Greetings one and all. All is well here, just have either been too busy, or had nothing to talk about, or both.
Not sure I really have anything worth talking about now, but I do have things I need to say.
Primarily: it is HELL at age 77 to start using the body more and harder. I've been walking a lot -- inside the building (we have 3 floors of very long hallways and 3 sets of stairs) or out. Today I did over 10,000 steps and a lot of stairs in the process. I've been pushing the stairs for a couple of weeks, doing more and more, trying to see how my knees handle it. Every time I bump it up a bit, like today, the muscles in my lower back tell me enough already! They're not pulled or damaged, just sore from unaccustomed use.
My knees, which had begun hurting more and more when I climbed the stairs or rode the bike, are doing just fine with all this new stair climbing, and I have some things to say about that, too. I really want a new bike, but of course I want to be able to ride it. About 3 months ago I started taking a hyaluronic acid supplement daily, and felt the difference surprisingly fast. Then, as of January 2, I've been using a collagen peptides protein powder in my daily smoothie, and I think the combination of the two has really made a difference. Both support all the boring but necessary things in the body like tendons and ligaments and cartilage, and really, every cell in the body. It was my hope that they would rebuild any lost cartilage in the knees and by golly, they (or something) seems to have done just that. I don't run up the three flights of stairs, but I do walk them steadily and without pain. Nor is there pain afterwards. I get an occasional twinge here and there, but nothing like I'd been experiencing.
There's so much else these things are good for, but I have no way to gauge how they're working with anything but the knees. The knees alone are enough.
I also began a very tight Keto diet plan on January 2 (had to wait until after the Rose Bowl!), and while I don't have any trouble sticking with it, the fat is not burning off as quickly as I'd hoped. It takes the body awhile to switch from using carbs for fuel into using mostly fat for fuel, but of course I want instantaneous and big results. To help facilitate all this, I bought the iPad, then an app for the Keto diet (SO much better than the Excel spreadsheets I used to try to keep), and then a Fitbit to keep track of steps and exercise time, which it communicates to the diet app. I'm having fun with this new technology, if nothing else. Young folks take it for granted, but we old folks get a kick out of it.
So that's all I have to say tonight. Anybody out there?
A work in progress
7 years ago
