Just so we're clear, here's what I had done:
Week 7 starts next Monday and I'll be on the lifetime maintenance diet, which means I get to eat whatever I want, in small amounts. Right now I can eat lean chicken, turkey, fish, or seafood. I haven't been craving beef or pork as much as I thought I would, but I'm REAL tired of chicken, turkey, fish, and seafood as that's all I've been eating since week 4. Before that, I got tired of strained soups and soft foods, so progress has been made certainly.
Things that happened pretty much immediately include my knee pain practically disappearing, my plantarfaciitis going the same, and my carpal tunnel settling down. I assume those issues will continue to subside and if nothing else resulted, I'd be happy with than as those contributed to a lot of my chronic pain. I still don't walk for exercise a whole lot because that's about the only thing that aggravates my confounded knees but I do ride my recumbent bike a lot. I have a post surgical followup with my surgeon on Election Day and I expect to get cleared for swimming and maybe some aerobics if my knees will manage it. I still have some twinges of pain in my abdomen from time to time if I'm twisting or bending while lifting something so I know there's still some healing going on in there. I don't want to do anything to jeopardize how good I feel right now. I'm really looking forward to starting back to pilates but it's definitely too soon for that right now. I do a couple of crunches after my post-cycling stretch, but those muscles are ready for any serious squishing and I'm not going to try for another couple of weeks. My post surgical instructions said no strenuous exercise for 6-8 weeks, so I can hold out on trying for another 2 weeks.
No regrets! Moving forward from here!
How you doin'?
