Just one of those days...or I'm just a crybaby...

Nothing remarkable.  Doing ok with being able to eat and drink, not too much of the slimeys or pukies... I just don't want to eat.  I have absolutely no desire to eat... or move... or anything today.

I don't have a follow-up with my surgeon until March, but I'm debating whether to call him or not.  My sides hurt and my abdomen is really tender.  It's not an all-out stabby pain, but if I'm not wearing tightish pants, my sides ache... When I poke at my abdomen it HURTS.  It's okay if I don't poke, though.  I dunno if I should call and complain, or just let it go until my appointment.  I keep thinking that I'm overreacting, but every time I call I end up in the hospital...  I'm thinking maybe it's just gravity pulling on all my excess skin.  I can't imagine people walk around and function in this level of pain, though.

I'm thinking I might just have to talk to my GP about getting back on some kind of depression meds.  Feeling this moody and grumpy is going to start impacting my family soon.  I'm irrationally crabby.  I dislike my body more now than I did 130 lbs ago.  I still can't see the weight loss like other people can.  Now I just have more loose skin and less boobs... I dunno...

I'm attempting to finish this protein shake, but it's not going down easy today.  Chike Very Vanilla, 8oz of 2% milk, and a splash to sugar-free Torani chocolate syrup.  Meh.  I'm just not feeling it today, but I've been slacking on my protein this past week.  I haven't had a gain, but I'm exactly the same weight I was a week ago...  Gotta drink my protein.  That's my new mantra.  Gotta drink my protein.  Gotta drink my protein.

Waaaaaaaaahhhhhh.....

No news is good news...

So, I really have nothing new to report.  I'm slowly trying to get some solid foods into my diet.  Chicken hates me.  Pureed chicken hates me.  I don't know what I'm doing wrong there, but chicken makes me get the slimies.  Ouch.  I have a follow up appointment scheduled for March 14th.  Yay...

Happy Valentines Day to those of you who celebrate it today.  I've been celebrating Valentines Day in June since 1994, so it's not a February holiday to me...

Planning on going up to the tattoo shop tonight, just to drop off some cupcakes and chocolates for them.  I love my tattoo guys!  When all of this stooopid medical crap is over with, I'm getting my sleeves finished... 

...someday.

I hate electronics... *Rant Incoming*

So, first I started out with the Wii and a WiiFit board.  It said I was too fat and couldn't calculate anything... please remove your enormous girth from the WiiBoard before you break it...  After a while, I was able to actually USE the WiiFit (apparently it has a 330 lbs weight limit).  When I would step on the board it would say "Oooooh!"  Kinda like a Wii "OUCH"... Then in a most pleasant voice the Wii would announce "That's obese!"  Yay! Bite me!  I know that.  That's why I got a fricking WiiFit in the first place, thank you Captain Obvious.

I was doing pretty good with the WiiFit workouts... aerobic step, boxing, running in place... the balance games would make me mad, but the rest were pretty much okay.  Doable.  I watched as my BMI went down along with my weight... yes, of course I'm wearing heavy winter clothes to workout, doesn't everyone?!?!?

My lovely, wonderful, supportive S.O. decided that we needed to get an Xbox for Christmas... Look, we'll get a Kinect so you can still work out with games and stuff.  Yay, I apparently love change.  Let's screw up my routine some more!

Enter February 9th.  I finally got up the nerve to try out said Kinect game, YourShape.  I battled with the Xbox for a while trying to figure out the controller, then with the Kinect who made me poke at random pretend buttons in the air.  Now I feel stupid.  I hate new stuff.  So, I'm in my living room poking at invisible option buttons.  The Kinect thinks it's a good idea to put a scan of you into the game.  Now I get to see my fat ripple and shake as I try and punch down walls and swing an invisible jumprope.  Eeew.  Really?!? 
After every game I tried, the stern woman instructor tells me "You're not quite getting it."  Yeah, ya think?!?  I use my anger to curse out this voice and fuel my hopping and punchings.  I was not going to quit...
Thirty minutes late, I apparently "punched out" 10 calories.  What?  Sorry, did you misplace a decimal?  Ten? 

AAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!  I could burn more calories banging my head on the wall.  That can't be right.  I chalked it up to "Aerobics - general" in the MyFitnessPal log.  Somehow in my annoyance, I hit some random buttons and the Kinect decided to recalibrate.  It's too low.  The dang thing is sitting too low in the room and it wasn't reading my movements.  Now I have to redecorate and find somewhere else for the Kinect doohickey to sit so it can actually track my movements.  Guess that's my evening planned...
I miss my Wii...   *pout*

Umm... who IS that??

So, this is me.  In February 2011... I had already started "dieting" in anticipation of my first surgery... I thought I looked pretty good.  Actually, I still kinda do.  This is the girl I see in the mirror every day.  This is the girl who cries over pants that look too small.  This is the girl that hates eating, but still loves food.  This is me.


This was Halloween 2011.  Underneath that proudly off-the-rack dress, I had a feeding tube that went into my jejunum.  I stayed seated most of the night because I was feeling HUGE in that tiny dress, and I was afraid you could see the feeding tube through the white front of the dress...  And yeah, I look weird with hair... I was the evil Alice in Wonderland... the evil, fat one...  *shrugs*



This is who everyone else sees.  This is the girl who posts pics with the cellphone thinking "Damn, that facebook-cellphone angle really does make you look 125 lbs thinner!!"  This is the girl that sucked it up and tried on those size 16 jeans... and is wearing them now.



And now you have a face (and a few chins) to put with the inane ramblings on this page...  And now that I know how to post pics, you can expect that I'll perhaps do it more often...

Random rambling update...

Sooo... about a week after my last dilation and I'm attempting a few new things.  I actually kept down half a Quest protein bar this morning...  Hooray, solids!  Well, sort of solids... I warmed it up so it wouldn't be too chewy.  If you haven't tried the Quest bars yet, you should.  They're expensive and only available online, but damn, they're yummy.  And you can stuff them in yer pocket for a few minutes to warm and soften them...  Mmmm, butt-warmed protein bars...  Seriously, though, they're one of the few protein supplements that don't taste like protein.  I only wish the new "all-natural" line didn't have stevia in them.  I'm allergic to stevia.  But the original line of Quest flavors are sweetened with sucralose and have no sugar alcohols at all.  None!  That makes for a happier GI tract  =)

I'm still not really a fan of breakfast, but I'm trying to eat on schedule and get all my proteins in.  I never really ate breakfast, I just drank coffee til noonish.  Now I'm forcing myself to get at least 10g of protein in the morning.  It's hard.  This is all much harder than I though it would be.

I'm still having a fair amount of pain from my new stomach.  Part of it is still healing... five surgeries in eight months has left me rather exhausted some days.  The surgeon says I haven't had time to properly heal from any of the surgeries given my problems keeping food down.  It's hard to heal a malnourished body.  Makes sense.  So some days I think I'm superwoman and get six loads of laundry done and pick up after the kids and get dinner made.... Then I cry on the couch for being so stupid when the pain kicks back in.  Somedays I just wake up crying and turn into a couch-lump.  It's all so random.  I think today is going to be a couch-lump day.  I hurt.  My stomach hurts.  My back hurts.  My sides hurt.  I think all the extra skin is starting to find gravity.  It's a constant tugging sensation when I stand... sometimes, it pulls when I lay on my side...  Next payday, I think I'm investing in some Spanx to try and control gravity a bit....

People are really starting to notice my weight loss now.  The compliments are nice, but I still don't see it.  There's still a 400 lb girl in my mirror.  She's cute, yeah, but still really really fat.  My brain hasn't caught up yet.  I hope it will someday.  My newly ebay'd size 20 jeans are falling off of me.  I ebay'd some size 16s, figuring that I'm already losing sizes faster than i can keep up.  They look so small.  I know 16 is still "Plus Sized," but they look so small.  I cried when I opened the box.  I don't want to try them on.  What if they don't fit.  I know it's silly, but it's there... The brain says some foul things sometimes.  What if I can never fit into a 16?  What if my 20 jeans are just mislabeled?  What if I start gaining weight back?  My old size 26 jeans have been donated to charity... except for one pair.  I can't let that last one go.  Not yet.

I've had five surgeries on my abdomen.  Now it's time to work on my head.  My brain is not in this.  My brain does not like this.  Change is bad.  Change is wrong.  Change never works.  I need to fix that.  Today, I think I'll just find the mental duct tape and shut my brain up.

Surgery #5 complete... and then some...

I'm still feeling kinda awful, so the updates are slow going... sorry about that...

So, the revision abdominal adhesion surgery went well.  I no longer have two navels.  No more horrible pulling pain.  Yay!  As it heals it looks more and more like normal, though i do have a new two inch incision to heal.

This procedure was done at the Surgicenter as an outpatient thing.  I was at the Surgicenter at 7am and home before 3pm.  Easy peasy.  The only problem I had was my surgeon went from my surgery to another surgery and couldn't be reached to change my Rx.  The standard outpatient pain Rx apparently is Tylenol 3.  I'm allergic to codeine.  Yep, Umm... I can't take that... Luckily, I'm not really compliant about taking pain meds on time so i had some leftover meds at the house.

I did let my doc know that I'm still not doing well on solid foods, so he schedule another EGD with balloon dilation for me on February 2nd.  i should go back and count how many EGDs I've had so far... i think this was 16 or 18...

Anywho, the EGD went well.  I wasn't fully strictured, but it was closed slightly.  The doc discovered new ulcerations at the permanent stitches site, so he said that irritation is what's causing me to heave on the solid foods.  Now I'm on Carafate for the ulceration and we have another procedure to schedule to remove the permannet stitches once my new pseudo-tummy is completely healed.  Hopefully that one will be a quick outpatient thing, too.  they should be able to remove the pesky stitches with the EGD set-up, so no more incisions.

I got a stern talking-to when the doc said "What pain meds are you on?" and I said "None."  Now I'm back on the heavy-duty meds and I was told to take it easy and sit on my butt more.  So, I'm gong to sit on my butt...