Pineapple, Augmentin, & Lips Rivaling BB King : The Beast Gets Beat Down

About two weeks ago, I ate 3-4 pineapples via smoothie, BBQ, and just plain-ol’ straight to the face. Needless to say, I love pineapple.

The problem with pineapples on mainland US is that they seem to destroy my mouth. I have heard, but haven’t been able to find credible sources, that there are quite a few chemicals used to keep the pineapples from ripening too fast. Even if that isn’t true, pineapples have a pH level of 2-3, which is highly acidic. The only US grown pineapples I have not had problems demolishing have been during my times in Hawaii eating Dole pineapples grown on Oahu. If I wanted to, I could buy pineapples from the Dole plantation in Hawaii and have them shipped here, but that runs about $48 for two pineapples.

So, after I had made the known mistake of downing a ton of pineapple, I ended up with a mouthful of canker sores…as usual.

After a week of the pain, they slowly started to subside. Then, the real fun began.

For whatever reason, I seem to have run into contact with a lot of sick people this year more than most years. Unfortunately, I blame one of them for what was to come.

Sunday evening, after eating a farewell dinner with Mark Wiens of Migrationology, I hit the hay around 7pm. My body was feeling weak and I know that sleep usually prevents me from getting sick.

I awoke Monday morning with the canker sores still hurting a bit and a throat that hurt to swallow even my saliva. As a guy, I knew I was stronger than the sickness that had taken over so I decided to rest it off on Monday. You know how that ends up.

First thing Tuesday morning, I was groveling like a baby and headed straight to the urgent care nearby. That’s when all hell broke loose in my mouth.

The doctor gave me a prescription for Augmentin, which is meant to kill bacteria. Unfortunately, a side effect can be white patches along the inside of the mouth. Oh yeah, and EXTREME swelling.

Remember those canker sores that were almost gone from the pineapple. Now, they were thriving.

Within 30 hours, I was back to the doc, barely able to swallow at all, a body temperature that wouldn’t stay balanced since I couldn’t eat or put any fluids down, and lips that rivaled the one and only BB King.

This time around, the doc gave me three prescriptions that were much stronger and minus the crazy side effects (so far). They have done wonders and I am now just waiting for the inside of my mouth and lips to heal so I can get back to living a normal, unfazed Beast life.

What Can You Learn from My Pain and Suffering

There are quite a few things that you can learn from this wonderful experience I had this week.

1. Save your “…In sickness and in health…” points for when you really need them. Ali Damron, the wifey as I like to call her, has been amazing, as usual, helping me get better. She is practically a doctor. She’s at least smarter than most doctors. I feel like she just reads medical journals for shits and giggles. I am the absolute biggest baby when I am sick so I definitely love having those marriage points stacked for the Big Beast Fall when it does happen.
2. Being sick sucks, so prevent it at all costs. Both of our mothers have rheumatoid arthritis and a major reason it can be debilitating is due to controllable health issues. They are working hard to correct those now, but preventing their current health situation from getting to where this disease has gotten to would have made their lives much better today. I am not here to pick on our moms because there have definitely been some health mistakes I have made myself (i.e. a whole bottle of Jagermeister in one night), but I have tried to make most of my life decisions around maintaining a healthy and balanced lifestyle. I eat healthy and well with a few pleasures here and there and I put my body through the grind in workouts. I hate being sick. I am horrible to be around when I am sick. I wish I could never be sick. The primary way I can prevent the majority of this from occurring is simply through prevention.
3. Losing 10 pounds in 3 days via not eating is not healthy weight loss. I have lost at least 10 pounds, if not more, this week. Though I needed to lose 10 pounds, I didn’t lose it the healthy way. I lost it simply because I wasn’t consuming calories and my body was trying to feed off itself to beat that damn virus. If you think being sick is a great way to lose weight, you have problems.

Become a Beast Updates

Now that you know where I have been all week, I feel like I should give some sort of update as to the status of Become a Beast.

I really was trying to get the energy and focus to finish up some previously started posts, but I didn’t want to lose the quality just to post something. So, I held off. I know. Not really ideal to have Become a Beast out of the box for only 1 week and then have a dead week, but I almost died (…not really).

To get back on track and start getting more quality content in front of your lovely faces, I have come to the conclusion a schedule is absolutely, positively necessary. You deserve it.

Going forward, this is what the Become a Beast schedule will look like…

Brand Spankin’ New Posts Monday through Thursday

• Monday : ‘How to’ post detailing tips, strategies, advice, suggestions, and everything in between to improve your health/fitness/life.
• Tuesday : Focus on Food – Recipes, types of foods, ways to cook, and everything else you could imagine regarding food.
• Wednesday : Ali Damron, the wifey, will be the featured writer on these days. She has great content over at AliDamron.com and she doesn’t hold back much so she will definitely be a good voice around Become a Beast.
• Thursday : ‘Are You Going to Eat That?’ Series- Will feature a single food item detailing what the food is actually made of and why it is/isn’t beneficial to your life and well-being.

As with any and everything, this may change if you guys absolutely hate this approach. 🙂

Feeling Beastly

The last month has been a bit crazy. I have had my wisdom teeth pulled, gone through canker sore hell, dealt with fatty lips, couldn’t swallow, and everything in between. My fitness and health regimen has been all but consistent. I hate that. Hopefully, in the next few days, I will be able to get back on track to feeling like the Beast I like to be.

Well wishes and let the fun begin…again. 😉

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Special thanks goes out to Benny Hsu, Amanda Christine, Merridew (sp?), & Hamish M for all the well wishes and advice this week. Much appreciated!

photo credit: jlacpo via photopin cc