Miss Mac

They will even stay on in the shower.

In my exercise DVD collection (which includes everything from bedfast to Zumba) my favorites are: 1. Leslie Sansone's Walk Your Belly Flat. This one is my "go to" when walking is all I have energy for. It has three 1 mile increments for walking in the house. I try to walk one mile in house every morning even if I am not able to do other exercises later in the day. Sometimes I have to use my walker to keep going, but I am determined to get in at least one 12 minute mile. 2. Joel Harper's Firming After 50. It is a complete upper and lower body workout (with a bonus section on ab work)without equipment. Joel does the advanced level, his 30-ish assistant does the normal version, and his mother does an adjusted version. I follow along with his mother. 3. Boomers Workout with Sunshine (doesn't give her real name). This is upper and lower body strength training using hand held barbells. She also has one with resistance bands. On alternate days when I am not doing strength training, I may pull out Sweating to the Oldies, Hula Abs and Buns, or Hip Hop Abs (I look ridiculous, but laughter is the best medicine, right?

Be patient for sure. I am 5 1/2 weeks out and in a stall, but I am keeping up with my weight training and exercise. My hope is that my body is in a muscle exchange, then loss will kick in eventually. Exasperating - yes. Uncommon - no.

Oh, man......I have almost 40 exercise DVD's to eliminate boredom with my exercise. Pilates for Wimps was difficult enough, but I saw Belly Dance Pilates on sale on Amazon, so I bought it, thinking it might be more fun.. Today is the first day I tried, and only got through 15 minutes of it. Gotta tell ya, I am exhausted! This was harder than my every-other-day weight training. Maybe it will be more fun in another 30 pounds or so. Right now, my belly almost dances by itself when I walk.....and my butt still looks like two twerking cats in a sack! Rant over.

Here is a mental trick that I use to handle cravings for the unhealthy foods that got me in this place. My former favorite drive-throughs are now: McPoisons, Poison King, Poison Castle, Wendy's Poison Palace, Poison Hut, etc......Looney, but it helps. As for Pasta, bread, cake, etc., I just can't. It doesn't influence my thinking like it used to. When I get a craving for that kind of stuff, I just go do some exercise. (That means some days I exercise a lot). I was more depressed about my disabilities caused by my weight, than I will ever be about these adjustments I have to make to get healthy.

If there is an ATI Therapy near you, it wouldn't hurt to ask if they could waive the co-pay. When I fell and tore 3 of the 4 tendons in my rotator cuff (and had to have subsequent surgery and therapy), my pain was high and my funds were low. Three sessions a week would have cost me $300 a month I did not have. ATI waived my co-pays so that I could get treatment. They are making hundreds of dollars off of each session from the insurance companies, anyway. When I had to have therapy post-stroke, they even provided transportation, and charged the insurance for that, too.

See if you can get a referral to a pain clinic. If what you have is indeed sciatica, there is relief available for you - don't be a pain martyr and be suffering. My pain doctor is an anesthesiologist at my hospital. The spinal epidural shots every 3-4 months have helped me put off spinal fusion in my lower back for years. I finally had to give in and get a three level fusion in my neck last year. The steroid in the epidural bathes raw nerve endings in liquid comfort, which makes a difference in my quality of life. The last one I had was September 7, and my sleeve date was 12/23. I have lost 40 pounds so far, and I think it already has made a difference for me. I also have femoral nerve pain, which the spinal epidural relieves. There is not so much belly pressing on the femoral nerve, so it has quieted down. So, who needs to be in pain when they don't have to be? I used to not believe so much in medication, but now that I am older and more things ache, I think of it as better living through chemistry!

While you are waiting on a prescription, drink cranberry juice. Also, Walgreens has cranberry tablets that are fairly small to swallow. Cranberries have a chemical that creates a Teflon-like coating on the urinary tract so that bacteria can't stick around. Some studies say it's true, some not so much.....but the last two times I got a UTI after surgery, my primary doctor has prescribed Metronidazole, cranberry tablets, and cranberry juice. Provides relief for me.

Same here.....even though I have dropped over 40 pounds now, I feel like I have gone from a giant blob to a pencil with a tractor tire around the middle. It's just sheer grit and gumption that keeps me going. I am really pushing the exercise, and I must say that I am sleeping a lot better. But the mirror - I just want to drape it in black cloth and wait until summer to look at it again.

That's what I am doing with my adjustment process, too......embracing the gray.

No regrets.....textbook recovery.....age 62, lost 42 pounds so far, arthritis doesn't bother me so much, walking better than I have in ten years, have enough energy for strength training now, overall feeling better in many ways. Even overall inflammation has backed off.

I am in week five now and took a preemptive strike against hair loss. When I saw Rita Moreno's hair at the 2014 SAG Awards, I knew that would be the cut for me. It is a multi-layered chop cut, so hair falling out and growing in at an unpredictable rate might not look as funky as it would if I do nothing. My hair dresser who did the cut agreed that it would be suitable for this purpose, and she has done the same or similar cut for many cancer survivors. Since my hair has always been bountifully thick, I am hoping for the best. Worst case scenario - I will buy a wig for going out of the house.

Same as Blondiee, my program used the starting weight for submission. Now that I am out of the liquid diet and post-op, my Nutritionist advised me to hold the Protein shakes to one a day and try to get the rest of my protein from real food. Once you consume your protein first at each meal, there is little, if no room left for anything else. Fair warning........When you consume Protein Shakes and are eating less Fiber from fruits and veggies, take preventative measures against constipation. Good luck with your program.

WendyT, you will learn so much during the pre-op nutrition phase of your journey. The biggest take-a-way for me was portion control. Portions were a whole lot smaller than I thought. My eyes were bigger than my stomach. Now, my eyes really are bigger than my stomach. Welcome to the forum.

Yesterday I had the WonderSlim Cran-Grape for the first time, which I made in sugar free cranberry juice. Not so bad, and better than some other combinations I have had.

Dude, Congratulations......awesome job!

Two nights in the hospital - no drain.

Started full liquids and purees on day 3, soft foods day 10, solid foods day 21. It is crazy how all of our instructions are so different.

Mine sounds like a dragon fight. The worst was when I tried to eat cauliflower.

Sounds like Iburtie4 is getting her groove back!

At 4 1/2 weeks out, my surgeon has moved me to the solid food phase. The printed materials that I have say 800-1200 calories. That is an awfully wide range. In the past, I could not lose weight on 1,000 calories no matter what, because of medical issues that made me sedentary. Even though I am allowed to test solid foods, I really am in no hurry. I had some steak the other day and could eat so little of it (because of capacity), it was hardly worth the cooking of it. dinner today will probably be beef stew made with ground round instead of stew meat. It is curious how we all manage this process so differently. At 40 pounds down now, I feel better and can do exercises and strength training. So, with all that and limiting myself to 800 calories, I have broken through a stall and am on the way down again. Losing this weight is a freaking lot of work - even with my new tummy. Others might be able to eat more and still lose, but I know where my limits are, now. I agree that since your surgeon and your NUT seem to be on different planets, you need to speak up and ask for one plan to follow. Wishing you good luck and good health.

I am so glad you are here to take this journey with us. I lost my mother to AAA in 1993. She was 5'2" and weighed 320 pounds. The WLS resources that we have now were not available to her then. You are truly a survivor and can use that gift to encourage others along.

Would ya look at those legs????? Congratulations!

I have been doing walking all along, but did not start strength training until week four post-op, with a limit of five-pound weights.

Everyone's journey is so different, starting with your bariatric team's requirements, but some things stay the same......the Dreaded Week Three Stall, for one. My surgeon said he had never heard of it.....so guess what? It hit me right in the middle of week three. You have already found many nuggets of advice and fair warning here, so visit us often and let us know how you are doing. It won't be long before you can help someone following in your footsteps.