exercise

“I Be Up In The Gym Just Working On My Fitness”

In the famous words of Fergie, “I be up in the gym just working on my fitness.”  Or, at least I should be for my overall health, as well as my diabetes management.

Admittedly, my exercise regimen has waned in recent times.  During grad school, I was on a mission to do #AllOfTheThings and to do them very well, so I was somewhat of a “gym rat.”  Nowadays, I will meander around the city on my lunch breaks or take a stroll to de-stress after work.  Otherwise, does lifting up a Bud Light and putting it down count as a workout? (Inquiring for a friend…)

Needless to say, when I was asked to review the fabulous Christel Oerum’s eBook, Fit With Diabetes, I realized it was a good opportunity for an exercise and diabetes tune-up, and, perhaps, to help some of my readers/followers do the same.  (See below for my disclosures).*

Christel- Front page

Christel is “one of us,” a fellow person with diabetes (type 1), who clearly has a passion for fitness and healthy living.  She does not come off as “preachy” in the eBook, which is a welcome change to what is customary in literature regarding diabetes and exercise.  Rather, Christel is down to earth and likable.

She acknowledges that there is certainly tough work cut out for us, yet illustrates that our goals can be more attainable through some helpful tips.  As Christel explains in the introduction to the eBook, we each have individualized diabetes and exercise needs, but with a proper framework in place, we can make the process smoother.

From cardio, to resistance training, to nutrition, to workout routines, Fit With Diabetes has us covered.  The various chapters of the eBook are user-friendly in terms of looking up specific areas of focus quickly and easily.  Christel provides real world examples for various scenarios, such as planning effectively for different types of exercise whether using an insulin pump or injections.  From my viewpoint as someone looking to get re-motivated on the exercise front, it was nice to see these firsthand examples.

I believe this eBook is a useful tool for anyone living with diabetes, their support networks, and healthcare professionals, alike.  Christel provides a straightforward guide by which you can generate your own effective course of action.

Please see here if interested in reading the eBook.

Many thanks to Christel for contributing this insightful work to our community!

 

 

 

*My disclosures are the following:

I was asked to review Fit With Diabetes, and I received a copy of the eBook in order to do so.  Opinions expressed are my own.

Thank you to Ginger Vieira for introducing me to Christel Oerum of DiabetesStrong.com and author of Fit With Diabetes.

 

 

 

 

Advertisement

#BigBlueTest

Big Blue Test

The last month or so has been a balancing act of sorts made more difficult by the fact that my balancing skills ended decades ago after a few too many tumbles-gone-wrong in kindergarten gymnastics class.  Work was stacked up on my desk, and many days I found myself slouched in my chair at lunch, reading feverishly before grad class scheduled for that evening and picking at a salad and a half-eaten salami sandwich.  I’d break away for 5 minutes to get a very light, no sugar coffee, but that was the extent of things.  Exercise?  I don’t have time for that! echoed around the tired spaces of my head.

I kept hearing of the Big Blue Test and shrugging it off as something that I’d like to do one day when life wasn’t a three-ring circus trying to fit four rings of obligations into a tiny amount of time.  When Laddie over at Test Guess and Go suggested that I give the Big Blue Test a try, I tucked her words into the back pocket of my mental toolkit for a few minutes, procrastinating yet again when it came to exercising.

I Google-searched Big Blue Test, promising myself to throw in the towel if signing up was even remotely challenging.  In hindsight, it was thankfully quite easy to register.  Big Blue Test is free; it encourages you to get off your bum and move around; and it fosters a good conversation about diabetes and exercising.  It’s a win-win-win-win-win-situation, and you can also encourage others to join in on the fun.  You can download the phone app, answer a few questions (whether diabetic or non-diabetic) each time you work out, and $1.00 towards diabetes efforts is granted by the Diabetes Hands Foundation for each exercise log that you make.

I have found that this app holds me more accountable for leaving my desk to stretch my legs for 15 minutes at work.  The ten second practice of entering the data into the app makes the process fun and rewarding; watching blood sugars drop from even 220 to 205 in 15 minutes is still a little victory for diabetics versus the diabetes monster.  Take that, diabetes!

I may have felt like the world would collapse without me typing up a storm at my computer for 15 minutes prior to the Big Blue Test, but, no surprise here, the world moved along just fine and I was able to enjoy the nice fall weather when taking my weekly walks.  Friends have joined me and we have some great diabetes discussions on our walks after I explain the meaning behind the Big Blue Test.  Krissy over at Krissy’s Dance and Fitness Studio in Rhode Island is helping out our cause by logging her workouts and asking her clients to do the same.  Coworkers have risen to the occasion to keep me company on my strolls through the city.

“So, do you have to take shots?” one walker asked.

“I used to take a lot of shots, but now I have an insulin pump,” I explained, lifting my shirt to show him the “pager” part of the pump.

(Don’t worry, I spared him the dramatic war stories of my insulin pump experiences in recent months for now. Baby steps…)

In all seriousness, though, moments like that help our mission to spread awareness of diabetes. They get people thinking outside of the misguided media portrayal of the disease.  They inspire others to stay healthy by working out with us and giving to a great cause in the process.  There is all good and no bad by participating in the Big Blue Test, as far as I’m concerned.

Lastly, those walks make these moments quite salvageable:

Nurse, while flipping through my blood glucose logs from the past week: “So, cheese and crackers for dinner almost every night…? And ice cream sometimes?  I mean, you did pretty well with your blood sugars, but still…??”

She wasn’t being judgmental, rather, she was rightfully concerned that a fully-nutritious meal definitely wasn’t happening on school nights.

Me: “Yeah, it’s called the ‘grad school special.’ Plus, I ‘worked out’ this week…”