Time To Roll Into August - I took this photo last Sunday while Jerry was driving down highway 50 at about 55 miles per hour.
I can honestly say I've had probably the worst July ever. Maybe even the worst month ever. Colitis and the pain it causes sucked the life out of me. I quit going in the swimming pool because it hurt too much and took to much energy to crawl over the ladder. My horse probably forgot who I am. I've been doing the absolute bare minimum for about three weeks.
Needless to say there were almost no workouts - the last was a leg day on Wednesday July 9th before I went into this tail spin. I've done three separate 24 hour fasts to help rest my colon and give it a chance to heal. I'm holding steady at 118 pounds, but my body fat is up to 24 percent. I've probably lost a little muscle and gained a little fat. Nothing I can't correct when I'm better.
On the up side, I'm reading a lot of books and magazines.
And I am better with less pain. Unfortunately last night and this morning another issue arose. I take a multi-vitamin but haven't been eating fruits, vegetables, grains, nuts, milk, etc per the colitis diet. My big gaff was skipping the potatoes as of late. Not enough potassium, kids. A really bad move in hot weather.
I woke up at 2:30 AM to go to the bathroom and the room was spinning. Although we've been keeping the bedroom air conditioner on low overnight, we've both been waking up sweaty. When I crawled back in bed this continued and I had a rapid pulse. My danged heart felt like it was in my ear. I fell back to sleep then had a repeat episode at 5:30 AM and when I got up at 8 AM.
I had a pretty good idea what it was. As soon as I could stand up without being dizzy I made French fries with breakfast and took 4 of Jerry's potassium tablets (each is 3% of the daily requirement). I'm getting a little woozy and I'm going to make more. Seems my diet is dismally low on potassium lately and I'm sweating out all my electrolytes and not replacing some. I had a similar episode about a year ago only then I was iron depleted.
Foods Rich In Potassium (I'm only allowed one on this list - Potatoes - on this phase of the Colitis Diet. The rest on the list have fructose, lactose, or are high fiber).
In other news, my 6 year old washing machine died Saturday night. Hardly a day would pass she didn't get used. Luckily by Sunday afternoon I had a new one.
Our other big thing has been hay cubes. Our regular source, who sold by the ton, has raised prices - from $95 to $115 - and now doesn't answer her phone. We know other people are having the same problem as the local feed stores only carry 50 pound bags at $15 each. Well my 17 hand thoroughbred can go through three bags a week. while a ton lasted about 8 weeks. That's a lot of cubes and moola.
I put an ad on Kijiji.com for a hay cube source and several people pointed us to a place in Lockwood over near Sparks. The prices are incredible at $5.50 per 50 pound bag and they sell by the ton. We're driving over Saturday morning and getting a truck load.
We were watching yet another news story on the home foreclosures crisis last night. Jerry turned to me and said "Thank God our big problems are finding hay cubes and replacing washers in 90 degree weather. Thanks again, Hon." Since this whole bad economy slash foreclosure slash high gas and grocery prices mess he's thanked me repeatedly. Back in 1999 and 2000 we paid off our property and ditched credit cards and all other forms of credit. Now we buy only what we can pay for outright. While we have sympathy for everyone who's struggling and losing their houses we can't help but feel blessed we made that decision to be mortgage and debt free.
Hope you all have a happy weekend and roll into August problem free and healthy.
