Get Back Up: And Introductory Entry

Life knocks you down. The trick is to get back up every time. Some recoveries are slower than others. With that being said,

Hi.

As most of you already know, My name is John Gabel. Nobody actually ever calls me that. "Jack" is what my family called me growing up and it's what I've gone by my entire life. It seems to fit me. I'm happily married to Marissa, who is pretty much the person most directly responsible for keeping my sick ass alive. The woman is an absolute Saint, but I can tell she's starting to get a little jaded by the various illnesses. I guess your husband can on almost die so many time before you completely loose your panic reflex. The past decade of medical issues has turned my wife into the person you want standing next to you in any given crisis. It's actually pretty spectacular to watch. Between us, we have 4 kids, ranging in age from 25 to 18, and we have 1 grand daughter.

"Medical issues?" Yes... Oh yes.

For starters, a little background. I spent my 20s and early 30s treating my body like a landfill. I'd eat nothing but junk food and did pretty much every drug known to man at one point or another. All this lead to the following:

• High Blood Pressure
• Type 2 Diabetes (Advanced, with nerve damage and various other issues.)
• High cholesterol 
• a heart attack, resulting in a metal heart valve.
• Renal Failure
• Depression
• Restless Leg Syndrome
• Insomnia

That's the highlights anyway. There's more. And they are not the end of the story by any stretch of the imagination. 2 years ago, Marissa and I went of the Ketogenic diet. We both lost a bunch of weight.I got down to a 32 waist in jeans... and I also cured my type 2 diabetes. Yes, you read that right. After a long break from sugar and carbs, my pancreas decided to behave itself. We stayed on Keto for about a year. We fall off the wagon on a road trip, so so often happens to people keeping diets. Road food is bad for you. Very very bad. Once we fell off the Keto, we fell hard. We also started smoking again. Oddly enough, it was also during this "off the wagon" period when I started doing DDPYoga.

Anyway, that's a bit of a general overview, and brings us to today. I had dialysis this morning. Slept on and off during the process. Any dialysis patient will tell you it's better to sleep through it. We I got home, Marissa was at work, and I remembered with horror that we had set today as our quit date.

I had no cigarettes.

Thank God for my handy-dandy e-cig. Marissa eventually got home from work, and I discussed getting back on Keto. I felt better when were were keto. I wasn't as sick, and I healed a hell of a lot faster. It's gonna require some extensive grocery shopping and a lot harder work meal-wise on our part. I'm not sure if Marissa is completely on board with this, and I wouldn't blame her if she wasn't. But I need this. and this is also part of why I'm doing this blog. Accountability.  If I make my log of exercises and and dieting public, I'm much more likely to catch myself when I start to slip.

The potential for shame is a powerful motivator.

That's it until at least after I do Synergy 40 today. In the mean time, here's a picture of Baby Yoda, just because.