Scale Drama

I have been doing Atkins since February 26th.

The first week and a half I lost 10 lbs. I was so stoked and excited about my weight loss, and felt really good about myself for doing so well. I worked really hard on eating right, eating often, and exercising. I counted my carbs and calories every day, ate my veggies and lean protein. I decided the next Friday that since I had done so well, and since I still had three more weeks to lose 5 lbs, that I deserved a cheat day.

Nate and I went to our bar we always go to for Trivia night. I had a no carb drink- dirty martini

(yum yum)
They had a special on the board for seafood ravioli with grilled shrimp.


I wanted it, so I got it. Keep in mind, I hadn’t had pasta or anything like that in a week and a half.

When it came out, I had three large ravioli stuffed with seafood, a cream sauce, and grilled shrimp. As far as a carb meal, it wasn’t that bad, as there wasn’t much “noodle” to eat. I also had a few bites of the garlic bread because… well it’s fucking garlic bread and it’s amazing.

I felt SO sick after I ate it. I don’t know if it was the carbs, the cream sauce, the seafood, the drink, or a combo of some/all of those, but I thought I was going to get sick. Knowing what happens to me when I get sick
(Please see http://mybigfatsurgery.blogspot.com/2014/11/endoscopy.html to read about my broken blood vessels)
I really did not want to do that. So I suffered through that night, ate tums, and hoped it would go away by morning.
Well, it didn’t really. I felt a little icky all day, and barely ate.

I really screwed myself for the rest of the week, apparently, because I did not lose a POUND for the next week. I have been so frustrated with myself, I haven’t cheated since then, but the scale hasn’t moved. Oh no wait, I lied. I GAINED two lbs. I swear my scale is plotting against me.

So this week, I haven’t stepped on the scale. My friend Meaghan told me not to weigh myself until Friday, and that she PROMISES that if I do that (and continue to work hard and stick to my diet) that I’ll drop 5 lbs. I am skeptacle, but I am going to do it.
I do think it is finally working, because today my jeans that are usually tight, were not so tight. I may even go home and put on a pair of jeans that are a smaller size then what I usually wear, just to see if they will button.

I am very stressed out about this, because if I don’t lose this weight, then I have to hear a lecture from Dr. Asshole, and then I’ll have to wait ANOTHER month to get my date.
And why the hell wouldn’t I be losing weight? I literally eat meat and veggies ALL DAY LONG. This is the easiest/hardest diet I have gone on, because everything I know about health and wellness is down the tubes right now. I know how to be healthy and eat healthy, which is why I want to have the surgery. I know I can be successful after I have a jump start. I know how to do it. But being on a “diet” is where I get fucked up. I know whats healthy, and I just want to be able to do that in my lifestyle.

It’s times like these that my qualms about the surgery go away.

In other very good news, a very good friend who is doing this journey with me got her surgery date today. I am so excited for her to start this amazing transformation!

Make Time

This post is about my Psych Eval- 1st appointment and then the follow up

This is the first appointment in this whole process I actually enjoyed.

Dr. Wardle is a very nice woman in her 60’s, she is calm and very interesting. She is a classically trained chef, and has more cookbooks in her house then I have ever seen. We met at her home office this morning and had a nice chat.

She started out by telling me a few stories of past patients going through bariatric surgery, to kind of show me what not to do. She told me about a man who decided he knew better about his body then his doctors after having a gastric bypass. He ate an entire sub sandwich, and it ended up rupturing his stomach and he died. There was a woman who was having the surgery because her husband told her he would leave her if she didn’t. And of course the stories of people thinking this was going to be a magic wand and POOF they’d be thin and perfect and then their lives would be perfect.

I felt in the beginning of this appointment, as I do with most of my appointments, that the doctors go into these appointments thinking people have no idea about this surgery, and they treat every patient like they are dumb. I have done a lot of research, I have two very close people in my life that have had the surgery, and I know a lot about it. I also have a very good friend who is doing this process with me, and I have learned a lot from her as well. I want to just tell them right off the bat; I know it isn’t a magic wand, I know my life isn’t going to be perfect when I lose weight, I know I am going to have to work hard and change my entire life. Why would I go though all this bullshit if I didn’t know that? This has been the most aggravating, stressful process I have ever had to go through, and I do NOT want to go through it again. I don’t understand the people who don’t take this seriously, and why they are even approved if they don’t know what this means to have this surgery.

Then she starts asking me about myself. I tell her about Nate, and my mom, and my good friend Meaghan. We go over some of my previous attempts at losing weight, and how I felt when I lost a lot of weight. She called me out on something that I know of myself, but I never thought it was something that could sabotage my surgery. She told me that I make excuses about being too busy. She said, “You just need to make the time. Everyone has the same amount of hours in the day, you just have to use yours differently to make what is important the top of the list.”

I really heard that. I know I procrastinate-that is my biggest flaw. I have always said, if I had a magically genie and he granted me one wish, it would be that I wasn’t a procrastinator any longer. I could be in the job I really want/love, I may be a bit thinner, and I’d be successful. I put things off and say I am too busy, and I really do hate that about myself- but I am really glad she called me out on it. It really made me take a look at my life and I see the excuses for not exercising or not eating right. I don’t want to make those anymore. I want to go to the gym even if I worked until 7:00. I want to make myself a healthy lunch every day even if I have to stay up late or get up early. I want my life to change.

I am done making excuses.

I will make time.



Follow up:
Again, I really enjoyed Dr. Wardle. She went over briefly what we talked about in our previous session, and she wrote up my approval letter to send to Dr. Trevedi, my surgeon. In a nutshell, she said that I am a passionate person and am perfect for this surgery. I have done a lot of research and I understand that this is going to be a lifestyle change and not a “magic wand.” She feels that I am going to be very successful with this surgery based on my attitude, support, and knowledge. In her closing, she stated how pleased she was to recommend such a deserving person. I really felt good about my appointment with her, and it gave me the strength to realize that I can do this, and I will be successful at it.
Since I spoke with her the first time, I have made an effort to make time for the things that are important. Right now, those things are making my breakfast and lunch. Some days are better then others, but I am goin to continue to work on myself, and not just my outward appearance

I am feeling really good

Tomorrow I have an appointment with the dietician, so hopefully she can give me some good tips about eating right!

I want BREAD!

So after meeting with my “Nutritionist” and having an AMAZING Birthday weekend in Lake Placid with Nate- I had to decide on how I was going to start losing this 15-25 lbs that Lemanski wants me to lose.

Now keep in mind, since January 6th I have been eating whatever I want. Literally, whatever. Bread, dessert, deep fried, cream sauces, you name it. It has been wonderful and horrible all at the same time. I’ve felt like complete shit, so I was kind of looking forward to eating healthy and not feeling like this anymore.

Lemanski gave me a diet to follow, in which I looked at and rejected. I pretty much wouldn’t eat anything in the diet he gave me. So I started looking into the best way to lose weight. After many pros and cons, I decided on Atkins- I don’t have to portion very much, I just stick to a food list, count my carbs, and I will lose weight fast.

I went grocery shopping and made a list of meals I was going to make. It was a lot more difficult then I thought after going through the list, as I cannot have carrots, a few other veggies I love because of carb content, and the worst thing of all, milk. I can’t drink milk. Those of you who know me, know this is a big issue. Pretty much the only thing I drink is water and milk. I was very upset, but I figure I can do without for 4 weeks, or find a soy/almond milk to have instead. (I ended up getting unsweetened almond milk, and it is NOT the same)

I got all of my low/no carb snacks and meals and I have been doing pretty good so far. The first four days were the worst! All I wanted was bread and milk. I couldn’t have my morning bagel, or rice with dinner, or a cookie that was clearly calling my name. But after those first days it has gotten a lot better.

Here is a look at what I usually eat:
Breakfast:
Scrambled eggs and cheese, sometimes with ham or salsa

Lunch:
Tuna salad
sautéed veggies (Zucchini, onions, and mushrooms)
Or I have leftovers from dinner the night before-

Snack:
Pepperoni and cheese

Dinner:
Greek burger (AMAZING) and veggies (for the recipe below, if you are doing Atkins, you can swap out the greek yogurt for sour cream)
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/ellie-krieger/my-big-fat-greek-burgers-recipe.html
Other options:
Taco Salad
Salsa Verde Burger: http://www.rachaelraymag.com/recipes/rachael-ray-magazine-recipe-search/rachael-ray-burger-recipes/salsa-verde-turkey-burger
Or just any meat and a veggie

The other thing I found is that I was STARVING during this transition, and it felt like I could never eat enough. Now, I know I have to eat a little something every few hours in order to feel not hungry, because that’s when you start to get in trouble. I crave the foods I am not supposed to have when I am hungry. So if I don’t get hungry, and have a snack every few hours, I don’t crave. LIGHTBULB!!

I must be doing something right, because I have been doing Atkins since Wednesday, February 26th and I have lost 10 lbs. I feel really good about the next few weeks and I think I’ll do really great with this.

I also feel like this is going to get me in the right mind set for after my surgery too. I think I could really get used to this, and this is the first time that I have really felt like that. I could really be successful with this surgery.

If we lived in a world of famine, you’d live.

So I have been putting off this post, only because this doctor was so mean and hurtful, I don’t really want to relive it. But I wanted to document everything and that means the good and the bad.

On February 20th I had my appointment with my “Nutritionist.” I say this term loosely because he is not a nutritionist, and I don’t even know why my surgeon wants me to see him. He is a doctor for preventive medicine, and is the only doctor I don’t have a choice on seeing. I HAVE to see him to be approved.

I was already nervous because I had been warned by my friend Meaghan that he was an asshole and fat hater, and also by my surgeon that there is a 50/50 shot I would like him.
I went to this office, that was EMPTY, and waited for a while to even go into the room.


When I went into the room, the nurse came in and took down my information, and you could tell she didn’t want to be there and kept wrinkling her forehead on her laptop that didn’t want to work. Off to a great start.



Meaghan told me he was going to make me wait, because he is the almighty doctor and he sees you on his own time. Due to this knowledge, I found this newspaper clip he had in the room to be VERY ironic.



So he comes in and I try to shake his hand, he gives me a limp wrist and it almost looked like he wanted me to kiss it the way he was holding it. He didn’t make eye contact with me at all, and made me feel very uncomfortable. He started asking me more questions about my family history and my health. Then he gets into what I eat. What do you usually eat in a day?

I don’t fucking know- I like variety in my life. It depends on my mood, on my diet, if i’m pmsing, if I’m on vacation, if I’m sick. Seriously, who knows what they eat USUALLY! So I told him what I eat, and he looks at me (This is the first time, BTW he has looked at me at all) and said “Then why have you gained so much weight.”

I wanted to punch him in the face and say “WELL YOU’RE THE DOCTOR, YOU TELL ME!!”
I didn’t. We got through it and I told him I have a portion control problem, especially when it comes to carbs. If I go for seconds, it’s for rice or pasta or potatoes. I told him in general, I eat heathy, I don’t snack on chips or cookies, but yes I have been known to eat them. I do like to induldge, but I try not to do it often.

I wanted to say, “I am not eating 6000 calories a day like most FAT PEOPLE you know DOCTOR!” Because this is what he is expecting to hear, that I have cereal, a bagel, an omelet, grits, a pound of bacon, and potatoes for breakfast, a big mac, a mcchicken, and a filet o fish, fries and soda for lunch, and 5 burritos for dinner. Well guess what, I DON’T.
Wow sorry I went off a little there.

Then he starts to talk, and show me what a genius he is. He is talking about random shit that has nothing to do with my surgery or my life. He tells me that our brains our ingrained to eat food with high fat content, because when we were cave men we didn’t know when our next meal would be. So we eat and eat and eat because we think we need to, but in reality there is a McDonald’s right down the street. He said to me, “If we lived in a world of famine, you’d live.” GEE THANKS DOCTOR ALMIGHTY!

He continues this bullshit for a while. He asks me about my goals. I tell him I’d love to be 150lbs, but i’d be happy even if I lost 50. He looks at me (only the second time, btw) and says, “Well what would be the point of the surgery if you only lost 50 lbs? That isn’t a success story.” Look doc- I just want to be healthy, not be a fashion model.

He told me he thought my goal to be 150lbs is a great goal, and that he thinks I’ll reach it. He thought my weight loss goal of 10-15lbs by my surgeon wasn’t enough, and told me he’d like to see 15-25. He said that I will have a higher success rate during and after the surgery the more weight I lose, so that it will shrink my liver, prepare me for after my surgery, and it will be easier for my surgeon. Less risk.

The rest of the appointment was boring, more of Dr. Holierthenthou spouting more bullshit. He wants me to see a dietician so I know what kind of foods to eat after my surgery, and gave me a diet to stick to.

I decided after looking at the diet, that I wasn’t going to do his diet, and started Atkins instead. I was going to do this on my own without any help from the fat hater.
Of course, that weekend was my birthday weekend, so my boyfriend and I lived it up and went to Lake Placid for the weekend. I had my last hurrah! I decided to forget about the pompus prick and enjoyed my birthday.

Aren’t we cute???

Endoscopy

My Endoscopy was on February 13th (if I would have known how much this procedure was going to effect me I would not have scheduled it for the day before Valentines Day.) It was not fun.

First they brought me behind a curtain where there was a hospital bed. They had me undress (oo la la) and I put on a gown. I got in the bed and they gave me a really nice warm blanket. They put an IV in me and wheeled me into the room where they do the procedure. I laid there for a good half hour waiting for the doctor to finish with the previous patient, and I was very uncomfortable and just wanted it to be over.
I asked the nurse to take a photo of me before they got started

So then the doctor comes in and asks me a few questions, they explain the procedure to me. They were going to give me something that was going relax me but keep me awake, but I wouldn’t remember anything. It’s true, you don’t remember ANYTHING. Then they were going to put the camera down my throat and take some photos. If they found anything they needed to do a biopsy on, they would do that then.

What I DO remember, is them laying me down, and telling me they were giving me the medicine in my IV. I had my eyes closed, and I think I opened them and they had to give me more, because the next thing I knew I was back behind the curtain. I must have grabbed my phone and took a few photo’s of myself, because I found them later on my phone.

Here is one- Yeah, I looked stoned


I think I feel back asleep, and woke up with my phone in my hand so started texting my boyfriend to come and get me. I think he may have asked if he could come back to see me, because a few minutes later the nurse came in and told me he couldn’t come back yet. Apparently this news upset me, because I burst into tears. The nurse calmly told me it was okay and to go back to sleep. So I did.

I woke up feeling a bit better. The nurse came in to talk to me, told me I could eat anything I wanted, to stay away from alcohol, and not to drive for 24 hours. I got dressed and they brought me into a little room where I was able to finally see my boyfriend. The doctor came in to give me photos of my insides (which I am having a hard time scanning, sorry) and told me I have a slight hernia, but it was nothing to worry about.

After, Nate decided to take me to a diner that has Gyro’s. (I am originally from Detroit, and there is a very large Greek community. There is a TON of Greek food there, and NONE here. So when I find a place that serves something even a TINY bit Greek, I’m gonna jump on it.)

So we go to the diner and I get my Gyro. It’s amazing. I hadn’t eaten since the night before and it was probably 2:00 in the afternoon at that point, so I was really hungry.. As I am eating this meat pita, I notice my throat starts to hurt. Every time I swallowed, it was painful- almost like having strep throat.

After we were done, we had to run a few errands, and my throat was still killing me. I was exhausted, and cranky, so my boyfriend decided to stop at the store and got the most amazing vanilla ice cream ever. So the rest of the day I napped and ate ice cream.
But the next day, I was still in a lot of pain and exhausted. I noticed also that I had broken some blood vessels in my face, most likely from gagging on the camera they put down my throat.

Look, even popped a blood vessel in my eye!!! (that showed up the next day)


It was a good thing I only had to work 4 hours that day because of a snow storm. My poor boyfriend, however, had to do snow removal all day. So we were both exhausted and spent Valentines day with some homemade soup and the TV.


 

SO busy!

I am sorry about neglecting all of you, I have just been so busy!

I will be doing a few updates within the next few days, letting all of you know how all of my appointments have gone and how everything has progressed.

February 12th I had my appointment with my cardiologist. I got there a little late, but they were so nice and saw me anyway.

The nurse came in and did the EKG- which are odd tests I think. They put all these stuckums on you and it monitors your heart. I am not sure what they are looking for when they do this, but everything looked normal, even with my high blood pressure. (Even with my medication, my blood pressure is usually high at the doctors office- my primary says I have white coat syndrome–haha get it?)

When the doctor came in, he went over my family history. (Which is the 400th time I’ve had to do that. Why can doctors just have all this information on the same network so we don’t have to repeatedly tell them what diseases our family has and what we’re allergic to? I just want to type out my entire family history/my history and just give them that. It’s annoying!!) (/rant)

So then he asked me about pain- where I feel pain, what kind of pain, how long, during what kind of activity- stuff like that. I told him how when I do Zumba I get a pain in my back on the upper right side. It feels like my back has to crack, but it doesn’t. I have always believed this to be some sort of pinched nerve, but apparently my doctor didn’t think so. It sent him into some sort of tizzy, because he spends the next 20 minutes talking to me about this, but never tells me why. Obviously he thought something was wrong because I get this pain, from what I assumed was just from a pinched nerve!! So after 20 minutes of him going back and forth on what tests he should run, he decided to have me go down the hall and get an echocardiogram.

The echo reminded me a lot of the abdomen ultrasound I had, but she didn’t push as hard, and it was all around my heart. It was very cool! Sometimes she took video with sound, and I could hear my heart beating. It’s like what pregnant woman hear when they get an ultrasound.

I haven’t heard from them yet, so hopefully everything went well!
Next post-Lots of pictures! All about my Endoscopy

And after that- I’ll tell you all about my “nutritionist” meeting and how he is the most arrogant, fat-hating, loves to listen to himself talk, thinks he is GOD, pedantic asshole i’ve ever met!

Barium is *gag*

Barium is super gross. Let me just say that now.

Last week I had my first of many appointments to be approved for my Roux-en-Y gastric bypass.

First appointment of the morning was an ultrasound of my abdomen, then I had to have an Upper Gi. I needed to fast for these, so no food or water. I was SO thirsty!!
So the ultrasound is to rule out a hiatal hernia and thanks to Web MD I found out more about this:


“Any time an internal body part pushes into an area where it doesn’t belong, it’s called a hernia.The hiatus is an opening in the diaphragm — the muscular wall separating the chest cavity from the abdomen. Normally, the esophagus (food pipe) goes through the hiatus and attaches to the stomach. In a hiatal hernia (also called hiatus hernia) the stomach bulges up into the chest through that opening.”
So here is me waiting to get my ultrasound

It was very painful. The technician was really pushing that thing into me, right under my ribs. And it was a continual process- I had to breathe in and hold it, she’d shove that thing into my stomach right under my ribs, and then I had to breath out. My right side was especially painful, and I am not really sure why. At one point I had tears running down my face because it hurt so badly. I felt a little embarrassed to tell her she was hurting me, as my assumption to why she was pushing the device into me was that I am large and it is hard to get a good image because of that.

After that, I was led to a little room and asked to change into a gown (that actually FIT BTW, you have no idea how embarrassing it is to have to wear a gown that is too small, but this one was HUGE on me and I loved it.) and asked to leave my shoes on. I thought the shoes thing was a little odd, but I didn’t argue.

Photo’s of me showing off my super sexy gown, shoes, and chapped lips due to lack of water!

They laid me on a table and got an x-ray of my insides as a base for my other tests. (I am super sad, I couldn’t get any photo’s of this!) Then they moved the table upright so I would stand, with the x-ray at my stomach. The nurse and the resident Brian were both very funny, and helped me understand what they were doing, and talked me through everything. At this point while standing is where I had to start drinking the barium. First, they gave me a tiny cup with a bit of water, and poured crystals in it- I had to down that quickly and not burp. The crystals create gas in your stomach so it expands,and it is easier to see. It was very hard to not burp, but it subsided after a few minutes.

Then they gave me a cup with this white stuff in it. Now- those of you who have had to drink barium understand where I am coming from now. But those who haven’t- think of a drink with a thicker consistency of Pepto Bismol and tastes like chalk.

So Brian says, “Okay you have to take three big sips when I say.” And I think- okay easy peesy. I take a huge sip and instantly start to gag. I manage to swallow it, but I am still gagging, and my eyes are tearing up. The thing about me you have to know, is I gag at pretty much everything. Doing the dishes? I gag. Something smells gross? I gag. Cleaning the cat litter? I gag. So this was pretty horrible. But it is rare that I ever throw up or anything.

So I have to take another sip. Since I knew what was coming, I think my body start to have gaggy feelings even before I tried to take another one. So I sip it, not as big as last time, manage to swallow, and just proceed to gag a lot. They had to stop everything for me so I could take a few breaths. So I do the last one, and compose myself.
So then he tilts the machine so I am laying down now, and makes me turn around 3 times so the barium coats the stomach. He has me go into a few different positions laying down and takes x-rays while he does it. Then he has me lay on my right side (still sore from the ultrasound mind you) and wants me to drink more barium, but its not as thick. It was even worse, because it tasted like the only thing I actually hate: Bannanas. I start to gag just smelling this crap.

Brian says, “Okay, Ashlee. Just three big gulps and we’ll be done.” I tried to gear myself up and tried to push all the icks from my mind, but it didn’t work. I ended up taking two small sips before my gagging frenzy caused Brian to quit and leave me be.
They let me sit up finally, and put all the nasty barium away, which followed by me burping very loudly as soon as I was sitting up. I said, “Well I hope I was allowed to burp now!”

All in all, it was a pretty horrid experience, and am not looking forward to anything else if it is going to be like this appointment.