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"You are beautiful. Your beauty, just like your capacity for life, happiness, and success, is immeasurable. Day after day, countless people across the globe get on a scale in search of validation of beauty and social acceptance. Get off the scale! I have yet to see a scale that can tell you how enchanting your eyes are. I have yet to see a scale that can show you how wonderful your hair looks when the sun shines its glorious rays on it. I have yet to see a scale that can thank you for your compassion, sense of humor, and contagious smile. Get off the scale because I have yet to see one that can admire you for your perseverance when challenged in life. It’s true, the scale can only give you a numerical reflection of your relationship with gravity. That’s it. It cannot measure beauty, talent, purpose, life force, possibility, strength, or love. Don’t give the scale more power than it has earned. Take note of the number, then get off the scale and live your life. You are beautiful!” Steve Maraboli, Life, the Truth, and Being Free

Even though I work in computers now with the school system, my college degree was actually Counseling with a concentration in Substance Abuse. While working at a drug treatment center I worked with patients on developing coping skills to help them deal with cravings to use. We would tell them, they must avoid people, places and things that are triggers; some to the point of having to live some where other than where they came from. During that time I was in denial that I myself was an addict, but my drug of choice was food. Unfortunatly, I can't avoid food. I must eat, but as I continue on the self reflective journey I have been on of late, I realize that I have food triggers. Cookies- I love them, they are buttery and chewy and oh so good. If I make cookies and eat one, I can't stop- I must eat more. Ice Cream is another problem, I love ice cream, any shape or form- cones, cups, shakes- yum. So I know, no ice cream should be kept in the house because I won't stop until it is all gone. Now you may say, where is you will power, where is your want power? I do want to lose weight, but there are times where it is like an out of body experience, I realize what I am doing is wrong and I will regret it, but I can't stop- this is classic addict behavior. If you are able to use your want power to prevent you from ever slipping up- awesome for you- but addicts many times can not rely strictly on that. I am actully going back and reading some of my old college textbooks to help myself with this addiction. While I have lost a little more than half of what I want to lose, in order for me to lose more and here is the key- keep it off- I must figure out my triggers and develop coping skills for dealing with these. Is this journey easy- heck no! Will it be worth it- heck yes. But, I feel I will be much more successful long term now that I am looking at this for what it is! Just like drug, tobacco, alcohol addiction is a life long battle- so is food addiction. For those of you who what I am saying rings true, take a look at yourself- what are your triggers- what can you do to cope with them. So with that- Hello, my name is Kim and I am a foodaholic.

I'm 9 weeks post-op and have lost 28lbs. My clothes are looking sloppy and I'm feeling great about it. I have absolutely no regrets about this decision. I did start to fell like I could handle a few tortilla chips and a slice of bread here and there, not a smart decision. I researched the process of Ketosis that is happening to my body and decided if I wanted to take advantage of this small window of about 9 months to 1 year when the weight loss is most likely to happen, I had better get serious and stop eating simple carbohydrates. I have done that now and feel really good about it. I guess I was trying to test my sleeve or something. I will be diligent about what goes in my mouth knowing that "Nothing tastes as good as being thin feels". Yea Me! Getting enough water has been the hardest part of this journey and I am so trying to get better with that. Like so many people have said, "I wish I had done this sooner", better late than never. When I have lost 50 lbs, I will share pictures. Thanks for reading.

Today is my 3 weeks out of surgery! Loving it! I am now on pureed foods (which isn't so bad)...sometimes things upset my stomach even though they didn't at first. Its going to have to be process of elimination on what I can and cannot eat. The only other issue I am having is I am soooo thirsty I feel like I can never drink enough WHICH to me is worse than feeling hungry LOL. Other than those two things I am extremely motivated and energetic. I'm down 20+ lbs. I personally DO NOT see a change BUT everyone tells me how good I look and my clothes do fit loose compared to what they were before surgery. I'm actually down 1 shirt size and 1 pant size (however I'm still wearing clothes from before my surgery).

So far, so good. Met with my surgeon again today and he said the surgery went great. he said there were no complications with my surgery and that everything went fine. I feel very fortunate and excited to see what's next. there's been a lot of abdominal pain but the meds they have been giving me are helping a lot. I can't wait until I can drink some water, i'm very thirsty and ice chips just aren't doing it for me. also, can't wait to go home!

So I have been overweight since I hit puberty. It wasn't an issue until several years ago. After, I started having children the weight just never disappeared and then after some time the weight just continued and continued to increase and now I know that I need to do something. I don't think that I'm ugly or unslightly but life isn't as enjoyable as it should be and I kow that if I lost the weight I would be a more lively person. So here I am started the journey to the rest of my life.

Ok, I might get blackballed and lose my MAN CARD for admitting this, but here goes. I was cleaning out the closet, looking for smaller pants to wear. I started rummaging for something that would fit, found a nice pair to try on. They were a PERFECT fit, better than any pants I've put on. Looked good in the mirror too! All that walking is shaping my butt up! Did I really say that last line? Up till recently, you could lean me up against a flat wall and there’d be no gaps anywhere from the top of my back to my calves. My butt was so flat… How flat was it? It was often mistaken for an end table when I lay on the floor. I looked at the tags only to find that they weren’t men’s pants at all - but a ladies size 16 that got left behind from a previous girlfriend! They must’ve mistakenly gotten mixed in with the tons of other pants and shirts that were put in the “I’ll be able to wear that again someday,” wishful thinking pile. For the MAN Committee, I know you have no knowledge of this, but, a 16 is the 1X Women's Plus Size according to Overstock.com. And I DID have to look that up; it didn’t come from memory or previous experience wearing women’s clothing! (So MAN Committee, please take that into account when voting.) This means that I now have the body of a woman with voluptuous hips! P.S. Blackball or not, I'm KEEPING the pants!! Keep Pimpin that sleeve!

Talk about irony! A toothache really!!! I have no idea how I got a toothache. Could it be the way I am sleeping? I know its not food? I wonder what happened? Anyway how is everyone day today? Today I did not wake up hungry I took my multivitamin and grab my 16 oz. bottle water and I was on my way to work. I even luck out and found a close parking spot to my job. I know what you are thinking I should park far and I normally do but it looked like it was about to rain and we all know that sugar melts! I grab my second bottle of water and went into my office and my coworkers congratulated me on my first day of week 4. I call it my treat is meat! LOL Anyway for breakfast I had 1 hardboiled eggs and the Buddig Chicken deli meat that was 150 calories and 15 grams of protein. I was actually full until 130pm I was really not hungry but I thought I needed to eat something so I had a tuna salad with 5 saltine crackers. That was 200 calories and 20 grams of protein. I had a hard time eating lunch because of my toothache so I took my time. It’s 8:05pm and I am not hungry. I put on orajel on the pain and its not working. Maybe the pain is keeping me full or maybe I am just not hungry. I am still trying to get familiar with my Band. This is the first relationship I had when I taking things slow! Anyway I am going to try to get a quick workout in. Thanks for reading.

Finally, people are really noticing my weight loss. It has been almost 2 months. I really expected the weight to just drop off of me, but That is not the case. I have been working really really hard; it is nice that people are starting to notice. I put on a shirt that was extremely small last fall. Not only did it fit today, it was also loose! I think another two or three weeks may require me to do some shopping! Yippee!!!

Today was one of those scary days were it seemed like I just never got enough to eat. I have days like this on occasion and don’t really know what triggers them. I haven’t strayed from eating “good” foods, so I don’t think it has anything to do with the foods that trigger my hunger monster. But, the amount of food I have been able to eat is really starting to scare me. With everything I’ve eaten, I definitely feel full, but the feeling doesn't seem to last but an hour or so. So to combat those feeling of “I’m going to obsess about eating until I’ve eaten something,” I keep plenty of lean protein in the house. Grilled chicken breast, grilled pork loin and plenty of low sugar sauces. I don’t keep any temptations in the house to ward against days like this. Maybe I need a WLS voodoo doll with pictures of bad food and pins stuck through them. I really started thinking about how and what I've been eating. And I have read the warning stories about people regaining their weight after surgery and it is a really scary feeling. I would never forgive myself for having gone through all this just to gain all the weight back. So, I've set some limits on myself. Not so strict as to feel deprived, but not so loose as to let myself get out of control. I will eat healthy food first. Protein/vegs/fiber every day. I will let myself try a dessert, but never eat more than a bite or two. (And by bite, I don’t mean “as much of the cookie as will fit into my mouth at one time” bite. :-P) I will not bring unhealthy food into the house. If I want something that bad, I’ll have to get off my butt and drive to the store. Most times, the craving does not overrule my need to stay camped out in front of the TV in my underwear or by the time I DO get there, the “craving” has worn off. I will make my own lunches to bring to work. That way, I can’t rationalize going out to eat and making food bad choices, convincing myself that eating healthy food costs too much. I’m trying to be realistic and know that I’m not always going to be faithful. But having the rules reminds me to stop and think before making a food choice. It’s a tool, just like WLS. Knowing that I am allowed to eat SOME bad stuff removes the stress of “I can’t ever have that again!” Knowing that I CAN eat a little of anything puts the power back in my hands and puts the responsibility on my shoulders to CHOOSE to eat the right way. It is empowering to feel like I am allowed to eat anything I want, but it’s my CHOICE to pick a different food option. I like this new lifestyle and after 5 months of hating to get out and walk, I am beginning to WANT to go on daily walks. Although I don’t necessarily like them, I do like seeing the scale drop and my energy level go up! Keep Pimpin that Sleeve!