Crashing and Crackhead Physiology 101

That's me smiling at you!  This picture was on the CD I requested from the CT scan I had done the day I was in the ER.  The reason my teeth are all lit up is that the front 8 (top 4 and bottom 4 central) all have posts/crowns from a rollerskating crash when I was 26, and many of my other teeth have regular crowns on them.  So lots of gold and other metals in there.

I still remember that crash--I was on the Chicago lakefront path at Diversey, and I was wearing red short shorts and a red/white striped tube top (yes I was quite the fashion victim back then), and I was heading north and just missed jumping this 2.5" sidewalk rise.  Both skates crashed into the tiny wall, and I did a face plant onto the concrete, blacked out, and woke up in an ambulance.  Luckily, that day there was a lawyer and paramedic hanging out on the lakefront, and they called the ambulance for me.  I was shaken, but didn't feel too bad other than knowing I'd scraped up my arms and legs.

I passed out again on the way to the hospital (I guess I did go into shock), and when we got there they put me in a room and at that point I was OK to sit up.  Of course someone had removed my rollerskates from my feet and put my tube top back into place.  I guess it had kind of come off my boobs when I crashed.

A doctor came into the room and began examining me and cleaning me up.  I don't remember being X-rayed, as he checked my arms and legs and everything was moving just fine, but then he gave me Betadine and some cotton balls and told me to go work on my face myself since it was going to hurt.  While I was in some pain and knew I'd hit my face, I had no clue what it looked like.

Well I went into the bathroom and saw myself in the mirror and almost fainted!  I became nauseous and had to sit on the floor a few moments, then I got back up and worked on myself.  There was a cut from my lip to my nose (that did not require stitches), and the left side of my face was a giant road rash, including bits of rock and such.  My upper lip was pretty swollen, too.  I kept yelling OUCH while carefully removing bits of debris from my face.  That's when I got a good look at the rest of me, too.  I'd scraped my left shoulder pretty bad, about 8" of my left shin and somehow both elbows.  I looked like I'd been in a car accident!

So after I cleaned up, I went back into the room, they pronounced me ugly but OK to go home, and I was only maybe 1/2 mile from my apartment, so I decided to walk home in the hospital slippers, with my skates slung over my non-scraped right shoulder.  I got a lot of funny looks because of my outfit, the skates, the slippers, and then of course, my face.  My younger sister, Lisa, was staying with me that weekend, and I'd called her from the hospital to get my insurance card info, and she freaked out, but I told her I was OK.

When I got back to my apartment and Lisa opened the door, she started crying when she saw me.  While I was in a little pain, it wasn't that bad, but it was funny to me that she started crying.  I told her I was fine, and then I began to wonder how I was going to wear regular clothes to work with all the scrapes.  I knew nylons (popular back then) were out of the question, and I didn't think I could wear a bra (not that I needed one) over my left shoulder.

The next day I did get on the bus (#151 Sheridan) to go to work.  I found out what it feels like to be looked at when you are disfigured.  My face was a huge mess, now turning into a giant scab on the left side, and of course the swollen lip and cut to my nose.  Some people looked at me in horror, some scowled like I didn't belong on the bus.  I do remember the bus driver joking with me saying, "I bet the other guy looks a lot worse!"  I did have a good laugh about it.

When I got to work, my then boss nearly lost it when she saw me.  She asked why I'd come into work, and I said I felt fine, I just looked bad.  That was when I decided that sometimes it's OK to call into work UGLY!  Nobody in the office could believe I was brave enough to go out in public looking the way I did.  But what was I supposed to do?   Sit at home and be ugly?  I couldn't do that.

Anyway, I just had fun remembering all this.  My face healed up just fine and I don't have any scars from it, but my front 8 teeth had to have root canals and crowns, although I didn't know this for a few years.  At any rate, somehow I didn't break any bones during that crash, but it was pretty spectacular, all things considered!

Now back to my physiology.  I got the test results back from wearing the heart monitor harness. It revealed that what I thought were palpitations were nothing, so there were no adverse findings.  But it recorded my heart rate all the time I was wearing it.  Turns out my resting heart rate is 44!   If I recall, that's about what it was back in 2001 after I had arthroscopy on my left knee.  Turns out 44 is off the charts good for a woman of my advanced age. Actually I am off the chart for an 18 year old girl!  Some of that is my genetic bradycardia, but of course, a resting heart rate that low is also indicative of my fitness, and I would say that I am NOT overtrained based on this.  Maybe I am nearly dead, though!

There are other interesting aspects of my physiology.  My VO2Max is 58, which is sky-high for a woman my age according to this chart. Again, my VO2Max is off the chart for an 18-year old girl.  This is why I am such an endurance freak.

My most recent cholesterol numbers are HDL 80, triglycerides 47 and LDL 122.  So pretty damn good.

The EKG I had in the ER didn't show anything untoward, and apparently there are no robots or monkeys in my brain.  So all I'm left to contend with at this time is the (barely) osteoporosis and hypothyroidism.

The hypothyroidism is my bane, and right now we don't know what my body is doing or why.  My doctor thinks we caught my thryoid when it's just crapping out, but I'm not convinced.  I think I am just extremely sensitive to stress (including training stress) and that it fluctuates.  So I will continue on with my plan of running the thyroid panel every 6 weeks to see what it does at various points in my training cycle.  Even though I tested hypothyroid, the worst I've been measured at, I don't really feel all that bad.  But I did notice I put on a few pounds, and that just shouldn't be happening with all the training I am doing.  But, we are once again increasing my levothyroxine, probably to the point where I am nearly hyperthyroid and that should strip these excess pounds right off me without any effort.  That is how sensitive my physiology is!

The nice thing, though, is that I found an article that explains that I did not MAKE my thyroid do what it's doing.  Remember that I have actually been hypothyroid far longer than I have been doing endurance sports.  At least that's what the tests say.  It could be that when I was tested 15 years ago while depressed that the depression caused the reading.  Or vice versa.  We just don't know.  But there is precedence.

So overall, I would appear to be in good health and there are just some puzzling aspects to my physiology that bear further investigation.  My brother Mike said his doctor is asking him about his siblings, so I can report all my data to him, because a lot of the above is genetic.  However, I am the only child of my siblings who has put my physiology to the test with the lifestyle I lead.  I am happy that I am able to see hard data about myself.  I intend to have at least CBC and metabolic panel run every 6 months now, and next year I will have another bone scan to see if my bones are maintaining (I have a feeling they are even though I've stopped meds for the time being).  I hope my doctor is finding it fascinating to work with someone like me.  I think next time I see her in the office, I am going to tell her how Ironman/Ultraman training really works.  While she knows what an Ironman is, I doubt she (or most people, for that matter) really knows how much training is involved.  I love the fact that she has never once told me to stop doing it, and so far, there is nothing telling me that I need to.  Heart is fine, BP is fine, blood is fine, cholesterol is fine, weight is fine, bones could be better, but even that is genetic (my maternal Grandma had osteoporosis and I think to an extent so did Mom although they never measured it since she never broke a hip), mind is fine for the time being.

Oh yeah the other day some asshole at my pool told me I have no life!  Really.  REALLY?  I told him he had no fucking right (and yes I said FUCKING) to make that statement.  He thinks because all he knows about is that I train a lot that that's all I do.  Well obviously, this blog is mainly about THAT, so to a reader, what else would you think?  But I don't judge others' lifestyles--I figure if a person is happy, that's all that matters, right?  Even if their hobby is collecting potato chips that look like people.  Every single day I feel like I am living the SHIT out of life between my job, my training and racing, my friends and family, gardening, cooking, sewing, reading and whatever else I find time for.  I guess if that's not having a life, then I should probably off myself right now!

Despite the continuing science experiment that is me, I am really super happy, even as I am training like a beast right now.  I can't always do the intensity I want to, and I think that is what is most affected by my thyroid, but I can sure put in the volume, and this week will hit close to 21 hours, which is pretty hefty.  I continue to overcome whatever my thyroid is doing, and for that I am extremely grateful.  I still fucking love fucking training hard, it still feels really awesome to me even when my legs are sore and I'm fatigued most of the time, and it makes me mentally sharp.  So until further notice:

The "Device" and Fashion Update

Yesterday I went back to the hospital to get what they term a "holter" (I once dated a Steven Holter is that the same?), which is like a continuous EKG thing.  You wear the electrodes and the little pack that collects the data for whatever period of time your doctor wants.  Last week, my doctor asked me if I wanted to do this because I'd periodically experienced what feel like palpitations.  Since I have now given myself over to all the science experiments on me, and this is just a mechanical test, NOT drug-induced, I said sure, why not?

I did not know what the thing looked lie or how big it was.  I guess I was thinking standard heart rate monitor stuff, so a strap around my ribcage.  I wasn't looking forward to that, since when I fell last week, I strained and/or bruised my left pec major (also the external oblique, but that's just fine now and I'm left with pec strain but it's coming along nicely), and my ribcage is a bit bony as it is, and I dislike heart rate monitor straps.

I went into the room with 2 techs--primary and a guy who is learning.  I figured I'd have to strip off my shirt so they could put the thing on, so I told them I had no self-consciousness about nudity, but the woman just began attaching electrodes to me, and then she showed me the measuring device, which is smaller than many phones, and all the electrodes hook into it.  She asked if I wanted a belt for it, and I said yeah, I will be biking and running with it on.  No hospital nudity was required--she just lifted up my shirt and felt me up a little!

I had a nice chat with the techs about my bizarre physiology (a bit manic yet hypothyroid; bradycardic yet a Crackhead), and I think they enjoyed hearing about someone other than a couch potato.  I also told them how I could feel my left pulmonary artery pulsing where I'd injured my pec, so the pec inflammation must be irritating it.  I tell you, I know more about the human body than many medical people!  But it's my business to know about my body in order to do what I'm doing and attempting to stay healthy.

So the deal is to write down when I feel weirdness in my heart and at what time.  I am keeping a small spreadsheet of the main things I did yesterday and this morning, just so when the graph of the EKG comes back I can see what my heart does when I am doing certain things.  I am particularly interested in what happens about 1.5 hours after I take the levothyroxine, because I can usually feel my heart start to get all excited.  I am sure they will tell me this doesn't really happen, but LET'S GO TO THE EKG DATA, WOLF (I'm thinking of Wolf Blitzer here LOL).

Anyway, here I am all electroded up:

There are 5 electrodes on me, and you can see the battery-powered measuring device on my left hip.  It doesn't weigh very much (maybe 4 oz.), and since once upon a time in a land far, far away, I used to wear a Walkman on a belt when running, it didn't really bother me. In fact, I had to remind myself to write stuff down for a few hours there.  To date, I experienced what felt like palpitations to me twice, but I'm expecting them in another hour, as I took the levothyroxine about 40 minutes ago.  2 weeks ago when I felt them, it was more central under my sternum, but now they are by my left pulmonary artery.  I suppose it's possible that because I fell on that pec that I have just inflamed that area.  Whatever, we will see what we see.

I had to do a 2-hour ride yesterday, and it was raining and crappy, and I needed to monitor something at work anyway, so it was hop on the trainer.  My training schedule calls for 11.5 hours of biking this week, and I'm pretty sure it will ALL be on the trainer.  That will be a first to do that much all on the trainer!  But I couldn't give a fuck, it has to be done, I have plenty of HTFU and tunes and movies and Infinit!

Here I am ready to start my ride.  I busted out a vintage Zoot outfit that I hadn't worn in a few years.  I think I look really fat, but the shorts seem to fit just fine.  I got that cool silver skull at Walgreen's yesterday on the way home from the hospital!  I check Walgreen's every October, because I usually find some sort of cool Halloween thing, and I was happy to find this because it reminds me of Terminator:

I really didn't notice the monitor while I was on the bike since I had all the electrode cords channeled so I wouldn't get all tangled up on the bike!  I think it was a good idea I was riding on the trainer, because if I'd gone outside with the device, I might have got it wrapped around the bars and crashed!

I had a great ride of 2 hours.  I lengthened it from 1:30 so that I can ride 1/2 hour less on Sunday, when I'm cooking dinner for 2 girlfriends, Lori and Shelley.  I ran :25 on my treadmill, Hal, at a super easy pace.  Turns out I wasn't supposed to run off the bike, oh well, I guess my coach will punish me for that!  I couldn't take a full shower afterwards, so I got in the tub and hung the device on the shower door handle, washed from the waist down, then did my arms and neck.  At 5:30 I went to get a haircut and asked my girl Clorinda to shave my head.  It's really short again, because with all this riding, I can't stand extra hair, although I let her leave slight bangs.  My final haircut before IMCOZ I will get totally shaved down, cuz that's how I roll.  It was nice to finally get my hair washed after walking around being a disgusting pig after working out.

On Saturday I'm riding 5:30, and me and my girls are going out for sushi (I will try not to pass out on them), and then on Sunday I'm riding 3:30 and running :40 off the bike, will lay down for a bit after that and pass out or not, and then I will complete the prep for our Sunday dinner.  Below are the Elvis Presley pound cakes that I baked on Sunday, and following that is the full dinner menu:

• Cheese and crackers while I'm cooking
• Asparagus bundles with fontina and prosciutto.  These are easy to fix, and will take me no more than 1/2 hour to cook the asparagus, make the bundles, and then ready them for the final baking in the oven.
• Fettucine with bacon/Gorgonzola sauce.  I made the sauce last night except for the addition of the cheese, so that will take all of 5 minutes.
• Roast chicken with garlic, lemon and rosemary.  This will take maybe 15 minutes of prep time and then into the oven for just over 1.5 hours.
• Dessert will be the Elvis Presley pound cake with gelato (I have hazelnut and coconut) drizzed with optional Grand Marnier

Sounds like a good meal, huh? We will drink good French champagne with dinner, as there is much to celebrate!  There will, of course, be leftovers, and I expect to send some home with both my girls.  I do love to cook, especially when I can do a whole meal like this for others.  I don't really have a whole lot of time to cook right now, but with planning, I was able to put this together with my schedule.  This will be a great reward for my big training week, too!

I only have about :45 left to wear the monitor, then I will strip off the electrodes, take off the strap, and go for a swim. After that, I will drive to hospital to drop off the device.  It will take them about 2 weeks to look through the recorded data.  Should be interesting.  I do know that I have a mitral valve prolapse that is nothing to worry about (I had an echocardiogram some years back to confirm), but it will be interesting to me to see what my heart is doing while I exercise now, since it's been so long since I've worn a heart monitor.

Meanwhile, we've upped my levothyroxine so I take 75mcg twice a week (I'm doing it on Monday and Friday), and then we will retest me during my taper.  Man, I really would like to be dialed in for race day, but who the fuck knows what is happening with my body yet?  The fucking science experiment continues...

But despite all this hassle, I continue to be grateful that I am able to keep training and living life to the fullest possible for the moment. Aspects of my life are a royal pain in the ass right about now, but things could be much, much worse.  At some point, we will get my thryoid function dialed in, and then I will get to see how/who I really am!  Can you imagine what my body might be able to do with all my mitochondria working at 100%?  The prospect of that is what keeps me from freaking out about all this.  I mean look what I've been able to do with sub-optimal thyroid function for years.  I think it will feel something like this when I am finally fixed up: