a bit worse for wear.

 

This has to be my last time. I will get there this time. I say this for a number of reasons.

 

1 – I’m in the worst shape ever. I’m over 400 pounds. That is as close to the actual number that I will get at this time. Maybe when I get away from the number, I will be able to utter it, we shall see. But I am so weak and sedentary, its plain sad.

 

2 – My health has deteriorated. I am now officially a diabetic, also diagnosed with hypothyroidism, among other underlying issues. I’m on three medications. Three! It brings to mind images of my grandparents basket of prescriptions that was passed around the breakfast table each morning. Makes me feel old. I’m only 44!

 

3 – I want to be the Mother and Wife I know I can be and the one my family deserves.

 

4 – I have God. Of course I’ve always had Him, but I never relied on Him when it came to my trying to work toward better health. With Him, anything can be achieved.

 

After these last few months, its even more critical.

 

Seven years ago, we helplessly watched a family member get sicker and sicker and do nothing to become healthier, until it was too later. We lost them years before it was necessary if he had taken the time to eat well, work out and stop smoking. A year later, we lost someone else, even younger, to poor choices and ignoring warning signs.

 

Now, even though he made it to 82, if he had gone to the doctor when he first started feeling poorly, you cannot convince me that he wouldn’t have had more time with us all and not gotten so weak at this point that he couldn’t have fought back even more than he did.

 

I had never been begged so much to step up and try harder, to please take care of me for myself, for my family. I hated the looks of pity I was getting from everyone, it just made me loathe myself even more. Time to step it up.

 

So begins my journey. You are welcome to walk along. I’ll need all of the allies I can get.

Lessons Learned Over These Months? There’s an App For That

Upon hearing the news of the job, we tried to lower our bills in any way we could, so we bit the bullet and joined the 21st century and got smart phones.

Wait. What?

How could upgrading your phone save you money?

It actually did.

By heading over and getting WalMart Family Mobile, it actually brought our bill down at least $10 a month, some months twice as much as that, so that makes our average savings $180 a year.

Plus, there’s the apps.

Come on.

Any Ebay seller lives to hear the “cha-ching” of their notifier, letting them know that they just made a sale. The first time mine cha-chinged, I squealed like a little girl at Christmas.

I’ve added many helpful apps, but of course two of the very first were a bible and a devotional. I just dove in and grabbed one, but it was obviously divinely chose, as God helped me with a struggle that I was just beginning to have and knew nowhere to turn to for answers,

It seems like when you turn toward God in a moment of crisis, Satan works ever so much harder to push doubts and irrational fears into your every thought. Every day that went on while my Dad was ill, he would have a good day, where he’d be asking to eat, asking for coffee, asking questions about family members and the like, giving us all hope that we were headed toward rehab and home. The next day we’d come back to him being moved back to ICU status and another surgery scheduled. We’d send out requests for everyone to pray for him, then the questions and frustrations began to creep in.

Luke 12:7–  But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered.

Jeremiah 29:11 — For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

If God already knows what is going to happen to you, what is the point of prayer? He sits and tells you in one moment that he will give you everything you answer as long as you ask, and yet, if his plans are for you to lose this person from your like, do you think he’s going to change his mind for you. or is he just lying?

These thoughts were manic in my mind for weeks. I asked a few of my family members, my Sunday School teachers, but never really got the answer my heart was seeking,

Fast-forward to my apps again.

I was sitting in the hospital room, and I was sitting quietly on the sofa while Mom and Dad visited. I got out my phone and decided to seek some solace in scripture. I opened up my Daughters of the King app, right to When You Pray For Your Friends.

The first sentence? “And the LORD turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends: also the LORD gave Job twice as much as he had before” Job 42:10. I was hooked. While the route to the message had nothing to do with my questions and struggles,  it brought me to the same conclusion:

When Job prayed for his friends, the Lord turned his situation around. God gave him twice as much wealth as he had before. It is the Lord that will turn things around for you when you wise up and do what big girls do. As you pray, God will bless you richly with a release and will turn things around for you.

I held on and waited to the answer I needed to go on. And it came. It always does. I noticed my prayers changing from saving him to helping my Mom come to terms with the path that was beginning to clear out before us. The main request from our hearts became to assure us that both Mom and Dad had been saved, so we know that we’ll be together again soon.

And guess what?

God does answer prayers.

Just like He says.

About the last 24 hours:

Waking blood Sugar this morning:

156

Blood Sugar after dinner:

168 (not bad for a white carb dinner!)

Dinner Tonight:

I made fresh pasta sauce from a ton of fresh veggies I got at the Farmer’s Market right before Dad passed. I didn’t want them to go to waste – second batch on tap for tomorrow!

kicking the nasusea after its hold on me all day – thank you Jesus!

Up

I have always heard that once you fall all the way down, as far into the depths that you can can go, the only way you have to look and to aim for is up.
We all know those depths.
It can come in waves of despair over finances, over relationships. It can come as feelings of your health deteriorating and so much more.
Up.
The direction of hope, of faith and mercy. The direction we lift our weary eyes to in hopes of feeling assurance from our heavenly father, to feel the love we seem to somehow be missing out on at that time.
Of course as a growing child of God, I’ve learned to let go and let God, just as we are instructed to over and over in the bible.
Come to me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. – Matthew 11:28

Cast your burden on the LORD, and he shall sustain you: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved. – Psalm 55:22
But its always been one thing,
One thing at a time.
A lost job.
An illness.
A bad relationship.
Is that truly trusting God with your life?
Little did I know that this was shaping up to be the year we will find out!
It all started the last week of March, when Randall comes in and tells me he has lost his night job. I felt like the example of a true Christian – I told him that God answered our prayers – that even though we’d have less money on paper, we were gaining so much more. I knew God had this and never blinked and eye. I watched things fall into an order and never looked back, nor do I plan to if things look shaky, because God is in control.
That same week, my nephew totaled his car on the way to school. No one was hurt by the grace of God. Here comes acceleration. Down
….down….
down.
The first Friday of April, the phone call came. Dad had fallen and needed to go to the hospital. The next seven weeks and five days were filled with frustration, confusion, stress and fear that I can get into some other time. It all came to a head when the hero of my girlhood drew his last earthly breath on Wednesday morning, May 20th, at about 5:20 in the morning,
I spent every night from April 3rd on sleeping anywhere from 3 to 4 hours, forcing myself into an exhaustion like I’ve never felt. I have steadily become weaker and sicker. I’m looking up.
So, here I am. A broken, fatherless woman who sets, ashamed of the effort that she’s made to keep her house a home, the jobs of wife and mother that she’s done. It was the first time in a while since I’d seen either of my sisters, and felt pitied by them both. I love my sisters, but  I hate pity. I’m looking up.
It’s time to surrender my all to my Lord and let him make me all He has intended. Its time to let everyone else see it happen and use this platform as my testimony. I want others to follow along, to see how things change, how much more blessed my family and I will be. I’m going to have Prayer Requests for my family and I, should you be a prayer warrior. If you are not, who knows – you may become by the end of this.
So, welcome, to my family journey, There will be tears and trials, treasures and triumphs, and I look forward to every minute of it!

About the last 24 hours:

Waking blood Sugar this morning:

156