Well, now that I know that I want to have my surgery at hospital C, I'm just waiting for the phone call from my assigned Personal Patient Advocate to start scheduling everything...
Meanwhile, I have been working on healthy changes at home. It started out with a search for an elliptical at a bunch of garage sales. That didn't pan out, but something else happened. A neighbor offered me his Total Body Gym and treadmill for FREE. I'm not a huge treadmill fan, and I think I'm lifting enough weight for the moment ;P but keeping my family, my future self, and the price in mind - I accepted. Now I need to find some big strong guys who can help get it out of his basement into ours... (the current owner had a back injury/ surgery that prevents him from using, let alone moving them). Then, after missing a great reconditioned elliptical at a Sears outlet by 1 hour, I decided to try out a bottom of the line basic model sold at Walmart for under $200. My review - it works, as in it goes in an elliptical path and makes me sweat. The console doesn't do great readouts (some of the numbers blink in and out of readability) but I can see how long I've been on it, and the resistance seems to work. Given what I paid for it, I think that's pretty good. I'm going to work on tightening the bolts to get rid of a thunking sound I hear every revolution.
So I've also cut down on snacking after dinner. I used to have popcorn, or light fro-yo, or something after dinner. Between our kids having their community sports gearing up and a concerted effort to distract myself most nights I'm not having dessert/ post dinner snacks. I'm still walking at least a mile a day and now doing about 15 minutes a day on the elliptical (which sometimes says I have burned 144 calories doing it), and I have actually lost a few pounds in the last two weeks. Now, my only concern is a strange one. What if I lose enough weight that I'm no longer elligible for the surgery?
My BMI is 41, but in three more pounds lost it will be 40. Currently I qualify for surgery by having a BMI over 40. I will still qualify for surgery with a BMI 35-40 because of my co-morbidity of type II diabetes. To drop under 35, I would need to lose 33 pounds from now. Unlikely, but possibile. Because I will be on a medically supervised diet for 90 days after my initial surgical consult, I should be continuing to lose weight. I doubt I can lose 33 more pounds in that time period. If I could, I wouldn't be considering this weight loss surgery. The last time I lost 33 pounds it took me 5 months on a very restrictive nutrisystem diet. So why am I worried? I guess logically I'm not. But it does seem strange that for some reason I wouldn't want to lose TOO much weight.
The other part is that when I lose that much weight I haven't been successful at keeping it off. I feel hungry all the time, and start thinking things like "why can everybody eat a piece of bread except me and I'm still obese?" That's what I'm hoping will be taken care of by the surgery. That I'll have a tool that lets me feel full - REALLY full, after eating just a small amount of bread, protein, vegetable, etc. Then I won't want more. A friend told me about a friend of theirs who had the surgery and for two years was religious about what they ate. After two years, he came into the breakroom and saw the every-present donuts and said "You know, I want a donut!" So he cut a quarter of a donut off and ate it, smiled and said "OK, I'm full". That's my dream. Two years after surgery to be at a healthy weight, be able to have a couple bites of a dessert and say "OK, I'm done."
Waiting for that phone call....
Meanwhile, I have been working on healthy changes at home. It started out with a search for an elliptical at a bunch of garage sales. That didn't pan out, but something else happened. A neighbor offered me his Total Body Gym and treadmill for FREE. I'm not a huge treadmill fan, and I think I'm lifting enough weight for the moment ;P but keeping my family, my future self, and the price in mind - I accepted. Now I need to find some big strong guys who can help get it out of his basement into ours... (the current owner had a back injury/ surgery that prevents him from using, let alone moving them). Then, after missing a great reconditioned elliptical at a Sears outlet by 1 hour, I decided to try out a bottom of the line basic model sold at Walmart for under $200. My review - it works, as in it goes in an elliptical path and makes me sweat. The console doesn't do great readouts (some of the numbers blink in and out of readability) but I can see how long I've been on it, and the resistance seems to work. Given what I paid for it, I think that's pretty good. I'm going to work on tightening the bolts to get rid of a thunking sound I hear every revolution.
So I've also cut down on snacking after dinner. I used to have popcorn, or light fro-yo, or something after dinner. Between our kids having their community sports gearing up and a concerted effort to distract myself most nights I'm not having dessert/ post dinner snacks. I'm still walking at least a mile a day and now doing about 15 minutes a day on the elliptical (which sometimes says I have burned 144 calories doing it), and I have actually lost a few pounds in the last two weeks. Now, my only concern is a strange one. What if I lose enough weight that I'm no longer elligible for the surgery?
My BMI is 41, but in three more pounds lost it will be 40. Currently I qualify for surgery by having a BMI over 40. I will still qualify for surgery with a BMI 35-40 because of my co-morbidity of type II diabetes. To drop under 35, I would need to lose 33 pounds from now. Unlikely, but possibile. Because I will be on a medically supervised diet for 90 days after my initial surgical consult, I should be continuing to lose weight. I doubt I can lose 33 more pounds in that time period. If I could, I wouldn't be considering this weight loss surgery. The last time I lost 33 pounds it took me 5 months on a very restrictive nutrisystem diet. So why am I worried? I guess logically I'm not. But it does seem strange that for some reason I wouldn't want to lose TOO much weight.
The other part is that when I lose that much weight I haven't been successful at keeping it off. I feel hungry all the time, and start thinking things like "why can everybody eat a piece of bread except me and I'm still obese?" That's what I'm hoping will be taken care of by the surgery. That I'll have a tool that lets me feel full - REALLY full, after eating just a small amount of bread, protein, vegetable, etc. Then I won't want more. A friend told me about a friend of theirs who had the surgery and for two years was religious about what they ate. After two years, he came into the breakroom and saw the every-present donuts and said "You know, I want a donut!" So he cut a quarter of a donut off and ate it, smiled and said "OK, I'm full". That's my dream. Two years after surgery to be at a healthy weight, be able to have a couple bites of a dessert and say "OK, I'm done."
Waiting for that phone call....
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