I woke up this morning hurting. I think it's more because I slept the night flat on my back. I like to sleep on my sides a good bit so it makes sense why my back might be hurting. I also still feel the pressure in my middle chest from the gas bubble. I'd like to know when that is going to finally end. My port incision is very tender and sore and hurts. Today I take a shower....yeah! The bloating seems to be going down from the surgery. My tummy doesn't feel quite as hard as surgery date. I'm so tempted to get on the scales to see if I've lost any, but what I've read from previous other blogs, I think I want to wait. I went in to this knowing that the best method for me is to lose weight slowly...maybe 1 lb a week. It's hard not to get excited and think I've lost more. I was soooo happy when I weighed in before surgery and found that I was down to 228 lbs from 235 lbs. I haven't lost that kind of weight in awhile so it's hard not to get excited.

I have found that the broth soups seem to be enough to keep me full. I ate a total of 4 cups throughout the day yesterday. It would get cold but it tasted good enough when I would feel hungry. My boyfriend would eat his food and I have to admit that I really wanted to snack on some of his chips & salsa BUT I realized it was out of habit more than actually being hungry. THAT is what this journey will help me with....hopefully to get my emotional eating under control for the first time in my life.

It's so strange to me to be talking about my actual weight in public, but this is a safe website (right?) to do just that. All of you understand my apprehension, right? I'm so SICK of being this heavy, but I've made a choice to do something GOOD. I feel hope for the first time in I don't know how long that I can actually lose the weight that I've been dreaming about for what seems like forever. Now I have a "tool" that will help me to lose it and keep it off for the rest of my life IF I choose to do the legwork. That means no liquid calories...binge eating ice cream, heavy laden soups filled with cream and dairy that I don't need (just to name a few). I feel hopeful that I'm finally going to be able to bend down to pick something up off the ground and not be out of breath in the process of embarrassed for someone to see me struggle to do so. I'm so looking forward to the day that I can look in the mirror in the morning when I've finished dressing for work and instead of seeing the bulging checks and neckline filled with fat that I will see healthy lean face. There may be sagging skin...I'm keeping my fingers crossed it won't be too bad, but that will be better than all this fat covering me now. I want to wear a blouse that I don't see my tummy folds pressed against the fabric and then have to walk away knowing that I'm too fat to look any different. Sure, I can keep buying bigger and bigger tops, but they just make me look like a fat woman that needs something to cover up with. Not a curvaceous woman, but a FAT woman that has no choice but to wear FAT clothes.

Today I live with hope that one day in the near future, I will look in the mirror and smile, a genuine smile because I actually "like" what I'm seeing. Amen!