03/04/10: I'm done!!!

I'm done!  I'm done I'm done I'm done!!!!!  It's so over.  The "unweightloss" program is a thing of the past!!!!

I'm done!!!!

I'm so excited...and I just can't hide it...and I know I know I know I know I know I want you, want you!

Come on, sing it with me!!!

I'm in love with my band and I haven't even met it yet!

So I weighed in.  I weighed in a whole whopping 0.2 lbs down from last time!  So my BMI is SAFE!

Talk about playing the numbers!

Since this is a good time for me to take time off work, my RNP said she'd talk to my advocate about getting my paperwork sent over today - so that they receive it tomorrow.  They told me to go ahead and start the pre-op diet.  They told me it's conceivable that this could happen within the next two weeks!

So here we go again...

I'm so excited...and I just can't hide it...and I know I know I know I know I know I want you, want you!


So here's some key points for me, my situation and my surgeon.

1) I have to lose a minimum of ten pounds between now and surgery.
2) I will have monthly check-ins for the first year.  I may get filled, and I may not, in each of those appts.  I will continue to see my RNP that I've seen for the "unweightloss" program for the check-ins.  She will do my fills.  It sounds like they are pretty agressive - at least my surgeon allows aggression.  Other surgeons with this center - not so much.  But mine...YAY!
3) He will start me with a fill in surgery...although how much is dependent on me.  At one month post-op I get my first fill although if I want to, I can come in at two weeks instead of a month out, and that fill can be a lot, depending on how I'm doing.  From the first month onwards, they try to keep the opening at about the diameter of a drinking straw. 
4) I will get dermabond which means showers are allowed from the get-go.  I LIKE that.  I am an oily mess of a person if I don't get to take a shower every day!  (TMI?)  ((I think it's disgusting...but daily showers keep me in check.)
5) Surgery will either be on a tues or a thurs.  I'd like a thurs as then I'd have Friday off and then the following week.  My RNP said it would be no problem for my surgeon to give me that whole week off.  That's good.  I was actually worried that he'd say go back to work on Mon.  I don't want to laze around forever, but I don't want to push it like crazy, either!
6) I won't see my RNP again until after surgery.  At this point, since I want to do my surgery through the location closest to me (and my insurance requires it be at a certified hospital - this hospital is 15 miles from me as opposed to the bariatric center which is 35 miles from me) I will switch to my surgeon's private clinic and work with him and his RNP at their clinic for all the pre-op stuff.  I will miss my RNP and will be happy to see her again ASAP!  I like her.  I really really like her!
7) This could be happening in two weeks.  So, as you might know, I started my pre-op diet this week (kind of mostly) to just play around with it and see what it's like.  I've determined that when I do start it for real, I  want to add another week to it, for a total of three weeks, so that I can ween myself onto it, if you will.  Well...I've basically been doing that this week - so I will just keep going with it.

Which leads to tonight.  My sweet hubby and I have reservations with two friends for the swankest dinner house in town.  I love this place!  It's, by most accounts, the best restaurant in Houston - and, by most accounts, the most loved restaurant in Houston.  It's Brennan's.  No, not of the New Orleans Brennan's, the original, but kind of yes, too.  The guy that started this place is from the same family.  But he does less creole here and more American fare.  But his American fare has a definite creole twist as well as some twists specific to Houston.  So no...but yes.  Anywho.  They generally always have a reservation list/waiting list a mile long.  But...it's worse right now.  They just re-opened.  The restaurant caught on fire in the middle of hurricane Ike and while the fire trucks could and did get there to try and put the fire out, the winds from the storm were just blowing the water around.  So the fire burned.  Three people were in the restaurant, the sommelier and his daughter and, I think, one of the chefs.  The third guy made it our with minor injuries but the sommelier and his daughter were burned, both over 70% and Houston has banded together to pay for their continued care.  So the restaurant was destroyed.  An old old (read VERY BIT) oak tree in the courtyard was burned and had to be removed.  It's a brick building and while the exterior of the restaurant was mostly in tact, nothing remained inside and the roof was gone.  But on that brick exterior - the lone marker of the restaurant was left untouched - an awning over the front door which says Brennan's on it - the only "sign" the restaurant has. 

We have reservations tonight.  We booked them over a month ago and we booked them in anticipation of the end of the "unweightloss" program.  It's my last hoorah dinner - although I am not going crazy...it's not cheap and there's not a lot served on the plates, anyway.  I will eat there again, that I know.  But this is a celebration dinner.  Celebrating Brennan's is back, celebrating the start of my new life, celebrating the end of the games, celebrating life!  And after my last hoorah tonight - I'll go on the pre-op diet for good tomorrow - no kind-of's about it.

For some reason, again, the nutritionist came in to chat again.  At the end of the chat, I was actually glad to have talked to her!  Interesting things from that...

1) she gave me a packet of paper of low-carb recipe suggestions for the pre-op diet.  There are some great recipes in there.  It's in the car - but as I make these recipes and try them out, I'll post pics and recipes to go with them.  From a precursory glance, it appears there are as many recipes as there are days in this pre-op diet (assuming it is precisely two weeks).
2) she looked at what I was eating this past month and she could not pick a single thing apart!  Yay me!  As usual, she went straight to my smoothie.  She studied it and studied it and all the while she was saying "ok, your smoothie, I want you to try...."  And after studying it for about two minutes she said "there's nothing to change here.  Good job!"  So she moves onto lunch.  She studied it and studied it all the while she was saying "ok, your lunch, I want you to try...." And after studying it for about two minutes she said "there's nothing to change here. Good job!" So she moves onto dinner. She studied it and studied it all the while she was saying "ok, your dinner, I want you to try...." And after studying it for about two minutes she said "there's nothing to change here. Good job!" And then she showed me a side of herself I've not seen before.  We chatted.  And she said "You've done remarkably well at changing things and switching your diet."  I think I have, too!  She said, ok, "the supervised diet is over, so add back in your weightlifting".  I said the gym in my house is cleaned out and ready to go and next week I'll also start swimming.

Now I don't know if I'm going to start swimming quite yet.  It's not because I'm lazy but rather because I don't want to waste money.  If I go over there next week and pay for three months just to turn around and not use half of March or any of April because of healing...well...I'd just rather not waste money like that.  I can walk until I know I'm good to go on swimming.  So I think that until I have the surgery and I am all healed up and ready to exercise, I think it's walking that I will do.  If I knew that I could get a solid month out of the dues, then I'd pay for a solid month and get swimming.  But I may not have a whole month to use.  So, for now, walking will suffice.

We also talked about my weightlifting plan.  She was impressed with what I knew and loved the idea of my program.  It doesn't build muscle like a body builder - but it does build muscle just ever so slightly.  It gives great toning and, of course, muscles are the soul of our metabolism, so muscle creation is ideal.  It's anaerobic and it's resistance combined so it works multiple aspects of our bodies.  And because of how the program is designed, you avoid plateaus because it's not the same thing over and over.

I'll do another blog on that at a later time if there is interest.

What she did say to me is "I have no doubt that you will lose this weight or that you could do this on your own, you know so much about the right way to be going about this.  I know that the band will help you never put the weight back on."  That's my plan!

Anywho...I can't wait until I get a call saying "your paperwork has been submitted".  As soon as I get that call...I might wait 24 hours...but I'll be calling to make sure they got it.  And I'll breathe down their necks, politely, until they give me the right answer!

Oh...and the fabulous water bottles that our fantastic Amy W. turned me onto...I told my wonderful RNP about them.  And she was already to run out to Target and pick one up for herself!  She couldn't believe the amount of stuff I knew because of this wonderful fabulous blog world!  Thank you to you all for being such an inspiration and for being such amazing sources of information!