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Sitting at my desk wishing it was Friday... when I received a call from the hospital where I had my lap band surgery in December 2010 and most recently a sonogram after my tummy tuck to see what was causing the bleeding from my belly button. My first thought was they found some dreaded infection or worse yet…tumors… I braced myself for the bad news wondering why my plastic surgeon wasn’t calling… The woman identified herself as the Director of Patient Relations and she was calling to congratulate me on my successful Lap Band journey and ask me if I would be interested in a starring role in their new advertising campaign. It’s just in the works now and it may be print or television…no details are firm yet. After I picked my mouth off the ground and tried to wrap my head around the fact this wasn’t bad news… I thanked her for the call and asked how much it paid. Well maybe not quite that blunt but in a roundabout sort of way…. LOL. She doesn’t think it pays but it may open the door for other things… Like what…. I have no idea. So anyway…. I thanked her for the call, told her I would consider it and she assured me I would be hearing from their creative department. I hung up the phone and the first thought I had was seeing my body on a billboard on the highway…. I spent all this time to get thin and now they want to blow me up…. Hysterical.

I was banded on 1/7/13 and one of the things that my instructions talked about was that during the "Healing Phase" of my eating, many patients stop losing or actually gain weight. With this in mind I have been very careful to log all my food and count calories Even thought my NUT said that calorie counting wasn't necessary, she told me to shoot for between 1300 - 1500. So, this morning I was able to go back to one of my pre-band rituals of Saturday morning breakfast with a friend, but I was scared because I was flying solo, no scale, no measuring cups, just me and "Mistress Band". So, the result? I ordered two eggs and hash browns, I pre-cut all my food to the proper size, and tried to focus on the conversation and my eating. Pretty soon I hit a soft stop (hiccup) and then each bite I started asking myself why I was taking that bite. When the answer because "Because it tastes so good" I put my fork down and moved the plate out of reach. At that point, I was satisfied, not full, but satisfied and it looking at my plate, I realized that I had eaten about the same as I would have if I had pre-measured it. Maybe one day, I will be able to move rely totally on listening to my body and my band, but until then, I will log and count.

So I am currently on the mushy stage of my diet. Basically I can eat whatever I can mush up or thick liquids. If it can be pureed or mushied it can be eaten right now. I have a rather large combined family and one of my biggest fears is it would be really hard not to want to eat the things the kids can have but I cannot. So subtly, over the last few grocery trips I have been making small changes that add up. I bought spaghetti sauce with less sugar in it. I bought turkey meatballs and I changed their pasta to whole wheat. (I dont eat the pasta and probably never will again). So when I made dinner.. The kids never said a word about the new taste of the meal. They loved it! They never knew the difference in the meatballs because I never said anything like "Hey this is really different.. try it". I just cooked like normal but with better ingredients. The family had their pasta dinner and I had two mushed up tiny meatballs and a little bit of sauce. Family dinner was a success. Then last night's dinner was Mexican food night. Now.. I LOVE Mexican food. There is a little hole in the wall place here in the town I live in that I visited at least 4 times a week pre surgery. Yeah.. I admit it.. its my favorite and a weakness. I made the taco meat with ground turkey and just seasoned it like normal. The seasoning turned it the orange color and gave it the same flavor. The kids never knew the difference. Used lower fat cheese and for the fajitas we did grilled chicken. I had fat free refried beans with a little salsa on top. Lunch today was tomato soup with skim milk. They love tomato soup so that was never a fear. I was so scared I would want to eat junk food. In all reality I am improving the health of my kids and they don't even know the difference. I am not making a huge deal out of EVERYTHING HAS TO CHANGE!!! If I do that.. they will shut down and not want anything new. I bought this HUGE box of sugar free popsicles and the kids love them for treats. I wanted to write this blog to let other people know if you are worried about how the kids will react to the diet changes, just change it. Just make stuff and set it on the table. The rule in my house is if you are hungry enough you will eat. Try to make small little changes to favorites that make them healthier without changing everything they love. Another thing we have always done is there is never ever tv on during dinner. It is our time as a family to talk about the day. I think this kind of distracts them a little bit. It is so important for me to keep that time as a special family time. Where food was always the center of family get togethers, I think it in some ways still can be. We just have to make healthier decisions. So far even right down to the 6 year old, I have gotten great support from my kiddos. I am so happy my major change can also be a healthy change for them without negatively impacting them. The last thing I want is to find any of my daughters obsessing over a scale before school. I want this to be an easy transition for everyone. While I am still learning what I can eat, I am having fun experimenting and looking at new things to cook for everyone. I am sure I can come up with healthy treats and things kids love without gaining weight back. I am just going to have to make the effort and be excited and say things like Oh my gosh you guys.. this is so yummy. If I have something yummy, most of the time they want to try it. I still have my days where the smell of bacon wants me to know over my grandma for a plate of food.. but I think this journey is going to be a lot less hard than I thought as long as I just do it. My imagination is so much worse than reality. Don't pysche yourself out. You got this.

It has been 6 months since surgery and I'm doing really good. I have lost 51 #'s so far although I had a pretty long stall. It lasted about a month or so. I didn't worry about it because I knew it would be over and I would start losing again. I am now working on getting more water in as that is hard for me. I am in no rush with this weight loss as I did not put it on overnight and don't expect to lose it overnight. Of course it's coming off faster than it would have do to my tool so I'm happy with where I am at this point. I have started doing strength training and will focus on that for the time being so that I can tighten and tone up. I also want to lift my butt:) since I lost some of it. I'm so happy with my tool and will continue to work it to my advantage.

As you may have seen Someone posted that to me today.... Stop preaching. I really thought about it and decided that if my preaching about.... be good to the band and it will be good to you....helps one person out... Its worth having someone tell me to stop preaching. So I am not stopping. I will shout it from the rooftops... I love my band and my band loves me because I treat it with respect and dedication... If it chooses to fail me down the road it won't be from my doing...and I will just deal with it when the time comes. In the meantime the band and my effort gave me a thin healthy outlook on life and I plan on singing it's praises forever....

Today I have tried to focus on hydration. Which really isn't a problem for me because I stay thristy. My surgery date is feb 14th and the closer it gets the more I become nervous. Currently it is very cold outside and I have not been able to get my excersize in for the last couple of days. I am hoping that with the up coming weather change I will be able to get at least a mile or mile and half in each day that it's warm. I am really thinking that I need to invest in a Treadmill. Currently for today I have taken in 96oz of water and I have had three very small meals. Tomorrow I will try to substitue a meal for a protein shake. I will also weight myself tomorrow. My last weight was 330lbs down from a all time high of 347lbs. I will be so glad when the day comes that I can say good bye to the 300's forever and hello to 200.

1st Grade- NOW I have been overweight since 1st grade. I don't mean huge obese but Overweight all the same or as I vividly remember being called Husky, Fat, Pudgy, so on. I remember having to buy boy’s size husky because they didn’t make girls size jeans to fit and the misses sizes were way to long. I remember in 5th grade wearing my mother's clothes to school (5th grade!). I recall eating butter out of the empty refrigerator and I would wait until no one was looking and take extra and eat it outside or in my closet. I ate as an escape and for comfort. When I played youth softball I was always #12 because it was always the XL jersey. I always wished for #1 the small. In 5th 6th 7th 8th 9th, 10th grade I wanted to be the cute girl that the boys liked. By the time high school rolled around I started looking for ways to be popular because slim pretty girl was not going to do it for me. I started playing BALL. Basketball, Volleyball, Softball, Shot-put and discus in track. And it worked! By the time summer came before 11th grade I have played my way into a slimmer me. NOT skinny mind you but not chubby either. I spent that summer running for exercise every night. Senior year was great but because I stopped the EXTRA exercise (running) I added a few pounds and this is where the real dieting started. When I was in high school you couldn't just run to a doctor for diet pills sooooooo a friend’s college brother sold "yellow jackets" and I bought some. I guess you could say I was skinny for a year or so. Then of course the college freshman 15-20lbs and for my college years I would say chubby was back. Size 12/14 and I stayed there until 23-24yrs old. By the time I married I was size 16. (I never owned a scale so I have no idea what I weighted) Let me tell you shopping for a wedding dress size 16 in the late 90's was NO fun. And it began. I dieted on and off for the next few years until my first pregnancy. I began it as a size 18 and gained 60lbs. 5 months after having my first I was pregnant again (yes I know how it happens ) I gained 20 pounds with the second pregnancy. For the next 5 years I tried everything. Atkins, Weightwatchers, Soup diet, diet patches, herbal pills, over the counter pills and stayed between size 18-22. Baby #3 and my weight was 250 right after delivering and then 236 around a year after and I decided I needed to consider a major change so in 2007 I looked into WLS surgery. Instead I decided to tray a diet doctor - Metabolic Weightloss. 8 months and I lost 55lbs and was at 178lb my lowest in years. I felt GREAT. but it was a diet. Slowly over the next 5 years I have added EVERY pound back. AND again find myself looking into WLS. Of course my insurance will not cover it so I need to decide what to do. DESISION MADE! 239lbs and I am scheduled for Sleeve Surgery Tijuana Mexico I understand the life change but I am ready. Truly ready!