MY LEFT FOOT (NOT THE MOVIE)

The update on the stupid foot sitch – I’m seeing my primary care physician tomorrow to hear what he thinks/find out which orthopedic surgeon or sports med doc he wants me to see.

I’m not entirely convinced the podiatrist was right and that this is a rupture – most of you below say that if it were ruptured, I’d have known immediately. Plus, I’m getting back a limited range of motion and I can stand/walk/balance on the foot. I might be wrong and this is indeed a rupture; if so, and based on your advice, I’d rather explore next steps with an orthopod.

(Also, wouldn’t my foot/leg hurt? This doesn’t hurt.)

(I don’t want it to hurt, of course. I just think it’s weird that it doesn’t.)

(I have good health insurance. I feel like this was a factor in the podiatrist deciding I needed surgery two minutes into speaking with me, despite the above, and without an MRI.)

Plus, the podiatrist wanted me to stay completely away from the gym, saying that any exercise would be bad for me, which… really? Does this sound right to anyone else? I said to her, “Even upper-body exercise where I’m seated or on the floor with core work?” She said yes.

I could understand not working out post-surgery for a certain period of time, but to completely ignore the rest of the body pre-surgery because of a bum ankle? Didn’t make sense to me. My Lose to Win coach said a participant last year had a full on rupture in a training session, where the woman’s tendon popped so loudly everyone heard it (AAAAHHH!), and she still managed to lose enough to make it to third place while in a cast.

Again, that’s why I was dubious and solicited your fine advice… after having come home from my appointment, crying with my head down on the kitchen table at the irony of finally WANTING to go to the gym and not being allowed. That’s when Fletch said, “Screw it, we’re going to the gym after work so I can show you how to do an upper body circuit.”

And we did.

In better news - and despite having been in a jump boot all week - I still lost FIVE POUNDS at the weigh-in today. That’s a total of ten pounds over the past couple of weeks.

Wait, that deserves some exclamation points.

Here we go - !!!!!!!!!

I’ve been trying to parse out all the ways this experience has been different than when I was working on Such a Pretty Fat. From a caloric burn standpoint, I’m doing a lot less cardio and weight training than when I worked with Barbie, as the boot is limiting. However, my diet’s much better, particularly since I’m tracking everything on MyFitnessPal. (Barbie did want me to modify my diet and track my food, but that seemed like a pain in my big ass.) Plus, there’s the whole “do the work” business I’ve discussed in previous posts. All of these factors are adding up.

I’m just now back from having my resting metabolic rate measured. Basically, this test shows how many calories my body needs per day while at rest in order to maintain my present weight.

I’ve done the calculations before using online tools and have come up with caloric requirements anywhere from 1800 to 2400 per day.

HA.

HAAAAAAAAAAAA.

What I learned today is that I have the metabolism of a hibernating bear.

Not kidding.

Apparently I need the caloric equivalent of two Pixy Stix and a handful of oyster crackers to maintain my weight. If food were gasoline, then I’d be a Chevrolet Volt.

But at least now I know and can work around that, improving the rate as I lose weight and build muscle.

Anyway, that’s the update on the health and fitness front. Thanks again to everyone for all their suggestions and fine advice – I really do appreciate it!

In other news, I’ve been building a new Jennsylvania.com because it’s not 2008 anymore. I’m not sure how much of the archives I’m going to bring over to the new, pretty, functional, and informative site so if there’s something you really liked in the archives, make yourself a copy. I’ll let you know when I do the official cut-over so you can change your RSS feed accordingly.

Okay, I think that’s it.

Except to state that I really never imagined my stupid foot would generate so much content.

What funny here is two days before the injury, I decided that I didn’t need to spend the money to keep up my pedicure over the winter and now half a dozen medical professionals have seen and handled my unadorned hoof.

At least the delicious irony is calorie-free.

#losetowin