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So, in an email yesterday my bandster friend C had a mama moment and told me that the money I spent on my band would be wasted if I don't exercise. She said that I am no longer allowed to ride the elevator at work unless Tom Cruise was waiting on me. My email reply: Can it be unless Clive Owen is waiting on me? I tried walking up the two flights of stairs and made it through 36 steps before my legs started burning. The last 12 of 48 were a killer. *gasp*cough*gasp*cough*cough. But I did it! This morning, as is my routine upon arriving to work, I hailed the elevator and, as I stepped on, I saw a half sheet of paper taped to the wall of the elevator. There, looking out at me, was Clive Owen. The words read "You weren't really going to take the elevator were you?....... I'm watching you....... You never know where I'll be....... xoxoxo - Clive." Which caused me to laugh out loud. And turn around. And walk up to the second floor to see my friend C, laughing the whole way. She said she had been waiting to hear my laugh. And then she apologized for forgetting that I work on the third floor, stating that I need to start small. Silly C. And yet, I still have a smile on my face, glancing frequently at Clive Owen looking out at me from the side of my computer monitor.

For someone who is known for finding the silver lining in any dark cloud, an eternal ray of optimism for her friends and family...I sure am a Debbie Downer when it comes to matters of self. I have been so negative, so hard on myself about this sleeve since I got it. Its as if i choose not to trust it, and have faith in our success together, in fear of failure. When it comes to weight loss, i think all of us VSGer's have come to know that feeling at some point in time. I've thought that its too good to be true..that im eating too much at one time, that my sleeve is stretching etc, etc. Im four weeks out, and as of monday i am down 18lbs since surgery. 28lbs since the start of the process. i should be celebrating that, instead of scrutinizing it. So tonight, I went into my bedroom, and pulled out the little clothes. Particularly, my work scrubs. I fought myself, thinking, "do you really want to do this to yourself?" "Your not going to fit in those things girl, you couldn't get that one pair of pants over your thighs!" They ALL fit!!! I had two pairs, that i bought small. I wore them things like a second skin. I actually wore spanx with them!! LOL!! I was so mad that i didnt try them on at the uniform store, that i tortured myself, and made myself wear them to work anyways. I wore them twice..Once a pair. My weight was around 236 then..where i always would seem to get stuck. Let me tell you..they fit PERFECT!! Im soo stoked! I had other articles given to me, that never fit, and Im rocking them! Even the size Large Dickies pants that I couldn't get over my thighs..fit perfectly! Im so excited..It was so awesome to actually see, and feel the results! for the first time! Im going to come back to this post, when i start with the doubting..and remember that this is for real. <3ing my sleve!

YAY!!! My cardiologist OK'd me for surgery! Says I'm low risk and other than my weight, pretty healthy!! WOO HOO!! I know I don't have any heart trouble, but for some reason I was worried about this being a snag. So...anyway....there's that then..

Good Morning Band mates, I am feeling good this morning. Just completed my workout for the morning and I am ready to tackle today's journey. Something very interesting happened to me this morning. I was coming out the gym and bumped into a lady that I use to work with Nora. Now Nora was the weight watchers queen, she could tell you how many points something was just by looking at it. I am sitting here laughing because as much as she was aware of how many points things were she was big as a house. I couldn't understand why a person with her knowledge was still so big. The first thing she said to me was wow you look good. I said thank you and was open about having had WLS. I wonder why sometimes people feel they need to keep what they have done a secret. I think that if I can help another person just by telling them my story and showing them the results of what I did, then why not. I think we make things bigger then they really need to be. I think that we forget the celebrate the small things and allow ourselves to enjoy things for what they are and not what they could have been. I think that we get so caught up with the numbers that we allow the numbers to determine how we are going to feel. I have a week that I didn't lose anything, and yes it can be disappointing and you feel sad but when I look at the scale and I don't see 279 I am still happy. You have to train yourself to celebrate the simple things. Remove anything negative you may have about this journey and replace it with positive thinking. I worked out today, I celebrate that I am able to do 60 minutes on a treadmill. I couldn't have done that before. I celebrate the small thing of putting on a size 16 and not having to wear a size 22. We sometimes forget how far we have come in the journey. You will only be defeated when you allow yourself to be defeated. I challenge anyone on the blogs that get upset when they don't lose to look back on what you did for the week and how did you eat? did you work out? are you drinking enough water? all these things are things you have to look and and think about what you need to do to make things better for yourself. Lap band is a tool, it is not the deciding factor to your life.

I thought I would blog my journey so others could know what I went through and maybe it will be helpful to someone. Background info: I am 5'4" tall and 43 years old. I was sort of thick in high school. Not fat really but my thighs were a little heavy and I wore a size 9 to 11 jeans. I remember this well. I was a cheerleader and was the biggest one. In college, I lost a lot of weight because I was the mascot of my college and it is really hot in the suit! I was a size 5 then, for about 2 years or so. I joined the army and gained a little weight. I was back in a 9 or 11 for the next couple years. Then I got married and got pregnant. That was the beginning of the end. I gained 80 pounds with him and he was premature! I never lost all the weight. I was 210pounds when he was born. I got back to 175 and stayed there for a year. Then my second pregancy.... gained back to 210 and lost only to 190 the next year. I joined weight watchers in 1995 for the first time. It was an at work program. I lost 12 pounds over the summer and continued to loose til I got to 163. I thought I was done with weight watchers and quit. I was a perfect size 12 for two or three years (continuinig to go to WW later on). I was pretty happy with that. Then came my daughter. I gained back to 215. I lost some of that after her birth but was hovering around 200 for a year or so. I did WW again to try to loose the weight. I got a divorce soon after she was born and I managed to loose back to 170 but that is as far as I got. Then, I slowly gained and was in the 180's for several years. I did WW again and I lost 20 pounds or so and got back to 170. I did this 170 to 190 and back again about 3 more times in 5 years. In 2007, I met my husband and I weighed 170, still at weight watchers. We married in September and you guessed it, back to 190 before the wedding and had to get my dress let out! I felt very frustrated. We wanted to have children so I had a tubal reversal in December of 2007. I took a lot of hormones trying to conceive. I balooned up to 220. I tried WW again and lost 10 or 12 pounds. I couldnt seem to get under 200. Then I had a job transfer and moved all the way to Texas from Alabama. It was a huge stresser on our family to move from a house to an apartment. Nobody was happy about the move. My kids were mad and I couldnt sell our house. It took 9 months and we finally did sell it and buy a nice home here. During all of this, I gained to 235. My highest weight. My husband was not "particularly attracted" to me anymore and it left me in the worse depression I have ever experienced. He was heavy too and so I pointed that out and we both did WW for 6 months or so. He reached his goal in that time, loosing 60 pounds and I lost down to 210. I was depressed because it was just falling off of him and I was eating much less and not loosing very much at all. I gained it all back. We planned a trip to Brazil to see my exchange student get married. I had 6 months to loose some weight. I considered wls then in fall of 2010. I felt I could do the supervised diet and then have surgery when I returned in March. I did the diet and took the HCG and B12 shots every week until we left. I lost 20 pounds. I weighed about 215 when we left. I returned two weeks later at 230. I consulted a surgeon about wls again and I didnt like the staff at that Dr.s office. The medical assistants as they are called could not even spell and could not hold an intelligent conversation so I didnt feel I was in good hands. I gave up on that in May 2011. My husband got a new teaching job in July, his first since being in Texas! We were changing insurance in August. So July 29th, I decided to see if Humana was going to cover wls and what type of diet and stuff was I going to have to do to get it done. I saw that the surgeon my friend recommended to me was having a seminar the next day (Saturday, July 30th) and so I signed up. My husband and I went. We met nice people and I decided I wanted the sleeve. Its the same one I decided on the year before, but didnt follow through on. I made an appointment for Monday, August 1. Humana didnt cover the sleeve unless you have a bmi of 50 and mine was 40.2 so we were going to be self pay. We decided to get it over with before school started and scheduled the surgery for the NEXT Monday at 8 am. Wow! I had a date already! I went on a one week preop diet and lost 9 pounds. I was 225 when I had the surgery. I went back to work the following Monday. I was just weak and tired but not much pain or anything. I had a little trouble getting in the required fluids. Next chapter-- At the begining of my third week post op I developed a kidney stone because I was dehydrated. I was hospitalized for 5 days and had another surgery on my kidney to place a stent. I gained a lot of weight from the fluid they gave me. I got the stent removed last Wednesday and I am finally, at 5 weeks out, starting to feel like my old self again. I started walking this week and doing a little weight training. To date... I have lost 27 pounds. I weighed 206.9 this morning. Thats lower than I have been since the trying to conceive days about 3 or 4 years ago. I am doing better about drinking but have not reached 64 oz on any day yet. So in Summary: I have been a yo-yo dieter for 20 years and havent been under 170 in about 14 years. I want to be my college weight of about 135 pounds, a size 6. I could stand to be 125 but that is getting a little thin for my build. It has been forever but I at least have a reference point. I can visualize that but I still have a hard time believing that any thing will work to get me there. I am scared to believe that this is finally it for me! I hope I can do this and maintain it for my lifetime. At my highest weight, my feet and back ached all the time, I cant tie my shoes right. It hurts to lean over. I am miserably tired and have no energy to do anything. I starting thinking in terms of how far do I have to walk and are there any hills to climb before I would decide If I wanted to go to the zoo or any activity with my family. I was not living. I was slowly dying. I had to make a change for good. I am sorry this story is so long but I wanted to get it all out there. The truth, the facts... my story.