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Jack-Sweets make me feel bad,too! But-I don't have freaked out brownie dreams! What's in that water your drinking, anyways? At lunch today, I looked around and so many people were eating all of this high fat/high carb stuff. You know what I did? I looked at everyone and noticed that MANY people are overweight. Strange, I have ALWAYS felt like the fattest person in a room. Today, I didn't-I wasn't. I ate a side salad at Wendy's(I couldn't even eat all of it). I felt proud of myself and I didn't get down on myself for eating unhealthy. Hey, NSV- DH said that I was looking skinny, today! AND a lady that works in the dressing room at Wal-mart told me that I was pretty. No one has told me that in a long time! You know, I felt skinny and pretty today. Sure, I have a long way to go but I feel good about myself today.

Now I have a NSV myself. . .got into my hubbies truck to go with him and guess what? The seatbelt fit!!! It really fit, with space! I have never been able to put the seatbelt on, and used to just hold it in place to look as if it was on, but it fit all, it really did!!!!!! woot woot

Awesome NSV!

great job! great NSV about the seat belt too. I have to take a 5 hour plane ride in May, I am so hoping the seat fits, not squeezingly tight like before. we shall see.

That is a GREAT nsv apple!! Good for you! Kelly

Luck girl here, no weight needed on DL My most recent NSV is going from size 24-26 jeans to 18 dress pants 20 jeans. Love making a pile to get rid of clothes, also makes me nervous!lol

I am not sure how to detail this but looking back I remember how difficult it was to get down on to the floor and tons worse to get back up again, without rolling on to my knees and struggling to get up. My knees would be hurting, my back would be killing me and I hated it and it was embarassing. OK that said here is my NSV~ Last Thursday I was running a group at my work. A patient had a seizure and I had to run over and help hold him into place on his chair so he would not fall on to the floor and hurt himself. Then we had to lower him to the floor and I sat on the ground next to him to reassure him and to check on him while help arrived. I had to hop up undo the straps on the gurney and then grab the backboard, get back down on to the ground, help load him on the backboard and help lift him on to the gurney itself and Strap him him down on the gurney for safety and then he was taken away. When it was all over I realized I was hopping and kneeling and lifting and all of this and I never gave it a second thought!! I never hurt, I never struggled to get up or down or lift him or anything. I was a bit sore the next day, but just in my lower back but dang that was it and it was just a twinge if I paid attention to it. I NEVER could have done all that before surgery. It was amazing to realize I could do that and be fine. I never gave any of this a second thought until later in the day, but then it hit me and I am shocked and so excited over something so small.. How far and how fast things have changed for me.. I love this new me! I am strong and powerful and capable, what beats that?

NSV means something you consider to be a victory that's not coming from the numbers on a scale. Things like compliments, getting into smaller clothes, easier mobility, getting off meds, etc. They're related to your weightloss in a broad sense. SV would be something directly related to what your scale says, more like reaching a goal weight or weightloss milestone, or finally crossing out of the 200s and into the 100s.

Since you are handing out definitions.... I know what a NSV is I just dont know what is stand for....if that makes sense

Well, another weekend has come and gone and I am back to work this AM. Had a successful weekend with very few slip ups. I had a NSV moment this weekend..We had some dead spots in our yard so we had dug them up and were re-sodding..well, I was carrying the 40 pound bags of new dirt and throwing the squares of sod while my husband "watched". I asked if he was going to help - he laughed and told me that I was in better shape than he was, so he would just "let me" get my exercise in for the day..Hehe, As tired as I was - not to mention dirty - I kept on with the bags and the sod until the job was done. I acutally amazed myself in the fact that I was not short of breath and did not really get overly tired and no soreness. Now, you to have to know I live in Florida and it was 97 degrees and humid - Hot my friends..A year and 100 pounds ago - none of this would have been remotely possible. But I guess I am in pretty good shape to have done this job. As I sit and look at my tiny plate, with my tiny amount of food (all the time really wanting a pizza followed by some ice cream) I reflect back on this weekend and realize that I have come a long way. I am not only smaller, I am healthier and stronger than I was one year ago. Yep, I still have about 40 pounds more to go (the weight of one bag of dirt - which I thought was HEAVY) so I trudge on..Moving foward, not wanting to go back to the old fat me. I am thankful for the surgery and my weight loss...even if I never reach my goal weight - hey, there is still 100 pounds less of me today and that in itself is a "GOLD MEDAL" performance - if I do say so myself. So, next time you feel down, feeling left out or short changed - go find an old picture of yourself (a fat one) and think back at just how "wonderful life was" when you were heavier - huffing and puffing your way through life, with sore knees, bad ankles and who knows what going on in your insides. Hang in there bandster peeps - we are in this boat together and we will succeed one way or the other. This Saturday I am doing my 5th 5K - this one is up and down the ramps of the Jaguars (NFL) football stadium. It is called the "Stadium Challenge" and it is a tough one. I did it last year and I am crazy enough to do it again. Been working hard on my training. Keep your fingers crossed for me that I make it through such a demanding 5K. Maybe that dirt and sod "training" will come in handy.....I bet my husband will take credit for that one ! Until next time - have a great week and stay true to yourself ! Melinda in Florida

I beg your indulgence because this post is pretty long, but I got all reflective when I started writing. I have lost 60lbs exactly since surgery, so that's been 10lbs a month on average. I am very happy about that. That is what I had hoped for, so I can't complain! I can't believe that I'm so close to my goal, when a year ago I felt so far away from it. If I lose only 1lb a week until my 1 year bandversary, I will be at my original goal of 160lbs! That's a very exciting thought. I would have expected that by now I would have felt decent restriction. I am still trying to find it! While I credit some of the weight loss to my band, I feel that much of it has been on my part because I do Atkins low carb. Since I can still eat pretty decent size quantities, I've had to rely on my carb restriction and exercise to get the weight off. But maybe I don't give enough credit to the band, but then again, I rarely feel its presence. I don't really think about the band that much, and I just live my day to day life like everyone else. I am at my lowest weight ever, I'm in the best shape I've ever been in, and I feel amazing! It's interesting, because major weight loss is a very personal journey. A personal journey that is a very public one as well. There's no way to hide it. My friends and family have watched me shed over 100lbs in the last year and I have had tremendous support from them, for which I am grateful. Sometimes, however, they think they understand what I'm going through because they can see the change, but they don't really understand. For almost my entire life, people looked at me and saw an extremely overweight person. I never noticed the stares (which I'm sure I got), but I didn't care. I still feel like a extremely overweight person, even though I'm not. I think people still look at me the same way, but they don't. I look around a room now and I can see that I'm not the biggest one there anymore. I know I look different, but I still feel like the same person... because I am and I'm not. I am still my bubbly self, my personality hasn't changed but my body has. By no means am I skinny, because I still have weight to lose. So I guess that puts me in the category of the everyday overweight person? It is weird to think that I'm just another one of those "normal" looking people (so I've been told). And you know what? It's not so exciting. Not that losing weight, and having NSVs like being able to fit into smaller clothes and not worrying about the seatbelt on the plane fitting aren't exciting, because they are extremely exciting and they are what keep me going! What I mean, though, is that a regular sized person doesn't have a better life. And I knew this was true even before I lost my weight. I saw (and still see) many of my friends who aren't happy, and they're skinny, so it's obviously not possible that being thin automatically makes you happy. I had to learn that happiness and self worth was independent from the way I looked and how much I weighed. I think accepting myself and my body when I was overweight has made this journey that much easier. My happiness is not dependent on the number on the scale (but believe me, seeing a lower number when I step on the scalemakes me extremely happy!) To put it in an extremely cliche way (and I do beg your forgiveness, but really, it's true!), I think that the journey itself and the things I've learned about myself on this journey are more important then the actual goal itself. I never saw myself as the extremely self-motivated person, but I have come to realize that I wouldn't be where I am today if I wasn't. In conjunction with that, I've learned to be patient and to persevere. When I started this journey, Being under 200lbs seemed ages away and being from the generation of immediate gratification didn't help much. But there wasn't a chance that I was going to magically drop 100lbs overnight (even though tv ads guarantee it!), so I had no choice BUT to be patient. Sometimes I feel like I'll never get there, but then I have to remind myself about the strides I have made. I get immense satisfaction from seeing how far I've come in such short period of time. From walking at 3mph on the treadmill to walking at 4mph. From being totally out of breath, feeling like I'm going to die after 30 seconds of jogging on 3.5mph to running on 5mph for 5 min. knowing that if i really wanted to, I could go for longer. It's those small things that make up the journey that mean the most. Yeah, so those are my thoughts as of late. Thank you for allowing me to share my thoughts and feelings with you. I appreciate the opportunity to do so and I look forward to reading about your experiences and thoughts about your journey. Thank you to those who read my whole post, and if you didn't, I don't blame you!

In the almost 18 months that i've been banded I've had a few NSV's already. 1. Fitting comfortably on an airplane seat w/o having to use a seat belt extender last summer when I went to Florida 2. Going from size 26/28 (busting out of them) to wearing a size 20 in pants and size 14 in shirts 3. Getting complimented. I've had complete strangers where I work approach me and tell me I've inspired them to lose weight. 4. Constantly being happy!!! This is a major one. i am a very happy person nowadays 5. I was in a wedding last month and I wasn't the "fat one". As a matter of fact my dress I ordered was a size 16W and it had to be taken in on top quite a bit! 6. Taking 5 mile walks with my boyfriend and dog on a regular basis Next month I am looking forward to going to an amusement park and fitting on the seats comfortably. I went to disney last summer and was able to fit on those rides comfortably but this will be the 1st time I'm going to a park with a bunch of thrill rides and some of those rides are old rides and aren't as "large person" friendly.

LOL! great NSV!

Awesome! Congrats that is such a great NSV!

The scale has never been my friend and weight loss surgery hasn’t helped our relationship. When I diet, I tend to weigh every day, perhaps multiple times during the day (a mid-afternoon weighing will have to take into account being fully clothed and if I ate recently or if I just drank a lot of liquid). When I am not dieting, the scale sits there, neglected and collecting dust. Since we arrived back home on Friday (five short days ago), I have probably weighed 12-13 times. Yes, that’s averaging over two times per day. This is not a healthy behavior. Here’s what happened yesterday…I weighed in the morning and the scale said I “only” lost a half of a pound since the morning before. I think a normal person would log that and move on. Not, me and probably not many obese or formally obese people. I thought about that measly little number and wondered what was wrong with me the entire day. Why didn’t I lose more? I calculated my total weight loss. I calculated my loss since surgery. I calculated my loss since Friday. Over and over and over again all day long. Then I had a mid-afternoon weigh-in, subtracted for clothing and it was about the same and still feeling disgruntled. Why do I do this to myself? It makes no sense. I get hung up on the numbers that the stupid scale says – I relinquish all power to that stupid scale. When you look at it in reality, there is no possible way I am not losing weight. I am only taking in about 500 calories per day. My body right now (without exercising) burns at least 2000 calories daily. There are about 3500 calories in a pound. That calorie deficit adds up quickly, especially once you add in a walk here or there or start incorporating exercise. So why do I care so much about what that evil, bathroom-dwelling scale says? How can it have so much power over me? We need to Celebrate our non-scale victories (NSV’s). These are those little wins you get that are not necessarily related to the scale. Just in the past couple of days, I have had some. I tightened my FitBit Flex up by one notch (this means my wrist is smaller today than it was a few weeks ago when I got it). I tried on my winter coat last night and it fit. A few weeks ago, it was uncomfortable to zip up with just a t-shirt on, so I only used the Velcro fasteners to give me more room. Last night, not only could I zip it, I could have probably worn a sweatshirt and it would have still been comfortable. So, what am I going to do about it? I’m going to have my husband hide the scale. It will come out once per week on Thursday’s for a weekly weigh-in, then back in hiding it goes. As for my brain…I’m not sure the hubs can hide that. Do you do this to? How often do you weigh?

: ) nsv

So at the gym I had a couple really amazing moments. First I weighed in out of ritual and found out I'm down a couple more pounds and I'm now 167. Woohoo! Which made me excited to work out even harder. Did a full 5k distance in a little under 29 minutes on the elliptical followed by half an hour of circuit training where I upped all my max weights. I was pretty pumped by this point so I hopped back on the elliptical to do my fastest mile ever, 8.30 flat! Added one more mile to make it an even 5 and then off to the massage chairs. I love days like today!!

I do get on the scale - every morning – I can’t help myself. But you are correct - those NSV's are the best. They are what really tell the story! Needing smaller sized clothing, fitting comfortably in a charge or airplane seat…. You can’t beat that!

I did "ok". I ate some crackers w/brie. Potato's. I fell down with dessert... I ate a piece of cake with pineapple, sf vanilla and coolwhip. The important thing is I didn't eat any candy! That was a major NSV .... We'll see tomorrow when I get on the scale..

Awesome, seeing a stranger where a neighbor was, is exciting unless they call the cops, haha! great NSV.. Karen

30 days out and total loss are 22 pounds I lost them all in the first two weeks then stalling since then and even gained 4 pounds. I lost 26 pounds but not after this 4 pounds gain, total loss is 22 lbs. it is impossible that these 4 pounds are FAT! they must be water. I lost my appetite again and I don't feel that hungry. I really eat very little. since two days I was very hungry at dinner, I ate tuna tiny pieces in a small plate then I vomitted all. simply I can't eat much. I try to get my calories from protein. I am sure I am not getting enough but that is the best I can do. I thank god I can tolerate soft poached eggs very well and I love yoghurt. it passes very smoothly. I can also drink milk. I can eat like 2 eggs and one yoghurt a day. I am so frustrated. I am afraid I will stop here. I still have so so much to lose. as for exercise, I try to walk like 30 minutes a day. I hated protein shakes unfortunately. but my menstrual cycle was very disturbed in the first two weeks. I was spotting for like 20 days then it ended. may be all these is related to hormonal changes. the body is in shock. I really wish to reach my goal weight and to lose then I am sure maintenance will be easy with the sleeve. it is almost impossible to over eat and I don't crave sweets at all. I even hated the chewable centrum cuz it is very sugary. that is one NSV i guess.

Right now I'm having great results on the scale - and know that it comes and goes. Just try to remember these good days on the non-loss or gain days. Started at 475 on May 24. Weighed in at 387 today. 88 pounds in 18 weeks! As good as that feels, I had an ever better feeling experience this week. I flew out to San Diego this week and didn't have to use a seat belt extender (so used to it I own my own). Granted it was a first-class seat and maybe the belts are a bit bigger, but none the less it clicked! Was pretty damn excited! This last fill took me to 9.3 in a 14 cc band, but it's the first fill I really can feel. I'm still eating too fast and have gotten myself into trouble including a very embarrassing projectile vomit situation at a trade show in San Diego, but I may actually be close to GREEN. I would tell any newbies to learn NOW the importance of eating slowly, taking small bites, and learning to make good food choices. Learn it now so that when you get near the green zone and you HAVE to do those things you don't do what I did at the trade show. Pretty sure I'm not allowed back to the San Diego Convention Center anytime soon!

I am going to consider this a NSV. I think I am actually on a regular schedule for my period! It has been probably 15 years since I have been any sort of regular. Going on three months now, and on schedule. Don't know why I am so excited lol I guess the whole waiting game of having it every few months before is gone.

Got to love those NSV thats been getting me by lately. i have only lost 24lbs since surgery 6 months ago but my body for some reason likes to lose inches! i have gone from a 24 to a 16! incredible. makes me sick when i look on the scale but funny NSV for me is the other night i was laying on couch and my dear hubby says "wow i can see over your belly when I lay down beside you" I took it as a good thing!!! Congrats on your success!

So this weekend was my niece's quincenera and it was a great time. For the first time i wasn't the miserable lady sitting watching everyone else look good. I felt and looked better than i had in a long time! On top of that i was able to enjoy some of the food at the reception and feel satisfied. Overall best time I have had in a long time.