Dr. Jekyll and Mrs. Hyde

Jun 29, 2011

I don't know about you, but I'm pretty fricking jazzed about the lack of hunger that's accompanied my sleeve.  Even though I knew there was a chance it was temporary, I was happy to finally experience what it must be like for "normal" people who only eat when their stomachs are empty.

Last night, however, I got a reminder that just because the physical hunger has gone from Godzilla to Kermit the Frog doesn't mean that the battle is over... not by a long shot.

Head Hunger Rears Its Ugly... uh... Head

Not long ago I had a conversation with a friend around wondering where my "trigger" point is for carbs; at what point does the mindlessness start to creep in?  I know that if I keep it under 20-30g per day, I'm fine... no cravings, no obsessing over what else I can eat.  What I don't know, is how many carbs I can tolerate before I start floating into that Dr. Jekyl/Mrs. Hyde danger zone?

Yesterday I was doing pretty well.  I had my usual protein shake breakfast, had 2 tbsps of pureed egg salad for lunch and noticed that the vending machine at work has a tuna & crackers snack pack in it.  I can have both of those, so I had that and found that I'm probably better off making sure the tuna is pureed first as I'm not so great with chewing to a paste yet.  Not a big deal, not painful, but I definitely felt it sitting there after I ate it... I probably won't do that again until after I'm on the soft foods phase at the end of July.

I got home, had my 2oz of sloppy joe puree with some sour cream (reminded me of a taco) and a sugar free popsicle and thought that was it for the night.  But I wanted another popsicle... and another... and another... and another.  Then I remembered that I had picked up some Ritz crackers, which I hadn't tried with the hummus yet... so I had some of that.

Then I was done... and I was scared.  It started to feel like my control was slipping; I had to get a handle on it.  I went over to log my foods and saw that I was now up to 54 carbs for the day.

Journaling... NOW I Get It!

I've been a big proponent of using a site like MyFitnessPal.com to log everything that passes your lips.  Not only did it help me avoid going over my 30g allotment when I was on the pre-op diet, now that I'm finding my way back to regular food, it's helping me identify where that tipping point is. 

I still don't know exactly where that threshold is because I caught myself early enough that I hadn't yet ventured into auto-pilot territory, but I have a feeling I'll get a better feel for where the line in the sand is in the months to come.

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