March Update

Weighed in this morning and am 177. Nice to be in the 70's. Nice too that I only have 42 lbs left to go. That's 16 lbs less than I've lost! I can do this!!!  I went on the 5 day pouch test and it seemed to break my stall and get my body back into losing.

As I stated last post, I just assumed this WLS was going to be a walk in the park. When I researched the procedure, I know I focused more on the positive stories (big losses) and ignored the ones that lost slowly (that won't be me, I thought). Now I'm focusing more on people like me, who are losing slowly. There are two ladies I talk with who took 12 and 18 months to lose 100 lbs. I'm 7 months out, so if I can't lose the remainder of my weight in 5 months then I'm thinking I'm really not doing this right. Now that I've said it I won't lose anything. LOL

My struggle continues to be exercise. Just so happens we're having renos done in the basement and I can't get to my exercise equipment - that's just my excuse du jour. We'll be moving upstairs on Monday to start the bathroom, so my excuses will have to change. haha My biggest excuse is that I absolutely hate it. There are none of these "feel good" times or exercise highs or anything. I get on the machine, I sweat, I think I'm going to die, I can't walk when I'm finished, and I still feel like shit when I'm in the shower. It's just overall a very unpleasant experience.

Protein drinks are going well, carbs are still high - can't get under 40 very often - and calories are between 600-800. I've heard that upping calories in order to break a stall will sometimes work too. So while I try to keep my calories under 700, going higher every so often isn't a bad thing either.

Recipes

I'm in a group that has amazingly yummy and healthy recipes. I'm going to try to post one here. Hope it works!

BLT Lettuce Wraps

Ingredients:
4 slices lean bacon (pork or turkey) cooked and chopped
1 medium tomato, diced
1 tbsp light mayonnaise (I like Hellman's)
3 large iceberg lettuce leaves
fresh cracked pepper

Directions:
Carefully remove 2 large outer leaves of a head of lettuce. If you rip or tear one, just save it for the 3rd leaf you need to shred. Shred the 3rd leaf and set aside.
Dice tomato and set aside in a bowl.
Combine diced tomato with mayonnaise and fresh black pepper.
Place lettuce cups on a plate, top with shredded lettuce.
Add tomato...then bacon and roll it like a wrap and dig in!!!

Servings: 1 • Serving Size: 2 lettuce wraps • Calories: 160.7 • Fat: 10 g
• Protein: 10.8 g • Carb: 8.1 g • Fiber: 1.9 g • Sugar: 0.8 g

Valentine's Day

Happy belated Valentine's Day. It was a nice day although Darrin's back at work. We celebrated on Saturday so that's okay. Had a great supper at Montana's, received candy and flowers, gave a collector's coin. All around pretty good.

How goes the WLS pounds? 182 right now - been stalled for a bit. Not watching carbs or working out enough certainly contribute. I sometimes feel I just can't (won't?) do this anymore. Like there's a choice. Can't undo this one. Anyway, eating with watching calories, carbs and protein, drinking all my water (not getting as much in as I need) and ENSURING I'm getting the protein shakes/drinks in. So far, kind of good.

I am not very consistent with my exercise. It needs to be 3 times a week and it is some weeks, but mostly not. I had started a walk/run program, but only made it 2 times and then haven't been back down there since. (Treadmill is in the basement.)

I thought everything was going to drop off. I read so many stories of people losing 50 lbs in a month; 200 in 6 months. I just figured that would be me too. A large part of that is the fact that those people were in the 300's and 400's. That, combined with even a small amount of exercise, leads to the huge losses. I thought (like many people do) that I would be able to have this WLS and not have to do anything else. Just eat some good food and *poof* the weight will fall off. Well, that's not the case.

I'm confident I'll get down to my goal weight. It's just going to take me longer until I choose to make a difference. Time to get back to my support groups on facebook and get my ass downstairs, and watch my carbs (tough one) and keep them at 40 or lower.

Happy New Year 2012!

As of today's date I'm 186 lbs and a comfortable size 16. Hope to post an updated pic soon.

Made it through Christmas and New Year without anything major. Enjoyed all the goodies and meals and gained two pounds. Considering the amount of crap I ate, I would have thought I'd gain more. Thankfully my little pouch keeps me in check.

The past month has seen me lose A LOT of hair - thinning so much that it's noticeable to anyone who touches it. It, and the dry skin, seem to be abating so let's hope this is it. Not sure how much more I can lose before I'll buy a wig; I don't want to have bald spots showing. Crossing my fingers I've got the protein up enough now.

Speaking of protein, I've heard that 20g per meal is ideal with 20g drink twice a day. I'm still not up to that, but hope to get better. This morning I had an egg (6.3g) and a protein drink (20g). Plan on having some chinese food at lunch (15g) then an afternoon drink (20g). Likely chicken (20g?) but that remains to be seen. So that would make a total of 81.3g or 61.3 without the chicken. Both are very good numbers. Last month I was struggling to consistently get in 40g, with many days being below that. The body is good at showing us what it needs, that's for sure.

My challenge is exercise. I have a treadmill and a Zumba game for Wii, but I just can't get my ass off this chair - or procrastinating when I am off the chair - which isn't doing me any favours. It hasn't helped me lose any weight, but I've sure had my legs and calves shrink, which I know is muscle. Any ideas for getting motivated other than the obvious?

So that's the story so far. Maybe I'll be able to update this blog more than every three months too. :)

Stalled

I do believe I've hit a stall. I'm 202 lbs this morning and have been that for a few weeks now. I've upped the protein and have been going on the elliptical, but to no avail. I know it won't last forever, but it's certainly frustrating.

I'm feeling not to badly otherwise. Sometimes I wake in the morning with a pain in my little pouch - like it's very hungry and screaming for food. Morning pills and some water hold it off until breakfast, but when I get to breakfast I'm not that hungry and usually can't finish. So much for getting in the calories and protein.

That's something I'm still struggling with. Getting in the right amounts of what. The Unjury is helping a lot, but so far I only drink it in Crystal Light at snack time, and then only 10g at a time. My hair loss seems to be slowing, so hopefully that's helping. Approximately 10g at each "meal" so I'm totalling 50g or so. Better than nothing is what I say, and more than enough to keep the body going. Hopefully things will kick back in soon.

Thought I'd share info from two of the doctors:

Dr. Alvarez: http://www.endobariatric.com/ He can also be found on facebook if you search endobariatric.com. I believe his price is $5000 or $5500, however based on all the reviews I've read of different surgeons, he's the one who's the best. In hindsight I wish I had found his site before booking Dr. Almanza.

Dr. Almanza: http://www.marioalmanza.com/ I can't find him on facebook. His price is $4500 and while he's a good surgeon staff with good staff, he's had a few mishaps of late that would cause me to question going back there.

I just read of a fellow who had a Bypass, also know as a Roux-n-Y (staple stomach to small pouch, leave remaining stomach intact, reroute intestine.) Has a lot of complications including malabsorption and dumping syndrome. Not for me, but has worked for this fellow: http://www.edmontonsun.com/2011/10/05/a-cure-for-obesity

Congratulations to my cousin and his wife on the birth of their first child, a baby girl. Family is all doing well.

Down Down

Not down very much, not enough for my liking. Hit 205 on the 20th. I'll take it though as it all adds up.

Continue to struggle with protein.

Haven't got my butt moving any more than before.

SSDD :)

Better Late than Never

So I'm delinquent in my posting. What of it? At least I'm consistent! LOL

Things haven't been too bad. Finally settling down and FINALLY found some truly tastless proteins, and gaining a better understanding of what life will be like on the flip side.

Eating is going pretty good. I'm on full mushies and have already had some "normal" food - meatloaf, wonton soup, chili with potato, and Shreddies, to name a few. So far no problems with food sticking in my throat and everything goes down well. I notice I miss drinking with my meals. That 30 minute wait after eating is tough.

Protein can be found in a tasteless, unscented powder and it's wonderful! I wish I had known about these at the start. The first was suggested by a dietician from the Stollery Children's Hospital and it's called Beneprotein. It only has 6g of protein per scoop, but you can easily put 2 scoops in. It's used everywhere in the hospital. The second kind is called Unjury and it is medical quality protein that is also incredible. I put one of the packages in a smoothie and you couldn't detect anything different. One of these scoops is 20g protein so is very good.

I also happened upon Carnation Instant Breakfast. The chocolate is amazing AND it's 15g of protein!! Incredible. Speaking of breakfast, my bowl of Shreddies and milk = 11g.

Once you're able to start real food, that's when the worry about protein drops a bit, because you're getting a lot from your meals. I haven't been keeping track of what I'm eating though, so I can't conclusively say what I've been taking in for calories or protein. Hopefully it's not so little that my hair's all going to fall out!!

Weight is down to 211 from 235. Inches won't be announced for a couple more months.