today's numbers

Yesterday was a fasting day, and I walked last night. (Interesting photos from the walk are coming.) Today, I have numbers. Some are disappointing; some signify good news.

blood sugar: 92 (yay for anything under 100!)
blood pressure: 127/80 (slightly high because my machine thinks 120/80 is high)
weight: 115.5 kg (weight just not coming down)
pulse-ox: 97%
pulse: 64 (good)
estimated A1c since 4/15: 6.98 (biggest news of the morning!)

So, yes: I'm down into the sixes with my A1c. So that's one floor broken through. Slay the fatted calf! And this time, the 6.98 really means something because your A1c is a three-month average, and I've been checking my blood sugar almost daily for nearly three months (started on 4/15). When I go to the hospital next week, I'm hoping that their A1c reading is similar, i.e., roughly the low 7s or the high 6es.

Weight has been the real disappointment, but that's partly because I haven't been nearly as serious as I could've been this whole time about cutting calories. BP remains a puzzle: the BP meds that I'm on are pretty strong compared to the meds I had three years ago, so why am I so often not below 120/80? Or is my BP machine influencing my thinking? I think it's a little unfair that it puts the classic 120/80 in the yellow zone: 120/80 is considered classic human BP. Is it set to some weird Korean standard? But it is what it is, and I've been consistently slightly over that score for several weeks, with occasional dips below it and occasional radical spikes above it. I don't expect BP to really go down until I get back to doing stairs work,* but I admit I'm a little afraid to start—even more so now that I've been angina-free ever since I took that one nitroglycerin pill (again, no pain during last night's walk). I keep thinking the angina will come back once my heart really gets to pumping.

In other news: this year's walk along the Nakdong River Gukto Jongju will be about a week shorter than the usual Four Rivers walk, so I'm seriously considering not doing meds at all for that brief span of time. As long as I behave myself when eating, my numbers shouldn't creep up too high. And no meds will mean no diarrhea to worry about. The last thing I need is to soil my undies while I'm out in the middle of nowhere.

To sum up: I'm mostly happy about my fasting blood sugar, my pulse-ox, my pulse, and my A1c. Weight and blood pressure (which are at least somewhat linked) still need a lot of work. When the weight comes down, the BP—in theory, at least—ought to follow. We'll see. The cool thing about being a grownup is that I don't have a particular due date for reaching my goal. This can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on how lazy I am, but for the moment, it's a good thing because I don't feel an inordinate amount of pressure. (But maybe I should. My inner David Goggins, trapped in my fleshy frame, screams that I need to want it.)

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*I also need to ramp up the intensity of my other exercises in general. I've done some very light kettlebell and heavy-club work just to get used to the equipment, but that hasn't expanded into anything serious yet. It will, though. Oh, yes, Precious: it will!