I have also just survived a visit home to see family, which is trying in its own ways. I love my family very much. There are reminders of my mom (my best friend) who died 5 years ago in her 50s. During this visit I took my dad to the emergency room after a heart attack scare (no evidence of a heart attack after 5 hours in the ER, but still scary.) He has high blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes. My sister is there, and I'd buy the moon for her if I could, but feel like I really can't help at all, and I wish she wasn't sad. My nieces are adorable and I long for them and feel guilty I am not there every time I leave. We had celebrations and a party and I saw extended family. Everyone comments on how I look (code for weight; "you look good!" or "you look tired") whether it is up or down... luckily it was down this visit. I ate a lot, drank a lot, and was eventually glad it was all over.
I am still using my fitbit and LOVE it. I love the charts and graphs and datapoints and everything about it. It makes me walk more. I highly recomend it if numbers and graphs motivate you. If not the $100 fitbit, then even a $30 pedometer helps (or at least helped me pre-fitbit).
I am still using my fitbit and LOVE it. I love the charts and graphs and datapoints and everything about it. It makes me walk more. I highly recomend it if numbers and graphs motivate you. If not the $100 fitbit, then even a $30 pedometer helps (or at least helped me pre-fitbit).
I am down to 209 naked this week. I had a big loss in the last week, about 7 lbs, half of it (I presume) water weight after returning to my low-carb diet. The diet experiment has gone ok. I am eating very low carb, which means less than 30 grams a day. This means mostly meat and vegetables. I am eating more of both of those things than usual, and no: candy/treats/chips/breads. I have been researching this like crazy, reading all the literature, which basically says that people on low carb diets lose weight and it's generally not unhealthy, although it can be, just like any other diet. Personally, this is what I have found:
- it makes me feel full sooner, sometimes I can eat 1000 cal a day
- I peed on a stick, and yes, I have ketones in my pee. I like the science-y proof of diet-related tests, but am a little troubled by the biochemical changes. What does it REALLY mean that your brain usually uses carbs for energy and has to change processes in order to use fat?
- eating 1000 cal a day makes me a little lightheaded/dizzy
- low carb followers will say potassium/etc, drink broth... but I'd rather just eat food and not be dizzy
- I usually do not get enough protein in even on a meat diet
- I still have some concerns about nutrition related to this diet
- There is a super-great supportive community at reddit.com/r/keto and it always helps to set a goal with a supportive community. I need community. More than I currently have.
- I pee all the time- the diet is dehydrating, and I am worried this is not so good for me
- I have lost weight. About 10 lbs in 6 weeks, which is just slightly above what I was doing on WW alone, although I was hungrier on straight WW (was actually eating under points because I wasn't losing on full points.
- I am more aware of what I eat and I eat less junk.
I haven't stopped doing low carb yet, but probably will slowly start adding in some things like sweet potatoes to eat a more "paleo" clean diet- although I am not giving up dairy. So my basic plan is to keep eating veggies, a little more fruit, avoid processed food. I'd like to go back to doing some spinach and fruit shakes, which really helped me with my veggie intake and filled me up and made me feel good.
I feel really good about my weight loss. Today I am wearing a shirt that I've been carrying around 15 years because I love it, although this is the first time it fits in all that time. I feel like my head is finally around this.
Five years ago I had weight loss surgery. I had a lapband placed. I was up and down with it... starting over 300 lbs and then down to 280 by the surgery date (mandated pre-surgery loss) and down to 265 after a few weeks on liquids right after surgery. I made it to a brief 250 when the band was really tight and I was puking a lot. Really, I never knew whether I was going to be able to eat a meal or not. I had most of the tightness ("fill") removed from the band and was eventually creeped back to 270 lbs. I haven't seen the weight loss surgery doctor in a few years, but sometimes something still doesn't go down right and I have to "walk it off" in hopes that the too-big chunk will pass down my esophagus. It is often unpredictable.
I suspect that the lapband helps in some sense to keep me feeling fuller now. I certainly can't gorge on bread. If I try, it will make me feel tight in my throat and then eventually feel sick- saliva wells up until it can't be swallowed and I have to puke it up. It's all pretty disturbing. Obviously my head was not in a good enough place post-surgery to make the most of the lapband tool. Now, more often than not, I do not know that it is there. I can eat most foods and automatically avoid the ones I can't. It trained me to chew my food better. At this point I don't know whether I would have been as successful with my current loss without the surgery or not. It is probably helping some but the big change had to happen in my head, and it has. I had to make a plan and stick to it. I had to stop giving up. I had to stop eating sugar because I don't eat it in moderation. I know that diets, long term, are very unsuccessful, and that surgery has a greater risk of long term success. I don't think I regret doing it. I am happy I finally know how to make my head work, and will take along whatever other tools will help me make it through. I don't tell usually tell people about the surgery because I don't want the baggage that comes with it- the misunderstandings about what it is, but I guess also probably because of something I internalize about it- that I wasn't strong enough or smart enough or SOMETHING enough to just lose weight. Well- I am certainly proof that surgery doesn't fix the problem, and if a donut doesn't go down a small hole then ice cream certainly does.
Food/body/weight/image will always play a big role in my life... it's just the way it is. Since I was in sixth grade and the boy used to yell "earthquake" when I tried to play basketball on the playground, since when I was 10 and I kept my legs from resting on the seat of the chair in class so that they didn't press down and spread out and show their full width- since then, my fate has been sealed. I wish I could tuck all this away and say that being big and beautiful and confident and healthy and active is part of my world, but it isn't. I have fibromyalgia and my body aches. It aches worse when I am fat. It weighs heavy on all my bones. So I have to do this- I have to stick with it, and I have to take care of my body. I am afraid of killing myself with my fat and it is a big deal that I am finally making changes. And I am happy with the changes- happy I can run across a field, that I can jog to my tight connection at the airport, that I can shop for cheap crappy clothes at Old Navy. That I can wear a 20-year-old tshirt. That I am not "morbidly obese."
It makes me want to be better at everything, to change my whole life. If I can do this, what's to stop me from being a better housekeeper? A better wife, a better organizer, a better researcher and teacher, a better artist. A better friend. A better sister, aunt, mother. Better at speaking up and letting go. I want everything. I want to be more present in my life. I want to think about things less and do things more. I want to set goals and achieve them. Clearly this is possible.
