I realize you mean low carb, but the idea of being carb free kind of made me giggle. I think you'd have to eat nothing but cheddar and beef exclusively. 

No I am not low carb, I never have been. And I guess you could call me a protein first eater, but my surgeon expects us to get 150g of protein in shakes alone regardless of how much protein you are eating in REAL food. So really eating is basically what I feel like, what I feel like putting up with later (gas or maybe some watery stool depending on just how many thin mints I eat), it's kind of a hobby eating is, as I get all my nutrition from supplementation via vitamins and protein shakes, essentially.

 And, man, now that I am pregnant I am right now, well okay I put the fork down to type, eating quite a large bowl of whole wheat lasagna AND a whole wheat roll just slathered in butter. 

 When I asked my surgeon what my sleeve size was going to be he held up two fingers said "Probably five or six ounces, much MUCH bigger than a VSG for sure."

I was SSMO. I've lost 222 lbs. I got to my goal (I'm in my second trimester now so I'm watching the scale go up with glee, the sooner I can wear pants with a stretchy panel in them and crazy old ladies accost me on the street the better). I didn't particularly watch my carbs (I never counted them, I simply ate my protein first) and now that I am pregnant I am thanking my surgeon daily for my ability to eat eat eat. 

*****ally is to say how each of our individual weight losses will go. 

But if the question is CAN it be done, the answer is yes, I did it. 

 I loved him. He does at first seem fairly strict (the post-op diet directly following surgery specifically). And you will find that both he and his staff lapse into RNY eating suggestions. I called him on it once, when he was telling me about stuff getting stuck, and needing to drink protein an hour before I ate or drank anything else or whatever the timing was so that I didn't "wa**** out"  (We have a pyloris valve there's no real reason for that kind of nonsense as it opens when it wants to after everything is digested). And his nutrition course like most is pretty much a DS joke, there were TWO FAQ questions in his little pre-op book and both of them were irrelevant to the DS. 

He was there holding my hand right after surgery, and I've had no complications. If you have issues, you do stay, but we Srikanth patients lovingly refer to post-op as "Srikanth boot camp." I got wheeled into my tiny closet of a "room" in the day surgery wing of the hospital post surgery and was discharged the next morning 17 hours later. I may have been in the hospital a little over 24 total from the time I walked through the door and signed in at the front desk. My surgery was lap, 7 incisions, and 7 hours. I recovered really well. 

I will say that I am sort of disappointed that all of my visits past my second week visit have been with a nurse as opposed to him, I kind of feel sometimes considering I am self-pay that I would like to pay to see him, if you know what I mean. Also, I sometimes feel like I am re-explaining myself to a person I have no previous rapport with. 

 I think it does come on a lot faster for those of us with no issues (yet, to speak of). 

I mean I get gassy or maybe a bout of loose stool if I have an ENTIRE cinnamon roll in the morning on a bad day (oh about once a month around a specific time, ladies you know what I'm saying). 

But even that is manageable, and easy to predict. It's not like I'm racing off to the bathroom all the time.

I eat just about anything anywhere I go. I try all sorts of new things, I eat my favorites, I grocery shop in a way that is normal and doesn't require a lot of effort really.

Day to day everything is perfectly normal.  

 Congrats!

You know, it used to be in my signature that I was going to get a bike, it was one of my big goals. And I got one! MONTHS ago. And I rode it around, and pedaled the whole time and had no problems with it. And totally didn't think about how it was one of my big goals to ride a bike until I saw your topic. Now it's just another thing I can do!

 It's because if you just shrink what you have you're not getting the right pixel ratio (it's why it's distorted by a simple resize). 

Here I used pixel specific crop in photoshop for you. 


Right click and "save as" and then use it as your avatar if you like. 

 Hey there! I love Halloween. It is my thing. I decorate more for Halloween than I do Christmas. I like glowing jack-o-lanterns and ghosts and helping my kids pick out the costumes they want and adding unique flair. I love the trunk or treat our community does at the farm (people decorate their cars and line them up and give out candy from the trunks and there is apple bobbing and hay riding and best costume contests and a haunted house). 

This is our second year having a halloween party at our house for adults only and I can't wait. I have 5 bags of decorations I scored from the Dollar Tree (no really if you have one nearby and want to decorate for just about any season it's a great place to go). And am going to fake spider web the crap out of this place. 

And that leads me to Halloween costumes! I remember dressing up as a kid and it always being difficult to find costumes. I didn't have a particularly crafty mom to make them for me to fit my size and was always bummed I couldn't wear the cute witch costume. Plus sized costumes are few and far between and cost a ton! And as an adult you certainly don't get to be the "sexy" anything! I was always jealous of families that all dressed up because I just felt I could never find a costume that fit and making one seemed out of my sewing leauge. 

Last year I was still in a plus sized costume, BUT it was the first cute costume I was able to get as an adult!

I was little red riding hood!

This year, I got my costume at Value Village...in an ADULT SMALL (again, if you haven't been and are looking for costumes, VV gets overstock from the previous year and has it for rock bottom prices for everyone, including wigs: mine was 2.99 and fake weapons and accessories and makeup).

I'm a viking...uh the fishnet stockings add to my armor rating, really (only geeks understand this sentence). 


Which either of these is better than the Halloween Pre-op!
Although the kids are pretty darn cute if I must say so. 

SO! The important part. 

Do you have a costume yet? Pics or it didn't happen! I want to see costumes! Costumes from last year if you have those and not one for this year yet. Are you going to dress up for the first time in forever this year like me last year? I need to know! I love Halloween!

 It was my husband's grandfather. And while no death is a good thing in a family. It's kind of one of those "At least he's at rest" now deals. He'd had multiple strokes and heart attacks and would not recognize people, thought the people in the TV were in his home, and would cry for no reason. He'd also started being really vulgar and swearing. He just wasn't really himself at the end there. We couldn't take the kids over there because even when they were being polite and well mannered, they'd still often be still too loud for him. 

Also, My husband's grandmother had basically been taking care of him by herself for the last few months not wanting to move him since she promised him the last time he was in managed care that she would never do that to him again. I'm hoping even though she too is elderly at this point she can maybe reconnect with her community as she used to tell us when we would visit how no one visited her anymore and she never could go out and do things as grandpa couldn't walk very well (and all the behavior issues described above). 

So, it's sad but I think for the most part the family has a little bit of relief for him and his condition toward death if that makes sense. 

 I haven't been around much. It's because I've been busy busy busy. We own a small business (hardwood flooring) that is doing so well that we've hired two employees. My biggest kid went back to school and I'm sort of pseudo-preschooling the middle one. And the littlest is creeping in on two and likes to stop and throw her arms around a lot when she doesn't get cheese or a cookie the split second she asks for it. Add into that the getting my magnet and sticker business off the ground, day to day stuff, family trips, a 10 year anniversary, a family reunion, and sadly a death in the family. Well that doesn't make for good updating. 

Well, I'm almost 17 months out from surgery and I weigh 168ish (on a good day I might see 167 and on the "bad days" I'll see 172 whatever). I still sort of creep downward, I saw 166 just recently. To be quite honest I thought I'd look smaller at 166. I feel that there are ladies out there who look way smaller than me at higher weights, but that's just how their bodies are. I can wear a size small top in many stores (old navy for instance). I wear a size 12 pants. I am just positively tiny in the hands and neck and torso while I have junk all up in the trunk, for instance I have a 16 inch across under-bust. Just the other evening a bunch of my girlfriends and I were hanging out and they all tried on my ring I was wearing on my pointer finger and none of them could get it on. All of them were gushing about how tiny and delicate my hands were.

The list of things I can do now is numerous. My husband will still be attempting to make concessions for me so I can rest, etc. For instance, on our anniversary we went on a weekend away in Seattle and he'd constantly be trying to figure out where to park to save us a walk to wherever, and I'd smack him on the shoulder and say "We're both able bodied young adults just park somewhere!"

Speaking of my anniversary. My husband and I celebrated 10 years. And we went to lounges and dance clubs in Seattle where not only did guy**** on me but a woman came up to me and touched my arm and said "I just need to tell you that you are intimidating." My husband chuckled and said "She's fierce isn't she" And the woman looks at him and says "No, she's GORGEOUS." It was kind of surreal to have a random stranger, male or female come up and tell me I was intimidating. Me? What?!? The hubs had to tell me later about all the guys staring and I was telling him he had to be making most of it up or seeing things where there was nothing. But overall I think I did look pretty good:


Another thing that I did lately was get a tattoo I've wanted for a really long time. At first I didn't get it because I wasn't certain what I wanted. Then I didn't get it because I had had surgery and wanted to wait until I'd lost a good portion of my weight. I drew this myself and it the stencil was applied as it was drawn it took 8 hours total and three sessions:


In a way it's sort of my reward for getting to where I'm at. 



 Finally, just recently I was at a family reunion and people were of course snapping photos. Well here's one someone caught of me last year (four months after surgery when everyone said I looked so much tinier then!):


Well here's one of me from the most recent reunion (on labor day):



All in all most of the pictures from that day that have cropped up on facebook I feel like I am looking at ME. It's the first time I don't have a burning desire to hide, untag, or destroy photographic evidence of me. I felt like I looked nice, everyone told me I did, and then now the photos have started showing up and it's true! I did look nice. It's weird that I almost feel like this is the first time I have ever really seen myself in a photo in the same way I pictured myself in my head. As opposed to seeing photos of myself later and being utterly disgusted or shocked at how much space I took up or just how big I was or how something fit. 

I'd have to say that the best thing about this surgery is just getting to be me. To not have to worry about how I might be seen eating, or might be wearing something that draws attention. I do what I want now because I don't have to fear some one is judging me for my body from the outset. Judging me for something I can't control. I don't feel like I need to hide myself, or be small, or try to take up as little space as possible.

If they think anything of me it's based on choices I've made to look the way I do because I LIKE looking this way. It's really a freedom to have this body and be able to live in it. 

 I don't think it's ****** up or wrong. I certainly link food to people. And I am known for various things I bring to get togethers or make for girls night (oh man if I showed up without my roasted red pepper, Parmesan, artichoke dip girls night would turn into a mob murder).  

Food is highly social. I don't and never have seen anything wrong with that, sharing a meal, sharing a recipe. It's something we all can have in common easily. It's something we can teach someone else or introduce them to (we all have different favorites, or come from different cultures, or different parts of the world where even the restaurants and candies are different). Some foods only come around once in awhile or are remembered fondly from childhood (scones at the fair, pumpkin pies, roasted turkey at thanksgiving, and grandma's potato salad). 

In fact it's one of the big reasons why I was sold on the DS. The ability to enjoy an elephant ear once a year with my kids at a fair was important to me. Some people might think, that's just food, and junk food at that! Why do you care! But It was important to me to be able to interact with my family and friends and food all together in as close to the same manner as I did before. 

So yes, I experience linking people and memories to food. I think it's a good thing though, part of life for everyone. 

 The not breaking down has something to do with it too. Because fiberous veggies I can't eat a whole ton of either even they're not particularly dense. I have to really remind myself to get my scallops in before my asparagus because I eat an asparagus spear and it's all over. 

And that's really REALLY weird for me, because when ravenous I can take down two entire sushi rolls (less rice but still with rice and all maybe all that cream cheese and avocado help it go down :D). 

Sometimes there is just no rhyme or reason it seems. 

 Is it really tiny? Because when I go to the link I get a magnifying glass and I just click it and it makes it bigger (the proper size as it was displayed on the site).