buchannon

I've always loved a little kick to my eats, but about a year post-op it hit me that I ONLY desire to eat foods which are spicy. Mexican, Thai food, and everything in between! Last time I had pizza it was pepperoni with jalapenos, I then showed it in red peppers, then even put sriracha on it! Any one else feel an affinity for spicy food post-op? I wonder why this is.. (definitely not pregnant)

Should be all in my tracker in my signature, but I bounced between 200-300 lbs my whole life.

Actually, I play for the other team. But yes, the new found attention from the fellas is pretty nice! One more "before" picture that a friend just dug up, wow! (mmm margaritas though)

Wow this makes me feel like an alcoholic! I have a couple drinks a day and feel great with it (usually whiskey but I'm not too picky). I can drink beer (especially lighter stuff like bud and PBR) but it takes me forever to suck down an IPA now, which is my favorite.

Yep, Colorado is nice. I'm downtown / capitol hill area here. Get ready for the winter! One of my only two complaints about doing this is being cold all the time (the other is for it to be hard to drink beer)!

Thanks all for the compliments! I have always been into cardio, but recently started swimming. I think this does a good job of general toning. You can't really tell from the pictures, but I do have looser skin and such still. Not everything (anything) on there is hard.

Wow, I can't believe it's already been a year!! What a life changing event! I would recommend what I did to anyone in the same situation as I was 100% (has problems with portion control but still relatively active). I no longer live to eat and for the first time in my life I feel comfortable with myself and how I look. I stopped weighing every week as I've maintained a 180lbs for the last handful of months straight. Shameless shirtless pic included:

This --^

I had to move this weekend and found this. I was weighing once a week to keep up with my progress. My actual surgery was in December so the beginning is a little misleading.

I realize I have changed as well after losing weight. It'd be hard (impossible) not to. It's like this whole new world has opened up to me and I want to experience it rather than try to be the same person I was. Yes, because no compliments were given before. I see it like I just inherited a big lump of money and everyone knows and is acting differently around me. Not necessarily a bad thing, but just curious how things change.

I've lost a ton of weight. Everyone tells me I look like a completely different person. I feel happy and I think a lot of "being treated differently by people" has to do with my attitude and not completely with my looks. However.... I find it mildly depressing how different the world has become just because I'm not a fatass any more. Acquaintances I haven't seen or heard from in years are suddenly talking to me again. People I have never talked to at work are friendly and make the initiative to converse with me. I'm not complaining, I just find it.... a tad sad I guess. Any one else experience this?

Yeah pretty slowly now, but still losing some. I originally wanted to get to 170, but I just got under 190 and am feeling pretty good where I'm at. We'll see what happens...

I eat a couple Protein bars every day. I'm not sure what else I'd eat if I didn't have them... lol I usually go to Sam's Club and stock up on a couple different types. The lady asked "how's business going" last time I was there with 4 huge boxes of different protein bars.

What kellyw74 said, get on a PPI. I originally thought I wasn't going to need one, then just tried what my doc gave me (Protonix 1x a day) and now I feel awful when I don't take it. It helps curve appetite (could be in my head) and makes me have 0 acid issues. I recently forget them on a weekend trip and was suffering pretty badly. You never know how much you need something until it's gone, eh? Thank god for tums...

It's hard to find a good metric to decide what you "should" weigh. I'm at the point where I feel like I'm living/eating healthfully and I'm just going to see where I level out at.