11/29 & update on hubby & exercise in general (long)

[Guest guest]

> Sounds like a great plan (except maybe the burger -- think broiled chicken

Around here they're all breaded, anyway.

We wound up not going there because of the rain, anyway, but driving to a

different bookstore and mall. After 3 hours being out, by that evening Ed

was in so much pain, saying his knee hurt almost as bad as the first few

nights when he needed the Darvocet just to lie in bed! So, Friday he gets on

the phone to everyone involved and has made arrangements to stay out on

temporary disability until he can actually stay on his feet for 8 hours.

Heaven help me! LOL

At least now he's taking it easy, keeping it elevated and using the heating

pad instead of trying to be macho and return to full activities before he's

ready. He's also using this time to *really* search for a new job, one that

will allow him to work indoors at a desk again like he did for 26 years

before he was laid off. With things the way they are here and jobs in his

field even *more* scarce since Sept. 11, he may be desperate enough to

actually take a teaching job until he finds something else.

> out -- I think it's from not enough water yesterday. It was a crazy day

at

> work.

When I was still working full time I would feel the same way. All the

doctors used to look at us nurses and tell us what a pathetic looking bunch

we were, so dragged out. Here we were, literally running around the unit for

8 solid hours without even a lunch break most days, and these guys had the

nerve to tell us what we need is not rest but to exercise more! We made a

deal with one of them - you stay on our floor and do the work of a nurse for

one shift, *then* tell us we need more exercise. If you still think that way

at the end of the say, we'll do it. This guy was a year younger than most of

us (he's my own family doctor now, by the way) and was just starting out in

the family's practice and took us up on the challange. He came in at 7:15am,

claiming he was late because he couldn't park (our perrenial complaint - the

hospital lot is for doctors only but only from 9am - 4pm and he was too

early). He got a full assignment and was treated as one of us. He lasted

until 9am when he *demanded* he get a coffee break but was told by the head

nurse it was too busy and we were too short-staffed for him to leave the

floor for a break, to do what we do - grab a cup next time we have to run

into the bathroom, gulp it down, then rush out to get back to your patient

because now his doctor is waiting for you to assist him in changing a

dressing.

This doctor was *much* nicer to us nurses after that day, and never again

told us we needed more exercise.

As I mentioned, he's my family doc, too, and not once did he ever tell *me*

that, either. When Henry was a baby and I first started having the fatigue

and low blood sugar problems he even said it can't be the lack of exercise,

becasue he, too, had a baby home and said he knows what his wife goes

through with her. 18 years as my doc and the *only* time he told me to

exercise was when he gave me *specific* exercises to strengthen my back and

neck, never towards the goal of weight loss.

>As for a plan, I haven't even figured out what to

> have for breakfast yet! I'll work on it and try to get back here

later....

Today's an oatmeal day for me.

Sue in NJ