I know, I really started them yesterday. But today I jumped on a few more - like accidentally finding the prescription for my crestor in the house after I called both the pharmacy and the doctor's office to get a new one. I fixed it by calling them both back. And I took my crestor after about 4 days of missing it. I won't be missing anymore thank you very much and my heart and veins are happier for it.
I also emailed a contact at the American Cancer Society about any ideas for getting involved in a volunteer lobbying type position since nonprofits aren't hiring. He was super nice and gave me some ideas. Perhaps I'll discover if that's where I'm supposed to be this year.
Then I called my insurance carrier. I had called my OB-GYN the other day about getting a mammogram and they told me that they wanted me to talk to my insurance before they arranged for it because women who were getting mammograms for family history reasons were getting denied coverage. So I called Aetna. And sure enough, even though my mother had her entire right breast removed, that's not a medical event for me and thus it is a "medically unnecessary" screening that would not be covered. The only way the screening would be covered until I reach the age of 40 is if I actually have a lump in my breast. Ironically, my mother's cancer wasn't able to be felt in either her routine examination or in the physical exam in her doctor's office. But no, the insurance companies knows best.
I was not about to give up. No sir. My goals included a mammogram, so by golly, I'd find a way. I called the OB-GYN back and got the phone number for the radiology location they would send me to, explained the situation to the radiology group and they put me through to billing. I was told that if I paid in full the day of the mammogram, it would be $173. If I opted for a payment plan it would be $85 down and a total of $347. They take credit cards. So, Mr. Darcy and I decided that for $173, it was worth it for the scan which both my OB-GYN and my mother's oncologist and surgeon said was a good idea. This coming Monday afternoon, I'll be enduring the mammogram (affectionately referred to by a friend's Mom as the "booby squish"). I expect it will be just fine, but no need to take chances.
In other news, Mom called and said that her oncologist told her that she does not have to do any chemo or radiology or shots or other treatments because they got it out before it had penetrated the wall of the duct and her lymph node biopsy was clear. If it had penetrated the duct, she would have had to go with chemo. Turns out that they couldnt' give her the pills for hormone treatment because my Mom had leg throboses when she was pregnant with me (way back in the day), but the doctor said she didn't really need them anyway because since she had a full mastectomy on the right, there's a 0% chance of return on the right and a little less than 12% chance of recurrence in the left. So she is considered 100% cancer free today! YAY!!!
As for my training, I couldn't pull my booty out of bed this morning. Mr. Darcy had trouble sleeping and left the bed so as to not disturb me, but I ended up not being able to sleep well because he wasn't in the bed. Plus it was cold for Florida. LOW 30's. But, I stuck to the plan - which was to get on the bike and do a medium to hard ride for 60 minutes. It wasn't out on the road or on the trainer, but I went to the Y and did a 15 minute warm up with good resistance on the spin bikes (this one had aero bars so I spent 3/4 of the time in aero) and then did a 45 minute spin class. Spin class is hard. Getting out on the road seems easier to me, but then I don't have someone yelling at me to change into a harder gear every 15-20 seconds and then make me sprint in a super hard gear and tell the class we need to pedal harder. I was pouring with sweat, but liked it. Jumping from position to position while keeping your resistance high and focusing on not bouncing but pushing and pulling with your legs seems harder than getting in aero (which is sort of like position 4, except your standing in position 4) and staying there. I was so hot that I walked 1/2 a block to my car in 43 degree weather in my bike shorts and t-shirt and only got cold when I hit the shade right next to the car. I even steamed up the windshield a little. Not to mention that in that 45 minutes I drank 20 oz of water.
Tomorrow is a little bit of running speed work, which I'm actually looking forward to...I'm going to try to be brave enough to run outside in the morning, but if I wuss out it will be on the treadmill instead.
And I'm proud of Mr. Darcy - he did some weight training at the gym last night on the way home from work. I am hoping some cardio will work its way in there, which he says it will, but it's a great start. He even said he might be interested in doing an evening spin class with me. : )
Oh and I even started re-reading the Dalai Lama's book The Art of Happiness yesterday evening. And I'm officially on Day 2 of Phase 1 of South Beach, and only slightly concerned that after entering all I plan to eat today The Daily Plate food tracker says I can eat 1,009 more calories. Of course, a little more than 500 of that came from their calculation of calories expended during my workout. (I almost expect a phone call from my Coach within minutes of publishing post.) But after adding back the weight I lost during the first part of the recovery season and then a couple of pounds - from stress eating during the holidays, I have to do something and South Beach worked really well for me in the past.
Has anyone heard of Clean Eating? I've seen it on some blogs and a friend is giving it a try. I looked at the website and it looks like it's just eating less refined foods. Anyone know more about it?
It's 2010 and I'm on the case!
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