10 Months Out

It snuck up quickly on me this time and I cannot believe I am ten months out from surgery. I still wish I was smaller around the middle and I will continue to work on it, but over all every day is better than it was nine months ago.

Mini-Vacation

I went to the Biltmore Estate this weekend. It was somewhere I had been dying to go for quite a while and I finally planned a trip. This weekend they had a flower carpet display. I know my backyard will never look like that, but I do with we could have some green grass.

I did some wine tasting and after about seven tiny sips I was feeling giddy. I wasn't drunk but my days of drinking are over. Though I sober up quickly the smallest amount of alcohol makes me very tipsy, very quickly.

The Little Things

Before surgery I rarely wore jewelry, getting through the day was enough of a struggle that I didn't bother with extra's. I'm sure I portrayed an image to other people that I didn't care about myself, but I did it was just a tremendous effort to do what I was already doing; I wore makeup once a month or so, I always wore my hair up, my neck was too thick for necklaces and even the ones that did fit ended up bothering me. I also did not wear earrings, they bothered my ears, my holes had closed long ago and anything that dangled drove me nuts.

Well today I did a few things that the old me never did, put on makeup, did my hair, wore a necklace and pierced my ears.

Here are a few pictures of the results:

Things I've discovered since surgery

Its been nine months, it seems like I just wrote my 8 month update. My nieces were here this past month and the time just flew by. I have a lap, an actual lap perfect for snuggling nieces, resting papers, squeezing a coffee between my knees to put splenda in it (I admit the last thing is an act of stupidity, but we are all entitled). This was possibly the best summer I've ever had with my nieces, we left no activity undone. I am exhausted, but it is a good exhaustion, the kind that comes from having done so much you used up all your energy and not the kind of exhaustion that comes from being so overweight that every day is a struggle. Total weight loss 170 pounds.

My Inspiration

I posted recently about missing my grandfather and how he was a big motivator for this surgery. My grandfather was a healthy and active man most of his life. When he was 80 years old he was winning chin-up contests at the gym. He was also a healthy and active smoker, it eventually caught up with him and he was diagnosed with lung cancer. The cancer changed him from a strong and vibrant man to a man who was physically very weak. We thought he was getting better and then he has a stroke, testing after the stroke revealed cancer in his brain, the lung cancer we thought was under control has metastasized around his body. It was three short and shocking weeks and then he was gone. My grandfather chose not to have drastic measures to save his life and when he was unable to feed or care for himself he went into hospice care. We spent seven days watching him breathe. The doctors told us they couldn't tell us when the end would come, but as his breathing slowed the end was getting nearer. We took turns sitting there for a week, counting his breaths, hoping for one more and wishing that he could be in peace. What I wanted more than one more breath was one more moment with him as the man I remembered. The day he died was really the day my weight loss journey began, I was angry with him for being a smoker, I saw every cigarette as a moment that was taken away. Slowly I began to see these extra pounds as moments, moments I was taking away from myself and from my family and I decided I wanted them back. With every pound lost I feel more vibrant and more alive and more at peace with the loss of a man who meant so much to me.

Idle Hands

Make for lots of recent pictures of me.

My WOW Moment

Flying has been difficult the last couple of years. I recently went to a children's museum with my nieces and they had a fake cockpit complete with airline seats. Not only did I fit in the seat, I buckled it with room to spare!

Walk down Memory Lane

My three nieces are visiting me right now. We have been having a blast and tonight we decided to have a slumber party. The girls wanted to look through my wedding album and watch my wedding video. I was a little hesitant to watch it because it is hard to see myself when I was heavy, but all I could see was how happy I was that day. My niece looked at me and said you look different now than you did that day. It was the first time she's mentioned it. There is no question that I am happy with the weight I have lost, but I was happy with my life before too. I don't want this blog to create the impression that my life as a heavy person was not filled with happiness, it was, but now I am more of a participant than an observer.

My 31st Birthday

I turned 31 yesterday and this past week has been like a walk down memory lane for me. I spent the last week at Virginia Beach with my mother, my nieces and my sister. I spent many summers at Virginia Beach as a child, my great grandmother has a cottage there and I went there every summer until I was about sixteen years old. I went back many summers while in college and law school to share the memories with my friends. Just after my husband and I got married the cottage was sold and my Husband and I went to the beach to clean it out. I hadn't been back to Virginia Beach since that day, I had mixed feelings about going to the site where so many of my childhood memories were made and seeing an empty grass lot where the cottage had once stood. On the way up to Virginia we stopped to visit my grandfather's grave.

My grandfather died three years ago. He is a major reason that I am the person I am today and each time I look at my progress I feel a small pang of regret that he never got to see me live up to the full potential he always believed was there.

We avoided it for a few days, but we took a drive past the place where the cottage used to be. There was nothing there but grass. Even though the cottage was gone, we still had a blast at the beach. It was comforting to know that even though the house was gone I could still make memories at the beach. It is a lame metaphor for my life, my former identity is gone, but I can make new memories the way I am now.

This weekend I walked on the beach in a bathing suit, and while I don't exactly feel like a Hawaiian Tropic model, I didn't feel like people were pointing and laughing at me either.

Here is a glimpse of some of those new memories:

A little story

I turn 31 next Friday, turning 30 was hard for me, all I could think about was how much I had wanted to accomplish that I had not yet done and all the things I felt I would never accomplish. Turning 31, is not nearly as bitter sweet. As a matter of fact this is the first birthday I can remember where I'm looking forward not back.

Five months ago, weighing 270 pounds I went to the mall with a friend and bought a size twelve skirt. It seemed like such a far away and lofty goal at the time. Today I took some pictures in that skirt, and it was exactly what I needed in the middle of this long and frustrating stall.

8 Months Out

At eight months out from the surgery life is far more normal than I thought. My eating issues seem to be behind me and I can eat a relatively normal diet, just a lot less than what I ate before. I had my second round of post op blood tests and have been directed to follow up with a hematologist. My hematocrit and hemaglobin counts are low and the doctor wants me to follow up to make sure I am not developing a problem with anemia.

My weight is stalled, hopelessly and completely stalled. I have lost 152 pounds, but not a single pound in the last six weeks. I am trying not to frustrate, but I do wonder at what point a stall becomes the weight my body is determined to maintain. The truth is I would like to be thinner, now that I have come all this ways, visions of finally being thin dance in my head, but I have accomplished every other goal I set out for myself.

My niece is here for the summer and for the first time ever, she's wearing out before I do. It is uplifting to know that I can keep up with the often boundless energy of children.

I haven't taken my pictures yet, but they are coming soon I promise.

The one major change in the last month, my elusive collar bones have finally made an appearance and I am happy to see them!

Ham Update

This post has gotten more responses than any other post I have made on my blog. I'm not quite sure what to make of that, but for those of you who are curious (and there were MANY) I still have not located the ham and no the trunk of my car does not stink. I will post additional ham updates as they become available.