Tag: health

Stage III

I am officially on the Stage III Diet. What does that mean?

To start with, things aren’t that much different. Now instead of x ounces of puréed food we can start having x+y ounces of soft foods. Think seriously boiled veggies or meatballs or canned chicken or tuna without the extra step in the blender. The values of x and y are dependent on the patient. For me, x was about two ounces. Y will eventually be about a cup.

For my first meal I stayed purée but I increased the amount. I scrambled two eggs. That came out to about four ounces or half a cup. It was by far the biggest meal I’ve had since two days before the surgery.

Going forward I will have to take very small bites, about the size of a pencil eraser, and chew each bite at least 25 times. I will also need to take short breaks between bites. A one cup sized meal needs to take about 40 minutes. Yikes.

I’m also back to the 60 minutes between eating and having a drink. That is going to suck for me getting my fluids in, but they did up the hourly fluid goal by two ounces. That should help.

Okay, my 60 minute post-scrambled eggs timer just went off. I need to go get myself a protein shake. Talk to you later.

The Next Step

Today marks two weeks on the post-surgery recovery plan’s Stage II diet. (It might be phase II, not stage II, but who cares) Where do we go from here?

In about 5-10 minutes I will be heading out of the house to go to my Stage III class. That is, I believe, when they start letting me eat solid foods. Actual chewing will be involved.

I gotta say, I am a smidgen nervous about this step. I really want to eat food again, but I also really want to keep babying my little baby stomach.

I’ll let you know how it goes. Wish me luck.

Tough Night

I hit my goal for protein yesterday and I only missed my fluid goal by one ounce. I felt like I was in a good place as bed time approached.

It was about 11:00pm and I was trying to decide if I wanted to hate watch Fear the Walking Dead on the 11:15pm AMC replay or just pack it in for the night. I was sitting up in bed surfing around on my iPad when I realized I could only see the edges of the screen.

Ah, hell.

I don’t know about anyone else, but that vision thing has happened to me 3-4 times in my life and it’s very clearly the start of a migraine. In those few previous experiences the only help was darkness and sleep. It was bed time anyway so I quickly killed the lights, put on the CPAP mask, squeezed my eyes shut, and pulled the covers over my head. Fortunately I was asleep before the headache pain kicked in. I did wake up for a while a couple of hours later and there was definitely a headache. Fortunately, again, I was able to fall back to sleep pretty quickly.

When I woke up, at around 6:30am, I was better, I guess. My head was a little mushy but the pain was pretty much gone and my eyes were back to normal. Now, about four hours later, I am better still. I’m not 100%, but I am okay. I took out the trash, scooped the litter box, filled the bird feeder, and did a load of laundry. That’s a lot of work for me right now. I think it’s time to just watch some TV and calm my ass down for a while.

Here’s hoping that doesn’t happen again, and if it does let’s hope it waits a few years at least.

Nothing to Write About

I feel like I have nothing to write about. I’m sitting at my desk listening to a podcast and trying to eat a little pureed chicken. I have nothing to write about. I am so focused on getting my 60 ounces of liquids and 60 grams of protein in each day that I haven’t really worried about anything other than binge watching some TV. I’ve also spent a ton of time stressing over my mother’s situation, but I am not sharing that today so sorry not sorry.

I haven’t payed any attention to the NHL playoffs and I’ve barely payed attention to baseball, beyond checking the Red Sox scores once a day. I did finally finish reading Steve Hackett’s autobiography. There wasn’t a whole lot of detail there, but it was still a good read. I’m thinking Mike Rutherford’s book might be next. Get some of that Charterhouse story and all that.

I weighed myself today. Remember the other day when I wrote something about how I didn’t want to weigh myself all of the time? Yeah, I weighed myself again. If the scale I keep in the bedroom is accurate I have lost 60 pounds since January 19th. That is insane.

Should I play guitar after I post this meandering crap of a post? Jen is working in her office and Harry is working at his new job so why not just make a little noise on my own? I don’t know. I’m a little wary of it for some reason. I don’t know why. It’s a weird feeling. I don’t know.

Maybe I’ll goof around with the blog and see if I can find a new theme and layout. Maybe I’ll do that for a while, maybe not. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll sneak in some Breaking Bad. I only have about half of the final season left to go. Maybe I’ll check iBooks and see how much Mike Rutherfords’ book costs.

Drive

Jen and I went for a drive today. You wouldn’t think that was a huge deal but there it is. We drove to Danvers and back. In full pandemic mode, we didn’t go anywhere, we just drove there and drove back.

It was magnificent.

It made me a smidge late for my lunch but it was okay. I took a water bottle with me so I could keep sipping. Puréed tuna fish for lunch, puréed meatball for dinner.

It’s been a good day. Tuesday should be the day when I graduate to solid food. I’m good for now, but I’m feeling pretty ready to chew stuff again.

Meatball

Jen made spaghetti and meatballs for dinner for her and Harry, who coincidentally started a new job in a restaurant today, and she purred a meatball for me.

It was my first post-op taste of red meat and it was glorious.

It made me think about eating at restaurants. My go-to is usually a steak, but there is no way I’m going to be able to eat a whole steak in one sitting now. I’m going to have to learn how to be the kind of guy who takes home the leftovers. Maybe I’ll keep a cooler in the trunk of each car, or something like that.