We are closing out this old year and I am not making any New Year’s Resolutions. Instead, I am incorporating what I have learned this year, with this blog, into new habits for the coming year. I invite you to walk with me on my journey to better health and fitness.

In my last blog, I told you I received the Anointing of the Sick. I have a growth on my upper back. Years ago, a doctor told me it was a ‘fatty tumor’ and if it started to hurt or grow, I should get to a doctor right away. It was flat then and I did not worry about it. It has slowly become quite large; it is as big as a grapefruit now. It is not a ‘fatty tumor’. Today my primary care physician diagnosed it as ‘Cushing’s Disease’. There is a long list of symptoms and I have most of them. One of them is ‘weight gain of the upper body and trunk’. Imagine that!

I will see how quickly I can get an appointment with an endocrinologist. If the diagnosis is correct, there are many tests and ways to treat this disease, including surgery. I think I may have to post-pone Planet Fitness for a while.

On the upside, if this is truly ‘Cushing’s Disease’ and it is treatable, I may be able to finally drop this excess weight and have more energy to work out. My husband is hoping the mood swings will disappear.

Spiritually, the Holy Spirit is increasing the occasions for me to pray over people to heal them. If you are interested in these occurrences, please send me a comment with your email address. I don’t know why Jesus chose an old, fat woman to be His instrument, but I will obey as long as He wants me to reach out to those in pain.

I pray that you receive all the blessings that God has in store for you. I am ready to have better health and be able to continue to keep this blog going with many successes to report. Thank you for taking the time to read my blog posts. Your comments mean so much to me – as do your prayers. I will keep you ‘posted’.

I hope everyone who is reading this has had a wonderful and blessed Christmas. I certainly had my share of surprises!

A miracle happened to my husband and me on December 23rd. It said in our church bulletin that confessions would be heard on that night, from 7-8 pm. We arrived early anticipating a large crowd. There was no one there and the church was closed.

I went to the rectory to find out what happened and the housekeeper said there were no confessions that night, they were on the 19th – and there would be no more before Christmas. Then Father just walked in the door. He had nothing else scheduled for that night and it was a ‘miracle’ that we came when we did as he had been gone all day delivering food to the poor. He not only heard our confessions, but gave us the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick. (more on that later) I am sure God orchestrated all of this. We were now ready to receive Holy Communion on Christmas. When we returned home, I looked at the bulletin again and I was right. It was printed that confessions were scheduled for that night – the night no one came to church but us.

Another miracle is God has given me the gift of healing. I walked into church a half hour early and no one had arrived yet accept the ushers. One of them, who I knew, looked so bad, I just had to stop and ask him what was wrong. He told me he was in severe pain due to a pinched nerve in his back and severe arthritis, among other things. You could tell he was in incredible pain as his face had aged 20 years! I was ‘moved’ to pray over him. I annointed him with oil blessed by Padre Pio and when I began to pray, the graces came through me from the tabernacle as if someone turned on a firehose and aimed it at the side facing the tabernacle. They came down my arms and into my hands to him. When I was finished, his face was absolutely radiant. He felt he was completely healed. He had not been able to genuflect for years and now he can. The pain is gone and the trembling in his hands stopped. What a wonderful Christmas gift – for both of us.

How is my workout and weight loss going? My visits to the gym have been cut back due to the holidays. But I have cut way back on what goes in my mouth. I am drinking my shake at lunchtime and am not preparing huge meals for just the two of us. Sometimes we only have soup and crackers or a baked potato. If we are still hungry, we will eat something more later. Christmas dinner with our family was no problem – I ate little.

Though I am doing all these things, my body does not look good. After looking in my full length mirror, I was so disgusted with myself but kept asking God to help me. Last night, Christmas Day, I sat on the living room floor watching TV with Eddie and began doing my ‘floor exercises’. This morning, my arms look ½ the size. Lesson to Ginger: Keep Moving – and God will do the rest.

I will do my best to write more often. I always think I have nothing new to write about and look what came out of the keyboard today. I wish all of you a Blessed, Peaceful, and Healthy New Year.

Again, it has been a while since I have written. My life has been filled with December. This is a difficult month for me and I was hoping to spend most of it at the gym. But my husband had to use my car for a while.

Today I worked at Wal-Mart as a temp to earn extra money. I could only stock shelves for 3 hours! This was one tough workout. I salute all those in retail who stand on their feet all day as cashiers and stockers. You guys rock!

This experiment of working at Wal-Mart alerted me to the fact that I am so out of shape, it is literally a sin! I have my full length mirror in my bedroom and I check myself out each day. Sadly, I have gotten so much bigger. I do not know if I am retaining water, it is more likely I am retaining fat grams. And the lack of exercise every day is taking its toll on me.

I have not gotten away from the bowl of ice cream every day yet! Sometimes it is more than 1 bowl a day! I am sure that is a big reason for the weight gain.

You see, I am lactose intolerant and have not been able to eat ice cream for many years. Now the stores carry ‘Lactaid©’ ice cream and it feels like I am making up for lost time. I was hoping to get sick of it by now, but so far, I still love it.

This IS a sin. Gluttony! It is also an addiction. And we know who is in charge of all that is NOT of God, right? Yes, the evil one. To sum it up, I am committing some of the 7 Deadly Sins of the Catholic Church every day! They are: gluttony, wrath, greed, sloth, pride, lust and envy.

Do you see how every day habits make it easy to fall into Satan’s traps? This is Christmas, the time when Jesus was born into the world with nothing. It seems like a good time to lay down these sins at His little feet and never take them up again. He would like that Christmas present – for me to stop eating too much, to stop being lazy and to seriously work on becoming healthy.

I know it’s been a while since I have written. But I am happy to report that I have been to Planet Fitness two days in a row and so far, I love it! I’ve been doing 10-15 minutes of the treadmill, which runs so much smoother than mine at home.

There is a section in the building for working on abs, so I went there and tried the machines. Some I could not even move, but there is one that helps me do crunches and I liked how easy it was. I even put some time on the bikes.

I had my MP3 player and was listening to Michael W. Smith music. I really got lost in the music and did not need to focus on what I was doing. Before I knew it, I had been there an hour. I had thought taking a shower and blow drying my hair there would be a hassle, but it was not and I felt like a new person walking out of the door!

For me, it’s a place to ‘get away’ from my stress and concerns. I am in my own world and no one pays any attention to me or what I am doing as they are focused on their workout. I have to wait until Dec. 15th to ‘Design Your Own Program’ with a personal trainer. In the meantime, I will stick to the machines that I know how to use.

You know, it seems like I was able to focus on the music more while working out and I really listened to the words of the songs honoring God. It was like nothing else mattered except being in the ‘here and now’ with Jesus. It was a a wonderful spiritual experience. I know this is something He wants me to do. He gave me good muscle tone so it should not take longer than a year (hopefully sooner) for me to be in the shape I want. What a wonderful gift from Him to put an affordable gym in my neighborhood! There are no excuses for being overweight now.

For the first time, I actually hope I do not get a job for a month or so. By then I will have a routine and hopefully, I will be able to buy nicer clothes than the maternity tops I’ve been wearing. But it all starts in the morning when I wake up knowing I will go to the gym, no matter what is scheduled. I need that time for myself and God has found a way of giving it to me.