Step two...
...start posting!
Well, I'm back. . . and quite obviously, I need to be back!
Life got the best of me for a few months. .
After my last post in Feb. I flew back to Athens and after the jetlag wore off ...I landed a nasty flu bug. . . then after about a week things started going wrong. I was dizzy and my fingers and feet started to go numb... We thought it was dehydration from the flu. . . but after a few days of no improvement (and walking into a lot of walls!) we called the Dr. He came to the house (they do that in Greece! :p) and said it's probably nothing but go to the ER since there is a teenie chance it could be Guillain-Barre. . . but the odds of that are slim to none since it's so rare. (Ten ppl in Greece diagnosed with it a year..) Well, I had it. The public hospital sent me home saying 'it's nothing, maybe you are depressed.. take some aspirin' ...eh?! But after another day and a half of *not* feeling better -- we took me to a private hospital and after convincing them I wasn't pregnant, the neuorologist nailed it. The link will explain it better than I can -- but in a nutshell -- the flu virus I had had the same genetic code as my nervous system. So, when my body attacked the flu ...I attacked my nervous system as well. Scary. As. Hell. I was paralyzed from the neck down and my face was starting to go numb. I *really* didn't want to talk because it was hard (weird to say it was hard, but ..it was??) but husband was excellent and enforced a little tough love.. made me at least say 'yes' or 'no'. Lung failure was a concern - but thankfully never happened. My neurologist was fantastic. . and pushed for starting treatment before it could actually be diagnosed (takes 10 days after the symptoms show up for it to test positive..) He had ruled out everything else that it could be. ...which was just a terrifying list of choices . . . MS, brain cancer... etc. And as fast as I got really sick... I got better. It was 5 days of medicine via IV.. and the first 3 days I would continue to decline before I showed signs of improvement (just the way the medicine works..) Ten days in the hospital and I walked out on my own (ok, husband held my hand... and I might not of been mrs. speedy or balanced ;P) ..sporten a really cool eyepatch since my vision was still a little screwed up. 
However, the flu 10 days in the hospital with no appetite was great for my weight loss. Altho, it didn't last. :P I gained a few back once I started eating properly again and then played with a few lbs. gain, lose, gain, lose... right up until about a month ago ..when I went back to the states for my brothers wedding in July and then husband joined me Aug. 1 for his first visit to the states. :) BUT that meant many many many BBQ's and beers and ice cream.. etc. And barely any water... You get the picture. :P In a months time I gained just over TWENTY lbs. *cry* It was so shocking when I got on the scale that I couldn't even be upset, it was just crazy. I had to laugh...
But now - it's back to business. Drinking my water, aware of what's going in my mouth and taking the time to get out and walk each day. When it cools off I'll rejoin my gym but for now I'll ease back into it with walking and a bit of swimming. It's too darn hot (constantly) to even think about an eliptical. :P
As soon as I can muster the courage, I'll post some new 'before' pictures. 