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Showing posts with the label health and fitness

True Story©... 24 Hours To Live!

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       What would you do if you were told you had 24 hours to live? Since my cardiac event that landed me in the hospital Summer 2018, I have been dealing with a minefield of doctor and specialists visits usually about every other month. Since the exact cause of my episode could never be pinned down, we keep an eye on everything from my blood pressure, to my asthma and even my kidneys. No stone gets left unturned and, when combined with my recent obsession with sobriety and my physique, shit works out pretty well on a month-to-month basis. Three weeks ago, I got a phone call… Me: “Hello.” Nurse: “Hi, this is your nurse from Dr Samuel’s office.” Me: “Okay” Nurse: “Dr Samuel is going on vacation next week and wants to get you in as soon as possible. You have 24 hours to give blood at the lab so he can review it before he leaves.” Did she say what I think she said!?   Me: “I have–… 24–… hours?” Nurse: “Yes” Me: “Well I guess I got no choice, lemme make some arrangements and deal wi

True Story©… Mighty Moe Phitness

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       I know it feels like I talk about this a lot lately, but by the time the two of you read this, I will be within 20 ounces of the lowest I have weighed since I discovered food and alcohol as a combination. Even that low-water mark was the result of a bad accident that led to a broken jaw and me off of solid foods for eight weeks in 2003.      Covid season created a world wherein I was ABSOLUTELY not social outside of what could be attained from my phone or one of my computers. I was work/eat/sleep/work/drink/sleep/work, week in and week out and the weight that had been yo-yo’ing between 245 and 270 was firmly at 265. I felt like shit and decided to do something about it. July 2022, I decided to take out the running shoes I’d already acquired and hit the pavement. Three weeks later, I ended my (then-) 26-year relationship with alcohol. The first few pounds slid right off no problem. Nothing noticeable, not on a “go buy new clothes” level, but the scale was telling it for

True Story©… Watching The Neighborhood

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  Most of the time, I mind my own damned business.  Sure, my eyes are open and my head is on a swivel as I walk around my neighborhood three times a day but that is more for loose dogs and (now) kidnappers. I have learned here recently as this past Monday that my neighbors are watching or noticing me as I walk about.  There is the family on the corner that adopted a little dog named Duke.  His hair is similar to Shaggy Thunder, so they asked who my groomer was.  There are the kids that catch the bus oddly late and the lady with two dogs who is always interested in how my miles I clock a day. Those people are normal, as in I see them daily, sometimes multiple times.  Otherwise, though, there are other neighbors that I have NEVER seen outside in over two years now.  Yes, I know they come and go because I do notice cars in and out of driveways but I never see PEOPLE coming and going. … until last Thursday. Down at the bottom of the hill as I was coming back up my last three blocks

True Story©… Old Bamma Care

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       I once said “I’on know who’s big mama need to hear this, but Ginger Ale is just soda.” I was immediately jumped by six nonagenarian grandmothers with canes.   I legit did not learn my lesson about THINKING such things, only about saying them aloud.      So I got to thinking…   How many more of those “remedies” they gave us in the 80s that didn’t actually cure shit, so much as made us just a little bit more comfortable until our honestly-pretty-damned-effective immune systems circled up the wagons and handled business as designed?   The Google search sent me down an internet rabbit hole which I found both intriguing and re-traumtizing, I will talk to my therapist about that part next week…      It also gave me an idea… Remember, back in Soft Eyes , when I explained just how much you could get away with just on the strength of the fact that people don’t pay attention to shit?   Well we’re back on that!      I had to put a plan in action and that plan clearly required some

True Story©... Back To Life

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     I tried some major cash grabs in 2017.  Right from the damn beginning, no less.  Y’all remember back in January, I decided I would be accountabilibuddy to people who needed to be insulted into action? [ link ]      Well naturally, no one took me up on it.  No skin off my back.  I ended 2017 weighing considerably less and feeling a ton better than I did when I started it. As discussed in these pages, a lot of eating right and a little bit of exercise has been the key.  Such an effective approach has it been that we were allowed to take long breaks from it all in the mid-summer and again for the holidays without doing too much damage.  Changing habits for the better tends to make shit better for when it’s time to snap back to your norms.      “Norms,” as it relates to me, includes showing my ass back up at the gym in the afternoons.  No huge deal, there, my physical conditioning has continued to remain good through walking on my lunches and spending as much time on my f

My (almost) Every October PSA

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A repost of mammarial proportions... (yes, I know that "mammarial" is not a word, or was not until now) I'd originally posted this blog on MySpace in October 2007, and as the date draws near again my mind has not changed one little bit, nor has the importance of the subject at hand, so here goes...  Do you know what this week is? According to NYC Cancer Prevention , the 3rd Friday in every October is "National Mammography Day." I know what you're thinking, "But Phillip, you don't have titties," and the jokes of my man-boobs are damn near moot, as they are just about gone now. I DO have a sense of humor about myself and I know that I am still not a small person by any stretch of the imagination, but I digress... I have taken on the vigil to make sure that no woman misses out on their mammogram this coming Friday. I work for a company in the healthcare industry, so I am 100% sure and clear of the shortcomings in availability a

True Story© The Roller Coaster

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My life is a weird set of ups and downs… For the sake of that sentence, by “my life,” I mean “my weight.”  I seem to be on this odd cycle where I will decide to get to it and lose several pounds, then something catastrophic will happen and I stop even bothering for a couple of years and gain the whole 50 back. My last “gain” phase almost took me to the upper room.  Apparently putting on this time sent my blood pressure to a level that my then-current medication regimen wasn’t on board with and, then a bout of bronchitis made it all worst and next thing you know I am speaking to a cardiologist trying to convince me to spend a weekend in the hospital due to congestive heart failure. I was 306 pounds that morning, 35ish more than expected walking in and a full 55 more than my “norm.” I was mobile enough to get to and from my car, care for my kid and not miss a minute of work, so the man couldn’t FORCE me to the ER.  He did change up my meds aggressively to get the fluid off