Tuesday Roll Call

Monica My Dear Friend, I'm envious of your toast feast!  I'm starting to hate ice tea on a very personal level!  I've been very succesful with Kohl's for dress cloths.  They are very inexpensive when you catch the sales, and they always have sales!  Wal-Mart has cheap clothing, but I haven't had much success with dress stuff and the quality is not that great. Paul

I had to LOL Paul and the toast feast comment.  It sure did taste good but my pouch is still deciding if it liked it or not.  Which is why I haven't left my computer to start my day yet! lol

Kohl's!  yes, I should have thought of that.  Hubby and i always joke about Kohl's having a sale!  I will take Tyler there.  Thanks for the reminder!!

Good Morning Paul and the rest of Illinois! Glad to hear that your kidney stone "event" is over and that you found a doctor that you like.  Both are major things. Well, my upper GI shows that everything is working correctly, my pouch is intact and the stoma is as it should be.  My surgeon had no answer as to WHY I stopped losing when I did and why I can't seem to lose any more.  He says that I have lost 51.6% of my excess weight since surgery (a bit more from my highest weight) and that yes, I am still "obese".  He says that they would like to see the BMI drop by 3 more points to get me out of the "obese" range, but it may never happen.  He had no further suggestions besides to keep with the program to avoid re-gain.  The good news is that of the 400 or so patients that they have, I have lost more than 30% or so of them.  He does not really consider the surgery a failure, but the results are not optimal. I DID let him know that the nutritionist is very frustrating to work with and inconsistent with her advice.  I'm sure she is a capable nutitionist with non-op people, but I don't think she understands the special needs of a post-op. Like I said before, I was not sure if I wanted him to find something (which may have meant another surgery) or nothing.  I now know that everything is as it should be and I need to be satified with how far I have come and realize that this may be as good as it gets.  I had hoped to be closer to "normal" but life is too short to dwell on the negative.  I will try, from now on, to dwell only on the positives.....better health, better looks, better quality of life in general.  You guys can remind me of this if I get down. Anyway, work today, then Liv's concert tonight. I am thinking of Karey, and wishing everyone a lovely, sunny day!

aww Dawn.  It's frustrating when you know that something isn't working right and no one can tell ya why. 

I'm sorry that the test wasn't more helpful, but on the other hand I am also very glad they didn't find anything "wrong" either. 

You look good and are a wonderful, kind and sweet person and I wish there was something I could do to help you!

Hugs

Thanks for the [hugs] and wonderful compliments. I will just look on the bright side.....I feel much better and have wonderful new friends, like you!

Dawn, Last night at my meeting they said that sometimes, after a bunch of weight loss, the body will stop and readjust to get use to all the changes.  So no further weight loss happens for a bit of time.  The advice was to just let it happen and before you know it, the losing begins again.  Almost everybody in the room who was a year or more post-op said that they went through this.  One woman said that she started taking measurements and found that even though her weight stayed the same, she was still losing inch's!  I hope this is true for you too. Paul

Thanks Paul, and I will not totally give up hope, but it's been 9 months with no pounds lost or inches.  I think I will just "fuggeduboutit" and stop being SO anal about everything and see if that does anything for me. The one suggestion that the surgeon had that was contrary to the nutritionist's advice was to stop drinking at least a half an hour before eating.  (The NUT said to drink right up until).  So, I will try that. 

I just thought of something else.  About three months ago I took a seminar on "zone" training.  The basic idea was that you don't want to excersize the convential way.  Instead, you do repitions in which you get your heart rate up to 80% of maximum for 1 minute and then you rest until it goes back down.  You do this 5 times in a row (so 10 minutes total).  This is all you do 3 times a week.  This trains the body to burn muscle sugar instead of fat.  The idea being that if you burn fat, the body changes to compensate and creates fat to supply the exercise need.  But if you burn muscle sugar, the body converts fat to replenish the muscle sugar!  There was a whole lot of science behind it and several people who had actually been doing it with great success.  I can't remember the website that was suggested, but I just left a message with my friend who presented the seminar.  I'll get the site to you when I get it.  The great thing was that it didn't matter how you got your heart rate up (treadmill, bike, running, etc...) as long as you did it.  Just remember that you either are taking in too many calories, or your not burning them up.  It's a simple equation.  This might be a solution! Paul

Thanks Paul!  I aprreciate any help I can get.

Good morning everybody.  I started on a new diet today.  I don't meet with my primary Dr. until the 21st to get the whole surgical waiting period/process started.  I made a decision that I'm going to do it and I need to start changing now.   I have to lose at least 16 pounds before my surgery will get approved.