Rebecca1492
2 month 1 week post RNY - some minor setbacks
Feb 08, 2017
Winter is usually a time where I burrow in, eat because it is cold and going outside is miserable, and I get a little fatter. But this winter has been different. This is the winter I am finally feeling well. I feel like I am taking my life back. I had no idea how exhausted I had become. I mean, I knew I was sleep deprived and I knew it was impacting my ability to do things and to concentrate and to even be a competent functioning adult. But until you start feeling better again I don’t know that one truly appreciates how imperative SLEEP is! How incredibly vital one feels when you’ve slept through the night and you wake up without PAIN. It’s incredible.
I get 40 minutes every morning on the elliptical machine. Before that I start my day with yoga stretches. I have only been to 3 classes so far, but my instructor sent me home with a sheet of paper showing some of the most basic poses and I use that to stretch and pose every morning. I like the class. It is taught at the senior center. When I signed up I asked if it was only for seniors and was assured that it was for all ages, so I signed my 14 year old daughter and I. Then, when we got there we were the only ones under 60. Still, I feel like it is a good pace for me. The instructor is about ensuring we don’t have pain but that we still push ourselves a little. I am also WAY more inflexible than I thought I would be. And I had VERY low expectations for myself. I can usually do the poses, but HOLDING them sometimes induces trembling like a little purse dog.
I have only lost about 33 lbs so far, but I have lost over 4 inches in my waist alone. I am not yet walking around with a rope to hold up my pants. But I am getting close. I have in my closet some “skinny clothes” that have been 1-2 sizes too small for several years. I kept them because I always had hope. Now I am pulling them out and trying them on and they FIT! I need to spend a weekend day just cleaning out my closet of the stuff that is too huge and getting rid of it.
My wedding ring is getting pretty loose. Soon I will have to put it on my middle finger instead of my ring finger. Trying to decide if I will get it resized or just ask my husband for a new jeweled band for our anniversary.
I still don’t get all the calories and protein in each day that I am targeted to get. I go to support meetings once a month (they have them twice a month but my yoga class conflicts with one of the meetings and I choose yoga.) At the support group the nurse navigator says that it is normal not to be able to reach those target goals this early on. I have to take a whole slew of vitamins every day in order to supplement what I can get in through eating. Both because I cannot get in enough through eating and because for the first year I will have malabsorption of my nutrients. I don’t mind taking the vitamins. I am telling you, I feel SO MUCH BETTER!
I still have struggles. My husband got a blood clot in his leg when he was stuck for 9 hours in his truck on the roads during one of the big December snow storms in Portland. This is the 2nd time he's gotten a blood clot in the last 3-4 years. Apparently he is prone to them. Thank God we are past the phase where he felt he needed to do nothing but sit on his ass with his leg propped up while he binge watched Game of Thrones. He still has doctor appointments regularly in an effort to try to get his INR #’s in a good range. AND, while they were doing all the bloodwork on him they discovered he is on the borderline of having diabetes, so they put him on metformin. That motivated him to start working out and eating better. For a couple of weeks. Then he stopped. I keep hoping that my example of working out every single day and eating better will rub off on him. I serve a healthy meal for dinner on the nights I am home. But if I have a board meeting or night court and am not the one making dinner, he cooks pasta with heavy sauce, macaroni and cheese, bread and no vegetables. It has gotten to the point where the kids are delighted to learn I will not be home for dinner. They also love the high fat carb fests. I knew it would be a difficult change for my family, I just didn't expect this much RESISTANCE. The other night when he knew I would be at Yoga he stopped and got the kids fast food. He tries to only do it when he knows I won't be around, but it's not like I don't KNOW about it.
And just because I have had the suregery, it is not a magic cure that makes me stop wanting the things that are bad for me. I made cupcakes for my daughter's 14th birthday yesterday and wanted one SO freaking bad! I make this cream cheese frosting that I used to just BINGE on. Finally, I decided I would eat a cupcake. I knew it was not on my diet and it could give me terrible diarrhea but I decided I wanted to do it anyway. How sick is that? On the plus side, although it did make my tummy upset, as I was eating it I realized it was not nearly as good as I had made it out to be in my mind. Maybe the memory of that will help me say "no" next time around. Maybe not. I'm not going to beat myself up for my mistakes. I'm just going to move forward and try to make good decisions in the future.
