14 Months later, surgery on 10/10/16
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Wow that’s An amazing story. Kudos for you and your desire for success. Congrats girl.
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Yes, it took a level of determination and commitment, 16 months full liquid, that I didn't know I had. It's how I knew I could do well with the surgery and post op protocols because of it as well. Tha
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full liquid diet for 16 months. I lost 200 lbs. hey bud amazing story with a wonderful out come, hard work for the rest of your life! you will continue as a success story. nice of
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On 10/10/2016 I had my Vertical Gastric Sleeve. OH MAN has it been a crazy 14 months!! It's hard to even think back on this time without wonder. It seems so long ago and yet just yesterday. I went from dying to flying, it's truly unbelievable to me. I wanted to take this time to kind of lay out what my 14 months looked like and where I am at now.
I started this journey 4 years ago and this was me then:
I start on this journey doing a full liquid diet for 16 months. I lost 200 lbs.
I then gained back about 60. And then I started getting sick, very sick. I ended up in the hospital, was told I needed to do the VGS or look at dying in the next few years. So VGS it was!! lol!
I was not a voluntary patient, it was thrust upon me and I was scared, I didn't want to permanently change my relationship with food but I also knew that choosing food was choosing death. So of course I had the surgery.
The first few months were rough, as most of you know our stomachs are like testy newborns and there are a lot of growing pains and learning curves. By about 3 months I was on solid food and starting to try different things.
By 6 months I was moving beyond just Protein and safe foods to some adventurous spices, I was starting to exercise to a much higher degree. I was now walking 4-7 miles a day and feeling AMAZING!
By 9 months out I was moving into a size 12, SIZE 12!!!!!!!!!!!!! OMG! I remember being so astounded. I started going out on dates, I started feeling like I might be getting a life I never even dreamed was a possibility for me.
By around 10 months I started experiencing some crazy hormone symptoms. Now, I had already dealt with some hormone related issues but by this point I wasn't getting my period, I was having the bizarre mood swings, I was crying one day, then up like crazy the next. I also started having a lot of issues with my diabetes meds. My weight loss was not making my diabetes go away, in fact, it is now getting harder to control. So I spent most of July, August and Sept going from specialist to specialist. I was switching my meds and basically felt like I was a walking drug trial. But then by the end of September everything smoothed out hormone wise. I was put on a birth control that regulated my estrogen. I guess my weight loss was flooding my system with hormones and then when it would drop off my body would respond like I was in menopause. What a nightmare! lol! At this point I am also close to being put on insulin. Unfortunately when my gallbladder went bad it damaged my pancreas to the point it won't ever recover. I dealt with that blow, adjusted my life again to deal with this and just moved on.
Reverse back to July of this year and that is when I took my first Yoga class. This also changed the direction of my journey. I began doing a C1 (like Yoga 101) class daily. By September I was feeling like a pro and starting to take some of the harder classes. Flash-forward to today and I do daily advanced Yoga (I call it Bootcamp Yoga, it's a mix between Yoga and Cross Fit I think). I can plank for 5 minutes, I can do 200 crunches, I do squats and lunges, I do like 40 pushups, I run, I do handstands, I cartwheel, jump-rope, etc. I am in the BEST physical condition of my life and I expect it to just continue. In fact, I jokingly/not jokingly say I'm aiming towards American Ninja Warrior. I want to be that strong and badass.
Today I am 14 months post op, I am in a size 10 about to move on from there, I am toning my body like crazy, still dropping about 1/2 a day if I go hard on my exercise. My daily food diary is so simple yet perfect for me:
I am still quite diabetic, they are unsure if I'm type 1 or type 2, but if that's my biggest health worry??? I'm happy!!
I do have some down sides, I get Dumping Syndrome. My doc kind of implied it's because of poor food choices but after 9 months of tracking I can now say this - there is almost NO through line to determine cause. It can happen when I just have Protein or if I drink Water too fast, it can happen with sugars or if I eat grilled veggies. The most common factor is time. It seems to most frequently happen in the evenings. And I do get quite sick to the point I have to go hid and do this breathing/huffing thing and then often sleep between 30 minutes and 6 hours. Because of this I stick very closely to the routine I listed above. But that is a life issue I have no problem dealing with.
This is me today, or, actually, this weekend. lol! I feel like a brand new person. This journey is hard, I had regrets, I had tears, some days I wished I'd never done it, other days I wished I'd had it done 20 years ago. I sometimes feel like I wasted half my life and other days I feel like I gained a whole new life. This journey is one of ups and downs and every single hill and valley has been a wondrous experience.