Tag: weight loss surgery

12 Weeks

My Gastric Bypass surgery was 12 weeks ago today. I still feel great. I still weigh a ton, but it’s about half a ton less than it was 12 weeks ago. I will take that.

I am still eating tiny meals. Weirdly, over the last couple of days I have found myself feeling hungry after these tiny meals. That hasn’t really happened before. Is that a part of the recovery process? Is that my brain revolting? I don’t know. I have an appointment with the nutritionist tomorrow. I will likely bring up that topic then.

My clothes are all way to big for me now, even the clothes I’ve bought post-surgery. That’s a new experience for me. I’m still doing at least 30 minutes of exercise each day, and I am still doing a full 30 minutes in one shot. Most days I am doing more like 45-60 minutes of exercise. I do the 30 minute walk in the morning and then ride the bike for 15 minutes at lunch. Not every day, but when I can fit it into the schedule. I’m also trotting up and down the cellar stairs all day long and that adds to the fun. In other words, my energy level is kinda through the roof. I’m pretty curious how that will continue to change if I continue to lose weight at this rate. Will I be training for the marathon 12 weeks from now? Could be.

I still screw up now and then. Not often, but there have been a couple of nausea events. Nothing world rocking, but definitely unpleasant. I am often taking too much food in each bite (including the bite of scrambled eggs that I just shoveled into my maw before typing this sentence). I am still probably going too fast, though I still keep a stop-watch running to force myself to wait 30 seconds between bites. I have drastically cut down on the amount of puree/soft foods I’ve been eating, but there are still some things in the diet (see the scrambled eggs reference above). Mostly I am eating real food now. Still almost all protein, but I’ve snuck some fruits and veggies in here and there. I need to do more of that, but I also need to check in with the nutritionist tomorrow before I go too crazy.

Still no bread/rice/crackers/pasta/quinoa. Jen had some French bread with dinner a couple of nights ago and I was so jealous. Maybe that restraint will be removed tomorrow? Will Wednesdays become Prince Spaghetti day again? Here’s hoping.

Happy 12 weeks, everyone. Here’s to a successful week 13. I’ll let you know.

Belt

For the first time in a few days, I don’t feel like my jeans are about to fall off.

I picked up a new belt at Casual Male XL* today. It’s two sizes smaller than my old belt and the difference is epic. I had the old belt as tight as it would go and it was like I wasn’t wearing it at all. Add that to my jeans being at least one size too big and you have a recipe for an America’s Funniest Home Video winner.

The new belt has some room to grow. At this rate I will probably have to replace it in 3-4 weeks, but I’m okay with that. We knew going into the Gastric Bypass that clothing was going to be a pretty crazy expense after the fact. So far I’ve only bought two pairs of jeans (both of which are already too big), the belt, and some undies (which have not been delivered yet). There was also a few pairs of sweatpants that we got on the day of the surgery. Those are way too big at this point. Otherwise I have been making use of old clothes that were too small for me back in May, but are okay now.

I have already bagged up one pile of clothes (mostly shirts) for donation somewhere. I think I have enough to fill up a second bag. Once I do that, I just have to decide where to donate everything. Goodwill, probably. I’m not a fan of the Salvation Army in general. I’ve heard some nasty shit about Goodwill too, but it’s still the preferable option.

I hope we can last another couple of weeks before I have to go back for more clothes. It’ll be jeans again, and probably some collared shirts for work. Stay tuned, friends and neighbors.

*The name of the store is Casual Male XL, right? I always call it Tall and Fat. Remember Rodney Dangerfield in the movie Back to School? His character was a millionaire who made his fortune owning a chain of stores for oversized men that was called Tall and Fat.

At least I think it was. I haven’t seen that movie in 100 years. It had Robert Downey, Jr in it, didn’t it? He looked about 12 years old, if I remember correctly.

Want to Weigh In?

I failed to go out for car music this morning but I did not fail to lose 3.6 pounds, so I’ll take that as a fair trade.

Last week I weighed in on Monday instead of Wednesday because I am an impatient idiot. This week I weighed in on Tuesday because eight days seemed long enough and if I waited until the “official” weigh in tomorrow it would be nine days and that was just too long a wait. Next week I’ll do Wednesday and it will be eight days again and all will be right with the world.

The 10’s column of my total changed again, just barely. How to use algebra to demonstrate…

Last week’s weigh in was nx3.4 where n is a number and x is a number. This week is ny9.8 where n is the same number as before and y=x-1. Dig it? Every high school kid who took a hissy fit in algebra class because he/she would “never have to use algebra in the real world” can suck it. Boom. Math, bitches.

The total weight lost since the surgery has topped 90! It’s currently sitting at 91.6 and that is beyond amazing. The total weight lost since the first weigh in is up to an astronomical 112.2.

I can’t believe it.

I was a little bummed out over the 3.6 this week being so much less than the 7 or so from each of the last couple of weigh ins, but there have been a few weeks in the past where the weight loss was around 3 pounds. I was afraid this might have been a sign of me leveling off, but now that I analyze the data, it seems more like getting back to normal. I’m happy with that.

So let’s see if I can manage to not step on the scale for the next eight days. Wish me luck.

Fun with Gatorade

I am trying something new today with the diet thing. Normally I keep track of liquids by drinking an ounce at a time. I have a little stack of one ounce cups and I just fill a cup, drink it, repeat. I write down every time I pour out an ounce, and when I am done I add the total to my spreadsheet.

Not today. Today I took a 20oz bottle of G2 (lower sugar Gatorade) and noted the time I opened it on my spreadsheet (7:58am). I have left that row on the sheet incomplete as I will just keep drinking from the bottle until it is empty. Then I’ll add the 20 ounces and the stop time. Makes sense, right? Sure, except that I have eaten two meals after opening the bottle of G2. So the spreadsheet is no longer technically in chronological order.

I don’t think I will do this again. The bottle is half empty now, but I just finished lunch (4.4 oz of chicken) and I can’t drink again for another hour. I took two Calcium Citrate pills at 12:30 or so. I have to take two more around dinner time. I don’t want to still be drinking this bottle of G2* and have to track all four Calcium pills on the same row. I want to see distinct entries for each vitamin dose.

Hmmm… maybe I’ll just close the open row and put it at 10 ounces. Yeah, I’ll do that. I don’t want to overcomplicate this stuff.

Drink up, kids!

*I just read the label of the bottle of G2 and realized the actual name is G/2, as in “G over 2″**. It’s a math problem. It says it has 1/2 the sugar of original Gatorade… Hence, G/2. I get it! I actually prefer G Free because that is supposed to have zero sugar, but G/2, or G2, or whatever doesn’t have enough sugar to make me feel sick so I think it’s okay.

I’m guessing this is one of the longest blog posts about Gatorade in the history of the internets.

**(Rush fans from the 80’s might get this reference) If you’re not wearing your 3D glasses you’ll only be seeing this in one half D! Count Floyd, 1984 or so.

Come Home Already

I made it home from the office pretty easily. There was a little traffic jam in Waltham, but nothing too bad. It took me about an hour to get home.

I had dinner. 4.6 oz of roast beef. After 2.6 ounces I stopped. I’m not sure why. I was still hungry, I wasn’t feeling any nausea, it tasted good. I just needed to stop. I had a little sugar free pudding to try and fill my tiny new stomach, but I’m still a little hungry. I am not sure what happened. We’ll keep an eye out for any future occurances.

Bellana went to her dad’s house for a bit this evening. We are waiting for her to come home so we can watch the 1st season finale of Stranger Things. Bellana has seen all of season four so far. I was going to start watching it over the weekend, but Jen had never seen any of it and Bellana talked her into giving it a try. So Jen and I are watching it together. We burned through the first seven episodes in two sittings. I think my beautiful bride might be enjoying the show.

Okay, Bellana is almost home. Time to watch some tube.

Ring

I’ve written about this before, but when it comes to weight loss and the after effects of weight loss surgery, my wedding ring sort of acts as a canary in a coalmine.

The day after the wedding, while at our first honeymoon stop at a bed and breakfast in Woodstock, VT, my wedding ring fell off in the shower. I had lost a little weight since the ring fitting and my hands were soapy and pow, the ring fell to the shower floor.

For the first few months of our marriage, I would take off the ring before getting into the shower, or doing anything that involved soap and a drain. After a few months I grew into it a little and no longer needed to take it off.

By the time we get to January 2022, when I couldn’t stand the weight and the yo-yo dieting and the fluctuations and the lack of energy and the back pain and the leg pain and the general misery that my weight caused me, I really couldn’t take the ring off anymore. It wasn’t painful, but it was pretty well stuck in place.

Now, post surgery and about a hundred pounds later, it’s been slipping lately. Only when I am washing up or showering or doing something that gets me all soapy and stuff. It hasn’t fallen off yet, but it’s been close.

Close enough that when I took a shower yesterday morning, I took it off. That’s the first time since the summer of 2009. I didn’t take it off today, but only because I was in a bit of a rush and forgot to. When lunch started I went upstairs and shaved. I took it off for that. I’m reaching the point where the idea of my ring falling into a sink or shower drain is becoming real. That’s a bad thing, of course, but from a weight loss perspective it’s a good thing. It’s weird, but true.

I don’t want to resize my wedding ring. I’ll probably put a piece of tape around the back side of it to tighten it. That will work for a while at least.

Okay, kids. Lunch break and story time is over now. Get back to work.

I Lied to Myself

I told myself that I wasn’t going to weigh in today. I told myself that as I was turning on the scale. I told myself that as I was stepping onto the scale. I told myself that as I was standing there in awe of how much weight I’ve lost since Wednesday.

7.6 pounds in five days. How am I still even alive? My 10’s column changed again. I am up to 88 pounds lost since the surgery and 108.6 since the first appointment. My BMI dropped 0.9 points since Wednesday too.

Hoe

Lee

Shit.

If I can lose 3.5 pounds in the next two days my 10’s column will change again.

Another Week Down

The pill caddy has been filled once again. If you could only see the fascinated looks on all of your faces. Gold! Another week down with only the rest of my life left to go.

DSC_0003
One prescription anti-acid and four separate vitamin supplements.

Birthday Cake Blues

I shared a picture of Bellana’s birthday cake yesterday. I bought it at the supermarket a couple of days ago. It’s huge and chocolate and it looks delicious and wonderful and I can’t have any. Well, if I wanted to trigger a round of dumping syndrome I could have some, but I absolutely do not want that to happen so I won’t be having any.

I really want some. Not in the same way that I used to want cake prior to the Gastric Bypass surgery. Back then I would have drooled for a while as I fought the urge to eat half of the cake in one bite and then I would eat half of the cake in one bite. Now I just look at it longingly and then forget it’s there for a while. The next time I find myself in the kitchen I’ll go through it all again.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again… this is a weird new universe we’re living in.

I’m Pretty Sore Today

Yesterday was a tough one physically mostly, but also mentally.

I am not going into a lot of detail here, but the back story is this. Last September my parents moved from their house in Tewksbury to an assisted living space in Billerica. Over the course of the next eight months my mother’s dementia grew steadily worse to the point where she was getting up in the middle of the night and falling down. On May 9th she had a fall and was taken to Lowell General Hospital. The assisted living space said they could no longer handle assisting her living so the hospital started working toward finding a new place for her. She was moved into a nursing facility in Andover and she’s living there now. That means that my parents, who are days away from their 55th wedding anniversary, are no longer able to live together. It’s crushing to say the least. My father was still in the same room at the assisted living place, but that room was in the memory care unit, which he does not require. So yesterday we moved him to a new room, one that is not in the locked down memory unit.

We had movers pick up a piece of furniture at the house in Tewksbury and take it to Billerica. They then moved everything from the memory wing in the basement to Dad’s new room on the first floor, then they took some of mom’s things back to Tewksbury. I bounced from place to place with them and helped out a little. Mostly just by punching in the door lock codes getting in and out of the memory wing.

After the movers were done (huge, huge thanks to them) I went back to Dad’s new room and helped unpack. My sister and my two nephews were there too. We had everything wrapped up by about 2:00 with one glaring exception. Dad sleeps on a rented hospital bed. The company that rents the bed handles moving it from place to place. They initially said they would be there to move the bed at 2:09. Then 2:48. Then 3:30. I had to leave before they got there. I’ll tell you why right now.

We had broken for lunch at around noon. Dad went to the cafe, My sister and the kids went to Wendy’s, and I stayed in the room waiting for maintenance to fix something in the bathroom and switch on the Cable TV. I started eating my little four ounce of chicken lunch but kept getting interrupted. In the end it took me about two hours to get through it and I spent a lot of time taking a bite, then unpacking something for a few minutes, then going back for another bite. I don’t know if my bites were too big, or if it was something to do with being active mid-meal, but I found myself getting pretty nauseous. I pushed through it, but I was feeling pretty bad.

Later, during the time we were done with everything but the waiting for the bed I started feeling sicker. I think it was due to lack of protein? Maybe? Lack of food? Something? I only had a protein shake for breakfast so I hadn’t eaten much. I was just feeling sick to my stomach again and weak and I was getting on toward being nervous about driving. I had to leave and go get something to eat. Once I was home with food in me I felt better. I feel bad about bailing, but at least now I have another couple of food experiences to keep an eye on.

So stomach wise, things are good today. Thankfully. Dad wise, he’s in his new place. He’s miserable about being separated from Mom, but otherwise he seemed okay yesterday. It’s possible he was just putting on a brave face for two of his kids and two of his grandkids, but he did seem okay. Here’s hoping he still feels okay today.

The hang up for me, personally, at this point is pain. I more or less was on my feet yesterday from 7:00am to 3:00pm. It was rough for Mr. Out of Shape here. Sure, I have a lot more energy and stuff since losing 100 pounds in the last seven months (WOOHOO!), but I am still really fat and out of shape and that was a lot of work yesterday.

Then to make things work, I still did my 30 minutes of walking. It was after dinner when I was all settled and feeling better. Jen and I were in the living room watching the tube and I got up and started walking. My Activity App credited me for 18 minutes of exercise during the day, but I have a streak of doing 30 minute walks going (I don’t actually remember when the streak started so I can’t tell you how long it’s lasted) and I didn’t want to ruin it. So I started walking. 30 minutes later I was a mess, but happy. Today I got up as usual and did another 30 minutes before work and now my legs are going to fall off. Poof, no legs. Figuratively at least.

Here’s hoping the pain lessens as the day goes on, but we will have to see.

Ouch, babie. Ouch.