Van Cortlandt Park Running Trail

Yesterday I went to check out the Van Cortlandt Park Cross Country track that will be used for the 5K race I was hoping to run. Whoa, not so fast!! It’s a beautiful trail, but the hills are just too much for me. I actually managed to slow jog a lot of it, but ended up walking a lot, too. Some of the hills made me breathless just walking up them at a good clip. Maybe next year…

Van Cortlandt Park Running Track

Fortunately, there’s another race the same weekend that I might be able to do. I’m not sure yet if it will work out. I think I found out another reason why I am having such a hard time getting back in condition. The night before my pre-op, so long ago, I went into atrial fibrillation, and kept it up all during the next day. They had to admit me into the hospital to get my heart back to normal so they could operate, and after the operation, I did it again a few times, though never for more than an hour…so I got put on medication to keep it from recurring, and never got taken off. I just realized how much it slows down  the heart, which means your muscles don’t get blood! So I have an appointment next month to discuss training and heart medication, and to see if I can be weaned off at least some of it.

Stiff toes…I have found that my toes on the foot-previously-known-as-broken are getting stiff, so it’s back to foot exercises. I’m also using a toe stretcher (in moderation) and interlacing my fingers between my toes when I do a foot massage. I’ll see how it goes…

Stagnant blood chi???

I was so excited because I found out that the Cancer Center now has an acupuncturist, and for a while, treatment will be free! So I went to see her, hoping that she will be able to counteract the gelling (getting “frozen” into a position after you’ve held it for a while, like having trouble straightening up after sitting at a table) I am experiencing. She went over a bunch of stuff, then told me that the purple tinge on my tongue meant I had stagnant blood chi. Whoooo, that doesn’t sound good. Gave me a bunch of suggestions to overcome that condition.
Then she went on to discuss additional suggestions, while I continued to muse…my tongue surely isn’t always purple…etc…when suddenly I remembered:
GRAPE JUICE!!!

The Culprit

I slugged down a bunch of grape juice just before I left the house!
Shouldn’t one ask before diagnosing????