A Little Shopping

Hellllo blogworld! I got a haircut yesterday, and since I *rarely* blow my hair dry, I'm going to post a photo from last night.Which was taken in a bathroom with really harsh lighting. Sigh. Aging is so sad.

Anyway, the hair:

This morning I did a little shopping with the munchkin. Not as much as I would have liked, but those 17-month-olds do what they want, ya know?

My winter jacket from last year is wayyyy too big. I have a nice black dress coat circa 2007 that fits well now, but I needed a warm winter jacket. So I found a really pretty pearly-white one today. A regular XL! Plus, it's cozy. Win-win. (The hair didn't hold up so well, but I enjoyed it while it lasted.)

I also tried on a 16W purple velvet blazer (prettier in person than it sounds in writing), which was too big. Then I tried the 14W. Guess what, blog friends? Also kind of loose. Exciting.

Then I pushed my luck and tried a size 14P Calvin Klein skirt. HA. That was a reminder of the work ahead.

This latest fill, just a smidge (0.1 cc's to be exact), seems to be working nicely. I do feel more restriction and I've been looking for food less frequently. Plus, the scale is slowly moving down again, which is a nice change and a sign of good things to come.

Before I had my band surgery, I was obsessed with what I wouldn't be able to eat anymore. I asked everyone and got a wide range of answers. What I didn't realize was that what you can or can't eat is entirely dependent on how much fluid you have in your band. That seems pretty obvious now, but for some reason it didn't occur to me for a while. At 5+ cc's, I can't really eat pasta. Maybe one bite, but for the most part I don't care enough to try it. Sometimes I surprise myself, though. Even where I am now, at 5.6 cc's, I had a small portion of butternut squash risotto for dinner the other night. I added extra chicken stock to my portion so it would be soupier. It was delicious, I didn't "miss out" on anything and my band did its job by keeping my portion in check.

However.

The one thing that I don't think will work at all with my band is anything doughy. I haven't tried, because the misery of sliming and throwing up isn't worth the risk for me. But I know that I will likely never eat another Philadelphia soft pretzel. Or those doughy cinnamon buns with frosting.

For the most part, I really don't miss it. Once in a while I may have a three-second pity party, but then I glance in a mirror and recover pretty quickly.

We have a couple of dinners planned in New York City this month (both with the Hubs' colleagues), and I'm not too worried about having any problems.

If my restriction stays consistent (I know, that's the tricky part) then I think I'll be able to enjoy my meals without fear of ralphing in front of a bathroom attendant. One of the dinners is at Per Se, which is supposed to be over-the-top delicious. Per Se is famous for its amazing brioche. Ain't no way that will go down, so that's a teeny bit sad. I predict I'll get over it.

But, yummm, doesn't that look like some buttery deliciousness?