January 24, 2012 - Much Better

As bad as yesterday was, diet wise, that's how good today was.  After 24 days of this year everyone can plainly see how imperfect I am when it comes to taking care of myself.  I don't think I'm different from anyone else out there.  What is so important for me is to follow up that "bad" day with a good one.  I know I'm "beating a dead horse" with that statement, however, it cannot be understated.  Any chance of a flare up must be avoided.  My lousy diet on Monday brought about a night of being in the bathroom...all night long.  Basically, when that happens, I give my intestines the next day off or as many days as needed until they are back to being healthy. 

After a really light breakfast, I headed over to the vet with Lulu for a weigh in.  She just turned 1 and is growing every day.  All dog medicine is dispensed based on their weight.  After the vet I ran a bunch of errands.  Once home, I had a Myoplex Lite shake.  In the middle of the afternoon I went for a run.  What a day out today!  55 degrees, blue sky and sun.  Unbelievable for January 24th in New Jersey.  Just a couple of light shirts and shorts and 3.5 miles later I headed back home for another shake.  Every little thing I do helps me to stay relatively healthy but if I had to pick 1 thing that is the most important, it is the shakes.  Not eating food when my intestines need a break gives them a chance to heal.  In the past, when I was in the middle of a flare up, I would dread sitting down to eat because I knew the pain that would be associated with eating.  I don't even think twice about having a shake because there is never pain associated with it.  I'm getting all of the nutrition I need and at the same time my intestines don't have to work.

Grilled burgers for dinner.  I know a lot of people with Crohn's have problems with proteins, but, for me, as long as I don't have too much (especially steak), I'm usually pretty good.  By the end of the day, I was feeling completely back to normal.  A total of just 1400 calories, of which 600 came from shakes did the trick.

January 23, 2012 - Super Bowl Trip?

So, I've got a decision to make.  In my blog posted on 12/29/2011, I wrote about how travel can negatively affect my Crohn's.  I just booked a trip to Tampa in early March and need to decide if I want to book a trip for the game.  I also wrote a few days ago about "quality of life" and not allowing negative thoughts affect my decision making.  This one is a little tougher because of the environment in Indianapolis.  Air travel followed by endless parties, followed by the game itself.  I'll make the decision by the end of this week.

Spent half of today studying for this coming Saturday's N.H.H.C.(National Harness Handicapping Contest) qualifier.  I won the qualifier 2 years ago and was invited back to compete again this year.  Harness horses typically race once a week and usually on the same day of the week.  I downloaded the results charts from this past Saturday's races along with the video replays of each race.  Once I viewed the races, I marked the charts with some notes.  Once the entries for Saturday nights races come out on Thursday, I will download that program and put everything together.

My diet was absolutely awful today and I really have no idea where that came from.  Breakfast was fine, just a bowl of cereal.  I basically ate bread and coffee cake the rest of the day.  No shake, no workout, no real meal.  Between running around doing errands and the aforementioned studying, I just didn't take the time to eat properly.  Hopefully, there will be no repercussions from this?  Tomorrow is also a busy day, however, I will make sure and take much better care of myself.  The key for me, if I mess up, is to get right back to doing what I need to do to avoid flare ups.

January 22, 2012 - Super Bowl Here We Come !

 
Would someone please tell me if I am still dreaming about the Giants run to the Super Bowl in 2007 or is this real?  I still cannot believe it.   Looks like the playoff beard is going to grow all the way till February 6th.  Emily says I'm looking a bit on the homeless side these days.

The best part about the day today was that I was so nervous about the game, I had no appetite, therefore, didn't binge like the past 2 weeks.  The way the season went, I figured the team might get past Atlanta, but would then get bounced by Green Bay.  Once they beat Green Bay and moved into today's conference championship, the nerves showed up.  It was, once again, my brother Larry over, with both of us wearing the exact same clothes and sitting in the same seats.  People always laugh at my superstitions, but I can prove it works.  With the Giants leading 10-7 in the 3rd quarter, I had to go to the bathroom.  I had not missed 1 snap from scrimmage the entire playoffs.  Any bathroom going was always during commercials.  This time, I just couldn't wait until the commercial (thank you, Crohn's).  Sure enough, the 49ers went right down the field and scored a touchdown while I was in the bathroom.  Next time that happens, I'll have a mop and pail ready because I am never leaving my seat again.

The day started off with Adin's first hockey game of the season.  His team lost 8-6, but it's always exciting to watch him play.  I didn't feel like going to the gym today, therefore did not work out at all.  Normally, I would have run, but with yesterdays snowfall, it was impossible to run outside.  Spent the rest of the afternoon just counting the hours until kickoff.  I was going a bit nuts, so Emily was trying to come up with something to keep my mind off of the game.  She suggested we play some gin rummy.  I'm hoping my mind was on the game because she kicked my ass.  Tried to get some sleep, but just as I fell asleep, my friend Frank called to talk about the game and woke me up.  Finally, it was 6 p.m. and my brother showed up ready for 6:30 kickoff.  I really want to try and go to the game in 2 weeks.  The search for tickets and a room starts tomorrow.

January 21, 2012 - Positive Mentality

I was thinking today about how much of an influence your mind has over your body.  Emily and I went to a "Fork and Dine" movie today.  For anyone not familiar, its restaurant quality food served to you in a movie theater.  More importantly, you can also drink alcohol.  Ten years ago, one of two things would have happened.   I would have gone to the movie and worried the entire time that I would have to go to the bathroom after eating.  This might cause me to miss some of the movie.  Just thinking about it would basically be talking myself into having to go.  The second possibility is even worse.  I would not have gone at all.   Why go if I'm going to be spending half the time in the bathroom.

Having a positive outlook on things has given me and my family a so much better quality of life.  Yeah, once in a while, I do have to go to the bathroom, but more times than not, I don't.  We had a great time.  Saw the movie "Contraband".  We both thought it was pretty good.  I had a sliced prime rib sandwich, fries and 2 vodka and 7's.  Emily had a shrimp taco with 2 cosmos.  No wonder we thought the movie was good.

Believe me, I know how tough it can be to be remain positive.  I certainly have my fair share of bad days.  I just have found that the more negative I am, the longer I stay sick.  That can become a dangerous cycle because one leads right back into the other.  My point is, if my attitude was negative, Emily and I would have missed out on a great night together.  The most important thing for me and my family is quality of life.  The only shot at having quality in our lives is to be positive.

January 20, 2012 - Food Diaries

Dinner today made my choice of what to write about very easy.  Keeping a food diary.  To say that dinner did not agree with me would be an understatement.  The funny thing is, I have had this meal many times without any problems, which is what makes food diaries so tricky.

My day was a very good one.  I have an account where I do some investing on my own and had a very, very good day today.  I also booked a trip to Tampa to spend some time with my buddy Frank, who works for the Yankees and spends the month of March in Tampa working spring training (have I mentioned I love sports?).  I also had a great workout at the gym in the morning.  The boys were picked up by their dad after 4 p.m. and Emily and I were deciding what to have for dinner, when I got a craving for a potato and egg sandwich.  That is something I would typically make at home, but, instead, I ordered from the local pizzeria.  Geez, you would think you can't get any simpler meal to digest, but it sent me to the bathroom the rest of the day and night.  It will never be ordered again from that place.

That's where food diaries become tricky.  They are not as simple as jotting down a food that disagrees with me and making sure not to eat it again.  I need to be specific as to where it was ordered from.  When I make it for myself, I use cooking spray.  The pizzeria probably used a ton of butter.  I have had exact same meals from 2 different restaurants where I am fine with one and bad with the other.  Then there is the case of being in the middle of a flare up, where anything I eat bothers me.  It all makes for a very complicated food diary.  With Crohn's there is definitely the need to differentiate between a bad reaction to food (like tonight) and a reaction when I'm flared up.  Here is what today's entry looks like in my diary:

Date            Food                      Restaurant  Cond. Before Eating  Reaction
1-20-2012  Potato & Egg Sub   Romeo's           Healthy               Severe Diarrhea

I will typically remember when I react badly to certain meals.  Just in case I'm not sure, this makes it easy to verify.  I believe that everyone should keep a food diary, however, it is imperative for anyone with Crohn's or any other IBD.  It is a big part of what keeps me healthy.

January 19, 2012 - Catch 22

For anyone that follows my blog, you know, I typically go through my day and how I deal with the ups and downs of living with Crohn's disease.  For the past few days, I have touched on some general subjects as they relate to Crohn's rather than relaying specifics about my day.  When I do that, it means nothing out of the ordinary has occurred during the day and I have been feeling great.  Today was a bit of an exception to this, but more of an annoyance than anything serious.

Went out for a run late morning.  A beautiful, but cold day out.  Sometimes its really tough to throw on a pair of shorts and head out into 18 degree weather.  Once I get out there, I'm good to go.  Ran my first 2 miles in a relatively slow pace of about 10 minutes per mile.  At that point, I decided to pick up my pace.  I have an app on my Iphone that tells me every minute exactly what my per mile pace is.  I was shooting for an 8:30 per mile pace and was able to keep that pace pretty easily for about a mile.  It was at that point that I got a cutting cramp in my gut, which of course meant I had to head right home and to the bathroom.  I was really pissed off.  You'd think after 42 years I would be used to dealing with the "catch 22" of physically knowing I can accomplish something, yet the after effects of what Crohn's does to the body after pushing myself keeps me from pushing myself.  Yes, I know that was a ridiculous sentence, but that's what "catch 22"s" are...confusing and frustrating.  Anyone that suffers from this disease knows exactly what I am talking about.  I can probably spend the next month writing about examples of this in my life, but I will only talk about 2.

One of them actually changed my whole life and had nothing to do with physically pushing myself.  My dad, who passed away in 2008, was a stock broker.  I remember at 8 years old going to his office on one of those "kids go to parents office" days.  I have always been pretty good with numbers but I might as well have been in Disney that day.  All of those lights with numbers going by amazed me.  I had no idea what it meant but knew I wanted to learn about it.  By the time I graduated high school, I was sure that's what I wanted to do the rest of my life.  By that time I already had Crohn's.  My dad knew the stress involved in managing other people's money and also knew what that constant stress would do to my Crohn's.  He did everything he could to dissuade me from going into that business and he succeeded.  I always thanked him for doing that because my guess is I might not be writing this blog right now, if he didn't.  At the same time, it's really frustrating.  I was very successful at what I did, however, never had the passion I would have had if I had worked in the stock market.

The second example was also life altering, but in a much different way.  I worked for a large company for 25 years and played on the company softball team the last 10 years I was there.  The 9th year was my best.  The team won the league championship and individually I was the best I had ever been.  In the winter after that season I became pretty sick again.  I played for the team the following year, however was nowhere near as good.  I always remember overhearing our pitcher talking to one of the other players about me saying "I have never seen someone age physically so much in such a short amount of time".   He didn't mean anything by it, he had no idea about me having Crohn's and how bad it was that year.  But, he was correct.  We barely made the playoffs that year.  I knew what my limits were physically but I couldn't get that conversation I had heard out of my head.  I pushed myself way beyond what I should have.  We won that first playoff game.  I don't remember all of the details but I was as good as I had ever been at any time in my life that game.  I think that turnaround shocked everyone even more than how bad I was all season.  It was the last game I ever played (to this date).  I was as sick as I have ever been later that night and ended up having surgery 4 months later.  I don't know if pushing myself directly led to that surgery, but I know it definitely sped up the process.

These "catch 22's" have always been one of the toughest things for me to deal with.  Knowing what those limits are is so important to managing this disease.  I will always push to see exactly what I can accomplish.  The upcoming half-marathon in June has me extremely excited, yet nervous.  Sounds like a catch 22 to me.

January 18, 2012 - Willpower

I have a major issue with eating "junk", especially any form of cake.  It's tough to ask my wife not to buy any junk, what with 2 teenagers living in the house.  I had a solution for the problem that would make everyone happy.  Just yesterday, I asked Emily, when buying sweets, to only buy chocolate.  Over the past couple of years I have developed some sort of allergy to chocolate.  If I so much as put my lips on any kind of chocolate, I immediately get a splitting headache and severe nausea.  You may ask yourself, why doesn't he just not eat the sweets that his wife buys, no matter what kind it is.  I really do my best at watching what I eat, but when it comes to cake, I have absolutely no willpower.  So, with my chocolate idea, the kids would be happy and I would have absolutely no temptation.

"Every time I try and get out, they pull me back in"!

That line, one of the few good things to come out of The Godfather III, really hit home today.  After the boys got home from school today, they went over a friends house.  That friends dad works for place in NJ called Delicious Orchards.  Without going into boring detail of what that place sells, all of my plans went right out the window because the boys came home with not 1, not 2 but 3 packages of Apple Cider Donuts.  Just kill me!

I really need to get a better understanding of exactly what happens in the brain when temptation hits.  Why do I have full control over some things and absolutely no control over others?  Is there a drug secreted in the brain that renders us helpless in our fight against temptation?

The boys went to their dad's after they got home from their friends.  Emily and I had a nice dinner at a local Japanese restaurant.  After we got back home, I wasn't in the house for 10 minutes and I had already eaten 2 donuts.


" Every time I try and get out, they pull me back in"!

January 17, 2012 - The Importance of Sleep

I have written endlessly about doing my best to stick to eating and drinking the right foods, and not pushing myself physically when I'm not feeling well.  Those two things are extremely important factors in my being as healthy as I have been for the past 6-7 years.  They are, however, not the most important factor.  For me, the most important thing is getting full night of sleep.  If I don't get the proper amount of sleep, I am an irritable, less tolerant person.  I'm like a car in need of a tune up.  I feel like I am running on 4 cylinders instead of 8.  My brain does not function as well, I am less creative and am physically tired.  Those things aren't even important as it compares to what lack of sleep does to my immune system.  Everyone with Crohn's knows how tough it can be to sleep.  The cold sweats, the nightmares are just a couple of the things that can keep us awake.  When I was younger, I would just accept the fact that 4-5 hours of sleep a night was all I was going to get.  I was taking so much medication, the last thing I wanted to do was have to take something else to help me sleep.  How wrong I was.  Continuously getting a half night of sleep kept me from being able to effectively fight my flare ups.  Flare ups that would never go away, led to more and more damage to my intestines and eventually more and more surgeries.  Along with all of the changes in my diet I made 6-7 years ago, I also decided to try an over the counter sleep aid (Unisom).  Luckily for me, it worked like a charm.  I still take it every night before going to sleep.  I typically get 8-9 hours of sleep every night.  If I have something that I need to do early the following morning, I just go to sleep earlier the night before.  I sometimes am not very good when it comes to diet, however, I NEVER allow myself to go without the proper amount of sleep.  For me, it is the most important factor in remaining as healthy as I have been.

Today was a different kind of day for me in that I just did not feel like doing much of anything.  I really don't have these kind of days very often.  I had planned to run, but didn't.  I had a bunch of things I needed to take care of, but instead just moved them all to tomorrow's "to do" list.  It was the kind of day I would have if I did not get the proper amount of sleep, even though I did.  The only thing I did do was go to a 3:30 p.m. doctors appointment.  My appointment was with a kidney doctor.  Seems I have been manufacturing kidney stones.  A bunch of tests had been done and it was determined that certain nitrate levels were low, indicating a need for potassium citrate as a supplement.  The doc feels this will stop the stones from forming.  Doesn't seem to be any big deal because he and I spent way more time talking about the Giants than we did about me (I'm sure I'll still get a bill).  Rangers played tonight and I didn't even feel like watching the game.  At that point, I think Emily got a little worried?  Just a funky kind of day that we all have once in a while.  After 8-9 hours of sleep, I'm sure I will be raring to go tomorrow.

January 16, 2012 - After the Binge, Part 2

I am a lucky guy.  Actually, I am for many reasons, but in the interest of this blog, as it relates to Crohn's.  I follow many fellow "Crohnies" on twitter and see the awful stuff they deal with on a daily basis.  Things that I have dealt with in the past, but, other than an occasional flare up, have not for a while.  Woke up today with absolutely no after affects from last nights mini-binge.  I understand enough about this disease to know that despite feeling great this morning, I need to treat today as if I did flare up this morning.  After a light breakfast, I headed to the gym for a workout.  I bitch and moan every time the weather keeps me from running outside and forces me to the gym for a run on a treadmill.  Besides the fact that I hate treadmills, I tend to overheat 15 minutes into my run when I do it indoors.  I wasn't planning on running today, I was just going to do some weight lifting.  I decided to take a different route to the area in my gym where I would be working out and came upon a room that I was shown during my orientation day at the gym, that I had completely forgotten about.  The room is basically a converted movie theater that has cardio equipment in it.  It continuously loops a movie all day long and I happened to walk in at the beginning of the movie "The Hangover".  I have seen the movie about 100 times and made a beeline for a treadmill.  Time for 101.  The room is nice and cool and I'm pretty sure I will be setting new endurance records for myself shortly because, what a great environment.  I ran for a bit, went out into the gym for some lifting, then headed home and had a shake.  Emily made chicken "Veronique" for dinner, which was a recipe that her mom had made when she was growing up.  It was great!  That along with some rice and biscuits and I was a happy guy.  A nice relaxing night with no late night snacking and it looks like I have officially survived the 2nd round of the NFL playoffs. 

January 15, 2012 - The Giants Do it Again

I tried...I really did.  I even spoke about the upcoming Giant game in my blog all week long with the purpose of mentally preparing not to abuse myself with various food and drink during the game.  Then the referees, who officiated the game like they had cheese heads covering their eyes, ruined everything.  OK, so I'm not going to completely blame the refs.  My brother Larry and I both take superstition to a new level of stupidness, therefore, same exact clothes as last week (right down to the blue underwear), sitting in the exact same spot and yes, pizza ordered from the same place.  I've been feeling pretty good all week, so a few (all right, I admit it, 4) slices of pizza can't hurt?  Then the refs took over.  I'm not going to get into the specifics of the horrible calls because that is for a football blog, but I will say that the unnecessary stress it brought both Larry and I, led to breaking out the half gallon of vodka. After filling our 16oz. Giants glasses with about 14 oz. of vodka and a splash of 7-up, my first drink was gone in about 4 minutes.  I poured myself a second similar drink.  I don't think Larry did it on purpose, but an "accidental" knocking over of my half full second drink, ended my drinking for the day.  It was during another horrible call by a ref that Larry and I both stood up and started screaming at the TV.  He knocked over my drink and I took that as a sign to stop, so I did.  The Giants went on to crush the Packers 37-20 (would have been 51-3 without the refs bullshit).  After the game I was just content to sit and watch the post game highlights over and over again.  I did this with a bag of Hostess "Donnetes" on my lap.  For those unfamiliar with "Donnettes", they are mini-white powdered donuts.  I think I had 6 of them.  I guess we all have our triggers, things that mentally lead us to stray from our diets.  Sports is mine...especially football.  This time, I'm going to start talking about it today to see if that helps?  Next Sunday night, 6:30 p.m. eastern time, the Giants play for the NFC championship in San Francisco.  It's time to wash the Eli Manning jersey, the Jason Pierre Paul shirt I wear under the jersey, black sweat pants and BLUE underwear.  Pizza anyone?