Sleep, Drink and Prevention

I don’t know about you, but my life keeps getting crazier every day.  I mean, I guess I’m due; after all I’ve had a solid two years in a row of overall happiness.

Yesterday was my mother’s chemo day, and it was an extra long one because she was dehydrated.  While I was there I ran into one of my former bodybuilding teammates who works at the hospital.  She asked me how I was doing. “Terrible!” I said with a little sob.  Well, I guess it was more than a little sob because my right contact lens popped out and I had to drive home looking like Popeye. (There is a reason why my blog is named “ShesLosingIt” and not “ShesTotallyGotHerActTogether.”)

When it ended, 4 hours later, I had enough time to drop off mom, say hi to my father-in-law (did I mention he flew in to visit?), pick up the kids and start their homework.  That done I decided to take a nap.  I was awoken by a call from my dermatologist.  There was a mole that showed up this summer that looked odd, and with my family history I just decided to get it removed last week.

And…it’s cancer.  But she said, “It’s nothing like what your mom has.  You don’t need chemo or radiation or anything like that.  We just need to have you come back to make sure we cut deep enough to get it all out.”  She said this was very common (1 in 3 people get this) and most likely from a bad sunburn 20 years ago, which makes sense because when I was 20 I fell asleep on a topless beach (I was being a rebel) and woke up with sun poisoning.  I remember thinking at the time, “I’ll bet I get skin cancer from this.”

Not to brag, but she also said that of all the cancers out there, I had the very best one to get.  Yay?  And that’s why God made chocolate.  Obviously I’m happy that this was caught so soon and it reminds me that now more than ever, I absolutely need to take care of myself.  Which brings me to my next topic.

Yesterday’s goal for the I’m Too Busy to Take Care of Myself Challenge was #20 – Go to Bed before 10 p.m.  Ask me if that happened.  It did not.  But I did get to the gym at 10 p.m. and did cardio for an hour in a sweatshirt.  I just felt like I had so many stress hormones built up inside me I needed to sweat them out.  It helped; I felt a lot better.

Today’s goal #21 – Drink 8 glasses of water – is going pretty well.  I went to the gym at 4 a.m. and did a leg workout.  Leg workouts are great for helping me sleep and working out stress, so I managed to get through about 6 glasses of water just there.    But now onto some good news (for a change!)

Prevention Magazine has selected me as one of the bloggers to attend their R3 Summit, October 17-18.  Tonight they are hosting a dinner for all the Austin health bloggers to give us a sneak preview about the topics that will be covered, including health, fitness, clean eating and ageing well.  (All topics I’m interested in.)  They also gave us a promo code, R3VIB, for $20 off for anyone who wants to attend the event next month at the Long Center.  You can get the tickets here:  Prevention R3 Summit tickets.  I’ll have more information for you after tonight’s dinner.  It will be good to get out tonight.

How about you?  Are you making time to take care of yourself?  Lisa 

• @sheslosingitnet
• http://www.facebook.com/ShesLosingItnet

ShesLosingIt.com (c) 2014 Lisa Traugott. All rights reserved. No portion of this blog, including any text, photographs, and artwork, may be reproduced or copied without written permission