Ok since today is a bathroom fashion show I guess we shall talk about something else as well.

but first… here is my bathroom fashion show for the day:

1. the jacket is an 8 an EIGHT for gods sake… I feel really good in this outfit btw:

Ok so now let’s talk about my body image.   In clothes I don’t look too bad, especially if I stand up straight and suck in my belly…  and wear good foundation garments.. and don’t try to pretend that I can cram this belly into size 10 jeans.  Naked… now that’s another story…  I hate my body naked.     For several reasons.  I don’t care about scars or  stretch marks, those are battle scars earned by years of living and well deserved.  What I hate are

my deflated hanging remnants of breasts

my belly

my thighs (and therefore my knees),

my back and hips.

OH and my thin hair.

That’s a lot of hate…  so maybe I need to balance it with what I like:

from the top down I LIKE:

my curls and color

my eyes

my nose is not bad

my mouth is good and i love my smile

my ears… they are small and flat against my head

my shoulders. I LIKE THEM… they are round but not flabby… they are defined.

I have collar bones! I like them

I like my biceps

I like my wrists

I like my calves

I like my ankles.

so basically from the armpits to the knees I want to replace.  That’s a lot of replacing.   And based on what I’m hearing NONE of it is going to be covered by insurance.  So now I have to figure out how to pay for it.  not sure what to think.. I guess a few more doctors are called for. I have an appointment on December 28th for a consult.    At least i can get an idea of what it’s going to cost and how much more weight he thinks this will take off of me.

Tags: bathroom fashion show, body image, plastic surgery

so it’s been forever since I  wrote.  My Bad as the kids say.  Life is busy.  Kids are good. I’m ok… hanging in

weight at 14 months out is about 160 so i’m as done as I’m going to be based on how i choose to eat…

I did go shopping this weekend and got a ton of new clothes so now we do fashion show for a bit:

gray slacks and a purple top.. hard to tell eh?

more randomness….

here are the kids from last night… taken with my cell phone

so i guess this is the current fav picture of them… Matt’s using it as his avatar on facebook!

My hubby bless his heart is feeling left out… no clue why I love him more than ever… and I think I’ve spent time with him but maybe not…  hard to see your own life when you are living it….    I think that’s why I enjoy having the kids around so much… I can WATCH them learn to be a couple.  I can WATCH them fall in love… and be in love… and it’s darling… they are so good together…

the gym was good today… one of the trainers winked at me as I ran laps… LOL…  yoga was good too.  I love yoga.

my weight is up a bit but I’m sure it’s water weight, I ate a lot yesterday… including popcorn… and chinese food for lunch…

well that’s all for now.

Tags: crystal, family, kids, matt, pictures

Just feeling like I should post something.

Life has changed in so many ways

Brian is FIVE POUNDS from losing 200 pounds.  He was 282 this morning.. so he wants to go back to the gym.  I think his plan is to come back on the 15th but I plan to go with Matt.  I like working out with him.   He makes me RUN and that feels GOOD and it’s good for me… I don’t lift with him but I bet Bri will and that’s good for both of them!

Brian’s happy

I’m HAPPY

my daughter is happy

and we have Matt now.    he seems happy too!

so where do we go from here?  up and out I guess.

Moving him in to our house might seem weird and strange and unusual and it is even to me… BUT we seem to be finding our way as a non-traditional family.  He loves my daughter. My daughter loves him.  May they live long and love long… and stay happy….   Brian and I while stressing do like having him in our home.

And living the way we do, while suspect and odd, works for us.

and we are eating great.  THIS KID CAN COOK and he works hard to learn to make healthy stuff!

and the house is clean

and the best thing.. my daughter smiles and laughs… and she’s growing and maturing daily.

It’s on my mind a lot that they are playing house under our very noses and we not only indulge it we encourage it.  But it seems to be working…

where do we go from here?  I do not know…one day at a time…

Tags: brian, randomness, weight loss

I know why I love him… he cooks, he cleans, he’s funny and obviously he’s FUN

this is MATT (see previous post) in my husband’s halloween wig and my dog’s  reindeer antler headband and my sunglasses

C for Cougar!

I think it’s funny in a weird sort of way that my daughter’s BF Matt

This is my favorite picture of them right now... they were just having fun and her smile is so true and natural..

said I look like a cougar in this skirt.     Now I’m going to trust Matt’s opinion because at 22 wouldn’t he know???

again it’s a bathroom fashion show  so the quality is not great, but here we go:

Tags: cougar fashion

I weighed 162 pounds
my BMI is 28.7
My BMR is 5642 kj or 1349 cal (that’s what I burn if i lay in bed and do nothing at all for 24 hours)
My fat percentage is 28%
Fat mass a whopping 45.5 lbs
FFM (everything in the body that is not fat what we call LBM) 116.5
TBW  85.5 lbs  means I”m well hydrated
my fat % and my fat mass are both in the desirable range!

my bloodwork:

Cholesterol:  went up a bit to 137
Triglycerides dropped to 75
HDL is at 57
LDL Cholesterol is 65
Cholesterol/HDL ratio is 2.4

Iron:   119
TIBC 265  lower than I would like but within range
% Saturation 45
UIBC:  146
Ferritin is down again too  106  so even with my taking 65 mg iron daily I’m still pulling Iron stores even without a period

Prealbumin 31

Folate  >24.0

VITAMIN D3  95  (nurse said it was the best she had ever seen… I guess their patients aren’t really compliant then)
Vitamin D2 <4

Calcium is 9.6
Protein Total is 6.9
Albumin is  4.2

B1 is 194

there is no freaking b12 but it was over 2000 last time

PTH intact is 40
calcium is 9.8

Tags: blood work, doctor, weight report

Wow.   Today is one year to the day I had Roux-En-Y (RNY) surgery.  A year.   How the hell did that happen???   It’s been a wild Ride.

I have to go back and read journal entries to get all the details right.    Let’s talk about the here and now for a second.  Life is good.  I walk, I do yoga regularly, I can lift weights as needed and I have energy and stamina like I did not before. I can climb a flight of steps and not be out of breath.

I weighed 253 on my scale the morning of surgery. This morning I weighed 160.8   not quite to my goal but less than ten pounds away from it! So  I go back and I read stuff to figure this out.. I remember HATING the pre-surgery weight loss requirements.  Gained 6 gained 4 stayed the same lost 4 net gain of six pounds… really sad.  And it made me worry that I’d be a failure at it after WLS.

There are times I still FEEL like a failure… I mean here I am at a year out and NOT AT MY GOAL!   I’m at my doctor’s goal… but not mine.  What does that say to me or about me? I remember waiting waiting waiting… Waiting for the insurance to approve me… scared they would not… of course they did..

On July 7, 2009 I said this :  …oy will I ever be thin?  I have been eating fairly well.  I know i need to exercise but everything hurts.  the tops of my feet hurt, my muscles are cramping, I’m out of breath constantly.  If i don’t lose weight I can’t have WLS so I can lose weight… what a catch 22, if i could lose weight would I need WLS?    What strikes me about this post is not the part about losing weight,  it’s the part about the exercise… EVERYTHING hurts…   now I work out… hard… at least 3 days a week!  And I like it.  A LOT!

So I had surgery and I did fine.  I stayed one night in the hospital and came home.   I had nausea.  I had an allergy to the stuff they paint on you to make steri strips stick… I felt crummy.  I never had regret.  And once all that cleared up I healed pretty quickly. I was 253 on my scale the morning of surgery. And while I’ve kept a spread sheet of monthly weigh in results since surgery I don’t go all the way back to the beginning with the daily ones. Or even the weekly ones.

I didn’t start keeping track till mid December for some reason.

I do have notes like this:

12/7/09 down 33 pounds in 11 weeks

3/24/10 down 63 pounds in 6 months

By December I was working out regularly I’ve been consistently faithful with my supplements and I was pristine with my food for the first six months.

At 5 months out, I wrote a long piece and in it I talked about wanting to weigh 150 or even 146.   I was just under 200 at 197.5 or so. I still have a goal of 151 but I doubt I’ll ever see 146 without plastic surgery.  My skin is horrible. I have a lot of it. And it has a lot of subcutaneous fat.

It’s been an interesting journey and I’m sure it’s not over. I have made some good friends. I have good times. I feel good.  I still weigh 300 pounds in the matrix…  (you know how they say the way you see yourself in your mind is how you look in the matrix it’s residual self image and it’s a perfect way to describe how formerly fat people see themselves)

So yesterday in the shower, I noticed how I can feel my bones when I bathe.  I put my leg up to wash and there are curves, bones, and hollows that weren’t there a year ago.

Shopping is fun now not tiring; of course getting clothes that fit is interesting as you never know what size to try… before it used to be just get something big enough to cover you that was easy to put  on and comfy.  Comfort was the key… easy was the key… cause I would break a sweat just getting dressed in my size 26 pull on pants after a shower.  Now the shimmy involved in getting into the form fitting size 10  jeans is laughable… a nice way to start my day but still…

Would I do it again?   Yep.   Would I change anything? YEP I would have done it YEARS ago…

Tags: clothes, feelings, surgiversar, weight loss, WLS, yoga

Ravens Shirt 1/17/10:

Same Shirt  9/17/10  45 pounds lighter:

Pictures can’t lie….  sometimes I don’t see it  stuff like this helps!

Tags: pictures, ravens shirt, weight loss