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Well I've been gone for a while. Two issues, I was and currently am still on sim following a March that was break even followed by some draw down. However, the big issue was that I had a cardiac incident a number of days ago and while I've followed some of the journals by mobile phone, I've been away from the charts for a few days.
I did trade a bit yesterday but nothing to really speak of and today was the first day I really decided to focus and try to follow my trading plan and make some money (sim).
I finished the day +47 and I think all trades met my definition of something I could do. I did close a couple of them out early as I didn't feel all that comfortable with them and my second long was taken out prematurely by an errant trailing stop. I selected an ATM with a trail when I didn't mean to, otherwise that would have been my one and done trade for the day.
As to the cardiac incident, I am doing ok, have my first follow up visit with the doc on Monday, and beginning to learn how to eat again. Fortunately, it was quite mild and so with my youngish age, lifestyle modification, etc, I should live long enough to be an embarrassment to my kiddo long into her 40s or even 50s.....that would make me quite old by that time.
As you know, there is more to life than trading and tucking my kiddo into bed and holding her when she comes home from school is FAR more important than trading (or anything else for that matter). If you are a trade aholic reading this, just stop and go kiss your family. It could be gone in an instant.
My chart today.
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
Hi PW, great post, sorry about what it was caused by. You're probably my age and I know I worry about stuff like heart problems, and all the other stuff that can take you out before you're ready - but last year I watched a BBC documentary called "Horizon - Eat, fast, live longer" by a guy called Dr Michael Mosley. It's pretty convincing. Pretty much the giste of it is that you can get rid of heart disease and the danger of cancer, Alzheimer's, you name it, any Western disease like that by fasting 2 days a week. Big claims I know. And it sounds terrible to not eat 2 days a week, but I've been doing it for 2 weeks now and it's not so bad. Watch the documentary if you can find it - he sells the idea much better than I can - sometimes it's on youtube but it gets taken down regularly. Good luck.
You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
I've been a silent admirer of your journal for some time.
I had a minor cardiac event 10 years ago at age 39. It was quite alarming and unpleasant dealing with mortality at an "early age." I know that my event was stress induced. Balance in life is as important as it is in trading and I know you have alluded to this in your journal.
The great thing about "minor cardiac events" is that they are often just that....minor. If your event was minor and you have a good cardiologist you will likely be embarrassing your daughter in her 60's as planned.
I'm sure you have a good support group in place, but feel free to reach out to me if you like.
Thanks for all the effort you have put into your journal. I'm sure it's helpful to many individuals.
I too just had a cardiac event a couple of weeks ago, prolonged atrial fib that lasted well over 24 hours with my heart rate ranging from 100-150. I'm 37 and relatively healthy and it put some things in perspective for me.
What put things in even more perspective was that same night a coworker's husband experienced an aortal dissection (age 50). They had to take his heart out to work on him and afterwards he's had some complications but he's lucky to be alive with a 75% morbidity rate.
I hug my kids tighter now so I know where you're coming from. Hope you're well on the road to recovery.
Interesting day today. I tried getting short several times this morning, they all failed....mostly due to the fact I was unwilling to set the stop where it needed to be....many ticks away. Once my short set ups failed, I got long, did not like it at all and close it pretty quick. A few minutes later, the short I was looking for all morning happened and I capitalized on it pretty well.
Of course the trade of the day was the long that happened some time later but by then, I was long gone.
Healthwise, yesterday was a disaster. One of the meds the doc put me on was lisinopril. This thing made me cough something terrible almost from the minute they first gave it to me in the hospital. Its for high blood pressure I think and my blood pressure is mostly normal. Anyway, yesterday starting around 10:30 my time, I coughed almost all day. Today my chest is sore from all the coughing. I called the doc and they took me off the med and today, almost no coughing. Still some residual effect I suspect causing the remaining coughing but a much better day overall. In a few minutes, I am head for the cardiac rehab center for a tour and sign up for their program. Everyone that I know thats been through it says nothing but good about them.
Life sure is interesting.....
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
This is the old third rule. The new third rule was causing me drawdown, the old third rule is what worked for me but I got away from with the new third rule.
Basically it says to do business where other shorter time frame traders like me are puking out stops from having positions opposite of the current market direction.
Some more details. By the way, I normally require a CLOSE beyond the puke point to take a trade. Otherwise it might just be a fake out.
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris
A single trade today before the cash open. I had a long bias due to homework yesterday. And so I took the long early. It went four ticks my way, stopped at -12 and went down all morning. At every single support area, I kept looking for the long signal. Each one was simply burned through.
Finally after taking out all obvious support levels, it bounced and went straight up. I then waited for the breakout pull back entry. It never came and just powered up without me.
At this point I needed to head for the cardiologist office and took off for the rest of the morning.
When I got back a short was setting up, I took it, went +15 and came back and ended break even. I tried the same trade twice more, both were -10.
The two tick winner was my live account and the two losers were the first two trades of my combine.
Tomorrow I start it in earnest.
No charts today as I am posting from Starbucks on my phone after a nice 30 minute walk... Docs orders.
Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication, Leonardo da Vinci
Most people chose unhappiness over uncertainty, Tim Ferris