15 years ago today, I proposed to my best friend and she said yes. 2 dozen roses just got delivered, now I need to think something really special for next month and the marriage anniversary.
My initial loss with my band was amazing (and a little scary), but the joy of seeing pounds dropping off on a daily basis was truly fantastic. As I was looking at my weight this morning, I noticed that I had only lost 5 pounds during the month of April and was tempted toward the negative by comparing my loss with what I did when I was first banded.
Then I started to think about my bike ride on Sunday, 28 miles, 23 miles two days before, Both at speeds that it took me 5 months of work up to last year to be able to sustain for 15 miles.
I thought about my spin class and the progress I have made during it, where I had to stop and rest halfway through when I first started.
I thought about the fact that it is time to go shopping for clothes again because my pants are starting to bunch at the waist when I tighten my belt enough to hold them up.
I thought about the fact that I am down to one belt because I haven't punched holes in the other two.
I thought about the fact that the fat percentage on my scale hit a new low number this morning.
I thought about all the weight that I lost on WW, and how 5 pounds in a month would have been a cause for celebration.
Yup, the low hanging fruit of my band journey is all gone, but that's ok I burn more calories when I have to climb the branches to reach the higher fruit.
Father God, please help me to remain thankful for all that you have given me instead of focusing on what I don't have...
I have had my morning shake at 6:30, and no I'm not hungry, but I would really like to eat right now. Why? A bit of boredom, a bit of panic when I realize that I won't eat again until 11:30 (3 hours), missing pleasure that comes from the act of eating.
Of all the things in my life, I think that overcoming the baggage that food has will be the hardest. Not impossible by any means, but hard.
I hate baggy clothes, and wearing my size 40 jeans made me feel sloppy. I am currently wearing 38"comfortably, but I decided to try on 36" when I went shopping. Here are the results:
Now this is uncharted territory, but I am more than happy to keep on exploring. Going where Terry has never gone before. Band, warp 9!
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I'll have a strong cup of decaf and play a video game instead.
I remember during my undergrad studies in Psychology reading a paper that talked about people who were addicted to gambling and a peculiar memory trait that only allowed them to remember the times that they won. This caused them to constantly misjudge the odds when placing a bet, because the were overly optimistic about their chances.
I think that we who are fat have a similar trait, but in reverse. We only remember the times that we have failed in our journey to be fit, and so when there is temptation, when there are rough spots we err by forgetting all the scale victories, all the nsvs, all the times that we beat temptation and made a right choice and we only remember the times when we failed. So we believe that failure is inevitable and give in.
Today has been a hard day for me, I am experiencing a bit of bandster hell, combined with a generous portion of head hunger and emotional eating and the only thing I can think about is why bother, I am just going to fail anyhow. No, I haven't given in to those voices, but I have had one NSV after another this last week, I am within 4 pounds being at the lowest weight I have been at since I was a freshman in high school, and yet my failures are the memories parade before me today.
One of the things that the people of the Old Testament did when God did something spectacular in their lives was they built a marker, a pile of stones to remind them of the victory that had happened in that place. I think I need to start building some markers in my life so that I can concentrate on the victories, and not the defeats.
I ran across a post about using baby silverware or chopsticks to help get the proper speed and bite size for bandsters. So I decided to try it out. This morning's breakfast consists of 2 scrambled eggs, 1 cup of spinach and 1 Tyson reduced fat sausage patty. I cut the spinach and sausage to the proper size, dumped that and the eggs into a microwavable container, and when I got to work this morning microwaved it for a couple of minutes. I am now sitting at my desk with the chopsticks I bought off of Amazon, eating breakfast, and it is working well. The chopsticks slow me down and force me to take small bites and I don't feel nearly as silly as I would with a baby fork or spoon. That and the sticks are much easier to clean.
I was shaving this morning and my wife came in and weighed herself, curious I asked how much? Her answer was 122.5 (she is 5' 5"), and that around Thanksgiving she noticed that her back was hurting so she dropped 5 pounds and had been holding steady ever since. You know how my wife dropped 5 pounds and then holds her weight steady? She simply eats less. Not a diet, not skipping meals, not exercising, she eats less of the things that she eats every day. If she wants a beer or a cocktail, she will skip dessert.
This is how normal people interact with food. I am not normal, I am a mutant when it comes to food. The band is my tool to help me pass for normal person
Put re-heated steak on the list of this that Mistress Band will punish me if I try and eat. Worst stuck episode yet, but it is cleared and instead of steak, I had a protein shake for dinner.
It has been a bad day, a really bad day as I deal with a family member that has severe emotional/psychological problems. As I drove away from their home my mind kept ticking through the things that would dull some of the pain I was feeling, and everyone of them revolved around food. Hell, I have a bottle of good Irish Whiskey downstairs in my office, and while I will probably pour myself a stiff drink after the kids are down for the evening, it isn't nearly as attractive in my mind as taking the family out for BBQ and eating until I am so full that it hurts. Is it any wonder diets don't work for us, when food has become a drug that we use to dull the pain that comes with living?
Well, the good news is, as my mind ticked through my options I knew that those that dealt with food really weren't an option. After getting stuck last night, I am not willing to piss off Mistress Band two days in a row, and to tell the truth since being banded, I know that using food as a drug will only make me feel worse and I will still have the family matter to deal with with the guilt of having indulged in emotional eating added to it.
So, here I sit with my glass of crystal light lemonade, writing a blog entry for those who have helped me on this forum. Thanks for listening.
Very little riding this week, but in my travels I ran across a Perl Izumi Outlet store (High end biking clothes) and look what I found on the clearance racks. Now, I like bright but this was a bit much even for me. Two things convinced me: 1. 200.00 off list price. 2. Wolf whistles from my wife and and the fact that I had to promise I wouldn't just wear it for biking. :wub:
Spent a week here http://www.nps.gov/meve/index.htm. Truly an amazing place and one that I would recommend to anyone visiting this part of our nation. I gave up logging after the first day, tried to make good choices and stay active, but found this little Mexican restaurant and the food was amazing, including something new to me that the owner called "Mexican Coleslaw", I am going to have to work on re-creating his version of it. Got on the scale for the first time in a week and the verdict is, up 5 pounds. Not a big deal, since I know I didn't eat 21K extra calories, I know that the weight is water and will soon go away now that I am back on my regular eating schedule.
A couple of NSV's:
1. Despite the altitude (7-8K), I never ran out of breath on our hikes.
2. One tour through a cliff dwelling required that we crawl out a tunnel with an 18" opening and I doubt that I would have fit 6 months ago.
I'm not sure why and I'm not sure how, but early on in my life I learned to lie to myself about many things, but most importantly about what I ate. It is one of the things that I am having to unlearn in order for my band to work for me.
Today, even though I ate less than anyone at the table, I over ate and I'm not ashamed, I'm not guilty. I made a choice, and went past my soft stop. Yes I was uncomfortable. No, I didn't PB or vomit. No I didn't stretch my pouch or cause my band to slip.
But the important part, I am not going to lie to myself about what I did. I am going to log the calories (as best I can), I am going to eat lightly tonight (protein shake) and I am going to go back to my normal eating pattern because if I eat like I did today on a regular basis I won't lose any more weight.
Made Sourdough Waffles for the family this morning, they were so light and smelled so good that I knew with enough butter and syrup they would be a slider food for sure. two small bites later and NOPE. Fed the sewage system and will have a shake before Church.
I attended support group last night, and then read CG's post this morning on want power has me thinking...
There is want, and then there is WANT. The problem is that we want it all, and society had told us, that we not only CAN have it, we DESERVE it. Ever seen a fad diet advertised "East want you want, and still loose weight"? The band for all it's power, doesn't replace our wants, at the most it mutes some of them.
I have had a rough couple of days, I hit a new low weight and immediately my head hunger took over and I tried to eat everything in sight. Well, I don't have to worry about that new low weight now. No, I didn't really gain, just excess fluid from jumping my sodium intake. But the point is there is a part of me that glories in my success wants to continue, and there is a part of me that is terrified of it and wants to go back to the old lifestyle.
Right now, I want to succeed, but the fear is that the greater the success the more terrible will be the tragedy of my eventual failure. Yes, I know this is not a productive thought process, but as we all know the band only works on your stomach, not your head.
Now, this is an obvious generalization, so please bear with me.
There are two types of people on this forum, Moms and Dads...And it has nothing to do with gender.
Moms are the empaths, sympathizing with the hurts and bruises of the people here, taking into account their feelings when they give their advice. Patting them on the back as they are bent over the toilet puking their guts out because they tried to test their band.
Dads are the authoritarians, telling people who ate a cheeseburger and fries on the way home from post-op "WTF did you do that for, are you stupid?" and "I was able to work my band, what the hell is wrong with you"?
The friction I see on the site comes many times from the Moms and Dads fighting over the best way to help the kids, when in reality, both types of advice and help are necessary for the people who come here. We need to stop beating each other up, and start realizing that we NEED both types of people. So, in the words of that great wise man Rodney King, "Why can't we all just get along"?
BTW, as I said at the start this is a generalization and the reality is not quite so clear, I personally relate more to the "Dads" on the board, but my heart also weeps for those who are struggling getting the band to work for them, especially when it has been so easy for me.
My wife and I have been quite open with our two daughters (9 and 12) about my lap band. Before surgery we walked them through what would happen, how it would affect my life and more than that why I was doing it. So as I have had to adjust to my new lifestyle, my daughters and wife have adjusted with me. But I didn't realize the extent of that adjustment until I heard these words come out of my 9 year old's mouth "Mom, you are chewing too fast, you need to slow down!" The look of shock on my wife's face was priceless
I went to my LB support group last and the subject was Plateaus and and one of the comments is that sometimes a plateau will turn into an avalanche of weight gain. Now there is absolutely no logic in the world to the thought process that say "I'm not loosing, so I will gain weight instead", yet, I totally, totally have done that, as have many of the others on this forum.
It is similar to the logic that we use that says, "I failed at one meal, so I might as well blow the whole day and eat like a pig". That is like saying, I made a mistake in my checkbook and I am 10.00 overdrawn, so I am might as well go out and buy a new TV!
I walked away from the support group with reminded that much of what we are doing in our journey revolves around our mind, rather than around our stomach....Now if only there was a band for our brain
BTW, I met a nice lady there who recognized me from the forums, but forgot to ask her user name.
I went for my 5th fill this morning, so today is liquids and tomorrow is mushies.
Normal for me is to pick up a quart of milk and a quart of OJ to supplement my shakes and get me through the day because I am so freaking hungry. Just got out of spin class and sat down at my desk and opened a shake and started reading the forum. Pretty soon half my shake was gone and I picked it up for another sip, and Mistress Band said "Sorry Bud, but you are done". Now, she didn't say it in a mean way, she didn't bring out the spiked heels, I just looked at the shake and thought to myself, ewwww! (And I love my shakes).
Interesting...
Cleaning our closets out finally got to me, so I went in to do mine, and it is only about a quarter full now. Got a nice NSV in the process as well. 2005 I hit the lowest weight of my adult life when I went from 324 to 249.8, I stayed there for a couple of weeks and then started gaining again. During the that time I bought a couple of nice sports shirts that I really loved, but haven't been able to wear since, and I ran across them while I was cleaning. On a lark I tried them on and they fit.
Now looking forward to the sale at Kohl's in a couple of days with a 20% off coupon in my hot little hand.
My body has a rule, when ever I have a cheat day, my body uses that as the new minimum for food intake.
Had a couple of slices of pizza last night, starving this morning even though I have eaten my normal breakfast
In a landscape of shades of brown and muted greens, this little gem stood out like a beacon. I sat and watched it the bees gathering pollen, but it wasn't until I zoomed in that I saw the others...
Because that is where I am spending my day. My daughter's middle school is having a Narnia celebration and I have volunteered to be a photographer. I think I will hide some jerky in my camera bag, I hope Aslan doesn't mind.
My daughter and I ready for a day in Narnia.
Moved to solid foods on Friday, not only have Mistress Band and I not been on the best of terms since then, my weight loss stopped.
This is why when we talk about calories in versus calories out, we always need to look at the big picture rather than the daily total. Once my body gets used to what I am feeding it, the loss will start up again. Until then I just need to concentrate on making sure that I am eating what and how much I am supposed to, getting my water and exercise in.
On the plus side, I had my first spin class yesterday and survived.
