My body, my identity

I intended it to be a throwaway observation, but the hearer took it as an affirmation. It happened in the locker room at the pool. In that locker room -- and on the pool deck, and in the water -- greetings like "How are you?" and "How's it going?" aren't just small talk. We're a community of people who know what it's like to live with chronic pain, and we really want to know how the others who come to the water with us are faring, even if we don't know their names. When a woman, whom I hadn't seen for a while, asked me, "How's it going?", I answered honestly. "It's going great. How's it going with you?" "Oh, OK," she said. I heard the hesitation in her voice, but I don't remember whether I specifically invited her to elaborate. But she did. It seems she's in the process of moving to a new home, and the move has been so time-consuming and unsettling that she hasn't been able to keep ...

If this blog has seemed a little quiet, it's because it's Columbia County Fair week. For the reporter at my newspaper who covers Columbia County (hey, that's me!), the high holy days fall in the fourth week of July, when all the 4-H and FFA kids shine a spotlight on the many, many things that even very young rural children can accomplish. I really should take a pedometer to the fair sometime, to see how far I walk during any given stint of legging out a daily fair story. I would bet my titanium left knee that it's easily a quarter-mile from the Ag Building to the Portage Fire Department's food stand, where I traditionally buy my first fair food each year -- an ear of roasted corn with no salt or butter. And, during livestock show, I bet I put another half-mile on my mud-caked shoes trying to find a decent photo angle in the Ag Building, where all the open barn doors create vicious backlighting. So who needs to exercise during fair week? I do. The challenge is fin...

This is a family photo, taken in July 2015 at Joe's Crab Shack near Des Moines. My mom, Phyllis Hanson, is on the left, and the two good-looking guys are my brothers, Dan and Matt. You couldn't tell it from Mom, who in her later years (she was 87 here, and lived only one more year) would become considerably slimmer, largely due to a change in her appetite. But my family, immediate and extended, tends toward obesity. You'd see it even more if I were to show a group photo including many of my cousins. It's not a judgment or a put-down. It's just the truth. Martha Malena "Mollie" Berge (1878-1973) was the only of my eight great-grandparents whom I got to know. A native of Norway, Mollie was rotund in her young adulthood. She had religious convictions against alcohol (and, for that matter, dancing, gambling and playing cards), so her principal vices were flour, sugar, butter and gravy. Those same vices prevailed in my extended family, and eating that way ...

I allowed myself a "woot" -- just one "woot" -- on the day the scale showed I'd attained my goal weight. It was last Friday. As is my custom after completing a swim, I showered, wrung the excess water out of my swimsuit, changed into my undies and stepped on the locker room's scale.  There it was, the more-or-less arbitrary number for which I've been aiming for almost a year and a half. So why just one "woot?" Why not hug every woman in the locker room and proclaim, "Rejoice with me, for that which was found is lost!"? Why didn't I go find the Dans and treat them each to a meal from the American Bistro's famous salad bar? (That's what passes for a  cafeteria at the hospital-clinic where I swim, where I underwent PT and where I had my knee surgery. It's extraordinary -- focused on healthful food, and offering an amazing variety of greens.) Well... I know from experience that this is not a one-time achievement. It...

Hi, my name is Lyn, and I'm an athlete. I never thought I'd use that word to describe my body or my identity, but here it is. As much as I abhor the writing device of referring to the dictionary definition of a word, that's what I'm going to do here. Webster's defines "athlete" as "a person who is trained or skilled in exercises, sports or games requiring physical strength, agility or stamina." The term "athlete" was a barrier for me when I first started physical therapy, because I wasn't one. My PT took place in a clinic that heavily emphasized sports medicine. How in the world, I wondered, would a therapist -- especially an obviously athletic man like Dan M. -- ever relate to a recliner-dwelling, cross-stitching, "West Wing" binge-watching lump of lard like me? Part of my problem, I guess, is that I bought into my culture's pervasive but seldom articulated attitude about who is and who isn't an athlete. If y...

About a month from now, Jay and I plan to be back in the place where my body-identity journey started -- Phoenix, Arizona. That was where I spent my first night in the ER and the rest of the vacation in our hotel suite, because I could not walk. It's where we had to hire an SUV to take me to the airport for the trip home, because I couldn't ride in our low-slung rental car. I'm already making plans for the end-of-August journey, and by "plans" I don't just mean perusing guidebooks and buying clothes (including my bikini). I have to plan how I'm going to eat. The airport (we're flying out of Milwaukee) is actually the worst place to find healthful food. On or off the plane, what they offer is junk, high in calories and low in nutritional value. That's why the bag that I carry onto the plane, and stow under my seat during takeoffs and landings, will contain snacks in approximately 100-calorie increments. These might include granola-fruit bars, hig...

I had a hot date Friday night with my husband. We went to one of the Madison area's premier seafood establishments, Captain Bill's in Middleton. The old joke about the "seafood diet" goes something like this: "When I SEE FOOD, I eat it!" Not me. Not anymore. Seafood is a healthy choice, however, if you pay attention to how it's prepared and served. Wisconsin's traditional Friday night fish fries? I can't handle them anymore. Grease and beer-batter made me nauseous even before I began to be intentional in making calories count. Door County style boiled fish? Love it! The trouble is, I'm several hours away from Door County, and I know of only one restaurant in Madison -- the Avenue -- that serves Door County style fish. And it's only available on Fridays, when the crowd spills out onto East Washington Street and the wait for a table can be several hours. Lobster, crab and shrimp? Expensive. But a boiled or broiled lobster tail is a h...

I'm about a pound or two away from my more-or-less arbitrary goal weight, which means I'm essentially there. But my body, it seems, is fighting back. And I don't know why. At the pool yesterday morning, I had to cut my workout short because ... well, certain symptoms needed to be addressed somewhere other than the water. I came to the pool prepared to go directly from my swim to work, but I called in sick, went home, took some OTC medication and ate saltines washed down with water and Diet Sierra Mist. I'm going back to work today, feeling OK (for now, anyway), but I'm resolved to open hailing frequencies with my doctor. The old medical saying goes, "When you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras." A medical practitioner is trained to look for common explanations, rather than unusual or exotic ones, for symptoms. That's one of many reasons doctors often harp on their patients' weight. Well, the symptoms I'm having showed up after my wei...

There are people (Iowans, mostly) who laugh out loud when I say the name "Pardeeville." It's a community in my newspaper's coverage area,  population about 2,000, located about 12 miles from the Columbia County seat of Portage. It's a fun and newsy village,  home of the International Watermelon Speed-eating and Seed-spitting competition, a huge Labor Day weekend antique car show, and (in my totally unbiased opinion) Columbia County's best Fourth of July celebration, bar none. Pardeeville is where I've been for most of the last 10 Fourths of July, and it's where I'll be tomorrow. And I'm preparing my body for what I know will be a test of strength and endurance. The parade steps off at high noon. If the day is even a little bit sunny, it is a huge challenge to find a camera angle that isn't full of glares and shadows. That means staking out a bench near the elementary school before somebody else gets it, and jumping up and running severa...

I don't always repost them, but I get a kick out of my daily Facebook memories. Consider, for instance, this post from a year ago today: "Left Knee and I have an understanding: I take it swimming, and it supports me without pain. Unless it decides to have a meltdown." Well, Left Knee -- part of it, anyway -- is now medical waste, and has been replaced by bones of steel and cartilage of plastic. That happened almost four months ago. Here's what's changed as a result: I carry my crutches in my car, but rarely need them. However, my doctors have authorized an accommodation, in the event of long periods of on-the-job standing and walking. I may use the crutches, and if I need to rest and elevate my legs, I should do so. A month and six days after my surgery, I was back in the water. At first, it was for short periods -- say, 15 to 20 minutes of gentle movement in the warm-water pool. Now, I'm back to my pre-surgery routine, in which an hour in the water is...