I love reading everyone's blogs because I find out a lot of information. I am not reading too much about other people that are stuck in the unweightloss program from he!! just like me - and I kinda wish I were. But I can go back to some other blogs and see what they were thinking/saying/feeling back then and I say "ok". But I do get a sense from all the other bloggers out there what it will be like when I'm done with this and waiting on approval. I do get a sense from all the other bloggers out there what it will be like to finally get a date. I do get a sense from all the other bloggers out there what it will be like to have the surgery. I do get a sense from all the other bloggers out there what the healing will be like. I do get a sense from all the other bloggers out there what the initial weightloss might be like. I do get a sense from all the other bloggers out there what it will be like at six months and then a year and with each 10 pound loss, etc.

I try to make my blog be pertinent and about life and I don't know that I pull it off. But I try...

And my thougts today are not that I need to add another blog (like so many of the others) saying something to the effect of:

"I lost another pound yesterday which means, I'm down 3 for the "month" (which for me started on the 7th) and that's significant to me because I'm at that time of my cycle where I should be gaining. I'm bloated as all get out and my jeans are still loose on me. I just need to keep this going..."

No. I don't need to add that. But it seems like the "recipe book for Bandster blogs" states that you must say how many pounds in how many days. And isn't that a given, on this website of all websites, that we are here to proclaim we lost weight?

Instead, I want to say, today, that somehow, I'm at peace with this danged program that I think is such a joke (sounds like it, eh?). I'm closer to done than not. On the one hand, I want so much to move on. I can't exercise or my weightloss will get out of control and that could be bad. Might not be, but could be. But I WANT to! I want to be walking - because I already feel better with what little I've done. I want to be lifting weights, because I already feel better with what I've done. And "with what I've done" I mean the weight that I've lost already - and it's not much. I am struggling to not exercise. Really struggling. Is anyone else dealing with this?

I want to say that this process, this path has led me to examine other things in my life. And like so many other bloggers/bandsters - this is my year for change. I am cleaning out the proverbial closet and throwing skeletons away. I'm not really sure why I was even hanging onto them. Turning over new stones and leaves and I feel very very fortunate that I'm doing these things at 34.

I keep reading blogs about details. But not about the why's behind them. Those why's tell the story - and they might help someone else in this process.

Why am I losing weight without trying? Because I'm focusing on protein. Not ketosis. I still eat my starches amongst all the other "shoulds" and even a few of the "should-nots". But my protein was way too low for way too long. Who knew that protein intake can matter more than fat intake!

I feel like this year is the year I get back on track. I'm not even sure what the track is - track sounds so uni-directional. But in multiple arenas of my life, I've just been trying and trying and trying to swim upstream in a river that's overflowed it's banks. I got so far off course...I couldn't even begin to tell you where the river once flowed. And I'm not going to try that anymore. I'm going to try something else now. To me, the band represents a new approach. In each of the stones my husband and I are turning over, there are new approaches being discovered. That's the nice thing about life - there is no "one" way to do anything. And if what you are doing doesn't work - find a new way. An obstacle pops up? Go around it - the view from that approach may just be better.

This will be your year! Soon you'll be 'paying it forward' to other newbies and you'll know exactly what information they'll need out of your approach! -BG