Improvise, Adapt, Overcome

There are not too many things from my childhood time with my father that I remember more than him saying: “Improvise, Adapt, Overcome.” He spent his youth in the Marines and did his tour in Viet Nam. He came home quiet with his words and wandered the country. The stories from those times are the basis of how I know him as a man. He used that Marine mindset for most of his life and in all things.

At ten years old, it is hard to understand how this might be helpful. What did I know at ten that I could apply this to? Probably a lot, but that isn’t how ten year old girls work. I am sure I pouted instead, held grudges, and wished for something better without doing anything about it.

In February, as you know, I was diagnosed with diabetes. “Improvise, Adapt, Overcome” became a silent mantra that thrummed in the back of my mind, but sort of like a cadence that I couldn’t understand. You know how you hear a familiar sound in the distance, but can’t quite place it in your mind? That sort of thing. There I was a the gym five days a week, lifting heavier weights than I ever had and with a plan. We started shaping our diet at home. Only two things on the plate, smaller plates, no more than 150 g of carbs.

I wasn’t sure if I was doing everything right even though I was losing weight and inches, but didn’t know if I was getting enough nutrients to go with my exercise, so I signed up to see Medical Bariatrics for some assistance. I suppose I didn’t think about what that silo of healthcare meant really. I walked in there excited about all the exercise I had done, the changes I had made to my diet, and hopeful that I was moving in the right direction. The doctor was lovely, but out the gate she said I was exercising “too much” and cut me back. She cut my diet back as well and made me log every morsel of food I ate. This went on for about 2 months before I ended up crying and frustrated.

I know I have mentioned somewhere in this blog along the way that I suffered from bulimia in the past and over the years I suffered through every diet known to man trying to lose weight with only transient results. I would always fall back into comfort food and gain everything back. What stayed consistent was that every time I did food/calorie tracking, I would become obsessed and alienate most people around me because it was all I could talk about. This happened again. Sorry to all my friends and family that suffered it.

Feeling a little lost, I had a conversation with my pop in my mind asking for advice. There was a lot of silence, but I was asking how to achieve my goals but in a way that serves me as an individual, not the cookie cutter weight loss program built for people who don’t have any willpower or accountability. I have both of those things. This morning in the shower, I finally heard his voice, “Improvise, Adapt, Overcome” and I understood, 40 years later, what that means.

Surviving a chronic disease like diabetes takes more than fancy gadgets and GLPs to melt the weight off. It requires commitment and perseverance. It requires an absolute overhaul of the life you were living previously. I can understand why many diabetics are successful and how they let their life be taken over by fancy medications instead of hard work. IT IS HARD WORK. There is a lot of science involved and understanding how our body systems work. This information is often left out from the general public for some reason. Even as a nurse, I had to research my medication, fine tune my workout schedules, and make choices that affect not only the present desires but the future consequences of those desires.

Needless to say, I dumped the Medical Bariatric pathway and returned to my original plan of eating as clean as possible, honoring my cravings (to an extent), and working out to a degree that makes me feel strong and complete. I am the only one who can tailor the outcomes and reach my goals so I should be the one driving the bus. I need to be accountable to me. I need to make me proud. I need to be the one calling the shots.

Today I stepped on the scale and found that I am only 0.8 pounds from my first goal of losing 20 lbs. Since February I have lose 11.75 inches from hard work and I am very proud of that. Mostly, I am excited about reversing diabetes because it is possible. Since January I dropped my HA1c from 7.0 to 6.7 and that was without the help of gadgets and magic potions. Just hard work and less food.

This will probably be my last medical post for awhile as I am now able to concentrate on something other than medical things. I have a new book coming out this summer. More on that in another post.

Thank you for reading. Be kind to YOURSELF. Be kind in general. Read. Write. Laugh as much as possible.

Aleathia