Court

No, I haven't disappeared. I've been peripherally involved in a divorce proceeding. I was a witness for the plaintiff who is BP's (business partner) fiance. I tell ya, this is the most interesting shit I've ever seen. It's like looking at a train wreck. I don't mean to make liht of other people's pain, but it's just that I've been listening to all this drama for over a year and it was just very intriguing to see the whole thing come to a conclusion.

Anyway, today is my 3 month anniversary! Woo-hoo! My official weigh in this morning was 432.0, that's a 15.4 lb loss for the month. I have mixed emotions about it. I started exercising in earnest and I know that has contributed to me retaining more water than usual, especially since I've got so many sore muscles. Ugh. BUT, I have noticed that I am definitely getting smaller even though the scale isn't moving as fast, so overall, I am quite happy, I am down almost 85 lbs afterall. It's funny because during the week and half I went from the fourth hole to the 5th hole and now I'm punching a 6th hole in it.

I've been noticing my clothes a heckuva lot more lately. I think I only have a few more weeks with my current jeans, then they'll have to go. It's probably time that I got rid of them now, but I just can't. It's just one of those things.

I can't believe it's been 3 months. It seems like a long time ago that I had surgery, much longer than roughly 90 days. Life isn't too much different yet, but getting around is much, much easier. Thank goodness. I'm really looking forward to the coming months.

Mmmmm.... Turkey

I just got back from my first post-Thanksgiving walk. I did my 25 minute walk in 23. Pretty darn cool. I had a decent Thanksgiving, not as good as last year, but okay, nonetheless. The food was great. I had plenty of turkey and ham, a tad bit of stuffing and way too much mashed potatoes. The mashed potatoes weren't my only transgression, I had two small pecan pie tarts as well. Ugh. Let me just say that there was a reason why I didn't go on my walk yesterday... it wasn't a good idea to be too far away from the bathroom. I learned my lesson. Carbs in significant quantities wreak royal havoc on my system and I just can't deal. I don't want to, the gas and cramps were at a level I've never experienced before. Yikes!

Anyway, I noticed something in my walking. I seem to be a little unsteady. I'm so used to walking a certain way, almost leaning back in order to equalize me weight, but now since I've lost a significant amount of weight, I've noticed that I'm not quite used to walking smoothly and at a consistent pace. I guess that is going to be a minor problem from here on out. I also need to invest in some good walking/running shoes. I'm currently walking in a pair of K-Swiss Classics, but I've noticed some pressure at my big toe which is uncomfortable. I'm thinking New Balance, but I have no idea. I really like my walk. It's fun, although I'm not too keen on being lapped by little old ladies. Sigh.

Well, I am still having poop issues. I know what it feels like to be free and clear, so to speak and I just feel like I'm filled with a thick sludge. Gross, I know, but it's driving me mad. I'm not sure what the culprit is, but I am going to go back to basics and keep things simple AND consistent. Someone at support group said that your body likes consistency. Hell if I know, but I guess it couldn't hurt.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and had the opportunity to spend some quality time with friends and family. I won't go into all that I am greatful for, but needless to say, I am immensely grateful for my DS, Dr. M. and all the wonderful people I have met during this incredibly journey. I am truly blessed.

Weirdness

Since surgery, every single time that I have thrown up it was because of eating too fast and having that sensation that food was stuck in my throat and was coming up anyway. Actually it feels like there is a giant air bubble between my stomach and food in my throat and I have to burp, but if I burp, it means I'm hurling. Today something weird happened. I ate about an hour and a half ago, a couple of enchiladas left over from lunch. I then ate my two Calcium Citrate wafers. A good half hour later, I'm dancing around the house with my newly purchased iPod and I get this funky feeling in my stomach and then my mouth starts to generate copious amounts of saliva. Whenever my mouth starts to salivate like that, I know something is coming up. It was the weirdest feeling because it almost felt like my stomach seized up on me, like it was spasming or something. It's hard to describe and I can't recall feeling like that before. I make a bee-line to the kitchen sink and upchuck my calcium citrate. It was too late for the enchiladas. I feel a little perplexed. I don't know if it was the dancing or not, but I had been dancing for a good 10-15 mins and I never felt that food stuck in my throat feeling.

I'm not sure what just happened, but it is definitely a little disconcerting.

Ugh. On a less gross note, I have been given the opportunity to do two big photography projects in the coming weeks. The first one is straight forward, I am doing a shoot for a family of 5. They had considered a setup like Olan Mills, but had seen some of my previous work and have asked me to do the photography. My previous work consisted of a set of photographs I had taken last year of my business partner's two daughters and pictures I had taken at her family reunion. She didn't have any recent pictures of her kids together so I arranged an informal shoot and they pictures came out great. I also picked a few pictures from the set I took at their reunion and had them printed. It turned out to be a HUGE hit, especially the family reunion pics because it was the last time my business partner and her siblings were together with their mother as their mom passed away a couple of months later. Anyway, I converted all the pics to B&W and bought 5 or 6 nice frames and gave them to BP for X-Mas last year. She cried and cried.

The second project is BP's wedding on Christmas Eve. This one I am nervous about. I've been the unofficial picture taker at birthday parties, reunions, even a funeral, but never a wedding. I worry that my camera isn't good enough, that I'm not skilled enough. This is just a hobby of mine, y'know, I'm no professional. Yes, the wedding will be pretty low-key, but still. Ugh, the only thing I can think to do is practice in the meantime. I gotta admit though, I am super excited! I love photography. I wish I could do it for a living. Anyway, I have a couple of unique ideas about the wedding. I have these two "toy" cameras that take awesome, sorta atmospheric, moody pictures and I can't wait to utilize those. My digital one will be the primary camera, but hopefully I'll have the opportunity to experiment.

Geez, I better order some film

Oy, my legs!

Uh...it's that time of night when your body starts giving you hints as to how much pain you'll be in tomorrow. I searched and searched and couldn't find any info that could tell me how far I walked this morning. I'm bad at guessing distances in these situations so I won't even guess. Alls I know is my legs are starting to kill me and I just know I feel it even more tomorrow. The good thing about all this is that the more I walk, the better I'll feel. Unfortunately I won't be able to make it back out tomorrow, I have an early meeting, but I do plan to get a good walk in. I'm heading to the Super Target to pick up a few things.

Yeah well, I'm off to take yet another hot shower!

Walking

Had a great time at support group meeting, as always. The last time I went I was in the midst of a three week stall and was a little desperate. I lost around 27 lbs since the last meeting so I guess that was enough for there to be a difference in how I looked as I got a lot of comments on how I looked. One lady said she didn't even recognize me! Whaaaat???? Me thinks maybe it was my hair that threw her off. I curled it all nice and pretty yesterday.

Oh how times change. Like I mentioned in a previous entry, that stall taught me a lot. This morning I weighed 435.2 lbs. I will probably end the month with around 18-20 lbs lost. Not bad. ;)

I had a conversation with a friend of mine about my progress. She stressed that I needed to really be more active, especially since I work from home. Walking around my house throughout the day is not enough. Riding my bike for 15 mins is not enough, so I decided that starting today I would go to the nearby park and walk their long walking path and that's exactly what I did. Took me about 25-30 mins to complete the entire circuit. I have no idea how long it is, but it is long. I'll have to look it up to see how long the trail is. I started to get tired just past the 1/2 way mark and I looked back and was like, dang, I gotta walk all the way back, but I did it and it feels good. I tell you one thing, it certainly gets the innards moving and I headed straight to the bathroom as soon as I walked in the door!

I have to make a confession. Friday, while I was loading the dishwasher I noticed that the kitchen sink was gurgling and a foul order was emitting from it's depths. Gross. Long story short, looks like I have a clog or some crap going on in my pipes. It's weird because the hall bath toilet was backing up a little and would gurgle as well, but my master bath toilet and shower have been fine. Anyway, this whole thing totally stressed me out yesterday. I hate crap like that. I don't like having house or car issues that I can't fix myself. I hate the feeling of ignorance and ineptitude about certain things like plumbing or transmissions. I was peeved all day and for the first time, I got that familiar pang of wanting to eat crappy food in order to soothe my stress. It was unexpected for sure. I didn't do anything about it except obsess about it for a few hours and then I decided to just take the rest of the night off and just caught up on my TV shows that I've been recording all week.

I don't like that I am having those feelings, but I suppose it's normal now that life with the DS is becoming more and more normal. It's not as all consuming as it once was. The big question for me is what will my coping mechanism be? I will, of course, continue to write here and talk things out, but it's still worrisome.

Ok, a little wow moment. This morning I noticed my boobs stick out further than my stomach! Ha!

Again

So I'm stalled again. Woo-hoo...... not. Anyway, not freaking out about it although I must say, for the record, not fun. The past 4 days been weighing in at 437.4 lbs exactly. Funny how that works. Anyway, I'm still pretty happy about things, in the last 30 days, I've lost a little over 27 lbs. Woo-hoo! That's a monthly average I can get into!

I've got a busy day ahead of me, lots of running around plus my support group meeting meets tonight. I can't wait.

X-Mas

It's 5:30 in the morning. I've been up for an hour and a half. Can't sleep. Sigh.

$400-$500. That's how much it'll cost me to go home for Christmas. Where's home? Texas. I really want to go home. I miss my family, especially my mama. I haven't seen her since January of this year. I saw my dad just over a month ago. I think she is desperate to see me too. I have this lingering feeling that she'll feel a little after she actually has undeniable visual proof for herself that I am indeed okay.

Brazil was not cheap, by no means. I have the money, but I am kinda debating about whether I should wait til maybe the spring when airfares aren't so high. I don't know. The other thing is that I am not too keen on getting on a freakin' airplane right about now. I had enough of that crap with my six going to and coming from Brazil. Plus, there is the whole seat issue. Here's the thing, I can book a normal reservation where there's a stop in either Dallas or Houston, this will cost around $400. If I opt for the non-stop from Atlanta to my destination, the flight will cost a little over $500. I'd gladly pay the money for the nonstop, but I'd have to be positive the flight was empty enough so that I could have an empty seat next to me.

Good grief.

Mini - wow

My favorite pair of jeans are getting too big, but I can't bring myself to let them go. I love them. I bought them earlier this year, pre-surgery and they were the first pair of jeans I had worn in God only knows how long. They've got that cool faded, worn look that I dig and they're so soft and comfortable. Today when I put them on I had to use the 4th hole on m'belt. I haven't worn these jeans in almost two weeks and had just migrated to the 3rd hole. Goodness. Pretty darn cool. Just one more hole left and then I gotta start punching my own!

I do have a few clothes that I love that I'll totally be fighting tooth and nail not to give up. Most of them are items I have had forever. My favorite item by far is a grey pullover shirt. I freakin' love that thing. I've had it for over five years at least. This winter will probably be the last time I'll be wearing it. I'm going to keep it though, it'll be like a beloved blanky and a reminder of how things used to be. I'm just sentimental like that.

Anyway, yesterday I took my iron pill in the morning which I think was a mistake. I have that constipated feeling. I usually take it at night. Ugh. Here we go again.... Well, I got on the scale and weighed in at 437.0 lbs. I'm just hoping to get everything flowing well today, I don't want to have to take MoM.

Yeah well, enough chit-chat, gotta make up for all the work I didn't do yesterday.

Rambling Thoughts

I haven't felt much like working today. I've spent a great amount of time on some of the DS boards and groups reading as much as I can about the magical weight loss window, the 12-24 months each of us has to lose weight fairly easily. After the magical, mystical window closes, DSers can still lose weight, but not nearly as easily if your lucky. Frankly, this scares the shit out of me. I don't want to waste my window. The biggest disappointment for me will be to stop losing at 300 lbs. Yeah, I will have lost 200 lbs and that will be monumental, BUT that won't be enough. I do not want to be in a situation where I'm filled with regret because I didn't do enough of the right things and I'm scared that maybe I won't have the discipline to do all the right things. When I think about how I am doing now, I know I am not perfect. I am not exercising as much as I should, but I am doing more than before, and to be honest, it's not the easiest thing in the world to exercise at my size. The best I can manage nowadays is like 15-30 mins of dancing to some good music every other day.

On the water and vitamin/supplement front, I am nearly perfect as far as what I've determined my regime should be. I am hitting those marks. Food-wise, I could probably tweak my diet a little, but I think I am doing well. My carbs are less than 30 per day, my protein is well over a hundred. I don't watch my fat grams all that much only because the added fat solves my constipation issues. I don't eat/drink anything with sugar or eat any "white" foods. I have some veggies every now and again, but with getting the protein in it doesn't leave a lot of room for much else. I don't eat a lot of processed food, maybe a sausage or some hard salami every now and again, but that's it. Overall, I'd give myself an A-. I don't feel like I'm dieting per se, but I do feel like I have to watch what I eat which technically isn't all that difficult since I can't eat all that much anyway. I don't have to stress about it too much since it's very similar to how I was eating when I was an avid low-carber. There really isn't much difference so it's not new to me and all the tips and tricks I learned, I can use now.

I don't know, I guess I am just worrying for no good reason, I am, afterall only 2.5 months post-op. What the hell do I know?!? I also don't want to sound holier-than-though and look down on someone for having a cookie. It's not like that at all. I won't be surprised if at some point I want a cookie or a piece of cake or a donut. I'm sure it'll happen, but I also don't want to feel like a failure if I do. This is all reminiscent of my old dieting life. I always felt like I had to be perfect and if/when I strayed, it would spell catastrophe for my efforts. I also remember how stalls back then would be completely demoralizing. I never had the resolve to stay the course of a long stall. I would get discouraged after a few days, much like how I freaked out last month. The difference? Probably not much, only in the realization that the DS isn't a diet. I can't undo it. I didn't eat the greatest some of the days during the stall, but I didn't give up on it. I learned so much during those three weeks. It was freakin' hard. Those days were difficult to get through mostly because of the head games I played with myself. My biggest fear has always been that even with the DS, I wouldn't be able to lose the weight. The biggest thing I learned (from the dozens of people I whined to) was just to calm the !@#$ down and stick to the plan and do the right things and all will be well. When failure is all you've known in that regard, sometimes it's hard to be rational. :)

As I lose more and more weight, I'm becoming more and more of a true believer. I can't say that when I started all this that I was one. Believe you me, I had my doubts. I believed that the DS was a good thing and that it might give me a chance, but I am just now starting to really believe in it and dare to hope that I can get to where I want to be.

I tell you one thing, this surgery has really opened me up. I never talked about this kind of stuff in the past. Never. It was hidden away in my mind and my heart, but I'm grateful to the DS for opening that window. This is almost therapeutic. Y'know, it is. I can blather on and know that this is just part of the process for me and as I read other post-op's blogs I can take comfort in the fact that I'm not alone in this, there are many who've come before me and there will be many to come after me and that my issues are not all that unique.

What a relief!

Hmmm

I'm losing my padding. Sitting in my chair causes my butt to hurt now. I had to supplement with an extra pillow. My elbows are tender now because the extra layer of fat I had is gone and now it feels like the only thing between bone and hard desk is a thin layer of skin. Me and my bony elbows. Craziness. Ultimately, I still feel the same, I don't feel any smaller although I know that I am. It's such a weird thing.

Anyway, I had a chicken incident yesterday. Sometimes on weekends, I am a little lax in my daily routine. Instead of having my Nectar Lemonade protein drink in the morning, I'll maybe have something solid. So anyway, I decided to have a couple of chicken legs that I had roasted a couple of days before. Yum. Problem was, I had just drunk a big glass of water so by the time I got to the second leg, oh, I knew something was awry. Up it all came. Not fun and it left me feeling a little queasy the rest of the day. This was about 10 AM and I didn't eat again til around 4 pm (after a long nap) which was not a good idea because by then I was feeling a little lightheaded and weak. I had my Nectar at 6 pm and a light snacks at 8pm and around 10 PM. Sometimes I just forget that I can't eat like I used to.

Anyway, I weighed in today at 437.4 lbs. Woo-hoo! I'm losing between 5-6 lbs a week. I just hope I keep this pace up for a few months. I've got a looooong way to go.

Goals

I have intentionally stayed away from establishing specific goals as far as my weightloss is concerned. I don't want to set myself up for any disappointments, but as time goes on and weight comes off, I feel like it might be good to establish something to look forward to. Next year there are three semi-big events that I am looking to attending. The first is my 10 year college reunion. At my school, they have this big weekend long to do for all alumni celebrating -5 or -0 reunions (5, 10, 15 etc). Typically there are several thousand alumni who come into town, many with their spouses and kids and spend a weekend catching up with their peers, running around campus and some even take seminars or renew their vows, crap like that. I am seriously thinking about going next year. I talked to my best friend with whom I graduated and he's only mildly interested. The thing is, unless you go with a group of friends, there isn't much to do unless you're just really into spending a couple of nights in the dorms and walking around campus all day. The big motivator for me, actually, is that I would love to be able to walk around and take pictures. The campus is flat out one of the most picturesque in the country... plus I need to stock up on Alumni gear. The downside is that no one knows about my surgery and I'm not sure I'd be ready to go into in that environment. I will be just over 9 months post op by then. I have no idea how much I'll weigh, but I am hoping to be 310-320 lbs by then.

The second thing is I want to go to the opening football of above mentioned alma mater. My best friend is totally down for that. I went last year and although I had a ton of fun, it was the trip that really made me start to consider weight loss surgery. Getting around was tough, I was easily tired and uncomfortable. I love these football weekends and I knew that if I were much smaller, I'd have a much, much better time. The first game is usually in early September and I would love to be 250 lbs for it. The weekend is so fun-filled that there aren't a lot of opportunities for me to be hounded by questions about my dramatic weight loss.

The last event is our family reunion in October. I am in my element when I am around my whole family. I am definitely going and it'll be interesting to see people's reactions. I won't have a problem talking about my surgery here, but I don't want it to be the center of attention. I'll be about 13 1/2 months post by this time and I hope to be around 225-250. This is the weight Dr. M said I would be in about a year.

My only other little goal is to be 399.8 by January 1st. I weighed in at 438.8 this morning and January 1st is exactly 50 days away. That would be 39 lbs in a little over 7 weeks, which is a rate of about 5.6 lbs a weeks. It's doable, but even a 2-4 day stall could mess it all up. If I make it, then big woo-hoo, if not, I won't be upset. I'd be estatic to hit 416.6 by the end of the year because that will mean I will have hit the century mark.

Update: I forgot to mention one thing. My dream of dreams. Dr. M. said that I should expect to end up around 200 lbs after all is said and done, even post plastic surgery. I really, really want to get down to like 170-175. At 200 lbs, I'll still be considered overweight and I would just be absolutely delighted beyond belief to be "normal".

Buh-Bye

Nice knowing you, 440's, it's been real. 439.8 today.

I mentioned the enchilada casserole I made the other day. I've been eating off of it all week. The interesting thing about it is that I didn't drain the fat off the hamburger meat when I cooked it so it was pretty fatty. Delicious, but fatty. The odd thing is that the weight has been dropping pretty consistently and almost as importantly, I haven't had any poop issues. No constipation. Looking at my average for the week in Fitday (yes, I still track it all) I am averaging about 1400 calories, 90 grams of fat, 29 grams of carbs (mostly fiber) and about 129 grams of protein. I typically eat 5 times a day, 3 meals and 2 snacks. I hardly eat any carbs. I used to be tempted every now and again with grits or pasta, but after giving them a whirl a couple of times and not feeling too hot afterwards, they tempt me no more. It's strange because I used to love that kind of stuff, but it just sits in my stomach like a brick and often feels like wet sand or sludge going down. Not exactly appealing.

I am little intrigued by my disinterest in sweets though. I take these chewable Calcium Citrate wafers four times a day and I swear, it's like eating candy. They taste great, but they are sweet. The thing is I don't know if they really are that sweet or is it just me. I drink Nectar Roadside Lemonade every morning and it's kinda sweet too. I used to looooove sweets, my nemesis. It's a wonder I wasn't already diabetic. Today, I see cookies & cakes & pastries in the store or on TV or at someone's house and I just can't do it, even if I wanted to and I don't want to.

This may be my favorite part of the DS. Back around a year ago when I first decided to look into WLS, I went to my first support group meeting and that just happened to be the meeting where Dr. Smith was going to show video of both the RNY and the DS. He explained the plusses and minuses of both procedures and walked through them both. As a tangent, I truly believe God works in mysterious ways because what are the odds that my first step in this whole journey would be that meeting where I first learned about the DS. Had I not gone, I'm not sure I would have even entertained the thought. Anyway, one of the things Dr. Smith mentioned was that if you were a person who was beholden to sweets, the RNY would probably be better surgery for you because of dumping and how it discourages people from partaking of sweets. That stuck in my head and although I did leave there thinking I wanted the DS, a few weeks later, I had decided that maybe the RNY was better for me because of the sweets thing. Luckily, I changed my mind. It's just ironic (or not) that it seems like my sweet tooth may be resolved anyway. I don't know if it is permanent or not, but for now I have no interest in anything that even remotely sugary. Yuck!

Holy Crap!

I've lost 75 lbs, y'all. In 72 days. I weighed in today at 441. That's the lowest I've been in probably 2-3, maybe even 4 years.

This is so wild! I think I am going to go ahead and say it... I kinda like my DS. :)

Enchilalas

Tuesday, I made an enchilada casserole. Yum, yum and yum some more. I love Mexican food. Growing up in a border town I've been exposed to it since I could eat solid food. Cheese enchiladas are my favorite food above everything and anything else. I affectionately call them "enchilalas". I could eat them everyday, but given my new internal plumbing, I had make some changes to the recipe. First of all, I added plenty of ground beef, had to get the protein way up, just using cheese wasn't going to cut it. I then substituted regular corn tortillas with large low-carb whole wheat ones. These things have like 19 grams of carbs, 14 grams of which is fiber. Good stuff. The miracle of all miracles is that I actually found a good enchilada sauce in the grocery store. It was spicy and had multidimensional flavor. It'll be my sauce of choice from now on. Anyway, I made a small 13x13 tray of it and it should last me the rest of the week.

Foodwise, I am still plowing along. Eating well, staying away from carbs, getting in my water and supplements. This morning I weighed in at 442.2, hopefully I'll be out of the 440s by the end of the weekend. I'm only 0.6 lbs away from a total loss of 75lbs in about 10 weeks. Can you believe that???? Freakin' amazing. I'd love to see 416.6 by the end of the year. That would mean 100 lbs lost in 4 months.

Figured it out

I know now what's bugging about the progress photos I put together. I don't know who the girl on the left is. I absolutely do not connect that as being me. I just don't and that's a little disconcerting for a couple of reasons. The obvious one is, shit, how did I let myself get that big and two, I never saw myself as that big and therefore couldn't fathom looking like that. It's such a trip, but I am comfort myself in knowing that I'll never get that big again. NEVER. Today I weight 444 lbs. That's not a great thing to admit, embarassing even, but I tell you what. I won't be weighing that for long and when I say goodbye to 440 and hello to 439, I can tell you I won't be 440 ever again. Those steps and those realizations are the most important things to me. I used to be caught in wanting to fast forward 18 months from now when I'm hopefully through losing what I need to lose, but the journey is turning out to be an relevatory one, something I didn't think I'd relish. My best friend, food (especially sweet stuff), has found itself in a whole different capacity post-op so I am discovering that the DS did change me in more ways than one. The biggest change is that I am more aware of my feelings and am allowing them to just be instead of trying to numb them out. Forces me to figure out what is really going on.

Yes, indeed people, this is an interesting journey for me.

Ugh

I've had an interesting couple of weeks. My business partner and I are having issues, not entirely surprising but hopefully they seemed to be resolved for now. It's been a long journey with this person and is somewhat disappointing in how some things turned out, but I do think we're on the right track.

I've been having weird poop issues. I must be the only DSer that gets constipated, so very annoying. I had the problem pre-op but I figured with all the new wiring I didn't need to worry about it. How wrong I was/am. In the morning, I would wake up with a distended belly, almost like I had eaten a full meal. Even after my morning poop, I didn't feel that empty feeling. The deal is that I often feel clogged up and it's not entirely painful, just uncomfortable. Well, I should say there have been times when it almost felt like my intestines were sore, if that makes sense. I know, I know that sounds weird, but that's the best way I can describe it. I not sure what the culprit is, but I think it's a function of what I am eating. Like most DSers, for me, it's all about the protein.

For the past few weeks I have been averaging anywhere between 120-140 grams of protein. That's a lot and I think I have going about it wrong. I think I was eating too much in one sitting. Even though I was taking my time sometimes up to 45 mins to eat, I think it was too much in one sitting. I think I need to and maybe bring my protein down to the 80-100 grams a day level. I think all that protein was too much bulk going through my system and causing me problems.

Last night I got fed up and took some MoM and spent most of the day clearing the duct work. Not fun, but I feel better. I've been thinking of ways to maintain good plumbing. I'm eating at least one Low Carb tortilla every day as they are mostly (70-80%) fiber and I try to get in plenty of fat (which is easy to do) and a small portion of a veggy now and again. I am finishing off the last of the pot roast I made some time ago so maybe the beef is problematic and now that I think about it, I have been eating a ton of cheese so maybe backing off of that will help.

One other thing, I had been pretty lax about my wonderful binder. It's freakin aggravating and I just didn't feel like I needed to wear it when I was just hanging out or working at home so I haven't been diligent about wearing it. What I am aware of today, is how much it was working to help control how fast I was eating/drinking. It definitely slowed me down and I think as soon as I started to ditch it, I started to have more problems, so today, I've been wearing it almost non-stop and I can immediately see the difference in how much, how fast I've eaten/drank today and how much better I feel.

Anyway, I'm currently working on my dinner right now and will probably be finished in a good 15 mins, then it's my next to last vitamins for the day and I'll be sipping water til I fall asleep. Man, I was hoping I'd be cruising at this stage of the game, but I guess it's a good thing to evaluate what I am doing and what my progress is. Mind you, all of this is prompted by a slow moving scales. Yes, I know I said I was gonna put it away, but I can't just yet, I can't. I don't feel comfortable doing it until I feel comfortable that I have a solid handle on my eating & exercise.

Yeah, well. The scale now reads 444.2, so I am happy with that, but after the day I've had, I won't be surprised to see it much lower tomorrow. Besides that, water is good (80-120 oz a day), I'm taking my vitamins, exercise is a work in progress though, BUT I did do 25 mins on the bike this morning and I'm thinking about taking a drive to the local park (5 mins away) and walk the jogging path. We'll see.