2 NSVs

Two NSVs (non-scale victories) today:

1 - I was able to tie my gym shoes with ease while sitting on the couch bending over. Before surgery I would get winded, have to move my belly out of the way, and generally have to kneel on the floor to reach my shoes.

2 - I was able to walk on the treadmill for almost 20 minutes (18 to be exact). I did not break a sweat so I know I can do more.

Hormones and Baking

Today I will be baking. I will be attempting a couple of recipes that were given to me at my 2-week follow up appointment. One is for a no-noodle lasagna (cottage cheese, marinara/spaghetti sauce, seasonings, egg whites – blend and bake). The other is for a Chocolate Treat (cottage cheese, chocolate pudding mix, egg whites, Splenda (I’ll be using Truvia) – blend and bake). We’ll see how they turn out.

**Update: The no-noodle lasagna smelled fantastic as it was baking. I ate a few of them over the course of a week and ended up throwing the others away. It just wasn't my thing. I have since found this recipe for Ricotta bake that I would have liked better (this woman's blog is amazing and I keep returning to it to try out new recipes and get tips on bariatric eating).

The chocolate treat was delicious. I used high protein pudding mix from my surgeon's office that was Chocolate Mint flavor. Yum! I made this recipe three times while on the pureed consistency foods part of my journey.

Last night I wasn’t feeling the greatest. Very low energy. Lots of intestinal gurgling. No pain, just discomfort. Well, just before bed, I went to the bathroom and I was bleeding (female bleeding, not from incisions), yet again. This hormonal thing is no joke. I bleed way more and randomly than I ever did before. I’m just assuming this is my body trying to figure out what to do with itself. If it gets too bad, I’ll call the surgeon’s office first and my OB to see what’s up.

Okay, so I never called the surgeon nor did I call my OB. I did a lot of reading online and decided it was just hormones and this was something I would need to deal with as my body adjusts.

First full day away from home since surgery

I got up, drank a glass of water, and packed my food for the day. I took way more than I knew I could eat, but I wanted to be sure I had enough. I always end up staying later than I think while with my mom or Maggie. 

I went to my mom’s store (she owns her own consignment shop for larger size women's clothing) to visit for a couple of hours. She had a woman from a local bakery that brought in baked goods. I wasn’t even tempted. They smelled great, but I really had no desire to eat them. That was an odd experience. Mom is having a Pampered Chef party so I gave her a few ideas for kitchen gadgets that my boyfriend might like for Christmas. It is getting harder and harder to shop for adults for Christmas. None of us really need anything. It’s more fun to buy for the kids anyways. I chatted with a lady who had the bypass surgery this past summer. She was pretty chatty but was very encouraging. My mom kept saying over and over that she could see the weight loss in my face. I can’t see it yet, but a lot of people say they still think of themselves as the larger person they were. She took a close up picture of my face. I posted it on Facebook and I have had a ton of comments that people see it. I must be doing something right.

Here's the picture:

 

I left there and headed to Maggie’s house for more crafting. It had been a while since we were able to get together so two times in one week was amazing. I set my alarm for every couple of hours and just got up to get my food and eat. This was helpful as I can get crafting and forget to eat and drink. I had my water bottle with me. Unfortunately, I only drank one bottle full (24 ounces). I drank more when I got home and I was able to have a shake when I got home which added to my liquids for the day. I had some tuna puree with saltine crackers, and some cottage cheese. I had brought yogurt, pudding, and leftover soup, but I didn’t eat those. I made some pinwheels (enough to make 12 cards) with Christmas patterned paper. I worked on stamping and coloring with my Spectrum Noir markers. I don’t use them often enough at home and really wanted to work on technique. I was able to get about a dozen stamped images colored. I will use some of them on cards. Some were just to work on coloring.

I headed home from there. My boyfriend was up north with his mom and step-dad at a cookout and bonfire. He met me a few minutes after I got home and we went to the movie store to drop off the one movie that was due back today.

2 week follow up appointment

I had my 2-week follow up appointment today. I was weighed. I’m down just under 25 pounds in a month. Not bad. I need to get the exercise portion in this week. They gave the okay to start on pureed consistency foods. We had a group session. I wish they would have told me that. I brought my boyfriend with me so that he could learn what I could have since he does the majority (okay, all) of the cooking. The poor guy sat in the waiting room for an hour and dozed off because he got up early to go with me. Then he didn’t come back with me to see the surgeon since he’s usually pretty quick. Surgeon came in, checked my incisions, made sure my 6 week appointment was set, and then was gone. I like that he keeps things short and to the point. The nurse came in and we talked about a return to work date and why I was requesting the full 6 weeks off instead of just 2. Return to work date: December 7.

Today is my brother’s birthday. He’s 26 today! It is crazy how time flies. We went to the Winter Inn for dinner with Nicole’s family also. It was a lot of fun seeing everyone and chatting with Bentley (my oldest nephew). I will be heading to their house this coming week to play and plan on going over there quite a bit while I’m off work. The restaurant had a chicken Florentine soup. I asked for it to be pureed. I explained to the waitress that I had the bariatric surgery and had to have everything pureed at this point. Her comment was, “Good for you! I’ll write it down and see what the chefs can do.” That was an awesome response. When she brought it out, it was literally pureed to complete liquid. The only thing I had to chew a little were a few of the onion pieces. It was actually pretty tasty too. The hard part about ordering from a restaurant like that is that there were no nutrition facts for me to calculate. I only ate about 2 ounces of the soup and it was my first day being able to eat those foods, so I didn’t bother looking up a comparable recipe. We were invited back to my brother’s house for cake and ice cream. We planned on going. My belly was really gurgling but I figured it was just because it wasn’t used to the food being in there. We stopped at Meijer to get some Gas-X strips to help with the gurgling. I pooped. I was drained after that. I sent a message to my brother that I was just going to go home to be safe. It is no fun having to poop somewhere else when I usually end up going a couple of times in a short time frame before I’m done. It was no big deal and he even mentioned that I was looking great!

When I got home, I was feeling a little better. I made tuna puree with plain greek yogurt, pudding, and put cottage cheese in a container. This was all food I plan to take with me tomorrow.