Maelstrom

March 14, Pi Day, is the first day of the Spring season in the Universal Solar Calendar, which calls today Maelstrom.  Albert Einstein was born on this day (1879) and Stephen Hawking died on this day (2018), but you already know that if you completed today's NY Times crossword puzzle.

It feels like Spring outside. The temperature reached 77° F here in Atlanta today. I completed a 3-mile walk and actually broke a sweat outside.

Apparently, I need the exercise.  The doctor finally messaged me after my bloodwork Tuesday and didn't say, "You have diabetes" like I was expecting but did say, "You are prediabetic." 

I always thought that "prediabetic" was a ridiculous term. If you don't have diabetes, aren't you by definition "prediabetic?" We're "pre-cancerous" until we get cancer. We're "pre-heart disease" until we're diagnosed with a heart illness. We're "pre-dead" as along as we're still alive.

But I get it.  My glucose and A1C levels are above the "normal" range but not yet in the "diabetic" range. With better diet and more exercise, I can still turn things around and get the levels back down to the normal range, which is what the doctor recommends. I don't want to take another medication on top of my blood-pressure and my pee meds, and I suspect that if I took a 'script for diabetes, I'd rely on that to do the work for me and not make the effort to exercise and eat right.

The exercise shouldn't actually be a problem - I've been meaning to get out and walk more anyway and this diagnosis is if anything positive reinforcement. But diet will be a challenge. I take little pleasure or satisfaction in elaborate preparation of meals, and prefer to eat on the fly, as hunger dictates, and eat anything and everything I want. 

As a general rule, I avoid fried foods and sweets - I don't really have a sweet tooth and don't care for greasy fried stuff either. But reading through some recommended prediabetic menus was depressing - I can't see myself subsisting on olive salads and rice cakes. As it is, I eat way too much pasta and carbs - someone once pointed out to me that I carbo-load like I'm going to run a marathon the next day, without actually doing the running.

This is going to take some planning and research on my part, and a lot more dietary will-power than I've exercised most of my adult life.