Victory: Water, weight and waiting

I admitted defeat a few days ago without even realizing it. I said I could never follow all the water rules without a 12-step program. After one of my surgeries this year, swallowing and swelling were dual conflicts for me. I started regular “sipping” with meals to keep food from getting stuck and later it turned into fairly heavy drinking with meals; especially when eating out.

I never went back to the “no drinking with meals” rule and I could no longer justify all my reasons to ignore the instructions. Dr. Mark Hausmann once explained that drinking with meals leads to more overeating because the water helps to wash food out of the stomach at a faster rate and results in a delay in that “full feeling.” I have a lot of trust in Dr. Hausmann, but I always thought my swelling and wound issues made me unique and maybe a little liquid would keep me from getting sick while eating. Well, I still get sick sipping water at times so I decided to score this debate: Hausmann – 1; Spencer – 0.

I decided to follow Nike’s advice and “just do it.” Instead of sipping water with my meals for the last two days, I’ve concentrated on thorough chewing and smaller bites. Results: No productive burps or pain from stuck food. Even my pork chops went down with comfort – slow, but comfortable. I’ve also waited an hour or more after the meal to drink my tiny 24 oz. glass of water.

Instead of 8 glasses of water, I’ve turned my water consumption up to 80 - 100 ounces a day. Considering the fact that most super-size drinks are at least 32 oz. it doesn’t seem to be a lot to exceed 64 ounces which is the recommendation for someone at a normal weight.

I’m starting my day with 30+ grams of protein and trying to get another 40-50 between the next two meals. Milk, yogurt and cheese make this easy without adding too many carbs.

My restart efforts have been rewarded – THE SCALE MOVED!!

As of this morning, I seem to have lost about half of my hurricane weight gain. My goal is to have the excess gone before I get fill in about two weeks. I think by simply revisiting the weight loss surgery basics I can be back on the band wagon. Now that’s something I’ll (in an hour and a half) drink to!

Keeping Score on My Restarting Efforts

Rome wasn’t built in a day and my empire is no exception to the ‘time and patience’ rule. I hit the restart button on my weight loss efforts and the last couple of days have been a combination of tries and trial-and-error.

Nothing I ate yesterday stayed down. Oh, well. I will call that day errors. Mild cheddar over garlic triscuit crackers – yacked. Too much fiber consumed too fast. Fresh-herb baked chicken breast with stuffed portabellos – half yacked. I learned. I’m eating the right things, but not concentrating on chewing slowly and big chunks become, well, blown chunks. (Excuse the graphic nature of this post) After things settled down, I returned to my cold chicken and spinach-stuffed portabello. It wasn’t too bad chewed to death.

Rule No. 1 – Eat protein first and eat slowly and carefully. Funny thing is that only goes for healthy food. I could eat Orioles and Rocky Road ice cream at the speed of light. Yes, that’s weird. I don’t make the rules; I just break them and later beg mercy from the lap band gods.

Today, I started my day with my weight loss special breakfast – Oatmeal Yogurt Crunch. Ok, that’s a long, corny name. The night before, I mixed 2 cups of plain, fat free yogurt with 1 cup of plain rolled oats. To that mixture, I fold a can each of pineapples and mandarin oranges. After the oatmeal softens, I mix in a half cup of slivered almonds. I add a scoop of vanilla flavored protein powder to each serving. I estimate that it has about 230 calories and more than 20 grams of protein. Quite filling and it gives me a good head start to getting 60-80 grams.

Rule No. 2 – Limit carbohydrates within a high-protein diet. I try to get my protein from solid protein instead of shakes, but I still use Juice Plus as a vitamin and protein supplement.

I got some exercise. I walked two miles to a convenience store to get milk for my little girl and myself. Not impressed? I left at 2:30 p.m. (in Louisiana!) pulling my nearly-40 pound toddler in her Little Tykes wagon built for two. Ya gotta see this thing. It’s got a door, two seats and cup holders. On the trip back with a bag of groceries, I drank half the water and splashed the rest on our faces. “Mommy, my face is crying,” she complained. I guess the ungrateful little tot would prefer spontaneous combustion.

Rule No. 3 – Exercise at least 30 minutes a day. I dragged my earthly remains home at 4 p.m.

I’m a heavy drinker (of water), so this routine didn’t change much for me. It’s very hard for me to drink less than 16 ounces at a time. It truly is hard for me not to drink with meals and I do think this is a big part of weight loss surgery success or failure. I’ve gotten it down to only sipping with meals and when I do abstain from water with meals, I never can wait an hour before having a large glass of water. Shame shame.

Rule No. 4 – Drink at least eight glasses of water a day with no drinking during meals and ‘something’ about an hour before meals and ‘something else’ about an hour and a half afterwards. I drank 80 ounces of water today and I will aim for 100 ounces. The rest of the water rules will not be achieved without a 12-step program.

My day ended with a horrible headache from the hot walk. Dinner was shrimp Alfredo over Dreamfields low-carb pasta and leftover spinach-stuffed portabello. This low carb pasta is out of sight and it has 7 grams of protein per serving with only 5 net carbs. I estimate the pasta, shrimp and mushroom dinner had more than 40 grams of protein. I think there was about three different types of cheese in those ingredients and cheese=protein!

I have the end-of-the-night-munchies. Watching my toddler and husband snack on about 5 different things hasn’t been easy, but only because I have to fetch snacks and clean up the messes that they leave. I’m thinking of ending my day with a large cup of sugar-free Nestle’s Quick with milk. 10 grams of protein, here we come!

Time to Hit the Restart Button

Time to Hit the Restart Button

It’s early October 2005 and it’s time to hit the old “restart button.” I’m really kinda calm at this moment and I don’t know if I don’t care about my weight gain or I’m just so numb from weeks of living in South Louisiana.

I put the scale in a corner the week before Hurricane Katrina hit and took it out after my family left to return to my hometown that was “ripped a new one” by Hurricane Rita. I call this period of my life LaKarita!

During LaKarita, I gained around 10 pounds. I’ve taken no vitamins. I’ve mixed no shakes. My exercise included walking down a dark highway with my baby in a wagon to find a way out of my energy-starved subdivision the night after Katrina hit. I also pushed my car a lot. It started dying Katrina morn and has been in a shop through the end of the Rita evacuation.

I didn’t cook much during Hurricane Katrina, but for the two weeks of mandatory evacuation of my hometown, we were nine deep in my house. Yes, nine people, two cats and a dog for more than two weeks. Ya know, I think it was fun. We had to shop for groceries everyday and I think we have stock in Wal-Mart now.

Cooking for nine people can be fun, but the challenge to find what would make the “majority” happy got difficult. To add to the challenge, five of the nine were diabetics. Not five old people either. Our diabetics ranged 17, 35, 38, 67 and 69. My 17-year-old niece and I have been insulin dependent and the other three are and will always be daily insulin takers.

The weight loss efforts felt victim to the following:

Bread and starches – we stopped eating bread in my house, but daily bread and rice is the Louisiana way of life.
Sugar – I fought the soda every step of the way, but I treated the gang to bakery cakes and a big Baskin Robbins run just to keep morale up and tensions down. I also learned that teens and snacks go hand in hand.
Stress – Ok, I may act like Wonder Woman, but this stuff got difficult. I got new meds post-Katrina and I think it helped me stay calm with nine people in my house (2 cats and a dog). I don’t think I’m an emotional eater because some yummy comfort food just made me sicker. My stress hives make me look like I’ve taken a lashing with a bull whip.
Exercise – Hmm, what is this exercise? I guess marathons of the Weather Channel don’t count.

Some great things happened while I gained those 10 pounds:
Grilling – I have some new grilling secrets. Who needs electricity if you have a BBQ pit. Will grilled everything short of the (2 cats and a dog) and that practice will serve us well. After the lights came back on we kept grilling because it helped cool the house.
I cook therefore I am – There’s no place to easily take nine people out to dinner. We had to cook, plan meals and cook.
Peace of mind – I never wondered where my sick and elderly family members were. We were together. Being the youngest of the family, it felt good to know that I could step up and be everything to my parents. LaKarita taught us a lot.

So, I’m hitting the restart button. Eight or more glasses of water, limit sugar and carbohydrates, 60-80 grams of protein a day and EXERCISE WILL YA!

The lap band surgery is adjustable and I’m sure I need an adjustment called a fill. My first 13 months, I’ve had only one ½ cc fill. I’m afraid of getting too much restriction because I get nervous, eat fast and get “sick.” I’ll have to concentrate and take it slow.

It’s been a little over a year and I’ve lost a considerable amount of weight. I know it could be a lot more, but considering the year it’s been, I chose to give myself some grace instead of lamenting. I still weigh less than 300 pounds and I believe with time and hard work, I can weigh less than 200 pounds.

Mark your calendars, it all starts NOW!

Preparing for Year Anniversary

Time flies when you're.... (hmm), yup, time sure does fly!I have my one-year visit tomorrow (Monday) with SupaDoc Karl LeBlanc. Some of you who have followed me for a year have both my appreciation and sympathy. I don't know if I'm disappointed with my weight loss or just glad to make it to this point with no medical attachments.I'm going to gather all my stats and write my own analysis of the year taking into account unresolved gyn problems and recurrent hernia operations. I expected to be farther along (I'm around 75 pounds), but I didn't factor in those 5 other surgeries and the never-ending fight to convince a gyn to do what would have been the seventh. My next post should be a novelette (reader’s beware!)I also never expected to encounter such warm, supportive families in my cyber world of this blog and at www.obestityhelp.com and my every-day physical contacts.  What a beautiful, expected treat you all are.Onward,Frances