Four Weeks

It's been four weeks today since my surgery. I weighed in at 237 this morning - 16 pounds lost since Jan. 4th and 29 since October. Yayyyy! I ordered a new pair of jeans as one of my pairs is getting way too big, so that's kind of exciting.

It's been exhausting around here yesterday and today, so I'm pooped and going to bed. G'night, all.

FREEZIN FEBRUARY CHALLENGE

Happy February, people! This week's challenge starts Monday, Feb. 1st and ends Friday, Feb. 5th. The details: Everyone must commit to at least 20 minutes of exercise per day, every day. Any kind of exercise counts, walking or zumba or elliptical or whatever. Whoever accumulates the most minutes wins the challenge, although we'll all end the week victorious.

So far, this challenge includes Cara, Barbara, Jen, Yana, Jennifer, Vanessa and me. If anyone else wants to join, please do. The more, the merrier.

When you've completed your exercise for the day, update me with your info on that day's post here.

Looking forward to getting moving with you!

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In other news, something strange happened today. I wasn't much interested in food. At all. It was kind of that way later in the day yesterday too. I have to think hormones are involved here somewhere, because my cravings fell off a cliff. Boom, just like someone flicked a switch.

I'm not going to overanalyze. I'm happy with it. Scale is holding steady (it took back those three pounds and apologized for the misunderstanding). I ate really well today. Didn't exercise, though - the challenge will light a fire under my lazy butt.

The party last night was great - awesome reggae band, good wine, nice people. Judging from the showing at the party, it's amazing to me how many men have Hawaiian shirts in the back of their closets. Especially in New England. My husband (who has two, and trust me, he's not exactly good-time Charlie) claims that every gentleman should have at least one Hawaiian shirt and a tuxedo in his wardrobe. There's something to ponder.

The whole point of mentioning the party was to say, I did awesome with the food. I had a turkey and cheese roll-up before we left the house, and then had three appetizer-size crabcakes. I did also have two large glasses of pinot noir, so it wasn't a fantastic *calorie intake* day. But at least I didn't pile tons of food on top of the wine. Baby steps, right?

Cara, GOOD LUCK starting your course this week. You will be brilliant! Be sure to let us know how it all goes.

Bandster Hell and CHALLENGE

I'm in it. Not so much that I'm having cravings, more that as soon as I have one I tend to indulge it. My daily calories are still in the 900-1300 range, but inching up. First fill: Feb. 10th.

I need to get my act together. I was doing so well, and now I guess I'm realizing that I can eat more (although I do have a little restriction, I can definitely tell when I eat too fast or don't chew well enough).

I'm just going to take this meal by meal. The past two days I haven't done so well with logging every bite. Need to start doing that again.

We have a party to go to tonight - a Hawaiian theme. Of course I do not have a single cute resort-y dress to wear, so I'm wearing all black and buying a few leis from the local party store. Ay yi yi.

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It seems like we have some takers on the CHALLENGE. Let's say everyone will do a minimum of 20 minutes each day from Monday-Friday, but keep track of your total minutes so we can see who takes the prize! Challenge starts Monday, Feb. 1st and ends 11.59 pm on Friday.

Comment here to let me know you're in, and then each day as you finish, comment on that day's post to let us know how you're doing.

GOOD LUCK!

My Dearest, Darling Scale

You tell me I weigh three pounds more today than I did yesterday. Really? Really? Because while I did have the munchies last night and may have knocked off a couple handfuls of Sun Chips, a slice of American cheese and about 12 M&Ms, I am pretty sure I didn't consume the 10,500 additional calories necessary to gain three pounds overnight.

So bite me.

Drink Lots! (But Not During Meals)

Eating without drinking was one of the things I most dreaded about getting this band. I used to drink A LOT of water with my meals. It's been a real adjustment to not have a glass in front of me while I eat. And I'm having trouble remembering to drink at other times, so sometimes I get to the evening and realize I've had about 10 ounces all day. Not ideal.

But the no-drinking-while-eating seems to be one of the most effective band rules, so I'm taking it seriously and sticking with it. I'm sure I'll get used to it at some point. Eating protein first doesn't seem to be a particular challenge, but for some reason I'm nervous about most vegetables. Avocados are my friends right now and I've had cherry tomatoes a few times. But I haven't ventured out beyond that yet.

In other news, I'm reading Game Change, about the 2008 presidential election. It was a birthday gift, and let me tell you - it's awesome. It reads like a gossipy tabloid (how can it not when we're talking about John Edwards, Bill and Hillary and the Palins?) but it makes the reader look like an intellectual because it's about the election. WIN WIN, people.

I'm also reading Push for my book club. It's the book that the movie Precious (haven't seen it) was based on. You know - illiterate 16-year-old tries to better herself while pregnant with her second baby by her father and then finds out she's HIV positive. Kind of a downer. I was dreading reading it but book club is Sunday night and they always have good wine so I figured I better get moving. It's unbelievable, the abuse in it is so horrible. I'd NEVER read it on my own, which is the whole point of a book club I guess (other than the wine). But it really is compelling. I'm only about 1/3 of the way through it, so I will suspend further judgment until I'm done.

Vanessa over at Dinnerland got my lazy ass on the move with a five-day challenge to walk/move/exercise for at least 20 minutes a day. Anyone want to do another challenge with me? Let me know and I'll set it up. (And by 'set it up,' I mean I'll mention it in the next post.)

Confession of a Celebrity Gossip Junkie; and Question of the Day

I seem to be taking a page from Vanessa's book; I woke up at 3.30 am and so far haven't been able to go back to sleep. But I haven't snacked at all, so go me!

Getting back on the wagon yesterday was at times challenging but I'm proud to report that I did well. I avoided the leftover birthday cake and my husband is taking the rest of it into the office. So it's gone. And good riddance, you horrid package of delicious temptation!

I got in my 20 minutes of walking yesterday (Tues) and plan to do 20 minutes on the elliptical later today. I used to have a firm rule that I could only read my two favorite magazines, New York and Vanity Fair, when I was on the elliptical. It made me more likely to hop on so I could get through the latest bits of salacious gossip. Full disclosure: I was a "serious" newspaper reporter, I've been on staff at newspapers in Florida and Maryland, and spent a couple years editing and reporting for the Wall Street Journal Online. Most recently, I was writing occasionally for the New York Times. Then I got preggers, had my third baby in May and life got in the way.

Anyway, the point here is despite my 'serious news' bent, I LOVE trashy celebrity gossip. LOVE LOVE LOVE. I can give you the full Brad/Jen/Angelina timeline without pausing for a breath, but I haven't cracked a page of the health care legislation. So that no-reading-gossip-unless-I'm-on-the-elliptical rule was fairly effective. I might have to reinstate it.

Question of the Day: My LoseIt! app automatically adds however many exercise calories I've burned into my daily calorie allowance. Do you use these calories, or do you stick to your planned intake? Any thoughts on best strategies here?

Back on the Wagon

I wouldn't say I went hog-wild yesterday for my birthday. But I wouldn't say I was a model bandster either; somewhere in between. Oddly, the scale was down a bit today although it was either half a pound, one pound or one and a half pounds. Ah, I do love my scale. So I haven't changed the ticker. We'll see what the verdict is for tomorrow.

I am firmly back on the wagon today; so far I've had some decaf tea, two soft-boiled eggs and half a mushed-up avocado with a little salt. Plus I walked for 20 minutes and I'm thinking I may do some more walking while the older son is at swim practice.

Thanks for the birthday wishes. It was a great, relaxing day. I had a mani/pedi and the boys got me a new label maker. What else could a mom ask for? They also, with the hubs' help, made me a cake. (See above.) I am saving pieces for their dessert tonight and then getting rid of the rest of the cake. It torments me.

Glad some of you enjoyed the book reviews; most of those books are geared toward people thinking about having the surgery so they may not be helpful to those of us already banded. But it's information I would have liked to have when I was researching so I figured I'd post it for anyone still in the researching phase.

Enjoy the day - the monsoon we had yesterday is gone, replaced with a patchy blue sky and mild temps. Yay for that!

Birthday Gift and Book Reviews

The scale took pity on me and threw me a bone for my 37th birthday today. I'm down a half pound after seven days of wailing and gnashing teeth.

Today also marks three weeks since my surgery. Putting things in perspective (not a strength of mine), losing 13.5 pounds in three weeks is nothing to sneeze at. Look, I just ended a sentence with a preposition. Let's pretend that didn't happen.

Anyway, I will continue to plug away until my first fill on Feb. 10th and hope that the scale continues to move. My husband says when you've lost a lot of weight in a short period of time, your metabolism slows dramatically and then finds a new balance so you can continue to lose. Also, my period is due in the next week or so, and I've read that women often lose less in the two weeks before their period. Something to do with hormones controlling the force with which food is pushed through the digestive system.

And now, BOOK REVIEW TIME!

I've read four books on weight-loss surgery and banding. They range from really excellent to abysmal.

1. Fighting Weight: How I Achieved Healthy Weight Loss With "Banding" by Khaliah Ali

This is far and away the best book on lap-band I've read. Khaliah Ali is a daughter of the fighting great Muhammad Ali, and she struggled mightily with her weight until she was banded a few years ago. The book combines Ali's memoir of her experiences as an obese single mother and her decision to have surgery with great information from her doctors. The surgeons, George Fielding and Christine Ren of NYU, are the rock stars of banding and WLS in general (and also the doctors of several here in our blogging community). Interspersed throughout the book are sections written by the doctors, covering everything from finding the right doctor and getting insurance coverage to handling social situations and eating in restaurants post-band. Their information is fantastic, and I've found myself going back to this book many many times in the last few months to re-read sections. I highly recommend this one.

2. Weight Loss Surgery for Dummies by Marina Kurian et al.

This book, like most in the Dummies series, is a great resource for those who don't know much about the subject. It covers most of the available procedures, including banding, bypass and duodenal switch (but not the gastric sleeve, as the book was published in 2005). For people trying to decide which surgery will work for them, this explains the procedures and gives a list of pros and cons to each. Marina Kurian is another rock-star surgeon in the weight-loss world - she operated on Al Roker and Star Jones (both bypass patients). At the time the book was published, Kurian was still at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City. She has since left to join NYU and now practices with Drs. Fielding and Ren. The book offers some recipes for post-surgery cooking, which are somewhat helpful but are not specific to band patients. Bypass and band post-op diets are not identical, so this can be a bit confusing. The book is also a little out of date and could use a revision and updating, but it generally gives a good overall picture of the options available and explanations of each.

3. Before and After, Revised Edition: Living and Eating Well After Weight-Loss Surgery by Susan Maria Leach

Susan Maria Leach had gastric bypass surgery, and this book combines a memoir with 135 recipes for weight-loss patients. Before and After was recommended to me by someone in my support group, but I have to say I didn't find it very satisfying. Leach mentions banding once or twice, but the book is completely geared toward bypass patients. While band patients have some similar experiences starting out and at goal weight with bypass patients, the process is pretty different. I haven't tried the recipes, but they do look delicious. Leach's book is great for someone getting a bypass but definitely not a must-read for band patients.

4. Outpatient Weight-Loss Surgery by Kent Sasse

If you know anything at all about weight loss surgery and banding - if you've been to an info session or read a few blogs - this book is useless. The last 80 pages are appendices with charts and graphs, and notes citing other sources. The first 220 pages have the widest margins I have ever seen in a published book. And the whole thing is double-spaced. It reminded me of nothing so much as one of my college term papers, desperately trying to stretch three pages of material to 10 pages. The content is basic in the extreme. I don't recommend this one at all, I found it to be a waste of time and money.

That's it for now. If you've read a book you liked or didn't, please post in the comments. I'd love to hear what everyone thinks. Stay well!

5-Day Challenge

For the record, I did my 20 minutes of walking today, Vanessa. It was a crappy day to walk outside and I didn't feel like it but I did 20 minutes on the treadmill. I definitely wouldn't have done it if not for the challenge, so thank you!

Sticky Scale

ARGH.

That should sum it up. The scale continues to read 240, despite mixing up my calorie intake (but still hovering in the 800-1100 calorie range every day) and walking for an hour yesterday. Boy, is this frustrating. I know people don't always lose at this point, but I figured that was because they didn't have good restriction yet so they were eating things they shouldn't or more than they should.

I AM BEING A DREAM BANDER AND I STILL HAVEN'T LOST WEIGHT IN SIX DAYS.

There. I said it. Let me tell you, I have rarely kept to a diet. But I am following all the rules here and I'm stuck in the same spot. It's too early for a plateau, isn't it?

Otherwise, things are going well. I made a delicious scallop recipe from Sally last night. My in-laws were here, and everyone loved it! I served the scallops over a bed of spinach. I was able to eat two scallops and eight or nine very small bites of spinach. Delicious. Thanks Sally!

I am getting a few of my lap-band books together and will be writing a post reviewing each one. Some of them are terrible, and some are awesome. Stay tuned...