Category: health

Thoughts on BMI

Two posts back I wrote a footnote about the possibility of my weight dropping below 200 pounds and how I imagine I would be unhealthily thin at that weight.

According to the site I go to when I want to calculate my BMI, that statement is actually super wrong. The calculator page includes this list of BMI Categories:

Underweight = <18.5
Normal weight = 18.5–24.9
Overweight = 25–29.9
Obesity = BMI of 30 or greater

I have spent my entire adult life in the Obesity range. I have a looooong way to go to drop below that category. With my height being 6’4″ I would have to get down to 246 to have a BMI of 29.9. I am so far away from 246 pounds that I haven’t even considered it a possibility.

In order to get below the Overweight category, I would have to get down to 204 pounds. That seems insane to me. Completely out of the realm of reality. Wow.

That means the range for me to be in the Normal weight category is 152 to 204 pounds. I can’t even imagine it. I feel like, at 152 pounds, if I turned sideways I would be so thin you wouldn’t be able to see me. I would be invisible. Really.

So if dropping from 200 pounds to 199 pounds represents entering Onederland… I guess that wouldn’t be unhealthy for me after all. It’s not a goal though. I don’t have a goal number in mind. My only goal is to be healthier and not have to constantly worry that the heart attack is right around the next corner.

I’ll get there.

Eight Weeks

Hello and welcome to the eight weeks post-op update. TL/DR: I feel friggin great.

I weighed myself this morning. It’s been a real mental struggle to stop myself from weighing in more than once a week. Obviously I am not going to tell you how much I weigh. Nope. I will tell you what the losses are though. Last Wednesday the drop was a lot bigger than I expected. Today was nothing like that, but it was still a little bigger than I expected and I am really pleased.

I was down 5.4 pounds today. It wasn’t enough to change the tens column in my current weight. Changing the tens column is a thrill. Changing the hundreds column… now that’s worthy of a celebration complete with circus animals and a marching band and a Blue Angels flyover. It’s going to be a while before that happens.* Still, I am happy today.

My total loss since a few days before the surgery is now 69.6 pounds. I’d really like to round that up to 70, but no. Let’s be literal with this number. I don’t mind being a little fuzzier with the other total though, but I don’t have to today. The total weight loss since my first check in at the weight loss clinic is now 90.2 pounds. Let me spell that out once more time. NINETY POUNDS!

NINETY POUNDS!

My next check up at the clinic is tomorrow afternoon. I assume they are going to weigh me when I get there. That number will be higher than today’s number (I assume), and I am wondering if I want to include it on my tracker or not. I think it would be a more “official” number than today’s due to the likelihood that the scale is more accurate, and because it’s the same scale I used for both my initial weigh in in January, and the last weigh in before the surgery… But I really don’t want to see that number drop below 90 due to some technicality.

So in summation, allow me to share that I feel fantastic. My energy level… I feel 10 years younger. I can exercise without feeling like I am going to die. I don’t have to stop and rest when I walk for 10 feet. It’s amazing. Yeah, my clothes don’t fit anymore and I look like a clown, but that will be at least partially addressed over the weekend. I still eat too fast and that has kicked my sorry ass a few times now. Nausea is not fun, but I have not been bad enough to take the nausea medication they prescribed for me at the hospital. I just feel great, and I can’t wait to see how I feel with each new week.

*On the Bariatric Surgery Facebook group I have learned that folks refer to the drop from 200 to 199 pounds as Onederland. If I reach Onederland I think I will look like an anorexic. That is too far for me to consider. I think that would make me unhealthy on the other end of the spectrum. Still… Onederland. Sounds pretty engaging.

Planning and Postscript

Two things. First, weather.com says it is going to be sunny in the morning. I am going to try to get up around sunrise and go find a place in the city to take some film photo tests. Maybe just downtown before everything opens. Maybe the cemetery near the railroad station. Maybe the castle ruins. Maybe something else. I don’t know, but I want to do it and I only want to bring dad’s film camera. We’ll see what (if anything) happens.

Second, In regards to the previous post, Jen read an article tonight saying that people recovering from Gastric Bypass surgery probably should not try to eat broccoli until after three months or so. Something about the fiber causing food to get stuck. Well then I’ll just have to wait and see what happens, but I do feel perfectly fine at the moment. No worries.

Bonus third topic. I am in the middle of a third straight photo a day project thingie on Flickr. Every day for two years and nine months I have taken a picture with my iPhone. As of now, 9:14pm, I have not taken a picture with my iPhone. The streak lives, however, because I have taken a picture with my D90 and it’s on Flickr. The streak continues, babie!

Ain’t she sweet?

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Post-Surgical First

What’s your favorite vegetable? Cool! Me? It’s broccoli. Nothing else comes close.

After having surgery, when I hit the phase three diet I thought I was good to go, but they suggested we stay off of green veggies for a while. I did what I was told.

Tonight though, Jen made dinner and on the side of the plate was 0.8 ounces of broccoli. I ate it. It was delicious. My stomach has not complained at all.

Now we are good to go, folks.

Clothes

I need new clothes. I’m nearly at the point where I can’t deal with it anymore.

I like loose fitting clothes. When you’re might height your clothes shopping options dwindle greatly. When you’re my weight too, they pretty much vanish. I wear what I can get my hands on. That’s it.

Today though, I am wearing clothes that I bought 80+ pounds ago. Everything I own is super baggy now. I really don’t mind with t-shirts and collared shirts except that the neck opening sometimes hangs down low enough that it feels like a v-neck. Jeans… well… Ever seen a movie from the 50’s with a hobbo character? That’s how I feel. I am starting to feel like I look like a clown.

Jen and I are planning to do some clothes shopping this weekend. I usually buy online, but I don’t really know what size I need now. I am going to have to spend some quality fitting room time. I’m actually stressing out about this a little. Why?

I’ve been using a selfie a day app and taking a picture of myself in the mirror every morning. I don’t see a lot of difference in my appearance. I wonder if that’s because the clothes are the same size in all of the pics. If I wear smaller clothes will I then look thinner? I don’t know. I don’t care. Well, maybe I do care.

Wednesday is my weigh in day. I woke up this morning needing to step on the scale. I mean I needed to. I didn’t. I fought the urge to break the routine. I don’t know if I will be able to do the same tomorrow (Tuesday) but I will do my best. Once a week is good. Once every two weeks would be better. Once a month would be best. I just don’t want to get caught up in the numbers game, but at the same time I feel like this whole post-surgery experience is difficult enough that I should be celebrating every single ounce I lose. I don’t know.

Weigh in the day after tomorrow. Clothes shopping three days later. Such a crazy, weird new world, huh?

No Pain, No Gain, Something Something

I walked/marched in place for 30 minutes this morning before work. At lunch time I rode the exercise bike for 15 minutes. I have been trying to work the bike into my daily routine for a couple of weeks. Hopefully things will work out in such a way that I can do this regularly.

The downside is that my legs feel like rubber and walking is a little bit of an adventure. Yikes.

Here comes some camera nerd thoughts. Ready? Okay, I installed a light meter app on my phone yesterday. Dad’s camera has a built in light meter and I would utterly be toast without it. I assume my Nikon has one built in too, but I don’t know where it is or how to use it (now that I think of it, it’s probably just the auto mode). At lunch today I tested it out a smidge. I picked something to shoot, used the light meter, used manual mode on the Nikon, set everything the way the meter told me to, and took a picture. It looked okay on the D90’s little view screen. I then turned off half of the lights in the cellar and did it again. The picture looked okay but it was a little on the dark side (insert Vader’s breathing here).

I then repeated the entire process with the Pentax. The internal light meter looked good in both cases, so I think the app is probably close to accurate. How will the pictures look when I get them developed? I haven’t a freakin’ clue. Not even a tiny inkling of an idea. It may be a long time before I get the results. I took the roll that was in the camera (the 35ish year old roll that Dad started and I finished) to CVS on Saturday. They said 7-10 days… so I should be getting a call from them any minute now. (For those of you reading this post at some random future date, it hasn’t even been 48 hours yet. I was kidding. Get it?)

What else? Do I need to get a camera bag for Dad’s camera, or do I need to rearrange the bag that I have so that it can hold both cameras? My bag has the D90, two lenses, and some other little things. I can change the size of each section in the bag so I know I can fit the camera in there somehow, I just won’t be able to fit all of the other stuff. I have three lenses for the D90, including one that would be on the camera, and two for the K1000, again including one that’s actually on the camera. I may have to leave the extra lenses at home when I take the bag out somewhere. Maybe I get a bag for the two cameras and another bag for the lenses? Do amateur goofballs do that?

I also saw some youtube videos showing a couple of accessories that have kicked off my camera gear acquisition syndrome. Amazon has a remote shutter that screws on to the actual shutter switch. I could use the shit out of that for long exposures. I also saw a timer that is a little windup clock thing that also screws onto the shutter. I think K1000s might have come with that at some point. I wonder if Dad had one. I can’t find any of those anywhere online, including ebay.

And that, dear friends and neighbors, is my lunch break post for today.

Not Ready for Monday

I am just not ready for this… Monday. Crud.

I’m on track today. I started work before starting breakfast, which I don’t like, but otherwise all is well. My day’s exercise is done, the laundry is running and the bed is made and things are looking good. I just want another day for the weekend, that’s all.

I only got four hours of sleep Saturday night, thanks to the sunrise chasing. Last night I got seven hours but the numbers were as good as I’ve ever seen. I don’t know if that’s enough though because I am pretty seriously sleepy right now.

I stayed up later than I should have last night because I was being a camera nerd. Well… a camera researching nerd. Is that a thing? I was on youtube watching videos of common film photography mistakes, and tips and tricks for film photography beginners, and videos of people taking their Pentax K1000 on street photography photo walks around various places. I’ve done that a couple of times in Boston and New York. Well… usually I was doing something else and just took my camera with me and pretended I was on a photo walk.

I want to do it again with Dad’s camera now. Like… lets do it now! I need to get some fast film so I can do it at night too (assuming I don’t screw up loading the film again). I want to start at the old Tower Records location and just walk down Newbury Street to the Common, and then walk through the theater district, and then go back up to the building formerly known as the Hancock building and the church next door, and then go to the North End and go through the farmers market, and then, and then, and then. Man, I friggin’ love Boston. Screw Covid for keeping us away.

Oh, and then we need to go to New York, and then we need to go back up to the mountains and find waterfalls. All of it.

Also, if I don’t play my guitar soon I am going to die. Just saying. Thursday is the day I have pegged for trying to trade in my Strat. If they give me cash I will use that cash for the upgrades to the two 1970’s Gibsons.

Okay. Time to take on Monday. Mondays suck. I wanna go to Boston and wander around instead. Unless it starts raining… and it’s supposed to rain. Crud.

My Voice is Still Broken

I spent the last three hours in meetings and I was talking quite a bit through all of them. My voice is almost gone. It’s mostly just a croaky, squeaky mess right now. I drank about 14 ounces of liquid (grape juice, babie) over that time, but it seems like it was a losing battle.

I haven’t tried to sing much since discovering my voice was damaged over the last weekend. Anything I have sung (in the car, driving places) has been in a low register. Low notes good. High notes bad. I was thinking on my drive to Tewksbury last night that I was hitting higher notes (while singing along to a Pineapple Thief record) than I was on Sunday (while singing along to a U2 record). I don’t know if that’s the case anymore. My voice is shot.

I need to stop talking. That should be easy enough for me.