Lost 100 Lbs, Before and after pics, 23 Weeks Post Op

I had a huge milestone last week and forgot to blog about it!  My weigh in days are on Wednesday, and last Wednesday, I was down 100.8 Lbs!  Woohoo!

I was so happy!  I told everyone and people were pleased but I was really surprised that my family didn't do something for me to help me celebrate.  I don't really need it because the weight loss itself its own reward, but I was kind of let down.

Anyway, here are some photos.  In the first, I'm covering my cleavage as this top is a size XL and is now so big on me that the shoulders fall off on both sides and the front gapes open too much if I bend over, like I am in this photo.

 

Me after losing 100 Lbs

Before and after (during, as I still need to lose more)

 The shot on the left, above, is from last summer.  I hated getting my photo taken and you can tell by the look on my face.  That's a piece of pizza on my plate.  I hated eating in public and always took small portions so nobody would give me dirty looks. The photo on the right  side was taken last week.

Before and After 100 Lb loss

The above photo shows my face, this past Christmas vs last week (July 2017).

So, I'm doing well.  My weight fluctuates some because I retain water, especially on humid days. I can only take a half dosage of my water pills or they make me lightheaded, but can't go off of them because of the water retention.  I'm hoping that will get better.

9 Weeks Post Op, down 62.4 Lbs!

Hi Guys,
Wow, can't believe it's been so long since I last posted.  I was down with pneumonia for 2 weeks and that got me way off track, blog wise.

My new eating/drinking/exercise routines have taken up a lot of my time.  I'm down 62.4 Lbs since I started Optifast, 3 weeks before surgery, and I'm thrilled about that!

Here are my stats:

                      My Weight       Weekly Lbs Lost      Total Weight Loss    Monthly       Since Surgery

Starting:
Jan. 11th, 2017:        304 
after Week 1 Opti:    298                    6                        6
after Week 2 Opti:    284.8               13.2                   19.2
after Week 3 Opti:    281                    3.8                   23                     Pre-op: 23
(same day as surgery day)         
Total 23 Lbs lost on 3 weeks of Opti Opti

Surgery Day
Feb. 1st, 2017         281                          23/0
1 weeks post op:     271.2                         9.8              32.8                                                   9.8
2 weeks post op:     265.2                          6                38.8                                                 15.8 
3 weeks post op:     262.4                          2.8             41.6                                                 18.6
4 weeks post op:     257.4                          5                46.6              Month 1: 23.6             23.6

5 weeks post op:     252.6                         4.8              51.4                                                  28.4
6 weeks post op:     248.4                         4.2              55.6                                                  32.6
7 weeks post op:     246                            2.4              58                                                     35
8 weeks post op:     244.8                         1.2              59.2              Month 2: 13.2             36.2

9 weeks post op:     241.6                         3.2              62.4                                                  39.4

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So, I'm doing great, and couldn't be happier about the weight loss! 

I also starting bike riding this week.  My first ride, on April 2nd, was 5 km.  It was nice and sunny and warm for this time of year, but it was weird riding past snowbanks, lol.

My second bike ride on April 3rd wasn't as nice. It was only 3 Celcius (37.4 Farenheit) and windy.  I was only able to do 20 minutes (2.6 km) that day, as it started to rain so I had to get home. It rained all the rest of that day and all day yesterday. Today it is not raining so I hope to go out again, if the puddles aren't too bad.

My clothes are almost all too big, and the sleeves of all of my tops, sweaters, and jackets dangle way below my fingertips, lol.  I was shocked by that, lol.  I still have a few tops that were way too tight for me to get into before surgery, that I can wear now, but even those are getting baggy.

The new leggings I bought last month still look OK, but I can pull them up to my bra now, lol.  All the rest of my pants are huge. It is such a great feeling to grow out of clothes because they are too big instead of too small! 

I'm on soft foods now, and can eat things like fake crab meat, tuna,omelets,  roasted chicken, as long as I leave the skin on while it cooks so it stays moist.  I take the skin and fat off before I eat the meat.  I can have up to 3 ounces of food at one time now, or 3/4 cups of soft foods, like yogurt. I still sometimes need a protein shake to get my protein in.  I've started using 2 tbsps of my vanilla and caramel protein shakes as tea whitener, so my tea now has 6 grams of protein, lol.  I normally drink 3 cups of herbal tea per day, so that's an easy way to sneak an extra 18 grams of protein in.  I'm supposed to get 60-80 grams of protein in, and can sometimes get 70 grams in, but usually it's a struggle just to reach 60.  I also need to drink 8 cups (about 2000 ml) of water per day, and the tea helps with that, too.

My asthma is much better, and I can walk for an hour without needing ventolin at all.  I used to need ventolin every single day and I only needed it once this week, on my windy bike ride.  I didn't need it at all on my other, longer bike ride, so I think the wind just made it so much harder to pedal that I needed it.

Another great thing is that my back doesn't ache all the time, and I'm not getting migraines every day.  I still get headaches sometimes, but they aren't debilitating.

Even though I had a rough time with lots of pain for so long, and then pneumonia, I don't regret doing this, not one bit. It's the best thing I ever did for myself.  I'm so happy now.  I'm not depressed or anxious or feeling full of shame all the time, like I was before.  I'm even slowly becoming more social and not isolating myself like I used to. 

I went to a big family gathering over the weekend, and that's something I normally would have tried to skip, as I always felt so judged about my weight.  I hated eating in front of people.  I went though, and everyone was so kind, and gave me so many compliments about how much I'd lost.  Everyone stared at the small amount of food on my plate, and some joked about it, but it took me longer to eat my 4 tablespoons of food than it took everyone else to eat their plates, plus second and third helpings, and desert!  I felt completely fine and satisfied and not like I was missing out at all. I was able to catch up with some of my younger cousins, which was really nice.

Sorry this was so long; thanks for reading!  Big hugs!

5 Weeks Post Op RNY Gastric Bypass Surgery, with Pneumonia

So I have good news and bad news.  The good news is that I lost another 4.8 Lbs this week, bringing my grand total to 51.4 Lbs lost altogether since starting Optifast on January 18th.

The bad news is I have pneumonia.  I think I caught it in the mall...not pneumonia, but the virus that led to it.  I have to walk every day and we still have loads of snow and ice here, so I've been walking in the mall.  I normally avoid crowded places as I get sick easily, but it was important to walk so I went anyway.  I caught a cold or virus last Thursday, and it wasn't bad at first; just sneezing, runny nose, a bit of a dry cough.  By the weekend my asthma had kicked in and on Monday, when I couldn't get ahold of my doctor, I decided I'd better go to the hospital for an asthma treatment.

Thank goodness I went, or I'd have no idea I had pneumonia and think it was my asthma.  They both feel the same; wheezing, coughing, shortness of breath, back pain from all of the coughing.

I'm on antibiotics now.  The pharmacist said it will take 3 days for the antibiotics to start working, and this evening's dose will be the third day so hopefully he's right. I already feel better than I did on Monday; Monday was the worst.

I only have 7 days total of antibiotics and usually need more than that.  I have a follow up appointment with my family doctor on Friday morning, so hopefully he'll top me off if I need more. 

The doctor in emergency scared the hell out of me.  He sent me for blood work, an EKG, and Xrays (I requested the Xray to see if my atelectasis had gotten worse).  He said he was worried I had complications from surgery and was looking for a blood clot, and that I may need to go back in for a CAT scan.  He said he'd call me with the results of my blood work and then never did.  I think it's wrong to scare someone like that and then not call to alleviate or confirm the fears.
I called the hospital but they wouldn't tell me anything, except to say that if I hadn't heard from the doctor then it probably means he found nothing wrong on the blood tests. Hopefully my family doctor can access that information and let me know on Friday.

I need to call my nurse in Sudbury tomorrow to let her know about the pneumonia.

This is all a pain in the butt, but I don't think the pneumonia is due to the surgery.  I used to get pneumonia all the time back when I was teaching.  If I would have gone in to emerg a day earlier it may have just progressed to bronchitis like normal, and not pneumonia. I usually get sick at this time of year because the snow starts to melt, then freezes, melts, then freezes, and it releases snow molds in the air, which I am allergic to. I think that, coupled with picking up an infection from someone at the mall, is what made me so sick this time.

I am happy to have lost over 50 Lbs; it was my first mini goal.  I'm also happy to weigh 252.6 Lbs. I was 304 when I started this and hadn't seen the 250's in ages.  It will be amazing to drop below 250 and get into the 240's, then 230's.  My weight stalled in the 230's for years, then stalled in the 250's for years, then 260-280 for years.  When it went up to 300 it scared me into surgery.

People are already commenting on how much I've lost, which is nice.  I was feeling so ashamed about my weight I barely left the house, and hated being looked at because I felt judged every where I went.  Eating in public was agony and I preferred to eat alone, hiding at home.  I just felt so full of shame, and that's all gone.  I haven't felt shame since I started Optifast on Jan. 18th and that alone makes this whole ordeal worth it to me.

Week 2 Post Op

I am posting this a bit late, but I was down 6 Ibs in my second week Post Op RNY Surgery.  Week 1 I lost 9.8 Ibs, so I lost 15.8 Ibs since surgery, plus 23 Ibs in the 3 weeks prior to surgery, for a total of 38.8 Ibs!!

My tops are all baggy, and the other day I pulled up my track pants, let go and they fell to the floor again, lol.  I had to undo the knot on the drawstring so I could make them tight enough to not fall off. That was cool.

I have had a LOT of pain since surgery though, so it has not been easy sailing for me. The pain was awful for the first week and then slowly got better the second week.  It went away, and it was wonderful to be pain free for 3 days. Then I dropped a pill and stupidly bent over at the waist to pick it up and OMG, the pain was bad. I think I may have pulled a muscle in my abdomen, or else maybe just pulled on the stitches on the main incision too much.

Then, (and don't keep reading if you have a weak stomach), I discovered I was seriously constipated because the pharmacist gave me the wrong Senokot.  My surgeon wrote that i needed the one with stool softener, and for 2 weeks I was taking one without a stool softener because the pharmacist screwed up and I didn't notice, and it hurt soooo badly. I saw my family doctor last Thursday, and he prescribed Restorolax.  Today, Monday,  is the first day that I'm not in major pain a few hours after eating, so it's finally working.  Thank God.