Happy New Year Everybody!!!!!

Happy New Year my OH family!  I hope everyone will have a good time doing whatever it is that you do on New Year's Eve in your neck of the woods.  The guys are putting together a big bonfire to set off at midnight and our whole family will be here to sing Auld Lang Syne and have a toast to the new year.  We live in the country, so no Waterford crystal ball dropping for us.  Speaking of which, Neecee's boyfriend, Anderson Cooper, will be there tonight for the countdown.  Maybe that ball will knock him down and she can fall under him!

I've been reflecting on my weight loss journey because even though I've lost my weight and had reconstructive surgery to reclaim what obesity took from me, I now need to start working on handling maintenance.  Oprah made the comment that she got ****y after her last weight loss cuz she felt like she had it licked...and then she went back up to 200 pounds.  I don't ever want to feel so smug that I feel over confident in my abilities to keep this weight under control.  It's a never ending battle and I NEED to wrap my head around the fact that because I have been morbidly obese, my body will always want to go back to that.  It's a tough pill to swallow that I will never be able to eat like normal people...but hey, eating like a normal person is what got me morbidly obese, so get over it Mary!

On this forum, we are all struggling with this.  No matter what our reasons for being here, we are all in the same boat and living the same struggles with our minds.  Weight loss and maintenance is 99.9% head game...so my prayer for the new year is that this is the year that we get control over our thoughts and attitudes towards our bodies.  We are so worth the effort!!!

Have a great night and I hope that all of your dreams for the new year come true!

 Mary   

Happy New Year Mary and everyone else!

You have made it this far, you won't ruin your PS results by gaining weight.  Besides, your abs are too tight to overstuff yourself with food ;-)  
 

LOL, you have the same abs so I know you know what you're talkin' bout!  Pretty good feeling though for someone who's stomach muscles were in two different time zones.  Hey, does your lower body lift incision get tight when you swell.  That's another thing that keeps me away from the shrimp po'boys!

A lady asked me the other day what motivated me to not gain the weight back.  I told her, I've already ruined God's creation once, I didn't want to ruin doc's creation and be guilty of THAT again! 

So what are you're new year's resolutions?  Mine is to finish my house.  I have a funny feeling that could be my same resolution for years.  

  Mary

My husband & I will be drinking a small amount of Sherry, and watching the ball drop at midnight.  That is the extent of our New Year's Eve celebrating.  As for keeping your weight off, I commend you for getting to that place.  I've only been there a few times, and I didn't understand completely why I had put it on in the first place.  I understand that now, and am getting therapy for my overeating issues.  I am a volume and big emotional eater, and I am also a recovering compulsive overeater.  You are right about it being a lifetime problem we have to work on every day.  But I disagree with you on one point you made - we are not "normal eaters".  Normal eaters eat until they're full, then stop, and don't want any more.  Compulsive overeaters eat, and eat, and eat, and then eat some more, until they're sick to their stomach, or feel drugged by too much food intake.  I will never be a normal eater.  I've tried, and failed too many times to deceive myself any more.

Denise Phares/kitties4

Hey Denise, sounds like a nice quiet New Year's Eve for you and your DH.  Mmmmm....Sherry.

What I meant by saying that I gained weight by eating like a normal person is that I am insulin resistant due to the PCOS and will gain weight if I eat highly processed foods.  So if I were to go to Subway and eat the way that Jared did, I'd be GAINING weight!  So I'm destined to eat low carb, which is something I'm learning to be OK with.  Geeze Sweetie, I'm glad to hear that you are getting some help with your compulsive overeating.  It sounds like you've been through hell and back, and I pray that you are successful at working this out. 

May the New Year bring you success!

Mary

I don't ever swell in my abdomen or LBL area/incision.  I swell in the area just above my knees.  It's been a year now so I don't know why it still swells?  Maybe it's just fat?

My new year's resolution is to be healthy and get past what I've been through this year....and I'm gonna work on getting some of my curves back.

Fat knees?  On you?  You're joking, right?  If you're knees swell, it's definitely from your thigh lift surgery cuz woman, you have like zero body fat!

Ooh la la...I can't wait for you to get your curves back, cuz you had some pretty snazzy curves going on there!  Fine at forty...yeah Baybeee!

Mary

Happy New Year to you too Mary, and Happy New Year everyone!! Here's to a new year, and healthy habits that will stick for a lifetime! 

What a great concept...healthy habits that will stick for a lifetime!  I pray that they stick like superglue!

Mary

Thanks for that Oprah quote - I need to hear it that like every week. Maybe I will tape up something like that to see every day.

I THINK I got it...something feels different with me and how I eat. I THINK it has settled in that this is forever and ever, no matter how much I may whine and how much I resent it.

OA gets credit for helping me with the beginnings of that - even while I was fat i accepted that this is a chronic condition and required my constant and dynamic understanding that I was never going to get better. My bariatric doc is who sealed the deal - this is the 2nd time I have been under his care and it took 2x to get it this well.

I am SO proud that for the past ten years or so, i am at long last, a normal eater. Like kitties says in her post, I am not showing the symptoms of compulsion with my food:  to eat to the stuffed point. I know that it lies sleeping in my soul - it has came out 1-3x and each time shocked me. It was usually tied to being alone for too long; and I must say that when i get like that, to be isolated is MY choosing. I am not only blessed with tons of friends, there must be untold number of people who would like my help and company.

Thank you all for being here...I learn so much every time i come here - about you about me, about this condition we share. Happy new year!  Just by being here, it shows the Universe that you do care and are pulling positive energy your way to make this all better.