8 months?

I guess I’m a couple of days past 8 months.  I realized yesterday that it was probably time to update but wasn’t sure of the date.

I’m trying something new – not weighing but once a month.  My next weigh-in is not until September 9 – I chose “anniversaries” of my preop diet rather than my surgery just because that’s when my weight peaked.  (Well, for this process, anyway!)  The last time I weighed was actually just 10 days or so ago, though, not August 9th, and as of that weigh-in I had lost 70 pounds total!!  I was thrilled.  194.  That puts me at or past both my halfway goal and the most weight I have ever lost in one sustained effort.  Those were both huge milestones for me.

Next milestone is another strange number – 183.  I think that is what I weighed, flying by, when I got pregnant with my youngest.  I have been really wanting to find my old food/weight loss journals to see my record since then (12-1/2 years!), wondering what my lowest weight was and when I was last in the 180s, but I can’t seem to find the journals.  They aren’t in any of the places they should be.  Odd, that.

This last 10 or so pounds has made a tremendous difference.  I feel SOOOOO good.  I caught myself, without even thinking about it, running down the stairs and bleachers last week.  I am not working out consistently at this point, but even then my treadmill speed has increased to 3.2 or 3.3 to keep my heart rate in the same range.  I am also starting to job for a minute here and there.

I can’t wait to see what the scale says on September 9th.  I have been trying very hard to adjust my expectations down to the 5 pounds a month that I am actually losing and finally realized that even at “only” 5 pounds a month, some exciting numbers are much closer than I thought!  Next goal, as mentioned, is 183 and then 172 (peak weight after baby #1 before starting to lose it), then, and yes this is still 30 pounds away, but I am looking forward to the 100 pounds lost mark!

7 months – Big Milestone!

I didn’t realize a whole month had passed since my last update.  Today I am 7 months out from surgery.  We have had a crazy, crazy last month.  We went on vacation to Branson, MO, which was very relaxing.  I was frustrated when we returned because the scale said 205 – a full month without losing any weight.  When the water retention from travel left, however, the scale moved again, and by the middle of this last week I saw … drumroll please … a 1 in front!!!  I really don’t like the term “onederland,” but it sure describes it well.  Today the scale said 198.  I can’t even begin to tell you how excited I was!!!  I haven’t weighed in the 100s for several years.  My clothes are all getting too big, too.  I feel like now, from here on “down,” every new number on the scale is new and exciting.  Getting to 203 felt like retread.  I was re-covering fairly recent ground.  Now, however … well, like I said, new and exciting.

I don’t have a lot of time right now – on our way to friends’ house – but I wanted to do a quick update.  Still losing.  Still slow but still going.

The number 6

I wanted to update yesterday but ran out of time.  Yesterday was a big day – 6 months from my surgery date!  This week, I am finally down to 60 pounds down (total, from preop diet start).  As always, I am still monitoring whether I feel it was worth it.  I do still have moments when I think, “Well, I could have lost 60 pounds with Weight Watchers, probably at least as fast.”  Yeah, maybe.  BUT I am still losing at a steady, if irregular, rate and show no signs of stopping.  It’s still relatively easy to stay within a calorie range that keeps me losing.  No regrets yet.

Now, the other thing with the number 6 is kind of odd … when I get to the middle of each decade, usually around the time I get to a number with 6 in it, is when I kind of stall.  I lose kind of slow or stall for days, then when I get to around a 2 or 3, I lose pretty quickly again until I get to #6 again.  This time, I didn’t stall for 2-3 weeks like the last two #6 weights.  I popped back UP, then went up and down over a couple of weeks and have finally lost again.  Bodies can be mysterious things.

Today’s weight was 203.  This is a significant number for me.  The last time I had a sustained weight loss, I got down to 203 for about 5 minutes before refatting. 🙂  So this is big.  Anything I lose now is the lowest I’ve been in … I don’t even know how long.  More than 5 years.  Hmmm … now I’m curious.  Not sure how to figure that out, but anyway.  It’s been a very long time since I’ve been under 200 pounds.  Yay me!!

I have to admit I’m not super comfortable with all the attention.  One man at church even leaned over (I was sitting, he was standing behind me) and whispered something like, “I know this is probably inappropriate to say, but you’ve always been good lucking.  Now that you’re losing weight, though, you’re turning into a total babe.”  Ummmm, your brain should have stopped you at “I know this is probably inappropriate.”  Fortunately the guy is a friend and I can laugh it off.  But I get tired of people telling me how great I look since I know I still have a very long way to go.

Getting back to the number 6, maybe now that I’ve passed 6 months and 60 pounds, maybe my body will quit stalling when I hit the number 6 in my weight!

Five months

It’s hard to believe that it’s been 5 months since my surgery.  Wow.  Kind of funny to me, though – I kind of forgot until yesterday.  Previous months, I anticipated the “anniversary.”  As always, I’m not thrilled by where I am as far as weight loss goes, but I’m trying really hard not to focus on that.  It’s impossible to know if the procedure I chose is the problem or just my stubborn, middle-aged body.

That said, I did have a maintenance week last week.  No weight loss, but I really didn’t eat in a weight-loss range.  Well, should have lost maybe half a pound if my body’s metabolism knew what it was doing.  This week I’m back on track and ended the week at 209.  Down 55 from preop diet starting point, down 37 from the day of surgery.  See – 37 pounds in 5 months seems kind of pathetic.  However, I AM down 55 pounds from December 9, and that is a good thing.

I’m also within spitting distance of a couple of goals.  I fear I am repeating myself, so forgive me if I am.  I am far too lazy tonight to look at my previous entry.  I am within 10 pounds of being under 200!  I am only 6 pounds from where I started going back up last time I had an extended effort at losing weight (yes, I got to only 4 pounds from the 100s and started refatting!).  Finally, and this just hit me a week or so ago, but it is HUGE:  I am only about 10 or so pounds from losing the most weight I have EVER lost.  Not total – if you add together all the pounds I’ve lost after regaining, it would be depressingly, disgustingly higher – but in any one extended effort.  From the summer of … 2008 (I think?) to early 2010 I lost 64 pounds (267 to 203).  Then way back in 1997 to 1999, I lost about 60  (started at 217, got down to something like 157/9).  Obviously, starting at a higher weight means I will lose a higher total number of pounds, but I am still kind of happy about all this.

So this week I’ve been sick.  Why is it that every time I get back into exercise, something happens to derail me?  Granted, a few times it’s been me derailing myself, but still!  I had fever, body aches, chills, and have had sweats since the fever ended yesterday morning.  Ick.  Now I am coughing horribly, definitely can’t exercise because even NO exertion makes me start hacking.  Just breathing makes me need to cough.  Also, eating has been weird.  I haven’t had much of an appetite, and I have a hard to stopping drinking long enough to eat (20 minutes before and 20 minutes after) because I need that lubrication in my throat.  I’ve eaten a lot of ice cream (slow-churned), though, because it feels SO good and coats my throat.  So, not as much quantity of food but worse quality, so calories have ended up about right.

It is SO past my bedtime, especially on a school night.  Only 1 more month to the half-year mark!

Rollin’, rollin’, rollin’

Keep those wagons rollin’!

I had an interesting experience 2 weekends ago.  Reed and I went away for our annual anniversary weekend away (our anniversary was in the middle of the week, so we picked a weekend nearby).  We went to Lexington, then Saturday we drove out to Natural Bridge State Park to hike.  We hiked that in the morning then drove over to Red River Gorge National Park (just a couple of miles up the road) for more hiking.  All told, we hiked over 11 miles that day.  I learned some things.  Some of them were hard things.

I learned that in spite of increasing my exercise, I am still really out of shape.  Really, really.  Hiking up to Natural Bridge was about a mile mostly uphill, mostly steep.  It was difficult.  It was coming down, however, that ’bout killed me.  By the time we reached the bottom, my legs felt like jelly.  We had hiked more when we reached the top, too, so it was about 2-1/4 hours of hiking.  Red River Gorge, on the other hand, was brutal.  My legs were already tired out, but the afternoon hike was closer to 5 hours of hiking.  We did stop for a 1/2 hour or so for lunch, and we did stop a lot during some uphill stretches on the last half of the hike, but I was just spent.  I could barely feel my legs, and the slighest bit of incline would render me breathless after just a few yards.

I also understood how heavy I still am.  I won’t say learned, because of course I know that I’m still really heavy.  I’ve been feeling so much better, however, that I think I’d lost sight of how far I still have to go.  I felt every pound of it, though, in my knees as I hiked up and down those hills and mountains.

I could hardly walk the next few days.  Sunday while down there we went a couple of other places (the Arboretum and the Henry Clay estate), and it was torture!  Monday and Tuesday were also torture, but by the end of the week a little tightness in my calves was all that was left.  This week I resumed exercise.  I also bruised up my big toes’ toenails, especially my right.  I had a spot where I stumbled going downhill, and my toe kind of slammed into the toe of my shoe.  It was a pretty shade of lavender but not too bad at first.  After donning my tennis shoes for exercise this week, though, it has turned nearly black.  It also kind of hurts in shoes and with exercise but not too bad.  We’ll see what happens, I guess.

In spite of the pain and agony, I am anxious to go back.  In fact, I suggested that we do the same thing next year for our anniversary (except I think we’re taking Emily out to California for her senior trip right around that time).  I want to try it again after getting in better shape and losing more weight.  By this time next year I would love to be at my goal weight – if I only lose a pound a week, though, I will still be down to 160 or so, which is still a reasonable weight to try this hike at.

Weight-wise, that massive hike didn’t help.  According to myfitnesspal, I burned over 3000 calories that day.  I only ate about 1500.  That was also a problem, by the way – because I can’t eat and drink at the same time, it was quite difficult to fuel my body properly.  I was far more thirsty than hungry, so I didn’t want to sacrifice water for food, even for the 45 minutes or so required.  In hindsight, I should have packed more fruit, which would have given me some fuel while still helping to slake my thirst.

In any case, it’s impossible to know whether the stress to my body caused it or whether it was just fitting into my usual pattern, but I lost no weight that week again.  This most recent week, however, I did lose a couple of pounds and weighed in at 210.5 on Thursday (and this morning, incidentally).  I am within spitting distance of being under 210 and soooo close to that magical 200/199 mark!

I went shopping in my closet this week, too, which was exciting!  I was having a pants crisis – All my capris were getting a little loose except for 1 pair I just bought, which is still a little too tight.  I was thinking I would have to go buy more and not wanting to do so, when I remembered that I had seen a pair or 2 when putting clothes away previously.  I went digging through my piles of jeans that I had put away and found, not just 1 or 2 pairs, but several pairs of size 18 and 16 capris!  Definitely enough to get me through the summer unless my weight loss picks up dramatically, which I don’t expect to happen.  The only thing I think I will need to buy is some exercise gear.  My current exercise pants (2 pair) are getting so loose that I have to pull them up occasionally while working out.  I’m guessing that another 10 pounds will finish them off.

Rawhide!

4 months!

Well, 4 months and 4 days, technically.  I just got off another 3-week stall.  That was frustrating again.  The scale has moved this week, though, finally, and I weighed in at 212.5 today and yesterday!  What is kind of cool is what I saw on My Fitness Pal.  It has this feature where, when you finish logging your foods for the day, it estimates what you will weigh in 5 weeks based on your calorie intake.  I mostly ignore it because it’s never right – I’m losing WAY slower – but tonight when I hit complete for the day, the number I saw had a 1 in front of it!!!  I’m within spitting distance of “onederland!”  (I actually hate that word, but I couldn’t think how else to put it.)

Not much else going on.  I have a followup appointment tomorrow with the PA regarding my vitamin deficiencies.  Honestly, I don’t feel a whole lot of difference.  Still very tired and sluggish, but I can’t sleep especially well.  I almost forgot, though! – My hair loss seems to be slowing down!  For the last week it has been less.  The initial handful in my shower is just as big, but the subsequent ones are noticeably smaller.  Yay for that!

Time marches on

I haven’t updated for a couple weeks.  Not much happening.  I’m in another stall, but some of this one might be somewhat self-inflicted.  I apparently can suck down a surprising amount of calories in a day if I eat the right (i.e. WRONG) foods.  I had a couple of 1500+ calorie days in there and most were 1200+ calories in a week’s time.  In the good old days before I wrecked my metabolism, that wouldn’t have caused a gain.  Now apparently it does. 😦  I don’t remember what I weighed last time I posted, but today it was 215.  Thursday, my “official” weigh-in day, I was 216, and the week before I was 216.5.  I would love to see the scale continue dropping, obviously!

I did have a great workout today – ended up going an hour an a half with weight training and cardio, burning 570 calories.  It felt good.  I have trouble getting to the gym, but when I do, it usually is worth it.

Another week, another …

… something.  Not sure what.  Time marches on, weight drifts off.  Exciting thing for me was that today I weighed in at 217.  Not only is that firmly in the two-teens, 217 is a significant number for me for some reason.  It’s what I weighed when I began Weight Watchers when K was just over a year old (14 years ago!), and it was really the first time I had any experience in the 200s (I hadn’t really weighed myself much before that for some time).  It has remained a benchmark for me ever since.  Because of that, it was pretty darn exciting to make it today.  Also of interest to me is that I did manage to do a little better than 5 pounds lost for March – something like 8 or 9 (can’t remember right now).

Only 5 pounds to go until 50 lost!

Spring has sprung with surprising swiftness

I saw an amusing Garfield comic about 3 weeks ago.  Normally I’m not a huge Garfield fan, but this one has made me smile since then.  In the opening frame, Garfield is standing outside basking in the sunshine.  In the 2nd frame, Garfield looks surprised as it begins to snow.  In the following frames, the snow turns to rain, to hail, and is followed by a giant gust of wind.  The final frame shows Garfield stomping into the house (hairless) grumping about March being here.  The Friday either before or after I read the cartoon, we had tornados (closest one hit about 15 miles from here, but there were several in the area) and a lot of storminess.  Just 3 mornings later, Monday morning, we awoke to about 2 inches of snow (not enough on the roads to cancel school, though, to my kids’ frustration).  Today we have finally cooled off from a record-setting March heat wave, a week or more of temperatures in the 80s.  Of course, we had hail in there, too, some of the biggest hail I’ve actually seen here personally (marble size, though I know bigger has fallen).  Welcome to March in Kentucky!

It’s been a busy 2 weeks.  Yesterday was my 3-month anniversary of my surgery.  I weighed in at 220, though I actually saw the two-teens the day before and today (219.5)!  My goal was to have lost 50 pounds by 3 months out (including preop diet in weight loss), and I’ve lost 44.  Not too far off.  Yes, it’s slow, but it’s still coming off, and I’m grateful.

Last Thursday, the 15th, I had my 3-month postop visit and talked to the PA about my hair falling out.  She also got it in her head that I’m having fatigue, though I said nothing about that.  I sort of am, but I’ve been chalking it up to inadequate sleeping habits.  She ran a whole slew of blood tests, including a thyroid panel, CBC, CMP, and some vitamin levels.  Thyroid turned out fine, which I expected but half hoped would be an easy target as the culprit.  I’m anemic, with low hemoglobin and hematocrit and iron saturation, elevated RDW (an anemia marker), so I’ve added iron.  I’ve added biotin for the hair loss.  I also have a pretty low vitamin D level at 16.8, so I’ve upped my vitamin D.  I was actually taking some before, but not nearly enough obviously!

Interestingly, the low vitamin D can cause fatigue and mental sluggishness as well as depression and anxiety.  I have been really irritable and almost depressed lately and even considered talking to my doctor about an antidepressant (though the one time I tried it in the past it did nothing for me).  Now I wonder how much of that is the low vitamin D.  Hopefully getting my level up will help my mood.  I’m going to try to get out in the sun for 15-30 minutes a day, too, to help raise it naturally.

I’m to return to the PA in 6 weeks for reevaluation.  Unfortunately, I don’t think any of my results can help understand the slow/uneven weight loss.  The nutritionist suggested I be more consistent with my carbs – while I averaged about 70-80 grams per day over the last month, it varied pretty widely between 40 and 100.  I had a couple of highs over 100, too.  I’m working on that.  When I get cravings, they’re carbs!  I never thought I had a carb problem, but I’m starting to rethink that.  I’m working on finding a protein snack first when I’m craving carbs, then if I do eat the carby thing, I can’t have as much because I’m already at least half full.

Oh, and the best news of all – I got the green light to start on raw fruits and vegetables!  I’ve been eating an orange every day with my egg for breakfast.  SOOOOO good, and they’re not even the best oranges ever; they just taste good because I have missed them!!

Fits and starts

I guess the title describes how my body loses weight.  I had noticed this over the last few years on Weight Watchers, too, where I’ll seemingly stall, then lose a few, then stall, lose a few, etc.  After my 2 week stall, I weighed in at 221.5 Thursday – down 4-1/2 or 5 pounds for the week (can’t remember right now!).  Good loss for 1 week, but averaged out over 3 weeks, not spectacular.  Not horrible, either.  As long as things are gradually going down, I’m happy.  Scale bounced back up 1/2 pound the last few days, but I’m starting to kind of accept that.  I expect to stall here for a bit before losing again.  At least I expect it now.

I had a realization last week that I meant to include a note about:  I had been stressing about my carb/fat/protein levels, that my fat and carbs, in particular, were higher than they should be.  The realization, though, was this:  If you add together those maxes I was given, the total is only 700-750 calories.  I have been eating more like 800-1000.  Now, some days I know I’m well beyond my limits on fat and carbs, but overall, I can have more of those as long as I’m also getting proportionately more protein.  I do need to work on that, though – still love my carbs a little too much!!

Speaking of calorie levels, I’ve been a little nervous about crashing my metabolism.  I read something last week about a ruined metabolism being the reason weight loss tends to slow down or stop 18-24 months after surgery.  I have no idea how true that is, but that coupled with other things I have learned about super low calories and metabolism have made me a little concerned.  What I’m trying to do is once or twice a week eat in the 1000-1200 calorie range.  Even 1300 calories.  Problem with this is that I can’t eat large quantities, so to get the calories up, they have to just be more dense, which generally means less healthy.  Who knew this was going to be so complicated?!