Daily Journal #15: My Numbers Are Better. My Head Isn’t There Yet.

My morning health checks are continuing to trend in the right direction.

Finally.

My weight has stabilized and I’ve even lost a little more. I’m still working toward my goal of 225 pounds by April 2027, so I’ll happily take a loss when it’s the kind I’m actually trying to achieve.

My blood pressure was normal this morning.

My body-water percentage was unchanged from yesterday.

And maybe most importantly after what I’ve been watching over the last few days:

No swelling in my feet today.

Weight stable.

Blood pressure good.

Body water stable.

No swelling.

All of those signs tell me that I’m pretty much back to my version of “normal.”

Physically, that’s great news.

Mentally?

That’s a little more complicated.

Now I Have to Convince Myself It’s Okay to Eat and Drink

After watching my weight climb and seeing the swelling in my feet, I became extremely cautious about what I was eating and drinking.

Maybe too cautious.

Truth be told, I didn’t eat or drink normally yesterday.

I drank because I know my kidneys need hydration.

I ate because I know I need enough food to keep my blood sugar from dropping.

But I can’t say I was comfortable doing either one.

That’s something I’m still working on.

Logically, I understand that my body needs food and fluid.

Emotionally, there’s another voice saying:

Remember what happens when this goes wrong.

Because the thing I really want to avoid is another hospitalization.

I Really Hate Hospitals

I don’t just dislike being hospitalized.

I hate it.

It’s incredibly difficult for me to stay positive when I’m in the hospital.

Part of that is everything that comes with being sick enough to be there in the first place.

But there’s something else.

I’m kind of a germ freak.

Okay…

I’m definitely a germ freak.

I practiced social distancing before COVID made it fashionable.

When I was working, I’d walk around with Lysol wipes cleaning things.

Door knobs.

Conference tables.

Chairs.

Elevator buttons.

Handrails.

Basically, if another human being had touched it, there was a decent chance I was coming behind them with a disinfecting wipe.

A little insane?

Probably.

But I rarely got sick.

So you can probably imagine how I feel about hospitals.

They’re full of sick people.

There are germs everywhere.

There are diseases I didn’t even know existed until somebody put me in a room next to one.

That part of being hospitalized genuinely freaks me out.

And unfortunately, I have a pretty good reason for feeling that way.

Then There Was C. Diff

After one of my hospital stays, I ended up back home only to develop C. diff shortly afterward.

At that point in my life, I was barely leaving the house because of everything else going on with my health.

Where exactly I picked it up isn’t something I can prove, but the timing certainly made that hospital stay stand out in my mind.

If you’ve never experienced C. diff…

Consider yourself lucky.

It was awful.

It even threatened to interfere with the timing of my heart procedure.

At the time, there was absolutely nothing funny about it.

Now?

Well…

Enough time has passed that I can find some humor in the experience.

That might eventually become a Living With It article.

Although I’m not entirely sure the internet is ready for that one.

So Yeah, I’m Afraid of Going Back

All of that helps explain why a couple pounds of weight gain and some swelling can mess with my head.

It’s not simply:

Oh, my weight went up.

My brain immediately starts working its way down the road:

Weight gain.

Fluid retention.

Heart failure.

Diuretics.

Is it getting worse?

Do I need to call somebody?

Am I going back to the hospital?

That’s what I’m trying to get better at managing.

My morning health checks are supposed to give me information.

They’re supposed to help me make informed decisions and recognize trends.

I don’t want them to become something that makes me afraid to eat.

There’s a balance there that I haven’t completely figured out yet.

Meanwhile, Welcome to August in Southwest Florida

Life itself has been pretty boring lately.

It’s August in Southwest Florida.

Which basically means:

It’s hot.

Really hot.

And I’ve been trying to stay out of it.

I’ve had several episodes recently where I’ve become extremely lightheaded and started sweating profusely, particularly with exertion and heat.

One of them happened while I was simply cooking on the grill.

I wasn’t running a marathon.

I wasn’t doing yard work.

I was making dinner.

Suddenly, I became so lightheaded that I genuinely thought I might face-plant.

When that happens, I’m done.

I sit down.

I cool off.

And it can take about 20 minutes before I start feeling normal again.

That’s something I’m already working with my doctors to understand.

Until we have better answers, I’m not going to prove how tough I am by standing outside in the Florida heat.

The grill will survive without me.

❤️ Greg’s Take

Physically, today was a good morning.

Actually, it was probably exactly what I wanted to see.

My weight has stabilized.

My blood pressure looks good.

My body-water percentage isn’t climbing.

And the swelling in my feet is gone.

That’s a win.

Now I have to work on the other part.

Trusting my body enough to eat.

Trusting myself enough to drink what I’m supposed to drink.

And using my morning health checks as information rather than letting every change scare me into thinking I’m headed back to the hospital.

That’s easier said than done.

I’ve had enough hospital stays that avoiding another one has become a pretty powerful motivator.

Sometimes maybe too powerful.

But that’s part of living with all of this too.

Not every recovery happens on a scale.

Sometimes the numbers return to normal before your head does.

Today, my numbers look pretty good.

Now I need to work on catching up with them.

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