/bypass

A-MOL-E

Three things….well four really cause the fourth is awesome.

ONE: I was a total vegetable this week. I only left the house to go to school on Monday, and groceries on Tuesday, or wednesday, I can’t remember now. The rest of the time I have been at home working on school work and catching up on the many many novels that I have neglected to read all year. I am pleased to announce that I knocked three down - five more to go. (that doesn’t include the 3 graphic novels that I decided to read also - shhh don’t judge me!) This vegetable bedrest that I have basically been on has meant that I haven’t had much motivation to actually get up and workout, so like the novels I have neglected to read all year, I also shoved aside my exercise, which I didn’t think would matter because it was only a week. Right? HOLY CRAP WRONG. Even a week without exercising has left me absolutely obliterated today after a session. This has taught me that taking an entire week off is not an option for me and that I have to try and get motivated to do at least mini workouts if I can’t do a full on session in order to keep my muscles working.

TWO: Today I hit a proud moment. Although I haven’t lost any weight since last time I updated (sigh), I have dramatically pushed myself harder.  Last week, I was doing 4 minutes of walking and 2 minutes of running, but walking at 4.5 and running at 6.5, which if you know anything about the tread mill is actually NOT that difficult because it’s a very slow pace. Today, I pushed that up, walking at 5.5 for 2 minutes, running at 9 for 1.5 minutes and back down to 5.5 for 2 minutes. At one point I was running and I thought it would be a challenge if I picked my knees up really high off the ground - almost like jumping, in fact I actually bashed my knee against the handle which hurt very much afterwards (not at the time cause i was in the zzzone). After the third increment I pushed the speed up to 9.5 and that extra .5 almost killed me, but the dude beside me told me “you can do it!” (which totally shocked the hell out of me) and I just kept running, and after I was done and had completed my 1.5 minutes he said “wow, you did really really good” and I said “i know!” He said later that I should be proud about my accomplishments because he watched me when I first started and couldn’t believe how far I have come so far. That made me feel really awesome.

For the first time I thought, wow, i really did something BY MYSELF. I mean, yes, I got this surgery and there is some amount of effort that goes into it, especially mental effort — but for the most part I have felt extremely blessed. But this. This is different because the surgery, where it helped me get down the weight is not “responsible” for my running accomplishments. I did that. I mean, ahh it’s hard to explain. I KNOW that I lost the weight too, but having the gastric bypass has always sortof nagged at me a little, like I didn’t do it by myself - that there is some sort of alien in me that helped me out. I think of my stomach as a separate entity than “me” because it is man made. Therefore, the weight, although I lost it, I feel as if I didn’t really DO IT on my own because my man made instrument was helping me. I am not necessarily saying this in a negative way, really. Don’t take it like that. I am more or less just saying that when I was running today, I pushed myself to overcome my own challenges and I succeeded and I didn’t need any tools or help — I just used what I was originally given.

You know, I didn’t even know I felt like this until just now writing it out. Writing always does that to me. I think I need to really reflect on what I have just said about my stomach being alien to me…because I can tell that that is something I need to explore and analyze.

ANYWAY sorry about blabbering on about that….where was I?

Oh yeah THREE: Chest pains! After my workout and during my 9.0-9.5 running I realized my chest was throbbing, er lungs or I donno. It was the only reason I could not go to 2 minutes. I mean, it feels fine now, obviously because otherwise I would be hospitalized, but I have to wonder, will that go away? What is it caused by? How hard should I push myself when my chest hurts? Should I just plod on or should I just slow down a bit? Is it a warning sign or a natural part of the process? These are questions that I am hoping someone like Shalagh or Amy can answer — someone who trains daily and knows what I should do?

FOUR: Here comes the awesome bit. I decided that because I was near death after my run that instead of doing Yoga downstairs like I usually do, that I would collapse in a heap in my bed. So, I just grabbed my stuff and bolted out the door. I was breathing so heavily, in that really good way, where you just feel so good to draw in fresh oxygen. When I got in the elevator (basement) someone was coming out and let out the BIGGEST FART which stayed IN THE ELEVATOR and I was absolutely dying because I was breathing so hard and yet it was just RUINED by the stench of old man fart. UGH. It sucked. I was like ALL MY HARD WORK and ALL i wanted to do was BREATHE. I managed to make it 14 floors up and realized I left my keys downstairs so I had to go back down but took the other elevator this time, which smelled like meat, but was substantially better than poop-gas.

So yeah, long blog post but again, thank you all for your support. It’s just so lovely to see your encouraging words. So thank you, Katie, Tobey, Amy and Denise <3

And just for my records here:  15 min Yoga to start - 40 minutes treadmill

Increments: W 5.5 - 2 min - R 9.0 - 1.5 min

one round of R 9.5 - 1.5 min with one round of W 6.0 - 2 minutes

didn’t cool down today - should have cooled down.

First of all I would like to thank those who have responded in comments both on this site and on facebook! Thank you: Matt, Robin, Karen, Anna, Ginny, Mandy, Tobey, Tyler, Auntie Sara, and Zander for all your wonderful feedback and loving support! I especially took the advice to heart (especially to my insanely beating heart right now) as I further my journey to runningdom. Yes, it’s a word now. Look it up in my new dictionary. Anyways, you guys are amazing!!

Second, my new shoes are KICK ASS. These are them!

http://www.newbalance.com/performance/running/products/MR1064/

They are absolutely the most insane cushioning I think I have ever felt. My feet have always either fallen asleep while walking/running or my ankle starts cracking half way through - but with these, I feel as if I could go on for hours, prevented by my heart pounding out of my chest and my thighs feeling like soggy ramen.

Third. I have a new problem that I have never mentioned here, but an old problem that I have had since I was a child. I haven’t found much research available on what happens, but I will try to explain and maybe, just maybe, someone out there will know what the hee-haw hell I am talking about. It seems like every time I break into a dripping sweat, not a light sweat, that my ears start to ACHE like a rucker fudder. Rucker fudder sounds like something that would ache. Anyway, it HURTS so bad! Mind you, this is NOT because I am outside and there is NO air coming into my ear from the outside because I almost always have my Shure Earphones in which prevent pretty much ANYTHING from getting in my ears other than the sweet sweet sound of Boards of Canada.  So yeah, it’s only when I sweat and this happened today on the elliptical machine and boy - oh boy - did I want to, like, rip the right side of my face clean off!

Fourth, I have lost 3 pounds since the running. I am not even going to say something like “not the greatest” or “too bad it’s so low” because UHM HELLO, I’m freaking awesome! So this brings my grand total to 117 pounds lost since December 4th, 2009 — and I am officially 205 pounds, FIVE pounds away from my next mini goal of 200, where you shall all receive another one of those great side by side pictures of me in my practically naked clothes.

Fifth, I gots me a wedding dress to die for. Tee hee! Obviously I cannot post a picture of it because Donnyhonny will see it and it will RUIN THE ENTIRE WEDDING. haha, no, actually I don’t believe it that, but I do believe in painfully making him wait despite his squirmings.

i think that is all for now.

Oh wait~ I forgot. I have to track here what I am actually up to on the running. Well today the treadmills were taken so I couldn’t treadthemill but I did do half an hour of pretty intense elliptical training and then 30 minutes of yoga afterwards to try to calm the freak down, which didn’t work because yoga and janie = mad imbalance. So yeah before that I was doing 45 minutes on the treadmill in increments of 4 minute walking, 2 minute running, on and on and on. So yeah, a teenie-weenie improvement from the starting point, but I hope to gradually increase everything!

Today marks one year since I changed my battle with weight forever. It almost doesn’t seem real. That’s all I can really say. Right now, one year later, I can’t really believe that I made that decision in the first place, that at one point in my life I was so desperate and sad about being fat. I mean, I remember those feelings…but only vaguely. It’s been so long it seems since I experienced a complete sense of hopelessness in regards to my body.

I am sitting here drinking some tea by the light of a sheer white cotton fragranced candle. First of all, how the hell do they know what the colour WHITE smells like? Honestly, people! Secondly, about the weight loss, it’s started to pick up again for completely unknown reasons. I thought I would be staying at 212-15 forever. I thought maybe that my body was done, but apparently it’s not because this week I am down to 207, which is an all time low for me. When I first did my hotdog diet in 2002-2003 I went from 288 down to 210 in a matter of maybe 5 months or something like that…and gained it all back and then some over the years because I ate one piece of bread (slight hyperbole). So to actually reach 207 is an amazing feat for me because I can honestly say I have not been this weight since elementary school.

When I went to the information session with Dr.Hendricks in Michigan he told us that GBS patients will lose 60-80% of their EXCESS body weight. He pegged the weight that I should be at 175. That means that in order to lose 100% of my excess body weight I would need to lose 147. I have lost 115 out of that 147 which equals roughly 78%. So my next goal will be to lose another 5 pounds to put me OVER the average of excess body weight lost, and from there I wish to make the under 200 pounds goal.

It’s a weird day filled with quiet reflection and a little bit of loneliness. I have been cooped up all day working and the only guy I really talked to was the UPS guy and I almost said “today is my birthday” so that he would say happy birthday — even though it’s not my real birthday, and it’s a different birthday of sorts.

No pictures until I hit 120 pounds folks! It’s always by the 20s! PLUS i don’t think there is any difference anyway!

Thank you to all my friends who have been cheering me on from day 1, and even day -120 from when I was contemplating this whole adventure. Your support has meant the world to me and I can’t tell you enough how much I love you and hope that this blog has been a good read.  <3

Because I cannot update you with progress pictures, here is a picture of me at Halloween:

I apologize for my absence on this blog. I have such a “normal” life as far as the gastric bypass goes. I mean, I lose weight, but as far as eating goes, I don’t feel like it’s such a big deal. I eat small meals and frequently. I recently went to BC for a visit and felt very comfortable with my eating habits. Sugar is still a no-no for me, of course, but going out with my friends and being invited over for dinner, I didn’t feel as if I was the odd one out. I ate as much as I wanted, and not the rest. It was very simple and relaxed. I can’t believe how wonderful it has been to had this surgery with little to no complications (knock on wood).

I will get to the 100 pound thing in a sec, but first I want to say that I am no longer allergic to alcohol. This is very strange for me, because since I can remember I have not been able to comfortably drink alcohol without having to stick my head under a cold faucet to quench my burning face. Red wine still makes me sick, but only in a gastric bypass too much sugar kind of way. I have issue with the alcohol thing, however, as I am not used to being able to drink it. I have no knowledge of limitations or what I can handle before being smashed. I have no experience with it which has led to at least one horribly embarrassing incident thus far. I have decided that for me, it’s not safe or worth the humiliation that ensues afterward. I just thought I would share this because I haven’t a clue why the weight loss would prompt my body to accept alcohol without reaction. Drinking prior to the surgery was absolutely horrifying and could many times bring me to tears as my face felt like it was being branded, (with the exception of pina coladas for some unknown reason). Where I am grateful that I can drink alcohol, I don’t think I will make it any sort of habit for the sake’s of all those who are with me.

Okay, now for the 100 pounds talk. This will be a long post, I apologize in advance. A few weeks ago I did hit that sweet number. I can’t remember the exact date, but one morning I woke up and there it was: 222.0 on the blinky blink. Since then I have lost an additional 2 pounds, bringing my total to 102 and my weight at 220. When I hit 210 I will be lighter than my highschool weight in grade 8 (I was 12).

I was thinking of ways that I could celebrate this occasion. At first I thought that I would take 10 balloons and place notes of things that I can do now that I couldn’t do when I was 100 pounds heavier and release the balloons over the city of burlington where I live. As this proved to cost too much money, I decided that I would throw each note in a fire. Luckily that weekend a family friend decided to have our family over for dinner and they had a fire in the back yard. I read each note aloud and threw them into the fire.
Here is the list of things that I have “given up”

• Not being able to sit in multiple positions, including: crossing my legs, sitting cross-legged comfortably and sitting with my knees under my chin. This includes as well, not being able to go cross-legged in the bath, or even on the toilet!
• Not finding myself attractive or beautiful, or being able to believe people when they say that I am.
  Sweating more than any mammal in the universe (notice I say universe, because aliens are most likely able to perspire).
• Not being able to pick out what I wanted to wear, but only what fit my enormous body, and sticking to mainly black to “hide”. Also, not being able to wear pretty dresses or anything that calls attention to myself.
• Being called fat, or getting terrible looks while I am eating as people assume that I am an unhealthy eater, and don’t take care of myself.
• Breaking chairs at my mom’s house during thanksgiving dinner!
• Hurting when I walk, or climb stairs. Losing my breath after 2 seconds of strenuous activity.
• Fearing/dreading being an ugly bride or not being able to properly take care of my future children, or not having safe pregnancies due to obesity.
• Immediately going into the handicapped washroom stalls to better fit my ample bottom.
• Being the fat friend, fat lover, fat sister, fat daughter, fat cousin, fat loner, “her face is beautiful it’s too bad she’s so fat” girl. I may be still chubby, but I give up the persona of being fat. It no longer is my culture, my identity, or the brunt of all my jokes. (although I will probably always joke about how I used to be fat)

So I crumbled up each of my 10 pieces of paper, signifying 10 pounds that I have lost and after I did that I felt such a overwhelming sense of accomplishment. With my family and friends surrounding me, and cheering me on, it was a very beautiful experience. My brother caught it on video but I don’t think you want to see me missing the firepit at least 5 times out of 10 from 3 feet away.

With that, I will get on to the progress pictures. I am still dealing with my kanga pouch that holds no kind of little roo. You’ll have to excuse my hair. We (my hair and I) are going through a bit of a transition phase and I had no will to straighten it nice for the occasion of picture taking.















Cheers Everyone! xoxoxo

Thank you all for your support and love!

So we have been fairly busy around here in the Biggar/Cosby household. We started our own business, which has thrilled us both to the core. As a result though, my energy has been poured into that and not updating you guys on the status of my weight loss. So I am tres apologetic. I have also been making wedding plans and meeting with the caterer etc etc so things have been hairy.

I stepped on the scale this morning (read: afternoon) and I was pleased that I finally broke my horrendous stall. I have been hovering at 235 now for something like three weeks. I am now 234! Wewt! I know that one pound may not seem like a big thing, but as my mom always said when I was little, it’s two whole half pounds of butter! Well no, she didn’t say it like that because she is far more eloquent and a grammar deity - so it was more like she showed me what a pound looked like with sticks of butter. They used to be packaged in half pounds and she would pile them in their little copper wrappers on top of one another and let me hold them. I am surprised I didn’t eat them right there and then.

BBQ season is in full swing. I have now been to several and although I cannot eat very much, and I feel VERY much in control (which is freaking awesome) it doesn’t mean what I have to choose from is healthy for me. I have to work on that. Always eat the meat first and a hot dog does not equal meat.

Oh I forgot to say that I went to that wedding that I have been talking about and I got to wear a lovely dress for the first time in my life. I will post a picture of it because I know that I have talked quite frequently about it. The dress is a size 16! It is hard to believe that 7 months ago I was a size 24. Oh i guess it’s my 7 month mark today, on July 4th. Happy I-day to all you americans out there, btw.

Man, i just tried looking for some better pictures of my dress and these are the only ones I could find. I don’t really like them for the actual showing off of this dress and I don’t think that the pictures do it justice, but whatever, it’s what I have. If I get to wear the dress again I will take better pictures!

So yeah, things are going good. We have a new business (wedding photography) our first paid client, a new camera. Things are going really really well. When it’s more completed, I’ll give you a link to our business website. It’s really rough right now so I don’t want to!

Cheers!

For the last, what, 3 months? 4 months? I have been losing 1-2 pounds a week steadily. On an EXTREMELY LUCKY week I could lose 3 pounds but always sorta stalled a bit after those weeks. Now, I have lost 5 pounds in 5 days and it’s sorta freaking me out! I am not doing anything differently, I don’t think. I threw up last night hardcore style because I ate reheated meat which is a big hellno for us bypassers because the rubbery consistency that comes out of the microwave just sits like a brick in our pouches. I thought I could beat the system (system of what exactly, janie?) but alas, no, PUUUUKE, broken blood vessels in my face, it was THAT hardcore. After I looked in the mirror I thought I had just given birth. Congratulations it’s a slightly used rubbery hamburger!

Anyway, this makes my weight loss to date 83 pounds.

OH, I will say this because I just remembered. I have been very intolerant to sweetener lately and have replaced it with real sugar. This is a very new development of about 5 or 6 days since my time with Grant and Denise in Crystal Beach where they are adamantly against aspartame. Maybe the extra calories or something is giving me a bit of a boost!? I have no freaking idea. If sugar is making me lose weight than I think my head will explode from the years of sugar deprivation! haha. No. Sugar is still bad. But maybe in my case, having VERY LITTLE SUGAR EVER, it’s causing my body to not store all the fat. I have no idea. Don’t go out and eat more sugar because I said so. I have no idea if this is the reason…but it is what I have been doing differently. Weird.

But what if there is something like…wrong? What if…what if I am leaking blood somewhere? OR my blood is evaporating? 5 pounds of blood MISSING!!!!!!! What if.

Oh, did you guys know that I respond to your comments that you make on the website by writing comments underneath yours? Some of you ask questions and I answer them usually by writing a comment underneath the comments that you make. I know not whether you are notified of this comment exchange, so I thought I would tell you this, in case you think that I am ignoring you! I am not ignoring you! I LOVE YOU! Thank you all so much for the continued support that you have given me these past 8+ months. You have stuck with me through thick and now thinner and I appreciate your encouragement and laughter. xoxoxo

Hullo again. I realize that I wrote to you last night stating that I was too afraid to show you any progress pics because I am sortof self conscious about my hanging body fat. Swing batta batta! Anyway, this morning I stepped on the scale SIX TIMES because I was trapped in a realm of disbelief. The scale read…get ready for it. 241. TWO FOURTY FRICKING ONE. Somehow in my insane novel writing last night and the tea that kept me up til 4:30am, I lost two more pounds. What the h-bloody-ell? Whatever. I am taking it. My penance for being so lame and not showing you progress pictures, is of course, to show you progress pictures. So i got up, got dressed, put on some face (cause uhm, dudes it’s the morning) and posed away for the camera.

Two things that I am noticing about this batch. No wonder the chick at the plus size store thought I was pregnant. I DO LOOK PREGNANT! Sigh. But it’s like a 1st trimester pregnant and not a 3rd at least, AND…and and…it’s cause of that hanging inner tube that I have mentioned before - so I have bravely pulled it out in the last picture to show you exactly what I have to deal with. I realize that it’s incredibly embarrassing to show you one’s roll of fat in all its glory - but this blog is real and real dictates that I must pull out my fat to show you the truth of the matter. Losing weight rapidly as I have done over the past 6 months (yes it’s almost been that long, folks!) changes the way your skin holds your chunk. This is why they offer the tummy tuck in Canada for free if you’ve lost 100 pounds in a year, because we Canadians value these sort of things. Yes, cut back on Needle Exchange programs because of lack of funding, but pay for a bunch of tummy tucks because flat tummies are essential for the betterment of mankind.)**

**actually it’s cause the fatter people of this world can get nasty rashes under their loose skin, and that can lead to skin complications.

ANYway - I will get to the juices.

Peace out! <3

I am SO close to losing 80 pounds that I think that if I breathe out hard enough I shall in fact lose it.

I am having a hard time, folks, with these progression pictures. I feel all of a sudden really self conscious, like you guys won’t see the difference and I am almost ashamed or something.

My skin is hanging in weird places, but not so much that you can tell it’s really loose skin - but I can tell. It looks like deflated fat. The fat just hangs lower than it used to. It’s weird and it makes me sortof poopy. My sentences are short and choppy! CHOP! KAH! FRUG! Anyway, I am embarrassed and I need some encouragement.

I made some changes to the site to make it more user friendly. I categorized all my pre-op things with the category name “pre-op” (how creative of me) so that you can click on “pre-op” under the categories on the side menu and it will bring up only the posts that are pre-op. MOUTHFULL!

This weekend I enjoyed the company of very close friends in Crystal Beach. We laughed and talked and talked…and talked and Donny and I enjoyed some hot-tubbing. It’s my home away from home. Thank you Grant and Denise for a very needed weekend together.

Plans for the wedding are also going smoothly now that we have picked a date and I am comfortable with it being on a Sunday. For awhile I was sad because I always thought the perfect DAY to have a wedding would be on Saturday - but after realizing that having it on the Sunday will save us 2k, I became quite comfortable with the idea.

We are less stressed (aka a hell of a lot less stressed) since Donny got full time hours at his job. I didn’t get that job at the plus size store but I am still looking around and handing off resumes.

Do you guys know how fan-freakingtastic Donny is? Lemme tell you a bit about my Donny. He is thee most amazing person in the whole universe and I love him more as each day passes, if that’s at all possible. For the past four years plus, we have had an unbelievable time together and I have not heard of a couple that is happier than we are (of course, I am sortof bias). I have never been with anyone who I truly respect and cherish to the very core until now. For him, I have the most tremendous appreciation - for all that he does for me, for our relationship, and for being the creative, generous and loving man that he is. I just wanted to let you know this not because I haven’t said it before, and not because I’ve done something naughty and I am trying to apologize, but just because I love him and I will continue to love him in every way I can, including shamelessly shouting about it on this blog.

Now that I have melted your heart, I think I will go drink some 11:40pm tea and try to write a bit of my novel. Although, seeing as how this blog entry is terribly written I might want to not attempt to write my novel tonight as I will most likely be discouraged and gnash my teeth.

Should I get over my woes and just post progress pictures already? How can I do this? I am feeling like I have gained 20 pounds of loose skin.

It is now that I am being truly tested, but I feel that I am managing well. I am unemployed and stressed to the max, avoiding (as much as I can) the fears that I have about the future and the uncertainty of my situations in life. I love my life, I really do. I love my Donny and I love my apartment and my new party body (a nick name that we have come up with to explain the weird sortof hip sway walk I do now). But I am stressed. SO FREAKING STRESSED and it’s taking its toll emotionally. Unemployment is GREAT and TERRIBLE. It’s great because I get to be with the person I love most in the world 24/7. We get to wake up, and have our morning (read: afternoon) coffees and apply for jobs and the cuddle and lounge around after we have applied for our jobs. I get to watch the strange things that my cats do inside grocery bags and with teddy bears. But it’s only a matter of time before I WILL BE EATING GUM OFF THE STREET. I have applied for over 70 jobs now and have received not one call back. It’s not only me. A number of people I know are struggling as well.

I don’t know what else to do but keep trying and make sure I don’t let my unemployment stress and anxiety turn into a full blown case of depression. So you can imagine that me keeping my head above the water right now in that area has taken away from my full focus on losing weight. I am still losing. The grand total being 77 pounds lost now, but I could be doing better. The truth is, is that I don’t want to try as hard as I can because if I do, and if I fail I don’t know if I could handle it. At least this way, I am succeeding, little by little, it’s enough to get by on. That sounds dumber written down than it did in my head, but it’s the honest to Zeus truth. So I am just kinda “going through the motions” or something as cliched and retarded as that. I am just waking up, taking my vitamins, checking my energy levels, working out if I can, and looking for jobs. I don’t know if I have the emotional strength to take the time that I have off while I am not working and spent it doing 2 hours in the gym every day. I could be, but I think I’d rather chop my legs off and eat them. (which brings up the grand dismay I have about my calves in their patriotic glory fluttering like flags for having the most loose skin of all the other calves in all the world).

Novel writing is going good. I have doubled the relaxation of the activity by creating a shelf that sits on the bath that I can use as a desk while I am taking a bath. If you have been reading this blog in its entirety, you know that baths are the best things in the whole frakking universe.The shelf is the bestest thing everer, but sometimes i forget about the world and realize too late that I am either freezing and blue or feverish and magenta.

Odd things about being 77 pounds lighter.

I can cross my legs under my desk, both in my office and the shelf that I made for the bath.

I wear a size 16 now and am in desperate need of pants!

I can run on the treadmill for a long period of time (although I shouldn’t because it hurts my ankle)

My knees hit each other while I am sleeping and it frakking hurts!!!! (gotta love that I am using the word Frak all of a sudden after being overloaded with Battlestar Galactica Episodes!)

Philip Glass is the best ever to work out to. (this isn’t related to 77 pounds down, but I think that you should know.)

Sometimes I feel like I wanna run around the apartment and dance and jump like a silly bean - other times I feel like I can’t get out of bed because I am a pile of mush. (like today for example)

I DO NOT CRAVE BREAD. I never thought I would say this, but I really don’t. It’s strange and I think that I have somehow become host to a wheat intolerant alien.

I think that’s it. Sorry for the randomness. I seem to be not so into writing in the blog because of the novel writing. Truth is, when I am in that world, it’s hard to come out of it.

Tomorrow night I am going to see Star Trek, and I am going to sit in the theatre with AMPLE room in between the arm rest and my bum. It’s always bothered me how tight of a fit it was before when I was over 300. It was so embarrassing, even though in the darkness of the theatre nobody notices, unless you are me, and are looking around to see if anyone else is suffering. Tomorrow night I will sit down, with my ample room and I will enjoy a film without being embarrassed. Take THAT!

Well I finally hit my half way point of 73 pounds lost!! (that’s half way to 175 from 322 by the way). So my new weight is 249! I took pictures but none of them turned out because they aren’t at the right angle and can’t be properly set up with the other photos in photoshop without me looking like I am three feet tall. Not that I have anything against being three feet tall - it’s just that I am not…and I wouldn’t want people to assume that having a gastric bypass creates some sort of crazy shrinking of height. SOooo I’ll have to re-take the pictures (aka get donny to take them) and the right angle.

I don’t think I have anything else I have to say. My stress is diminishing with every exam that I finish up. I am done 2 and have 3 more to go next week.

Oh I will say this actually… Losing weight really really really makes the whole dropping off resumes and talking to managers to try and apply for jobs a heck of a lot easier. I mean, we all know that I am not skinny minny, but they just look at me differently - without as much judgment in their twinkling eyes. I need a job, desperately so I must say that losing this 73 pounds will most likely help the whole application process a fair amount. It’s sad really. When I was heavier people would automatically assume I was lazy! Hell, I know I am lazy - but that’s not the first impression that I want to give people because of my weight Actually, I shouldn’t say that - I am a lot less lazy than I was.

Anyway - hoorah for hitting half way in 4.5 months! I know that I said I was going to reward myself with something when I hit 73, but I really can’t afford to do so - which is okay. It is reward enough to know that what I have accomplished thus far is changing my life for the better slowly but surely. And yes, I could use  a new pair of pants - but why waste the money when they will be baggy in a month Oh, and Value Village had NOTHING to offer me. All the sizes were either 14s or 26s. I was very discouraged. Luckily the weather has been sortof nice and I have one pair of shorts that isn’t too big for me and I salvaged some old belts that were holding some area rugs together.

Next time I post I promise that I will have some photos!

So just a quick update. Things are great! I feel so much better. I was able to go out last night and spend some time with some friends who I haven’t seen in a long time. It was really nice. I felt some pain though later on in the evening, around 11:00pm so Donny took me home and I fell into a vicodine slumber.

Oh I found out what it feels to be really full! I didn’t mean to do it but I was just drinking too fast I guess. I was SO thirsty. It’s really hard not to take those huge long gulps that I loved to take - so I was drinking and eating some strained cream of mushroom soup and all of a sudden there was this tightness in my chest. I stopped. It stopped after about 2-3 minutes - afterall it’s liquid so it didn’t last long in my stomach. I just don’t know what the feel is leading UP to full yet. So I am working on that…

SO now I can tell you my weigh in results!!! Donny fixed the scale and apparently it goes up to 303.2! I have lost 18.8 pounds since 1 week before my surgery so…2 weeks!

yay

So I don’t have time to write you a nice big blog letter to tell you everything but I will tell you the main events of what happened after the surgery.

We got into a huge car accident on our way home from the hospital! It was so freaking scary! I have to tell you exactly what happened though because it is so very dramatic (so very Janie). We had a killer snow storm and we thought it was subsiding so we weren’t too too worried. I mean, I was uncomfortable because of all the bumps but it was not that bad so we were okay. All of a sudden the van went out of control, went over three lanes into oncoming traffic and smashed into the guard rail on the opposite side. After the hit we ended up in the middle lane facing the on coming traffic but nobody could see us because it was snowing so badly that you could barely see two feet in front of you. That was the scariest thing because donny and I after saying “are you okay i love you i love you” a million times were then facing these cars that look like we are going to be smashed ten times over again. I realized then that something was wrong with my foot and also that my knees were up against the dash and I couldn’t get out of the van because my side was all smashed in. My glasses were also all smashed up so I couldn’t see anything in any sort of detail so that was all very disconcerting.

Then a lady came to my door and pried it loose and told me she was a nurse and she saw the whole thing. I said “OMG LOOK AT MY INCISIONS TELL ME IF I AM SCREWED!” and she did and said they looked fine. (i was wearing my seatbelt so where there would be lots of bruising at least they were forced against the belt and not torn across the dash or something). Get this though, her HUSBAND was driving behind us (she was in front of us) and happened to be an city of sarnia emergency traffic dude who was able to barricade the road off from oncoming traffic with his lights and reflector thingys. So that was an insane relief! OMG! So because I was crying at this point because I knew everything was going to be okay and my emotions starting kicking in, the nice nurse lady took me into her van and wrapped me up in blanket to wait for the ambulance. I knew as soon as I stepped on my foot that it was sprained. She took another look at my incisions in the light and said that one of them might be seeping but it was okay still.

We went to the hospital and called my parents and Donny’s parents to let them know what was going on. The damage of the car is probably a write off. We won’t know for sure until we get the assessment back. Donny’s dad said he was going to pick us up. We were still 2 hours away from home at this point, so that was a huge wonderful marvelous thing that he did for us to relieve that stress of not being home. So I got checked out at the hospital…and we grabbed the most important things from the van before we left it at the impound lot.

That was last night and we got in at about 11:30pm. I went straight to bed. The “being off my feet for 48 hours” really conflicts with the “walking a mile a day to prevent blood clots” from the surgery so I am sorta frustrated about that.

DONNY IS AMAZING. He has done everything and more for me. He is the best. Right now he has me propped up on pillows and surrounded me by things that I need like kleenex and lotion and computer and broth.

I will update you more about the day to day living with gastric bypass week one sorta thing in a bit - but right now we are going to watch some Heroes from last week and all that jazz.

Everyone is fine. We are fine. We love each other very much and we were SO LUCKY. Unbelievably lucky.

Thank you all for your prayers and support. We both really feel that you were with us all the way. xoxoxoxo

Hello all! So I have news that most of you are aware of but I will tell all anyway and save the best til the last.
Firstly, I have my surgery date! It’s December 17th pending that all the blood work that I have to re-do goes smoothly and I have never had a problem before so I am not anticipating any problems but it’s still something that makes me a little worried.

The consult went great. There were 7 other people there and we all learned the basics and stuff. I was supposed to have gone to an information seminar in London, ON beforehand but nobody told me so my surgeon was a little annoyed, but “passed” me anyway because I did good on the test.

The first thing that I want to say is that my surgeon (whose name is Dr. Hendricks) was hella shocked that I am getting this surgery because he has never seen anyone approved that has NO health problems and at such a young age. He said it was awesome, but he was just shocked. So now, I am shocked too. He said “it makes me think that someone actually made a mistake…but a good mistake and one that they can’t take back now” so yay. weird but yay.

Information here is going to be sporadic because I just came home and I got NO sleep last night due to being super excited about having the consult and donny being SO incredibly sick that I was worried about him. I gained 22 pounds since I was approved. Isn’t that INSANE? Ughhhh!!!! I will probably lose that during the liquid diet I have to be on 7 days prior to the surgery, but still. I am a fatt-fattytard!!!

What else….

Uhm, crappy news is that I have to go to Michigan a week after my surgery for a check up, which means it’ll be Christmas Eve. My dad has graciously consented to drive me and give Donny a bit of a break since he will be so incredibly busy taking care of me. Christmas day will be a blur I am sure but nothing I can’t endure. I am so tired right now I just typed that entire paragraph with my eyes closed. I really need to get some sleep.

I am super excited about the surgery coming so close, but I am also excited because on the way back from Michigan my boyfriend pulled off into a little town with a Gazebo lighted up with Christmas lights (it was snowing) and asked me to marry him He then produced to most gorgeous ring I have ever seen….and suits me SO well. It is exactly what I wanted. Simple but beautiful. Here is a picture!

My engagement ring!!!

I would have taken a picture with it on but its a smidgen too small. We are getting it re-sized tomorrow because I can’t wait to wear it. We are so happy and giddy it’s retarded. Unfortunately though I am exhausted and must get to sleep before I drop dead.

Take care everyone!!