This and That...

Not much going on. Just thought I'd write a quick post to keep in touch.

I'm just wishing the weather would improve so I could plant my tomatoes. I can't believe how cold it is, in spite of being mid-April. It snowed on Sunday night! This morning it was 35 degrees on my way to work. I heard on the news that it might even get into the 20s (not sure where they were talking about, maybe it wasn't in the Seattle area). At least today the sun was out for a while.

My leg still looks awful, and is covered with big dark bruise spots at the injection sites. But I'm still being patient. The tech said to give it 4 weeks minimum, so I will wait before I start to evaluate whether I'm happy or not.

I find that the longer I stay on the 4HB diet, the less I want to eat. I really don't have much of an appetite for what's allowed, so I'm eating "enough" but not a lot. I wonder if that is part of the idea, you get bored and so you don't eat? Whatever, I don't really miss food during the week, although I do enjoy my cheat day. I did weigh myself today, and I'm down 1 more pound.

Well, sorry for the boring post. Maybe I'll get inspired if the weather improves.

I'll leave you with this photo...Hub & went shopping on Sunday at an Asian market that just moved to a new location. Thought you might like to see this big fish (Opah) that they had in the fish case. It's hard to tell how big he was from the photo, but I think he weighed about 100 lbs!

Wait and See

To be honest, I’m not sure about the sclerotherapy. But for those of you who are interested, here’s what happened:

The technician was really nice, and explained what she was going to do. She said I could watch if I wanted, but I don’t really like needles. So I declined.

I had taken a couple of Tylenol about an hour beforehand, and I listened to my iPod during. The procedure really didn’t hurt very much. Once in a while, I had a feeling like I was being stung by a bee, but overall it was pretty painless.

After the procedure was over (it took about 45 minutes), I was supposed to wear some compression panty hose for at least 24 hours. The clinic doesn’t supply them, but gave instructions on what to get beforehand. So before my appointment, I went to Nordstrom and bought what I thought was the correct size based on my height and weight. In fact, according to the chart, I was on the low side of XL. I could have weighed 10 lbs more and been 2 inches taller and still been an XL. So I figured I had plenty of room for error.

Well, I could barely get them up past my knees, and I struggled so hard to pull them up that I put a big rip in the butt. I finally got the crotch up to within about 3 inches of where it should have been, but as I walked around, it kept slipping down. And my muffin top was pushed out over the top. I felt like the Pillsbury Dough Boy. lol

This was definitely the worst part of the whole experience. When I got home, I thought, No way can I wear these to work tomorrow! So I took those suckers off and cut off the panty part and just wore them as stockings yesterday and today. This seemed to work okay, but the whole compression pantyhose experience sucked. I hate even regular old pantyhose, and these were "bad pantyhose" multiplied exponentially.

Now, 2 days later, I have an ankle that looks like crap. The technician said the veins would look worse before they look better, and the part about looking worse is definitely true. But I’m supposed to give it at 4-6 weeks before I make a final judgment on the results. So I’m optimistic that it will improve as everything heals.

Tomorrow is my day off, which I'm looking forward to. Yeah, baby!

Vain about veins

Just to start off…sorry I haven't posted much lately. Everything is fine, but I have been very busy. Yeah, I know...I'm sure I am the only blogger in the world with this problem. :-)

Hub is now on Coumadin for his blood clot, and that seems to be resolving. Although he has to go in every other day for blood tests to check his INR levels, he is feeling better, and his knee is getting stronger. So my own mental state is much improved from last time I posted. (I know I shouldn't let his moods affect mine so much, but they do.) I'm back at work on a normal schedule, which also helps my sanity.

As for my diet…Well, I haven’t lost any weight in the past month, but I’ve not gained any either. I think I’m so close to my goal that it will take extraordinary measures to get there, and to be honest, right now I’m just not that motivated. (Maybe I’ll get more into it as the summer approaches…who knows?) Anyway, I’ve decided that the number I’ve chosen as my "ideal weight" is really just an arbitrary number. So I’m still following the 4HB program pretty closely, which is comfortable and not hard to do at all. I will admit I’ve slipped up a bit on my personal restriction of no fake sweeteners (it's not a 4HB restriction, just something I was doing on my own). I’ve been eating some sugar free jello (only one a day) and using Splenda in my coffee (also only one a day). I guess if that’s what it takes, there are worse things.

I’m having a procedure done this afternoon, which is totally for vanity purposes. As I've mentioned previously, I sprained my right ankle very badly a number of years ago, and it swelled up literally to the size of a tree trunk. It was so huge, it looked deformed and I wondered at the time if it would ever look normal again. I still have issues with it from time to time when I over exercise or tweak it a bit from walking on uneven ground. But for the most part, the swelling has gone down and it’s a “normal” ankle.

But there are some residual effects from the extreme swelling that took place. I have broken blood vessels, called spider veins, all over the outside of my leg that have never gone away. I actually have a very dark band of vessels around where the top of my sock hits, and a patch on the ankle bone area too. They are just plain ugly and I’m very self-conscious about them, especially when I wear shorts or a bathing suit. (Sorry for the poor quality of the photo, I just took it with my Blackberry camera.)

So…This afternoon, I’m having sclerotherapy to have them removed! I saw this on Dr Oz a while ago and decided to inquire about it. There is a fairly new solution (FDA approved about a year ago) which is used to treat them, called Asclera, which I guess does a really great job. I’ve done some research, and the vast majority of the reviews have been quite positive. I'm also having it done at a plastic surgery clinic, and they've also gotten wonderful reviews. So I'm not having it done by amateurs.

I’m a little nervous (mostly because I hate needles!) but I think I will be glad I did it. I figured I should have it done before (if) the summer weather shows up here, as it takes a few weeks for the effects to be complete.

I’ll let you know how it goes.