When I lived in Maine, gardening seemed easy – an abundance of rain and acidic soil allowed me to grow my garden favorites with minimal effort.  Here in the arid west, gardening isn’t quite as easy.  We have alkaline soil which means a lot of my east coast faves don’t grow here well past one season such as azaleas, rhododendrons and astilbes and we don’t get much in the way of precipitation.

We do get an abundance of sunshine which certainly helps, but lack of water is tricky.  In fact, I think here in Denver, we’re going on about day 30 with no rain.  The storm clouds swell every afternoon, but any precipitation evaporates before hitting the ground.  These magnificent thunderhead clouds move towards the mid-west where they have received more than their fair share of rain.  Being fairly environmentally conscious, I’ve decided to use plants that are rugged and that tolerate harsher conditions.  I’ve xeriscaped our backyard and hell strip (that little section of ground between the road and sidewalk) in front of our home.  Did you know that it’s illegal to capture rain water in Colorado?   Apparently it is considered stealing by the folks who own the water rights in our arid lands.

My little veggie patch

So where am I going with this?  Yesterday morning when I got back from my little jog in the park around 6am, it was nice and cool.  I started doing a little weeding and before you know it I’m full fledged all out dividing, tending and rearranging my yard.  It didn’t hurt that I’m on drugs and had the stamina and single mindedness to keep on going.  They are prescription drugs lest you become alarmed, and are my dirty little secret – which I guess isn’t so secret now afterall.

Here’s the back story on the drugs….  I was diagnosed with hypo-thyroidism after having my daughter 10 years ago.  The symptoms of an under active thyroid are decreased metabolic activity which results in weight gain, fatigue, depression, infertility, anemia and heart disease.  These were my symptoms – weight gain, fatigue, infertility, anemia and high cholesterol.  I’m fully medicated now with Synthroid and Cytomel which is a combination of T4 and T3 (thryroid hormone) replacements to make me feel well.

For the most part all is well except that I never managed to lose the 25 pounds that I gained after being diagnosed.  I’ve tried severe calorie restricted diets: low carb, low sugar, vegetarian, grape fruit, cabbage soup, even ran and trained for 2 half marathons.  Weight loss – nada zip.  And, I might add to all this, that I’m not a good dieter – it’s no fun and sucks the fun right out of life.  Now, I’m not aiming for super model thin – I just want to feel better and lower my cholesterol.  Both my father and paternal grandmother died of heart attacks – my dad at age 44 (only 2 years older than I am now).

Every 6 months I go to one of the top endocrinologists in Denver for lab  work to check all my levels.  About a year ago, the nurse practioner suggested phentermine to help lose the weight.  In between last year and this, I visited a nutritionist and kept on trying to lose the weight myself drug free to no avail.  Now, I’m not a huge fan of drugs – especially since it’s humbling to know that I will be on prescription drugs for the rest of my life.  Yes – I have one of those little day of the week pill cases to keep it all organized!

After stepping on the scale at my bi-annual appointment on Wednesday, I decided what the hell, give me the phentermine!  OMG – this must be what speed feels like.  I haven’t felt this energetic in years, not to mention I’m not hungry and am not really interested in food right now.  Weird feeling.  I am feeling some side effects, mainly I have a really dry mouth – though it’s making me drink more water * bonus here in arid Colorado.  I hope this works in the weight loss department and I’ll keep you updated as time goes on.  One note about phentermine, you have to have good blood pressure and not be pregnant and it might cause your arm to fall off (okay not true about the last bit).

Thanks for taking my tangent with me… backtracking to yesterday morning’s garden binge – I could have kept going and going.  I felt terrific – I haven’t felt this good in years.  Meanwhile, I think I pulled a muscle in one of my little toes and I got sun burned after spending 7 hours in the garden working in a tank top and shorts.

The photo above is my little veggie patch.  It’s not much to brag about, but I have 2 tomato plants, a zucchini plant and lots of herbs.  It saves me a lot of money in the summer and it really yoinks my chain to pay $4.00 for a little packet of fresh basil.  As an added bonus, they’re organic since I don’t use any chemicals in my garden.  See that dinky little  bamboo stake and jute fence around the veggies?  That actually keeps my 2 big dogs out of the veggies.

Egyptian onions also known as tree or walking onions

I divided my Egyptian onions too.  I originally planted them in my hell strip (see above) last year and they’ve gone wild.  I thought that they were ornamentals, but it turns out that the little bulblets that grow on the top are edible.  Next time my recipe calls for onions, I’m going to give them a try.  They are purportedly stronger than regular onions.

Well, if this wasn’t a TMI post, I’ll be a monkey’s aunt!  But, just maybe someone out in blogland will benefit if they stumble upon my site.

I’m off to the guild to mix some glazes after spending some quality time with Hopper, Roy and Hesselberth the past couple of days before heading to the park for today’s 4th of July festivities.

Have a great weekend,

~Cynthia

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