3000

My goal was to be able to swim 2800 meters in a session by the end of the month. I did 3000 tonight. I found that by doing a thousand, then resting 5 minutes and then doing another set I actually do more meters faster than if I swim without resting. I am up to half breast stroke and half freestyle. In the beginning I was worried that the rotation of the breast stroke kick would be painful to my knee. Instead I find that the flutter kick is actually more difficult. Also the freestyle is much more challenging to my cardiovascular system. Right now I just do alternating fifties of the two strokes. I'd like to keep adding more freestyle until my knee is stronger and my breathing is more efficient. Right now I can easily breathe every three strokes, but when I go for five it is very challenging. I would also like to get to flip turns. Right now I don't have the confidence that I have enough air to complete a turn without drowning myself.

My goal was to swim 15 times this month. Tonight was only #5. The next two weeks there are going to be days where I am going to have to swim consecutive days in order to achieve that goal. I may have to cut the distance a little bit so I don't strain the knee. If I do have to cut the distance I plan to work on my breathing and start working on the 5 stroke intervals.

I am still hovering around the same weight. My morning weight tends to bounce between 194 and 197. The day I hit 190.0 or less I am going to measure my belly. That is the weight I was when I last measured it. I had gone from around 220 to the 190 and lost three inches on the waist. I think I recall now that it was 48 inches after the loss. A woman's waist is supposed to be 35 or less to be considered healthy. I wonder how much weight I will have to lose to meet that. The last weight I felt really healthy at was 180, but I think this time I am going to have to go lower to achieve the same level of health. I got older plus it is since that time that I have been diagnosed with all these lovely afflictions.

I decided to quit Dr. Andry. I called the pharmacy and told them to take all my meds off auto-refill. That way they won't call him when the refills run out. I think I have enough meds and refills to make it for a while. I scheduled an appointment with a potential new doctor in the beginning of August. She is a DO and specializes in women's health and chronic disease management - sound like anybody you know? She looks about the same age as my daughter - eek! I am getting so freaking old!

I'm still fighting MAJOR fatigue and sleep delay and disruption. I think I slept about three hours last night, worked an eight hour day, ran errands on my lunch, went and looked at a house for a friend, swam 3000 meters, went by contra dance to pay some money to my web developer, came home and posted all the photos of the house for Shannon, made some lists for Michael, and I could easily stay up another three hours, despite taking a few little blue pills an hour ago. I am going to get away from this sleep-depriving trap and let a movie remove my mind from reality and sleeeeep, sleeeep. I may get five whole hours! Woo hoo! Of course I still need to unload and reload my gym bag if I am going to swim tomorrow. That's part of the pain of swimming instead of walking... special clothes and equipment, blah, blah, blah...

I feel good about the progress I have made. Thank you, Sirpa, with all my heart for getting me kick started in my swimming. It is just another way you have made an amazingly wonderful difference in my life. I love you!