fear_of_grace

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So. . .I definitely feel like I have moved into the stage where this all feels "normal" to me now.  I wake up, chew my vitamins and start working on a protein shake for breakfast. Current favorite is Premier Protein. 30 grams of protein to jumpstart my day AND I can drink water right afterwards without having to wait.  I'm NEVER ate breakfast pre-op, so grabbing a RTD shake out of the fridge is an easy compromise, esp on busy mornings.  

Lunch is 3 oz of protein, usually meat. I tried something new today trying to bring tastes from my old life back and had a cheese quesadilla on a low carb tortilla.  The tortilla was gross and I only ate half of it and of course it wasn't really enough protein. So lesson learned.  

Dinner is the same, with maybe a couple bites of a low carb veggie. Mushrooms and spinach have always been my favorites, so I eat a lot of those now.  

Snacks aren't part of my doctor's program, but every now and then (esp on days like today with a poor lunch) I have 1 oz of turkey perky jerky in the afternoon.  

I will be honest, I do have a bite of something "forbidden" every now and then. My husband's rice on his dinner plate, a bite of fudge, etc and I am working on trying to eliminate that habit.  For today I'm being positive and telling myself that now I always stop at that one bite.  Much better than the huge portions I ate before!

I have been working out at my local Y 5 days a week and I can tell it's making a difference in my weight loss. It's my TOM right now and I'm still losing! Not a lot, only like .2 or .6 a day, but last month I went up 2 or 3 pounds and stalled for a week, so small steady loss is OK by me! 

Water is still a struggle to get in my 64 oz, but I just try my best. Everyday I can drink faster and bigger sips so I know it will be easier soon. 

Today when I weighed in, I realized that I am now 1/3 of the way to goal! I have lost 42 pounds so far. My jeans are 2 sizes smaller too! Some days I can see it, other days I can't. My husband has been very supportive and we took pictures last week to compare and there are some small differences. I can't wait to see myself in 2 more months! 

I moved AND backdated all my posts over to tumblr.  I like the look better over there and feel ike it's more "mine"

Here's the link if you are interested, http://honestbites.tumblr.com/

I know when I was pre-op I was looking for everything I could find about the surgery. :)

Mentally I'm having a hard time right now. I had surgery 1 month, 5 days ago. It took about 2 weeks for me to feel "normal" afterwards, then I had one week of feeling pretty good. The next week I had my period. I have a mirena and have had 2 or 3 days of "spotting" in the last year and a half. This time, I'm assuming due to the weight loss, I had a 7 day killer insane period. This totally sucked all the life out of me and I stayed curled on the couch most of the time. This week I'm battling severe congestion, dry cough and more fatigue. Everyone in the house is sick so we all have the same thing.  

I'm not used to being "sick" for 4 out of 5 weeks, so that has put me in a grumpy mood. And the scale HAS. NOT. MOVED. IN 2. WEEKS. (ok, it's moved, but within the 247-250 range, up and down, up and down)

Also, I have been tracking my food and eating within my NUT's guidelines (400-600 cals, less than 15 carbs and at least 60 grams of protein). I have NOT been drinking enough fluids, today I have already drank double what I did yesterday and I'm attempting to bring that back up to at least the 64 oz minimum.  One of the comments on my previous entry mentioned that if it doesn't taste "good", they just don't drink it. That's me as well. Pre-op, I was a mountain dew fiend, I loved that neon green citrus crap. I also think I've gone through most of my life partially dehydrated. Pre-op, I rarely drank water and also rarely finished any type of beverage period. My husband hated all the half drank cups and bottles I left around. 

Anyway, yesterday was particularly hard. I overslept and had to rush around for an hour trying to get everything back on schedule and that was just enough to push me over the edge emotionally and all the negative thoughts I've been having won out.  I just felt like this was yet another fad diet that I was failing and that there was nothing that I could do to change it. (all untrue logically, but emotionally. . . ) And I made bad food choices all day, I totally let myself slide back into the "old me". The me that used to think that since I'm not losing weight it doesn't matter what I eat. The me that would eat something "bad" and then punish myself by skipping meal, only to eat something even worse afterwards. I wasn't able to eat much, clearly since I'm just over a month out, but I made some dubious choices. Fast food for breakfast (sausage patty and a few bites of biscuit), skipped lunch, had an afternoon snack of half a slice of pound cake, and went out for dinner and ordered a sirloin steak and fries with a glass of red wine! I ate so little of that it was ridiculous. The steak wasn't great and I only had 3 sips of wine before I handed it over to my husband.  I also had half a scoop of ice cream.  I'm completely ashamed to post this, but I'm being honest. Luckily I did not get sick from any of that, but I don't want to press my luck again. 

Today I started fresh, took my vitamins like a big girl, so far I've drank 4 glasses of water and I've stayed on plan. I can do this and I will.  I did something drastic by having a VSG and sometime I feel like I want drastic results. I have to remember that I am getting drastic results, I just have to do my part by taking care of myself and enjoying the journey. 

The Good

• I have no pain at all from my incisions and can bend and lift pretty much whatever I need to. The only thing that still twinges is putting my 30 lb toddler in his crib.  He goes completely limp, so I have to hover all 30 lbs of him AND crunch over the side rail(I'm short) to get him on the mattress without dropping him.  I can sleep on my side and move around no problem! 
• The incisions are healing well, everything is still red, but seems to be healing well. 
• Food is going extremely well, I posted earlier about eggs bothering me and that has been the only thing so far. I had egg beaters tonight and they went down no problem.  I'm officially in the "puree" stage, but I've just been chewing everything very well and making sure to eat moist food and it's all good so far. I've had chicken, fish, shrimp, turkey bacon, eggs, yogurt, all sorts of cheeses and of course proteing shakes! 
• Premier Protein RTD chocolate is still what I am liking the best.  It's funny how tastes change even from one week to the next.  I don't mind the taste of these anymore and I LOVE starting my day with 30 grams of protein. It helps me feel that my day is attainable. 
• I've already packed away the jeans I was wearing pre-surgery and my current ones (that I could no longer zip) are baggy now as well. 

The Bad

• I am still struggling with getting all my liquids in, i went through a few days that I could tell I was dehydrated and tried to step it up and I 'm feeling better now, but I know I need to keep fighting this one.  I'm loving decaf iced tea with lemon and splenda so that's helping. 
• Still working on vitamins as well.  I have iphone reminders set, I just need to take them! 
• My husband ordered pizza last night and I ate 3 bites of crust! Unnecessary! I need to be more careful of "bites"
• Halloween candy. Not terrible, I think I ate 5 pieces over 4 days, but still ridiculous considering I am a month out of surgery, 

All in all, I'm extremely happy and feel like things are working out well. Still so excited to see my ticker and the progress I've made so far! 

27 pounds lost! Not bad at all! That's 10% of my total weight gone in a month.  I remember that losing that much before took at least 5 months of constant dieting and exercise with my PCOS working against me.  

And in measurement news 15 inches gone!  Mainly 4 inches off my chest! Eep! And 3 inches off both my waist and hips. 

So happy with my surgery choice.  I feel almost fully recovered now, just still get easily fatigued which I've heard is normal and will pass. 

Weight has been somewhat stalled and now it's my TOM, so the numbers aren't moving the right way.  ( I "gained" a pound, yesterday and today), but I know I'm eating right and that it's all water weight/retention and it will fall off soon. 

I love you egg! My plan says I can  at 2 eggs for a meal, but every time  eat an egg. I just feel blech. I haven't been sick or had the foamies or anything, but they do not sit well.  boooo.

I thought I would have more issues with chicken, but I had a delicious pureed meal of chicken last night that went down just fine.

Green Chicken Puree

2 oz chicken (NUT reccomends pouch chicken while in puree stage)

1 oz 0% greek yogurt

2 tbsp Trader Joe's salsa verde (10 calories, 1 carb!)

1 oz cheese of your choice.  

 

Smash together with fork and microwave. Easy peasy and delicious. Basically tastes like the filling of an enchilada. with around 20 grams of protein.  

Went down fine.  My deviled eggs for lunch today. . .couldn't finish them and still need a lot more protein and water for today.  Might need a shake to get it all in.  

So excited! The next 25 are going to be even more exciting.  I haven't had anyone notice the weight loss yet, but I don't blame them since I usually yo-yo around within that 25 pound range.  I overate in the month leading up to surgery, I'll be honest. And I think I still have slight swelling in my midsection.  Today is my 3 week surgiversary and I am feeling good about my loss so far.  My goal for this month (and I'm going by calendar month) was to lose 27 pounds by Nov 8.  I am SOOOO going to make that happen. My 2 month goal is to lose 28 more pounds. Eep! Seems like a lot, but I'm going off this calculator that that I found here. http://www.obesityhelp.com/morbidobesity/information/planner+results.php

My surgeon's goal for me is 150 and this recommends 138, but I will worry about that when I get there.  haha. 

I've really been working on the protein and I think that's what broke my stall.  

I'm not going to lie, things are a little rough over here.  I am ready to eat  food! I am going shopping at Trader Joe's Monday night, then Tuesday it is on!!! I have planned out several meals, all with around 20 grams of protein and around 200 calories, so I have plenty of options to choose from and keep me satisfied. Until then, I'm sipping my shakes and my water and one of my new obsessions Arizona Half and half, zero calories.  

Not helping my moral sate of being is that I am STALLED!! I have been wiggling around in the same 2 pound window for over a week! Realistically, I know this is normal and I will get through this. However, there is this little voice that says "oh look! You failed yet another diet, you still can't lose the weight even with surgery" My inner voice isn't always the nicest. It's so easy to blame the lack of weight loss on my PCOS, but as I said before stalls are normal. I will keep repeating that to myself!! I still have only been getting around 40 grams of protein a day and not always hitting my water goal so those are 2 things right there I can do to try to proactively break this stall!!

My husband is on day 3 of a juice cleanse, I think he has a lot more sympathy for my liquid only plight now, hahaha. 

 I have been having a tough time getting protein and water in this week, but still averaging 40 grams of protein and 64 ounces of fluids. I am feeling better, but still reminded that I'm in healing process and need to be gentle on my body still.  I went for a walk last night of about 1.5 miles and then to see my surgeon today, then off to the mall to walk around and run some errands.  I was going to go to Trader Joe's and Target as well, but I simply was done.  I came home and my sweet hubby went to Target without me AND took our toddler so I could rest.  I was wiped out!!!  

My followup went well, everything is looking good and I was cleared for full liquids!!  I had a protein shake tonight that I thought tasted good!  Dark chocolate was just the thing after all these fruity watery shakes.  I'm sure I will be sick of it this time next week, but for now it's delicious. 

I made some protein jello as an experiment and took a taste tonight.  I probably took too big of a bite, I was trying to make sure I had everything on the spoon and put the whole bite in my mouth.  
It was super gross and my first reaction was to GET RID OF IT!
Unfortunately, my natural instinct was to swallow it whole!!!!
Arghhhh. I can feel it sitting like a rock just past my throat.