Today I am FIVE MONTHS OUT from Bariatric Surgery. I can’t really believe its 5 months already but, it’s true that the time flies and life becomes normal. Well it becomes a new sort of normal. Normal no longer means stopping at Dunkin Donuts on the way to work and getting 3 bagels and 3 donuts (and eating all of them in one day). Normal no longer means whopper, fries onion rings and a milkshake for a meal. Normal no longer means FOURTH MEAL from Taco Bell at two am with my hubby while sitting on our bed. And yes I admit to missing SOME of these things now and then. But I don’t miss being winded just turning over in bed. I don’t miss my legs rubbing together and hurting. I don’t miss being out of breath just climbing a flight of steps.
My highest weight ever that I recall at home was 286 (293 once at the doctors). Now I’m ONLY 5’3” (I swear I was taller in high school.) This means that I TECHNICALLY should weigh in at a whopping 130 pounds. NOT happening. I’m big and solid and muscular so I’m thinking that 150 is a good weight for me. I have a goal of 146 but that may never happen. I kind of want to get to 125 just to have some bounce back room but I don’t think in a million years that’s happening. In fact, I have NO CLUE how low I’ll get. I wonder how to figure that out.
How did I get to this point in my life? Well I married my husband in December 2004 and I was close to 300 pounds. He’s a tall guy nearly 6’4” but he was close to 500 pounds (he was 477 at the doctor’s for his first visit). We love to eat and we have many friends who also love to eat. So we ate. A LOT. And we did not exercise. AT ALL. And we were complacent with this. But I watched Brian struggle to raise his arms over his head to change a light bulb. And I watched him struggle in pain with lympaedema of the legs. And I watched him, feel bad about himself. He likes nice clothes and it’s hard to find nice clothes in a size 6XLT.
I knew how to eat right. I was raised by a perennial Weight Watcher. 5 fish meals and one liver meal a week was my upbringing. Skim milk was what I was raised on. I had NO EXCUSE for my weight other than I loved to eat. And I like sweets and carbs. And sadly there is NO diet that allows sweets and carbs in abundance not even WLS like Duodenal Switch. Carbs are still an issue. Brian, being the gem that he is eats whatever I put in front of him as long as it’s not asparagus. I think that’s pretty much the only thing he does not like. So he really did not know what the good things he should be eating were.
In April 2006 I had to have my gall bladder removed. I knew we had to do SOMETHING to get our lives back in control. Brian asked about Gastric bypass then. I brushed off that idea saying ‘we can do this ourselves just by changing what we eat’. So May 1, 2006 we went on SOUTH BEACH DIET. And it was good for a while. I lost 16 pounds the first month (very similar to WLS although with WLS I was already eating low carb and had lost water weight going into surgery) and we kept going. I took off about 80 pounds and felt good. Brian lost a lot of weight too but he struggled with it and he never OWNED it. He did it to please me more than anything. I got STUCK around 210. Could NOT budge the scale. I was swimming almost daily and working out and getting NOWHERE. I was frustrated to no end.
Then Bagel our Newfoundland mix had to be euthanized in September 2008. And we got Harley a Newfoundland rescue in October 2008 and the beginning of the end came. Harley needed a lot of TLC as he was a very skittish rescue. I slept on the floor with him the first night. I slept on the couch for him for four weeks. No gym time as I was the only one he would go out for or with. And food…. Forget it… cooking went by the wayside. Junk became the way of our world.
By the time Harley was ok with either girl child (the daughter) or hubby, I was out of control and eating whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. I was gaining. I got as high as 271 or so at the surgeons office. So dangerously close to a total regain of my lost weight.
The surgeon needed me to lose SOME weight to prove that I could do it and show I would be compliant with the program. I was not a very good patient in this regard. But I managed to do it.
The morning of surgery I weighed 253 on my scale. (This distinction is made to show that I’m now going by what MY scale says. I weigh naked, every morning after potty and teeth brushing)
So I already can barely remember the beginning. But I’m going to try. I woke up nervous. Brian had surgery 5 weeks before me so he was already working his plan and doing GREAT. He was a bit scared for me but he had friends to sit with him… God Bless Norman. He’s the best buddy we can have. I remember getting to the hospital and going through everything. I do know I had to be WEIGHED and thank goodness I made weight. I swear I think Dr. von Rueden would have sent me home had I gained. I remember being wheeled into the hall and the next thing I remember is waking up in recovery thinking “OH my G-D what have I done?” But ya know what… that was my only ‘buyer’s remorse’ thinking.
I was taken to my room. Brian stayed with me till dinner time then I was on my own for the night but I survived. He has to work the next day but Angie (another angel disguised as a friend) came and sat with me all day. I walked a bit. Before Angie got there I had my swallow test and that was HORRID. I admit it. Yuck. Then back to the room and I got water and ices and broth.
And then Brian was there to take me home. So I only spent one night in the hospital then I was home. I slept in the recliner for a few nights (I don’t remember how many) but then I went upstairs. I never wanted to eat or drink anything so I had to force myself to sip sip sip water, tea, broth etc. I did not worry about protein intake yet. That was for two days.
After 48 hours home I was able to advance to FULL LIQUIDS. This for our surgeon’s plan includes COTTAGE CHEESE and yogurt. (I don’t get it but I’m not a doctor) and I LOVED that first bite of cottage cheese. I was so scared and I CHEWED IT. Who chews cottage cheese? I used tiny baby spoons and tiny bowls and I think that helped. I mean one tablespoon of cottage cheese is NOTHING and in a tiny bowl it really helped me feel like I had some FOOD. Of course I had barely anything.
TEN days out from surgery I was able to progress to pureed foods. OMG… heaven on a plate. Refried beans with cheese, cream of rice made with milk and RTD protein drink, ricotta cheese, scrambled eggs. MASHED CRAB! Yes I lived on these things for two weeks. Seems like so long ago. Seemed so frustrating then but now I still go back to my crab when I can’t figure out what to eat. I eat more crab and shrimp now than I ever did because I can order one ‘set’ of Alaskan crab legs at the deli and have it steamed for dinner for under 5 dollars and I’m worth it. But I digress.
I think that Pureed is the hardest stage truly. The TEXTURE of food just threw me off. I stuck to cottage cheese and cream of rice or crab with mayo and survived.
After pureed is SOFT food… not much different. But I added in ground beef and that has still been a staple for me. I could not do chicken at first. In fact, I just recently added chicken back and it’s still not a fav for me.
The rest just kind of all starts to blur together and gets me to today…
This morning I weighed in at 197.6 which means in five months I’ve lost just over 55 pounds. I’ve lost 11 pounds PER MONTH on average. Of course, the first month I lost like 17 pounds and this month a mere 7, but the average sounds good no? Sadly I see women who have had surgery the same time I have had it and have lost DOUBLE what I’ve lost. This makes me sad and frustrated but I need to remember this is MY Journey, not theirs, not Brian’s (my husband who had surgery 5 weeks before I did)
I do weigh myself DAILY. I know many ‘experts’ say you shouldn’t do this but I do. WHY? Because on Saturday I saw 196 and I know I’ll see it again soon. IF I only weighed weekly I would have missed that. As a lover of numbers I can relegate it to a data point and nothing more.
How does my day go now? Glad you asked.
I get up (usually early) I potty (and hope it’s a “complete” potty but sadly with all the bowel issues it’s often just pee… I brush my teeth and then I get on the scale. BUTT NAKED with the dogs watching. No matter what I do I always take the first number unless it’s clearly WAY OFF (i.e. it says I weigh ten pounds). I will probably get on a few more times if I have time to play with it but it’s a GAME so I don’t panic. Sometimes I’m downright silly about it. Yes the scale can disappoint me but I live with it, after all there’s always tomorrow.
I’m an all or nothing kind of gal. I could not get on once a week. I just could not. It would make me nuts.
One of the first things I do if I didn’t do it the night before is transfer my daily supplements and vitamins to my travel container
So what do I currently take as supplements:
7:30 a.m
- 1 bariatric multi high in ADEK
- 1 1000 Vitamin D3
- 1 2500 mcg B12
- 1 colace
- 1 400 mg magnesium oxide
9:30 a.m.
- 1 calcium citrate 400 mg
- 1 5000 Vitamin D3
11:30 a.m.
- 1 calcium citrate 400 mg
- 1 5000 Vitamin D3
1:30 p.m.
- 1 carbonyl iron 45 mg elemental iron
- 1 colace
- 500 mg Vitamin C
- 1 400 mg magnesium oxide
5:30 p.m.
- 1 calcium citrate 400 mg
- 1 5000 Vitamin D3
7:30 p.m.
- 1 bariatric multi high in ADEK
- 1 1000 Vitamin D3
- 1 2500 mcg B12
9:30 p.m.
- 1 calcium citrate 400 mg
- 1 5000 Vitamin D3
Now I try really really hard to stick to this schedule but some days (esp on the weekends) it’s HARD and some days I miss calcium and/or iron. You can’t take your iron within 2 hours of your calcium and you can’t take more than 500 mg of calcium at a time. You’re not supposed to take it with coffee or tea either but sometimes a girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.
Then there is either ‘the commute’ or ‘the wake up’ either way it’s pretty much the same thing. PROTEIN. I struggle very hard to get my protein in. The doctor says 60 g a day is enough I work for 100 g a day. I also struggle with fluid intake but that’s another story.
Anyway, how do I get my fluids AND proteins? I drink them. My protein drink for wake up/commute is this:
1 scoop Body Fortress Vanilla Protein Powder,
1 heaping teaspoon of Benefiber powder,
1 rounded teaspoon of instant coffee
2-4 pumps of whatever Sugar Free Syrup I desire that morning (and we come up with fun mixtures)
about 2-3 oz of 1% milk (that’s protein too 1 g for every ounce)
I mix that with my great immersion blender (best 15 dollars I ever spent) and heat that in the microwave and brew an ice coffee shot in my wonderful Keurig machine (another can’t live without device) mix them together and either pour it into the travel mug for the commute or drink it at the table.
Then I get to work. At work I drink a Syntrax Nectar Fuzzy Navel protein drink with a tube of Crystal light orange and ice.
Those two drinks alone net me about 20 oz of fluids and 50 g of protein. It’s a daily thing. It has to be.
I admit to missing eating and drinking together at breakfast and for snacks. When I get home from work I want to sit with a cup of coffee and a snack. I can’t do that anymore since we don’t drink and eat at the same time. In fact, I don’t drink 30 minutes before or 30 minutes after eating either. Although I’ve been known to push the 30 minutes before to 20 when I’m out at a restaurant.
What kinds of things to I eat: hummus, chickpeas, black beans, crab, shrimp, ground beef, onions, bananas, apples, peanut butter, imitation crab, cheese, (cottage, hard, ricotta, laughing cow, low fat cream cheese) soups (mostly homemade bean with ham), chili, fish (salmon or tuna steaks) chicken, some salad, avocados, nuts (pecans, and almonds mostly), TVP on some things, bacon (turkey or otherwise) 1% milk (mixed with things and usually hot) oatmeal or cream of rice (rarely) sweet potato (rarely) mashed potatoes (rarely), Greek yogurt…
(As I sit here thinking of what I eat I find the list is really rather short which is ODD since I’m pretty much allowed to eat what I want) The only limits are for ONE MORE MONTH and those are no bread, rice or pasta and no alcohol. Well I can tell you I’ve had bread (pita) and rice and while I can do it, if I eat fast afterwards I don’t feel good. But I find it really hard to eat slowly which is really important. I still have to work on that I guess.
Sometimes it’s hard. Most times it’s not. I’m very happy I had the surgery. I’m glad my husband had it too. I don’t know that our marriage would have survived had we both not done it. We’ve both changed a lot. We both feel better. We have more energy. We have different relationships with food and with each other.
I think it’s hard for our friends. I wonder if later on our friendships will change… I worry about it too.
Oh well this NOTE ended up being much longer than I expected.
Tags: surgiversary