And we say goodbye to 2018 and hello to 2019. I have to say I am not sorry to see 2018 vanish into the sunset and have a chance to start this rat race over, with new goals, and perhaps a bit of a new attitude.
I started off 2018 with a blood clot and I saw the New Year arrive from Tampa General Hospital where I had been admitted to on New Year’s Eve. The rest of 2018 was not pleasant health wise. I had a failure of yet another blood thinner, found out I was allergic to one of the remaining blood thinners that had worked in the past, and am now on the final blood thinner that is available to us to use. I also found out that I am developing bone spurs in some pretty obnoxious places. The one on my right foot, under my Achilles’ tendon prevents me from doing any running. Around July we finally identified where a large amount of my pain has been coming from when they found bone spurs pressing on my spinal cord at two places, and then the final kick in the gut was the bone spur that seems to be developing in my left shoulder, and that totally sucks from a swimming perspective. They put me on some pretty strong nerve block medications to help with the pain. However, mixing all these medications may have led to some additional side effects. Time will tell.
Regardless, I managed to make about half of my fitness goals for the year. In 2018 I managed to complete 145 workouts for a total of 127 hours, 2 minutes, and 40 seconds of activity time. This included: 130 swims (115:59:01) totaling 390,058 meters (242 miles), 10 hikes (8:34:16) totaling 41,720m (26 miles), 4 runs (2:17:14) totaling 18,085 meters (11 miles), and one very short bike ride at 3,356 meters (2 miles). Sorry, my watch is set for meters because it is the international standard for swimming.
I competed in three events in 2018. I swam in Swim Siesta Key in which I placed second in the my age group (and yes, there was more than one swimmer), then I swam in the Corsicana Cup at Melbourne Beach where I did not finish due to extremely rough and hazardous water conditions (I decided it wasn’t worth it when I saw a lifeguard get rescued), and then I finished up my planned competitions with the Pan Am Masters at Daytona Beach. I did not place but did finish (that was the event that showed I had something wrong with my shoulder.) The Pan Am Masters was something that I had wanted to do for some time. I think I would have placed had there not been two former Olympic champions that just happened to be in my age group swimming (sort of sucked).
Along the way I found time to go to a family reunion on Cape Cod for the week following the Pan Am Games, and had a good time up there, but came home 100% exhausted.
The Summer came and went, and then September came along with Hurricane Michael putting a bullseye on Florida. As with Irma I suddenly found myself trying to balance my full-time position at Porter and Chester Institute with all of the insurance claim inspections that was now I was being asked to do. Somehow, I managed to do it all and over the course of 2018 have inspected about 320 HVACR systems as in the beginning of the year I was still looking at Hurricane Irma damage. I spent about 6 weeks traveling running about 10 hours’ worth of inspections and then doing my 8 hours for my full-time job each day. I no longer really like to travel, and it is extremely hard on Jesse as well when I am gone that long.
In the midst of this Ranger started having more and more pain. We still do not know where he was hurting, and we will never know. We said goodbye to our old boy in the Fall of 2018. It was probably the hardest decision I ever had to make. He was not 100% ready, he was still in good spirits, but the pain was obvious, his backend was getting weaker, and his body was failing him. Ranger was 13.
We did not finish out the year well. While Jesse was gone to San Antonio for his final half-marathon of the year, I came down with the flu (yes, I did have a flu shot) and it was bad. Three weeks later and the cough is just now going away. After lots of tama-flu and other meds, sleep, and just feeling miserable I started to feel better. However, I started having massive stomach issues and pain in my throat and chest. Needless to say, when it really hit was right before Christmas, and I finished out the year by being in the emergency room and then admitted to the hospital for 4 days, I was discharged on Christmas-eve after having an upper GI scope. And another problem found. I sort of feel that at this rate in another 10 years I won’t be able to move, something has to give.
On other news, Jesse competed in a number of 5K’s and half marathons and really did well, very proud of his efforts. He already has 3 scheduled for this year.
So, what do I want for 2019?
1) NO HOSPITAL VISITS!! Seriously, I do not want to be poked and prodded for the next year.
2) I am going to come off of the nerve block medicine, I have a feeling it is causing me some side effects that I do not want.
3) I am going to get back into the pool and work up my swimming again. I am not 100% sure I am going to compete in 2019. There are some virtual events that US Masters Swimming sponsors and I may do a few of those, but I am not sure about it. I may attempt to do a few pool swim meets but they really do not interest me, been there done that, got the medals, done.
4) I have to lose weight. I am up from 201 pounds to 240 pounds in the last six months and this is not good.
5) Spend time with the dogs, they are getting older and we never know how much time is left.
6) Try to figure out why my HVACR inspection/consulting business has not succeeded here in Florida, and most likely move my efforts more to the training side of things.
I want to wish all of my friends and family a happy new year, and a much better 2019.