Fat vs. Lean

Jack Sprat could eat no fat
His wife could eat no lean
And so betwixt the two of them
They licked the platter clean

Jack ate all the lean,
Joan ate all the fat.
The bone they picked it clean,
Then gave it to the cat

Jack Sprat was wheeling,
His wife by the ditch.
The barrow turned over,
And in she did pitch.

Says Jack, "She'll be drowned!"
But Joan did reply,
"I don't think I shall,
For the ditch is quite dry.".

To figure out if we were fat or not, we used to stand on a scale and slide the bars over. Sometimes we even paid a nickel to have our fortune told with our weight. Then we would let someone guess at a county fair... Doctors made it more complicated and would measure rolls of fat with calipers and give you a stern lecture on eating salads.

Then the Atkins Diet, Grapefruit Diet, and any number of diet fads. After that along came the Body Mass Index and home scales that would tell you how much fat you have. It got complicated. We got confused. Eat vegetables, no fruit, no whole grains, skip red meat, no eat some red meat, follow the food pyramid, they changed the food pyramid, again. We have a country full of confused people and they wonder why we are obese.

But wait there's more. Now they say skip the BMI and pay attention to your percent of body fat. But the best thing is to figure out your waist to hip ratio:

'Or, since abdominal fat is more hazardous, simply take a tape measure around the widest part of the abdomen and another at the hips and calculate the waist-to-hip ratio. For men it should be no higher than 0.90, and for women no higher than 0.83.'

So do I skip weighing myself and find a tape measure or do I ignore them all and have ice cream for dessert as I contemplate just how confused I am?

Its nice to knowI'm not the only one

Recently I have written (or blabbed or bored you) about clinical trials and the drug approval process and how (un)happy I am with it at times where they approve drugs and then withdraw them. Well, it turns out, I am not the only one. There was an article this morning where a doctor at Children's Hospital in Boston discusses possible flaws in the drug approval process. But she also has some plausible solutions for changing the process - and says we aren't there yet. So I'll go on with my fingers crossed that nothing I take will be recalled.

But its Monday morning and I have my forgotten radiation oncologist follow up first thing. Somehow I will be incredibly busy in the next two weeks. Why do I do these things to myself? I have four doctor appointments, two meetings, two big work deadlines, and have to go to work as well. When am I supposed to have fun?

Paying the price

Today I am paying the price. Yesterday I had fun. I got together with a college friend. She runs half marathons and I don't so she is probably in better shape than I but that, of course, didn't stop me. I went to visit her yesterday. She went for a run before I got there so she should have been tired.

We hung out on the rocks behind her house on the lake. Then we went for a little hike - 3-4 miles through the woods and got caught up on marriages and old friends. After a brief shopping stop, we decided to cool off by floating around her lake on tubes. After successfully flipping from my back to my stomach on the tube and staying dry, I was over confident and assumed I could handle tubing. I erroneously attempted to navigate off the tube and onto the rocks. On my first try, I stayed mostly on the tube but did not get onto the rocks. But of course did not stay on the tube and ended up in the lake with the tube upside down over my head. I did make it on to the rocks eventually but my tube floated away - but conveniently floated over to the beach which was our final destination.

I swam ashore after my tube. Upon successfully retrieving it, I attempted to sit on it while standing in water less than a foot deep. I ended up in the water with the tube floating away - again. I retrieved it. My friend got to laugh at me twice in one day.

I do admit to being tired after all that but decided I should just drive home. By the time I got home, I was wiped out and spent the evening sitting - this meant my husband cooked dinner and cleaned up. I didn't sleep well again last night. Today so far, my back hurts. I am exhausted. I don't have many plans for the day. In fact, my plans include the living room couch, the DVR, and my laptop. I think we will go for a walk as well but it won't be very long.

I think my blog is boring lately. I was going to write something more profound, scintillating maybe, intellectual possibly, or just plain interesting but am too tired. I need to rest up for my doctor appointment tomorrow morning.

All the fun out of life

So after cancer, life goes on and you return to a new normal - you can never go back to being normal, your are now a zebra. After chemo, your system once again appreciates food, your hair returns, and life goes on. And now they say if you drink, you are more likely to have your breast cancer return.

What if life is a tiny bit more stressful than it was in the past and you appreciate that dinner glass of wine a bit more. But now you can't have it. Here's the choice: (A)don't have wine and feel more stressed because your cancer might return or (B)have wine and feel less stressed because you are slightly relaxed about if your cancer will return. Do you want A or B? (Actually, how about (C) have no cancer in the first place?) They are taking all the fun out of life.

Anyway today I am off to visit a college friend. (I was going to say an old friend but we aren't old.) She and her husband live on a lake. I said I can't kayak or canoe but she offered to tow me with her kayak while I float in an inner tube. That could be quite enjoyable.

Actually today my back is not happy. I woke up in the middle of the night and then I tried lying on my side to get back to sleep and ended up in excruciating pain... But I have drugs and will still be able to float.

How does this work?

The latest medical recall has Johnson & Johnson recalling hip implants. So, if you got one of those and its recalled, how are you supposed to send it back? Do you have surgery to take it out and get a new one?

This is the same thing when they recall medical stents - how do you take it back to the dealer and get a new one? Or do you just walk around with a little time bomb inside you that isn't going to work as expected? I mean if you have a Toyota, you take your car back to the dealer and they fix what was wrong. I don't mean to pick on Toyota but they seem to have recalls weekly - I guess that QA got overlooked there for a bit.

I simplified the salmonella egg problem in our house. I ditched the last of the store bought eggs and bought some from the local farm stand which raises their eggs there. I avoided the tylenol recalls by buying the safe store brands. But if you had a hip replacement, how do you give it back?

I don't know. None of these recalls makes me feel particularly safe and comfy. It goes back to the question should we all be living in a cave somewhere so we can be safe?

I am not sure how this happened

I forgot about my upcoming radiation oncologist appointment. I mean I knew it was coming but thought it was a few more weeks away. I thought I had more time before worrying about it. You can't visit an oncologist without worrying. You know you are in trouble when you make that first oncologist appointment.

I actually have two oncologists - one radiation and one medical (chemo) oncologist. I'll see my medical oncologist in a few weeks. This is my annual follow up with my radiation oncologist. I think I see her for five years or so after treatment ended to make sure there are not any long term side effects. She is a very nice Russian woman with a long hard to pronounce name so she is called Dr. G by most people. We often compare shoes in addition to talk about how I am doing. But how did I forget about this?

1. Maybe I am less stressed by the cancer business than in the past. Well that is an option and partly may be the cause.
2. I have no brain and just completely forgot about it. This is a definite option.
3. I was ignoring it and thought I had weeks to go. This is definitely part of this as well.

I am going for mostly 2 with a little bit of 1 and 3 in the mix. But now I have to get my little list of questions for her together. Basically it will be a bit of an exam followed by lots of questions. I need to bring her up to date on my other issues - include my lovely, ongoing thyroid adventures (that I am definitely ignoring).

Well today the rain has finally stopped and I am very optimistic that my garden will burst into bloom. We barely had rain for 2.5 months - one night of showers since early June - and my dahlias are very late with other flowers gone dormant for a while. But three days and more than five inches of rain later, it has turned green all over again. I am not able to stay home until my flowers bloom but must go to work all day.

I can if I want to

I have a transportation dilemma. I live on the border of two towns. It is just over two miles west to the next town's center and just about two miles east to my town's center. It is relatively flat to both towns. Both towns have libraries, banks, farmers markets, grocery stores, and other necessary stops in life. 90% of my life is contained between these two points. I have many transportation options.

I can drive. I consider myself lazy to drive to one town center or the other for one thing and make an effort to combine trips. Many of my trips don't even require me to go as far as 2 miles so its kind of stupid.

I can take a bus. There is one approximately every 5-10 minutes to my town and once an hour to the next town. Its relatively cheap but it involves standing around and waiting. I usually am too impatient to wait. But on a rainy day, it can be much better than walking.

I can walk. I often do. In fact there is a multi-use bike path parallel to the main road which I can walk on. But then I have to carry things.

I can't bike. My back does not allow me to bike. I have given my niece my bike. I really liked my bike (it was fuschia and mine for nearly 15 years) but with my back issues I can't bike so I gave it up.

I could roller blade but I have a feeling my back would not like it. And then you have to carry a pair of shoes to switch to in stores and other places. How to carry things home?

I could get a motorized scooter. But road traffic is busy and they are relatively expensive, not necessarily green, and may require a motorcycle driver's license which would be a hassle to get. Motorized vehicles are not allowed on the bike path.

I need options. My latest thought (and feel free to disagree - my husband thinks I'm nuts) is a kick scooter. I could use it on the bike path. It would get me places quicker than walking. I could fold it up and lock it at a bike rack, run my errands, hop on and head home. Yes I would have to carry things as if I was walking but I would be vertical for a shorter period of time which helps my back. If I got rained on, I could hop on the bus. It would be green. It would be easy to store.

The problem is what if I buy it and then my back really hates it? I have to ponder that. But I can if I want to.