My Awesome Doc and Mario Week 2 Recap

As a city employee, I get good benefits. The best, I know as a wife and mom, is health insurance, but that's not as sexy (to me) as the free membership I get to the Boulder Recreation Center, home of my weight training and spin classes. One condition of this membership, though, is that I have to get my blood drawn every year for a cholesterol/glucose analysis as part of the City Wellness Program.

This meant a visit to my doctor at the Boulder Center for Sports Medicine this morning. My doctor is *great.* He effectively fixed my Morton's neuroma back in February, was super kind when I came down with a kidney infection in July after the ZOOMA Women's Half and he's been helping me try to get to the bottom (so to speak) of my tricky intestines.

He's also a badass runner. This morning I had the following conversation with him before the Wellness Program blood draw. Have you ever had a conversation like this with your doctor?

HIM: So your kidneys have been OK? No residual pain?
ME: Oh yeah. That was the other thing about my marathon. 15-minute PR, no pooping during the race, and no bladder infection! Yeah, they've been fine.
HIM: Great! You know, I ran Chicago on Sunday.
ME: Really?! How'd you do?
HIM: Well, I'm a master now, I'm 41, and there's good money at that race for masters, like $2,500, so I thought I'd go for it. And I was doing great, on a 2:30 pace. But it was hot and I just couldn't eat, and at mile 17 I just died. Those last nine miles were torture. I did pull out a 2:50 but I had to walk for about 15 minutes at one point.
ME: (trying not to let my mouth drop open at "2:30 pace" and "2:50") Yeah, that happened to me in my race too...except I DID eat. Makes me feel better that guys like you walk sometimes, too.
HIM: Yeah, it was my first marathon. I really want to do another one now and get it right. I guess I should do Boston, since I qualified.

I guess!! His first marathon! 2:50! And that was with a bonk! He told me he had four GUs in his pockets during the race and couldn't bring himself to touch them.

I'm so glad this guy is treating me, that there is a facility like this here. A couple weeks back, I was in there briefly and had the door opened for me by Frank Shorter. Ah Boulder.

Today is Tuesday, so that meant weighing in. Not such good news on the body fat front today....my home scale read 22.5%, and because I had to leave weights class early for the doc appointment, I didn't have a chance to get my trainer, Chris, to do a measurement with the calipers as I had planned. My weight, at least, was unchanged on the home scale at 128.4 pounds, and a little lower on the gym scale, at 128.2. I might have been a bit dehydrated, as I had to fast for the blood draw and had run 6 miles in the wee hours.

The second week of the Mario Lopez Extra Lean Family eating plan didn't go quite as smoothly as the first, though the planning, shopping and prep were once again fine. Part of the issue was it's "that time of the month" and at that time I'm always ravenous for things I shouldn't be eating--like second helpings of Mario's chicken enchiladas and other tasty things. I also caved and took the kids to a coffee shop once for their snack, which didn't harm me (I drank unsweetened green tea), but wasn't exactly easy on the pocketbook.

On the upside, we once again stayed out of restaurants entirely (two weeks of no eating out is a record, I think), and my fruit and vegetable consumption is way up. This week I'll do my best to keep the portions reasonable again, and my hands out of the snack trough at work. I'm still really liking the ease of this plan. I actually ordered Mario's book. It's a big deal for this cheap librarian to actually BUY a book, if that tells you anything.

Finally, I have MET my $500 goal for the Houston Marathon/Houston Food Bank's Run for Food Program. YOU FOLKS ROCK!! In fact, at $506, I'm now just $94 away from the $600 level at which I have promised to do a giveaway of some tasty and healthful Boulder goodies. Can you help me keep it going? If so, go to my fundraising page and donate! A big THANKS AGAIN to all of you who have already given. I'm so happy about this.