Category Archives: injury

Walking of sorts

Hey y’all!  Ha ha, can a yankee girl say ‘y’all’??  Just to let you know I am feeling fine today.  I got over my annoyance from yesterday and just am going with the flow.  Still unsure as to the actual closing on the house, but it will happen.  I didn’t stress eat yesterday.  I had a piece of toast with nutbutter and jam for a snack last night and that was it.  Phew!  Sometimes I actually have some control 😀

The morning didn’t start off on the right foot, though:

Overflow!!  That’s what happens when you try to make coffee before you have had any coffee!  It took all my self control not to lick the counter.

Breakfast was protein waffles topped with a mixture of plain greek yogurt, raspberries, and honey.  It was good!

I got right to work and finished up early today, seeing as I started early.  Lunch time was wrap time.  This is a egg/egg white combo with laughing cow and hot sauce!

Mmmmm…. lots of hot sauce:

It’s cold (38 degrees) and rainy today.  It actually snowed a little bit 😯  Doesn’t mother nature know it is almost May?  I took a walk this afternoon and listened to the latest 2 Fit Chicks and a Microphone podcast.  While the rest of me is progressing really well, the walking front is still difficult.  It is kind of painful and I don’t have any speed yet.  I think running is still at least many days away.  When I try a couple jog steps, my knee does not support me at all.  No hurry, though.  I want to make sure I am fully ready.  Here is a beautiful crabapple tree I saw on my walk!

I was feeling the stirfry for dinner tonight.  We used a Kikomann ginger teriyaki sauce.  Loves the proteiny shrimps!

I cut my pear different, too – just to be a rebel.

Pixie was singing in the rain.  See – she does open her eyes!

Sometimes I have some concerns about how well I am going to heal from the sciatica.  I know the doctor said 6 to 8 weeks and I am halfway there, so there is time.  The numbness of half my knee coupled with the burning pain it gets is just so weird, especially since the injury is actually in my back and not my knee.  There is nothing to do but wait and see what happens.  The day I can run will be the day I know I am back to normal (or what passes for that around here!).

Off to get some coffee and chillax tonight!

Question:  If I do a video blog, what would you like me to talk about?

Return of the biker babe

Sunday heralds the new work week for me, and the requisite bagel!

Today was blueberry.

Then it was time for the other pre work Sunday ritual:

Freshly stocked with produce and dairy!

Work was a little slow today, so I got down to making some soap.  I still have a business that I periodically make soap for, and she contacted me this week.  It’s near cherry blossom time, so I have been making a bunch of cherry soap for her (which I can’t stand, oddly enough).

John had run some errands and brought me a little marshmallow egg with caramel.  Gotta love sale Easter candy LOL.

Then it was lunchtime and I had some carrots:

Plus a green smoothie made with pumpkin, brown rice protein powder, Barlean’s Omega 3 and cinnamon.

Didn’t like this combo very much, I have to say.  At least it was nutritious.

After a little more work, it got slow again 🙄 , so I decided to give the bike a try! I nabbed a date and some nut butter and headed out to test the asphalt.

Look at this happy biker:

I missed it so much in the last 2.5 weeks!! The ride went well.  Not really much pain, but I have real weakness in my left leg.  I cannot go fast.  My brain is telling my leg to push harder and it just won’t go.  It’s like when you run in your dreams and you run really slow, even though you are trying to run fast (does anyone else dream like that?) Hills were a little funny that way because I just kept getting slower and slower as I went up.   There were only a couple small hills, which was the plan.  I actually went to see my folks (unannounced).  My dad wasn’t there, but I was able to visit with my mom.  Then I biked home.  6.5 miles – so  good start to get back on the bike!  Overall very pleased with my injury progress.  Biker babe is back in action!!

Had to make a snack when I got back!

Got a call that the closing on the house is scheduled for Tuesday.  I can’t believe it’s actually happening!  Now I need to decide whether to try to flip another house, start a business, or keep doing what I am doing.  Too many choices.

Dinner time was a constructed BBQ chicken salad since we got new lettuce to replace the produce soup I had to toss on Friday. 😀

I’ll be working late tonight to finish up if there is work to be had, plus more soapmaking, foam rolling, and stretching.  And I need to ponder an evening snack……

The Scale versus The Injury

Happy Earth Day!  The malt was quite good that John brought me last night.  It was made with maple soft serve and malt powder!  I am really sorry that I know how good that combo is….

I went to bed around 10 pm last night, hoping to get extra sleep, but I was up before 6!  I just wonder if my body doesn’t need 8 hours?

Anyway, I got up early and started working so I could finish up early today if possible.  Made a pot of coffee with some fresh roasted beans:

I am sorry that you cannot smell these.  Then cooked up some protein waffles topped with a mix of pumpkin, honey, ricotta cheese and a few dried cranberries.

This was good, although I do like my topping to be a little moister.  Yogurt works better for this instead of the ricotta, I think.

I imagine you all are curious as to how my herniated disk and lack of normal activity has affected the scale.  I was curious as well.  As you have seen on my blog, I am not restricting what I eat all that much.  Not always for lack of trying, though.  I am eating a little less, but still have my snacktacular days *yesterday, cough, cough*, just like normal.  I thought my appetite was going down because of lower activity, but I think it was my prescription pain meds.  Once I stopped those and switched to plain old ibuprofen, my regular appetite returned.

So here is the interesting thing.  All of March, I did my normal hard workouts and lost 1 pound for the whole month.  I have lost 2 pounds since I injured myself and barely moving.  The irony of this is not lost on me.  (Irony has been in my vocabulary a lot lately….). John said the weight loss gods have a sense of humor.  I thought it was a fluke, but I weighed in 3 days in a row and the lower weight stayed.  It can’t possibly be muscle atrophy in only 2 weeks, can it?  I’ll take it, though!  My cruise weight is all gone now – yay!  I’ll be curious as to what happens over the next few weeks.  I have not gone running in 14 days and no biking in 13 days (other than the stationary at the gym this week).

Lunch time!  I forgot I had bought a cucumber this week, so that went onto the plate.  With some tuna salad.

I decided on the pear after waffling between that and a kiwi.  I almost had both LOL!

Got back to work and busted out all my lines to finish up early today.  So, I had to make the afternoon lattes…..

Then I took a walk.  Went a few slow blocks and enjoyed the sunshine!

Did a quick and easy stock dinner tonight.

I cooked the broccoli on the griddle pan to our new grill!  That was pretty cool.

Stopped at the rental house to get the lawnmower and have John help me with a couple things, then back home to relax.  I am snacking on some dates with nut butter tonight and a cup of tea while I write this post.

I don’t have anything earth-shattering (har har) to say about Earth Day.  So instead, I will leave you with some photos I took today on my walk:

Bagels and biking and bread!

Triple B today!  I woke up early today because of pain.  Just a momentary gripe here, but I will be so glad to finally wake up pain free – or just be pain free period.  This is getting really old.  It’s better mind you, a lot better, but not much fun.  Patience…..

We headed out to Panera Bread, where I had a french toast bagel.

I really took the time to slow down and eat, too.  Sometimes I wolf my food down because I am hungry and it tastes good 😀

Then we went grocery shopping, with me on crutches.  I can’t walk long distances without the crutches yet, although I can get around the house and such without them.  After checking in with work and it being slow (as in dead), we packed up some food and headed out to catch the Battenkill pro bikers along their route.  This bike race is 124 miles long.  Lunch in the car for me was some broccoli slaw sauteed in coconut oil, 1/4 cup of rice and 1 egg/2 egg whites scrambled.  With some hot sauce.  This was quite good!

Poor bikers – it was a cold day and rainy.

We had a cup of coffee and I ate my strawberries while waiting for the bikers.  We were excited!

Poor John, I always cut his head off :D. We actually timed it pretty well (or John did, I should say).  It was quite exciting.  I have never seen a live bike race before.  I have been to plenty of running races, but the tempo of this was so fast compared to that!  Here is a video of the main group.

You can hear me start to freak out about how close the bikers came to us and you can hear them hit their brakes around the curve.  It was a hard left curve. We were on the curb and not even in the road and they came so close!  I actually got a little scared 😳

That was a rush.  They were so colorful, too. I can’t believe how close they ride together at that speed.  Average speed is around 25-30 miles an hour on this course.

Then other small clusters came by.

They were also going fast.

Ooops  – missed the biker here :mrgreen:  He just shot right past my camera.

One lonely Trek rider, way behind.

It was all over so fast.  Next year, I want to go to the finish area, but it is another 1/2 hour away, so we couldn’t do that today with my work.  I want to ride so bad!

Also noted were some lovely azaleas!

Had to get back to work, although it would have been nice to hang around and see the bikers come through again (they do a double 62-mile loop).   Got to work and there was some to do, so I got busy.  John made lattes and I had a snack to go with:

Granola nut clusters.  Addictive!

John made up some of the 5-minute healthy bread from the book I bought him:

It was perfection!  I had a slice with my dinner salad:

I am going to have to work some of this into my eating this week.  So good.  John is happy because the recipe worked!  There is more dough in the fridge, so he can bake whenever he wants.

Pear for dessert:

Well, that fun today comes at a price of having to work late tonight, but it was worth it!

Tomorrow I will talk about me being in Shape and more pictures from the photo shoot we did a couple months ago! 😀

I am also going to venture to the gym for the first time in almost 2 weeks to do some light lifting.  I need to get back into some routine again.

How does my garden grow and injury update

Such a gorgeous day outside!  Last nice day for a while, too.  I hobbled on down to make some breakfast.

Protein waffles!  Looks like a bow tie, doesn’t it?

After breakfast and checking in at work (there was none), I went out for a short walk.   It’s much easier to use the crutches still.  John came with and I went further than yesterday, which is good.  Also took the plastic off the garden plants.  They seemed to have survived the freezing okay.  It’s getting greener all the time!

Look – I have my own fiddleheads!

Lunch time was an egg white puff with a ladle of hot sauce on it 😀  I could drink hot sauce.

I spoke with my doctor again today, and it is likely that what I have is not just the muscle pull, but  because I still have numbness in my knee and referred pain down the leg – I have a herniated disk in my back, which is what is still causing the sciatica.  Unfortunately, there is nothing that can be done for this other than time.  This means probably about 6 weeks.  I can still progress activities as tolerated, but any thoughts of running are going to be at least many days out from now.  😐  Biking may happen sooner, but I still have to walk first (baby steps and all that).  I’m not going to let it get me down.  I won’t talk about it too much anymore unless something changes.

Latte time included one of my favorites!

I bought a whole box of these Attunes (with coupon LOL).

I still was hungry, so I nibbled on some Bran Buds.  Fiber rules!

We tried out our new Coleman portable grill for dinner tonight.  Love it!  John grilled some sirloin while I cooked a sweet potato.  Topped with sweet potato with some of the pecan/maple syrup combo that we had on the parsnips the other day.

This steak was amazing.  Local meat just tastes to much better!  We don’t have steak too often, and I just love it.

Going out for snack time!  Today is free coffee day at Starbucks if you bring in a mug, so we are on our way out the door for that tonight!  One thing I like about this Starbucks is that they have ceramic cups so you can get ‘for here’ drinks in  them and not waste a paper cup.  Of course, I will bring my own if it means anything free!  Yay!  Will be meeting my mother there and chatting away to start off my weekend.

Have a great night!

Chasing away the blues.

Getting better bit by bit.  I am just hoping to be walking pain free very soon.  That would be a giant step forward.  I was feeling pretty blue this morning about the whole thing.  I just wish I had a timeline, you know?

Very sad clown here….  I made a comforting bowl of banana oats this morning, topped with some Nuttzo and jam.

I don’t know if I will ever go back to not adding egg whites to my oatmeal anymore!  I am hooked.

I am looking into getting a foam roller.  I want to make sure I keep my back and leg muscles stretched out, and there is a specific roller exercise for sciatica, so that will be on the list.  I just need to find the right size roller, I guess.

Lunch was cobbled together with the last of the baby carrots, and a super unripe kiwi!

Dang, that was even more tart than the one I had last week.  No wonder they were on sale.  I need to let the other sit for a few days before eating.

One bonus to not working out in the morning is that I can start work early and be done early.  I was finished by 3!

Afternoon snack time:

One of John’s brownies.  I was going to ask for the recipe, but they really are a bit dry and not as good as they look (sorry J!).

I waddled outside  afterward to try and take a walk.  I made it this far:

Our house is the 2nd one down.  I had to turn back and come home because of the pain.  I should have gotten the crutches out for the walk, but I hadn’t needed them walking around the house.

Dinner time was some chicken topped with a laughing cow wedge and salsa – you must try this because it was soo good!

Yum!  John asked me if I wanted to go out for coffee this evening to cheer me up.  Of course I won’t say no that, as you well know.  It worked:

That’s my favorite travel mug – see how beat up it is?  I just can’t find one to replace it that is just right.  John on the other hand,has a ton of travel mugs.  Not pictured is the muffin I had with this….

Had to cover up the rose bushes tonight.  Temps are supposed to drop to 27!  Hope they make it.

Question:  Do any of you use a foam roller?

Bagel day and improvements.

Bagel day!  I slept back in my own bed last night, which felt pretty good.  I was very stiff and painful this morning, though. Mornings seem to be the hardest time for me pain-wise.  After taking forever showering and such, we headed on out for breakfast at Panera.  I was hoping to not have to use the crutches, but I needed them.  I decided on a chocolate chip bagel.

Chomp!

Yum!  Plus about 3 cups of coffee.  I was babbling away at breakfast, I think it was the Vicodin talking or something.  I think John finds it amusing…

Got to work, and luckily there was some to get started with.  Sunday mornings usually are slow, so I was glad to see there was work available.  I have been getting up every hour to walk around, and I was able to ambulate without the crutches by lunch, so either I loosened up, or the pain pills are really working better today.

It feels good to be doing more for myself now, and I made my lunch today.  John went grocery shopping by himself while I was working (can’t imagine how long it would have taken me hobbling along with him in the store).  He brought back some amazing looking strawberries – and they were delicious!

Tuna salad and brussels as well.

My appetite really does seemed to have adjusted to my lower activity.  I was worried because on my regular rest days, I am usually a bottomless pit – so I thought it would be days and days like that with me being inactive.  I still have the mind desire to snack, but not so bad that I can’t control it.

I have found there has been a little return of the fear of food, though, which bothers me.   John wanted to take me out to eat last night, and I got thinking about where I could go that would be healthy enough and low calorie enough for me where I would actually enjoy it.  I couldn’t think of anything, so we stayed home (plus it is just exhausting to move around so much).  I don’t like thinking about food that way.  Those are my old ways of thinking.  It’s only temporary, I know, but it’s hard to draw that line between being sensible and being neurotic about it.   I am also fighting a bit of the pity eating.  You know how you want to pamper yourself with chocolate because you can’t do stuff?

However, I satisfied that with a sensible snack of a latte and an Attune bar!

I am glad the cheap person in me keeps me from scarfing these down :mrgreen:

Dinner time was a veggie dinner.  No meat thawed out, so I made do with what was on hand.  1/2 a sweet potato topped with laughing cow and sauteed broccoli and 1/4 cup of chickpeas in coconut oil.

Quite good.  I don’t need to load up the protein right now like usual since I am not moving a lot.  I did go for a very slow walk for about a block tonight with the crutches.  I did not take anymore Vicodin today – I switched over to the diclofenac, because I don’t want to really like the narcotics, know what I mean?  The pain is tolerable.  Might use it for sleep, though.

I am hoping I’ll be biking again by next weekend!  This is driving me nuts.

I have a fun idea for oats tomorrow and I hope it turns out good!

Anyone do anything fun and exciting this weekend?

Navigating my way…

I can’t believe my weekend is almost over already.  I guess that is because I worked a little yesterday.  I slept pretty well last night, which was quite a relief, but woke up around 4 am with excruciating pain in my knee.  I think I like the numbness better.  It was past pain pill time, so I took one and fell back asleep.  This is just bizarre how the pain moves around from hip to thigh to knee.  Nerves are just an amazing thing in the body.  Sorry to keep talking about this, but I have never had an injury journey like this, so I am sort of feeling my way around.

I was feeling like something different for breakfast – so I made a pumpkin 1-minute muffin.  It took me forever moving around.  Only I could turn the 1-minute muffin into a 10-minute muffin. 🙄

It was worth it, though.  Topped with light cream cheese mixed with a bit of powdered sugar.  Soooo good!  This also filled me up until lunch, too.  It was awesome.  Or maybe my appetite is catching up to my activity (or lack thereof).

After breakfast, John took me to the indoor farmer’s market.  It’s smaller when it is indoors, but very charming.

My pics didn’t come out all that well.  There were hydroponic greens there, and lots of root veggies.  We picked up some apples and some parsnips!  I was all excited for a new veggie.  Is that a little sad?

We also stopped and got a new grill.  Our grill completely disintegrated into powder – and I am not joking – so we got a portable gas one.  I’ll get pics sometime after we set it up.  Walking with crutches is so slow, so all this took most of the morning.

Lunchtime and John wanted to try the parsnips, too.  He chopped them up and pan sauteed them in some coconut oil.  I made an egg white puff to go along with.

The parsnips were good!  They are kind of like a cross between a carrot and a potato.  I have a fun recipe to try with them, which I’ll probably do tomorrow.

I am pretty sleepy today.  Think it is the pain pills, but also just the fatigue of injury.  I am so glad I have all this upper body strength to use the crutches with.  Chin ups are good for something!

John has been busy cooking today.  He made a low fat protein brownie variation, which he brought out a sample of with my latte:

I’ll see if I can get the recipe from him.  Not low calorie, though.

I was so jealous, because John then went out for a bike ride.  Wahhhhh!!!  Although he made up for it by scoping out a store and bringing me some of this!

Pumpkin!!!  My stash was getting low, so I was all kinds of happy to see these cans 😀

Dinner time was a stir fry.  We had some cooked rice, so I combined that with broccoli and chicken and a little sesame oil.

So good.   I wandered outside to look at my garden.  I have some early tulips blooming now:

I think some of the perennials did not make it through the winter, so I might have some fun finding replacements this year!

I had a sweet urge, so I had a date.  Soft medjool dates.  These are like candy.  Expensive, but so worth it!  One with nut butter, one without.

Not much else on tap for the evening other than being slow.  I am so not used to doing anything slow for very long, so it is a good exercise in patience for me.  John was saying taking an extended break from exercise isn’t always a bad thing, so I am trying to view it like that.

Question:  Do you eat dates?

Narcotics and chocolate and coffee, oh my!

Hello from cloud 9 everybody!

I convinced John to make me some pumpkin custard oats for breakfast, and he just doubled the batch and shared with me.  Yay – I got him to eat more superfoods!

I got in to see the doctor this morning.  The pain had lessened enough so I can get around some, but my knee is numb and my thigh is really painful still.  I asked John to take a picture of me in the parking lot on my crutches.

First time in my life ever on crutches.  So, here is the deal on my injury:  I herniated a disk in my back.  When I twisted around, I pulled/popped the disk, which compressed the sciatic nerve.  That’s why the pain started in my back and gradually moved down into my leg and my knee, and which is causing the numbness there.  Fun, fun.  So, this is going to take a lot longer to recover since it is more than just a muscle pull.  I can progress activities as tolerated, and the doctor gave me some Vicodin and Flexeril.   😯 😯   I refused the prednisone.  Former fatty does *not* want to take a steroid, thankyouverymuch.  I would never re-lose that weight.

Of course, I do have to say that I have some real fear here about not being active.  I have to be so very careful about what I am eating because I am burning so few calories not moving around.  I made my way downstairs for the first time in a couple days, and the first thing I see is an open bag of chocolate chips on the counter.  Of course I hobbled over and snagged some like the addict I am.  John had to put them back up high again.  Who knows what he was eating downstairs when I couldn’t get down there :mrgreen:

I know that I am not going to wake up 100 pounds heavier.  I know that.  My rational mind knows that.  But the fear is there, you know?

I actually was able to make my own lunch today!  I kept it simple and somewhat random.  Tortilla with some Nuttzo and jam as my sandwich.

I really like the Nuttzo, I have to say.  It’s pricey, but quite good.  It took me forever to make this while leaning on my crutches, and then I had to have John come carry my plate for me.  I cannot tell you how hard this is for a fiercely independent woman….

I have been working some today to make up for Wednesday, but it is a relaxed kind of working.  Those are good days, don’t you agree?  Especially when a snack arrives for me:

Caffeine and chocolate!

200 calorie snack, which is just about perfect.  And really is perfect taste wise 😀

I also wanted to again thank every one you from the bottom of my heart for all your comments and emails the last couple days.  I was bowled over by them, truly.  I am so lucky to have so many wonderful people in my life, virtually and physically!

Dinner time came, and I was able to work on my salad bowl.  I haven’t had a BBQ chicken salad in awhile!

After dinner, I was feeling pretty good what with the meds and all, so we went out to pick up some food for Pixie and make a pit stop:

This is the reduced fat berry coffee cake at Starbies.  It’s pretty good.  It was so great to get out of the house, too, although I am pretty slow. 😀

Here’s to a good night’s sleep!

Question:  Have you ever had sciatica symptoms?

Injury update and thank you!

Thank you all so much for your well wishes and emails on my injury.  You guys are really the best 😳

I so rarely get injured, which I am very thankful for.  It’s funny how it’s the unexpected things that cause the hurt.    I had a very hard time yesterday with the pain and was flat on my back all day and night.  I could not put any weight on my leg or sit up, so I stayed upstairs.  I moved into the guest room near the bathroom, just so I wouldn’t have to trek down the hallway, which was agony.  It seems to be in my hip and leg, rather than my back.

I am doing better today as the day goes by.  At least the pain doesn’t make me cry when I move now, so that is progress.  I have a call in to the doctor to see if I can get some muscle relaxants, but she is taking forever to get back to me.

Funny thing, Pixie was all upset that I was locked away in the bedroom yesterday.  She does not come in there because John is allergic and needs one cat-free room in the house.  She kept pushing on the door hoping to get in.  When I moved out to the guest room, she slept with me all night.  My personal heating pad 😀  

I hope I don’t get too used to be waited on.  John actually made my protein waffles for me this morning!  His first try, and they were perfect.

I think I like breakfast in bed, just without the pain.

I have myself propped upright a little bit, so I can work again.  It’s one thing to write a blog post completely flat, but transcribing just wasn’t happening.  I am glad I work at home, because I wouldn’t have been able to get out to an office today.  At least I can earn some money while recuperating.  The Aleve seems to have dampened my appetite a bit, which is good seeing as I am not moving around.  I did need to eat a little something for lunch so I wasn’t taking the Aleve on an empty stomach, so John made me a half tuna sandwich and applesauce:

Things are moving along with the closing on my rental house.  My tenant moves out this weekend, then I will do the few fixups the buyers asked for (after I feel better).  Closing should still be around April 26th.  After that, I can start thinking about what my next adventure will be :mrgreen:

Lattes this afternoon and a homemade granola bar.

It’s kind of nice not to be ravenous for a change….

I am going to sign out this post early.   It’s not very exciting in Lori town right now.   I will work on my Gym in a Bag review to post tomorrow.

I have a pair of crutches on their way tonight so that I can be ambulatory and hopefully get downstairs tomorrow.  I said to my mother that I felt like Rapunzel stuck upstairs, only I don’t have long hair!

One last picture of sleepy Pixie.