Tuesday, September 11, 2007

After Weight Loss Surgery: What is a Regular Eating Plan?

Yesterday at the LivingAfterWLS Neighborhood we engaged in a conversation about a normal eating day following weight loss surgery. You can read it here: An Idea of What You Eat in a Normal Day.I was reminded of an article I wrote about my regular eating plan, back in 2005. Upon re-reading it I see I still follow the same pattern (except for this week while I am doing the 5 Day Pouch Test). No

Monday, September 10, 2007

Ok I give in...

I stuck it as long as I could... 48 hours post fill is not bad is it?
I am about to go to work in half an hour and I feel light headed and faint and I want to go to bed... however my mortgage say "GO TO WORK!"

So I am having to eat something to keep me going until I get home at 9:30pm.

Today I have had:
3 cups of coffee
1 yoghurt
half can of low fat chicken soup with a handful of peas in it
1 slice of bread (guess this is not a good sign of restriction)
1 instant pot of roast veg couscous approx 220 cals.

So not much, but its not enough either...

Port pain wise... I think I would be in agony if I tried hard enough. Its not horrendous, but I am popping aspirin (yeah i know its not good), paracetamol and also volterol (diclofenac). So I am on a cocktail of drugs so I guess my pain would be less. I simply cannot stand the thought of working in pain... I am goign to dose myself up again just prior to going off to work. I have managed to go to town and do the bank and give DS his whole day of school work, so I am not doing too badly. I just have to be careful not to bend down and pick stuff off the floor, or twist my body, run, stretch or like do anything normal!

Anyway, going to check DS's effort on his handwriting. He is trying to bargain with me already! The cheek of him. I told him Year 4 means no excuses and he might as well save his breath. I have been very good today and he has completed every task so far. Pfht. so much for "I cant do it its too hard"... *Evil laugh*

I will update later

Sunday, September 9, 2007

Sunday post fill...

Forgot to mention that yesterday the girls beat the boys at cribbage!! Yeah. 3 games to 2. OH YEAH! Probably because S was drunk, but hey, its still a win!

Anyway, this morning my swelling had gone down entirely. My skirt was done up and loose again and I didn't look like I was going to have to say "Honey, I think its time to take me to the hospital... its time"...

Those rotten friends of ours had prepared a luscious fried breakfast for everyone.. except me :o(

DH, DS and the Brown's tucked into a veritable heart attacking feast of sausages, bacon, eggs, fried pots and toast.

I sat there too smelling the deliciousness of it all drinking my innocent smoothie, eating another 2 kids fromage frais and a quarter tub of hummus. Yum Yum.

I was full.

My port has been EXCRUCIATING all day. I feel like I have a tennis ball for a port at the moment, and there is a red ring around the needle site of about an inch. Not good. God I hope its not an infection or something.

We can home and I spent most of the day in bed... I got up at 6:00pm as DH had gone to badminton and I just could not take any more time in bed as I felt skanky. I washed my hair and had a good de-fuzz and I feel much better.

Whilst I was in bed I had a yoghurt and a glass of orange juice.

When I got up I had a pint of milk. Since then I have had a cup of coffee and a glass of water with dissolveable paracetamol and aspirin in it. I had also made myself another coffee and opened another yoghurt... but they are still sitting here next to me... the coffee cold and the yoghurt slightly warmer than it should be.

I feel full. When I was talking on the phone to Mum earlier whilst lying in bed I had to keep clearing my throat as I had yoghurt coming back at me...

I am going to take this as a good sign that I have restriction.

If I wasn't in so much damned pain I would be really happy. But at the moment my port is beyond painful and I feel sick... probably all that milk.

So today's food:

2 petis filous
1/3rd tub hummus (65g)
2 glasses of smoothie (banana, apple, cherry, rosehip and blackcurrant)
2x coffee
1pt milk
1 pear yoghurt (250g)
1 pt orange juice

I also have another coffee and yoghurt here waiting to be eaten as I said earlier...

I am full as I can be.

This is great.

Ok... I think I feel.... restricted?

I went for another fill on Saturday. I can't remember how many I have had now... wait while I add them up...
Ok... it was FILL NUMBER 5

He gave me 2 mls. If all the fills are still actually present in the band I now have 9.7mls in there. I frankly think this is bull.

I am seriously doubting several things:
1.) Dr Clayson in Tamworth did not inject me with saline into my port, but instead it just went into my skin.
2.) If everything is ok... Is it actually leaking or something?

However, that said, the fills I have had in Barnes with Dr. Dovey have felt completely different. I can feel the needle for one thing, and I feel it knock hard against the metal plate at the back of the port when he does it.

After Clayson put my 3rd fill in in May I did find some minuscule restriction... If I am not careful I cant eat chips, bread or cake... But as long as its wet and I chew it well enough it went down no problem.

After the my 4th fill, which was with Dr. Dovey, I have been a well bad girl, but I didn't feel any difference at all with the amount of restriction. You can read all about how I have been between 29th June and today. I haven't even been blogging much; various reasons, but haven't been in a happy place either.

So Yesterday he gave me 1 and a half mls. Then as I could drink all the water no problem he suggested he aspirate the band and see categorically how much fluid was in there. So he jabbed me again and tried to pull out any fluid. Now, he had just inserted 1 and a half mls... but he got nothing out. He said sometimes when there is not much restriction it doesn't come out easily, but he couldn't get anything. I wanted him to try harder but it was PROPER killing me! So he put another half a ml in while he was at that anyhow.

So a total of 2ml. So according to everything I should have a stoma the size of a pin hole, but obviously this is not correct. I cant possibly have 9.7mls in my band. No way.

BUT.... We met this really lovely fellow bandster, Dee, who's blog you can view from the right hand side links. She had her band about a year ago and just check out the photos on her July entries... O M G!!!! Wow is all I can say. I was really impressed as she seemed to have a very similar experience... you know.. "all this money... no results... waste of time... bla bla" But it was about 6 moths for her until she really started noticing the difference in her food intake. I really enjoyed the comparison from her weightwatchers meal diarys to her meal diary now... WHAT A DIFFERENCE and band makes!

So I was really up beat when I left, even though I was a little concerned as I seem to have nothing in my band... even though he assured me there was.

We also met another guy from North Wales: Hello!! He was doing good too. He has lost a couple of stone, but it was just so nice to meet fellow Dillemans bandsters. We NEED to get a support group of people all who had their surgery there, because we suffer different problems from others due to the fact we don't have much aftercare here in the UK unless you have it done here too.

M (my fellow bunk mate from Belgium) was there too, and TB came with me for the drive so we all went to get a frapaccino after the ordeal. M had a 1 and a half ml fill too, so we are both really at the same place. Both a little fed up with the lack of weightloss... although she is doing better than me as she can do slimfast whereas I just want to slash my wrists if I am doing that for more than 1 day. Shes a dedicated lady. She looked absolutely fab too, which made me feel like a right loser. I have put on 9 pounds since my last fill. How good is that?

Ho Hum.. we sat down to coffee at Starbucks and had a good old chat. I started sucking my frap and I had to keep stopping. it was still kind of in my throat. Now, considering the fact that I still don't know what restriction is really, this was a little LOOPY. I kind of wanted to cry, shout and laugh and be sad all at the same time. M was like "No way... your joking me..." and looking at me like we were all waiting for a bomb to go off... **What will happen now?? ** Will she explode??
I felt hysterical - proper sense of the word. I didn't know whether to laugh cry or crap myself.

It took a good hour for me to drink the frapuccino, and I got one to go home with too. Greed still runs in the old veins you see!

Before I had my fill I was starving as I had only eaten an apple and a banana for breakfast and obviously I had my fill at 12pm and I was dying for food. I was full after drinking half a frap.

CCCCCCOOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLLLLL!

We came home and then we went around a friends for the evening for a BBQ. Great. I sat there watching the buggers gnawing away of ribs, steak, lamb kebabs, new pots, home made coleslaw and all the trimmings... I had some humus, 2 kids fromage frais and some soup. BOO HOO.

I did have wine though. 3 glasses. Mmmmm

We kipped there for the night as we couldn't be bothered to walk home at 1am and DS was sleeping over anyway, so made it easier just to bunk down there... but I was in a hell of a state. My port was throbbing. My stomach had swollen like I was 8 months preggers and it was right under my bust, just like pregnancy. I had to undo my skirt, and my pants were cutting into me. Our friends kept joking that I was going to explode and that I should warn them well in advance if I was going to let rip, as they would extinguish their cigarettes in case I blew us all up. I really thought I was going to fart for England.

So We bunked down for the night with DH praying he didn't die from toxic gas poisoning during the night.

Thursday, September 6, 2007

Completely strung out about my weight

I am having a hard time at the moment.
I have not been happy since coming back from Sri Lanka...
I don't know why, but my weight has just gone up and up since then.

I am not eating too much, but I am not eating the right things either.

I now weigh 17stone 9 and a half pounds (247.5lbs). That means since I was banded in February I have lost only 4 and a half pounds... Or should I say I have Re- gained 19 pounds. since I went to Sri Lanka.

Is this 100% down to me being a stupid cow?

I know what I am doing, but I don't know why I do this.

I think I want to lose the weight... but maybe I don't...? I can't understand why I keep sabotaging myself. Its like there is something inside me that likes being this way... and its stronger that the one that wants to be thin.

This 'fat me' is really strong. It pushes me so hard to do the wrong thing. And I do it.

The 'thin me' is a weak and pathetic thing made of whimsy voile or something that is like one of those old Victorian ladies with consumption... all floaty and romantic.

ARGHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I must sound like a complete stupid mad ridiculous nutcase!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Since coming back from Sri Lanka I think I have made about 6 fresh starts at losing the weight. Each time I fail. I get to a point and then pig out. I have never done this before and its scary. The other day I ate 9 chocolate covered muesli bars, 4 packets of crisps, 1 family bag size of minstrels and a bottle of red wine in just ONE EVENING!

These were just snacks. For my dinner that evening I had a Chinese takeaway - duck pancakes, sweet and sour chicken, prawn crackers, fried noodles, seaweed, sticky beef... etc.

Nothing I eat is a lot of food... its just the really WRONG food.

I eat the wrong thing at every opportunity.

I am binge eating too. I feel total scum when I do it.

*

So I went back to Slimmingworld with TB on Tuesday. The 'consumptive thin me' made the decision that I simply cannot do this alone. The last time I went to slimmingworld was before my holiday. This is the one big thing that has changed, and I know it kept me on the straight and narrow. Even if I did have a few off days, I would re-focus on the fact that I would be weighed the next week and start to do something about it.

So I went there not knowing what my weight was and I was DISGUSTED with myself.

I spent all that money on myself - went through all that agony - am STILL going through pain - and all I can do is eat like a fat stupid pig who doesn't know better.

I hate myself right now. I hate the person who gives in when temptation occurs.

I know I do want to lose weight, and I want to get rid of the strange tempter in my head.
I am also having a fill on Saturday. I booked it in yesterday as I know I don't have any restriction at all. I can eat anything I damn well please and to be honest, if I didn't have port pain, I wouldn't know I had a band in place right now. Something is not right.

I will try hard to sort my head out.

Tuesday, September 4, 2007

Carbs and Guilt: The Wicked Vicious Cycle

I think that most weight loss surgery post-ops will tell you that processed carbohydrates led to their obesity. After surgery during weight loss we live by the four rules or guidelines from our bariatric centers concentrating on a high-protein diet. Then somewhere along the line the snack monster attacks and we return to processed carbs. A little nibble here, a taste there. At first it doesn't

Monday, September 3, 2007

Pouch Test: One Neighbor's Story

Hello Everyone! I hope you had a nice long weekend full of LIVING and wellness. It was a busy weekend in my world and more than once I was grateful for my health and physical fitness as we engaged in numerous activities without respite. I realize that as a morbidly obese person I would have sat on the sidelines on such a busy weekend - but as a healthy weight fit person I played first team and