Tag: nutrition

Three Year Anniversary Weigh In

Happy anniversary! Three years ago today I went under the knife and had my insides rewired. Gastric Bypass. Weight loss surgery. Most of my stomach was tied off and a big chunk of my intestine was skipped. It was a brutal experience that required all sorts of lifestyle and diet changes and had all sorts of icky side effects but it was oh so worth it. Health care wise it is the single best move I’ve ever made. Overall it doesn’t quite measure up to marrying Jen and being a step father, but it tops just about everything else.

I weighed myself this morning and was pleasantly surprised to see I was down a little since the last time I stepped on a scale. That’s nice, huh? My first appointment at the weight loss clinic was January 19, 2022 and I weighed 452 pounds. Yup. The day of the surgery I did not weigh myself. The most recent number I had was from April 29, 2022 when I weighed 431.4 pounds. On the one year anniversary, May 4, 2023, I weighed 204.8 pounds. Suck it, morbid obesity! The lowest weight I ever recorded was the magical day of September 22, 2023 when I weighed in at 198.4 pounds. Sub-200! Glorious! We were told to expect our post-surgery weight to bottom out at some crazy number and then start climbing up again to a more reasonable, sustainable value. That’s been the case for the last year and a half or so. At my two year anniversary I was 211.2. The last time I weighed myself was the three year anniversary of the first check in, January 19, 2025, and I was 222.6. This morning, the first thing I did when I got out of bed was step on the scale. I was expecting something between 220 and 230 and I got 218.6! Down four pounds since January and back in the teens, babie! Currently I am down 212.8 since the surgery and 233.4 since the start of the process.

I still have problems with food getting stuck on the way into my new digestive system but not nearly as often as before. I can have trouble if I don’t chew enough, or eat too fast, or eat too much in one bite, but these days I can go faster and more per bite than I could have two years ago. Eating is easier now than it was before. When it goes bad it still goes bad. If a bite of food can’t get into my stomach (it’s actually technically called a pouch now) then it has to go somewhere. Either it just hangs out and blocks the path so that nothing else can get in (until it breaks down enough to enter) or it comes back up to say hello again. That’s life these days, but it doesn’t happen nearly as much as it used to.

In closing, here’s my selfie a day video from the first year. Enjoy watching me melt away.

Question for Myself

There is a question that I am asking myself today. More like a switch statement, for my programmer friends. I am not looking for advice or opinions, I am just mulling it around in my head.

Should I go to the sugar free bakery today and get some sweet sugar free cookies to have as after dinner snacks this week?

Or, should I bake that sugar free chocolate cake mix that has been in the cupboard for a couple of months now?

Or, should I do neither and just work my way through the pile of sugar free snacks I’ve hoarded over the last month or so?

Now, for the programmers… I asked Google Gemini to write me a switch statement in C that asks those three questions. Here’s what it gave me. 

#include <stdio.h>

int main() {
    int choice;

    printf("Should I go to the sugar-free bakery, or should I bake a sugar-free cake,\nor should I just eat the snacks I've hoarded over the last month?\n");
    printf("Enter your choice (1 for bakery, 2 for baking, 3 for snacks): ");
    scanf("%d", &choice);

    switch (choice) {
        case 1:
            printf("Going to the sugar-free bakery seems like a good option!\n");
            break;
        case 2:
            printf("Baking a sugar-free cake at home can be a fun and rewarding experience.\n");
            break;
        case 3:
            printf("Indulging in your hoarded snacks might be tempting, but consider the nutritional value and long-term effects.\n");
            break;
        default:
            printf("Invalid choice. Please enter 1, 2, or 3.\n");
    }

    return 0;
}

Random Thoughts

The last few days have put me into a prolonged, slow burning state of freak out. Fun.

My friend’s father passed away on Monday. My father went into the hospital on Tuesday. No details on either situation will be forthcoming. We just got clobbered by a thunderstorm which, it turns out, was rough enough to knock out the power in the hospital. The backup generators kicked in a second later, but woah.

I am planning to go to the hospital after work tonight. I need to make dinner first but then I’ll go for a quick visit before visiting hours end. Tomorrow morning is the funeral. I’ll go to the hospital afterwards. How’s that for a tough day? The last few days have been bad, but tomorrow… woah.

On less important (re: not important at all) topics, I have one more episode of The Umbrella Academy’s final season to watch. I strongly suspect that once I finish that final episode I will immediately start a rewatch of the entire series from season one episode one. I think that is going to happen.

Earlier today I was looking at Threads (the twitter alternative social network made by the same assholes who make instagram and bookfayce which begs the question why the fuck am I giving this new social network site the time of day) and I posted that musically speaking, today is a Porcupine Tree kinda day (from a mental health standpoint, of course… meaning heavy and complicated and confusing if you’re not paying close attention). TWELVE MINUTES LATER I got a notification that the Porcupine Tree instagram account had been ported to Threads. They haven’t posted anything yet but I guess I should say you’re welcome?

I don’t know what the dad situation is going to be like this weekend but I do know that Bellana, my step daughter, is coming over for a visit. All the bad, scary stuff going on feels a little more bearable when the kids come by. I am really looking forward to seeing how she did at her conference this week. I want all the sciency details.

Speaking of science, from a nutritional standpoint I screwed up yesterday. I spent the whole day at the hospital with Dad and when I left the house I forgot to take my pill case with me. I took my breakfast vitamin pills before I left, and took my lunch vitamin pills when I got home for dinner. I was going to take my dinner vitamin pills before I went to sleep, but I fell asleep earlier than expected and missed that dose. Dummy. Note to self: bring the friggin’ pill case tomorrow. Dumb ass.

What else? Word from the hospital this afternoon is that Dad is starting to show early signs of coming out of whatever was wrong. My fingers and toes and eyes are all firmly crossed. Again, I am not sharing details beyond a small hint of optimism. Enjoy it while you can.

Okay, Robert. Stop stressing and get back to work. You have stuff to do. Do it.

Stomach Dance

Me and my stomach have been doing that gastric bypass patient dance all day today. We’re having trouble getting along. We need to work together but today we’re causing problems for each other.

I have eaten three meals. Each meal came with a stomach problem of varying degrees.

I had a protein bar for breakfast. I went a little too fast and felt that blocked/stuck feeling. It wasn’t bad enough to become nausea or to produce large amounts of extra saliva that I have to spit out. I tried gagging it up but nothing came. I had to pause eating for about half an hour before the blockage was gone and then I was able to finish.

I had a burger (cooked on the grill) and some french fries for lunch. The burger went down without any issues. The fries though. I only had about four of them and I should have stopped at three. I felt a little blocked again. I think I was going too fast this time as well. It was never bad enough to require any spitting up. I don’t know how long it took to pass, but it wasn’t long. As soon as I declared myself done with lunch I was off to my father’s so it was probably a couple of hours before I even thought about eating or drinking anything else.

I had a big piece of chicken and a little bit of white rice for dinner. Well, it was big for me. about three ounces. The chicken went down fine. The rice felt a little off. I only had two small fork fulls. I was okay afterward though. I stopped in time to avoid any problems. When I finished dinner I was a smidge below my daily protein goal. I waited about 20 minutes and then had a little tiny protein bar snack. It went bad. I think this time I took too big a bite and it got stuck for real. I gagged up a tiny bit of it and have been spitting out saliva for about half an hour now.

So there we have it. All summed up. Three meals, three stomach issues. Yippee. My doctor told me that in almost every case when there is a stomach problem after eating it’s really the patient’s fault. In all three cases this was my fault. It actually makes me feel better knowing that. If it’s something I did rather than something going on with my new stomach, then it’s something I can control.

220 pounds lost since the surgery. Yeah, these sort of things are 100% worth it. Absolutely.

Priorities are Jerks

Is doing the right thing overrated? Are priorities jerks?

Wednesday night I got a little less than six hours of sleep. I was really tired through most of the day on Thursday. I wanted to go to bed early last night but I ended up going to bed late. Fail. Then at about 3:30am I woke up with stomach pain. I have been doing a really shitty job over the last few days of eating three square meals. Three nights in a row I’ve had protein bars for dinner. It caught up to me. I was dealing with hunger pain a lot yesterday. I just couldn’t keep my stomach topped off for very long. I ate something before bed but it wasn’t enough and I was hurting when I woke up in the middle of the night. I had a little protein bar and felt better but I couldn’t fall back to sleep. It was annoying.

The end result? Less than five hours of sleep, and that includes over sleeping by about an hour. That lead to another question. Do I do my normal morning exercise and skip playing some guitar before work, or do I skip some or all of my exercise and play guitar. Ugh. I did the right thing. I did my exercise. I did not play guitar. I punched in to work at 8:50 with plenty of time to spare before the start of my shift, but I did not get any 50/90 challenge work done. No music for me.

Bummer. Maybe I’ll be able to sneak some work in tonight. Also, maybe I’ll have actual dinner tonight instead of just protein supplements. Not that there is anything wrong with that. I just don’t want to have hunger pains today. Let’s do the right thing, m’kay?

I Miss It So Much

I’m having a weird stomach day. Not a bad day, just a weird day. That’s not what this post is about though. This post is about caffeine.

I used to consume caffeine by the truck load. I took it in caramel colored, carbonated form. Soda. Decades of Coca~Cola followed by a few years of Diet Pepsi. I just couldn’t get enough of that sweet, sweet, bubbly caffeine.

Then I signed up for elective weight loss surgery. I met with a dietitian at one of my first consultation appointments and was given a list of things that I had to say goodbye to forever. Both caffeine and carbonated beverages were on the list. I knew it was going to be tough but I also knew I was up for the challenge. I had my last ever soda that day.

Now here we are, about two and a half years later, and I would KILL for some caffeine right now. I have had a moderately decent night’s sleep each of the last three nights. I should be feeling fine in the exhausted department right now but I am not. Quite the opposite. I’m really tired. Back in the days prior to February 2022 I had so much caffeine each day that it barely affected me. Now? After over two years cold turkey? I bet even the tiniest sip of a caffeinated drink would leave me wired for hours on end. Wouldn’t that be nice?

Ah, for the good old days (he said sarcastically because the good old days included weighing over 400 pounds and he never ever wants to go back to that again).

Yeah, as nice as it would be to have a little caffeinated pick me up right now, I wouldn’t. No, I like the way I feel these days and I don’t want to do anything that will make me sick. Nope, while I miss it today I do not miss it enough to start thinking about how things used to be. No nostalgia here, my friends. I’ll trade a sleepy afternoon for being able to walk up a flight of stairs without feeling like I am going to die. That’s a trade that I win easily.

As for my stomach being weird today, I don’t think it’s diet or bypass surgery related though what else could it be? I woke up at 4:00am this morning (bladder: I’m old, it happens) and my stomach was pretty upset. I actually said out loud, “uh oh.” I whispered it. My wife was asleep and I didn’t want to wake her. I went back to bed and fell asleep immediately. When I woke up at 5:15 I felt better. Half an hour later I was doing my morning exercise and drinking some water and I felt off again. I paused on the water for a while and felt better again. I ate breakfast in the car on the way to work and it went fine. A little before lunch I felt a little queasy. I thought I was hungry and I think I was. I had some chicken for lunch and felt a little better at first, but then started feeling off again. I stopped eating for a while and eventually felt a little better. I had a snack and it went fine. That was about 90 minutes ago. Now I am drinking some water. In about five minutes I am going to have my last round of daily vitamins for the day. Here’s hoping things continue to feel okay through that. I expect I am going to have to have something to eat before I leave work today. There will be too long a gap between my after-lunch snack and dinner. My stomach is scheduled to be empty and angry starting around 5:30 tonight. I’ll have something small and then I should be okay for dinner.

Until then… dreams of that sweet, sweet caffeine. Sigh.

Food Experiment

This is one of those he-had-gastric-bypass-surgery posts. You’ve been warned.

I am doing a small food experiment today. I am hoping I do not get the results that I expect I will get.

I work in the office twice a week. Over the last couple of months I have noticed a trend. When I leave work I am dealing with some major gas pain. I thought it had to do with me having something to eat on the drive home and then being too stuffed for dinner, but the last couple of office days I have cut way down on the food I eat in the afternoon before dinner, and the gas pain has still been a thing.

I had a (very minor) epiphany on Monday. I think I know what’s going on. I bring the same lunch every time I go to the office. One serving of Purdue Chicken Bites (12 little mini chicken nuggets) that I heat up in the microwave, and then one serving (either 2.0 oz or 2.6 oz, depending on the brand) of peanuts. Combined it works out to 22 grams of protein, which is pretty good for that small a meal. Sometimes I’ll have some crackers or some sugar free candy with my lunch as well.

I have Purdue chicken, in various shapes and sizes, all the time. I have the sugar free candy and crackers all the time too. Peanuts though… in the early days of post-surgery solid foods I had peanuts all the time. Over the last year or so I have sort of lost interest in them and have only been eating them with lunch in the office. My question to myself then is this: Why didn’t that set off a red flag sooner?

Are the peanuts causing the afternoon/evening gas issues? It seems likely, doesn’t it? Today’s experiment then is to not have peanuts with lunch and then see what happens. I like peanuts. They are a good source of protein and they are tasty and while it’s true I have grown a little tired of eating them lately, I don’t want to have to stop. If peanuts turn out to be a problem… well that just sucks. I haven’t thought of an alternative yet. I will. Today I’ll just have a small protein bar with lunch to make up the difference, but going forward I’ll find something else.

We’ll see how today’s experiment goes, and then one day next week we’ll do it again and see if we get the same results. Then I’ll decide what to do going forward.

Until then… here’s an airplane for today’s photo a day challenge pic.

307/365

Two Year Follow Up Wrap Up

I’m done with my doctors appointment. My two year post gastric bypass surgery followup is complete.

To quote my surgeon, “I can’t believe it.”

What did I learn today? From a sugar avoidance standpoint, eating fruits that contain a lot of natural sugars (looking at you, apples) should be okay because it’s a complex sugar that breaks down differently than your more junk food sugars. Also, staying on the topic of sugar, if you’re having a low blood sugar episode it’s okay to have some sugar to fix it, even though the amount of sugar my diabetic step son was told to take in that situation is exactly the same as the amount I’ve been told will trigger dumping syndrome. Somehow my body will process that sugar in a different way when it’s combating an over abundance of insulin in my blood than when the insulin levels are okay. How? I don’t know. I’ll probably still avoid more than the tiniest amount of sugar. Finally, when I ask the question, “is this stomach pain because something is wrong or is it because I am hungry” I am apparently asking a question that all of us ask. It’s normal and common to not be able to tell the difference. You just have to get used to it and hope that someday you’ll figure it out.

My next follow up is one year from today. In closing, as I was leaving I overheard my surgeon talking to another staff member. They were both looking at me and the words “I can’t believe it” were uttered for a second time. I also heard one of them say, “he doesn’t even look like he needs to be here” or something like that. Yeah. Good work, Doc. I couldn’t have done this without you, but if you want to make a red head feel like a million bucks weight-loss-wise, then saying you can’t believe it is a really good way to do it.

Photos!

This was waiting for me as I was about to walk out the door to go to the appointment. Good morning, bird!

259/365
259/365

The clinic is in this building. Let’s do this!

In closing, you bet your ass I am doing some sugar free celebrating tonight.

Stomach Fun

Two days from now will mark one year and 11 months since my Gastric Bypass Surgery. That 2nd anniversary is right around the corner.

Today I think back to one of the regular check ins I had with the surgeon. I told her that I was having some issues with pain. I would eat something, then a few hours would go by and I would start to get a bad stomach ache. Am I doing something wrong?

No, she said. It’s normal. You’re hungry.

Huh… hungry, eh? That’s it?

Yup, you’re hungry.

Sure enough, when I get that type of stomach pain I have something to eat and it goes away. That’s all well and good except… well… I don’t want to eat. I want to not be hungry. I want to have breakfast and then not have anything else to eat until lunch, then not have anything else to eat until dinner, then not have anything else to eat until a pre-bedtime snack. That’s not how it works though.

Today I started feeling it about 2.5 hours after breakfast. I started feeling it about 20 minutes before my lunch break. I started feeling it again two hours and 50 minutes after lunch. It was probably 45 minutes before dinner. I had to have a snack. It was a small snack and it made me feel better, but not completely better. Now I’m having dinner so that should hopefully fix things for the next few hours.

Like I said though, I don’t want to be tied to food like this. I don’t want to feel hungry. I just want to take advantage of the fact that my bypassed stomach pouch is a little tiny guy and doesn’t require a lot of food to fill it.

I am not complaining. Not even a little bit. I am fine with all of this. I just didn’t expect it and I wish I had another way around it. I don’t though and it’s okay.

Dinner tonight is salmon and it’s delicious. Given all of the grief I used to give my mother when she tried to give us fish for dinner, she would be shocked that I am loving a nice piece of fish tonight. Who even am I?

The Do-Not-Eat List

At most of my weight loss clinic check ins, they ask me if I’ve found any foods that I cannot tolerate. There generally hasn’t been anything other than sugar, and I have never tested eating sugar, I just know that I can’t eat it without getting sick.

My answer to that question is that there are things I’ve had trouble with, but I can usually pin the trouble down on something I did (ate too fast, ate too much, didn’t chew enough) that caused the problem rather than the actual food itself.

There was one item that I was unsure of though. Quinoa. I freakin’ love me some quinoa, but most if not all of the few times I’ve had it in the 1.5 years since the surgery have resulted in nausea and problems with my redesigned stomach. I still wasn’t sure if it was the food or something I did.

Tonight we had quinoa. I only had a couple of little fork-fulls. It didn’t go well. Damn it. I think I officially have one food on the do-not-eat list. There is one food that I think I am unable to tolerate. Quinoa. Shit.

Oh well. We live and we learn and we move on to the next challenge.