Today is two weeks since my surgery.  As of this morning, I am down 20 pounds since the morning of surgery, and feel great.

  I have been working hard at keeping up my fluids, and am averaging around 120 ounces a day or a bit more.  Liquids are really not that big of a challenge for me at this point.  My new sleeve really seems to do just fine with liquids… but food is another matter.

 Last night, I jumped the gun by 12-14 hours and decided it was time for some scrambled eggs.  Boy, had I been looking forward to that for what seemed like a lifetime.  I got out my eggs, cracked one into a small bowl and started to scramble it up with a fork.  My brain overrode all my instructions, and convinced me that there was no way in hell that one egg was sufficient for me, so I cracked another egg into the bowl, scrambled them up and dumped them into my skillet with some cheese.  I have been a serious cook for a long time, but I don’t know that I have ever cooked anything that smelled better to me than those two scrambled eggs.  Yum…  I cooked them soft so they would go down easier.  I got out my tiny little infant spoon that I had gotten at Wal-Mart before surgery and set down to dig into my first post-op feast.  I was eating small bites, chewing well, and pausing between bites.  Those really were the best eggs ever – for about the first 8 tiny bites.  Then, my stomach started to feel a little odd.  Not paying good attention, I took another tiny bite of my scrumptious scrambled eggs, and all of a sudden, I was full of eggs up to the top of my Adam’s apple – what the hell?  I’ve been looking forward to these eggs for days and days, and now I probably got to eat about 2/3 of one egg???  I guess that is pretty much the idea, but my logical brain and my emotional brain were really having a pretty good battle over those eggs… turns out my stomach won.  I ended up throwing the rest in the trash.  I guess I’ll force myself to scramble just one egg at a time in the future.   Anyhow, that was the only time I really felt hungry yesterday, so I didn’t eat anything else, just kept on going with my fluids.  I’m starting to get a little hungry now, so I’m thinking of trying out some refried beans for lunch today and see how that goes.

  Overall, I still couldn’t be more pleased with my entire surgery experience.  I am having a bit of pain at my large incision today when I move wrong, but Dr. Walton warned me that would probably happen.  I feel great otherwise.  My energy level is way up from what it was before.  I have been “shopping” in the middle section of my closet the last few days, and am finding lots of clothes to wear at this point that I have not had on in years.  That is actually pretty exciting.  I hope I can keep “shopping” in my own closet for a while longer before I have to actually venture out to spend money on clothes.  I do think I may have to splurge on a new belt or two pretty soon.  I found out late last week that I will be traveling to a corporate training event in June and will be seeing some people I haven’t seen in a long time.  I’m anxious to see how that goes.  Also a little anxious about being in a situation where I’m having mealtime with these people three times a day for a week.  We’ll see.

  I’m starting back into my walking today.  Not sure if I’ll be able to go right back to the 5K/day plan that I had going before surgery, but I know I have to get something going again.  I was glad to hear from the Dr. that I should be able to get in the pool by this weekend.  It would really kinda suck to have the holiday weekend with everyone in the pool but me.  I’ll probably still have my t-shirt on, but at least I’ll be in the water.  That will be another avenue for exercise as well.

 All in all, things are going along well.  I’m hopeful that my scale will keep moving for another week or 10 days before I hit the prophesied “3 week stall” so that I can get it under 300 for the first time in about 8 years.  I’m just waiting for the day that my scale says 2 something instead of 3 something.    Will post more ramblings in a few days.  

First of all, let me say Happy Mothers’ Day to all you lovely ladies with offspring!

I am doing fairly well to this point.  I seem to have passed through most of the pain in my belly, and I think I’ve pretty well learned how to swallow liquids without getting too much air down with them.  I’ve been doing well with my liquids – pushing for roughly 100 ounces per day at a minimum.  I know this seems like a lot, but pre-op, I was regularly over 300 ounces per day.  I’m still a pretty big guy.

I am feeling well enough that I plan to return to work tomorrow.  I have my boss on alert that I might  not be able to make full days just yet, but at least I’ll be back in the office.  My mother went home today.  She has been here helping with the kids all week, but I have been lifting my little one for the last two days.  Really no more pain in lifting him (~40 pounds) than in just lifting my own butt up out of the recliner or off the bed… so I think I can take care of getting him to daycare and back now.

On the challenge side of things… I do still have some swelling around my incisions, a huge bruise at the site of my second (post-op) heparin injection.  I have also had some loose stools the last couple of days (but at least no constipation!)  Another challenge that hit me out of the blue this afternoon was Li’l Caesar’s Crazy Bread… ugh…  here’s the story:  yesterday, because it was most convenient for everyone, we celebrated Mothers’ Day at my house for my lovely wife, my mother, and my mother-in-law.  I spent a large part of the day cooking – yes, I cooked.  I made a huge beautiful green salad, baked potatoes, sautéed mushrooms, grilled filet mignon, plus all sorts of appetizers, and then my mother-in-law brought a lemon ice box cake, and my brother-in-law brought some beautiful peel and eat shrimp.  Now, keep in mind that all of these were some of my favorite things to eat as a pre-op… but it really and truly did not bother me.  Not when I was cooking, not when they were eating, not when I helped clean up.  I knew I couldn’t have it, I was really not hungry, and it just didn’t bother me.  BUT, today, with all the company gone, my lovely wife and our 10 year old decided they wanted Li’l Caesar’s…I had to get out and get gas anyway, so I went to pick up pizza and crazy bread for them.  It never crossed my mind that this would bother me after all the food from yesterday, but I wanted some of that Crazy Bread and Sauce SO BAD.  I finally had to get them to finish it all and get it out of here to remove the temptation.  I had some strained soup and some Crystal Light instead, and I’m making it through.  It was just so weird that this would be something that would bother me so much…

Anyhow, all in all, I couldn’t be more pleased with my progress.  I am down 11 pounds today from Monday morning.  I feel good, my energy is up.  I haven’t been nauseous since I got home from the hospital.  I’m getting pretty tired of the liquids in general, but I know I can make another week if I keep telling myself that I’m doing it to protect my new sleeve.  I managed to quit smoking without killing anyone, surely I can make this one more week while I wait on a scrambled egg and some refried beans.

 That’s about it for now… everyone have a great week!

John