Recently, I was at CVS Pharmacy.

Sh*t had gotten real.

While there, I impulse bought a respiratory trainer.

What is that, you ask?

I had no idea either.

Why buy it then?

It says it improves athletic performance.

I’ve been trying to figure out how to train for the Pier-to-Pier, which is my very favorite thing all year.

This is an ocean race. It starts going around one pier, you swim north two miles and finish coming around another.

This event has particular significance.

You see, my plan was to . . .

Well, pardon me for being morose in the Time of Covid . . .

But I planned my suicide when I wasn’t sure I would get better, when I had pain that was untreatable, unmanageable and unendurable, and no quality of life . . .

And that is the truth.

Read about that in my post Ocean Swim.

Seems tacky to admit, in this time of contagion and death. My apologies.

All of that is so many years ago, it’s almost hard to remember that I was that person, that desperate, that my life was that miserable.

Now things are so different.

The place where I imagined a beautiful death is now the place I swim a f*cking fantastic race every year with like 1,500 other swimmers or so. Which is way more fun.

Hang in there, Kiddos.

Don’t give up on yourself or life.

Just keep on trying.

That alone is worth living for.

2020 Dwight Crum Pier-to-Pier

Right now, I’m in total denial that this race won’t happen in 2020.

Because like of! course! they will let 1,500 people in bathing suits huddle together on Hermosa Beach by August.

Of! course! Covid-19 will be solved by then.

Of! course! I’m going around the Manhattan Beach Pier with the pack of human sardines this August.

Of! course!!!

Of! course!!!

Of! course!!!

I even waved down to my future self rounding the Manhattan Beach Pier, back in January when I was on crutches with my broken foot.

I was verrrrrrry unhappy. That was a big injury and it taxed my Ehlers-Danlos body. I felt miserable. Crutching to the end of the pier and looking out, imagining my summer goal made me feel much better.

Dream of your future, kiddos.

I haven’t been swimming in the ocean since last October. 😢

I missed the whole season of winter swims in the freezing ocean with the curious dolphins 🐬and the chance to smooch a whale💋🐳 while my surgical wound healed. 😢😢😢

It hurts. Not my foot. That’s okay now.

I am missing the ocean so much it hurts. 😭

I simply crave it.

I have to f*cking keep training!!!

But how? I don’t have a pool. Beaches are closed. A surfer in Manhattan Beach got a $1,000 fine for disobeying.

Is that worth it? I had to ask myself.

No.

So I bought the CVS respiratory trainer.

I’m glad I did. It was amazing.

After a few days of using it, my endurance with my kettle bells Q-U-A-D-R-U-P-L-E-D.

Whut?

Athletic performance enhanced just from strengthening my lungs?

Yes!

I liked the CVS one because it forces you to rest between reps. But it was hard to clean. I don’t want to breathe in bacteria. And it was an awkward device to hold.

So, I got another, this one from Amazon.

I like it better. So I’m recommending it here.

I use it while I read the news.

Breathe through these difficult times.

I am a news junkie. I like good writing. The world is a fascinating place. What humans do! It is the greatest soap opera on earth.

The Breather helps me cope with my news/human drama addiction. The news is a rather stressful.

I suggest you get one, too.

A Breather respiratory trainer, not an addiction.

Breathe through it all.

Make your lungs strong, in case you become afflicted with “it”.

You want to prepare as best as you can.

You want to go down fighting. Always.

Improve your lung capacity and your lung strength now.

While you are safe in quarantine.

One day soon, we’ll be going back out there, exchanging germs.

Train for it.

Because the coronavirus is not going to go away anytime soon.

It gets spread by people with no symptoms.

Count on the fact that you will get it, unless you never leave home or interact with anyone.

And we all should go on a diet.

Since obesity + Covid kills. Yikes. So does obesity + the flu. Yikes, yikes.

I’m at the upper end of Normal BMI these days. I’m not happy about that at all. I gained weight with my broken foot and not all of it has come off. I’ve done my share of pandemic stress eating. Grrrrrr. 🤬

Being at the upper end of Normal BMI means I could really be in the overweight category. This is just a chart not an analysis of my body. I have abnormally long, thin bones, which means I have less lean body mass than a person without Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome.

Plus I have belly fat. That’s a problem. Abdominal fat is the most toxic thing in your diet.

So I’m working on it.

One must take steps to cut back on food intake at times.

Portions sizes are way too big and we get served food everywhere, all the time.

You have to swim upstream to maintain healthy weight, because in our society the odds are stacked against you. If you go along with eating what you are served, you are eating too much.

Not only do we get served portions for four people, the food industry and restaurants have been adding more and more sugar to food. This is a dangerous situation, a public heath hazard. Over-feeding people is tremendously taxing to the resources of the planet.

One must make an effort, one must have a strategy. Otherwise you just keep gaining and gaining and gaining, making you unhealthier and demoralized and angry when your clothes don’t fit.

Easy changes

• Skip booze

• Take a break from sugar and fried food

• Don’t eat after dinner

• Limit bread, pasta, white potatoes, rice

The Best Exercise for Weight Loss

Strengthen the muscle that shuts the refrigerator door. And the one that puts the fork down.

Yes, small changes over time make a big difference.

Improving habits makes keeping excess weight off automatic and easy.

Good habits to train for

• Avoid snacking

• Refuse to engage in stress eating

• Try to end your meal when you start to feel full, especially when being served a dinner for four on your own plate

Your brain can hurt a little when you challenge long-standing habits, but it will adjust.

Cheer yourself on for all your efforts!! Yay!!! You did it!!

You cannot learn better habits on a crash diet.

Or by hating the way you look. Which is also a waste of energy.

Self-Acceptance

Is a different project from weight maintenance.

Health At Every Size is a true statement, as long as your BMI is in Normal range and you have minimal belly fat. Otherwise, we know for sure. Storied body fat drives up inflammation making you more likely to suffer from depression, get very ill or even succumb from Covid-19 or the the flu, get diabetes (dialysis and amputations are a great destroyer of quality of life) and cancer plus wear out your joints.

I’ll let you in on a secret.

Trying to get others to approve of you is definitely a way to make yourself miserable. You never really know what others are thinking. Don’t get too concerned about it. Be yourself, believe in yourself, accept yourself.

Besides, most of us don’t like ourselves all that much. Liking yourself a hard thing to achieve. It comes and goes. Most of us are not who we want to be.

Accept yourself right now today in spite of everything you wish you weren’t. You can do it!!

Best Practice for Weight Gain

Eh gad! Put your trash in the trash. Or might you get used to cuddling up with trash, and then you will start to find trash soothing. That’s a terrible practice.

That will set you on your way to a hoarding addiction.

Don’t we all have enough problems.

Put things you love in your nightstand drawer.

Stay safe, Kiddos. 😷❤️