A Huge Wow!!!!!

it will happen so quickly.  You will start having all these things that were seemingly forbidden to you because of your weight that will just be abundantly available, like walking distances, climbing stairs, booths, bathroom stalls. OMG, there are so many.  I still smile when I see the wow moments of the new post ops.  It brings it all back.

Great job!

Three years ago, my wife was in a wheelchair.  Last week when we went to the mall, I got on the escalator and was pleasantly surprised to see my wife walking up the stairs next to the escalator.  I guess I should have done that myself.  And I will next time.

George, I think that is why these walking, stair climbing, and running wows are so important for me.  I, too, was in a wheel chair for many years and for me the fact that walking was something that I had even quit dreaming about now is so effortlessly makes these wows so much sweeter.  I know your wife is happy to have her legs back as well as her ambulatory status.

Jeanne,

Funny, because other than when I was very young, or when I lived on the 4th floor of a 4 story walk up (about 10 years ago), I avoided stairs most of the time. . .  I work in Manhattan and there are 5 flights of stairs (actually 9 flights from the lowest point in the subway when I am coming into work) and two escalators leading up out of the subway at my station, lately, I find it a challenge to walk up the escalator, I generally make it 3/4 of the way now and I run down the stairs most evenings, which before I lost the weight was a very painful thought and reality and forget about me even attempting to walk up, just the stairs had me huffing and puffing. . .  my future goal will be to walk up the stairs totally.

Laureen that is great.  I think when we do these tasks that we haven't done for many years, the hardest part is not the effort but the relearning how to do it and reconditioning our muscles.  Running and climbing stairs are learned activities that come to us when we are so young that we just always know how to do it, but then when we stop and stop for many years, it is more about relearning.   Keep working it and you will soon be running from top to bottom.

Laureen, So we can count on plenty of exercise when we come visit? It seems like living in NYC, in a walkup, without a car, would almost guarantee plenty of exercise!

Karen,

Visiting NYC will put mileage on your loafers for sure. . .    back when I lived in that walkup, Dillinger was still a puppy, plus I had another dog, so I was up and down those stairs regularly, food shopping and laundry days were not welcome times, I was overweight, smoked cigarettes and did all that, but I was in my early 40s then. . .  but who said anything about not having a car?  In NYC, the best way to navigate is by foot or public transportation, however, to do things like going to beach and mall shopping you need a car ;) and I lived in the Bronx then and outer borough of NYC.

Hugs, Laureen

Laureen,

I think of the Seinfeld story about Jerry and a parking garage spot. Didn't have a car, but a spot came open, and it was a big deal to get one in ANTICIPATION of perhaps getting a car. Parking is very expensive in Seattle where my daughter used to live. She could ride the bus for several months for what it cost to park several blocks from where she worked.

I just see so many more walkers in bigger cities. Out here in the boonies everything is miles apart. We are so spoiled with being able to come and go on our schedule not someone elses. Let me tell you the rising gas costs have helped to tone that down. And I make sure I have a list and hit everywhere I need to go in one jaunt.

Years ago a friend got a divorce. She couldn't afford to keep her car which was old and always "needy." She sold it and took the bus everywhere. She lost 40 lbs in about 6 months just from that one change. She said she would find herself walking several blocks to catch a bus and before she knew it it all added up.

I know my parents never had any weight problems when young. They had built in exercise. Just day to day living involved so much of it. Think of the cooking, washing, ironing, canning, gardening, cleaning, beating rugs, and the field work. Back in Arkansas where they lived and married in 1933 they worked in the cotton fields: chopping, hoeing, picking cotton. Then came home and did all of the household stuff. Mom said she weighed 118 lbs when she DELIVERED  my brother Gary!

I digress. .  .. I do that alot!

Karen,

I am someone who can digress with the best of 'em and it's nice to see someone else with stories to share, so while I never watched Sienfeld, that episode you mentioned sounds like something a person in NYC would consider doing, if they had the thought to own a car. . .  I digress here. . .

There was a time, when my daughter's were teenagers, we lived on the 3rd floor of a 3 family residence, it was as I think on it a walkup (and how is it I managed to be obese?), anyway, I owned a car, most any city people who chose to own them, do so as a matter of convenience, in other words to possibly escape the city on weekends, as I lived two blocks from the subway I certainly would never drive to work; anyway, on the street where we lived, at one time there had been a bus route and which called for 4 day a week street cleaning rules (also known as alternate side of street parking rules), as opposed to the usual 2 days on most streets, which means that you have to keep your car off whichever side of the street is being cleaned for a period of 2 to 3 hours on that scheduled day, this is maddening when living in a City enviroment, since most of the residences are multifamily dwellings, sometimes 6 story apartment buildings, at this same time I worked 2nd shift, which was 5 p.m. to 12:30 a.m., I would get home at 1 a.m., go to sleep around 4 and have to get up to find a place to park my car by 8 a.m.  Within 9 months, because I could not adjust to sleeping in daylight and because of having to move my car 4 days a week, not getting enough sleep, I went back to working 1st shift.  The irony was that less then 6 months later they finally adjusted the rules to 2 days a week and changed the hours to 11 a.m.  1 p.m., instead of the old hours of 8 to 10 a.m.; not only had I gone back to working days, but I had found a parking space that I paid $80 a month for, which was a bargin considering that I would have to budget parking tickets into my monthly budget due to the fact that some mornings I just did not make it to the car in time to move it. 

That, dear Karen, is City living. 

I digress further to say that on the day I moved into my home here in SWNJ, I was thrilled to death that I no longer would ever face a parking ticket as I now had my very own driveway that fits 3 cars ;), however, on that day I found out that because I live on the same street as the Fire and Rescue squad, we are only allowed to park on one side of the street, should we need additional parking, and it's not my side of the street (lol). . .

Oh well. . .  hope it wasn't too boring a digression, but it would be why Sienfeld would want to get a parking space . . . 

Even Seattle has it's own parking rules. My daughter had a condo just about 6 miles north of downtown. On weekdays cars had to be out of the southbound parking lane by 6am and out of the northbound lane by 6pm; work traffic coming and going downtown. Weekends you could park on either side. I loved your digression. .  .