TTT

1.  I ran on the TM again last night!!  I am so freaking slow, 14 minute miles but I think I would be faster on the road.  Treadmills kind of freak me out.

2.  I brought my running shoes to work.  I am going to take a break about 2:30 and go to the TM and walk for 20 minutes per the Galloway app I am using.

3.  Work is crazy.  I have been working about 16 hours OT each week to try to cover for my Monday furlough days.  I filed an appeal but I am equally afraid they won't approve it and I will lose $1,000 a month pay or that I will get approved and won't be able to spend my days off at the pool. 

4.  I had the most mindblowing discussion with my mother yesterday.  It started when I was telling her about a friend of mine from high school and college who passed away Monday.  He is my age and had a stroke during emergency surgery.  We started talking about my uncle (my mom's brother) who had a massive stroke almost 20 years ago.  First of all I can't believe he has been gone 20 years; second, he was my older sister age!!  She told me that she was my age when they bought the house they are in now.  Even at 40 it is hard to fathom your parents ever being your age.  I remember moving into that house like it was yesterday.  MIND BLOWN 

5.  I found out today that there is going to be a huge concert to benefit the tornado victims.  So far the lineup is Toby Keith, Garth Brooks, Trisha Yearwook, and Willie Nelson.  I am not a big country music fan, but I love Garth.  Even though we are neighbors (yeah right) and you see him around town, he doesn't do concerts except for the limited engagements in Vegas.  Tickets are only $25 each and we are working on our strategy.  The last concert sold out in 5 minutes.

6.  It's hot.  I am not a fan of summer.  I wish I could run outside after work but alas it is not in the cards.

7.  Weight this morning was 120.  I will take that.  I really want to be 112 again but with the small amount of fill I have I am not going to complain.

8.  My ring is finally fitting again.  I think it had something to do with my BC pills.  The pharmacy I use was sold/merged into another pharmacy and I didn't have time to deal with it.  I finally got them refilled after a couple of weeks of not having them and the swelling in my fingers I had first thing in the morning went away. 

9.  I called my doctor and asked if she could give me something for anxiety.  She called in something for me and I will pick it up on my way home.  There are a lot of things going on at once and I am just overwhelemed.  I still cry everytime I come home and my Dex isn't there to great me.  Maybe this will help me not break down in tears everytime I see a black dog.  I know it is more than that but that seems to be the big trigger.

10.  I went to the new pharamcy the other day to pick up my vitamins and found several boxes of pure protein bars for under $2.50, they are almost that much if you buy one!!!  I bought all the chocolate pb they had and the smores flavor.  Now I am on a mission to stop at every WG I see to find out if they have more.  Those are my favorite bars.

one step at a time

You will never guess what I did yesterday.  I went to the gym and ran.  No really, I did.  I was going through apps on my old phone and found the Galloway half marathon training app.  I decided I would try it out.  It started out slow, which is good because I haven't done any kind of exercise in eons.  Day one consisted of a 3 minute warm up and 20 minutes of running intervals.  Done.  I am going to work my OT schedule around my running schedule because I need to do this for me. 

Summer hit full blast yesterday.  When I got in my car to go home from work the dash thermometer said 100.  No bueno for this red haired fair skin girl.  My plan is to do the short runs on the treadmill and wake up at the butt crack of dawn to do the long run on Saturday. 

Yesterday was a horrible day at work.  I'm not really sure if it was just me being overly sensitive or if things have been going on that I just didn't pay attention to because I have been all wrapped up in my own problems.  Basically they are giving the other lead in my branch all kinds of budget training so she will qualify for our supervisors job when she retires.  I told them that I don't want the job but for some reason it just really bothered me yesterday.  She also won an award for being a technical expert in our field but half of the stuff they wrote up that she did is MY job.  I really felt like bundling up all the work they say was hers and give it to our boss and say here ya go, this obviously isn't mine.  But, its just work.  My job does not define me.

My weight was up a little but I am going to blame the heat and that I got up in the middle of the night and drank a half a bottle of water.  There is no way I could be up 4 pounds over night.  I started with the water early today.  I would like to get 2L in before time for lunch.

No exercise tonight, I am going to work until my eyes cross.    

weekend update

I had an amazing weekend. The Lion King was breathtaking, I had a blast at the TT crit races, and even the company picnic was tolerable.

Friday was the picnic. The weather was perfect, just barely 80 degrees. It is so funny, we leave the office where we complain about everyone we work with just to go to a park and sit in lawn chairs with the same people. Almost as bad as a junior high dance. When I first started working for the Corps I was the young one and almost everyone had younger kids, I have been here 18 years and the "old" people are leaving, their kids grown. I am one of the "old" people now. There were so many young families around. Circle of life I tell ya

As soon as our new boss left our tent area I left to head home and get ready for Tulsa Tough bike races. I signed up to volunteer with race registration at 5 and by the time I got home, changed, let the dogs out for a little while, and grabbed a quick snack, I was running late. I walked out the door and the lady that lives next door to me intercepts my escape. She went into detail about how her cat had to be put to sleep and to tell me how much she missed Dexter. When I finally got away from her I had to go back inside and fix my makeup because I had cried off the first layer So, on my way downtown I had to stop for gas and had a little binge on chocolate chip cookies and root beer.
I had fun volunteering with my friend Chris and his boyfriend Joey. The comments they made about the guys in spandex had me crying from laughing which was long overdue. We had plenty of time to make sarcastic comments about the couple we volunteered with last year that made me swear I would never volunteer for TT again. They were back of course working payouts just like last year. I just tried to stay the f*ck away from them. My volunteer shift was over just in time to watch the last and most exciting race. It was a great one too with a last minute break away for the win. For the first time in 8 years the same guy took first all three days. It was pretty spectacular to watch. There were a few really bad accidents but nothing serious. Sunday one of the pro women blew a tire coming down the hill and was hurt pretty badly but I haven't heard for sure what the diagnosis was. They were pretty sure she had fractured at least on of her clavicles. I wasn't there to see it live but saw some of it on the live feed and it looked like it could have been a lot worse. She is lucky.



this was the last lap in the men's pro race. It is so cool to hear the bikes go by at 30+ miles and hour.

Sunday was Lion King!! It was so much fun. I was too tired from being out in the sun the last two days to be really excited but that changed as soon as the show started. Goosebumps I tell ya.

I don't think Dennis was too happy that I made him go with me, as you can see. He said he loved it and would go back when it plays again. The only not so great thing about the show was our seats. We had front row seats. Not always the best seats to have at a show but I would rather be there than the balcony. We were on an aisle seat so the parade of animals came right by us. The people in the show looked so happy. I know it is feel good disney show but the smiles they had on their faces were real, not your typical stage smile. You couldn't help but be happy with them.

My plan is to go to the gym tonight and run on the treadmill, just 30 minutes with the galloway app. I plan to get home and change and head to the gym without sitting down and giving myself a chance to get all caught up in my mind. I need to work some OT but I will work an hour longer on Tuesday, Thursday and maybe Friday to make up for not working two hours on my run nights. I just need to get back out there and do it. I am never going to start getting though this black hole of depression without some exercise. If I can find my one piece bathing suit I might go to aqua jogging (the class is at Oral Roberts University pool, no two pieces allowed). I really like that class and I bet I could talk HMF into going with me.

Somehow, despite my binge over the weekend I was 119.8 this morning. I really don't deserve that weight after the junk but I will take it regardless.

the ugly side of WLS

A friend of mine from work had gastric bypass surgery several years ago.  She lost over 200 pounds and has kept it off.  She had problems with her kidneys and had the surgery because she knew she would not qualify for a kidney transplant as obese as she was.  Unfortunately she has suffered severe side effects from the surgery.  She is severely anemic and has to have some heavy duty shots once a month that has to be given at hospital, btw the shots cost upward of $1,000.  Of course her kidneys only got worse and with all the problems she had after the bypass she still doesn't qualify for a transplant.  Two weeks ago she went in to have a simple hernia surgery, of course with her health problems she had to do it inpatient.  I was told that she came back to work last week while I was gone and had gained over 20 pounds in fluids.  We found out Monday that she is back in the hospital in renal failure.  The funny thing about this, she is one of my biggest supporters when it comes to WLS.  She told me if she had it to do all over again she wouldn't have done it but she supports anyone who feels that need to take that step to be healthy.  I really need to go by and see her this weekend.  She is an amazing person and I really hope she is able to come back to work healthy.

Today has been a hard day for me.  I found out earlier today that my friend Kim's dog ran away last weekend, got the gate open somehow.  She wasn't going to tell me but someone asked her about it while she was at my desk.  I understand that not everyone treats their dogs like I do but I kind of felt sorry for the dog.  They left her outside all of time, she was never allowed in the house.  This is the friend that has a 2 year old so I am sure the dog didn't get the attention she deserved and as a border collie/aussie mix, she needed to be challenged and/or entertained or she would get into trouble.  I asked her if she looked on craigslist or facebook and she said that she hadn't.  I told her that I would post something on the Tulsa lost and found if she would send me a picture.  Of course she doesn't have a picture of her (I can't fathom that) and the poor girl didn't have any tags.  In the meantime she looked up the local shelter and found a picture of her on the website.  She had called the shelter everyday for 4 days and they said they didn't have her.  It also said on the site that she had been adopted out.  So Kim called the shelter pissed and starts crying over the phone, the lady at the shelter said just about everything I was thinking.  Of course that makes me cry and pisses me off because she has no idea what it is like to really lose a dog that you love, one that slept with you every night with its head on your shoulder.  Turns out that the people that found her had shaved her hair so the dog she was describing over the phone didn't match the description of the dog they had.  She didn't go to the shelter to look for her either.  I didn't go off on her, just kept the internal dialog to myself.  I know she feels like an idiot in hind site and the lady at the shelter really let her have it. 

Sorry for the rant.

On a positive note my weight is on the way down and I am starting to feel a little more in control of that aspect of my life.  When I weighed at the doctor I was up to 128.8, but that was an afternoon appointment.  This morning I am down to 122.  My first goal was 123, later changed to 112.  I will just be happy when I can wear my rings again. 

Next week, exercise....one step at a time. 

restricted!!

I finally got my band filled again.  He put 2.5cc in to replace the 4 or so he took out.  I am miserable.  Why you ask?  Well I am a rocket surgeon who didn't even think about getting a pretty big fill before I reached for and ate a quarter of a chocolate cherry oatmeal cookie.  I have been in pain and sick ever since.  I tried to go to bed at 10 but literally was up every hour getting sick.  I know I have to be swollen pretty bad so I am sipping on some hot tea and trying to get my stomach to feel normal.  Calling in sick isn't an option right now because of all the OT I am working so I will just have to suck it up.  I am so freaking tired and just threw up the hot tea.  I wonder if it might be some kind of oddly timed stomach bug?  I have never had a problem like this with my band.

My appointment was a 2 yesterday and I made an appointment to see the dentist who put the crown on that broke at 3.  The waiting room was packed but they share it with an eye surgeon so I wasn't that concerned.  About 2:30 I went up and asked how much longer it would be because I had to get my tooth fixed also.  Dr. A's rep came out and said it would be at least 20 more minutes.  I was so mad.  I could have worked an hour longer and saved my sick leave.  I told her I had to leave, I couldn't sit there and wait and risk having to take another few hours of leave to reschedule.  I told her that I can't take off work another day and that I was getting furloughed next month and I wouldn't be able to come in until the but I can't afford to pay $150.  Why don't they call and tell you the doctor is running late?  I was so frustrated.  My weight was 128.8, on my scale this morning it was 122.8

The dentist went pretty smooth.  They had to numb up my left side to get the rest of the crown off.  I felt like a stroke victim.  I got that taken care of, I now have a temporary crown and go back to have the permanent crown put on June 20 at 11:00.  I have never been to the dentist so many times in my life!!  I asked the dentist how much this was going to cost me and they told me it was no cost.  Finally a break!!

I called Dr. A's office back to see if they could get me in and they told me to come back over.  I sat in a room for 15 minutes and Dr. A came in and said he was running late to a meeting and had to be quick.  Seriously.  Then he went over my file asking me questions about depression and stuff.  I was like my dog died less than a month ago in my arms, um, yeah, a little depressed. 

When I went to check out with his nurse she asked me how my dogs were doing and I broke down and cried in the freaking doctor's office.  I swear I have never cried so much in my life, just talking about this is making me tear up.  It might have helped though because the nurse said that if I needed anything and she would make me an under the table deal and won't charge me but she is the only one that can do it so call her directly.

I have an appointment with another counselor today.  This one was referred to me by a vet friend.  She is certified in pet bereavement so I have faith that this won't be a waste of time and money like the last one.  Since I was self pay for my band I never had to do the whole psych eval.  this lady will probably be like "holy shit, you are a train wreck".  Not looking forward to going because I know I will cry like a freaking baby and I forgot to wear waterproof mascara today but I hope it will help.

I need to start running again but it is going to have to wait until I can keep some food down.  I don't even care about it at all right now.  I have a half in St. Louis in October and I really want to beat the 3:00 hour mark so I have to get my increasingly growing ass moving.

This week is going to be busy.  I am going to work 2 hours over tomorrow and Thursday.  Friday is our picnic, I plan to leave early, go home and shower, and head to Tulsa Tough bike races to help with race registration.  Saturday I am going to work from home and Sunday we go see the Lion King.  This will be the first time in a very long time that I haven't been at the race from start to finish or volunteered everyday.  It is going to feel really strange but I have to be a grown up, ick.

TTT at the beach

1.  So technically I am at the beach but the closest I get to it is out of my office window :(,  Working 6am to 6pm kinda sucks and we are way to tired to do anything but eat and go to bed when we are finished for the day.  At least I can sit at "my desk" and watch dolphins play in the Gulf, you can't not smile watching that even if you are exhausted

This is my view, beats the view from my desk in Tulsa!!

2.  I came here with a resolve to eat better and did really well the first morning.  I went to the store on the way in and bought a protein bar and a small container of milk.  As I walked into the building for the first freaking time eating the said protein bar, I freaking BROKE A TOOTH.  How can that even happen?  I just got my implant finished and had x-rays last week!!!  This tooth is the bottom last molar on the same side as my implant.  The back 3/4 of the enamel part of my tooth just broke right off.  I should have freaking gotten a donut.  I am so pissed.  I am the kind of person that can't stand it if a fingernail breaks and is kind of jagged so you can only imagine how much this is aggrevating me.  Yeah I could go to the dentist down here but I really don't want to take off while I am down here doing work for them and the time is limited.  It doesn't really look good and I would lose out on some OT pay.

I called my dentist on Tuesday and told them what happened.  I told them that I can't really take off a lot right now since the furrloughs are going to start next month and I will have to work OT as much as I can.  You can't take leave and work OT in the same week so that is an issue.  I asked them to get me in for their earliest late appointment available, thinking they would get me in at 5.  Nope 2:30 on Tuesday.  There is no way I am going to be able to live with this until then.  I asked the receptionist if they knew of anyone open on Saturday or an emergency dentist, they told me nope not unless you go to one of the corporate dentists like Dental Depot or Aspen Dental but they are, and I quote "right out of school and don't have much experience.  And they work on volume."  Seriously?  I have been going to this dentist for years and they aren't even willing to make a few calls and find someone to help me if they couldn't?  I think I may have to change dentists.  I made an appointment with Dental Depot for 9:00 on Saturday but I may call the oral surgeon that did my implant and see if he knows of someone who could help me.  The more I think about the response I got from my dentist the more pissed off I get.

3.  Food has been ok.  I have been eating pretty much what I want, but it isn't as bad as what it would have been when I was home.  I went to Sam's to get a box of skinny cow bars for my trip and got a box of 2 dozen sugar cookies.  I ate probably a dozen of them on the Monday I left.  The only cookie I have eaten since I have been here came with my kids meal from my favorite burger place in the entire world. 

4.  I am so excited that I get to pack when I go back to the hotel tonight!!  I am ready to go home.  I am so freaking tired of waking up at 4:45.  As a matter of fact I turned my alarm off this morning and slept until 6.  Cassie, a co-worker that I am traveling with called and asked me if I was almost ready.  I got dressed in record time and put my make-up on in the car.  I have been wearing my hair curly because it is so humid.  No way I would have been able to straighten it this morning!!  I feel really bad but we can take a 30 minute lunch and leave at the same time.  No one here really cares.  They have a strong union presence and can pretty much get away with anything when it comes to work hours.  If they get their 80 hours in during the two week pay period they just don't have to come in on Friday.  They can also work up to 24 credit hours each pay period.  I am not sure how that works but they never have to take their leave and can take these month long vacations.  No wonder we are here doing the work they can't get done.

5.  Even though I have gained 20 pounds in the month that I have been an emotional wreck, the Chief here hasn't seen me in a few years and made a comment about how skinny I am.  Isn't that funny?  What gets me is when we worked together on the border fence in 2008 I was a size 10, working out everyday and just starting my running program, doing C25K on a treadmill.  I ate clean and felt great.  Right now I am feeling my body with junk to deal with my emotional breakdown, wear a size 4 (I might be able to get into some size 2s but I am afraid to try) and feel like shit.  I hope that is the motivation I need to get my crap in grear.

6.  I have broken down and drank soda.  I am so tired that I need the caffine.  I don't have any fill yet so I don't think it is a problem in that respect.  I know drinking calories are a huge nono but I am desperate right now.  I just hope that the few that I have drank doesn't get me addicted to caffiene again. 

7.  I finally get a fill on Monday!!!  Time to get serious about the weight loss.  This will force me to make better food choices, or at least limit the amount of crap I can eat.  I am so ready to feel restriction again.  He took out 5.4 cc's  I wonder how much he will put back in?  I know he won't put that much in.

8.  I am going to see another counselor next week.  This one is an actual counselor not a social worker and she is a certified pet bereavement counselor as well.  The last grief counslor I went to was so freaking worthless I came really close to refusing to pay as I left.  I was so mad.

9.  It is almost lunch time!!!  It isn't so much about eating lunch, it is just about getting away from the files and computer for a small break in the long day.

10.  There are a lot of things going on this weekend that I would love to be a part of.  A 5K for the Moore area tornado recovery, the fat guys burger 5K which finishes at the ballpark of our minor league baseball team complete with burgers from fat guys (yummo).  HMF is having a birthday party for her new live in boyfriend, which has turned her into absent friend, complete with meat from the smoker he got for his birthday.  There is a midsummer nights dream thing from the studio that teaches ariel ballet downtown and the mud run.  I probably will not do any of it since I have to go to the dentist that morning and I kind of just want to spend time with my dogs when I get home.  I miss them when I am away.

10a.  I got my hair done before I left. 

You probably can't see it very well since the sun is behind me.  The turquise is amazing.  I can cover it or I can fix it to were the colors show through.  When I wear it curly there is no hiding it but I don't really care.  If I wanted to hide it I wouldn't have had it done.  I have gotten so many complements on it.  I love it.

Thursday

I will attempt to do this TTT style, not sure if I have that many things to talk about....

1.  I am trying really hard to get my eating under control.  It is so hard to do without any fill in my band and the emotional roller coaster that my life has been.

2.  I get to see Dr. A June 3 to get re-filled, thank god.  I am seriously glad I didn't get rid of all my size 4's because the size 2 stuff ain't so comfortable right now.

3.  I am getting tired of people on the national news acting like people from Oklahoma are idiots because we don't all have basements or safe rooms.  Like we don't have sense to come in out of the rain.  Safe rooms are not cheap and trying to retrofit one to an older house is a nightmare.  The chances of getting hit by a tornado is not much more than the chances of being struck by lightening (unless you live in Moore, OK) and to pay 6K for something you may never have to use is out of the budget for most of us.  As far as basements go, the water table in OK is very high and we have clay soil.  The combination causes foundations to crack and if you have a basement it will eventually leak.  Nothing like having an inch of water in the basement.  Sorry I didn't mean to go off. 

4.  I spent all day Tuesday calling around looking for office space to house an emergency operations center in case we get deployed.  There are a lot of generous people out there that are willing to let emergency centers use space for no or very low cost.  Right now the state is doing most of the recovery services (because of our stupid state senators who continuously vote to reduce FEMA funding even though OK is like 3rd in the nation for disasters that qualify...again, sorry).  I hope they do ask us to help out so I can get the opportunity to do something.  Not to mention we could probably do the work cheaper and more efficiently since we do this all the time.

5.  I finally got a tooth!!  I can't stand it.  I got used to having a screw in my gums and a hole there.  The tooth is big and bulky and just feels really strange.  It will take some getting used to.

6.  I am leaving Monday for Galveston to work.  We are going to be working 12 hour days.  I love Galveston but it doesn't sound like I will be able to enjoy it much.  I am kind of irritated that I have to travel on the holiday, even though we aren't leaving until 6pm.  I will be home on Friday at midnight.  For some reason I am not looking forward so much to Memorial Day or the trip to Galveston.  It will be good for me to get away.

7.  I still miss Dexter so much.  I cry everyday when I go home from work and he isn't there to bark at me, and he passed away shortly after I got home from work.  Being gone next week will help.

8.  On that same note I haven't been sleeping well without my little cuddle buddy.  Last night I made Foster cuddle with me.  She isn't nearly as good at it as Dexter was but it did help.  I will have to break her in a little.

9.  I need to start running like a week ago but I just have no energy or ambition right now.  Next week isn't going to be any better working long days.  Normally I look forward to running on the seawall.  Maybe I will be re-energized when I get there, despite the long hours.

10.  I am going to make a pledge now that I will not longer stop at QT and get a chocolate donut and a root beer for breakfast!!  I have done this every day since Dex died.  I know eating something like that for breakfast is wrecking havoc on my blood sugar but I am having a hard time giving a crap right now.  But, I am not going to do that starting now.  I will start the day off healthy and that will make it easier to eat healthy the rest of the day.  Starting with crap just kind of puts me in a fuck it kind of mood the rest of the day.