Kinda Crispy Lookin'

For the past several months I've been gaining weight. As in fifty or more pounds. Honestly, it has been more than I can bear - I just cannot carry around anymore. I can't walk across the room without getting winded. Any time I eat anything, it cuts into my breathing. There just ain't room.

Of course, it's water weight.

I've even been cutting way way back on portions - like I should have been for years. And now my insulin resistance has changed markedly - it takes a lot less to do the same thing. Which has gotten me in trouble a couple times - hypoglycemia is not my friend. I've considered lap band surgery in the past, but the biggest problem is that there are no "providers" in this area. Wichita, Topeka, Denver, OKC  and KC no problem. Here not so much.

Plus all this weight gain has caused me another problem - been having trouble with a pinched nerve killing feeling in my legs when I'm at home wearing underwear and a tshirt. Relaxing uniform of the day for this fat boy. Fully clothed for whatever reason does not bother me, other than not having the wind necessary to do a damn thing.

So, when the front of my thighs started going numb, I'd park my butt on a chair for a few minutes and go on about my bidness. Sunday night I gambled on making it to the ol' easy chair in front of the tv rather than having a pit stop at the kitchen table. It didn't work. My legs buckled and my butt landed on my heels. I hypercompressed the ol' toes, the foot against the ankle, and just plain exceeded the design specs of said feet.

It really didn't hurt very bad, and I was able to regain my feet in short order. I iced the left foot quite a bit, but was really quite shocked to see what you see a  couple days later. The other foot - the toes were bent back, but not badly.

So, just try to walk around without using your toes. I had an appointment for Monday, but could not see walking that far into my doctor's office. Rescheduled, by golly. Had to postpone some other appointments as well - one with my chiropractor, who had been trying to ease the nerve pinching. It's about been all I can do just to walk from one side of the house to the other, so I guess it's been just as well that my diuretics have been failing. Lots less traveling, as it were.

I went into the office with a mission - I'm tired of living like this, I have tried dieting, and even now it's not working for me. I've gotta do something, or my time is extremely limited here. I wanted a recommendation from her for a weight loss surgeon, procedure or whatever, as well as figuring out what's going on with the water retention. Not all that swelling is from bruising - my ankles and calves weren't affected by this fall. That's just water, period. You aren't seeing how my skin is erupting in blisters that are oozing fluid.

Got the advice and more. She admitted me into the hospital, where they've been x-raying and so forth, blood testing for a jillion different things, got me hooked to a Foley catheter and giving me diuretics intravenously. Congestive heart failure is the main diagnosis. Anemic, slightly higher than normal liver creatine levels, antibiotics for the infection in my foot, you name it.

Things are already progressing for the better, and there are gonna be some changes made as well. If I've got to drive to Wichita for weight counseling all the time, so be it. Otherwise, I might as well kiss my arse goodbye.

Not ready to do that yet.