other footwear is really a good thing to do gradually. It's very important to do the one, two hour plus build up to prevent new and different blisters.

Something I'm sure you don't want, nor does Alan?

He will also probably find that walking normally in is 'old shoes' is going to need some adjustment/readjustments physically as well as 'toughening' tender skin that's not been rubbed 'that way' in a while.

I truly hope that all goes according to plan! - j

Thanks Melody. I responded back. For the cards its like my therapy too and gives me a good feeling. I love to card shop and send cute ones. Your right people are in a rush. Many of my friends are always in the fast lane. I think for many if mine is cause they don't stop and think but rush into things. They don't worry about the end result and just think in the now. I have been the opposite as I obsess and worry. I do feel many people are just into them when don't have extreme issues. I feel people who have struggles not just with pain but other things have more depth and compassion. They take the little things in life with pleaure. Like you say taking a walk in less pain. On the husband note and orthotics but also make sure he has good shoes and replaces them. I used to be a former runner before the pn and making sure to change shoes in the right time can help with support and blisters. It maybe expensive but really in the long rum saves money and pain.

Hi Mel, i am glad it's healing up for Alan they are such awful looking things.
I had to laugh when you said before " your not human before 9.0am " , i am as thick as a brick until i have my second mug of coffee in the morning, then i am slightly becoming human then too
all the best
Brian

Hi Brian:

If I am addicted to anything in this world, it's my first cup of coffee. We go to Dunkin Donuts and I see people ordering Iced Lattes and Frapucino, this and Cappucino blasts, and all things with ice, and I just look at them and go "oh my god, don't they know that a nice cup of hot coffee in the morning makes a person a human being??? lol

And get this....yesterday, I got an extra large container of Hot Dunkin Donuts Coffee with a little caramel, half and half and splenda. I thought I died and went to heaven.

So Alan and I are having our breakfast and there was a lot of coffee left over so I put it in the fridge. And this was yesterday. Today, I looked and said "oh, cold Dunkin Donuts Coffee, let me give it a try". I died and went to heaven again. Never had cold coffee before. Oh my goodness, on a hot day, it was glorious.

But in the morning, hot coffee.....the only way to go.


Now lets get back to Alan and the one hour a day with the shoe thing.

If the doctor tells Alan on Wednesday "Alan, tomorrow you do the one hour a day", do you think it's a good idea if Alan does this when we get up first thing in the a.m.??? We can go for breakfast, walk around the neighborhood doing our grocery shopping, that will take about an hour, then he can come home and put the boot back on.

Or, when people do the hour a day, do they put their regular shoe on at night, for one hour, or does it really make any difference when you do the hour? Anybody here ever have this experience?

Thanks, Melody

Dahlek:

You should see Alan's foot ulcer, It's almost gone. This shoe boot thing is like a miracle. The only thing to wait on is how he will do after the shoe boot thing heals. We can only hope that the ulcer doesn't re-cur.

Only time will tell.

I'm not having such a good day today. It's not about me. It's about my friend with the Stage 4 lung cancer. Just spoke to her on the phone. Because of her anorexia, she is down to probably 60 lbs. Her aides can't force her to eat anything and she sounded very fragile. It was like I was talking to an 95 year old fragile woman and she's my age. She then said "if you come, my eyes will be blanked when they look at you." She said this twice and I have no idea what she meant. Not looking good.

My goodness, it started with the emphasema, then she got the cough, then the diagnosis. Really, we don't know how she holds on. I don't live near her but this weekend I'll take the access-a-ride to make one last visit to her.

I've lost relatives, parents, etc, but I've never lost a friend before.

Kind of leaves you numb.

oh well.

Melody

I'm so sorry for your friend. I know how hard it is to watch your friend die. I have friends that still suffer from anorexia and its real hard to watch. There is only so much others can do and just telling the suffer your there is the most important. For your friend it sounds like she is at a point where she can't make clear choices from being underfed. I hope things turn around. As for your husband I'm glad he is doing better. How are you doing? I love DD too and have to have my coffee in the morning. It doesn't matter from where just a must. My new place is Panera. Yum!

Hi Daniella:

Right now, it's 8:45 a.m. and I'm waiting for Alan to phone me up and tell me he's at Dunkin Donuts and ready for breakfast. He gets off work at 8 a.m.

Oh, I saw the most fascinating thing on tv last night. It's called Intervention. I believe it's on A & E.

Last night they were doing an intervention on a 28 year old woman who is a drug user. I don't understand the drugs that are used today but she was taking this long tube and she put a piece of paper under the tube and she let the smoke go in her mouth.

Now what really made me sit up and notice was that they were planning an intervention for this young woman.

The father was sitting in the living room counting out $100. He looked at the camera and said "I hate this. I work hard for my money, and I have to give her money to pay her dealer???? "This stinks". I said to myself "why is he giving his daughter drug money??" Then she went out to a car and bought whatever she bought.

I found out he did this so she would participate in the what she thought was a special on people who takes drugs and the camera would be following her around. She had no idea they were setting her up for an intervention.

Now what makes this applicable to this post is that her mother was flying in from another state. Her mother was anorexic. She exercises 6 hours a day. She must weigh 80 lbs. All she does is run, walk, go on treadmills.

She spoke to the camera and she knows she has anorexia but she doesn't want to eat. She agreed to participate in the Intervention program to help her daughter. So the mother shows up at her former home and there's the husband who doesn't know why the wife left. He is perplexed. He says to the camera "I have two women here who I love most in this world, my wife's anorexic, and my daughters a junkie.

The mother started to yell at the father saying "I have issues, don't you know I have issues". The daughter went up to the room and did her smoke pipe thing.

They had a nice house, etc.

Then they did the intervention when everybody is sitting around about the confront the girl (who has no idea they are all going to be there in one room and do an intervention on her).

I fell asleep. I don't know what happened to the mother and the daughter. They do repeat this often. I can't wait to find out if the mother or the daughter got help. The mother said she was open to discuss it but then when she had a fight with her husband, she ran out of the house and she ran 10 miles.

How can anybody run so much, exercise so much and not fall apart.

My friend (who is sick), used to walk with me. I could never keep up with her. Then one night she pannelled her whole living room. She never slept. She had all this energy in a tiny body.

Most amazing thing I ever saw.

But in her case (she smoked all her life till she got the emphasema at 51). Then, well, everything hit her at once. She has all this family (compared to me, because we don't have anyone but each other). So she has all this family but no one can stand her because of what she put everybody through.

Everybody has a story. This much I know.j

Oh well.

It's very nice to speak to you. I wish you a nice cup of coffee this morning.

lol

Melody

Hi Melody:

Good for you and Alan for dealing with your problems instead of claiming everything is an addiction and you are helpless victims of this. I am so tired of hearing about addictions. I think they are bad habits and can be changed. (Waiting now for some to throw tomatoes!)

I admire you both for changing your habits and becoming healthier people. You are both setting good examples for the rest of us.

Shirley H.

Hi Shirley:

Well, it took me getting Diabetes, (even that didn't stop me from eating). I'll never know when the lightbulb moment happened but at least it happened. Too bad it didn't happen when I turned 30.

It was just easier to sit in front of the tv with a bag of chips, and dips, etc. I'll never forget the night my son left home when he was 20. I just went into the bedroom with two ding dongs, some yodells, and a big glass of SKIM milk. Yes, that's right, look how dumb my brain was??? SKIM MILK. Like that was going to solve everything. But I medicated myself into a coma that night.

Food (actually sweet and salty), did it for me. Didn't need a pill, or a drink. Guess it was the carbs in the ding dongs and the salt in the chips. Man, do I remember those party mix chip things, and my favorite, was the Dipsy Doodles Corn chips. Oh my god, have you ever eaten them? You could go to heaven from the salt alone. I could put away bags of those in one night, and go to bed completely saturated. OF course, god only knows what it did to my sugar!!!!

Oddly enough, once the lightbulb went off in my head, it stayed off. Don't know why.

Last year, I went to my husbands niece's house for a birthday party. They live in a mansion in New Jersey. You should have seen what was laid out on the table. In all my life, I never saw so many goodies. Thank God, I had that lightbulb thing go off in my head because I would have gained 20 lbs that day.

And they had food I didn't know what it was. I asked someone "what is that white stuff and they said 'herring in white cream sauce". Now I'm italian and my hubby is jewish so this was a party where most people are jewish. I do not know what herriing in a white cream sauce was and I wasn't about to find out. It's some kind of fish in a white cream sauce. Italians do not eat fish in a white cream sauce. Then they had some baked brie. Didn't touch that.

They did have all kind of wraps but they were the biggest wraps (filled with kosher stuff and really wide), I knew I couldn't eat that either.

Then they had a sald with cran-raisins in it. Never had a salad with those. Man, it was absolutely delicious. I knew I wouldn't go home and buy cran raisins because I'm diabetic, but honestly it was the lowest calorie thing at the party. So I had a small dish. Oh, they had smoked salmon. And whitefish. A big gold fish in the middle of the platter. It was absolutely delicious.

Then, in the party room , there were bowls and bowls of ........you guessed it......my nemesis, THE CHIPS AND THE DIPS.

Didn't go near it. But I did see a bowl of something I never saw before. It's some kind of flat pretzel thing. It's baked, not fried. I had exactly five. Let me tell you this. If this was invented five years ago, I'd be 300 lbs. That's how intoxicating these little pretzel things were. I tasted them. I said "delicious", then I walked away.

My husband's niece is 5 feet 10, weighs about 130 and could be a model. I love these tall skinny people who can eat whatever they want and nothing happens. I wasn't so lucky.


And I have a questions. There are terms like "guilty pleasures, vices, habits and addictions".

Exactly what is the difference between these things????

My doctor once asked me "you never cheat??" and I said "well, I do have a guilty pleasure, once in a while I'll have a baked potato with my dinner" and my doctor laughed and said "oh my god, Melody, if you're going to cheat, cheat with something that's worth cheating with". We all laughed and I said 'well, I have neuropathy, and if I cheat, my sugar will go up, my neuropathy will act up, and who on earth wants that". She looked at me and said "if only all my patients thought like you!!!"

I just said "hey it took me 55 or so years to think like this. It doesn't happen overnight"

But I get to dress up in pretty skirts (that are not black), I get to wear pretty tops (that are not black and long and tunics) and I get to wear low-cut blouses that makes Alan say to me "you are not leaving the house dressed like that!!!"

What till he sees me when I'm 70.

Oh Lord!!!! lol