Dat Ass...and other NSVs (long as always)

I have been down on myself lately because I have not been losing like I had intended. I have been blaming myself for: 1. Not exercising. My fibro has been flaring really bad and I’ve been under a lot of stress. I’ve been working 50 – 60 hours a week plus taking care of my ill/elderly father. Because of all this, I have not been taking care of me like I should. I need to quit punishing myself for not having the energy or enough days without severe pain to exercise vigorously but allow myself to take walks etc in order to get in more “gentle" exercise. Easier said than done though. 2. Not tracking my food/water intake as meticulously as I have in the past. No excuse, just a fact. 3. Consistently going over my carb allowance. I think this is related to both #1 and #2. I haven’t been binging, just going 5 or 10 gm over my allowed 40 because of poor attention to what I’m eating. And even though I plan my meals, I have found opportunity to indulge in unplanned things….a cracker here, a few grapes there…… 4. Not making the most of my sleeve. I occasionally forget Frisco’s rule of eating under my sleeve capacity. 5. Looking weird. I have lost all over but am losing slowest in my middle section. I feel like I look like humpty dumpty—skinny arms and legs but round in the middle. I am shaped so differently than when I was this same weight and gaining. I keep telling myself that exercise would help and just-get-off-your-ass-and-do-it……   Just when I was at the height of beating myself up for a two week stall and a 3 pound weight loss last month, I hit a very busy time at work. That busy time came with tons of NSVs. During this time, I’ve seen many people that I haven’t seen since before my surgery. I’ve gotten a lot of comments and here are the top 20 (not in order of awesomeness): 1. “Dat Ass!!! Girl, look at it!" (Not from a co-worker but one of my husband’s firemen friends).  2. “Look at you getting all FINE!!" (Another fireman….of course) 3. “Oh my gosh, I didn’t recognize you!"  4. “How much weight have you lost? You look great but….are you sick?" (No, I don’t have cancer, I’m not getting a divorce, blah, blah, blah. Ya just gotta laugh at some people’s stupidity or be touched by their concern for you---I have chosen to do both.) 5. “You look 10 to 15 years younger…..not that you looked old or anything but……Wow!" 6. “Oh my God….what size are those jeans? They look so small!" (I am proud to reveal my size now—14 Petite Thank You Very Much!!!) 7. “Wow….your face. It looks so thin! And your boobs aren’t up under your chin anymore. Can you breathe better?" (Stupidity vs concern again.) 8. “You look so little! I had to look twice to be sure it was you!" 9. “If I hadn’t heard you speak, I wouldn’t have known it was you!" 10. “You look like you did in high school."( No I don’t but I look more like I did at 17 than I did before I had surgery) 11. “You’ve lost 80 pounds? Wow, you don’t look wrinkly or anything like you’d expect." (A compliment but catty as hell…………) 12.   “Your eyes look so big now….I didn’t realize how pretty they are". (This was out of the blue from my precious 9 year old grandson. Even though I see him weekly, I think he’s just now noticing.) 13. “You look like your Mom did when she married your Dad". (This is a double—first my Mom has been dead since 2005 and I miss her; second, she was 20 years old when she married my Dad).  14. “Who is that lady? She seems to know my kids awfully well and her voice sounds familiar." (This was from my step-daughter’s ex-husband to my daughter after I had been talking to him for about 15 minutes at my grandson’s football game.) 15. “You really look great. And even though you’ve lost so much weight in just a few months, your skin looks so good. Your arms aren’t flabby and you look firm." (From my mother-in-law) 16. “Wow, you look better than you’ve looked in 20 years. You and Melissa do look alike." (From a childhood friend of my daughter that is now a formidable looking police officer.) 17. “I can get my arms all the way around you to hug you!" (One of my female friends and co-worker that is also considering VSG) 18. “Have you lost weight?" (My Dad, who doesn’t know I had surgery and sees me just about every day. However, he has early Alzheimer’s and severe depression so anytime he notices anything outside his little world and comments on it are a big deal.) 19. “Here are the size 14 jeans. Are you ready for those size 12 jeans yet? You can’t have my 10s though ‘cause I’m still in them!" (My middle daughter who has lost some weight in prep for a trip. I can’t believe I can wear my daughter’s hand-me-downs!) 20. “They may be smaller but they are still beautiful." (My sweet, lying husband about my ta-tas. I had warned him about the shrinkage and told him that he could buy me new ones if the end result wasn’t to his liking).   So all these NSVs and a 3 pound weight loss this week are rejuvenating my drive to get back my mo-jo and be religiously on track again. It also helped when I recalculated my BMI. I have gone from a 48.2 down to a 33.3 and I’ve lost 62% of my excess weight! After all, 84 pounds in 7.5 months ain’t too shabby for a 50 yo broad. Besides my fat was very codependent and didn’t want to let go!
 

Great Post!

That was a whole lot of awesomeness in those NSVs!  I almost cried with the comment from your dad.  So precious!

Glad you got your MOJO back.

That was beatuiful, I'm glad I took the 20 minutes to read it. Just kidding, congratulations!!!

I know....I know......but I DID warn ya!   I don't post ofren so when I do it's usually a novel!

That's a damn good list of motivations and encouragement from all corners.. you got this, but it's nice to hear it for sure!

BTW Jo, you are looking great!  Saw the pics you posted of your face and you are just beautiful!

umm..why are you hogging all the googly-eyed firefighters for yourself. send some my way!!!

mmm..firefighters..ok, refocus..

i know you will be able to get back on track.

and im so happy for you that you are getting positive comments and experiences from your loss so far.

One of the perks of my job is that I am surrounded by men all day long.  My office is in the Public Works Building for a municpality so it's almost all guys.  I am also frequently in the midst of hunky police officers and firemen.  The only problem is that a) I'm happily married to a handsome fireman, b) most of them are married and c) 75% of them are young enough to be my sons!

It's very surreal to have people not recognize you and to have all these compliments when not so long ago, I just wanted to fade into the background!

 

Oh....and Sassy.....you look absolutely fabulous!  The new boobs and belly look great so far.

And congrats on getting accepted to vet school!!!!!  You GO Girl!