Laundry is done.
Floor is washed.
Extra pillows and blankets are purchased.
Everyone at work has a to do list.
Away voicemail and out of office message...check.
Frozen natural lemonade pops freezing.
Medical recliner is rented (delivery tomorrow! power buttons and all!)
I have a list to bring to the drugstore tomorrow when I go fill my prescription for my pain meds. At the top of the list? Gas-X and a bottle of Magnesium citrate, which I get to drink in the midst of my clear-liquids-only diet tomorrow. This is part of something lovely called a "bowel prep." Good times. Thinking of when I prepared for vacation and printed out lists of "what to bring to Disney World" I cannot help but laugh on the inside. This is not something I ever thought I would have to prepare for.
As I went through the last few weeks since my diagnosis, I realized that I have been preparing myself since late 2012, when I started my LEAP journey. Little did I know that I was laying the foundation for this Friday. Little did I know that by eating healthy, and figuring out what foods caused inflammation in my body, and which foods made me feel bad, that I would be laying the groundwork for a healthier canvas on which my doctor could work. Little did I know that by following LEAP I would be able to stop all my medicines (Miralax, Nexium, Simvastatin) and drop my cholesterol 50+ points. My heart is healthier. My body is healthier. I am down to a more manageable weight and out of the "obese" category on the BMI chart. My fibromyalgia is gone baby gone and will not make my recovery more difficult.
I will be a better patient because my body is prepared.
You need to prepare for so many things. It would be foolish to take a test without studying for it. Or run a marathon without training for it. Studying after the test? Foolish. Running after the race? Dumb. Had I started to "prepare" my body only after I got my diagnosis, things would be much different. I would have had two weeks in which to act; hardly enough time for a proper preparation. I wouldn't be down 24 pounds (ok ok it was 30, nobody's perfect) :) I wouldn't be able to check off the box that says "none" when the hospital forms ask me what medicines I am taking.
When it comes to taking care of our bodies, we need to prepare just for the sake of preparing. Because you just never know what will come your way - and wouldn't you rather be ready for it instead of scrambling at the last minute to see what you could do to make things better? If there was an emergency RIGHT NOW would your body be prepared to handle it? Look, I have faith, but I admit I am scared. That's the human part of me; the part that doesn't yet understand God's plan to turn this into good. But trust you me, I would be a whole lot more scared if I had been diagnosed before I started LEAP and gotten control of my eating habits. A whole lot more.
Emily's website is a great place to start to get control over your relationship with food. Whether or not you have medical problems like I had (which is where LEAP helped me) it's better to use food as your medicine than medicine as your medicine. Of course, sometimes we have no choice (I will take that Percocet on Saturday thank you very much) but it's better to have a preventive maintenance plan in place, "just in case" you get news like I did a few weeks ago.
I do not know what to expect on Friday. I am not sure I can fully prepare for that. But I take comfort in the promise of Jeremiah 29:11, and I take comfort in the fact that I have been kind to my body. I have seen my body heal and recover (most miraculously from cracked ribs and most recently from a broken toe) and I know that it heals better when it feels better to begin with.
Ask yourself one question: Are you prepared? Would you be ready if something came your way?
This guy sure was:
I want to make sure that I stay prepared. I don't want something that is well within control (that is, the choices I make about what to put into my body) to define my health in case of an emergency.
I challenge you to make like Noah and build your ark :) so that you can withstand the mighty storm. I'm getting in :)
Peace!
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