Fe

Time to call my PCP to get my iron checked, been feeling a little unusually run down for some reason. It seems like quite a few DSers are struggling with this lately, I guess it's my turn.

Par-tay + Lost

So I've been looking forward to this gathering thingy tonight for several days now and for some reason, last night and this morning I've been hit with a fair amount of trepidation about it. Those old feelings of fear are creeping back into my consciousness when socializing comes into play. I guess what makes me anxious is that I don't have those one or two "safe" people to tag along with when I usually go to these types of things. There could be zero people there that I know and those situations I tend to do poorly in...historically, anyway. I'm just not very good at those types of situations, but the weight loss does help. 265+ lbs ago, there would no way in hell I'd be going, no way, not even a consideration. Now, it is a consideration, it's just a mental thing at this point.

A cool thing about it is that it's an opportunity to look cute. I love looking cute, I'm hoping I can look cute tonight. It's not a formal affair, sort of a happy hour kind of thing, I'm guessing since it's like 6:30 PM on so I can't imagine many people dressing up for it, I assume most will be barely business casual which is typical for the industry. I will probably wear a nice pair of jeans and a nice blouse and some cute shoes (God help me). My hair will be done and I will have some nice jewelry. I haven't crossed the makeup threshold yet so there will be none of that. So I should look okay.

The only problem with tonight is that it's also the season finale for my current obsession, Lost. What were they thinking?!? Thank God for DVR's or else that joint would be empty!

I never had a chance to see my PCP this month so it's going to be a priority next week. When I was in Texas, I checked my blood pressure everyday with my dad's machine and it was consistently in the 95-105/55-75 range. I think that's pushing being too low so I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Dr. B. will take me off the meds for good. I sometimes do get lightheaded when I stand up quickly so keep your fingers crossed that the meds are out the door!

I made a refill order with Vitalady for all my necessities earlier this week so I should fully back on track starting this weekend. I'm actually looking forward to starting fresh, if you will. Eating clean and drinking my water like I should always makes me just feel better, regardless of how friendly the scale is. I've been feeling a little sluggish lately so it'll be good to do things right.

Anywho, I've got a crap load of work to do before I can call it a day and breakfast is getting cold...

On second thought...

...I will be calling my doctor on Monday about the blood pressure meds. The last day or so I've been getting that dizzy sensation when I get up from a seated position or when like I am picking things up off the floor and stand straight. The room starts spinning a little bit and I hear that faint buzzing noise, yeah, that can't be good. It happened a couple of times in the past couple of days, but I chocked it up to not having eaten recently, but I just had the feeling a few minutes ago and I just ate and I had a protein shake an hour before that!

I'm so excited, almost to the point of tears, I'm going to the Mary J. Blige concert this week! I love me some Mary J. Her music is a major part of the soundtrack of my life! No More Drama changed my life:



Every ounce of emotion you see in that performance is 100% real and honest and true. Don't believe me?

When my sister, Monica, passed away in 2006, my sister S. and I took on the responsibility of handling all of her affairs and moving out her stuff from her apartment. Monica was a HUGE Mary fan and her music was what we listened to the entire time, especially, Be Without You. I know many people hate Mary, they say she's not a sophisticated singer, that she's a little too rough around the edges. Whatever. Mary's all heart and soul and that's what I love about her. This woman has been through the shit and back again and finally emerged clean and the kick ass part of it is that she pulled herself out of it. I dig that about her!

Mothercrapper!!!

I had a mid-week tennis lesson yesterday and typically I leave them somewhat fatigued, but on a high, usually feeling like I made some progress. Yesterday was different. My teacher introduced another level of complexity which completely threw everything out of whack and once again, I was lobbing ball over the fence. God, I hate that. Not getting the balls in court is bad enough, but when they're sailing 45° over the fence, that ain't good. Sigh. She had me work on what she is calling split stance and staying on my toes so that I work on moving to where the ball will land so that I can hit it within my natural stroke. Totally screwed me up and it's frustrating enough for me to lose a little sleep over it. So yeah, I will be hitting the tennis court this afternoon for sure!

My appointment with the endocrinologist is exactly one week from today. THANK GOD. I've been waiting for this for a month! Still working on a list of every possible question I want to ask. Dr. R. is going to get an earful, I hope he's ready, I will be.

Have I mentioned lately that I have nothing to wear? No? Ok. I have NOTHING to wear. I have 3 pairs of jeans and two good shirts. That's it. I'm compiling more clothes to take to Goodwill and it includes almost everything I've worn all winter. I'm trying to talk my sister into flying to meet me back home so that she can go shopping with me. We are only 1-2 sizes away from each other and she has such great style I'm hoping some of it would rub off on me!

Weight this morning, 255.8 lbs. Haven't made much progress within the last week, but no worries. I'm just happy to have made some progress this month at all.

This weekend is going to be spent at my desk. It's the end of the quarter and that means I'll be spending most of it working, running reports, updating pricing and product info, etc. I'll also be finalizing the photos for BP and her family. I want to get them all done and printed before I go home in about a week and a half.

I'm not sure what my problem is lately, but I have been spending more money on food than I usually do. I mean I'm buying all kinds of protein, my freezer is filled with all manner of beef, chicken, seafood and pork. I don't know why I keep buying the stuff, it's not like I go through a lot of it, it just keeps calling my name or something. I bought a corned beef which I am going to cook tomorrow. I had some on St. Patty's Day and wanted more. I also bought more shrimp, I love to cook it with butter, Adobo and some garlic. YUM. I guess this is a good thing, much better than the food aversion I had last year, that sucked.

Anyway, speaking of food, time to go get some!

Done!

Finally, my MRI was performed this morning and what an ordeal! Actually, it wasn't all that bad, the worst part was the lady trying to find a vein in my left arm, then the back of my hand, then finally calling another lady who found a vein in my right arm. I don't know what it is, but the last few nurses have had a hard time finding veins for me and it's so annoying. Today it really hurt -- enough for me to say "OUCH!", in fact, it still freakin' hurts! Not fun. The MRI, in and of itself, was as loud and as boring as I had heard and read. Mine took about an hour and I really tried not to move as I didn't want to have to do it over. A couple of times, I wanted to fall asleep, but I had to fight the urge as, again, I could just see myself nodding off and allowing my head to cock to the side. Nope, I was all about the "one and done." Luckily, the MRI machine was an open one so my fears of claustrophobia didn't come to fruition, but I did have a few moments of feeling like I might be getting to a point where I felt like I couldn't breathe. Hard to describe accurately, but my head was in this thing and the top of the MRI was probably less than 8 inches from my face. I definitely felt like if I were a panicky person, I would have panicked. All in all, not as horrific as I thought it could be. I should have the results mid-week, now I feel like I can relax a little and just calm the heck down.

That's exactly what I am going to do.

Deformed?!?

I went to pick up my test orders for my MRI tomorrow. I am anxious about it, I can't help but to be a little neurotic. I haven't been sleeping well all week, it's not that I'm scared, just ... anxious to done already. The doc attached a copy of my X-Ray results:

Lateral View of the Sella Turcica 2/12/2008:

History: Patient with history of absent menstruation.

Findings: The lateral view ofthe skull shows a deformed appearance of the sella turcica, which would suggest a space-occupying lesion in the pituitary fossa. Dedicated pituitary MRI examination is recommended.

Impression: Deformed appearance of the sella turcica, which would suggest a space-occupying lesion in the pituitary fossa. Dedicated pituitary MRI examination is recommended.

Sounds freakin' serious, don't it? Dang! Well, I just be glad when it's over. Hopefully, I'll have the results early next week.

Next steps...

Ok. I go to the GYN's office this morning to pick my orders for the tests I need to take. I then go to a different location, give the receptionist my paperwork, wait for my name to be called and surrender 4 vials of blood. I then have to yet another location for my X-rays. They basically just take two X-rays of my noggin, lateral view and I'm on my way home. Overall, pretty painless and I am hoping that at least the X-ray results will be available to my doctor today and I will hear from them soon.

I spent another good 2 hours late last night doing more research and I'm almost certain it's a prolactinoma. There seems to be three different causes for hyperprolactinaemia (1) reaction to certain medications none of which I am taking, (2) related to a thyroid condition - my tests are normal or (3) a tumor/cyst on the pituitary gland. At this point, I feel like all I need is a doggone prescription and I'm good to go. The most frustrating realization about this whole prolactinoma thing is that if I indeed have one, then it's reason #1 as to why I haven't been losing weight as well as I should have for like the past 4-6 months. I've read plenty of message board posts about people gaining weight because of hyperprolactinaemia and I think for me my DS was basically fighting tooth and nail with the prolactinoma as far as whether I'd lose weight or not. Seems like the DS was winning, but barely. It would be pie in the sky, la-la-land for me to hope to start taking Cabergoline and voila, I lose 20 lbs overnight. All I really want is for my old DS ability to lose weight to return. That's all I want. I don't have a problem doing the work, eating right and exercising, what's been completely maddening is doing the work and seeing very little results AND thinking I am doing something wrong OR thinking my DS is broken or my window is closed. Ugh.

It's weird because I'm hopeful that this is what has been causing my problems and therefore a solution exists, but frustrated with myself for not seeing a GYN earlier. If I had done so in August, it's possible I could be down another 30-60 lbs. I had been averaging over 17+ lbs loss per month up until then and then it fell to like 8 lbs or less. Frustrating. Oh well, no need to get all riled up for nothing. I just want my kick-ass DS weight-loss ability back, that's all. I feel 100 times more confident that my goal is attainable, before yesterday, I was honestly mostly doubtful, but didn't want to completely give up.

Everything happens for a reason, right?

Panic? Me? Nooooo.....

So, I'm writing some code late this afternoon when I get a phone call from my gynecologist's office. A nice lady on the phone tells me that my lab test results are in and Dr. H. wants to talk to me about them. Uh-oh. That can't be good, right? So I sit on hold for like the longest 2-3 minutes of my life and the cheery doc gets on the line and proceeds to tell me that my pap smear came back negative (yea) and all my hormone levels came back good (yea)...except one (boo). He said that he wants me to come in for another test, that the nurse will call me back with the info. I give him my fax number so that I can get the results faxed back to me. Nurse calls about 5 minutes later and tells me that I can pick up the orders for the tests tomorrow and go ahead and get the tests (MRI?) done the same day. She confirms my fax number and within a couple of minutes I get the results. Indeed, all my results are normal except for one. My Prolactin levels are high, normal range is 2.8 - 29.2, mine was 75.3. Yikes! Needless to say, I spend the next 1/2 hour Googling my little fingers to the bone. I'm trying really hard not to self-diagnose, but since my thyroid test came back normal it looks like I have a Prolactinoma which sounds a lot worst than it really is. It's basically a benign tumor on my pituitary gland that is causing the high levels of Prolactin. Treatment is a pill, twice a week. I can deal with a freakin' pill. Obviously, all this is speculation on my part as I still have at least one more (maybe 2-3) test to take. Oh joy, another thing to obsess over.

Call me crazy, but I have to admit to a tiny amount of relief. I kinda felt something was wrong/off/awry and it looks like it wasn't all my imagination. The next week or so will hopefully clear the picture up and give me some answers, and most importantly a solution, so I guess we'll just wait and see. Normally, I would be freaking out, but I'll save it for another day that warrants a freak out, right now, I'm just focusing on taking whatever tests I need to take and getting a diagnosis if there is one to be had. Onward...

Month 17 ... and other stuff

Well, I've had an interesting couple of days. That might be the understatement of the year. First, the whole situation with our Employee #2 seems to be resolves. Long story, he reacted poorly due to some tragic news he had just received and completely over-reacted in the midst of him trying to deal with the bad news. He apologized to Employee #1 as well as to me. I accepted his apology but stressed the need to try to step away and give himself a minute to calm down. I also communicated to the entire staff, in no uncertain terms, that I better not hear or read or catch wind of any more unprofessional behavior. I think for now, that is sufficient. Thank God it's Friday, I truly need a break.

On to more important things. This was an interesting month in my DS life and one that I can easily say I enjoyed, moreso than the last couple. This month was all about exercise and discovering the joy of tennis. The month started off with my Couch to 5K training and I was and still am amazed at my ability to run. It boggles the mind. When I first started walking at the end of 2006, I mentioned the fact that I hated getting lapped my little old ladies, well not anymore. Yesterday was the first time that I actually ran past people walking. It was such a thrill! Typically, there aren't a whole lot of people out there braving the cold and wind so the opportunity to lap folks has been infrequent, that's definitely part of the reason, but to actually pass someone after spending my whole having people pass me by is just incredible! As running gets more and more difficult, I also see improvements in myself, when I first could barely run for 60 straight seconds, I can now run 3 minutes without bursting a lung. I know if I keep at it, I'll be able to reach my goal of running a 5K.

Then there was tennis. I love tennis. I'm flabbergasted at how much I like it. I have very little interest in it pre-surgery. I think maybe it's because of the physicality involved and the opportunity it affords me to move around in space like I don't recall ever doing. I sweat more in one hour of tennis practice than training for the 5K. Also, I don't like sucking at things, especially things I've committed myself to doing. Yesterday I spent an hour practicing my forehand and had to force myself to pack up my stuff and go back home, I could have stayed out there for hours, but there was work to be done. I know I am a good year or so away from being a decent tennis player and I know there's a long road of suckitude and mediocrity ahead, but I know that I'll get there with hard work and lots and lots of practice.

Weight-wise, although I hadn't lost the 15 lbs I was hoping for, I did lose 7 lbs total, but lost roughly 12 lbs of body fat and gained roughly 5 lbs of muscle. I can definitely be happy with that. I do feel stronger, especially in my legs and thighs. which I love. My current weight is a steady 264.0 lbs, down from 516.6 lbs for a total loss of 252.6 lbs in 17 months.

I do find myself more and more anxious to be done with all the weight loss already. As I am never content nor comfortable with my nutrition/supplementation, I am always looking for the problem areas and one seems to pop up every now and again and that is the issue of not eating enough. For me, consuming more than say, 1800 calories, requires effort. I can easily get that amount of food in through the course of the day without thinking about it. Problem is that 1800 calories is nowhere near enough for me. I need to be getting upwards of 2500+ calories a day, probably well over 3000 with the amount of exercise I do. It's still a foreign concept to me and one that I haven't fully embraced -- that of eating more to lose. We've been down this road at least 5 or 6 times over the last 17 months and still I have to step back and remind myself that I need to freakin' eat.

These last several months have been rough though. I haven't lost the weight I have wanted to lose and part of me thinks it might be related to the Protonix I am taking. I have read some anecdotal evidence that PPI's can cause weight gain and my weight loss slow down seems to have started soon after I got on the Protonix at the beginning of August. Since August 1st, I have only lost about 44 lbs, 44 in 6 months. That is way below my average of around 14-17 lbs per month. My other worry is that maybe my estrogen levels are low. Low estrogen has been associated with weight gain, as has been the direct opposite. Maybe I'm reaching here, but I just want to know that there aren't any factors working against me. I know I am getting smaller as I can wear things now that I couldn't merely a month ago, it's just that the scale continues to frustrate the heck out of me. I miss those days when on average I would lose 0.2 - 0.8 lbs a day, hell, even if it went up, it was temporary and it would eventually go right back down. If nothing else, I covet consistency. Anyway, on Monday, I have the dreaded GYN appointment. I am sooooo not looking forward to it, but it must be done. Hopefully all will be well.

It's all the things I can't implicitly control that give me grief, so many other factors to consider like the exercise and increase in muscle I mentioned earlier. Sometimes I wish things could be more formulaic. Do X, get Y. That would be sublime, but such is not the case, at least not in any simple sense. Maybe the solution (goal weight) is a far more complex equation and maybe I don't have all the knowledge, skills and discipline to figure all out just yet...YET. What's interesting though, you would think that I'd find myself more and more content with a more "lenient" goal weight, but truthfully, it makes me want to see that normal BMI more and more. I guess this is a long-winded way for me to say I'm impatient, damnit! LOL.

Tomorrow morning I have a tennis lesson, then I am going to try to get a little shopping done. The rest of the day will be relaxing. Sunday is all about the Super Bowl. For the record, I am rooting for the Giants, gotta root for the underdog, right?

Weird Dream

Every now and then I have these really vivid dreams that seem so real and seem to last a good while. Typically, they involve people from my life and often people from movies or TV shows, especially ones that I've seen a lot. Several years ago, I used to have really extensive X-Files related dreams when I was a big X-Files nerd, but they were never like I was in the middle of an episode or anything, it was always me just hanging out with the main characters or something like that. Anyway, last night, I dreamt it was graduation day which was weird because there were friends and acquaintances from both my high school and college days. There were tons of people around and everyone had cameras and camcorders and we're having our last hurrah. I distinctly remember putting my video camera down and I guess the plot of the dream was me searching for the camera so I'd be going around and having these little episodes with people, almost like sub dreams. Well, one of these episodes, for some strange reason, was with Eric Close from Without a Trace. He's certainly yummy, but I've never spent any great amount of time fawning over him or anything which makes the dream so weird. Anyway, all I remember is us sharing this passionate kiss and then the next thing I remember is seeing a friend from college and he has my video camera. Crazy, huh? I don't know what it all means, maybe my hormones are raging, I don't know, but me thinks it's time to seriously contemplate jumping in the dating pool. I'm hoping this Valentine's is my last one solo.

Yesterday, the PMS truck hit my business partner hard and by 7PM she was a crying mess. Sometimes I wonder if I have low estrogen or something, because I can't ever recall getting that emotional over really remedial stuff. I'm going to make a doctor's appointment with the Gynecologist today, not because of BP, but because that was one of my things for 2008. I've been dreading it like you would not believe. Anyway, I'll do it this morning as soon as I track down a female doc in the area. Fun.

13.2

Dr.'s appointment on Monday went well although I really need to stop getting nervous/anxious at those darn things because my blood pressure is always higher there. 120/68. Long story, short, I'm still on the bp meds, that's okay, I told her about the readings I took and she said that when I start having symptoms of low blood pressure to give her a ring and they'll check me again. She's very happy with my weight loss and anticipates that I'll be off the meds in 6 months. Good enough for me, I just don't want to get off of them, only to have to get back on again, so if it takes a little while longer, no problemo! I also got my blood drawn and almost had to choke the lab technician. She was having trouble finding a vein and was poking and digging around. Lucky for her it was MLK Jr. Day!

I actually got the results back from my labs this morning. All is well, especially my iron. My hemoglobin is up to 13.2. That's higher than it was pre-surgery! Serum Ferritin is 151 and Serum Iron is 57. My Total Serum Protein is 7.8 and my Albumin is 4.5, both higher than all my previous post-op labs. Yea!

I started Week 3 of my running program yesterday and Holy Mother!!! Not easy. Running for 3 straight minutes is harder than I thought, but I did it! I was certainly breathing heavy during the last 3 minutes, BUT (1) I finished every run (2) I did NOT need to stop and (3) afterwards, I was spent, but again, not overly exhausted. I've started eating a tad more carbs so I think that is helping some. I bought a loaf of Nature's Own Double Fiber Wheat Bread and have been having a slice every morning. Luckily it's not giving me any gas issues. I had to run in the freezing rain and that was NOT something I want to do often. I had to go because I couldn't run Monday as I had my appointment and I didn't want to push it off another day because of the weather so I went and got soaked to the bone. It took me a good hour to warm back up.

I weighed in this morning at 264.0 lbs. Cool! That is down 2.4 lbs over the last couple of days. Yea! Last night I went to see Cloverfield with a friend. It was a trip! I liked it, it won't be winning any Oscars, but it was a fun movie experience. I holy-crap'd and ohmigod my way through the last 2/3 of the movie. Tonight something a little less apocalyptic...I have a dinner meeting with the planning committee for our local Walk From Obesity and I'm excited to be a part of it. I've never planned anything like this before so it should be interesting. I don't remember when the actual Walk is, but I believe it is 5K. Good stuff.

Yeah, baby, yeah!!!

Start Weight: 516.6 lbs
Surgery Weight: 510.0 lbs
Current Weight: 266.4 lbs
Goal Weight: 199.8 lbs

TOTAL LOSS: 250.2 lbs!

Woo-hoo!!!! The light at the end of the tunnel gets brighter and brighter. 66.6 lbs to goal.

Yes, I am a happy camper this morning, needless to say!

So, I have an appointment with my PCP this morning so I have to keep this post short. Keep your fingers crossed that she will give me the okay to get off the blood pressure meds for good! I checked it three times this weekend and it ranged from 83/64 to 107/78. I'm also going to get labs done as well.

Hydrochlorothiazide and other ramblings

That would be a diuretic. Dr. (not the good one) Smith prescribed it for me. I went out this afternoon and filled the prescription today as well as getting a refill for my Protonix and Lisinopril. I will take it for awhile to see what the deal is. It's definitely one of those things that I don't need to take if I don't need it. I also got a month's worth of my chewable multivitamin and some Zinc. As soon as my order from Vitalady gets in, I'll be good to go with my amped up Vitamin A & D and my new iron supps.

I bought myself a gallon jug several days ago and I make sure I fill it up every night and drink the whole thing every day. It's actually not as much water as I thought or rather it's not as hard to get it all in as I once thought. I have a 24 oz plastic tumbler and I fill that thing like 5 times throughout the day and I'm good. Piece of cake.

For whatever reason early this morning, I was up promptly at 3:30 AM with unexplained and unexpected killer gas. Good grief. Every 5 minutes or so I was up headed to the bathroom. I never, EVER trust a fart so most of it was precautionary measures, some of it productive. I'm not sure if it was a backlog or what, but by 2:00 PM I was dragging and had to take a nap... I had to force myself up around 4:30 so that I could get something to eat otherwise I would have been out for awhile. I'm still a little foggy headed and I'm hoping to stay awake til like 11:00 PM. I hate putting my sleep patterns out of whack.

Good news. Chicken is kind to me again. Yes! Persistence pays off! I made a tray of drumsticks the other day and froze most of them in two-packs for easy retrieval. Tomorrow I am either going to do another pot of chili or a pot roast. I haven't decided yet.

More good news. I am comfortably in an XL t-shirt AND I've dropped 1/2 a shoe size. Boggles the mind. I am hoping with the diuretic that the bloating will depart and I'll be a tad smaller. We'll see.

When I left the house this morning, the day seemed so beautiful and clear and bright, it was envigorating. After a long drought with poor air quality, the recent rain storms seem to have washed the whole area in a certain freshness (as well as drop the temperature like 10 degrees), it's almost spring-like. I lingered in the sun to get some natural Vitamin D. It was so nice to feel the warmth on my face and breathe some genuinely fresh air.

Gonna do a couple loads of laundry tonight I think (and see if a football game is on). Maybe I'll continue to tackle the 600+ pictures I have to get through.

Talked to my sister yesterday, our niece who is due in December is having a girl. Woo-hoo! I think in the past 10 years or so, the boy to girl ratio has been around 6:1. It's about time we had another little miss in the bunch.

Oh yeah, I weighed in at 318.6 lbs this morning. Down 0.8 lbs.

McHellNo

Sigh. So I went to my doctor's appointment today and was disappointed. I really do not like Dr. (not Dennis) Smith and thankfully I don't have to deal with him on a regular basis. Ugh. What a tool and he was kinda gross! I won't get into the whole debacle but I could have just skipped the whole thing and just headed directly to the lab to get my blood drawn. That's the only thing I really cared about, hopefully the results will be in in a couple of days. On a positive note, my blood pressure was a perfect 120/80 and my heart rate was 50. Also, the lab tech practically had a coronary after seeing me, she didn't recognize me at first and was amazed at my progress. I tried hard not to blush too much. I've been going to them for at least like 5-6 years and they saw me often for a good while when I having issues with Lupus-like symptoms. Her reaction caught me off guard, but certainly made up for the crappy doctor's visit.

Curious...

So it turns out my appointment is this afternoon! I got a call from the Dr.'s office on my home voicemail which I never check and they said that the nurse practitioner that I was to meet with has left that office and I needed to reschedule with someone else. I called in this morning and said I could still come in today and that I would be meeting with a "Dr. Smith"...Are you thinkin' what I'm thinkin'? There's no way that this is "the" Dr. Smith, Dr. Dennis Smith, one of the absolute best DS surgeons in the world! It's got to be some other Dr. Smith. I was too foggy headed to ask if it was The Dr. Dennis Smith, but I seriously doubt a man of that caliber would be doing pickup duties ... right??? Anyway, I guess I will find out soon enough. If it is, he's gonna get a ton of questions from me, but again, I doubt it. Whatever Dr. Smith shows up, I am going to go over my endoscopy results and get my labs drawn. I'll let you know how it goes, but I will be shocked if it is The Dr. Smith.

Anyway, God, I love this time of year, football season. I love football, especially college football. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like I will be making it down to my alma mater for a game this year. Unless a few things unexpectedly fall into place, it doesn't look like it. Total bummer, but next year for sure. Starting late August through the end of the year, my Saturdays will be full. Typically I watch all games from the comfort of my house, but this year, I've made a commitment to watch games from my alma mater with my fellow intown alumni usually at some pub somewhere. I've been to one or two, but this year, I am going to them all -- must socialize.

My weight is still pretty level (310.8 lbs)which is aggravating, but I have been eating like crap -- old bad habits/sabotage. Luckily I realized what I was doing and put an end to it yesterday afternoon. It seems like whenever I get close to a milestone, in this case, my one year anniversary and getting close to twoterville, my brain stops functioning and I do dumb things. Yes, things I need to work on.

I have a couple of giant piles of clothes to sift through and then I am going to go through the process of getting rid of almost all of it. I am going to try to find the best place to give them away to, I know there are a lot of plus sized folks who could use them. I'm having a hard time getting rid of the stuff, a lot of those items have been with me for years and I guess it's just part of the process of me accepting the fact that I'll never wear those clothes again. I won't ever need to. Sometimes that is really hard to believe.

Drive By Post

Been kinda busy lately. More than usual. Got my results back from the endoscopy. Benign ulcer, negative for H. Pylori. Was told to keep taking the Protonix. Will do exactly that! Had cheese the last two days, no surprise that weight is up. Bummer. Oh well, back on track!

What's a fundus?

Apparently, I have an ulcer. The paperwork they gave me says the following:

During the procedure we found the following:
- Ulcer in the fundus (biopsy)
- Otherwise normal EGD to second part of the duodenum

Our recommendations are as follows:
- Resume taking your current medications
- Maintain a high fiber diet
- Call the office in seven days to obtain your biopsy reports
- PPI therapy and antibiotics if H. Pylori positive

The doc gave me a prescription for Protonix. I haven't had time nor the mental acumen to process all this right now -- I am surprisingly (at least to me) sleepy and am going to take it easy and see how many protein drinks I can swallow in the next 2-3 hours. I am starving. More coherent thoughts tomorrow.

Thanks to all who have been thinking about me!

Shit.

So, I go to the gastroenterologist's office this afternoon and give him the rundown. I told him about Brazil and he seemed very interested in the whole thing even to go so far as to ask me how much the whole she-bang cost. Anyway, I told him what my symptoms were and he poked around some and said that he wasn't sure exactly what the issue is but he's scheduling me for an endoscopy and his scheduler will give me a call to set that up. Ugh. Something is definitely going on and it's much different than my issues at the end of May/beginning of June. Since yesterday, eating solid food is rough. I mean it hurts. I can actually feel it, this started after I was eating ham yesterday so I cut dinner in half and finished the day off with a protein shake. This morning I had a protein shake which was a little rough going down, but actually not that bad so later that morning I figured how bad could scrambled eggs be. Geez! The first bite felt like I was swallowing a rock but subsequent bites went down alright although I was only able to eat 2/3 of it and that has been the only solid food I have had today. It kinda feels like whatever I ate yesterday is slowly making it's way through my system and leaving irritated bowels along the way. And let's not talk about the burping... It's been protein drinks since the scrambled egg fiasco for me. It's weird because it's always the first bite or drink that is the most uncomfortable and then things are okay, but I am filling up way faster than normal. Good grief... and then, of course, my poop pattern changes. No 10:30-11:30 AM poop, so that's not good. AND to top it all off, weighed in at 312.8 lbs this morning.

I'm not sure what triggered all this, maybe the ham is stuck or something. The doc suggested bland soft foods for the next few days. That really translates to lots and lots of protein drinks. Or I have to regress back to my first post-op days and do the dreaded pureed food deal. Boooooooo. Hissssss. Boooooooo.

Oh well, if that is the case then I'm inclined to go get myself some grits and mashed potatoes and have at it. Getting in the protein won't be a problem, 5 shakes and I am there, but the calories will definitely be.

Sigh. Oh well, just another little bump in the road.

Yawnfest 2007

I've been dreading broaching this subject just because what I think I want is not what I know a lot of people don't want to hear from me... I don't ...really ... like ... my job ... that much anymore. It's in the city, the location is great, I've some cool people, it's nice to be out and about, but out of the 40 hours in any given week, I am doing actual work for maybe 8-10which means the majority of my time is spent doing not zip, zero... nada. I am bored and I HATE being bored. Believe you me, I have tried all kinds of stuff, from asking my supervisors to walking around to see if anyone needs help, from reading the company intranet I don't know how many times to just sitting there trying not to spend too much time surfin' the net. I'm not sure what to do and the powers that be don't seem to be concerned at all. The nature of my job is feast or famine, but good grief, I don't see it changing anytime soon and I don't know if I want to keep doing this. As luck would have it, things with my business are getting more interesting...I haven't been full time with it since February and had always looked at the time away as just a break and maybe not something fulltime. I don't know, there are pros and cons to either situation. New job is in town, lots of folks my same age, education and experience, but the commute sucks, the work is boring and I don't necessarily see myself learning much of anything any time soon. My business is challenging at times, I get to work from home and my time is my own (if I want to work from 4pm to midnight, I can), but BP gets on my nerves a lot, I wouldn't be taking home as much money and ... it can be isolating. I'm not sure what to do. The whole "my time is my own" thing is quite compelling for me, turns out my friend is getting married and Barbados and my best friend and I are planning on making it a week long vacation, then there's the trip to Savannah in August, my alma mater in September, St. Louis in November and home to Texas for Christmas. I am going to sleep on it for a couple of weeks and make a decision.

Tomorrow I have my appointment with the gastroenterologist. Things seem to be normal for the past couple of weeks although since yesterday, I've noticed my poop has been a medium grey color and I have been having a little stomach discomfort so I will bring that up. I have the hiccups and it feels like my food is stuck at the top of my stomach, almost like a good strong hiccup will bring it all up.... I also sometimes get a little lightheaded if I get up real quick, but that could mean I should visit my PCP in regard to my blood pressure meds, it may be time to get off them completely. Ugh. I am bringing all my medical info from the past year with me so that he will be well-informed. If I had a "before" picture, I'd bring it with me. I will let y'all know how it goes.

I weighed in at 310.8 lbs this morning so the steady loss continues. Woo-hoo! Incremental progress ... that's all I ever wanted!

Wouldn't you know it...

So it's been Poopfest 2007 this morning and wonder of all wonders, I finally ended up weighing in at 331.4 lbs this morning. Sigh. Dr.'s appointment is this afternoon and I anticipate frustrating the heck out of her...this ain't gonna be a 10 minute in and out kind of thing...We'll see how it goes.