What's on your Wednesday Menu RNyers?

Good morning menu friends. I have been reading posts but have t posted in a while. I have been rely busy. Spent all weekend camping - got lots of exercise, I had over 18,000 steps on Saturday. Went from camping to working and finally am getting a day off today. I have got to get better at finding time to post everyday.

Accountability: I have been doing really well. I have been within my calorie and carb range everyday but one. That one day I ate good food, but higher calorie meats, and I did have 1.5 ounces of alcohol ( I measured it out). Alcohol is not something I drink very often, but I always count it and measure it.

Today's menu:

B - Iced coffee with 1/2 Scoop protein powder, SF creamer

L - Shrimp, ****tail sauce, Yellow squash

D - Shrimp, ****tail sauce, Spinach salad

S - Emiepie's egg salad

Calories - 531, Protein - 69, Carb - 22

Today is my 6 month surgiversary!!! Down 175.4 in 12 1/2 months. I lost 84.8 in the 6 1/2 months of jumping thru insurance hoops, and have lost 90.6 in the 6 months since surgery.

Edited to add:

I just realized that I am less than 10 pounds from being 1/2 the woman I used to be :)

You look amazing, and I love your shirt! I want one. The logo is perfect and the colour matches my bike, lol.

Congrats on the amazing loss!

Thanks Kathy. I loved the shirt too...and I found it on sale for $3.99 - that made me love even more...lol

Wow, awesome sale!

Great pic!!!

You look fantastic Doxie!

Hello everyone,

QOTD: my birthday was in March so I was 6 months out. I made sf egg custard using almond milk for a treat and really enjoyed it. I haven't made it since then so that I can save it for special occasions.

Accountability; on track all day yesterday but completely exhausted. I'm hoping it's just adjusting to the new routine after summer. I admit I'm concerned about my iron but I don't have another check up with my surgeons office until January. I was kind of surprised when I saw them at my 9 month check up that they completely bypassed (pun intended) a year check up. Doesn't that seem odd? Wondering if I should call them to make sure if that.

B: decaf, pp, sf torani

S: tuna with calorie free dressing, string cheese

L: sb buffalo chicken and tj light cheddar cheese stick

S: peanut powder with sf jelly on a spoon

D: sirloin, broccoli

calories 801, protein 128, carbs 26, fat 28

Norma do not wait for January to have your Iron tested. If you can either make an appt with your PCP and get blood work done, make sure they test for FERRITIN. That is the number we all need to know and low ferritin is a huge contributor to exhaustion among a whole crap of other bad side effects. Google low ferritin/anemia symptoms. Please don't wait

And since you are a year out (next week) might be time to increase your carbs just a bit, try going up to 35-40, "brain fog" and exhaustion are also attributed to low carbs. Good carbs like veggies or fruit (berries). You could go up to 900 calories a day too and assess your energy levels.

Last year at this time I had low Ferritin it was a 4, that is extremely dangerous low. I ended up getting 4 iron infusions and got my ferritin up to over 100 and I feel like a totally different woman. I have seen the Vets on here say that a menstruating woman should keep their ferritin at 100- 150 no less than 80 or we start to feel the bad side effects of low ferritin/anemia. Please do some research and get your levels tested asap!!!!

Report back okay, want to make sure you are okay!!

Thank you so much for the input Daisey! I will call my PCP tomorrow cause there's just something not quite right about this tired. Edited to say that my surgeons office had never tested for ferritin only iron! Is that odd?

Ive been wanting to up the calories but been afraid to. I think for my surgerversary next week I'll up the calories a bit and add a few more veggies. We can see if that will help. I'll stay in touch. Thank you for the guidance.

Good, glad you can get in to see your PCP. Don't be surprised if your PCP does not know anything about gastric bypass, mine does not and I pretty much educate her each time I see her. Insist on a Ferritin level being done, not just iron saturation which is the usual. And find out your last Ferritin level whether that was from pre surgery or some time recent (If you don't already know this number) it will be good to see where you were at and where you are at now.

If you are taking oral iron pills, make sure you are not drinking tea or coffee with it or within a few hours of taking it. The caffeine pretty much cancels out the iron and as it is we barely absorb any oral iron anyways. The part of the intestine they remove in RNY is where Iron is absorbed so we never really absorb Iron well again, lucky us eh? ha ha ha

If you have not had a full set of labs done since you are approaching 1 year you need this done.

Here is a link to Teena D's "lab post" please read it all if you have not, lots of good info from the Vets on what our post gastric bypass labs should be.

Teena D Lab results post

One thing I can't stress enough is how Medical Labs will come back and tell you that your labs are "fine" they are basing these numbers on non gastric bypass people. Even our PCP if he or she is not up on what are labs should look like might even tell you all is fine, that is why we need to keep records of our own labs to see the trends. Vit D, B12, Ferritin and PTH (this is the level to show if you are losing calcium, and you want this level LOW not high. You will notice in Teena's labs her Ferritin was 323 in April and dropped to 182 in August, while 182 is still awesome that's a huge drop from 323 in 4 months. This is what happens to some of us and its not good.

Yes on playing with your macros a bit, up your carbs a tiny bit and your calories, won't hurt to try. Fingers crossed you get this sorted out. Get some rest my friend.