BIG Breath and....

It's been quite some time since I punched a few lines onto this blog.  August and September was all about training for a Century ride, leaving me with surprisingly very little say.  We had a rather pleasant 100 mile ride in mid-September and then after that a tight schedule leading up to our annual trip back to Akron.  Now, here we are at the very end of October.

The trip "home," the definition of which is up for debate, is an interesting experience for expats.  For those that can travel back and forth to their native land regularly the disconnect probably isn't as acute.  For those of us who only get back once a year or less, the experience can be, well, rather bizarre.  The more time that passes on assignment the greater the gulf can grow between then and now, here and there.  Sometimes, when faced with the reality that this is just an assignment and home will most definitely be over there again, the feelings are mixed.  Unless someone's expat journey has been completely negative, we feel a kinship with the new place sometimes equal to or even exceeding our native home.  But, for now here we are back in Germany for the time being with at least another year to enjoy it.

Besides all the fun parts about the home leave trip like sharing a drink at our favorite craft beer bars with good friends, enjoying a proper steak, and an early Thanksgiving meal with family, one of the annual events of home leave is making the rounds to all our medical professionals to make sure we're still doing good health wise.  I was looking forward to this year's checkup because I had a question.

My last post on here was about a particularly brutal climb that almost did me in.  After that I started paying close attention to my performance on hills and during other activities like mountain trekking.  It became clear to me that something was up with my breathing.  In the past I assumed my complete meltdowns on hills had to do with overall fitness.  I assumed I was struggling because I was out of shape.  But, as the year passed this excuse didn't seem pertinent.  We were cycling every day and during our century training we were averaging 130km a week.  Our diet has changed to being mostly vegetarian.  My weight and other vitals were in the right places.  I was sleeping normal.  But, every single time I hit a hill on the bike, a set of stairs, or an uphill track while trekking I started struggling, big time.  Off the bike I manage, but always slow way down and need breaks now and then to catch my breath.  On the bike, things get bad on those hills.  For anything above a Cat 4, I often have to dismount to calm my breathing.

Then, one day we were climbing a hill at a particularly slow pace.  We had taken a break not long before for a snack and to replenish our water, but I was in a bad way already.  My husband led for a bit, then I took over, hoping that if I found a steady pace I could relax my breathing.  It wasn't working.  The wide spot in the road was a welcome sight and I pulled over, dismounted, and sat down, certain I was going to black out.  When I finally got back to a comfortable heart rate and breathing, I looked up at the hill, the road winding above me.  As I did so, a woman went past.  On a steel city bike.  In khaki shorts and tennis shoes.  She was breathing through her nose.  That was the last straw.  I was mad.

Something was definitely up.

So, I sent my doctor in Akron a note.  I have an amazing doctor back in Akron, and having her just an email away is a lifesaver.  Thank you, modern technology!  Anyway, after tracking my symptoms and performance it sounded to me that I might have been suffering from exercise induced asthma all this time.  She concurred with my theory and set me up for some tests when I came back to town.

Asthma tests are something else.  You spend two hours in a room with a technician blowing into a tube after inhaling a progression of medications as the tech instructs "BIG breath and..BLOW, BLOW, BLOW!"  All of that tests lung capacity.  People with asthma will have a marked reduced capacity during the test.  People without it will have the same results from beginning to end.  When I sat down with my doctor a few days later, she said, "I'm so glad you contacted me, because you totally have asthma!"  Apparently, I have had it my whole life, explaining why I could never run the mile in PE or keep up in any sports like soccer when I was a kid, hence being assigned more stationary positions like fullback.  I was under the impression that I wasn't "good at running" or that I wasn't "athletic" back then.  But as I've gotten older I've realized that being "unathletic" isn't a real thing.  My doctor confirmed.  She said we choose to be active or not.  Sure, not everyone is built to run a marathon or bench 250lbs, but everyone should be able to find something they can do comfortably that keeps them physically fit.  If you struggle despite being fit, then there is a medical reason for it.  Anyone should be able to exercise.

I don't know what my doctor thought, when I responded to to my diagnosis with, "Oh, thank God!"  I can't begin to describe the relief I felt with finally having a reason for why climbing nearly kills me, why I can't keep up in the mountains, why climbing the stairs to the top floor our house has me leaning against the door frame for a bit.   The thought of climbing no longer fills me with dread.  I know what will happen when I start heading up and I know why.  It's not because I'm a failure.  I have the tools to deal with it and now the odds are in favor of me getting to the top without passing out.  Sometimes an answer is all you need.  And, albuterol.

The mountains are my favorite place on earth.  Now, spending time in their heights shouldn't be such a struggle.

Yeah, folks, I'll be "doping" when I'm out on the roads.   Let me get that out there right now.  Along with my patch kit and PB sammies, I'll be packing an inhaler.  I've accepted that in order to keep this managed properly I have to reign in my riding when I have a respiratory illness to avoid aggravating the disease (hence why I'm typing this up today instead of HTFU on the bike with this head cold).  I shouldn't take up extreme altitude mountaineering either.  Sigh.  Oh well, I don't have the money for that anyway.  But, there is no risk of having to give up the bike.  I'm not expecting to take all the local QOMs, but climbing the stairs, yeah, I can do that now.

So, look out, Bavaria, as soon as I kick this darn cold I'll be back.  Here's hoping none of you in khakis and sneakers will pass me on a climb.  But if you do, let's be clear.  My chain slipped.

The One About Chocolate

We all love chocolate.  OK, some of you out there don't, which I find very perplexing.  Anyway, most of us out there love chocolate.  Some of us, including myself, have rather strong feelings about it.  Except for special exceptions, dessert isn't dessert if there is no chocolate involved.  Now, in the quest for a more healthy lifestyle, the love of chocolate can be a bit of a hang up.  Tragically, one must pass on the delicious ice creams (sometime let me tell you about the glory of Mövenpick), in favor of healthier desserts.  Thankfully, chocolate can still make an appearance in the dessert bowls of those who love it dearly.

Chocolate, and when I say chocolate I mean Dark Chocolate, is known for its health benefits.  According to the Cleveland Clinic, consumption of dark chocolate that has not been overly refined in the production process can help lower bad cholesterol (LDL) and lower blood pressure, which increases blood flow throughout the body- which decreases the chance of heart attacks and strokes.  Dark chocolate is also rich in antioxidants which combat inflammation and it helps to raise insulin sensitivity in the blood, which helps your body process carbohydrates with more efficiency. For those leading an athletic lifestyle these benefits are particularly attractive.  Of course, you can't stuff yourself with it either.  The Cleveland Clinic recommends eating just an ounce (28g) a couple times a week. You also need to keep an eye on the label.  Sixty to seventy percent dark is where you want to start, if you can tolerate a stronger percentage that's even better.  Go any lower than 60% and you're mostly just getting other additives and not the ingredients you're after.  Don't even bother with Milk or White chocolates. Thankfully, several high end chocolate manufactures produce bars within these requirements.

One widely available brand, Lindt from Switzerland, produces a range of bars under the Excellence label that begin in 70% level and go all the way up to the 99% cocoa level.  Lindt is my personal go to choice because I can usually find it everywhere I go, from the American Midwest to Alpine Villages to the coast of Spain.  Other brands, such as Green & Black's, aren't as widely available.

http://www.lindtusa.com/index-exec/

The Excellence line can be found in nearly every grocery store in the United States and Europe.  Of course, this line also includes a wide variety of flavored bars- everything from wasabi paste to strawberry.  These flavored bars have a reduced percentage of cocoa, so they don't have the same level of healthy ingredients as the pure bars.  However, with many of the flavors coming from natural, non-sugary sources, I don't have a problem enjoying them from time to time too.  Sea Salt, Chili, and Mint are my personal favorites.  The flavors come from including the natural ingredient directly into the chocolate, instead of using synthetic syrups.  For example, the Intense Orange bar contains dried orange bits.

The Lindt Excellence line can take care or your chocolate fix in it's preferred, healthful form.  Two squares are 20 grams, your recommended serving.  So, if you love chocolate and want to make it apart of your diet in a healthy way, I recommend keeping an eye out for Lindt's Excellence.  No doubt you'll find something to relish amongst the selection.

How My Bike Is Saving My Life

The 100th Tour de France begins tomorrow.  For cycling fans this is what the year comes down to.  For the rest of the world, this is the only professional race they have heard of.  Rightly so.  It's a doozy.  While I waited along with you for the Tour of Tours to begin, I've spent a lot of time over the last few days thinking not so much about this upcoming competition or even the professional level of road racing.  Instead, I've been thinking about my personal relationship with the bicycle.  As the great race begins, we all enter into the second half of 2013.  Halfway through the year seems like a good time to assess how far we've come, with an eye to where we're headed.  The bicycle and I have come a long way together and I'm not just talking the kilometers we've travelled.  Like any journey, the past six months have been about more than distance covered.

Last week, my husband and I traveled home to Akron, Ohio.  We had been looking forward to this trip for quite a long time, probably about 6 months actually.  A year had passed since we had been home.  A lot had happened in that year.  We experienced things and saw places we'd only ever read about.  It had been, without a doubt, an incredible 365 days.  But, despite all that, we were really looking forward to visiting the familiar again.  We couldn't wait to see friends and family.  We looked forward to all sorts of things about home, not the least of which being all the edible delights.  Of course, we were looking forward to shopping too.  I was going to go to Walgreens for Band-Aids at midnight, just because I could.  But, one of the things I was most looking forward to was my annual checkup with my general practitioner.  Yeah, I know that sounds really bizarre.  It's true, though.  I couldn't wait to sit down with my doctor and chat about how my health had changed since the big move to Lux.

Never thought this rather lifeless view of the old hometown would warm the cockles of my heart.

The past six months have been, well, all about the bike.  I was determined to be at or very darned near a place physically where I could ride all day, every day.  I wanted to become a cyclist.  Really.  Through that process I wanted to get in the best shape of my life.  Ever.  Why?

I don't want to jostle for position in a crit or suffer through a stage race.  While I love to watch the competition, to me participating in such an event is about as desirable as a root canal.  I don't even want a QOM on Strava.  Heck, when I was a kid I'd intentionally misspell words in spelling B's so I wouldn't have to go head to head with my friends in front of the school.  The way I see it, we have enough conflict with others in life without purposefully inducing it.  But that's just the way I feel.  I have complete respect for healthy competition and those who participate in it, especially in sport.  But competition is not why I climb on the bike every day.  So, why am I here?

I don't want to wake up one morning wondering how I let things go so far.  I don't want to be popping pills for conditions I could have avoided by just living a healthy lifestyle.  I don't want to be held back from things I want to do whenever I want to do them.  I don't want to look back on my life at some point and regret a wasted youth.  In short, I want to live.  I want to live my life until the moment I finally clock out of here.

I'd made some mistakes that if continued could derail those hopes.  I knew from experience that the bicycle was going to be my ticket to correcting those mistakes.  We all have something, some sort of physical activity that we can do and love doing.  We just need to figure out what it is and then run with it.  For some it's team sports, for others it's solo sports.  For some it's the joy of competing against our peers, for other's it's the joy of competing against ourselves that keeps us coming back.  I never had a doubt about which sport was my thing.  It has always been the bike.  Figuring out exactly how the bike would become my thing has been a longer decision.  The bicycle isn't really like any other piece of sports equipment out there.  It can be used in so many different ways and in so many different disciplines that sometimes finding the one that fits takes a while.  I started on the bike with an interest in transportation that branched into recreation.  Being in Lux simplified things significantly.  I've had the means to discover a real love for road cycling.  So, road cycling is what the bicycle has become for me.  Sure, I'll still take the FX to the store, but when I think of cycling it's me alone (or with my husband), crouched over the drops, on a road somewhere, pushing myself.  Pushing myself to live.

The process started on January 1st, like all good resolutions do, and despite travel and illness it has
continued (miraculously) right up to today.  So, I was pretty excited to see how things stacked up with my doctor's records from the end of 2011.  When the first thing she said to me was, "Whatever you're doing, keep on doing it," I knew things looked good.  Blood pressure, heart rate, and cholesterol numbers have dropped and are exactly (and in some cases better than) where she wants them to be.  But the big story here is weight.  I've lost 40 lbs since I saw her in December 2011.  Thirty of them were lost since January of this year.  That's a big deal.

Everything has its specific place
in my diet.  In espresso's case, it's pre or mid-ride.

Obviously, it isn't just riding my bike that has gotten me to this point.  I wanted to redesign my life around the bike, not just make the bike a part of my life.  To do that I had to change the way I approached what I put in my body and how I helped it recover.  I totally changed the way I ate, from something that usually was the highlight of my day to something that helped me with what was now the highlight of the day- my ride.  High fat, high cholesterol foods weren't going to do me many favors on the bike, so they got reduced on the roster in favor of lean proteins, healthy carbs and other foods that are more efficient fuels.  Cheese, for example, while being one of my most appreciated foods had to be approached differently.  I wasn't going to cut it out all together (no need to be crazy), but I made it something I could enjoy more by giving it a different status in my diet- a special treat to be savored and appreciated, not tossed down without a second thought.  Beer had to be approached differently too.  Once again, I wasn't going to stop drinking it.  I was going to drink it differently.  Instead of going for a local pilsner, I only have beer when there's something available I haven't tried yet or I really like.  If a place doesn't have anything that meets my standards, I'll go for the water instead.  I'd rather wait for something more interesting.  Beer, in fact, is an excellent recovery drink.  So, after some of my more long and hot (there was a week here of proper summer temps) Womens 100 training rides, I'd reward myself with a small beer as a recovery aid.  Truth be told, I didn't cut anything out of my diet completely.  I didn't go vegetarian, paleo, carb free, or sugar free.  I didn't hold back on vacations either.  I use foods for how they can benefit me in my goal to be a cyclist.  Pretty much all foods can help in that process as long as they're used correctly, even bacon can have a role.

Recovery became extremely important too.  I made sure not to go overboard with the cycling, which can be hard to do when you really love it.  I listened to my body.  If something was hurting, I'd back off, do what needed to be done so it could heal, then figure out how to avoid the pain coming back in the future.  I made sure to get plenty of sleep.  I'd shape my meals around fuel and recovery, by eating things before my ride that will help my ride and eating certain things afterwards to help my muscles recover and heal.

I also started noticing some unexpected side-effects.  Cycling has given what could easily become a disjointed purposeless existence as an unemployed expat a focus.  Sure, I have my other interests and hobbies, but skipping out on photography for a few weeks isn't going to have a major negative impact on my health.  The bike keeps me on track.  It gets me up on time and in bed at a decent hour at night.  Additionally, there are mental health benefits to pedaling every day.  Something that they don't tell you in the expat brochure is that a majority of Americans struggle with being in Luxembourg for a long period of time.  Many end up on anti-depressants.  Why?  Well, it's probably for a number of reasons.  Luxembourg is not like the States.  I'm not saying it's a bad place, it's just very different and getting used to it can be hard to deal with.  The weather itself is no doubt a huge factor.  Thankfully, we come from a place in Northeast Ohio that's almost as overcast, but even the endless days of grey rain begin to take their toll on us.  Of course, it probably just comes down to living somewhere far from home, living a completely different lifestyle, and having to handle things you've never dealt with before.  You get lonely.  You get low.  But, at least for me, getting on the bike everyday has thus far combated that low feeling.  It's not just the known mental health benefits of daily exercise that have been there.  I think it has more to do with getting me out in this beautiful country.  During every ride there is a moment when I look up and say, "Wow, I can't believe I get to do this today.  Here.  I'm so incredibly blessed."  After those ride rides that totally kick my butt and then kick me when I'm down I can't help but think, "Europe is beating that crap out of me.  That's still pretty cool."

Have I met my goal of becoming a cyclist?  Yeah, I think so.  I certainly have the tan lines.  But, I have further to go.  That's the really cool thing about cycling.  There's always something else to look forward to.  The Womens 100 ride is next weekend.  When that's over, I'd like to keep up that level of riding to the winter.  When next year comes around, perhaps the goal will be doing 100 Miles instead of 100K.  Someday I want to get to a place with climbing that doesn't feel completely excruciating.   I'd like to look at almost any road, shrug, swing the leg over, clip in, and begin cranking those pedals with more excitement than trepidation.  But, I'd like a road to be out there somewhere that still holds a little dread.
 
Cuz, ya know, that's living.