The exercise challenge

7/13/16

Hello from Andee's world!
I thought I would stop by and do a little sharing. Just what your day needed, am I right?!

Tonight I am sharing some details on why getting back into an exercise routine has been such a challenge. For those of you who are new to our party, I will catch you up. During treatment (for me that took most of 2014) I gained weight. I know what you're thinking....probably the same thing I thought. If there was one upside to this cancer thing, I thought it would be that I would get really skinny. Weeeeell,..not so much. My treatment cocktail included a lovely dose of steroids. When I got into round 2 (the 12 week round of chemo), I received steroids on a weekly basis. The steroids do all kinds of wonderful things to help manage issues during chemo, but they also make you fat! What I didn't know is that I would quickly turn into Uncle Fester. Bald and fat, that was me. Every girl's dream!

Once treatment was over (last of 33 radiation treatments was on December 17, not that I remember specifics or anything) I took some time to rest and recover but when January 22 came around, I started my serious workout and eating plan and by March I had dropped 20 lbs. I was serious...and focused on the goal. I started with 21 Day Fix and then moved on to 21 Day Fix Extreme. I'm not advertising or anything, just offering my personal experience. I noticed a significant change in my body in DAYS. Inches lost immediately, things toned up...all the stuff you want. I was counting calories only (they didn't originally send all of the 21DF containers and I didn't want to wait). I was like a machine for a while. About mid-year, my cancer patient mentor passed away. I've written about going into a pretty bad place. The short story is that I was thinking about cancer every single minute of every single day. I was upset about the people I know that cancer has taken away. I was terrified of recurrence. It was not a good place.  If I'm being completely honest, which I am, I stopped exercising AND started eating my emotions. I have to say that the last quarter of last year was not good for me. I was mad at myself for letting myself go and also, there was a bit a stress added when I learned how extensive my pending surgery would be. It was a lot to process and I did a crappy job of processing it.
When January rolled around it was time to have surgery #1. On January 11, I had the first of 3 surgeries. 3 (short) weeks later I had my second surgery. At that point, the latissimus dorsi muscle was pulled around from my back to my chest. You can go back and read the details of the procedure but, the short version is that the muscle and skin became part of my chest BUT the muscle is actually still attached to my back. Crazy right?

https://sites.google.com/site/cancerbreastinfo

 Since it was not removed and relocated, just relocated, it still works like a lat muscle. Though the muscle has atrophied some, and will continue to do so, it's still a weird sensation. You probably don't know exactly when your lat muscle is engaged on a daily basis. I can now tell you! That's because when I do something as mundane as push on the arm rests of a chair as I try to get up out of a chair, it engages that muscle and it pulls like crazy. Even today, it feels like bad things could happen when I rise from that chair or try to get out of the bath tub. I try my best to modify how I do things but sometimes I just have to push through and deal with the discomfort.

Now, finally, let's talk about how this impacts exercise.  After waiting a few months to make sure I healed completely, I tried my 21 Day Fix/Extreme routines and also ventured into the Hammer & Chisel program. I was having to modify so much that I wondered what the end result would be if I kept going. I think I'll be able to go back to weights (have I mentioned I loved that?) in the future but probably not this year. I have one more surgery to go, which will likely take place in the next couple of months. I decided I just couldn't wait until next year to start working on myself again. So I had to sit down and figure out what was going to work. I have put up my weights (for now) and I've focused on finding something I can do now. I settled on the Cize program, which is a dance program and I LOVE IT! For people who don't know, I spent my time at dance class and competing from age 4 to age 18. I ended my "dance career" as a member of the University of Kentucky Dance Team. I have always loved to dance and I've had weekly dance parties with my babies for the past several years but no classes in AGES. I'm so enjoying the fact that I'm able to do this again. I still have to modify a bit but it's a blast and it burns 300-400 calories a pop. Positives all around.

So my program now is Cize at least 5 days per week and weekly meal planning and prep. I'm down 5 lbs in the first full week of meal planning and exercise. Yay! It's not much but it's a start. I'm feeling so much better and I'm excited about what's to come.

I guess the message of this post is that we all have limitations. You just have to figure out how to do what you can with what you've got and make the very best of it. It can take a little work and some planning, but you can do it!

Love to all,
Andee

Finalized 7/24/16

7 days

I haven't posted in over a month? That's just wrong!  I started this post earlier this week. Sorry it has taken so long but I'm back and posting!

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It has been an interesting 7 days.  Life continues to throw surprises and tests our way and, believe it or not, even though we are old pros at this, you never get used to it.  I think we've gotten better at handling the curveballs (I'd like to think so, anyway) but dang! As always, I'm sharing my business in hopes of educating and motivating others to take their health seriously. Let's get started, shall we?

On Monday June 27, I was scheduled to visit my plastic surgeon's office for a fill. I arrived several minutes early so I sat in my car for a while. I was browsing some things on my phone and I took a minute to send Bobby this picture with a caption that said something like "This sounds about right." Little did I know...

 For some reason, before I got out of the car I checked my appointment card and realized that I was over an hour early. No big deal...better than an hour late, right? I went and grabbed some breakfast and came back. When I went inside they took me right in. I got changed and prepped for my regular needle sticks and expansion. When the nurse got ready to start she paused for a moment. She said she noticed something on my skin. She said she had never noticed it before. She grabbed a mirror and pointed it out to me. She asked if I had noticed it before. I told her that it may have been there but one of the things I haven't spent a lot of time doing over the past couple of years is looking at my chest.

She carried on with my fill but she seemed concerned. She was wonderful and after suggesting I get it checked out, she even attempted to get me in with the dermatology office across the street. Unfortunately, they were booked so she suggested that I return on Tuesday so Dr. Hall could look at it. So the appointment was made and I headed home. Was there some anxiety? Yes. Who am I kidding, there was fear. After checking out the spot I realized why she was so concerned about it. It fit all of the "worry if" criteria for melanoma. Not symmetrical, larger than a pencil eraser, etc.  The only thing that kept me from flipping out completely was the color. The shape and other characteristics looked a lot like the melanoma pictures I found - but it was lighter. Remember back in the early days of the blog, I talked about looking for the Silver Lining in everything...well, here's one for this experience. I kept telling myself that it didn't look EXACTLY like those pictures so I held out hope. I won't lie - at one point, there were some tears. It's not easy to deal with scares but I guess that's part of my life now. I allowed myself my time for self-pity and had my "how much is one person expected to take?" breakdown. Then I pulled myself together and faced the test.

I returned to the office @ 9 AM on Tuesday morning. Dr. Hall checked everything out and said she would never forgive herself if she didn't do a biopsy and it turned out to be something. That means scalpel and stitches. Luckily, I have no feeling in the skin in that area so she took the sample and stitched me up. Now it was time to wait. I won't take you through boring details of the next few days but let's just say I kept myself busy to keep that "what ifs" out of my head. I don't know how much you know about melanoma but it is not something you want. Scary, scary stuff.  Needless to say, it was a more stressful week than normal, but life must carry on.

On Friday afternoon, Dr. Hall called me personally to let me know that she had gotten the results back. I was a little scared at first because I feared that she didnt' want anyone else to give me the bad news. (And breathe....) She said she received the results and there was no cancer. At that moment I was pleasantly surprised and very happy!  I thanked her for calling and letting me know. About 15 seconds after I hung up the phone, the tears came. I knew I was worried, on some level, but I had no idea I would respond the way I did. It was like the gates opened and the emotion just flooded out. What a relief.

If you've been a follower for a while, you know I believe that life has a way of smacking you in the head to make you focus on what's important. This was my reminder that I need to get back to focusing on myself. I must look after myself first or I won't be strong enough to get through life's challenges, take care of my family and work at my best. So here we go with the "me first" campaign.  It's not selfish - it's about taking care of this one body that I've been given, as defective as it is, it's the only one I have.

So, my message to you is to make sure you get yourself screened. if there's a spot that doesn't seem right, get it checked out. Mammograms, colonoscopies, and all other screenings can be scary but they are nowhere near as bad as cancer treatment....trust me!!

Back soon!

Love to all,

Andee