God is Completely Satisfied With You Just The Way You Are . . .

the problem is, you have no idea who you are.

That was one of the messages that I got from a retreat on Practical Christianity this weekend.  I spent the weekend listening to that still small voice from within.  It was telling me that as much as I want to love God, I need to also learn to love myself as God loves me.  God loves the authentic me, and in my ego-centeredness I may or may not be close at all to knowing who that person is.  

I know who I think I should be, but does that mean that my opinion of  who I am and where I am going is the same as God's?   Probably far from it.  It is only through lots of intentional prayer, and discernment that I will ever come to know who it is that God sees when God looks at me. 

Fr. Adrian, (our retreat master) said we should look at it as though we are athletes training for competition.  We can't become elite level Christians without intentionally setting aside time to make ourselves fit enough to be the person God sees us to be.  We have to work on our whole self;  mind, body and spirit.

I am good at working on the spirit and mind part of my elite level training program.  I love to learn new things, I am constantly reading spiritual books and the bible and spending time in prayer and meditation.  I spend time offering my services to others in volunteer activities and share my joy of salvation with others every chance I get.

Where I fall down is taking care of my body.  I need to get more exercise, and learn to eat better to control my blood pressure and blood sugar.   Exercise would help my arthritis.  Eating right coupled with the exercise would lead to weight loss which would in turn be good for my knees.

So,  I am going to try really hard to work on myself.  I am going to spend some time every day being intentional about taking care of my body which is a temple of the Holy Spirit; the place where God resides.  Because from now on it is not I but Christ who lives in and through me, and He shouldn't have to live in a place that looks like it ought to be condemned.

PAX

Friday of Holy Week: Good Friday

I have really bad knees, one is worse than the other, so I favor my left leg.  For probably fifteen years or more I have been standing with more weight on my right side than my left side and it has caused serious problems with my left hip, knee and foot.  I have lived with varying degrees of chronic pain over the last few years.  Finally with a combination of physical therapy, exercise and acupuncture the pain is pretty much handled, but I still have to be very careful not to stand with all of my weight on my right side (old habits die hard).

What does this have to do with Good Friday, you ask?  The entire time I have been going through all of the years of pain and suffering I would think about Christ on the cross, suffering for my sins and not once did it cross my mind to ask "Why me?"    In fact in the face of that great love that Christ poured out by offering his life as reparation for my sins, I am able to say "Why not me?"  Why shouldn't I be willing to carry this cross?

I work really hard at keeping my leg in shape, and for each incremental increase in the strength of my leg I begin to see the person that God intended me to be.  The person that is capable of doing what God has set out for me to do.

As Christ did the will of God by carrying His cross  and dying for all.  I can do God's will by carrying my cross and living for all.

What cross are you living with this Good Friday?

Pax

Surrender Means Not Wanting What you Can't Have

In my ongoing attempt to understand all of the changes in my life I am constantly finding a spiritual lesson in most things.  My big aha moment for this weekend was that it will be much easier to live with the changes in my diet if I learn to not want the things I can't have, like alcohol or processed foods or sugar.

I have been reading all of lent about surrender.  If not eating these things will make me healthier then surrendering my will to the improvement in health I will gain from not wanting or craving those foods will make me stronger.  It doesn't make it easier to do it this way, but if I look at is as a spiritual exercise, what I am gaining is even greater than what I am giving up.

So, my mindset is changing.  It isn't an easy or immediate change, but each day as I make good choices and don't crave or whine because I can't have something I would have just mindlessly eaten a few weeks ago I know that God is leading me.  And I can see by the numbers on the scale and the way my clothes fit that my lifestyle changes are making a difference.   I think of those things as signal graces that I am on the right track.

I hope my journey can inspire others to take charge of their lifestyle and health and make good choices.

Pax

Lifestyle Changes and Obedience

So the Dr. says I need to change the way I do things in order to be a healthier angelmeg.  I have known this for a long time and have been working on small changes for about two years now, but only with half  a heart really.  Now it is get serious about it time or I will be dealing with major health issues later on.

One of the things I need to change is how I plan and eat my meals.  I am one of those people who can skip breakfast and then go till maybe three o'clock before I actually sit down to eat something.  Even when I make good food choices this is not a good plan.  So that has to go.  No more skipping breakfast or lunch.  Regular meal times with good lean protein at every meal (it's a liver thing).   I need to eat more vegetables too, because I do eat veggies, but not enough of the dark green ones that are really good for me.

Because of my food allergies I am already pretty limited on carbohydrates, but I do tend to indulge in potato chips, or French fries because "I'm not allergic to potatoes".   Those are out of my diet now.  Nothing fried for a while at least.  and only really good oils in moderation.

No refined sugar either,  which pretty much means no chocolate, unless it is really dark very high cacao content (because they have less sugar).  For the first two weeks of this new diet, no chocolate at all.  Then a little (like one small piece every four or five days) after that.  Now that will be the hardest thing.

I started this new meal plan on Monday afternoon, and I'm not gonna lie,  I actually feel better already.  It is amazing how well your body's engine runs when you give it the right fuel.

The next hurdle is to tackle a vitamin D deficiency.  This one is a little harder for me.  I need to get out in the sun more often.  The problem is, I can't stand the cold and it really has only gotten sunny lately.  So,  Now, whenever there is a sunny day I need to take my work outside if I can, or take a walk, or find some other way to be out in the sun.  Maybe this year I will actually get my flower beds in shape.

As I was thinking about all of the things the Dr. is asking me to do to improve my health it occurred to me that it all comes down to obedience.  God gave me this body in order to do His will here on earth. If I don't take care of this body I am not at all effective in doing God's will because I am ill or just too darn tired. Just think how much more energy and vigor I will have when I am not dealing with all of the potential health issues that are looming over my head right now.

When I put my lifestyle changes into that kind of perspective it makes the doing of them a little easier.  I can look at them as a form of prayer and praise to my creator.  I am growing closer to being the person that God created me to be before my own willfulness got in the way and led me astray.

So, with each new change, no matter how much I am resisting it, I praise God.  Even for roasted beet salad,  I will praise His holy name, because I know that if I am eating good fuel I will be stronger in His service.

Pax

For What Its Worth: Thoughts on Bucket Lists

A colleague of my devoted husband's is living with a debilitating bout of cancer and struggling to maintain as normal a life as possible as he works his way through the treatment process.  Just this week in his weekly email update to his co-workers he mentioned that someone told him that if he had anything on his bucket list he should consider not putting them off.  I have been thinking about that statement all day

It made me think about my parents as an example.  They used to talk about how for one of their anniversaries they would go to France because that is where my mom's parents had come from.  They used to dream about how great that trip would be.  But then my dad got really sick with a brain tumor.  My mom went on that trip to France for her 30th anniversary, but she went without my father who had died years before she finally went.

It has really begun to bother me.  I don't want to think that the only reason that my husband and I are getting to do the amazing things we have always talked about doing, or are getting that fun toy we have always wanted to own is because one of us is dealing with or has just survived a life threatening illness. 


I don't want to call it my bucket list anymore.  I want to pick something really amazing that my husband and I have always wanted to do, or that and we have wanted to have;  or pick a place we have wanted to travel and fit them into our schedule and our budget now instead of waiting until it is too late or until we have some fear that drives us to do them.  Won't we enjoy them more this way?

For starters, I want my husband to plan an amazing golf vacation with his dad while they still both enjoy playing golf.  

Pax

What I Learned From Walking 13.1 Miles

So, most of you know that I trained to walk in the Festival 500 Mini Marathon last weekend.  I finished!!! in just over 4 hours.  It was the most excruciating, amazing thing I have ever done.  I know that I would have been so much faster if I hadn't gotten sick in February and March, but I kept at it, and even though I never quite got back the speed I had built up in early February I never gave up.

I met a woman in the corral before the race and we walked the entire way together. Without her support and companionship I don't know that I would have been able to finish.  When I was out of steam she gave me what she had left, and I did the same for her. 

We had one bad patch, just after we entered the Speedway.  We made the mistake of stopping for a pit stop at what we thought was the designated place, and we waited for almost 15 minutes to use the "facilities".  It turned out that there were plenty of "potties" just past the bathrooms where we stopped.  What a waste of our time. 

Mrangelmeg ran the race and finished in an amazing time of 1:41.  I am so proud of him.  He is ready to start training for a marathon.  I will be right there to cheer him on if he does run in a marathon, but I think 13.1 is the longest distance I ever want to go.

I will admit that this was probably the best run event I have ever seen, and except for the very cold weather, was a lot of fun.  You should give it a try.

I also want to give a big shout out to all of my classmates from Terre Haute South Vigo High School class of '78  we might be 50, but we are fabulous, and still BRAVE!  Saturday proved that.

Pax

It Has to Start Somewhere

I hate to admit it, but I am swiftly approaching that magic number birthday, when I will start to get all that wonderful mail from the old folks organizations. I hate to even mention it, but I will (gritting my teeth and closing my eyes)be 50 on my next birthday.

Wow, look at that, the world didn't even shift a bit, no portend of impending doom. I am just going to be officially one of those old people. I will no longer be able to call myself an "older young adult" and will have to start referring to myself as *gulp* "younger middle aged".

Anyway I have decided that I needed to do something momentous for my birthday. Something fitting the passage of time and something that will help me to feel like I am fully alive. Since I am much to sane to 1) jump out of a moving airplane, or 2) jump off of a stationary bridge, I decided that it would have to be something that would require all of my strength and determination. Some friends at the school where I volunteer are putting together a training team to run in the Indianapolis 500 Festival Mini Marathon, so I have decided to join them, only I have no illusions that I will be able to run 13.1 miles by then so I am planning to walk the mini. Mrangelmeg is being so supportive that he signed up to run in it so that we can be there together (we will see each other before it starts and then he will be waiting for hours after he finishes for me to cross the finish line, but that is the kind of supportive spouse I have.)


This race is one that has thousands of participants every year. It is a huge deal around here.

I started training with my initial three-mile walk today. I was hoping for a pace of 18 minutes per mile. What I accomplished was 16.34 minutes per mile! Tomorrow I rest and then I walk again on Wednesday and Thursday. I rest again on Friday and then my longest walks are on Saturdays. By ten weeks I should be up to 13 miles on Saturdays. Then I rest a week and start the whole process over again.

After three rounds of training I will be totally ready for the race. And a natural by-product of all that training will be that I should be in pretty awesome shape in time for my 50th birthday, and then mrangelmeg and my anniversary which is just a few months after my birthday. So my deciding to give myself this mini marathon for my birthday will have benefits that will enhance the rest of our lives.

And it all started with my looking into the inevitable abyss of AARP membership applications.

How cool is that?

Pax

Sweetness Personified

The angelbaby has gone to the hospital twice to see grandma since she had her TIA a week ago. Both times she sat on the edge of the bed and just held her hand without really saying much. Afterward she tried to explain how difficult it was for her to communicate.

She said that in her head there was so much that she wanted to say but when she saw Grandma sitting there in bed she was just so happy that she was okay that it was so hard for her to say anything at all. Every time she tried to talk she would choke up and was afraid she would start to cry with tears of relief, so she just kept quiet and held Grandma's hand.

It was so nice to hear that the angelbaby realizes that Grandma's health issues are really serious, but that she also realizes that what Grandma needs is her presence, and not so much to have conversation going on anyway.

We are visiting Grandma every day in the hospital, but we aren't asking the kids to go every day. Hopefully as Grandma gets stronger, angelbaby's visits will get easier.

Pax

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

I woke up yesterday with a really dry throat, which I attributed to the blower on our heat pump running almost non-stop since the temps dropped from the springlike weather we had over the weekend to the deep freeze levels of Wednesday and Thursday. So, I got up, gargled with salt water (a trick I learned from my dad) and went on with my day.

Unfortunately, as the day progressed I decidedly went downhill, and by the time I got home from my stint as a library volunteer at my daughter's school I was feeling like H-E-double hockey sticks. So I took some Thera-flu and got into bed.

The Thera-flu seemed to help, but the rest of the evening I had little energy to do much of anything (especially try to attempt to venture into Teresa's Castle). I pretty much vegged out on the couch and watched Thursday evening Television, with the kids: Foaming Bones, another spectacular Michael meltdown, half a Grey's Anatomy episode (I am not sure why I bother anymore) And the return of Doug Ross and Carol Hathaway and Dr. Benton to ER. By then I was so tired I just crawled into bed with my IPod sleep mix and went to sleep.

The question is; do I feel well enough this morning to venture out to my prayer group? I don't feel too bad, but I don't feel great. I hate to get all the way across town and decide that getting out was a huge mistake, but on the other hand I hate to miss my prayer group, especially when it is such an important part of my spiritual development.

I'm thinking I will go, if it is too much I can always come straight back after group and not go on to Mass (which is the normal Friday routine). If I do feel lousy, maybe being out already will be enough of a push to get me to stop in at our emergent clinic and get checked out.

It could happen.

NOTA: God is good all the time. Some decisions are made for us. I got a call just after I had managed to get dressed and was grudgingly making my way to the car with what little energy I had left. It seems that two of the three people in my group won't be able to make it and the third (the one who called me) would just as soon not meet with me this morning anyway (bless her, because she knows how bad I felt yesterday).

So, I took the angelbaby to the bus stop and then drove to the store for eggs, milk and beans for our soup tonight and came back home.

I intend to curl up in my nice warm bed, put on some studying music (the mix I made during Gradual School of songs with no lyrics to distract me -- all jazz and classical tracks) and plow my way through to the seventh mansion of Teresa's Castle and then make my famous white chili [minus the chicken] and some spelt bread with flax and sunflower seeds for dinner tonight. Maybe if I take it slow and comfy all day we can share our soup and bread with our church family at the Stations and Soup Supper this evening.

Pax

It Has To Hurt To Heal

They finally know what is causing the pain in my side. It is a tight band of connective tissue between my ilium and my tibia that affects how I walk, how I sit and just about everything else I do pretty much. And to top it all off I have a way of sitting with my left leg curled up underneath me that is just making the problem that much worse no matter how comfortable I think it feels.

So, I have to take physical therapy twice a week, which means the dreaded Graston Technique which involves scraping my leg and hip with assorted curved steel knives to kneed the tissue and get it all back working the way it should.

I also have to wear this really "interesting" patch on my leg. It is called an iontopheresis delivery system and it basically uses batteries to "shoot" the analgesic right into my hip. The closest sensation I can come up with is if someone tried to yank out your hair follicle by follicle over a period of about nine hours -- so enjoyable.

Then each day I have to do stretches of my leg that are meant to stretch the band of connective tissue back to its original length. OUCH! After I hold the three stretches for 30 seconds each I an in so much pain that I have to sit with ice on my leg for 20 minutes.

I realize that this is all good, and in just a few weeks I will be much better and most of the pain will be gone and I will be on the road to total recovery with only the building up of the muscles to do (which shouldn't hurt nearly as much, one would hope). But getting through the next two weeks will be crazy hard.

So, I am going to offer it up. If anyone has a need , just let me know because I have some serious offering up to do.

Pax

Cool patches and PT

The pain is still lingering in my left side, so my Dr. thinks it would be a good idea if I tried some Physical Therapy to see if we can't get my hip joint straightened out. Especially since the joint hurts more after exercise (especially after a visit with my trainer).

She also prescribed some really cool analgesic patches that I can apply directly to my hip rather than having to take yet another pill. This way the pain relief gets right where the pain is. I can't wait to try them, I am going to put one on right after dinner tonight.

She also suggested that I should try adding a Probiotic supplement to my diet for the next few weeks because of all of the trouble I have been having since my bout with food poisoning a week ago. She thinks I need to get back the good stuff my body lost.

It all makes a lot of sense to me. I am all for feeling good for a change. I want to get back on track with workouts and I haven't felt like I can go all out since Florida because of the pain in my hip. I am very hopeful.

Pax

This Too, My Child. Shall Pass

I received a note from my Dr. yesterday stating that my CAT scan last week was
"probably normal" which is "probably reassuring" at best.

What they did find was a small unobstructive kidney stone which is most likely the source of the pain I am experiencing. It should pass without any surgical intervention, so I am supposed to do nothing except wait it out, with the aide of pain medication as needed.

So I will continue to take pain meds and offer up the residual pain for the needs of those who are less fortunate than myself. My spiritual director said I could offer up my suffering for those caught up in false accusations of rumors that have their lives torn asunder. Since he didn't specify beyond this wasn't a personal request, one can only speculate as to whether he had someone on the Political landscape in mind!

If anyone else has someone who specifically needs prayers that I can offer up, please let me know.

If my pain continues for more than a week I am to make another appointment, and the Dr. will schedule a colonoscopy. Having survived one of those already, forewarned is forearmed. I am praying that everything passes as it should and there will be no need for the further tests. We all know how much I enjoy those "pleasantly flavored" elixirs from the hospital!

Pax

The Lord Provides

It's been said that God first separated the salt water from the fresh, made dry land, planted a garden, made animals and fish... All before making a human. He made and provided what we'd need before we were born. These are best & more powerful when eaten raw. We're such slow learners...; God left us a great clue as to what foods help what part of our body!

A sliced Carrot looks like the human eye. The pupil, iris and radiating lines look just like the human eye.. And YES, science now shows carrots greatly enhance blood flow to and function of the eyes.

Tomato has four chambers and is red. The heart has four chambers and is red. All of the research shows tomatoes are loaded with lycopine and are indeed pure heart and blood food.

Grapes hang in a cluster that has the shape of the heart. Each grape looks like a blood cell and all of the research today shows grapes are also profound heart and blood vitalizing food.A

Walnut looks like a little brain, a left and right hemisphere, upper cerebrums and lower cerebellums. Even the wrinkles or folds on the nut are just like the neo-cortex. We now know walnuts help develop more than three (3) dozen neuron-transmitters for brain function.

Kidney beans actually heal and help maintain kidney function and yes, they look exactly like the human kidneys.Cel ery, Bok Choy, Rhubarb and many more look just like bones. These foods specifically target bone strength. Bones are 23% sodium and these foods are 23% sodium. If you don't have enough sodium in your diet, the body pulls it from the bones, thus making them weak. These foods replenish the skeletal needs of the body.

Avocados, Eggplant and Pears target the health and function of the womb and cervix of the female - they look just like these organs. Today's research shows that when a woman eats one avocado a week, it balances hormones, sheds unwanted birth weight, and prevents cervical cancers. And how profound is this? It takes exactly nine (9) months to grow an avocado from blossom to fruit. There are over 14,000 photolytic chemical constituents ofnutrition in each one of these foods (Modern science has only studied and named about 141 of them).

Figs, are full of seeds and hang in twos when they grow. Figs increase the mobility of male sperm and increase the numbers of Sperm as well to overcome male sterility.

Sweet Potatoes look like the pancreas and actually balance the glycemic index of diabetics.

Olives assist the health and function of the ovaries. Oranges, Grapefruits, and other Citrus fruits look just like the mammary glands of the female and actually assist the health of the breasts and the movement of lymph in and out of the breasts.

Onions look like the body's cells. Today's research shows onions help clear waste materials from all of the body cells. They even produce tears which wash the epithelial layers of the eyes. A working companion, Garlic, also helps eliminate waste materials and dangerous free radicals from the body.

Now go eat what your body needs.

h/t to Kitchen Madonna for this wonderful information.

Pax

What I Don't Know About Arthritis . . . Can Ruin My Nights

I have had a few miserable nights lately due to arthritis pain. I wake up in the middle of the night with really horrible pain in my joints, especially my hands and feet. Last night it was worst in my fingers. It hurts to the point that I can't get back to sleep.

It makes me wonder if I'm doing something wrong in the evenings, or there isn't something I could be doing to make my nights better. So I did some Internet research today and found this site. It describes some over the counter remedies I can try to help with the pain I am experiencing in the night (from something as simple as a hot bath before bed to using something like Biofreeze on my painful hands in the middle of the night. I have used it after exercise but never thought to try it for pain in the night.

Another thing I found in another article was that taking red pepper capsules or ginger root capsules might be helpful, but I want to talk to my Dr. before I try either of those without talking to someone who has tried either of them.

Another suggestion was acupuncture, but I haven't got a clue where to find an acupuncturist in Destin, so I think I will table that for a while as well.

So, maybe I will take a nice hot bath before I go to bed tonight, and keep my tube of Biofreeze on the nightstand. If I wake up in the middle of the night with hands that hurt like blazes I will try spreading some Biofreeze on them. What can it hurt?

Maybe I will even get back to sleep a little easier.

Pax

Too Achy to Think Kind of Day

So I had a pretty miserable night. My arthritis took a nasty turn on me and every joint hurt all night long. I woke up at 6:30 and took a heavy duty pain killer and then at 8:30 I took a different kind of pain killer that would piggy back with the one I took earlier. By Mass time I was able to at least look as though I could move like I normal human being, but the pain killers were wearing off pretty quickly.

The family went to the movies this afternoon, but I decided it might be a better idea if I stuck close to the medicine chest. The last thing I want to do in my condition is be in a really loud movie theater when my pain meds wear off. Trust me I have been through this before.

So, yesterday I was noodling around on the Project Gutenberg Library site and found The Man Who Was Thursday in MP4 format and downloaded it and transferred it to my IPod. I think today would be an awesome day to have some great Chesterton read to me while I snuggle up in a nice warm bed; a little hot coffee and chocolate on the nightstand right next to my bottle of arthritis medicine.

And maybe, if I feel up to it I can even knit a few rows on the sock I am working on . . . no pressure though.

The trick is knowing your limits and being prepared. Lucky for me we went out and stocked up on Godiva chocolate just the other night!!!

Pax

GO: Training Tuesday

So I am at the one month mark in my training regimen. I feel awesome. I work out with the weights four days a week (begining this week I am going to four days a week strength and cardio at the Y, up till now it was 3).

I can feel my body changing. I know that my clothes fit better, especialy my pants. Every pair of pants I own feel loose through the hips waist and thighs. I can feel changes in my abs as well, although after five pregnancies and two abdominal surgeries I am never expecting to have bikini abs again.

The annoying thing is, after four week of concentrated physical training, and two weeks of closely monitoring the types of food I am eating and cutting out all of the foods that cause me to gain weight ( in my case high simple carbohydrate foods) I don't seem to be losing any weight.

I am telling you that the scale is stalled on the exact same weight as when I began this journey. I haven't gained or lost an ounce (well I can't guarantee that as my scale isn't that precise, but I weight exactly the same to the half pound that I did four weeks ago.)

I am beginning to wonder if my inability to lose weight has something to do with the new arthritis medicine I am taking. I hate to not take it as it actually works and I am not in pain, but if the alternative is that I will begin to lose weight again maybe the trade off is worth it.

I think I should probably go and see my Dr. before I do anything as foolish as go off my medication as "an experiment". Maybe I am just building up muscle mass which is more dense than fat, and eventually when my metabolism gets this all figured out the weight loss will kick in. Maybe the lack of weight loss is being caused by another factor I'm not even aware of yet.

I know I am doing all the right things. You don't know how hard it has been for me to give up chocolate for the last week (because I am trying to limit my overall carb intake to as low as possible to see if I can jumpstart the weightloss). Being frustrated makes me want to eat a piece of chocolate all the more, but I have been very careful for the time being (I didn't even sample the yummy bars mrangelmeg gave me for Valentines day yet).

I have decided that I am going to give it till next Monday, and if I don't have any weight loss by then I am going to make an appointment with my Dr. to discuss options and figure this out, because I really do want to add weight loss to the whole "getting in shape" life change I am trying to set in motion. I will keep you posted.

PAX

Its Always Darkest . . .

My family has taken another blow. My yougest brother suffered a heart attack while working in Toronto for his company. He is up there cut off from the family and in the hospital all alone, being single. The attack was mild, praise God, and he may only have to stay in the hospital a few days, but what a scare to have to handle with no support system.

He has decided to return to the US and recouperate at my sister's house in Phoenix where he can get good care and any treatment he might need and be around family.

Please say a prayer for him. He is an avowed agnostic, but that doesn't mean that God has abandoned him.

I don't know how much more "testing" my family can handle.

Pax

What a Week!

So I began this week saying goodbye to mrangelmeg who had to fly out to meetings for his job and would be away for the balance of the week.


Then on Tuesday I went to mom's nursing home for a Care Plan committee meeting where we discussed what kind of changes were going to be in mom's near future. As I have blogged about recently mom has been falling alot because her peripheral vision is being affected. Her doctor doesn't think it is time for her to be moved from the memory care unit even though there is a chance that she still might get hurt because of her unsteadiness and the chance of being hurt in a fall. Her doctor thinks, and I agree, that she needs to be in the more active ward as long as possible. The next step will be for her to be restricted to a wheelchair full time and in the more restricted ward of the nursing home. We both want to put that day off for a little while longer and keep her active and independent while she can be. These decisions are hard. I am so glad that mom has a Dr. ther who has personal experience with a parent with this disease, because knowing that he went through this with his own father makes me trust his judgement in these decisions so much more than if I thought he were just going on textbook knowledge alone.

So, for at least a little while longer mom has the freedom to move about (with someone right by her side when she is walking, as often as they can have it that way) and remains in the active ward where she knows everyone and everyone knows her.

Wednesday was Ash Wednesday, we had two amazing gifts at Mass. Our retired priest Fr. Charlie, who has been ailing for the last few months not only said Mass, but handed out communion assisted by St. Elmo (his portable oxygen tank). We are so happy to see him able to be active in his pastoral ministry. Also Fr. Emmanuel, a priest friend who went back to his homeland of Zimbabwe Africa last year was concelebrating. He looks a little bit older an more gray, but other than that not much worse for the wear of having survived cancer. I thought the Angelbaby was going to burst all through Mass wanting to rush up onto the altar to give him a hug, but she waited patiently until after the final hymn and ran back into the sacristy, but even then he had slipped away quietly before she could get to him. That is his way.

Thursday my older sister had a mild stroke. With mrangelmeg out of town I couldn't get up to see her, but I was in touch by phone with my sister who lives with her and another sister who drove in to see if things were okay. Now that I have seen her I think she is in much better shape than my mother-in-law was after her stroke last year. She will probably be home by Monday with outpatient physical therapy for speach and swallowing. She now knows that she is diabetic and needs to take much better care of herself.

This was my week to do hospital ministry. While I was there doing my rounds I found that one of my visits was to a dear friend Aggie. She is an older woman whose husband is also in the Knights of Columbus with mrangelmeg is flat on her back in Critical Care with pancreatitis. She was extremely cranky (which is partly her normal way) on Tuesday I stayed with her for a short time. I went back on Wednesday for a bit and again on Thursday after my regular rounds. Each day she got worse instead of better. I am really scared for her. I am hoping things turn around soon for her. I don't know what her husband will do without her.

While I was visiting Aggie, another Knight friend of ours Joe came in, and we found out that he has non-Hodgkins Lymphoma! He starts chemo this week.

So, I am asking all of you to send prayers my way to all of my dear ones who need it (or are on the mend).

GO Training Tuesday

I had my first day with my trainer today. If any of you have had the experience of seeing the woman trainer from Biggest Loser who has a website and constantly screams at the people on that show when they don't perform to her satisfaction, my trainer is her polar opposite.

My trainer, Dee, is the mildest mannered woman who explains each exercise and exactly what muscle groups it is targeting (we train all six of the major muscle groups each day that we do strength training). She makes sure that it is an exercise that I am comfortable with -- in fact we tried out three different machines for abdominals before we chose the one I will be using, just to be sure I was totally comfortable.

Dee wants me to do some form of aerobic exercise every day, and her regimen of strength training every other day ( a minimum of three days a week). I have to chart my progress on a form that is there at the Y, so that each week when we meet she will be able to see what I have been doing and then when we are together we can readjust the weights and resistances as needed.

I am so happy with this relationship. I feel as though I got a great workout. While my arthritic joints are a bit sore, I expected that to happen, so I just took a bit more of my extra medicine tonight and plan to put on some Biofreeze when I get home for the evening.

I feel great, I have an exercise program that I can stick to and a trainer that I really like.

God is good, all the time.

Pax

Time to Do Something

So yesterday we went to the Y. I haven't been in a really long time. My feeble excuse has been that I have been so busy with finishing the darn Gradual School degree that I just didn't have time.

In the meantime my old nemesis Arthur has mounted a full scale invasion. In my short workout yesterday I found that his forces has marshaled troops in my right shoulder and left hip, two new spots.

I tried to get as much done as I had before, but I was afraid of really doing some damage because I'm not sure how to use certain equipment correctly.

So, I have decided that I need to stop thinking about this and do it right. I looked at the bulletin board that introduced all of the trainers available for hire and there is one that is working on a PhD in Physical Therapy. I think I will go in there on Tuesday and see if I can get him to take me on as a client. That way I can explain to him that not only do I have to deal with arthritis, but I also have the issues with my lack of an ACL in my left knee, and make sure that when I am doing the exercises and using the equipment I am actually doing good, not harm.

I am tired of not being in shape, and I want to get into shape before mrangelmeg and I go on our anniversary trip this summer, so if I get started this winter I should have plenty of time to see some good results before summer.

Wish me luck, even with the best trainer in the world it will still be up to me to do the hard work.

Hey, stop laughing, it could happen.

Pax