It’s a few days before Thanksgiving and I am thinking about what I’m thankful for, maybe you can relate. Are you considering what you are thankful for? There’s lots I am thankful for: my amazing circle of friends, my snuggly loving dog Echo, my overall good health, to name the top items. I’m also profoundly … Read more
I told you last week that I started a 3-month journey of weight loss and increased fitness with diabetes. I successfully have logged my food intake for 8 days and I have joined the YWCA Maintain Your Weight program. I have lowered my basal rate by almost 15% and I am keeping my blood sugars … Read more
In May I broke my ankle, which radically altered my plan to ride my bike 100 miles a few weeks later. In fact, it interrupted my general fitness plans. Slowly and surely, my weight has creeped up. Not fun at all. I noticed how bad it had gotten a few weeks ago, when two pairs of my favorite pants no longer fit comfortably. Weight loss with type 1 diabetes is never a very easy problem to tackle.
At the end of the school year last year, I was invited to join the Adolescent 1 (A1) Odyssey trip that headed West starting the 3rd day of school. I agreed to jump on the Odyssey train, not really knowing what I was signing up to do. I love working at Great River School, the Montessori/International Baccalaureate 1st grade through 12th grade school at which I substitute teach and help out in other odd ways. I used to take groups of teenagers on all sorts of overnight adventures, so tent camping for 7 nights with 50 7th and 8th graders didn’t seem like that big of a jump in my experience wheel.
In May 2014, I went to see a shoulder orthopedic surgeon because of suffering more than 6 months with some terrible shoulder pain. It had come on suddenly and kept getting worse as the months went by. The physician took some x-rays and basically, because of having type 1 diabetes she diagnosed me with frozen shoulder. She sent me to physical therapy.
It is easy to get caught in the negative cycle of describing and feeling a difficult problem you have. With my diabetes, I spent years telling stories of how hopeless it was for me to avoid low blood sugars when exercising. I described, and over-described how awful it was to witness my father, who had … Read more
Saturday, June 4th was intended to be the day that I rode my bike 100 miles alongside a few of my friends at the Tour de Cure Twin Cities. I’d trained for 16 weeks and then, when I was out walking my dog as I explained in my last blog; I fell and broke my ankle. No bike ride for me on June 4th, not with my leg in the air boot.
On Monday, May 16th I was walking my dear dog Echo. We were on a perfectly flat sidewalk. The weather was perfect. Echo was not pulling. I was wearing new boots that I had never walked very far in before. These boots have rubber soles. I think what happened is the rubber caught on the cement of the sidewalk, and caused me to trip and wobble. So badly, I fell hard to my left. As I fell, I relaxed as I learned years ago from my cycling coach. Nonetheless, as I hit the ground I heard a very loud snap.
No doubt about it, if you get an injury and your movement and mobility are hampered, it sucks. Big time. Has it ever happened to you? Much to my chagrin, I’ve suffered a few injuries in recent years that have impacted my endurance sport abilities. Injury Number 1: my right shoulder. Initially it was suspected … Read more
I’m more than half Irish, as my father and mother are both more than half Irish. Yup, I’ve had lots of relatives long past take a big boat across the ocean and make their way to the new land of America. I’ve never yet traveled back to the island where they all came from, but … Read more