My m-i-l and I took my kids to Peter Piper Pizza today to celebrate the fact of how good they did on their report cards.  Billy got straight A's for the first time and Kourtney doesn't get letter grades yet but she did awesome on hers.  So we get there and my m-i-l asked if I thought we might be able to sit in a booth because of extreme back pain she's having.  Other than booths they have benches to sit on.  I said that we could give it a try and I fit!!!!  My tummy was still touching the table, but I wasn't feeling like I was squished liked I used to feel.  I haven't sat in a booth for nearly three years and it felt great!  She and I are both obese (she's on Weight Watcher's) so it was wonderful that we both took the initiative to give it a try and that we both fit without a problem.

I love WLS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!   *Happy Dance*

.....my life changed for the better in a healthy way.  This has been such an amazing month and one that I will never forget.  I have lost 25 pounds and the inches just poured off of me.  Here is how I did for the month....

Neck - Lost 1 1/2"
Chest - Lost 4"
Waist - Lost 2"
Hips - Lost 4" 
Thighs - Lost 3"
Upper Arms - Lost 2"
Calves - Stayed the same

My energy level has sky rocketed!  I can walk and talk now without feeling like somebody punched me in the gut....lol.  I want to go out and do things and I enjoy every minute of being out.  I can go to Walmart or the grocery store and not sweat up a storm like I did a month ago.  My back doesn't hurt like it used to.....it barely hurts at all when I walk now.  I don't even think I'd call it "hurt".....I'd have to say more of a dull and barely noticeable ache.  My thighs don't burn when I walk anymore as well either.  I can walk in Walmart without a shopping cart to hold me up.  I can do more things as a "normal person" now than I could have done a short time ago.  I have more confidence within myself and when I walk I hold my head higher than I have in years.  I look people in the eye now rather than looking away and hoping that they don't notice me.  Granted, I have an incredibly long way to go before I reach my goal, but it's what I know inside about myself and what I've done that has given me the confidence to look at a stranger and say hello.  

This surgery has got to be one of the best decisions I've made for myself in my life.  Next to marrying my husband and the birth of my two children this life changing surgery is tops.  God has blessed me with this wonderful tool inside of me and I'm not going to let Him down or anybody else either. 

This has been the most fun weekend that I've had in ages!  On Friday JJ and I surprised the kids by taking them to see Spiderman 3.....which was really good.  I have not been to a movie theater in ten years and I was very nervous about sitting in the seats.  To my amazement I fit so well in them!  It brought tears to my eyes that I felt so comfortable.  It was great to go out with the whole family on a Friday night and really enjoy ourselves.

Then, on Saturday our family (including my in-laws) went to see an Arizona Rattlers arena football game.  The last time I was at the arena was late last year to see a Phoenix Suns game and I was extremely worn out on my way to suite that we always go too.....JJ's work gives out tickets for the suite.  At that time I also had a tough time feeling comfortable in the seats.  This go around we had to wait about 20 minutes outside of the arena before it opened.  I had absolutely no trouble at all standing there and waiting for the doors to open.  I played around with the kids and we all joked about things together.  Late last year when I had gone had I had to stand there for that long of a time I would be sweating, my back would have hurting terribly and my thighs would have been extremely achy.  I had none of that this time.  I did sweat some, however, but that stood to reason since we were in a parking structure and it was 105 degrees outside.  So, the doors opened and in we went.  Excuse me, in the kids and I went and we left the others behind.  We had gotten so far ahead of everyone that JJ had to call out "hey speedy, wait up for the rest of us".....lol.  OMG, I felt incredible!!!!!  I could have seriously walked the entire arena at that moment with all the energy I had in me.  I....me.....I walked the way I used to walk years ago.  I didn't break a sweat, I could talk without sounding out of breath, my back didn't hurt one bit, my thighs didn't burn.....I felt like a person again who was out to enjoy herself.  Then in the suite I sat down in a seat.....I fit and had a little room to spare!!!!  My family was so happy for me and I couldn't stop grinning and laughing the whole night.  I was good about my dinner choice too....as good as I could have been.  They had hot dogs, chicken, salad, cookies, brownies, nuts and chips.  It was really hard, but I didn't touch any of the sweets ( I LOVE the brownies....best I've ever had), I had a couple of nuts, 3 itty bitty bites of the hot dog (minus the skin on it), 3 small pieces of chicken nugget type things and a little bit of the asian crispy noodles on the salad.  I probably could have been better, but I was very happy with myself.  Kourtney (my daughter) had a diet soda.  I allowed it to get flat and took a couple of sips of it.  I craved the soda and while I will not have it often (I don't want it often) I wanted to treat myself.  I didn't feel bad about having it either.  It was a wonderful night and one that I won't soon forget.

This morning I stepped on the scale and saw that I now weigh 319 pounds....25 pounds lost!  My goal was to reach 25 pounds lost by the time I hit one month out and I did it with 5 days to spare!  What a wonderful Mother's Day gift to myself.   

What an amazing and wonderful weekend.  I am floating on a natural high right now and don't want to float back down anytime soon.   =)

My best friend came to visit a couple of weeks ago and she got me off to a huge start on getting my home cleaned up again.  She dusted in places I can't begin to reach (I'm 5'3" and she's 5'10") so everything is still looking like she did it just yesterday.  After she left I started doing the little things.  The dusting and straightening up.  Today I vaccumed for the first time in months.  No, I didn't just let the floor go, I had JJ do it for me....lol.  Living in Arizona dust accumulates VERY quickly so I would have dust layers on top of dust layers.  I just couldn't get myself to do it prior to surgery because my back would ache so bad that I'd have to constantly take little breaks even though my house is very small.  Today, I did it for the first time!!!!!  My back had a slight ache to it, but it was very manageable.  

Seeing as how I'm doing so much more around the house now my husband suddenly seems to treat me as if I am the maid and leaves me little things to pick up.  It irritates me that I feel like he's taking advantage of my new found energy.  I don't know, maybe he's making up for all those months that he was having to help me out more and it's his retaliation for it.  He hasn't cleaned one dish, I have to put his TV tray away nearly everyday, leaves his soda cans for me to throw away.....you name it I do it.  I get on my best friend because she does all that for her husband and it's about time that I do the same.  I'm a wife, not a servant and I feel like that some days.  I know that he goes to work and is gone for 12 hours during the day, but how hard is it to do the little things.  Obviously I don't expect him to come home and do any dishes or big things, but I do expect him to clean up after himself.  Am I being a hypocrite because of the fact that before my surgery I needed to rely on him so much to help me?  I don't know the answer to that question.  

Physical contact between him and me is starting to dwindle again.  He's been having a problem with his shoulder so I can understand that he's not comfortable doing "strenuous" things.  However, that doesn't mean that he can't just put his arms around me and hold me or kiss me.  I get the feeling from him that the only time he should passionately kiss me is when we're leading up to sex.  The other night I was making dinner and took a moment to lean back against the counter to relax since I had a break during the preperation.  We stood there and talked and when I reached out for him he backed up some and started to turn and walk away from me.  I wouldn't accept that I told him to come back.  He did and I reached for him once again and brought him close to me.  We kissed for a moment, but I just didn't feel a connection because of how quickly he seemed to have wanted to end it.  There wasn't any sense of passion in the kiss and like always he didn't seem to want to do it.  I don't know, maybe I'm a bad kisser and just not pleasant enough to want to be passionate with.  I did something special for him last week that I haven't been able to do in quite some time.  To put it mildly......I chopped down the amazon forest.....lol.  He loves it when I do that and usually can't wait to get at least a small feel of it.  All he has done since I did it was take a slight brush of it and now won't even get close.  I just don't know what to do to make him interested in me again.  How can I feel attractive towards him if he isn't willing to want to be close to me in any way?  Like usual it's just something I'm going to have to live with.

Well that's my life in a nutshell right now.  Some good, some not so good.  I'm happy with my accomplishments and that's the main thing that's good so I'm happy with all of that.

I had my first pureed meals today and they were soooooo good!  I almost enjoyed being able to chew food more than having sex....lol.  I had about two tablespoons of scrambled eggs this morning.  They were a bit dry tasting and before surgery that was the way I liked them.  Next time I have them I'll add some salsa to moisten them up some.  For lunch I had two saltine crackers with a small wedge of creamy swiss cheese....yummy!!!!  Then for dinner I had ground turkey mixed with ricotta cheese and spaghetti sauce plus a small very crispy piece of homemade garlic bread.  It was a great meal to make because after I put my "spaghetti" helping off to the side I mixed in some pasta for the rest of my family to eat plus they had the garlic bread and a salad as well.  They all absolutely loved it.  It felt good to make a big family meal again.  JJ is even taking the leftovers to work and he very rarely does that.  

Everything that I ate today stayed down very well.  I remembered to take small bites and chewed them very well.  It took me about 30 minutes to eat my breakfast and dinner and about 20 minutes to eat my lunch.  Not drinking with my meals is going to be hard.  I wanted to reach for a glass of water with my dinner, but I was smart and kept it out of reaching distance so as not to tempt myself.  

I had a lot of energy before having some "real" food today, but now that I've got it in me I have even more.  I was constipated for a couple of days but all that is better now and I'm down three more pounds!  I was wanting to be at 25 pounds down by my first month out and now I just have two more pounds to lose in just 12 days.  I'm gonna make it!!!!!