I'm getting fit -You can as well !!

Another two weeks and I should be fit enough to be back at work. Another six weeks until I’m able to get back to volunteering at St John Ambulance; the First Aid does involve shifting casualties, and you MUST be reasonably fit to help shift a fifteen or twenty stone person onto a stretcher or into an ambulance (for the Canadians reading this, fifteen stone is 210 pounds, or 94 kilo’s).

I’ve been whizzing around London on the bus and Tube for nearly the entire past four weeks; no-one offers me a seat, but I guess that’s because I still look the same as before the ‘procedure’. The ‘cardiac rehab’ at the Sobell Sports centre is going really well, and I will pop in for the Circuit training tomorrow morning; I have been doing all the Aerobics training on a Friday morning. The instructors work really hard to keeping us up to the ‘heart-rate limit’, and this maximises our ‘back to full fitness’ state.

My diet has changed dramatically from before; no more bacon butties, and now porridge for breakfast every day. I eat five lots of fruit and veg every day. I seem to have fish for every meal except breakfast. No drinking (alcohol) two days a week; three units a day MAX on drinking days [see http://www.units.nhs.uk/ ]. I haven’t drunk much coffee lately, and it’s China tea, unless I’m out with friends.

Really, I don’t seem to mind. One or two of the relatives here are on the “Hey, let me lose weight with you’ bandwagon, which is all good fun. I’m trying to get them to stop smoking as well, actually . . . I haven’t smoked for three years, and have lost about nine pounds (FOUR kilo’s, for the Canadians) since I left hospital. I still have two boxes of lovely Cuban cigars on the kitchen shelf, if you can suggest a polite use for them; they are hand-made, and smell delightful.


I’ve cycled around my local park (Finsbury Park), a distance of about a mile, on several days recently. I made seven circuits yesterday in a hour and a half; plus I did the half mile there and then back. I’ve managed to get up to my ‘seven miles distant’ target. Now I know that I can cycle all the way to college in Paddington (for the Photography course on a Tuesday.), which is, strangely, just seven miles away. [For cyclist in London, see http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_jdgaGaDfeqE/RjwtO9fsilI/AAAAAAAAATg/auOPDFt18Rw/s400/towerbridge.jpg&imgrefurl=http://bikecommutetips.blogspot.com/2007/05/massive-rise-in-london-cyclists.html&h=288&w=400&sz=39&hl=en&start=1&sig2=VO12jraB7zE0x6UkWVYS4Q&um=1&usg=__rlGzhNo3VsAqV1N4F6lwvmoBYr8=&tbnid=kttsu531eKQaMM:&tbnh=89&tbnw=124&ei=ADHOSMCLMpH-1QaWi6mdDQ&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dcycling%2Bin%2Blondon%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26safe%3Doff%26client%3Dsafari%26rls%3Den-us%26sa%3DN ].

I saw my doctor at the general practitioners’ group practice this morning. I DID remember to say ‘Thanks’ for all the super-duper treatment I’ve had on the NHS; she said ’ . . . . That what we do’. I’ve got to go for liver and kidney tests this week, as I’m going to be put on Beta-blockers and ACE inhibitors [see http://www.vaughns-1-pagers.com/medicine/heart-drugs.htm ]. I’m currently on blood-thinning and cholesterol-reducing drugs, some for only one year, some for life.

Of some concern to me are the several of my friends and acquaintances who have told me about their health-care problems. One or two have said they’ve got illnesses such as Breast cancer or Prostate cancer, and I have commiserated, asked about treatments and prognoses, and told them about my care and rehabilitation. But the friends who cause the most consternation are those who’ve said’ . . . Well, I was diagnosed with Angina ten years ago, and I’ve had no treatment’. Or those who’ve said ‘ . . . Well, everyone on my mother’s side of the family was diagnosed with heart problems, and all died from heart attacks.’ I tell them, print out my blog and show it to your doctor; say you too want to be put on the Fast Track Cardiac Care programme which I’m on. It WILL change your life; you’ll be able to do all the things you want to do, just like I am doing. You don’t have to be a ‘cardiac cripple’, just because you’ve had Angina or a Heart Attack.

Right, I’m now going to cook lunch for the week, a large pot of lentils (some ham, but not fatty), and then cycle to Walthamstow (slightly uphill, five miles. I’ll have a rest and then go on to Stratford (slightly downhill, three miles). I shall take the train home from there. It is a beautiful sunny morning here in North London, and I shall make the most of it.