Trying to determine the difference between correlation and causation

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

Last week I had some pretty big meals, especially my dinner (our Anniversary meal). And I felt fine Saturday morning. I had roughly the same meals during the week, hit my fiber numbers etc. This Friday I again had a couple of big meals, including my dinner. But this Saturday, especially after my run, I felt like I had developed another stomach problem, possible obstruction. Very odd. The only thing that I can think of that was significantly different was that I resumed my sit ups this past week. Was it the sit ups? That is what the blog title is about, I don't know for sure, and my Google searches don't bring up anything that indicates that you should not do sit ups with my condition or any difference with those. I don't know for sure, but barring anything different I am forced to rely on my gut instinct (very germane in this instance) and just stop doing any abdominal exercises.

I felt bad enough that I skipped my Sunday run, but I did do the rest of my various exercise routines this weekend, and got a decent walk on Sunday, which included pulling a wagon with the 2 little ones from Old Colorado City back to the house. And Today's run went well. So not sure what brought all this on, but just have to keep things under control, and be real careful about what I do and don't do.

I rock my way to a 4 mile run, getting back to peak #fitwinning

Dear James, Daniel and Emily

Today's workout

Last night I was juggling around the songs on my running play list and added AC/DC's 'Back in Black' at the number 2 spot, and it felt fitting to listen to that as I got rolling on my first 4 mile run post hospital stay. Today was tough, particularly some of the yellow zone, but I kept rolling and never fell to a walk.

It felt really good to get back to a higher number of miles. But my body is ready for a break tomorrow, that's for sure.

I did a little planning yesterday and determined that it is unlikely I will get more than maybe 1 or 2 runs in while on vacation. But that's okay, I will still be on course in my training for the half marathon. And I will probably get a lot of walking in on at least 1 of the days we are down there.

Feeling the rhythm and strength returning.

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

Today's Run

Had some initial problems finding my rhythm this morning, but kept moving and eventually settled down. Of course that was about the time that the rain hit. So I got to spend the last third of my run running in the rain, which wasn't all that bad, because it was a spring rain, although I was still glad that I wore my pullover. After a week of returning to my regular workouts and running I am back to feeling normal about them now. I am not anywhere close to being back to where I was as far as my endurance but I can feel that returning gradually.

Sunday Run

This was a good one, ran a little later due to sleeping in, which meant I got to run in daylight. It was my first run in a long time with only 1 layer, which felt good.

Diet

I can see that it will be a challenge on the trip to maintain my desired calorie counts and especially the fiber amountson our trip in a couple of weeks. Going to have be sure to bring some fiber bars, apples, and good bread to keep things up to the desired speed. That is after a weekend with some traveling and trips, and my tracking showed I was clearly off a little. I am not so much going to worry about the calories (I am on vacation after all) but do need to track those fiber numbers either way.

After a week of changed diet, things are looking good

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

Looking forward to a couple of running days this weekend, probably resume sit ups on Monday. Without soccer I will return to taking the kids to the Y and running on treadmill on Saturday. Partially to work on getting my pacing back. Partially because that time out of the house is good for all of our sanity. I think the kids will be happy to get back to that.

After a week of being more fcoused and organized on balancing out my diet, and adding more fiber I can honestly say that I feel much better. Last week I was still in recovery mode. But this week was focused on getting into better habits, and I think I was successful at that.

My weight free fall ended, but it was stable. Once the regular of routine of regular exercise kicks in, with the reduced eating, along with better nutritional balance I should actually start to see some of the progress I wanted at the beginning of the year.

Overall, I feel much better than I did a week ago, and I feel that I have learned a lot in the past 2 weeks, and have better tools than I did to keep myself headed in the proper direction. It's going to take continued vigilance, and like all habits it takes some time for it all to become unconscious, but I am confident it will do so.

Chose to workout at home today, instead of run in the rain, no regrets, still #fitwinning

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

It was raining when I got up, I thought about running anyway, but this early on in my getting back on the horse as it were, I chose to just do an indoor workout. Really don't want to risk an injury or another illness.

But this workout was still a very good replacement: aerobic, with some strength aspects. Jogging in place, lunges, burpees, pushups etc. with the kind of jumps and switching so that you have to keep moving.

So far the diet is holding, Tuesday was a little hard, didn't realize how much I had until late. Kim discovered soem high fiber bars that I can use as a supplement that provide like a third of my daily requirements. And after doing some research they are part of an entire diet plan that I will get to read up on from the library. Just to educate myself on the proper way to balance everything out. I have gradually learned how to keep my calories under control, but the issue of balance has eluded me to some extent (thus the stomach problems) so that is something to focus on.

Return to the normal: resuming the morning runs

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

Today's workout

It wasn't as much of a struggle as I thought it might be. I mean I was sucking wind at the end, but I pushed to make it a full 3 miles. I never slowed to a walk, even when I was going up the hills (although I wasn't exactly sprinting either). It just felt great  to get out there and run again.

Those morning runs really clear the head, and get the blood moving for the rest of the day. And I was also able to restrain my appetite after the run and eat a normal sized breakfast. Which is really part of my plan at this point. Even if my exercise burns a lot of calories I don't want to go back to using that as an excuse to pig out.

Returning to my fitness regime and it feels good

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

First, this past weekend I got to play some spirited games of basketball and football with some kids about 3 times younger than me. And it felt really good to get out there after my time of rest and recovery. I was able to pretty much keep up with them, although I was sucking wind a little bit towards the end of the football game. That showed me 2 things: I am as close to fully recovered as I will get; I am ready to resume my regular fitness regimen.

Second, so today I struggled out of bed and returned to my morning fitness regimen. Today it was just stretching, plus some push ups and then squats. I think it would be prudent to give it another week before I resume my sit ups. Tomorrow I resume my morning runs, and boy am I looking forward to it. It got real hard to not push myself at the end of the week last week, especially Saturday morning, when I was alone with the kids.

Third, while the pain of the obstruction was not something I would ever want to endure again it did have a couple of positive side effects. It helped/forced me to curtail my appetite, now I can just eat a peanut butter sandwich and apple sauce and feel full. And eating so little for a couple of weeks boosted my weight loss, 10 pounds gone in 2 weeks, the trick being keeping that off. But having my appetite under control should help with that.

Last point of the day, I am slowly getting a grip on what and how to eat to insure this doesn't happen again. Keeping an eye on the fiber content, what I should and should not eat, making healthier choices when I eat out, things like that. And I am getting a lot of advice on that as well. The difficult thing will be the trip to Texas, but I hope that a couple of weeks practice and learning will help me be ready for that.

Feeling energetic and a little frisky, ready to resume exercise

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

Feeling reasonably confident that the worst is behind me. Not 100%, still need to hold to light meals for a while longer. But my energy is definitely returning. Today I was able to get out and enjoy the semi-nice weather with a little lunch time walk, and didn't feel tired or winded afterwards. Time will tell of course, I will keep the meals light and not really push it with exercise over the weekend.

I plan to resume some working out on Monday. And get out and run Tuesday morning. At this point it is a little up in the air if I will run in the Sailin' Shoes race in June. There is no longer an imperative, since I already failed to meet the every race requirement for completing the Grand Prix. And between this setback, and not being sure how much training I will get in when I am on my week vacation in June I may not be up to a 10K. I may still run the 5K, but I will hold off on sign up until I get back to see where I am.

The important thing at this point is to take it slow when I start back up, not try to go out and rip out a 25 minute 5K my first day out. It's just like starting over to some extent, because my body really did get beat up and exhausted. Plus I want to keep the eating under control, so if I push the running too much my appetite may get the better of me, that's going to be one of the biggest balancing acts the first couple of weeks.

Reality smacked me down hard yesterday, reassessing my optimism

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

Yesterday I had a good breakfast: bowl of granola with coconut milk, piece of toast and a glass of OJ, doesn't seem like too much right? Well that left me feeling full and bloated all morning. But I felt that I had to try to eat lunch when the time came: some Spanish rice with a few beans and a little taco meat. That was way too much apparently. Less than an hour after eating I was in the bathroom throwing up, and went home to lay down. Couldn't eat a thing the rest of the day.

Clearly my system just cannot handle much food right now. And by much food I mean more than about 300 calories at a time. Which really doesn't provide me with a lot of energy. And while I don't have a physical job it does require energy to get the kids rolling and ready for school every day, and work does take some energy.

I have a follow up with my regular doctor tomorrow where I can ask some hard questions. Is this just my system still recovering, or is there still some blockage? Will the blockage require surgery? When can I resume eating decent meals? When will I be able to resume exercising? I weighed in at 180 pounds today, which means I have lost 9 pounds in a little more than a week, which is really not healthy.

So all I can do today is take it easy as possible, keep fluids going, eat light, try to keep moving so my system doesn't get tied up (sitting straight for too long causes pain). We'll just have to wait and see how it all goes.

Now I truly know what I have to do, time to implement the new plan #fitwinning

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

Spent a good amount of time yesterday researching things, starting with bowel obstructions, then diverticulosis, then fiber and diet. Here is what all that breaks down to:

1. The bowel obstruction from last week was definitely a result or byproduct of my diverticulosis. Of all the possible causes for obstructions this was the only one that really fit me and what the doctors told me and found last week. Pretty much any of the other causes would have led to different treatment or symptoms or a combination of the 2. So that left me with diverticulosis, which I know I have.

2. Reading up more thoroughly on diverticulosis was very interesting and educational. I know I have the condition, and have had it for years now. And I was under the impression that I was handling it correctly and had it under control, particularly after dropping all that weight. Well it turns out I was wrong. My intermittent stomach issues that I have, the occasional pains, followed by diarrhea, etc. are just about word for word symptoms. My Dr. had given me a very general description of the condition when I was diagnosed, but he was always more focused on my weight issues. So now I have a much clearer idea of what has been my single biggest recurring health issue.

One interesting thing is that it only affects about 10% of the population, and isn't necessarily something a lot of people have or are familiar with. Which is probably why my symptoms never connected as well in my mind. The single biggest point about this condition is that the treatment is a different diet, specifically a high fiber one (you were right Mom), when I said I don't get to eat like normal people I was essentially right.

3. I do have to change what and how I eat to treat this condition. And that means a high fiber diet. I thought my normal diet had a pretty high fiber content, until I started really looking at what that means and looking at the real numbers. For someone with my condition the goal is to eat roughly 28-35 grams of fiber a day. That may not seem like a lot until you break it down, here is a glimpse of how hard it is to hit that number:

Breakfast: granola (should be high, but only has 2g)
Lunch: almond butter sandwich (wheat bread, total about 8g), apple sauce 1.5g
Snack: granola bar (again you would think higher but only 2g)
Dinner: rice with broccoli (total about 8g), water with fiber supplement (3g)
snack: peanut butter sandwich (7g)

So that was 33 grams, a good number, but I had to eat a number of things I am not accustomed to. And it certainly wasn't like my normal diet, especially the lunches. Among the new habits I will have to adopt: eating a piece or 2 of good bread with pretty much every meal, unless it already has a lot of fiber (like brown rice or beans), add the supplement 3 times a day, change what I eat for snacks and deserts. I can do all of that, but I have to balance that with trying to keep my appetite under control.

So I am giving myself a week to recover, and get used to new eating habits, then resume my running and training next Monday. It sucked to miss the race I had trained so hard for, which also meant missing out on completing the entire series. But, as Dad says, there will always be more races. I am resetting my running plan anyway to accommodate for the time off and recovery, so don't be surprised if my numbers are a little lower to start.

What happened to Mike? (Or how I spent 4 nights in the hospital)

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

The pain started around 3:00pm on Tuesday. My stomach was sore in a way I wasn't accustomed. I wrote it off as having done too many sit ups on Monday. It gradually got worse, to the point that I left work early. I went home and laid on the couch but it was clear this was no ordinary pain.


Mom drove me to urgent care, but after a quick analysis they directed me to the ER. I was in the ER triage/waiting area for about 4-5 hours, intermittently getting tested. I got moved to room to prep for a CT scan when the pain and movement caught up to me, causing me to throw up.

Things are a blur after that. Waves of really intense pain. Throwing up, getting the nose tube inserted (excruciating), some relief from a dose of morphine. Then the pain returning doubled until I finally got a morphine drip, and some rest.

After that things settled down for the night and my hopes rose. But that ended when the tube was pulled and I was told it would be another night before I could leave. But I could try some clear liquids. Which seemed promising until the pain returned.

So here I am, no idea when my belly will recover. Gonna have to wait it out, and stick with baby steps on all eating and drinking. I got out of the room to write this in the sunlit lobby, headed back to room now.

That was written Friday morning. Things did look promising. I had some clear fluids: apple juice, some chicken broth. They took me off the IV. Then the nausea returned, as the nurse said:

“It’s not a good sign when I come in and you are curled up with the puke bucket”

So they gave me some anti-nausea medicine, moved my IV and reconnected me and I was stuck for another night. I threw up a little, and the pain was there, not as severe, but I did take a hit of the morphine to get some rest. Then around 1:30AM the diarrhea arrived, which was unpleasant, and not fun, but it finally turned things around. Flushing out my system, and finally relieving the last of the obstruction. Once morning really arrived things picked up speed.

I was able to eat (without problem) some clear fluids and some oatmeal so I was released around 10:30AM. So all told 4 nights in the hospital.

First, thanks to everyone who chipped in to help Kim with the kids and everything else while I was in the hospital. Second, I am still pretty sore, so I will have to take it easy on the working out for a while. Third, I am doing some research, but just some cursory digging this morning has given me some clues to what and how this happened, and most importantly, what I can do to prevent it again in the future.

Just keep on running, 5 miles at a time today, who knows tomorrow?

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

Today's Run

Feeling good, feeling strong and ready to tackle those hills Saturday. Even though I stopped running at the 45 minute and 4.7 mile mark I still came in for 5 miles under 50 minutes! I am really pleased about where I am on the running. Especially when I realize (as I did this morning) that a year ago at this time I probably couldn't run for 20 minutes on a totally flat surface.

Spent some time yesterday figuring out the training program for the rest of the summer, getting ready for the 10K's, the 10 mile run, and the Half marathon in October. I am confident I can do it, and I am really looking forward to changing into shorts for my runs!

Coming back from a disappointing month #fitwinning

Dear James, Daniel and Emily,

April was not kind to me from a fitness perspective. I continued to make strides in my running, getting stronger there, although did not get in as many long runs as I would have liked. But my other exercise took a hit. And my weight went in the wrong direction.

But as I alluded to on Friday I know what I have to do. So this morning I got myself out of bed, even though I was still a little tired, and got to work. I reset my push up and sit up apps to week 1, day 1 since it had been about a month and I didn't want to jump in, have a bad restart, and set myself up for failure. I then changed up, instead of counting my squats/knee bends I decided to just do a running clock, starting at 30 seconds. Figuring that makes mores sense than counting reps when I am not actually lifting any weights. I also didn't want to push myself too hard this week so I have fresh legs for the race Saturday.

Then after the race I intend to redo my running training plan since I have been so scattered that it is hard to know exactly where I am on the overall plan. With the stated plan to get myself ready for a half marathon by fall.

And I already did the calorie count reset last week. Although I decided that I am going to try to cut the afternoon snacking down, there is no real reason to do so much of it. And with my just sitting at the desk all those snacks do is just sit there, almost like a late night snack before bedtime. That's a habit I have to break gradually, but I think I know how I intend to do so.

With all that hard work and some perseverance I should be back on track by the end of the month. I know I'm not going to suddenly drop pounds this week, there's a lot to change here. But I know I can get back on the track I was on a year ago.