9 Month follow up in Kingston

Thank you and thanks for the suggestion. I have these little packets of bran buds so I'll be adding them to everything for a while. lol

You should be very proud. You look great and you are doing awesome. As one of the first ppl I reached out to on the site, you have always been an inspiration. The folks in Kingston are great, and the social worker Don, he is a joy I tell ya. My chart is finally being signed off on, on Monday. On its way to HRRH.  And the nurses and team in Kingston have been nothing but nice. Even the intake girls are great. 

Congrats on your success !!!

Kingston people are great. Thank you for your kind words Arlene. You are so close now!  That's fantastic.

Good for you, Heather.  Sounds like you're doing great! 

As for the "fat" thing - sometimes I wonder if it's more comfortable to identify with larger people even after we've lost a lot of weight.  They're kind of "our people", you know?  They get it.  And so, we make jokes like the one you made (wanting to be the fastest of the "fat people").  There's also a such thing as "reclaiming" terms like "fat" too.  I don't call myself "overweight" or "zaftig" or "curvy" or any other euphemism.  I call myself what I am - fat - or obese - and I try to think of it as a descriptor, not as a judgment.  I think that because most people think of "fat" as the absolute worst thing anyone could be, ever, that when people who are fat call themselves "fat", thinner people freak out and think we're putting ourselves down.  Not always the case.

Of course, I'm much larger than you are still, and from your picture (great new avatar, by the way!), I wouldn't consider you to be "fat" at this point.  But I do think that it's not necessarily a bad thing to remember where we came from, and to identify with people larger than ourselves.  It's not good to have body dysmorphia, of course, and it's good to recognize the size we are, and I know a lot of us end up having a hard time seeing anything but fat in the mirror even after we've lost weight.  But I don't necessarily assume that when someone calls themselves "fat" that they're putting themselves down - especially if they're running 10K races! :)

Hi Kelly,

She was not very specific. She explained that we can't properly carb load before a run because of our new internal design. I can tweak the percentages a bit, eg. 35% protein, 35% carbs, 30% fat. She said that we need electrolytes and carbs low in sugar during the run. That she said would be trial and error. Bring gatorade or powerade zero and then experiment with gels, blocks, dried nuts and fruits or homemade carb balls that we would eat every 30 minutes. The trick will be to find for each individual what will work well with the pouch, not sit to heavy or cause rapid trips to the bathroom.

Then she advised me to get the Sports Nutrition Guidebook by Nancy Clark.

Hi Heather. OT. Have you heard anything about the Trenton support group. I don't want to go all the way there tomorrow only to find it not taking place again this month. I cannot seem to find the contact list from the meeting I attended in November. Any info would be appreciated.

Thanks, Karen