cunnine

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I know, I know... it's been a long time since my last post.  You'll have to forgive me, I've been very very busy with my new body and new life.  I am now 10 weeks out of surgery, and I am cruising along nicely.  On 8/24, I went to see Dr Gagne for my 2 month check-up.  At that point, I weighed in at 260 lbs, which made for 66 pounds lost in 8 weeks.  Dr G said that that was 42% of my excess weight, and he was very pleased with my progress.  As of yesterday, I weighed 252 lbs, which equals out to 74 lbs lost in about 10 weeks.  When I was in his office, Dr G said that I was at a point at 2 months that he would expect to see me at the 4 month mark!  What everyone has told me is apparently true... the harder I work, the harder my body will work for me.  

I have been keeping up with my trainer, and consistently going to the gym and working out.  I am continuing to work on my cardio workouts, and my trainer (Joe) is working my butt off.  When I was at the gym yesterday morning, I retook the fitness test that I took on my first day.  Joe said that he was very impressed with my progress so far.  Every one of my evaluations improved in the time that I've been with him.  The one that I'm most proud of is the flexibility test.  When I had my initial evaluation, I was only at 9 inches, which meant that when sitting flat legged on the floor, I could not reach past my toes.  Yesterday morning, I made it to 14 inches, which means that I was able to reach 5 inches past my toes.  Although that's not a huge improvement,  it's a huge improvement for me!  I have never, ever been able to reach past my toes on that test!!!

At my current weight, I am now lighter, and thinner, than I was in my sophomore year of high school!  I'm thinner than I was when I got hired!  Luckily for me, thanks to 15 years of yo-yo dieting, I had at least one uniform in most of the sizes that I passed through.  I had one set of uniforms that I purchased at one point when I was feeling ambitious with my dieting, that I was never able to get into.  The pants are SIZE 40 uniform pants (which always run small).  When I went for surgery, I was wearing SIZE 48 pants with elastic in the waistband.  

Well, this has gotten to be long enough, so I'm going to sign off for now.  I will take some new pictures and post them as soon as I can!!!

So... for now, I'll sign off...  until later...

Well... yesterday was my one month post-op date, and I'm still cruising along!  As of yesterday, I had lost 49 lbs.  I'm one pound away from my first big weight loss goal!!!  I am so excited.  

I had my first workout with my new personal trainer yesterday, and boy did he push me.  However, I really felt good after our workout.  I was tired, but not as sore as after our "evaluation."  I've also been doing good on my "cardio days," working well on the eliptical and treadmills.  

I had a little bit of a problem tonight, though.  My wife, who is doing an excellent job on her Weight Watchers program, had a good weigh-in and good meeting.  So, she wanted to go to the Olive Garden for dinner.  We went there, and got seated, and started to read the menu.  Well, I'm still on the soft foods phase of my eating plan, and I have been pretty much restricted to yogurt, cottage cheese, canned chicken, and white fish.  I have been trying very hard to stick to my eating plan, and I have been doing a fairly good job at it. (At least I think I have been doing a good job at it!)  So, at the Olive Garden, I was faced with a real challenge as far as what I should choose.  There were several dishes that I thought might have fit into this phase of my eating plan, but I was not able to choose.  I was actually afraid to make a choice!  I was so scared of the choice that my hands were shaking.  I was holding the menu in my hands, and I saw it shaking in my hands.  That really freaked me out!!!  I have never felt that way in my life.  

It reminds me of what I saw on the most recent season of Celbrity Fit Club.  The singer Cledus T Judd lost a significant amount of weight, but he became psychotic and paranoid, and became mortally afraid of food!  I am afraid that that may happen to me, and I don't know how to stop it.  Well... I will continue to work on it, and continue to learn about my "new" body and my new eating plan for the rest of my life.  

Wish me luck!!!

I truly subscribe to the military saying that "Pain is weakness leaving the body."  And today, I let a lot of weakness leave my body.  Today was a cardio day at the gym, so all I had to do was cardio work, no weight work. 

I tried to do what I was supposed to do, which is use the eliptical machine, but that didn't work.  I don't know what my problem was, but I was only able to make about 5 minutes on the eliptical.  My heart rate shot up and I was really having a hard time breathing.  My chest was pounding, and I was having a hard time with balance (not dizzy, just bad balance).  So, even though I am a "push through it" kind of guy, I knew better than to push that any further.  

So, I went to the treadmill to get my workout in there instead.  At the end of my 60 minutes on the treadmill, I made 4.11 miles and burned over 600 calories.  That means that in that 60 minute workout, I burned off more calories than I took in for the whole day yesterday!  I know that I may not always be able to have that kind of an in/out on my caloric intake, but it feels good to think about it!  

Anyway, I'm keeping that short so that I can do some laundry and take a nap...

Well, I took another big step towards using this tool that I was given to make a complete life change today.  I have been a member of the gym for about 12 years now.  And, for the most part, my membership has done nothing but take up room in my budget and in my wallet.  But... I know that without exercise and work, this journey will end up being just a waste of time, effort, pain and money.  

So, keeping this in mind, I started going back to the gym last week.  After my second workout, and realizing that I had no idea what I was doing, I set up an appointment with one of the personal trainers at the gym.  Today, I had that evaluation.

Initially, we did a fitness test and he checked a lot of my abilities and capabilities.  That was an eye opener, to say the least.  We were both impressed with some of the things that I was able to do, "for a guy my size," and we were both surprised by some of the muscle groups that should have been stronger than they have.  And then came the "shocker" of the day...lol.  My flexibility needs a lot of work.  As my wife said, "Duh!!!"  So, then we went into the workout plan that he wanted me to work on to achieve my goals.  

I was tired when it was all over, but I just kept reminding myself that "pain is just weakness leaving the body,"  and also that "pain is temporary, pride is forever."  There will be a lot, and I know A LOT, of work before I finally reach my goal.  I also know that reaching the goal is not the end of the journe, but simply its beginning.  I know that hard work is what I have to look forward to for the rest of my life.  The funny thing is, I am looking forward to the work!

I can see, already, that the work is paying off, and I am seeing results.  The more results I see, the harder I am willing to work.  I have to say, that I have not had a "lazy day" yet, where I just didn't feel like doing what I had to do.  I have been pushing and pushing, continually striving to reach y eventual goal.  

As someone once said... Today is the first day of the rest of my life...

I know it's been a while since I posted, but Superman here has been pretty busy (lol)!  

I had my 2 week post-op appointment with Nicole, the PA at Dr Gagne's office last Thursday (7/5), and things are going great!  I found out that the home scale was 4 lbs light, but now I know so I can keep on track.  Guess what???  I was 299 lbs at the appointment!  That makes 27 lbs in 10 days since surgery!  Boy was I excited... Nicole gave me my "final instructions" and guidance as I go into the next phase of my progress.

Then, I went on a mini-vacation to our camp.  My wife, my dogs and I went to spend some quiet time in the woods and just relax!  I'm still learning my way around the "soft foods" phase of the diet, but so far the experimenting is going well.  I'm following my eating plan, taking my vitamins and medicines, and doing my exercise, and I'm feeling GREAT! 

We were doing our walking, visiting the Grove City Outlet Shops, and I went into my favorite store there, the Big Dog clothing store.  As I was checking out the t-shirts that I liked... I bought a shirt in size XL!!!!!  I LOST TWO X's in my shirts!!!

Anyway... I got home Wednesday afternoon and went back to work Wednesday night.  A lot of people are surprised that I'm back to work full time so soon, but I wouldn't have it any other way.  I feel so great, I just can't believe it.  It's actually making me a little bit nervous, because things just don't normally go this smoothly for me, but I'm counting my blessings, and thanking my God that this is going so well!  

The saying goes that God helps those that help themselves, so I guess that doing everything that I had to do to be approved for and actually have the surgery is "proof" to God that I'm doing everything that I can to help myself.  Whatever it is, I'm not going to question it... I'm just going to enjoy it!

Nicole also yelled at me for weighing myself too often... oops!  I knew I shouldn't be doing it, but I couldn't help myself.  So, I'm only allowed to get on the scale once a week now.  Well... Wednesday was a week (almost), so when I got home from vacation, I got on the scale....and 289 lbs !!!!!!! That makes 37 lbs in 2 1/2 weeks!!!!!! 

Well... I'm going to close for now and get ready to enjoy some yogurt! (I'm loving soft foods...lol!)

Everyone says that I'm crazy, but I'm just me.  Going against what I initially thought would be the case, I was actually able to go into work for a few hours last night.  I had the opportunity to work some overtime, and I actually felt well enough to go in.  Soooo.... I got dressed in my uniform and went into work.  Boy was that a thrill!!!!  I put my uniform on, and the buttons on the shirt did not pull, and I HAD SAGGY BUTT in my pants!  I was thrilled.  

Then, when I got into work, my friends were so supportive of me, asking how I am feeling and genuinely wanting to hear my story.  They took interest in my story and what I had to say about my experience.  Oh, and they noticed that I was losing weight, too!  And... I had more energy than I can ever remember having at 3:00 am.  At the time when I would usually have been reaching for... the first half... of my lunch, I took a nice sip of s/f iced tea and kept going.  Thankfully, I am still not feeling hungry and I am not feeling any more pain either.  The gas is getting a little bit annoying, but if that is the price I pay, then so be it.  And I know that the gas will go away... at least to the extent that I was gassy before surgery...lol!  

Then, today, I went to our cousin's son's baseball game.  I stood, squatted, walked, took pictures, cheered, and did it all again for almost three straight hours.  And, guess what???  I had more energy than I can ever remember!  I still feel great!  Dr Gagne is an angel that God sent to help me to help myself onto the right road for the rest of my life.  

My only fear is this... can it really be this easy???  Oh, well... only time will tell.  But, I know this, I am ready for anything! 

I know that it's only a little thing, but it's the little things that make the most difference.  Confuscious said ... "A journey of a thousand miles begins with one single step."  And truly, that is the only way look at this journey.  If I look at the whole amount that I expect to lose, over the course of 6 to 12 months, I may become overwhelmed.  But, if I decide that I'm going to make reasonable goals that I can reach in a short amount of time, before I know it I will be looking backward and saying, "Wow, where did the time go?" and also, "Wow, look how far I've come without even knowing it!"  

All of that hot air was leading to this....  I'm excited because I got to drive for the first time yesterday.  I moved from the prescription pain killer to Tylenol liquid, and it is working well controlling my discomfort.  I wanted to drive, because I can not stand being "trapped."  My wonderful wife has not complained at all about driving me wherever I wanted to go, but I am not the type of person who likes to depend upon other people, even if they say that they don't mind.  So... we drove to the grocery store to pick up the Tylenol, and I drove!  It felt soooo good to be driving again.  Just knowing that I'm not "trapped" anymore set my spirits higher.  

Also... I'm not going to get too excited until Thursday when I can compare my home scale to the one at Dr Gagne's office, but things are looking good.  Before I had my WLS, if I got on the scale at home, it read "ERROR," which was computer language for "Ouch, get off fatso!"  Now, I just got on the scale this morning, and it's reading "301.5."  If that is correct, it will be a 17 pound weight loss since the morning of surgery (5 days ago!).  Like I said, I'm not trusting the home scale too much, but it is another thing to help to raise my spirits!  

Until next time...

Well, the long road ahead has begun.  I don't know why I didn't expect any post-op pain, but for some reason, I didn't expect it.  I'm not really complaining, but I'm just not enjoying it.  The only place I have pain is on the belly-button port where the camera was inserted.  I still hve muscle pain at that port.  The rest of my belly is still sore, but I am healing nicely, I think.  My wonderfully supportive wife said this morning that she can already see a difference in my face.  We're doing our walking, and I'm following my eating plan (well, I guess that for now, it's just a drinking plan...lol), so I think things are going well.  I had a glass of skim milk this morning for the first time, and afterwards I had some gas and a bit of a belly-ache, so I think that I may not have been ready for it yet.  The funny thing is, I didn't ever think that I would have been saying that "skim milk" really tasted good... but it did!!!  Oh, well, if it didn't work this morning, it will work later.  I'm still working on uploading the pics from the hospital and the recovery, so those should be on here soon!

Well.... it's all over, and I'm home from the hospital!  I am so energized and excited, I can't even describe this feeling!!!!  I feel great, I have a little bit of lingering discomfort, but no real pain left.  Dr Gagne and his staff wwere absolutely wonderful.  The hospital was ok, and the nurses were hit & miss.  A few of my nurses were WONDERFUL, and a few of them were less than wonderful, but all-in-all, I am doing well and I am ready for the rest of my life!  Please welcome me to the loser's side, and watch me go!!!!  I'll upload a couple of pictures later this evening!

Well, it's almost here... right now, we're less that 12 hours from my surgery.  I have to say, I am really excited and that's winning out over my nervousness!  My wife has been very supportive these last couple of days (she has always been supportive, I just needed it more these last couple of days!), and I'm ready, ready, ready!  

10 am tomorrow morning is the first day of the rest of my life!  I'm doing well, and because I know what's coming tomorrow, the little bit of hunger I'm feeling right now is not even bothering me.  

So... wish me luck, say a prayer for me, and I'll see you on the other side!  Thank God for giving me the strength to get to this point, and thank Him for guiding and protecting me through tomorrow morning and the next few days!  God Bless Me!