Today being my 6 week anniversary, or as it has been cleverly labeled as “surgiversary”, (which was clever the first 20 times I heard it said or written), I thought I would blog a bit about my progress so far, feelings, general health and where I am in my head.
To start with, I weighed in this morning at 216.2. I believe that is a loss of 1.2 pounds from last week. I stopped taking a prescription water pill about a week or so ago and immediately found my weight fluctuating all over the place…mostly up! It was very discouraging to me, but I knew that there wasn’t anything I was doing wrong as far as diet goes, and I have started to exercise more now that I am this far out from surgery. And I was right, the weight started to come down each day by small increments until I achieved this number this morning. I will take it! Do I wish that it was 3 pounds or 5 pounds? YES! But, I am hopeful I will still have some weeks like that too in the future. Mostly, I don’t want to have to log a gain.
My general health has improved a lot. I went on a walk at my break today and needed to tie my shoes. I was able to just bend over and tie them. No huffing and puffing, no blood rushing to my face because of lack of oxygen and no awkward squatting to try and find a way to balance my body without it tipping over. It’s funny the things others might take for granted, but as for me, this was one of those NSV’s I guess. My blood sugar has taken a dramatic jump to normal results in the past week. When I saw my PCP last week, she recommended I take Metformin again, so I do that in the morning. She also said I could take the lantus insulin in the evening, but only 5 units. With the numbers being normal every time I check them, I haven’t used the insulin in the evening, because I am afraid it would go too low. I think I will monitor them for a few more days and send her the information. Hopefully, she will agree with me on just taking the metformin for now. In 3 months, she will take my A1C again and I believe it’s going to be low enough to stop taking metformin. I could be wrong, she may want me to continue it, but I guess we will see.
I am still experiencing some head hunger, which really makes me crazy! It occurs primarily in the evenings, even after I have had my dinner. I am not in the least hungry. I don’t necessarily do anything about it, but I find myself looking in the fridge or the pantry as are my old habits and feeling frustrated because there genuinely is nothing there for me to eat (that I would even want to eat) and it’s just bad addictive habits. I think this will be a demon that will stick with me for the rest of my life…
I went back to work yesterday. It’s quite a different experience after being home for 6 weeks during recovery. It’s not too bad. I am having a difficult time gauging how much food to bring with me. On Tuesday, it didn’t feel like I brought quite enough and so at the end of my shift at 6PM, I had to make up a whopping 30 grams of protein. I used my old standby, which is shrimp, but I can’t eat that every day or I will get tired of it. Then today, I decided to pack a couple extra small snacks and here I am at the end of my shift with a lot of extra food in my lunch box that isn’t going to get eaten today. I just get so busy that I don’t have time or just plain forget to eat. And obviously the absence of the ghrelin hormone means I am not feeling the hunger pangs like I used to before surgery. I know that work and my stress levels are going to impact my progress (based off my work environment) but I will do my best to adjust.
Right now my 2 biggest obstacles are drinking enough fluids and making time for exercise. I REALLY want to get on that treadmill. (we have about a foot of snow outside, so no walking on those slippery sidewalks for me. Plus it is so cold!) The nutritionist wants me to workout for 45-60 minutes a day. If I could break that up into 2, 30 minutes workouts, I might be able to work it in, but I think they really want it to be one long workout for the full benefit. I keep telling myself that I have put myself through a lot to get to this surgery, have the surgery and reach my goals, so making excuses isn’t really the thinking I want to have. But, it certainly is hard to imagine finding another hour in the day without more sacrifice. I think though, I am going to have to make it a higher priority than some quiet down time after work. I am trying to figure this one out still.
So, that’s my progress after 6 weeks. I am down 30.8 lbs. It’s a good start!
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