1st consult for 6 month program

Mar 14, 2018

On Monday, I had my first consult for my insurance-required 6 month weight loss program. Visit started off with weigh-in, which I was disappointed to see I had gained almost 1 lbs. since my last visit with the fitness coach 2 weeks prior. I was disappointed, but not surprised as I had been on vacation all week prior and knew I hadn't eaten well. But the bright side is that I still have lost 4.6 lbs. since my very first consult with the WL surgeon. My goal is to lose at least 20 lbs. during my 6 month program and hopefully 25 before surgery.

The doctor that will be working with me during my 6 month program, was very friendly and explained the purpose of the program. He emphasized this was an opportunity for me to start making the lifestyle changes that will be necessary to keep the weight off after surgery. He was very open and frank about me having to commit to changes to not only lose weight, but keep it off, which was positive. While he stressed nutrition was important, we really emphasized fitness before and after surgery. He really didn’t give me any magic formula and strict rules to follow, but did get me some documents with initial recommendations. He said he would get into more specifics after I met with the nutritionist and after my metabolic tests next month. I revealed to him that I was using OH to help me start some of the nutrition changes and I have been taking the advice of the fitness evaluation to get a minimum of 150 minutes of exercise a week. He was pleased to hear that. Of course, I did admit I had not eaten well on my vacation, but that I still found time to exercise, for which he said was expected and perfectly acceptable.

Speaking of that, not only did I exercise on my vacation, I also ran/walk my first 5k ever! Well kind of…. My local YMCA held a Anyway/Anywhere/Anyhow 5K for their members, so I enrolled before I left North Carolina. It was self-administered, self-monitored, and self-reported 5K. We were requested by the YMCA to take pictures and post them on FB and IG with the hashtag #Anyway5K. The cool thing was I was vacationing in Reno, NV, and South Lake Tahoe, CA, so my pictures of me doing my 5K were definitely the coolest. One day I did 1.2 miles in downtown Reno, complete with a selfie at the famous Reno “Biggest Little City in the World” Arch. It was really cold outside so I did my running portions outside on the sidewalks, and then ducked in the casinos for the portions I needed to walk. I completed the last 2.0 miles a day later at South Lake Tahoe, with my run/walk passing the famous Gondola at Heavenly Ski Resort. Took another awesome selfie of me with the gondola and snow covered mountains in the background. Unfortunately I had to walk most of the 2 miles due to bitter cold and most of my route being covered in snow/ice. But I really didn’t care about walking most of it or about my total time. I was more focused on just completing the 3.2 miles to say I did a 5K. So even though you can argue I didn’t do a continuous 5K, I did the 5K “Anyway/Anyhow”, just as the event was described.

Now I’m back to reality at home and at work and ready to get focused on my eating habits more. I’ve been taking a lot of notes from the “Whatcha Eating Today VSGers” posts and will be taking a special trip to the store this week to stock up on high protein/low carb foods. Any suggestions on foods are welcome.

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