Exercise and well being during chemo and radiation

Jackbirdie

Lynn- look around on your various screens for the App Store. Click on that. At the top right there is a search box indicated by a magnifying glass. Click on that. The first time I tried I put in "pedometer" as a search parameter. I have also tried "step counter"..the two I've tried that I liked were Paer, and ummmm Now I'm drawing a blank on the other.

I would say just download a free one and try it. If you don't feel it is user friendly enough, pick another free one and download that and try.

I will say some are more oriented to just walking, but some also do biking, running, and link to fitness pal, which is where you can integrate diet and calorie counting/weight goals. That's pretty cool. Some apps are linked to GPS and maps and can help you determine where there are walks and hikes within your distance goals nearby. I think once you get started, you'll come up to speed quickly.

Good luck!

Jackbirdie

8/17: 2000 steps.

littleblueflowers

good work ladies! I didn't do jack all today except drive around and go to meetings. Tomorrow, though, I shall be hiking in full gear, which means 25 lb pack, boots, shovel, etc. That will teach me to answer my phone! Oh well, a couple crazy days won't make the cancer fairy come back, I hope! Rad Sim on monday...I'll sleep on the table

octogirl

mysunshine, mine is a new 6 (the regular 6, not the supersized one) and it was pre-loaded when I got in under an application called 'Health'...didn't have it on my old iPhone 4, by the way. So far, I am finding it fun to use. Remains to be seen whether it will be motivating or not in the long run, although I am pleased to say that the graph it shows for the week is on a steady upward slope....

ksusan

8/15:

• .5 hr T (2.5 MPH avg) + stretches
• 1.0 hr T (2.4 MPH avg) + Fitbit steps + stretches

= 5.12 miles

While I did have fried scallops and french fries at lunch, I did not have dessert (even though it was a birthday lunch).

so-she-did

Huh, I had no idea that I had that on my phone. Thanks for pointing that out Octogirl! I graduated from a flip phone to the iPhone 6 not too long ago but haven't explored everything yet.

Not a lot of exercise happened this week. My parents rolled into town with my girls on Sunday evening. I walked 2 miles one night and also exercised at my cancer rehab appointments this week. The one rehab hardly counts since I was so fatigued she just had me do stuff lying down.

Fatigue really hit me hard Thursday, Friday, and today. Felt reminiscent of chemo - ugh. Thought I was through with that level of fatigue. Managed 2 miles tonight, though, once I finally got out of my pajamas - ha!

Hopeful8201 - congrats on finishing rads! You finished the same day I did!

KBeee

5.35 mile walk this morning. I decided to ditch the boot a day early. Tomorrow I will substitute running for walking for one of my miles to gradually build back up.

Little blue, my rads sim is this upcoming Friday. I should start the next week. No rest for the weary

Trvler

Interesting that the phone registered more steps. I would think it would be the opposite since you don't have the phone in contact with your body at all times…at least I don't. I hate to say this but I started wondering about the Fitbit battery next to me when someone mentioned breast cancer in women who hold their phones in their bras. I told my husband if I got wrist cancer from it I was going to be pissed.

Hopeful82014

Amy, I'm honored to finish alongside such great company.Congratulations to you!!! I hope you did something special to observe the occasion.

Little blue - good luck with your simulation on Monday.

(ETA - after dealing with all those lightening strikes, etc., last week your sim should seem exceedingly tame.)

Jackbirdie

Things I wishI knew before starting to exercise


I just found this in My Fitness Pal this morning. Although there once were days where I was so fit....lifted, ran a half marathon and oodles of 10Ks, and have heard most of this stuff at some point in my life, I feel like a total newbie. Starting over. So these tips I did find reassuring and inspirational. Maybe it will help others starting at ground zero like me.


1500 steps yesterday. Slept in till 10am. I am so tired! But I have nothing on my schedule today except putting real walking shoes on and taking a real walk

pboi

Amy...I'm with you on the fatigue. Im one week post rads, and the fatigue seems to be getting worse this week. Im trying so hard to keep up with exercise, but it's getting harder.

How's your daughter doing?

Trvler- I want a Fitbit too, but am wondering about the safety of wearing it all the time. Not trying to scare anyone, but anyone know?

PB

eheinrich

Ya know, people say all sorts of things cause cancer from deodorant to underwire bars and microwaves which so far as I know is gibberish. I truly believe that the health benefits one may get from using a fitbit & having it be a source of exercise motivation out way any internet theory about it causing cancer.

Trvler

I should just say I have NEVER heard anyone say a Fitbit could cause cancer. But I have heard people say phones might. I honestly don't know. I should ask my friend the brain oncologist next time I see him.

ksusan

Snopes cites 3 women with tumors under where they carried their phones in their bras. Considering how widespread this practice is, I'd imagine there would be many more if this were significant. Or to come it it from the other direction, how many women get breast cancer and don't put phones in their bras? How many people get butt cancer from phones? I think it's reasonable to be attentive and careful, but if every fear online were true we'd all be dead.

Italychick

all of the alleged causes of cancer make me stop and think, and then I press on. In my mind, exercise is probably on the top of my list for ongoing future prevention. I think it even trumps weight, to be honest. Exercise the body, keep all the fluids pumping I say. I do eat organic and don't do toxic laundry and cleaning products. And I do supplements and take care of my teeth. Beyond that, I feel like I begin living my life in a plastic bubble. My mom, 73, is fat as hell, 150 pounds overweight, adult onset diabetic, eats the cheapest crappiest foods she can find, and overshoots insulin so she can eat Hershey's chocolate bars, chips and pasta. Lives on drugs like Vicodin. She has also never really exercised in her entire life, and goes for the closest spot in a parking lot. Breasts loaded with lumps, does annual PeT scans. No breast cancer, ever. Go figure. All her sisters eat crap, are overweight, etc. my female cousins too. No breast cancer on my biological fathers side. Closest relative I had who got breast cancer was a great aunt who got lump removed and lived to be 99. And another great aunt who got breast cancer, never took any treatment, and lived to be 92.

Go figure.

Hopeful82014

Theresa, I'm not clear on your point here; are you saying that staying fit and eating healthfully causes cancer OR that eating Hershey bars prevents cancer?

Trvler

LOL. I LOVE those stories. They make me feel less guilty that I did something to bring it on. But then they make me mad, too.

Trvler

Hopeful, I don't think she is saying that. I think she is saying we can worry about every bite we put in our mouth causing cancer but her family members prove that eating junk does not result in cancer because her families members are eating total garbage.

Trvler

Oh, and my husband's aunt is 92 and smokes a pack of cigarettes a day.

Italychick

ha! I guess reading what I posted, it does read that way. I was following up on eileen's comment about gibberish. Diet, exercise, etc., who the hell knows? We do the best we can. Avoiding plastic, or soy? Who the hell knows? I think for the most part that in any population, a number of people are going to have aberrant cells that run amok, and we are the ones who are those people. So I guess maybe I am saying I can take all the preventative steps I want, use hippie soap, eat organic, etc., and the random luck of the draw is somewhere laughing at me saying you really think living a pure life is the defining factor? Well here I am, the random, telling you otherwise. I mentioned my unhealthy family in an attempt to show how random breast cancer can be.

But I do believe in exercise at a moderate, non-stressing level. And I do all the other stuff just in case. Hell, I'd practice that chicken religion if I thought it would help me.

Trvler

LOL at the chicken religion.

so-she-did

Pboi - Glad to know I am not the only one feeling tired from rads but I wish neither of us has to feel like this. My daughter is doing great - thanks for asking! She has been such a trooper. Took her in to the doctor to get a cast put on the day after they got back and she went back to school the day after that. She'll get the pins pulled out (in the doctor's office!) at the end of the month and will probably also get her cast off.

Katy, thanks for the reminders. I, too, feel like I am starting at the beginning again.

Not eating the healthiest the last couple of days. Celebrated the last radiation with a slab of prime rib on Friday, ate the leftovers yesterday, and will be having fried halibut tonight. I'll hop back on the healthy eating wagon tomorrow.

Plan on walking at least 2 miles tonight if it cools down.

Italychick

• well, just sayin' haha. I always think about that scene in the movie Major League with Charlie Sheen where the guy says hell, I'd wipe snot on the ball if it would help me get a strike.
• Maybe I should eat Hershey's chocolate bars....

queenmomcat

Italychick: if it's any consolation, I figured your original comment was a "Who the hell knows?" Not that we should be a yutz--eating well and exercise is a grand idea on several levels--but the random arrow of fate all too often strikes where it listeth.

ksusan

My naturopath says that you should know the risks, change what it's feasible to change, and then don't waste time worrying about the rest. We've started switching out plastic containers for metal and glass, but when I rotate and upgrade our natural disaster supplies next month (which I do every fall equinox), I'll be buying some large plastic water containers, because 1) I wouldn't expect glass and plastic to do well in an earthquake, and 2) if there's a disaster, we'll be happy to have water and really not give a rat's ass whether the container might have leeched some nominal amount of hormone-disruptive effluvia into it.

4000 steps so far today, without "exercise." May the chicken god bless CostCo for long rambles in search of organic peanut butter.

Italychick

love it, ksusan Costco to the exercise rescue! Praise the almighty chicken God! Just food for thought, we found a plastic bath tub liner, kind of like a huge collapsible water bottle, on Amazon that you put in your bath tub and fill with water. It holds a lot. It is made by aquapodkit and is like $42. We bought it for earthquake preparedness, Fires, whatever. It can hold 195 gallons. It has a catchy name, Emergency Drinking Water Pod Storage, lol. Oh, and made in the USA so I guess it is the good quality estrogen producing plastic!

rainnyc

If we all ate Hershey bars....and carried our phones in our bras...we'd all be a lot fatter and have bras that sagged where the phone pulled on the fabric! As far as who gets BC or any other form of cancer, it's still largely a mystery. I think that if there's any one trait that sticks out on nearly every thread on these boards, it's the overwhelming guilt about what we did, or might have done, that contributed to our disease. BC is hard enough without feeling as if it's our fault. I don't mean you particular ladies: it's just something that seems to be prevalent across the board. And few of us are immune.

Enough ranting. Speaking of guilt, post-chemo exhaustion hit me hard this afternoon. Walked a mile in 90 degree heat and felt it was sufficient. Peace to all.

ksusan

Theresa, hilarious! My wife had put that in her Amazon cart within the last 10 minutes (after we bought some new water storage containers).

Jackbirdie

Hopeful- I think you can take your tongue out of your cheek now....😜.

T and Ksusan- forget Hershey! If they have them, have you tried the Justin's all organic dark chocolate peanut butter cups? Omg. I don't even like peanut butter that much, but those are to die for. Oops. Bad pun

Today I actually went for a walk. I walked, not that far, and did not record my steps. I walked until I got to a big hill that I didn't think I could manage, and turned around. I just wanted it to feel like a Sunday walk that I enjoyed without putting new myself under pressure. Mission accomplished.

Trvler

Suddenly I am craving a Hershey bar.