beachybikegirl

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Months 4 & 5

It feels like month 4 just blew by me. Just looking at the scale, here is how it breaks down:

Month 1 -25

Month 2 -10

Month 3 -10

Month 4 -11

Month 5 -11

Of course month 1 was great, down 25 lbs awesome right? Month 2 it was almost devastating to only lose 10lbs. I had studied the trend of weight loss on other peoples signatures or posts on this site and the trend seemed to be that month 2 was not as big as month 1 but still a sizable number, so 10lbs seemed a bit low for month 2 but I was still down 35lbs so I kept on keeping on, fluids, vitamins and protein. While at month 2 the 10lb loss was not rejoiced over now at month 5 another 10/11lbs is fantastic, there is something to be said about being consistent!

   One new habit I have started in month 4 is tracking my food. I go on to My Fitness Pal and track everything I eat. If I eat 4 french fries, I put it in my food dairy and I account for it. If I take one bite of a brownie I account for it. Now, my diet is not full of brownies and French fries, but I have had a bite of this or that and it does stay at a bite. A couple of times I have gone to a restaurant with amazing bread and butter like The Cheesecake Factory or Outback Steakhouse and I happily take 1 small slice of bread with some butter and enjoy the heck out of it but then I account for it on My Fitness Pal. I have been keeping my protein high and my carbs, fat and sugar low. My Calories end up somewhere between 750-1100. I am pretty consistent though at about 850-950 calories, with carbs under 50g, and protein between 50-90 grams but usually hitting the 70-80 mark.

Around 58lbs lost, 4 months and 1 week, I broke though something. It was one particular day at work when everyone kept commenting on how skinny I looked! Of course it was fantastic to hear these comments but also a little scary too. Being overweight allows you to move through the world somewhat unnoticed and I kind of liked it like that, and now it felt like a spotlight was on me and the thing that has caused me the most pain in my life my weight, right there in the hallways of my work/school people stopping me to talk about my weight, while it was in a good way, it is still scary. One guy looked at me and said, “You losing some weight huh?” To which I reply, “Maybe a little.” I certainly don’t stop and say heck yeah I’m down 67lbs, while I am certainly proud of that, I just don’t want the spotlight on me and my weight.

 Halloween, so what a fun time for girls who are over weight right? Every costume is a “Sexy this” and a “Sexy that.”   Even still, I love Halloween, I love fun costumes, I even sew which has truly come in handy when dealing with costumes. This year my family decided to be the Avengers, my son was Iron Man, Grandpa- The Hulk, Daddy -Captain America and me the girl version of Thor. I order the costumes in September to ensure we can get them then check the sizes and make any adjustments if necessary. So the girl Thor costume of course came in “Sexy Girl Thor.” The largest size they had was “large size” which equaled a size 12, but typically costumes are about a size smaller then listed so I was nervous about it fitting but hopeful. When it arrived, I was able to fit into it no problem but it was short because of the “sexy” factor. Putting my sewing skills to good use I made a silver under skirt which looked like part of the costume and made it look a tad more acceptable for my tastes. Our family went to a local Halloween street festival, people were stopping us and asking to take pictures with us but best of all I actually felt cute. I took the day off of work on the Friday before Halloween to go to my son’s school Halloween parade. My son is 3 and very attached to mommy and daddy. As the kids were dressed up in their costumes and walking out for the parade, which was basically a paparazzi line of parents taking pictures of their kids, I promised my son I would hold his hand and not leave him during the parade, while I wasn’t the only parent walking in the parade I was one of just a few but I started to well up with tears in my eyes. If this was a year ago I would have just died that I needed to hold my sons hand in a parade while a 100 parents snapped photos and videos, I would have just died of embarrassment! Now I was so joyful to hold my son’s hand during the parade and I didn’t care how many photos I ended up in, talk about an NSV!! One of the many reasons I wanted WLS was to not be embarrassed to be in photos with my son. My son is three and I have 4000 photos of him and about 10 of him and I together, while sad, it is starting to increase.

 

There are so many thoughts about this journey so far. It is both fantastic & hard, easy yet difficult, rewarding and frustrating.  It is truly a roller-coaster of emotions as you navigate life post surgery. I find watching Youtubers on WLS and visiting the OH forums helps me navigate all the emotions that come up through this journey.

 

I’ve settled into a pretty good eating routine:

7am- Breakfast-Protein shake for breakfast / Weekends I do a protein bar

10am- take half of my gummy vitamins for the day

12:30- Lunch -a chicken taco cheese beans, maybe guac –No Tortilla of course

3:30pm- I take the 2^nd half of my gummy vitamins for the day

5:30- snack protein bar or cheese ,salami, almond crackers and about 9 pistachios

8:30-Dinner – 4 oz of chicken or  another taco –no tortilla, I  have found if I get chicken tacos at Chipotle or whatever fast fresh Mexican grill, they usually serve you 3 tacos of which I can eat 1 & ½ then I save the other have for my next meal.  I could just order a bowl but then you end up with so much food.  The three taco system really works for me, I always skip eating the tortilla but the tortilla does help portion control.

 

I started Month 3 at 212 I was hoping to end it in Onederland but fell a little short and ended the month at 202. I talked to my counselor this week and told her I had become a little obsessed with the numbers. I am such a competitive person; I always look at other’s WLS stats and compare myself.  My first month seems on par with others but my months 2 & 3 seem a little lighter compared to most at only 10 lbs each. It’s also weird to me to feel frustrated at myself, for goodness sakes I’ve never lost 45lbs in one go.  Anyway my counselor said to stay off the scale.  While I can’t do that at least once a week I get on it to see where I am, but I am willing to let go of my comparison and study of other people’s numbers.  I think one youtuber said  something like Comparison will just steal your joy, it’s so true!!! So I did not hit my personal goal for this month but I still lost 10 lbs.  I could be in Onederland by next week, so who cares if it takes a little longer then I wished for it to be, as long as I am doing my best to use my tool to lose the weight I will get there.

 

NSV’s

I feel so much freer now.  When I walk down the hallways at school, I am not hating myself for what I look like because I feel pretty darn good!

A few people have stopped me in the hallway and said, “Hey have you lost weight?  Like a lot?” I smile and say yes, which it is fine, it’s great to have people notice but it’s weird that it keeps coming out as a question.  The other day one girl stopped me and said “Hey I love your hair, what’s different?” UMMM NOTHING IS DIFFERENT ABOUT MY HAIR I’VE LOST 45lbs!  I have pretty nice hair; it’s the one thing I actually like about myself. Here is what I believe is happening, 45 lbs heavier, I was invisible, I moved through the world as an invisible heavy person.  Now almost ½ way to my goal I have lost my invisibility cloak.  It is pretty funny to me how taking up less space in the world has made me more noticeable.   I continue to be hopeful that this will really work!!!  HOPEFUL & GRATEFUL! 

 

 

If I thought month 1 was an interesting ride I had no idea what was in store for me during month 2!  Where to begin, I'll start with the weight, during month one, I lost 21 lbs in the first 3 weeks then only 4 lbs the last week.  Which by any other diet standards 4 lbs in a week is not bad, but when you just lost 21 lbs in 3 weeks you really get greedy for more.  My weight loss was slow during month two.  

    So my mother-in-law, who had been living with us for the last year and half, had a series of strokes which put her in the hospital.  My husbands brother flew in from out of country because the doctors said it was serious.  So now there was a lot of stress in our house plus a house guest plus family in the hospital which didn't look good.  I hadn't told much of my family about my surgery, I mean he was and is out the country for an extended time so it wasn't like I was calling up all my relatives saying "Hey how are you, I'm having the gastric bypass on Thursday."  And because he was here for such a serious reason it didn't feel like the right time to mention this but he certainly noticed I was eating differently and less.  I also had my gall bladder removed so I mentioned that had happened and I just need to have a soft easy diet.  The focus of the month was really on the mother-in-law.  In some ways it took the focus of me, my surgery and, my recovery.  At the same time, I have just had a major life change, had lots of questions and no one really to talk to.  I had one friend who had the surgery but she lives in a different time zone and hard to catch on the phone.  Thankfully I found this website OH has differently helped calm my crazy.  Any questions or thoughts I have had I can just type it into the search button and low and behold some else has asked this same question and here are some answers.

    My mother-in-law passed and we had to fly to New York for her services.  While there for a not-so-great reason we tried to sneak in a few "vacation like moments."  We have young son and we were supposed to go to Hawaii but as life would have it that was not to be thank goodness we had purchased trip insurance.  I wasn't sure how I would handle the food.  Sammy's noodles and our favorite pizza joint, I knew would be a challenge.  Night one, the family got Sammy's, I was able to eat a small amount, a couple bites of noodles, a bite of a dumpling and some chicken.  I felt victorious, I indulged in just a few bites of one of my favorite places.  Next was our favorite New York pizza joint,  I had ordered a meatball slice, thinking I could at least eat the toppings but the meatball was too spicy.  I ended up having a few bites of my son's cheese slice.  It was wonderful in so many ways.  I used to go there and have 2 big slices and wish for more, this time I had less than 1/2 a slice, was full and satisfied!  Now I have to say, I was 7 weeks out at this point, if I were at home I would not have had pizza but I was in New York it was a moment with my family and I feel great victory over this moment.

 

There was also a big family lunch at a Chinese restaurant.  The menu was preset, and I didn't think to ask what was on it.  I brought a protein bar incase it was going to be stuff I couldn't eat.  The first course came out and it was cold cuts and jellyfish.  So I broke out the protein bar, I had about half it when the 2nd, course came out, there was some beef so I had a couple pieces and then 7 more courses came out... I had no idea!  I felt silly for eating half my protein bar when there was plenty of protein options.  I had a bite of chicken and that was it.  It felt pretty good to eat very little and stick to the plan.  Although I did have some people just put food on my plate and tell me I wasn't eating enough.  I just politely giggled and said I was full.

 Now up until this point for month two I had lost only 6 lbs, SO disappointing, I was hoping for another 20 and I was no where near that goal.  I kept reading as much as I could here on OH and I thought I am going to go back to what I was doing in the first 3 weeks be super strict and finish this month as strong as possible!  So for my last week of month 2, week 8 since surgery, I returned to work, (I'm a teacher) It is a busy week of prepping my classroom and attending meetings. I had a protein shake in the morning on the way to work, protein bar for lunch, string cheese snack, by the time I left work I had already 57 grams of protein. then I would eat some chicken or fish for dinner.  The week flew by and when I weighed in on Saturday I was down 4 lbs which I was quite happy after have 4 weeks of losing only 1-3lbs.

When I look at other people's stats, there is a trend of a large first month and smaller second month so closing out the month with a 10lb loss is not too bad. I also have my period going wacky, I have had it every other week since my surgery! So that's been fun too!

Looking forward to what happens during Month 3!

 

Waking up from the surgery was like I was in the twilight zone, I remember seeing the nurses face staring at me I actually screamed and she apologized for scaring me.  The next 3 hours it was terrible!!  I WAS SO NAUSEOUS!!!!  I was miserable I was afraid this might happen but I had no idea how bad it would be.  When I had my C-section with the birth of my son, I was also nauseous, feeling like I would pass out on the operating table but they were able to help with additional meds.  So between the pain and nausea, it was about the worst 3 hours of my life.  They gave me every medication they could to bring my nausea under control.  Once I felt a little better, I asked for pain meds which they were reluctant to give me because they thought it might make me nauseous again.  They gave me some moraphine and I started to feel okay.  (also a lesson from my c-section, I had refused pain meds all day & all night then woke up at 3am in the worst pain of my life)  This time I was bound & determined to get in front of the pain.  I am shocked when I read people's blogs or comments, "Oh I woke up from surgery and felt great!"  No, this was not the case for me!!!  Right after I started to feel okay, the nurses had me up, starting to drink my protein shakes, and walking around the hospital.  I actually wore my fitbit to the hospital bound and determined to rack up some steps while I was in the hospital.  While I am proud to say I walked 75 laps while I was in the hospital, those steps didn't register on my fitbit I was walking so slow!  So I manually counted my steps and laps it gave me something to do at 3am while walking around the hospital. Oh I also had my gall-bladder out at the same time and they had to cut my liver to get to it all.

    I was unable to get protein drinks down fast enough so I had 2 night hospital stay.  I really didn't care, I never thought 1 ounce of protein shake would seem like eating an elephant but it was for me.   I found it had to be really cold, both the water and the protein shake, I still have to drink both water and protein shakes with ice and very cold.

   I few days at home and I noticed one of my incisions looked strange, a lot of red spots around it.  I called my surgeon's office 3 times that day and no one called me back. The person who answered the phone was rude and said she couldn't do anything but send a message to the dr. on call and I would just have to wait.  Meanwhile, I was super dizzy all day!!!  The next morning I woke up and had my friend just drive me straight to the Dr.s office.  She actually told me to do so, she said they are not going to turn you away if you are standing in front of them.  So I did, she was right, the nice front office lady apologized for what happened the day before and got me right in to see the doctor.  He also profusely apologized for no one getting back to me the day before, he said he was the doctor on call and he never got a message.  Anyway he said my incision was fine, because it was the largest cut, the red spots were just it's bruising pattern but he was more concerned about my dizziness.  SEE, I was soo lucky to get my period they day after my surgery, and I was on the blood thinners so I was bleeding like crazy!!!  He asked if I was walking enough which I was so he said to stop the blood thinners.  I was so happy, once I stopped the blood thinners I felt SO MUCH BETTER!!!!!  The recovery was slower then I thought.  I am typically a super active person but  it took about a month to start to feel close to "normal."  I ended the month with a 25lb loss which was awesome!!  Although I had hoped for more, I found out that  this was actually pretty good!  Having PCOS has always interfered with my great efforts to lose weight, so I was starting to believe this would actually work!

Where to start??  I started my journey for WLS in January 2015 after a month of bleeding and getting an ultra sounds which confirmed I had cysts all over my ovaries.  I knew I had PCOS, but had been diagnosed by symptoms alone and not by ultra sound.  Between all they cysts, the bleeding and the unexplainable weight gain past my normal fat weight, I was freaking out not sure what to do!  I had just finished my Master's program so I started reading research articles on WLS and PCOS, there seemed to be medical evidence that the gastric bypass did indeed help women with PCOS lose the weight.  I have always been EXTREMELY active, I have run 2 marathons, done adventure racing, triathlons, was an avid hiker and mountain biker and an overall outdoor enthusiast but I never looked like a girl who could and had done all that.  Of course I did every diet known to man kind but at some point when you eat spinach and chicken for months and don't lose any weight, I think, "I might as well eat pizza it doesn't matter anyway, I don't lose any weight!."  I HAVE HATED myself my whole life for not being able to achieve this one thing, weight loss.

During one of my Master's classes our professor made us read this book Strength Finders, which was all about building on your strengths instead of focusing on or trying to fix your weaknesses.  It makes you take a test and has you come up with your top five strengths a few of mine were achiever, positivity, enthusiasm which made me mad!!! I thought about my weight loss efforts, If I am this great achiever, why can't I achieve weight loss, what is wrong with me???

Not until I started the WLS journey did I learn more about obesity and how doctors can't always explain why two people could virtually eat the same and move the same and one could be fat and one could be skinny.  There is so much more on that topic.

I went to my surgeon's information session where she basically said, look this is a tool, if you do wls you will still need to diet and exercise but the gastric bypass becomes a power tool that helps you with your efforts.  I thought how many diets have I been on, how many miles have I run, biked and hiked with none of it resulting in weight loss?  I believe I deserve the power tool!!!

My first request to see the doctor through my insurance was denied, I did not meet the requirements, I had no co-morbidities and they did not except PCOS as a reason to help me.  I DID NOT EXCEPT this,  I was so annoyed!!  I couldn't even meet with the surgeon until insurance said yes!!  So I got some "help" in being able to qualify, once I saw the surgeon and told her of my story, I felt like she "got" me.  She said that the gastric bypass would be the only surgery that would help my weight loss with PCOS but she made it clear that it would not "cure" PCOS I will have that forever but it would help me lose the weight.  

I took on all the requirements like a good achiever would and got them done in 6 weeks.  On June 25th I had the gastric bypass.  I thought getting to the operating table was the end of my journey......boy was I wrong, waking up from the surgery was really the start of my weight loss journey.  I am 5 weeks out and have already had a bunch of ups and downs.....  So glad I did it, I would do it again in a heartbeat and I am hopeful I finally lose all the weight!