12/06/10: Fa La La La La La La La La

I said I'd have multiple "favorites of Christmas".  I only got one up this weekend.  I have two more (at least) that I want to put up.  I will try to do so tonight...I know exactly what I want to do...I just have to take the pictures.

My husband was gracious enough to give me another cold.  He loves to share with me.  I wish he'd stop.  I'm so tired of being sick/not-feeling-well/having-to-go-to-the-doctor/not being 100%.

I got a fill on Saturday.  I love this new surgeon.  He's nice.  He's young.  Well, older than me...but I'll be able to have him as a Doc for a long long time.  He didn't try to boss me around, tell me I'm a crappy eater, tell me I'm mis-behaving.  None of that.  He said "You're the boss".  We recommend you come back in six months, but you tell us when you want to.  He asked how much of a fill I wanted (I said 0.25cc's) and then we had a minor conversation in which I did all the talking and then he said "how much do you really want" and I said 0.5cc's was probably more like what I needed.  He said that was what he thought and that was what he wanted to give me and so that is what he gave me.

He does not do fills under fluoroscopy - and I like that.  I don't feel comforted by x-rays mutliple times with each appt.  I can see how fluoroscopy has it's merit on occasion...but it doesn't have to be every friggin time!  So he found the port and stuck the needle right in and wa-la...I have restriction!

I decided not to do the liquid diet for two weeks.  Instead, I'm going back to my own personal basics.  Smoothie for breakfast.  Chicken or tuna salad for lunch.  "Nut-Thin" crackers for a mid-afternoon snack (only if needed) and protein and veggies for dinner.

Yesterday...I was craving juice...pineapple or pineapple-orange-banana was what we had in the house so that's what I had.  Wanting vitamin C, I guess.  You'd think that drinking 5 little cans (6oz a piece) would have blown my calories to ever loving hell, but it didn't.  I lost 4 pounds between 11am yesterday and 7am today.  And that was sitting on the couch.  I "barely touched' dinner...at least if you compare it to what I would have eaten (and did) on Friday night.  Last night, though, all I can say is, yep, it's true, I have a lap-band.  Friday night?  Nope, not so much.

4 lbs had to have been some sort of odd water weight courtesy of this cold, is what I'm figuring.  Could also be that I'm still not normal.

Anywho.  Today...drinking my smoothie...it was slow to go down.  Like how it was back in the day when I was successfully losing all the time.  It wasn't not going down.  It wasn't a troubling slow.  It was just enough that I had to drink slowly and enjoy.  Lunch today - tuna salad.  I'ma be surprised if I finish all of my 3oz!  I'm enjoying.

It all leads to.....

I Love the Lap-Band

I needed to turn off the ability to eat again.  While not necessarily trying to prove why I need the band, I just did exactly that.  When "allowed" to "relax" and not stress over food - quantity or choice - I slowly but surely was working myself back up to  the quantities that got me in trouble in the first place.  I could eat a lot and while I was eating it much slower than pre-band, I had also started to put together that if I ate slow enough - but also fast enough - I could eat as much as I want.  Now...I go and get myself that little fill.  If you can call 0.5cc's a little fill.  And it doesn't matter how much I want to eat.  My little pouch is back to optimum.  In my world, anyway.  My eating has to be slower.  So much slower that cold food tastes horrible and I drop the fork.  Which is where I was pre-pregnancy.  Not only was I, back then, able to drop the fork because the cold food was unappetizing, but I also was getting bored with eating and was able to pay attention to the full feeling.

It was interesting, this backwards slide that I was on...able to eat warm food...I discovered...I was more interested in eating.  And that meant even though I was still getting the full feeling...I was also more interested in keeping going with the wonderful tastes - and the warm food.

So I can now proclaim (as if I never could) that I truly love the lap-band.  It solves my brain, not my stomach.  My stomach isn't my issue...my choice to eat is.  My brain chooses to want more...and my brain doesn't care that my tummy says "enough".  This band, for me, isn't tightening my stomach down...it's tightening my brain down.

With only two days with this new fill...I can say I feel so very recharged and refreshed.  I don't think I need the liquid diet.  Yeah, it could probably do me some good, would, probably.  But I don't need the extreme.  That's what I got the band for!

I know about myself that when I am able to eat "proper" amounts, that I also make wiser choices.  I knew prior to getting pregnant that I was right on that edge of needing a fill but I also knew that getting pregnant would mean needing different amounts of calories and so I left it alone.  What I didn't know was just how "off" I was.  Getting a fill immediately following the D&C wouldn't have been wise, I don't think.  I do think, though, that everything worked out well, band-wise, anyway.  I really didn't gain through this ordeal/experience.  And losing wasn't the goal, either.  I learned a lot about myself AND about the band.  

I'm in a good place!  Now let the weightlifting begin!!!