P90 Bootcamp = Regaining Life

Year 2, Month 4:

So for the past 49 days or so, I have been working out, six days a week, alternating strengthening workouts with cardiac workouts.

I have Tony Horton and the Power90 video series to thank for it.  But first, before you get any ideas that I am one of those "success stories" floating around on the internet with a rock solid body, let me tell you that I AM NOT!

I am not an athletic person by nature.  I am a couch potato, perfectly content to sit on the bed or the couch with my laptop where it belongs -- on my lap.  That is most of my life.

But, being that my life has taken some very bizarre twists and turns over the past three years, I decided that I needed to make getting healthy my priority again.

So here I am, halfway through the P90 Bootcamp workout series:

Yep, that's me!  Proof that someone my age can still get a good workout!  Of course, it doesn't take much to be a workout for me.  All I have to do at my age, is go outside and deadhead the roses for an hour or so and I'm pooped.  After all, I'm the one who gets ready for bed at 8:30, and am happy as a clam to just lay in bed and read a book until I am so sleepy I can't focus anymore.

Lately, however, my night-time book reading has centered around text books:  Nursing books, Anatomy & Physiology, etc.  Not the best entertainment, but a necessity.  I am, after all, a college student once again.

Once you see this video, you will notice that there is still quite a bit of -- shall-we-say, "jiggling" going on.  I wasn't doing the P90 workouts to lose weight.  I was doing them to get in shape.

Suffice it to say, I have decided it is time to start watching what I eat again, also.  Time to cut out the junk and focus on something better -- more whole foods, fruits and vegetables.

Step by step, I am regaining my life. 

Now if I could only find answers to the constant heart palpitations.  Stay tuned for more research!!

Week 25 Recap: An Unremarkable Week

Week 25 was a very busy week, but I made sure I remembered to use the proper bioidentical hormone creams twice daily as I attempted to see if there would be any changes in the trembling I had been experiencing most notably during the night. I started with progesterone cream and would continue with this for a couple weeks and then stop for a week before starting estrogen cream.

Early in the week I noted that my heart doesn’t seem to like it when I lay down in certain positions, such as directly on my left side. It often feels as though it loses its pumping efficiency and I find myself changing positions so that I can breathe easier. I found that if I lay at an angle (not directly on either side, but leaning forward or back), breathing becomes more comfortable.

The trembling I had experienced over the past several weeks had died down somewhat during the first part of the week and so I thought maybe the progesterone cream was working, but the trembling reoccurred in the chest area about midweek, though it was relatively minor.

My exercise routine actually seemed to get easy enough for me to kick it up a notch and walk a bit faster at about 4 mph. This lasted for several days, but by the end of the week it felt like more of a challenge again. During one session on the Pilates Reformer I felt some mild heart fluttering and so took it easy during that session. That was the only time something like that happened during the week. Exercise totals included 90 minutes strength-training and 15.5 miles on the treadmill.

Overall, it was not a remarkable week and contained all the usual stresses of life.  In spite of the days I didn't feel like exercising or was too stressed, I continued to keep it up even if it was at a minimum.  I'm not ready to give up yet.  It ain't over!

Week 15 Recap: Still Learning

Did you know that most Yoplait Lite yogurts contain aspartame? I had been so busy looking for “GLUTEN FREE” on the labels I failed to notice the aspartame listed in the ingredients. I don’t react every time to aspartame, but suspect I am more sensitive to it now, than in the past.

I think I accidentally glutened myself over Easter weekend… one of those things that in retrospect I ask myself “What was I thinking?” I used distilled white vinegar in a recipe and think that may have done it. As to whether vinegar is safe or not, is debatable.

According to Gluten Free: The Celiac Site:

“Distilled vinegar (or white vinegar) has been listed as unsafe for people with celiac disease by the major organizations in the United States, but not by organizations in any other countries. This position changed in 2001. The Gluten Intolerance Group® and the Celiac Disease Foundation now state that all vinegar (except malt vinegar) is safe for people with celiac disease to consume. The American Dietetic Association has also stated…that distilled vinegar is gluten free.”

While according to Celiac.com and the Celiac Sprue Association (CSA):

“Distilled vinegar, however, is still on the CSAs ‘Low Gluten Items to Avoid List.’ The CSA still maintains that distilled vinegar and alcohol are ‘questionable,’ even if there is no detectable gluten/gliadin in them, and even though the Gluten Intolerance Group (GIG), Celiac Disease Foundation (CDF) and the new guidelines from the American Dietetic Association (ADA) all include them on their safe lists . The CSA urges celiacs to ascertain the source of any questionable ingredients from their manufacturers.”

I may have been reacting to something else, such as Hershey’s Kisses, but it sure felt like a gluten stomach-ache! Do achy joints have anything to do with being glutened?

The results to my EGD (endoscopy) last week came in, and both biopsies of the stomach and small intestine were normal. Yay! The doctor did not expect to find anything relating to celiac due to the time I’ve spent gluten-free (three months now), but there was also no sign of GERD (gastroesophageal reflux disease). This does not mean I don’t have reflux, it just means it hasn’t advanced to the stage of disease—so I guess I have caught it early enough, which is a good thing!

Besides waking up in the wee hours of the morning every single day and not getting enough sleep, the week was not a bad week. In fact, my treadmill walks were the best ever, feeling almost completely normal! For the first time in about eight weeks, my heart was feeling stronger and stronger—almost as if it has healed. I hope that is the case.

ODD THINGS THIS WEEK:

• A little pain to the left of my sternum, off and on for a couple of days.
• Minor left subclavian pain, off and on all week.
• Tingling tongue, and upper lip, also!
• Strange hives on my knuckles during the week.
• Minor right subclavian pain for about three days.
• Weirds pangs under mandible again.
• Fluttery sensations in chest from time to time, particularly when not feeling well.

“Physical Therapy” totals for the week include 55 minutes of Pilates, 60 minutes of weight-bearing exercises, and 18.309 miles walked.

It is ironic that the more I learn about celiac disease and how my body reacts to gluten, the less I realize I know about celiac and my body!  I am still learning, but it is a good learning.  Because I can be somewhat stubborn and hard-headed, it may take a couple of times to get through my head, but getting through my head it is-- and hopefully sooner than later-- I will finally reach the "Level Two" step (Step 1 = Beginning self-management and Foundation; Step 2 = Intermediate self-management and Expansion; Step 3 = Advanced level self-management and Maintenance) (Celiac Sprue Assocation).

This second step of "rehabilitation" includes (CSA):

• Establishing an individual treatment plan
• Keeping a daily diary and recording all intake, amounts, and reactions
• Identifying and eliminating immune-response triggers
• Waiting 2-4 weeks before reintroducing new or questionable items.
• Expanding knowledge of CD/DH

 Just when I think I have reached Level Two, I end up back in Level One, still trying to figure it all out.  15 weeks and still learning...

Week 7: G-Free Recap

The week didn’t start out terribly bad— I knew I was still recovering from a cold and each day I seemed a little better. I was still feeling some faint heart palpitations, particularly in the afternoons (must be when I’m getting tired or something), but at least the sneezing and coughing was going away. I took my newly prescribed Vitamin D (50,000 IUs) on Sunday, 3 days after the first dose.

I continued to increase my time on the treadmill-- two walks a day, plus a 20 minute Pilates workout to rebuild my strength, and 10 minutes of weight bearing exercises using a Pilates machine. I was still getting heart palpitations several minutes into my treadmill walks, and began wondering which would be better: shorter time on the treadmill but a faster pace? Or a longer time with a slower pace? Which method would be more beneficial to strengthening my heart (more about this later)?

Additionally, I was still feeling some congestion or fullness in my upper left chest that sometimes spread into the left side of my neck and my left armpit. I wondered again—why is it always my left side? Still no answers.

I took my third prescribed Vitamin D dose on Wednesday, two days after my last dose because I am supposed to take it twice a week. I figured Wednesdays and Sundays were just as good days as any, right? Within a couple hours of taking the Vitamin D, however, I began to feel nauseous. What had started out as a pretty good day went downhill quite rapidly. Within a couple more hours, a few random hives started popping up here and there. I made no connection to the vitamin, yet, because I had no reaction to it last week.

My back started aching on the same day, and I was beginning to feel flu-like. The last two times I experienced nausea and a back ache, I had a kidney infection. AGAIN??? I didn’t sleep a wink the entire night, and by the next day, I was even more nauseous, couldn’t eat, and for the first time since going gluten-free, felt distended and constipated. I tried my treadmill routine in the morning, but by the time I finished I felt like I was about to go into shock—cold and clammy, lightheaded and queasy. My heart was feeling very weak, and whenever I laid down to rest, I felt like I could very easily stop breathing-- my heart would jump back into action again.... very weird, and I lack the literary skills to put it into proper words.

I managed to get in to see my doctor that afternoon —the only medical professional I’ve seen all this time that I actually trust. My back pain was not in the right place to be a kidney concern, so that was good news to me. He offered a beta blocker for the palpitations, which I turned down because I don’t want anything messing with my heart as it is —and he offered a regular prescription of clonazepam for anxiety and to help me rest (which I also declined—for now). He decided that I may be reacting to the Vitamin D, in which side effects listed everything I was going through. Stop the vitamin for a week, try it again, and see what happens. Sounded like a plan to me!

I continued to develop a couple of random hives that night, and my stomach began to hurt just as if I had been gluten-ized!! And yet, I hadn’t eaten anything that I was aware of that could have caused a gluten reaction!  I wondered if the vitamin had gluten, but I had been assured by the pharmacist that it did not.

The next day, my stomach was very sore. I felt like I had been run over by a truck —the last time I felt that bad was when I first decided to go gluten-free back in December and see if it helped. I still felt queasy, but not enough to give up my treadmill walks —getting my heart stronger is my first priority.

My doctor had suggested a target heart rate of around 160, and so I walked 30 minutes, twice a day, for the rest of the week, keeping my heart rate at or below (and sometimes a little above) that target heart rate. Following that pattern for the rest of the week all but eliminated the heart palpitations. They gradually stopped happening during my walks, and have hardly happened since then at all!

The only drawback to the two 30-minute walks is something new for me: sore hips —whether it is related to my osteopenia, I don’t know —because my back has been very sore, and my injured left ring finger decided to flare up again also —but, I don’t think it is related —at least I hope not. I think my hip flexors just need to get used to walking for an hour a day.

My new question: Did I react to the Vitamin D because there was only two days between the last dose (and three days between the first two)? In other words, should I wait three days between each Vitamin D dose?  Or still go three days and two days?