Health | Fat Wallet Refugee

What are your thoughts on the concept of living a very long life?

Given my relative health and current medical conditions, I think 70 is a conservative estimate. My father is in his 80s and my mother is mid 60s, both have lived varied lives with very different upbringing.

I think older generations have been able to achieve longer lives due to diet and exercise in their formative years.

Science has revealed that many of the modern wonders I grew up with have not been particularly healthy choices. So, living to 70 is probably the best I can mange.

This isn’t a happy conclusion, as it reminds me that I am running late on normal life experiences like marriage and procreation.

My life up until this point has been a struggle to escape poverty. Realistically, that won’t happen in the time I have left in this world.

Once my family has departed this realm, I will be alone and without my safety net. There is still so much knowledge about living that I do not possess.

Knowledge is generally what gives the edge to people when circumstanes and situations come up unbidden. Those with some ken of how things work are far better equipped to handle the unexpected.

They come out on top when challenges occur. I’ve managed to scrape by; but it is a losing game, and I am running out time.

Thanks to the expansion of Medicaid access in NC, I now have medical insurance. I selected WellCare NC as my insurer this year and I am now beginning to take advantage of their available services.

I have been having monthly phone conversations with a Dietician and putting together a plan to improve my overall health while also, hopefully, losing some excess weight. I have been on medication to lower my high cholesterol for about a year now.

The benefit gives me access to the Good Measures program which helps me to track my meals, water intake, weight, and daily fitness goals. I have been logging my meals maybe intermittently. Certainly not as often as I think I should. It will be a good habit to pick up.

I should be getting a free gym membership sometime later this year. I have completed the healthy tasks that were required to qualify for the membership. I just need to wait for my information to percolate through the system and then I should receive some mail with further instructions.

Surface coated with a sweet bell pepper cut into colorful pieces composition as an abstract food background

Yesterday, I made a nice salad for breakfast and ended up not being able to finish the whole thing, so I had it for lunch and then again for dinner. I used some salad greens from our garden, packaged sweet peas, and carrots from Food Lion, three colors of bell peppers, and freshly made kimchi from our local Korean grocer (Han Ah Reum).

I will try to put together a recipe list for my healthy meals and post those soon.

Questions or comments put them below, and thanks for reading!