anaxila

There is a tasty looking recipe here for bariatric mozzarella sticks: http://bariatricfoodie.blogspot.com/2011/02/wls-friendly-mozzarella-sticks.html?m=1 I just plugged it into My Fitness Pal, and it came out to the following or stick (each stick is 1/2 string cheese plus breading): Calories: 68 Fat: 3.3g Carbs: 2.8g Protein: 5.8g Let us know how they turn out if you try them. I've always been very curious! Good luck!

I was eating a lot of chicken taco meat (cook it at home and throw it in the blender with spicy salsa for a good kick), refried beans, Greek yogurt, and scrambled eggs.

I reward myself a lot! It was important to me to not just reward myself for losing pounds, but also for medical milestones like comorbidities beaten and achievements like a perfect workout week or running a 5k. When I made the decision to have surgery, I bought a Pandora bracelet for Essence collection charms, with the plan to add a charm to the bracelet each time I achieved a milestone or goal. The charms are all named after virtues or ideals such as ""Hope", "Optimism", Health", "Wellness", "Balance", "Joy", "Happiness", "Faith", "Stability", etc. so they each felt very meaningful to me. So far, I have earned 8 charms and I an't wait to get the next one!

I change mine up a LOT. My current schedule is a bit weird because I'm doing the Couch to 5k (C25K) training at the expected rate of 3x/week, but the training sessions lumped oddly together because I have classes and and other commitments on certain days that I don't want to give up. Before C25K, I was usually doing 60min cardio (15min each on bike, treadmill, rowing machine, and arc trainer) on those days. Anyway, here's what I currently do: Sun: 30min C25K and 45-60min strength training Mon: 30min C25K and 45-60min strength training Tue: 60min Water Pump class Wed: 60min with personal trainer (usually strength training) Thu: day off or 60 min cardio (15 min bike, 15min treadmill, 15min rowing, 15min arc trainer) Frid: 30min C25K and 45-60min strength training Sat: 60min Water Pump class plus 45-60min strength training I'm happy to share the details of the strength training sessions if anyone's interested.

I didn't lose a thing during my 6 months of nutritional counseling. I only started to lose weight during the 2-week countdown to surgery. My surgeon wants all of his patients to lose 5% of their body weight prior to surgery: in my case, 15 pounds. I managed to burn off 13 pounds in a last-ditch effort in the 2 weeks pre-op diet, and then they didn't even weigh me that day. D'oh! My nutritionist worked hard to motivate me, but at the end she shifted gears towards shoring up my resolve and plan for post-op rather than trying to get me to lose pre-op. The team told me repeatedly that there is absolutely zero relationship between pre-op weight loss and post-op success. The ability to lose weight during pre-op has no predictive value to how you will do post-op, according to the scientific literature. @@KarenLoh, I'd dig a little deeper into the psych eval that concluded you would have low projected ability to stick with the program post-op. Were there any suggestions on how to address that, or any particular areas of concern you can deal with or education elements you could correct? It seems like that might be fertile ground for further investigation. This is a great time to adjust your habits in small ways. Tackle one habit at a time, and take time to really nail it before moving on to the next one. My weakness is eating out, with particular risk of fast food drive-thru. I limited my stops to a certain number per week, then cut it lower and lower until it was gone. Same with Diet Coke (my kryptonite!). I switched to Diet Pepsi (blech!) to consume less diet soda right away, then limited it to certain times of the day, certain quantities overall, and then gone completely. Don't feel like you need to tackle every bad habit at the same time, or you will struggle like we all do with every other "cold turkey" approach to dieting. Good luck!

I have had that problem with other activity trackers and pedometers, but never the Fitbit. That's one of the reasons why I settled on it. The first one I tried actually added about 10,000 steps in 30 minutes, based on the vibration of my motorcycle! I am left-handed, so my non-dominant hand (the one they suggest you use), is also my throttle hand and the tracker couldn't tell the difference between arm-swinging/walking and throttling the motorcycle. Needless to say, that one went back to the store in a hurry!

@, I'm sorry you're in so much pain. Mine was pretty bad too. I'm always amazed by people here who claim they had no pain, took no painkillers, etc. That was not my experience at all. I took my liquid oxy pretty continuously for the first week, and only started cutting back on it when I started to get nervous about how much I was taking. (Drugs kind of scare me.) The pain didn't start to fade until week 2. I wish I'd had a recliner or something else to lie on, because getting in and out of bed was tough. As was drinking while in bed, as you've also noted. I also had some challenges with my incisions - one in particular opened up and did NOT want to heal. There was nothing to be done for it but time, and it was no fun at all. I prefer to sleep on my side or stomach, so that was also hard. It was at least a month before I could shift effortlessly in bed without having to be mindful of incisions, pain spots, etc. Having said all that... I still feel like I had a pretty easy time overall, and I would do it again in a heartbeat. I never had any complications that required treatment, never vomited, never dumped, etc. Once the pain starts to fade and the fat starts to melt away, you'll never look back again. You can do this!

@@starbuckscoffeegal, I'm so sorry that things are so rough for you. I've been there, and it's no fun at all. At my 4 week appointment, the nurse practitioner asked me "so how have your emotions been?" I am SO glad she asked, because they'd been all over the place but I wasn't planning to talk about it until she brought it up. I'd been massively up and down and weepy and elated, but mostly down and weepy. She told me that one of the things that fat cells store is estrogen, which is released into your system in great quantities when you lose weight quickly after surgery. This is the explanation for both my menstrual cycle craziness (one period lasted FOUR WEEKS), as well as my emotional roller coaster. It didn't make the feelings go away, but it certainly made me feel less crazy about it. Here's hoping the coming days are better than the last.

@@FinallyFit50s, When I first tried to switch to myfitnesspal, I went running in the other direction all "nope nope nope not for me". But I finally got lonely all by myself over on Lose It and tried again, and the second time it took. I think it was just different, because once I decided to switch I found myself completely loving it. Part of the reason why I love it is because it integrates so seamlessly with my Fitbit activity tracker and Aria scale, Water tracking app (Waterlogged), and couch to 5k training app (C25K Free). It connects everything to everything and never duplicates info. You can adjust your target calories - and target nutrients, target activity level, etc. - to whatever you want it to be. The only thing it WON'T do is automatically generate a post to your timeline (e.g., "anaxila completed her food and exercise diary for 3/29/2015", followed by a link to view my diary) if you take in fewer than 1000 calories. Everyone I'm friends with can still view my diary (something you can turn on or off), but it doesn't prompt them every day that I'm done and they can go look. It's an annoyance, and a relatively recent one that lots of bariatric users have been giving strong feedback about. I know some users make dummy calorie entries on their diaries (for example, adding "254 calories added to publish my log" under snacks), which is an option if the automatic feed entries are important to you. In my experience, this is the only drawback to the app and website.

I'm with @innwtitdtity. There may be a physical component to the hunger, but the way to master it is all in your head. It's important to fight this battle at this phase and win it, because it sets the stage for your next battle and the one after that. The next few weeks will really test your resolve at times, but you can do this! That said, I think it's okay to push the boundaries, but not go all the way into the next phase. One thing that helped me a lot was to strain the food out of some good Soups and just drink the highly flavored broth. For example, Progresso chicken & Herb Dumpling Soup - with the chicken and dumplings strained out - was just about the best thing ever and kept me from losing my mind while waiting for the next phase.

I used "loseit!" before "myfitnesspal" and really didn't want to switch at first. But everyone else was over on myfitnesspal and I wanted the community, so I made the switch. SO happy I did! The friends I've hooked up with there (mostly all from here!) are amazing and the support they give me on a daily and hourly basis is fantastic. I'm also amazed at how extensive their food library is. I have scanned the barcodes of some very obscure foods, and been shocked to find they are already in the database. I also love that I can enter any recipe at all, by hand or by URL, and it will give me detailed nutrition information based on the precise ingredients and quantities. There have been times when I thought an online recipe looked pretty good, but once I ran it through mfp I found either the fat, carbs, or sugar were out of line. That alone makes the app worth its weight in gold.

I second the posters above. Deeply unpleasant, but completely normal.

I had the same urge, but I took the full time off and devoted that energy to building a gym routine that would survive my return to work. I was very scared that the habit would fall away as soon as I had to start working all day every day (afraid I would be "too tired"). So I stayed away from work and focused on building my stamina. It worked perfectly to plan for me. I say if you have the time off / can afford it, TAKE IT.

I would ask your surgical team. Some require you to avoid the gym for at least several weeks. Mine didn't, so I started with the treadmill, recumbent bike, and arc trainer at 7 days post-surgery. I did 30 minutes the first day, and 60 minutes thereafter with no issues. It's critically important to avoid any lifting/pulling/pushing that exceeds your weight limit, though. As my nurse said - if you're using your core at all, STOP. So no rowing machine, no yoga, no pilates, no weights, no resistance training at all. I started back in with light (5# - 8#) weights at 4 weeks. Once I was cleared of everything at 6 weeks, I went back to weights, rowing machine, etc.

My nurse practitioner told me I could have a cup of coffee per day once I could routinely get in 100 oz of water per day. That was all the motivation I needed.

Has anyone here ever done the Warrior Dash? I've set a goal to do the one in my area on August 1st. It feels like an extremely ambitious goal, in that there's no way on earth I could do it today, and I'll need to train like the devil to make it. I like to set stretch goals, and this definitely qualifies. If you've done it before, what did you think? Did you use the App to train? If so, did it set your expectations appropriately? Any input would be most appreciated!

I have a Fitbit Aria scale too and I love it! No issues at all, perfectly matches the doctor, and very reliable.

Add me too please! abarr.wi@gmail.com

.

My fitness pal!

This is completely a scale-related victory, but I thought y'all would get a kick out of it anyway. I just noticed that as-of Tuesday, my actual weight is lower than the completely fictional weight I've had on my drivers license for the past 10 years. LOL.

First, definitely tell the truth at your psych eval. The things you described should not be barriers at all. The main point of the eval is to determine if you've really thought it through, understand what is expected of you for the long term, and have realistic expectations. Nothing to Rory about. I did take FMLA leave for most of my time off. I work for a large company so they have good processes and routines and not a lot of guesswork on my part. Sorry if that's not the case got you.

Not sure if you're still looking for an answer on this, but just in case or if others have the same question... Iron supplements are weird. There are lots of different ways that iron can be made into supplements, and they each have varying amounts of "elemental iron". I learned this earn my team told me to start taking x quantity on iron, and like you that would have had me raking massive doses. So seek clarification from your team and read the package of the supplement you buy and make sure they match up. Here's some info from NIH if you're curious: http://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/Iron-HealthProfessional/ "Frequently used forms of iron in supplements include ferrous and ferric iron salts, such as ferrous sulfate, ferrous gluconate, ferric citrate, and ferric sulfate... The different forms of iron in supplements contain varying amounts of elemental iron. For example, ferrous fumarate is 33% elemental iron by weight, whereas ferrous sulfate is 20% and ferrous gluconate is 12% elemental iron [18]. Fortunately, elemental iron is listed in the Supplement Facts panel, so consumers do not need to calculate the amount of iron supplied by various forms of iron supplements."

Here's a big one for me. I'm on the plane, about to take off for my first post-surgery international flight... and I fit! Not only do I NOT need a seat belt extension, I actually have 6" of seat belt to spare! I just checked the tray table, and it folded all the way down, also with room to spare. It didn't just fold partway down and then run into my belly long before it was flat. This is a banner day!!

I was at the gym 5 days the week after surgery. It was very light cardio, but it was a full 60 minutes and felt great. Good luck!