Almost a 4 mile brisk walk today

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TheGymGuy

TheGymGuy

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 3, 2011
Messages
999
Location
Rockville, MD
Alright, in spirit of positive news sharing and positive energy keep up, here is my summary for today. I want to share this with you because you have done a lot for me, and I hope that some of these posts will be motivating. By no means am I bragging. My purpose is that by writing up my experiences I hope that at least one or two people (more if I am lucky) get motivated enough and do better just by walking, exercising and get better and progress forward.

This my day 9 post-op. Last night I slept on my side almost all night. Come to think of it, I flipped in the AM to the other side for 2 hours. I actually slept for a total of a little over 7 hours which is a new personal best. I was only awake twice, once to go to the bathroom at night (damn that huge glass of water before bed), and once in the AM when I heard my wife's alarm clock.

One of my workout partners came to visit me today and I asked him to go get some lunch with me. There is a shopping plaza about 2 miles away and they have all sorts of places to grab some food or just hang out. The walk there is a bit hilly but nothing too crazy, here is the summary link: http://runkeeper.com/user/thegymguy/activity/79764897?&mobile=false

Basically, it was 1.85 miles there, lunch break during which I consumed some delicious chicken kabob's on rice, and 1.85 miles back. Going there we averaged 18:30 per mile or 3.25 mph, and going back we did just about 3.5mph (3.49 actually). The average pace was 3.35mph which is not great, but also not too shabby. This walk and activity is what my wife and I did both weekends before the surgery and I have kept the same pace today, which is huge.

My heart-rate was very stable during the walk and only crossed over 100 once or twice while speed-walking the hill. During the walk we carried on a conversation about random things and I seemed to not be out of breath much.

I feel progress, and my body is mine at the moment, minus the chest mobility and 10 lb weight lifting limit. I will spend next 7-12 weeks doing more walks and speed walks and hopefully improve my cardiac ability/capacity before returning back to gym.

It is beautiful here on the east coast today, and I hope some of you can go out for some walking and get 1-2 milers out of the way. Please pace yourself, I do!!! I do several checks every several minutes to make sure all systems are fine and I monitor my heart rate, breathing and body temperature very very closely.
 
Keep raising that bar. I got 2 walks in at 1 mile each today. Sure helps to have good weather. It would be tough to have surgery smack in the middle of winter. I guess you'd need a treadmill or exercise bike.
 
bocco said:
Keep raising that bar. I got 2 walks in at 1 mile each today. Sure helps to have good weather. It would be tough to have surgery smack in the middle of winter. I guess you'd need a treadmill or exercise bike.
Click to expand...

No. You put on a hat and coat and walk in whatever weather is out there.
 
I think that it is awesome that you are recovering so well. It makes me want to see how fast that I can bounce back too. Not everyone's experience will be as good as yours, but I think people need to hear about what might be possible. It's tough to seem as though your amazing progress might b construed as bragging, but I think it sets a great example to try and emulate or even improve upon. Lol! Keep it up Vadim! You're doing great.

Tom
 
This board (members here), Adam Pick's Book, and the book from my signature have taught me everything that I know about heart surgery. That, and lots of google searching. ;)

I have an OCD when it comes to learning and understanding, I also have a very good work ethic. Given how much this board helped me, I want to give back. I know that once my sternum fully heals and I am cleared for powerlifting again, I will be here a lot less than now. And, until then, I want to post up anything helpful that I can that can be searchable later by other people who come here for help.

What I can contribute is my goods and my bads. I want to leave something here that would help someone else. It seems, as though, at the moment all I can leave is that which I am decent at, which is exercise, recovery, and not giving up. I have a crap load of powerlifting injuries which I had to rehab in the past and work around. When it came time to train for a competition I've learned to push my body through fire and ice and get it done. If I injured my adductor and could not perform a regular squat, I would do narrow stance squats and narrow stance leg presses with a lot more ferocity so that my body can grow, adapt and not loose momentum, just so that when my adductor heals I can get back to my regular squats stronger than ever. Alternatively, I could do a higher volume on deadlifts and improve on my posterior chain while my adductor was recovering, that with some extra core work would actually be a welcome break from squatting and put me ahead without even needing to squat. I learned that when one part of your body is injured it is a perfect opportunity to improve on others. It is sort of heart to apply it to a fixed heart, but I am going to try.

At the moment I have one job to do. I have 7-12 weeks to get my body back to its state on March 26th, 2012 minus a crap load of strength. My heart needs to remodel and get used to new parts, my body needs to get used to the new heart function, and I need to get my full control of my body. There is a very limited list of things I can do, but I can do them all, do them often and try my damn hardest to make sure that I recover well enough to be able to go back and get my strength back.

With that in mind here is my motivation for those that read this: "Never give up. Nothing is given to you for free, you have to fight and work hard to earn it. You will face many adversities and difficulties. You will overcome them all with hard work and belief. It won't be painless, it will not be easy, and you will want to quit many times. But, if you take one small step in the right direction every day, and if you stay the course, the change will come and you will prevail. This is my constitution."

I have written the message above many times and varied the wording. The message is always the same: "Try your hardest to get what you need and then try some more and perhaps you will get it".
 
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Excellent posts - I read them everyday and they give me encouragement as I face exactly the same surgery on the 17th April in the UK to replace the aortic valve and dacron graft for ascending aortic aneurysim

Many thanks
Mike
 
Congratulations on your early progress, your work ethic, and your desire to give back. After surgery I had neither the inclination or the courage to exercise. I was sedentary and over weight prior to surgery and was satified to survive. You drive to thrive. More power to ya! It's folks like you that help others know what's possible, provide inspiration, and remove fear.
 
I am planning to repeat this walk today with my wife and kid. It will be tougher for my wife as she will have the kid strapped on to her, but I think would be a great exercise for the whole family. Will post up once we finish. I plan to have Panera Bread for breakfast as a break in the middle, for some reason we love their coffee.
 
The chance to go on walk with your wife and kid is one of the biggest things that should make the prospect of OHS to fix a valve problem less scary for anyone who just got found out what they are facing. This is a great reward for what you have been through already and any of the bumps you may still face. Here's to many more!
 
Hi Vadim,
Hope you have an enjoyable walk today with your family. I'm planning on doing the same today (although much less distance). There's a great place to walk here in Narragansett, RI along the seawall; fresh, salt air...makes you grateful to be alive.
 
Hey hey Matu. Good weather in the spring is what makes us be a lot more active. How did your walk go?

Here in MD, tt was in the high 40's F outside in the AM and I had to cancel the walk. Instead we went to the mall later in the day and walked around for 2h 15m. Much less distance covered if you ask me, but it was good fun to get some steps in. My wife has a pedometer and it measured 12,200 steps for the day. I say not too shabby, and we had a great little dinner following our walk too.

Anyone else with recent AVR do any walking recently?
 
4.06 mile walk today in 1 hr 08 min. My lungs were not willing to keep up with my heart which seems to have gotten used to the load and stayed around 88-96 all the time (even during intervals). I am not a big cardio guy and the energy system that is used for cardio is different that what I am used to for powerlifting, so this could be one reason for suckyness. On the positive front I finished the walk just fine, but it was a little sad to see my lungs not keeping up and having to push them and be mad at them. Here is the link from today: http://runkeeper.com/user/thegymguy/activity/82040874

Tomorrow is 3 weeks since my surgery and I am seeing my cardiologist, hopefully we can reduce or cut-out Ameodarone and Metorpolol. Most importantly, this thursday I have a surprise exercise planned. Hope you all are walking as much as you can and get out of your comfort zone just a little bit here and there ;)
 
My Mom is 79 and she told me last night she started "training" for a 1 mile Senior Walk/Run. Then I read that GymGuy, at 3 weeks postop, did 4 miles in an hour. I felt positively lazy with my 1 mile/15 min walks twice a day that I have been doing the last week. My surgeon gave me the go-ahead a few days ago to do anything I wanted (except lift > 20 lbs) as long as I felt OK so I thought - well, let's see what I can do. I just got back from a 3 mile 45 min walk and it felt WONDERFUL! This is the first time in a long, long time I could do anything close without being utterly exhausted, short of breath, etc, etc.
GymGuy, keep up your posts - they are quite inspiring - even for 53 year old old ladies! :)
 
What restrictions have been placed on your walking intensity? I"m a marathon runner and want to get back to running as soon as I safely can.
 
Hey Karla, trust me age is one of those things which is in our heads. We are only as old as we let our bodies feel.
Plus, I see a big trend with many people 45+ (not sure why that age) who want to age gracefully and start good eating habits and lots of exercising to get back in shape (or stay in shape) and keep it that way. My friend, who is one of the best personal trainers in Northern VA area, would say people want to age like fine wine and that only happens once they get a little older.

Appointment went well, I am now on only 1 drug (metoprolol), and that is for just one more week. Cardiologist was pretty pleased with everything.

Hey J, my walking does not have any restrictions. They said listen to your body. To be honest, it is my body that must listen to me ;) so that is going quite well. One or two of the AVR patients of my cardiologist are tri-athletes and according to my cardiologist went back to their sport after recovery period from AVR. I am sure you will get back to marathon running, it will probably happen after your sternum completely heals, just think about running and bouncing a completely separated sternum (ouch!!!). I was told sternum healing time is from 6-13 weeks. So, in the worst case you will be speed walking till week 13, and then jogging right after. Of course, great thing about speed walking is that you can do 10 miles of speed walking in about 2.5 hours @ 4mph. Just think about switching to jogging a day later when your endurance is already up to 2.5 miles of speed walking ;) Heck, if you are badass, you could even get your speed walk up to 4.5 mph and cover great distances before starting to jog after the sternum is fully healed. Please run all these thoughts by your surgeon and make sure he is on the same page. Also, make sure your surgeon has dealt with athletes before as our bodies recover and behave differently as well as metabolize anestesia a little faster.
 
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