1 Year Surgiversary!

Sep 08, 2009

I went in to see the doctor last week for my 1 year checkup, and yesterday was officially my 1 year surgiversary.  To date, I have lost 91 lbs with the Lap Band, and I could not be happier with the results!  My highest weight was 247.4.  My doctor's goal for me was 160, and I'm now below that at 155.6, so he is extremely pleased with my progress and told me that Lap Banders rarely reach goal weight in the first year.  It usually takes at least another 6 months because of the slower weight loss rate than bypass.  He called me a poster child for the Band, so I don't think I could do much better than that!  My goal is to lose about 12 more lbs to get to MY goal of 145, which is what is considered a healthy BMI and weight for my height and puts me down into the "healthy weight" category instead of "overweight", "obese", or "morbidly obese".  I haven't been at a "healthy weight" since I was in middle school, so that will be a BIG deal for me!  Hopefully I can get there by the end of the calendar year, which will be a challenge, given the holiday season, but I really think I can do it now, for the first time in my whole life!

The eating is going fine right now.  I'm eating about 1/4 to 1/2 a cup of food at each meal, except for breakfast when I usually only eat an ounce of 2% cheese to get some protein in my body and get my metabolism going first thing in the morning, but otherwise no breakfast because the band is a little tight that early in the morning.  It's the exercise that I need to work on now!  I had gotten into a good routine, but I got overwhelmed at work and the exercise was the first thing to go, so I haven't really been to the gym in over a month.  I've got my gym bag with me today and plan to get going again, so keep me in your prayers for that one, because now that I've lost all this weight, I've gotta get rid of all of the extra skin on my arms and thighs (and that dreaded belly pouch that I had even before I lost weight from having 2 kids!).  Wish me luck!

I've also had a lot of NSV's (non-surgical victories) lately, including not only being able to fit into all of the "skinny clothes" that I had before surgery, but having to give all of those clothes away because they're too big for me now too!  I've had a couple of problems, though, including still having problems with my knees, but that is chronic and is at least less since there is 90 less pounds on them each day, so I guess I'll live with that.  I have also been having a lot of pain in my tail bone when I sit down for any period of time.  I saw the nurse (my mom, who's been an RN for 35 years), and she told me that my tail bone actually points out instead of curving back in like most, and that I've lost so much weight that I just don't have enough padding back there and it's poking out whenever I sit down!  I just never noticed it before because I've been either obese or morbidly obeses since the 8th grade.  Can you believe that!  I don't think when I had this surgery I would have ever imagined that someone would have told me that my butt wasn't big enough!  Woo hoo!!  I'll take that problem! 

Anyway, thanks for reading my blog.  I wish all of you the best of luck in your weight loss journey, and I hope that you'll keep thinking about me as I plug on in mine!

Meredith

1 Comment