brown eyed gal

@@brown eyed gal ... it took a while before they arrived here, too. And we are about as rural as it gets.
EDIT ... P.S. Also look for "Cafe Steamers" which are even lower calorie than the "Fit Kitchen" branded stuff. FYI, we shop mostly at Walmart for groceries. Of course, there's always Aldi's and local farmers' markets for fruits/veggies.

Just saw the commercial about the fit kitchen meals, hope I can find them in my rural area!

Below is Friday's menu, which was very typical of what I eat now that I'm 20.5 months post-op. (Yesterday was date night and not a typical menu.) Anyway ... Friday:
Breakfast:
* GNC Lean shake 25 (Swiss chocolate)
* Homemade skinny latte: 1/2 cup skim milk, 1/2 cup Starbucks espresso roast, 1 envelope Turbinado raw sugar
Morning snack:
* Doctor Kracker three seed cracker
* 1 ounce sharp cheddar cheese
* 2 tablespoons Smuckers sugar-free strawberry jam
Lunch:
* Ham and cheese sandwich: Oscar Mayer Black Forest ham (5 slices); 1 ounce sharp cheddar cheese; 2 tablespoons Hellman's Lite Mayo; 1 medium sliced tomato; 2 leaves of Romaine lettuce
* 1/2 cup petite carrots
Afternoon snack:
* Starbucks coffee - 6 ounces
* 1 tablespoon half and half
* 1 Specially Selected (Aldi's) salted caramel biscotti
Cocktail Hour:
* 1.5 ounces single malt scotch (was Aultmore that day)
Dinner:
* Stouffer's Fit Kitchen Steak Fajita (first time I'd tried one of these; not bad!)
* 2 cups Romaine lettuce hearts
* 1 tablespoon Litehouse chunky blue cheese dressing
After Dinner:
* Caltrate chewable (chocolate truffle)
* Dannon Oikos vanilla greek yogurt
* 2 small squares of Lindt dark chocolate with sea salt
Macronutrient Totals:
Calories - 1,700
Carb grams - 174
Fat grams - 64
Protein grams - 101
Sugars - 72
Fiber grams - 26 (minimums for women are 21-25)

I remember I didn't have time to stress eat before because I would have my planned meal and then go straight out for my walk or run. So now that is what I am doing, filling my time with activities. Yesterday was A 3 mile hike and a 6 mile bike ride and today so far I ran 2 miles during my lunch break. (some one brought macaroons in to work though.....ugh I miss the days of food not even looking good. sign one choice at a time. I made a choice to eat a macaroon but I also made the choice to go run 2 miles. smiles.

I'm a fairly private person. My family and close friends (very few by the way) know, but I don't have a large family and don't see them often. I live in a very small town so I'm sure it's gotten around although I don't socialize much and keep to my self. If it's someone I don't know well that comments about my weight, I just say thank you. If it's another over weight person or acquaintance from back when our kids were in school, I may go ahead and tell them that I had surgery.
I do have to admit though at 18 months out, I'm not near as gun shy to talk about it. I'm not one of those BIG success stories either though. I am happy about what I have lost though!

Well the lowest I got was around 162, unfortunately I'm at 172 now. Gotta Gotta get back on track. We've been purging our house of 18 years to live in a camper for 4 months while they build us a new house. Stressful!! We are settled in our camper now and not much stuff to do in there, so hopefully I'll get back on track with exercising and quit the stress eating!

Well...I have gained 5 pounds. I'm at 170 now. Kinda discouraging when I see how well everyone else has done. I can eat almost anything without trouble, which is not a good thing. Just yesterday, I refocused and with warmer weather I can start walking outside again! Pepsi....my nemesis! Started out occasionally as a treat and then moved up to several times a week. NO MORE! Got to remember how much I've paid financially and emotionally for this!

I have to take it for life. I also have Barrett's Esophagus, and even after RNY in October, I have some reflux. I had another scope done a few weeks ago to check things (all ok) and then also had an upper GI with a small bowel follow through last week. (all ok) He did say I have a small hiatal hernia, which is probably causing the reflux. What I don't understand is why I have the hernia still. I had one before surgery, but I would have thought that would have been repaired while doing the RNY. A question I have for the surgeon at my next check up!

Walked 10 miles today with a little bit of running in there!

[oh!! I've never heard of this!! I am going to try it.
Thanks!!
quote name=Shadow427" post="4053978" timestamp="1453041192]
Good morning. Reporting in. Just finished 2 weeks of the 3 Protein shakes, 2 Protein bars and 1 meal of protein and veg a day. Down 8 pounds and back to my lowest weight since surgery.... Hopefully this will jump start that plateau I've been on since Aug

A little over 7 months and you can see my ticker. I forget sometimes! I'm a slower loser but content!

Well my tush fell to my thighs! Lol! I'm stuck at 165 but have to be honest, haven't been being perfect everyday. And honestly if it wasn't for my big belly (where I'm sure the 25 more I need to lose is) I'm satisfied at being a size 12ish. Don't need to be a tiny hiny.

Ok so today I have officially lost half ot my starting weight, I started at 225, now weigh 112.4 holy cow, there used to be two of me.

Do your hot flashes happen after you eat? I get hot flashes from sugar. If I eat something that has too much sugar, it's like I imagine menopause to be. I get sweaty, my heart beats fast, and I get super hot. 20 minutes later, I'm back to normal. Also, weirdly enough around midnight everynight I get hot for about a half hour, then go back to normal.

Dumping for me is high fat or high sugar.
Fat: burping, uncomfortable, slight nausea but not enough to actually get sick, feeling tired, have to sit down because I am out of sorts.
Sugar: Sweating , elevated heart rate, exhaustion, have to lie down. Sometimes I even fall asleep for 10 - 20 minutes because the exhaustion is that overwhelming. It doesn't take much to reach that. Eating one banana too fast by itself can do it for me. I'm a half a banana girl!
Desert for me is: one single bite after food. Or I'l have to lie down after. NOT very convenient most of the time. In other words, I can eat more desert, if I'm prepared to waste an hour recovering after - NOT GOOD! It feels horrible. The other day, I had 1/2 a cupcake and I think the frosting was too rich and sweet. I had a hot flash within 5 minutes, my face was on fire and I could feel my neck getting wet. Then, my temples started to drip. I had to leave the party because I felt like I was going to have a heart attack. SOOOOO uncomfortable and so not worth it.

@@brown eyed gal
I have only had to lay down twice and only once was a on the floor lord help situation. But yes any of those symptoms can be considered dumping. And yes I am told we can change many times......but no matter if we can tolerate sugar, I know for me it is an addiction and I can not go back to normal sweets or I will have a problem. I know I needed this surgery for a reason and many people in my support group go to OA. Most people who have this surgery have some type of a bad relationship with food. If we don't do something to address it, we can slip back. That is my reason for feeling so strong about sugar and carbs. I did not do this intestinal rearranging to just slip back and let the food creep back in. I LOVE life too much to let the junk control it.
off my soap box now :-D
I am so glad I have you gladiators!! Thank you all for sharing your stories.

@@brown eyed gal--That must be your body's way of dealing with what it doesn't like.
I told my mom today (who was also at the meeting) it's a nice reminder for me to not eat crap.....

With our new tummies and insides things hit us stronger and often will drop faster. I know if I even have me BIG TREAT of a Fiber one Brownie (8g sugar) and I eat it too fast I get sick. I only have them if I have had a large amount of Protein first to help carry the sugars in my body. I know my body does not NEED it for nutrition so I try to only have them once in a blue moon and now that I have found Quest I stick to those more. But even eating the Fiber one to fast can make me sick.
It has been 8 months and I am still having to drill in to my brain to only eat for nutrition as much as possible. The mental part of the journey is so hard!!

It can for some people. Ideally, artificial sweeteners don't raise your blood sugar (and then plummet, the cause of the lightheadedness). But some low-carbers have found that certain ones do bother them. Granular splenda in small amounts doesn't seem to do that to me, but if I use the sugar-free coffee syrups like Torani, it seems to. Maybe just b/c quicker absorption?
2 Tbsp of Splenda does seem like a lot to me in a 16 oz drink - have you tried using less?
One of my favorite new (to me) artificial sweeteners is Swerve, which is erythritol. I also like xylitol but don't like having it in the house b/c it's very unsafe for dogs (drops their blood sugar)
YMMV

Gladiators, we definitely have to curtail the sweets. In my case, after I eat sugars, infeel crappy, and then sometimes a couple of hours later is when my bld sugar will drop I get shakey, sweaty, incoherent, weak.. very frightening. So, by sharing our stories.. it really does help the group.

Dumping does not necessarily mean all the symptoms it can just be the crappy feeling like high blood sugar. But I want to pass the warning to you that was passed to me, I have been warned by many many many post-ops 2-15 years out, to not go back to the sugar foods at all. I take Quest bars with me to parties and events I know will have cake or other yummies then I eat it at the same time as every one else. Today it is brownies and lemon bars at work, I have an emergency Quest bar, but I know if I eat it once then I know I will want it again and then the problem begins. I know we are all different, I just wanted to pass what I felt was wise advice. Keep up the hard work Gladiators!!

I needed to hear this!Thank you for sharing.

A little over 7 months and you can see my ticker. I forget sometimes! I'm a slower loser but content!

I tried on bathing suits today. I tried on a few bikinis knowing there is no way in heck I would be seen in them in public with the sad state my tummy is in. I snapped the picture on the right to send to my Husband as a desperate plea for a Tummy Tuck ASAP (he's anti-plastic surgery and loves my body the way it is.) I left the store feeling sad that although most of my body has snapped back after my almost 95 pound weight-loss, my stomach still frowns at me. I feel trapped in a fat suit most days.
Something made me search for the pic that led me to get WLS in the first place. A picture of me at my heaviest (245 pounds) in a bathing suit on a zip line on vacation.
Im still critical of my body but it helped to remind myself where I started. For those of you just getting started, take plenty of pictures to remind you where you started.
Now to save up for that tummy tuck!
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I haven't been using my CPAP every night and I sure would like to get rid of it but I don't want to go through the sleep study again! I have two insurance polices but the deductibles have both risen so much that I'm paying out the wazoo for that machine. Glad your blood work is good and they dropped your thyroid. I had blood drawn yesterday and go back next Friday for checkup. My weight loss has slowed way down so I'm trying to get stick again, I can eat most things just not a lot of it! We've had so much rain, I haven't walked outside in forever, I hate to use my treadmill....