Weekly update, 1/13/09

Sorry to not have been around much, either here or in the comments on anyone's blog. I have been reading, but whew! It's been a wringer of a week, although it started pretty well. On Wednesday, my parents called: my mom was having heart trouble; on Thursday she was admitted to the hospital. She's been living with a prolapsed mitral valve (in which one of the valves does not function properly and leaks a little), but she and her doctor were managing it alright. But then it started leaking a lot, and then her heart went into atrial fibrillation, which is when the beat gets really irregular, and then she started developing other symptoms (basically, congestive heart failure was happening). The good news is that they got her stabilized and that they can repair or replace the valve, and chances are good that they can surgically correct the atrial fibrillation. She'll get to go home to wait until next Tuesday for the surgery.

It's times like this that I wish they didn't live a 5-hour drive away. (On the bright side, it's a *drive* and not a *flight*.) I drove down on Saturday and was planning to stay until everything was done, but they ended up rescheduling the surgery. So I'll be going home, then back here again. It's hard on all of us.

Part of my coping strategy was to at least try and keep things as on track as possible, which is why I'm bothering to post at all. I've been doing pretty well on the food front, making good choices. (That's been easy...my step-dad has not been wanting to eat much at all, and they don't eat as many meals as I do, so I planned and brought lots of diabetes-friendly meal bars. The hospital cafeteria food was surprisingly good, too.) I did fair on the fitness front...in this situation, I've found it easier to mind the eating than to get in all the workouts. I'll have to analyze and figure out what I can do to plan better for next week. I did bring my weights and my workout video and my running shoes and my swimsuit. I got about 10 minutes of video, and I'm hoping to get in a swim tomorrow morning, and I did about a half hour of mild walking yesterday since I knew I might miss out today. (I had dearly hoped for a swim, but it didn't work out.)

I did do the BodyPump class at the gym last week, and it was a blast! I'm planning to do this week's class, now that I know I'll be back home.

Progress last week:
7-day blood glucose average goal and fasting numbers:
7-day average was 98;
7-day fasting average was 98, with 100% of numbers below 120. (met goals)
UPDATE: Lab results in: my a1c is now 5.7%, and cholesterol numbers are looking good, too!!! (<6% is normal; that is, what people without diabetes have. No, this does not mean I'm "cured"--there is no cure for diabetes--but it means I'm managing it well. Being below 6% was my goal; like maintaining a weight loss, I need to work at maintaining my a1c.)
Weight goal: -2 pounds (met goal of maintain or lose)
Food goals: 9 meatless, low-fat meals and 2 fish meals. (met both goals; hurray for *good* cafeteria food and meal bars!)
Exercise goals: I got 4/5 cardio--my runs and a stationary bike--so met the goal of 3 runs, but missed cardio by 1 days. I did a brisk half-hour walk Sunday, because I knew Monday would be a wash. Also did a 10 minute kickboxing workout video on Saturday. Sadly, only one strength training day, but it *was* BodyPump class and it kicked my posterior. And my quads. Arms and abs felt pretty good. So I now know that I really should be working upper and lower body, not just upper.
Misc. goals: Sleep? Ah ha ha hahahahaha! (Actually, I did track bed times. Got to bed no later than 11 p.m. all nights except last night. Guess why?)

Goals for this week:
Stay on track better with the tracking, even when out of town. There was plenty of downtime for writing stuff down on the log.
7-day blood glucose average goal and fasting numbers: below 120.
Weight goal: Maintain or lose.
Food goals: 4 or more meatless, low-fat meals and 2 or more fish meals. Lighter eating if dinner is after 7 p.m.
Exercise goals (modified for the next 2 weeks): At least 30 minutes of cardio or activity 5 days; 2 days of arms & abs strength training workouts; do at least 2 runs, weather permitting (Weather-permitting=not raining and temperature over 40 degrees). I'm going to try that BodyPump class again on Wednesday; I really liked it a lot. (Would likely not have taken the Friday class last Friday, since I was rather sore in the legs from Wednesday.)
Misc. goals: 7 or more hours sleep/night.