My new focus!

Has it really been almost a year since I posted to my blog?

I realized recently I should be updating my blog with my current life and my goal to improve my health.

In April 2009, I started having heart issues, my BMI had just turned morbidly obese, and my weight was 233. I couldn't lean over and tie my shoe without getting seriously out of breath. I couldn't walk around the block without getting seriously out of breath. One day, I looked up symptoms and drove myself to the hospital. The E.R. diagnosed me as having adult onset asthma and put me on an inhaler & prednisone. It didn't really help.

About three weeks later, I was driven back to the hospital by a coworker. This time a cardiologist came in to check me out and decided I should get an angiogram. What he found was that I had developed diastolic dysfunction, which meant that my heart was not pumping correctly and was not relaxing all the way in the diastol portion. His advise, it was reversible, but I needed to lose 20 pounds and get exercise 3 times a week. I was sent to cardiac rehab at the hospital to exercise with the geriatric patients. That was an eye-opener! How did I get to this point?

I spent the summer focusing on my health: and through diet and exercise I lost 35 pounds over the summer. School started back up...and my concern was could I keep losing weight and exercising once I went back to work?

I joined Cindy's Gym, a local gym for women only, and started taking zumba classes 2, then 3 times a week. I lost another 15 pounds and then hit a plateau. I no longer had the nurses to tell how much I weighed 3 times a week, so I was accountable to no one!

Over Christmas vacation, I gained 9 pounds!

Starting on the new year, I joined a Biggest Loser support group at the gym, and have lost the 9 and another 5, for a total of 60 pounds lost. My current target is a total of 70 pounds, which would put my BMI at overweight, instead of obese. But my overall goal is a healthy BMI, which means I have to lose another 40, or 100 altogether.

I'm now exercising in step classes on Monday & Wednesday nights, Zumba on Thursday nights and Saturday mornings. My latest addition was Friday Yoga classes. I have attended 2 classes so far, and was surprised at how well I can do the positions now, but learning to relax for 15 minutes at the end is a real struggle for me. The first time I tried I turned my cellphone off because it kept interrupting the class, and I wound up crying for 15 minutes because I was so stressed turning it off. Chase was home alone and I couldn't relax without my phone off. This last week I left my phone on, but it was on vibrate and my bluetooth was on so I would hear if he called.

I'm supposed to go back to see the cardiologist in May, and I'm really pushing for the 100 pounds gone by then. I have my setbacks, though. This week I blew off the diet on Thursday and Friday and have eaten like I used to.