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The Road goes ever on and on
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.

–J. R. R. Tolkien

I’ve been thinking for a long time about adding a sustained series of posts on my health journey:

  • What I’m doing generally to become healthier
  • What I’m doing specifically to become healthier
  • The health goals I would like to reach
  • My thoughts and feelings as I travel through my health journey

This is the official beginning of the series, although I’ve been seriously working at this since August of 2013. I started Weight Watchers in August, and that’s been the main thrust of my journey. But because I want to talk about other things that are tangentially related to this, I’m going to make these posts broader in scope.

Yesterday, we had a Starfleet get-together in Colombia, (South Carolina, not the country), so we dropped by Weight Watchers early to jump on the scale and check our progress for the previous week. Technically, Saturday is the beginning of my Weight Watchers week, but I still think of it as ending the week, since Saturday is the end of the week calendrically on both the Jewish and Gregorian calendars, (at least in the United States). Last week, I lost 2.6 pounds. This week, I stayed the same, neither gaining nor losing. I’m happy with these results for a couple of reasons:

  1. I tracked last week, but not every meal, mainly because I find the iPhone app such a pain to use with Voiceover, and the Weight Watchers site is pretty much unuseable with a screenreader, any screenreader.
  2. I was active this week according to my ActiveLink, and I was active more than the week before, but I still didn’t reach one hundred percent of my activity goals for any says this week.

My activity percentages were higher than the previous week though, and this is a good thing. I’m planning to be more consistently active during this week, to get the percentages higher.

I also had two non-scale victories this week.

  1. I have some dennim skirts that I couldn’t fit into before I started Weight Watchers back in August. As of last week, they were still a little tight, but not tight enough that they couldn’t be worn in public.
  2. I also had a T-shirt that I couldn’t get into back in August, and I can wear that now too.

This week, I’m getting up earlier so I can be up early enough to pray and get started on tasks I need to complete at a reasonable hour. I’m also going to make it a point to put my ActiveLink on earlier so that I can maximize the amount of activity I do in a day. I will also start a section in my journal to keep track of my thoughts, feelings and achievements over the week so that I can compile them into a post next week so I can keep this series going. I haven’t written in my journal in a long time and I think that’s something missing in my life.

I think if I stick to my goals, the week ahead will be a very productive one.

More next week.

Evans, Georgia, United States
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I normally try to keep things positive and apolitical around here, because I want everyone, no matter where they fit on the political spectrum, to feel welcome. But I just came across an article from Yahoo! News (thanks Twitter) about two men who decided to have their doctor euthanize them after they found out that along with being deaf, they were also going blind and would never see each other again. I heard something about this story earlier this week, but didn’t go looking for it. After reading this article, I’m shocked. I would never dream of having myself euthanized if I found myself in a position where I was going to lose my hearing, although I depend heavily on it. Yes, it would be devastating, but I’d learn to adapt. But I also recognize that, in Belgium, where this took place, euthanasia is legal, and individuals who are over eighteen, and mentally competent, have the option of doctor-assisted suicide if they’re suffering. But what really shocked me was the last line in the article:

Belgian lawmakers are considering a law that would extend euthanasia to dementia patients and children, whose families and doctors consented.

That’s taking this entirely too far, in my oppinion. I can see where this is going. A couple has a baby, learns that the child will be disabled, and then decides to have the child euthanized. The child has no say because he or she is too young. That’s crossing the line and would be murder. Same thing with the elderly. Family decides they don’t want to take care of Grandpa anymore, so let’s just put him out of his misery. And I can see all kinds of “quality-of-life” arguments being bandied around.

Personally, I think the two gentlemen who committed suicide rather than become blind and then learn to adapt made a tragic decision. But I can also understand that they had the choice, and maybe they weren’t aware of any resources that could help them, and they figured they were in for a lot of unbearable suffering. And so they exercised their right of free choice, and took the option they did. I don’t agree with it, but I can understand it. But according to the last line of that article, consent by the victim goes out the window, and it becomes another person’s choice. And that’s completely evil.

So what do you all think? Am I just foaming at the mouth, or does my position have merit? Leave a comment and let me know.