FluffyChix

My doc said I will probably be taking omeprazole for life. I presently take 40mg per day.

Yeah. So strange. It is her, not you. It's like you cheated on her or left the group, or something and now "due to cheating by having surgery and taking the easy way out", you are "one of them"--the skinny bi*ches. And she now feels more self-concious about her fattitude and condition. She also doesn't WANT to change her reality. She would rather have her food comfort/drug rather than change her life and eating habits. Sorry you are experiencing that! My middle sis is highly competitive with everyone, but especially me. And although she is proud of me and compliments me often, I can see it bothers her that she is now the "heavy sister". She watches everything I put in my mouth and I can tell, she chooses smaller portions and dishes she wouldn't normally eat when we go out. Meh...you can only do you. Can't control anyone else...

Ok, so I think I told you yesterday after the vomiting thing to go back a phase or 2 for a couple of days? Why on earth would you eat a P3 with nuts in it? In the early days, nuts were one of THE hardest things for me to handle? LOL. Going back a phase means, you go back to yogurt and protein drinks and maybe cottage cheese until your tummy is able to heal a little again. It's usually a couple of days. No wonder you didn't feel like eating. He has you on a Zone macro plan: 30 30 40 only he's flipping the protein and carbs so that protein is 40%. For your size, 74-75g is about the target protein amount especially in the early days. It's called the moderation approach, but the intention is to use those carbs for good. Only healthy carbs. You will have to experiment and see if that allows you to lose. It should as long as you stay at or below the 800cal deck. It should also confer metabolic reset for you. Dr. Michael Mosely wrote a book about the research from a UK scientist/dr. who reversed patients' diabetes on a 800cal diet that had a bunch of plant based carbs in it--and more Mediterranean style eating. It was called the 8 Week Diet Cure (I think--on Amazon--good book.) You can't customize macros beyond P/F/C in the free MFP version. So you just have to choose to track sugar as one of your 5 macros and keep an eye out for it yourself. Hope you are feeling better today. Take it easy on your food choices.

So welcome and congrats! Yay on being on track and problem free. Make sure to MAKE yourself hydrate. It's more important than eating or vitamins! Initially during the first 3-4 months (what the RD and doc call the healing phases), your job is very simple. 1. Get your fluids in each day. 2. Get your vitamins in each day. 3. Get your protein goals met in each day. Stick to the food stages in your manual! Advance foods per the doc/RD and how easily your pouch handles the new foods/stages. 4. Walk for 60 minutes each day--minimum. 5. Sleep well each day. 6. Live. Love. Enjoy your new reality. 7. Stick to the plan. Remain focused. Do not revert to old partying ways that got you to the Obesity Ball the first time around. 8. Get to goal. Those are your driving motivators each day. Each day will have different challenges. Hormones WILL flow. You will have picky pouch days. You will have hungry hungry heifer days. You will have days filled with head hunger. You will have days filled with food apathy and aversion. Every day is different, but those 8 rules above never change. They are you J-O-B! And no one can do it, but you. As you progress, they will give you a little more information with each visit. Right now, your sole focus is on fluids, vitamins, and protein. The calories take care of themselves and to an extent, so do the other macros. But honestly, I avoided things like cream of wheat or potatoes in favor of meeting my protein goal. If you have room for cream of wheat, you have room for protein, so no excuses for not meeting your protein goals each day, nor drinking too little.

Ok, so now I'm approaching the chaffel bandwagon. I love them made with egg whites rather than whole egg. No eggy aftertaste to contend with. I also used Daisy 2% cottage cheese as part of the cheese and added a spoon of protein powder to up the protein even more and add to the crispness. Even though I overcooked these (should have been closer to 4 mins rather than 5), the turkey club sandwich was the closest I've come to an honest to God sandwich since a year before surgery! AND, go run and immediately buy these Twin Peaks Protein Puffs from Alex in the Bariatric Pal Store. Cuz I kid you not...the ingredients aren't crazy bad AND they taste and feel so much like miniature "cheesy poofs" aka UTZ cheeseballs that I feel like I should confess being bad. But the whole meal was less than 300cals and less than 8g net carbs, and had 37g of protein. Lemme repeat that in case you missed it...37g of protein. I feel like I'm yelling. Am I yelling? I ate the whole damn thing. It wasn't really a trigger meal. But I absently continued to eat cuz it tasted so great and was so exciting to eat as a sandwich with cheesy poofs. Can I just say, I heart the crap outta maintenance? Here's the MFP info. The order of the macros is: cals; protein; fat; carb (whole); fiber; sugar And here are the Twin Peaks Protein Puffs I ordered from Bariatric Pal Store. I'm so STOKED about these. TOTES worth the $25. Seriously. A serving size is 1 cup and there are 10 servings. But I only served 6g of protein puffs with my meal and it was PLENTY! These are not very sliderish cuz of the protein content. So I felt replete from them. So I should get about 50 servings per container. Bargain! (I love these enough, that I'm racing to leave a review and I rarely review things!) I can't wait to order the other flavors!

You're welcome...

Ooops. Clearly skimming is not my forte. Leave what you hate and pick the rest.

Oh...forgot about quinoa, eggs, and fish! Good ones! I'm presently on a fish and shrimp kick!

lentils, black beans, kidney beans, white beans edamame, tofu, miso chia seeds, hemp hearts, almonds/walnuts/pecans, pumpkin/sesame/sunflower seeds, nutbutters of all kinds yogurt, cottage cheese, sour cream, whey protein supps/protein bars, protein mug cake leafy greens, broccoli, kale, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, bean sprouts, okra, eggplant, tomatoes edamame spaghetti, shirataki noodles with tofu Hate when that happens!

Woke up to a hankerin' for chaffling this morning. I tried the original (whole egg and cheese) in the photos below. And while I wanted to love them, the bottom line is that there is probably a learning curve to find your favorite and learn the timing on your waffle maker. Cuz even though it looked good and was crunchy, I still tasted the "browned egg" flavor that I'm not a huge fan of. So then I made a different version--a riff on my fluffychix "cheese bread" from my super old blogspot.com blog. And was too thin. Then I added a tbsp of almond flour and 10g of protein powder and accidentally created quest protein chips. ROFLMAO. They are dry like quest chips, but very light and crunchy (and too dark). I went from cooking 7minutes (totally shambolic) to cooking 4 minutes! Oy! So more learning needed, but I made a total of 7 chaffles this morning between 2 recipes. So there's gonna be lots of chaffle eating this week! I'm already calling MOM. LOL. IYKWIM and I think you do! hehe. Oh btw, they are SUPER filling. No way could I eat a whole recipe! I ate one and I'm just on the border of whoa and crap (too much fat/cheese). We'll see how it shakes out in the coming hour. I am hopeful that I can use one on my turkey hatch burger as a bun! Here's the basic chaffle nutrition. This makes 2 chaffles, splitting the ingredients between the two: Here's where the recipe is for the original griddle bread from Atkins. http://fluffychixcook.blogspot.com/2012/04/cinco-de-mayo-tex-mex-vittles-and.html (This was my very first blog back in the day that was replaced by the newer version at fluffychixcook.com

Move up in increments and do it wisely. Fill it with protein. So move to 3/4c food = 3oz dense protein + al dente veggies with whatever space you have left in the 3/4cup. If that still doesn't satisfy, see how much of the 3/4c is taken up by doing 4oz of dense lean protein. Do that for the next couple weeks to see how you feel? Also, add 1/2oz avocado and 1/2oz grape tomatoes. Eat them at the end of the meal. They are total sliders and very wet. A 3/4 cup meal would look about like this: 3oz grilled chicken, cut into dice the size of pencil erasers 1oz steam broccoli, al dente + molly mcbutter sprinkles (or 1/2 tsp butter) 1/2oz avocado + 1/2oz grape tomatoes cut into 3 sections per tomato

yes. I'm hypo. I've lost 157lbs from my recent high of 287lbs. I'm in normal BMI and weight range and am my final Goal #3.

Ok, tonight's dinner meeting outfit. Tuck or untuck?

My chaffle maker came today. It's stinking cute!!! But we have a dinner meeting...so no chaffles for us today. Wah. Wah. Wahhhhh.

I replied to you, because food never gets stuck and because I have a large tool. Glad you're eating healthy. My journey is in my signature. I'm trying to explain (not very well) that to control hunger you have to do one of three things: 1. Eat VERY low carb, dense lean protein 2. Eat more at a meal 3. Eat more often By your time frame, I was eating 1 cup of food by volume per meal. I can readily get about 4oz of protein into that cup by weight if that's all I eat. Cuz I'm limited to 1cup of food by volume at any meal. And cuz 1oz of diced protein by weight = 1/4c of volume (or pretty close). So I choose to eat 3oz dense protein per meal + 1 to 2oz of al dente veggies=about 1/4cup by volume + 1 serving of fat = 1 tsp of oil/butter or 1/2oz nuts or 1 tbsp nut butter or 1 oz avocado. My satiety and meal satisfaction is directly tied to how dense the protein is and how under cooked the veg is. Fat also affects satiety. It makes me full longer, but the trade off is, too much fat makes me nauseated. And it also adds cals. So if I'm sticking to 650-850/day for weight loss, then it uses those calories pretty quickly without a lot of satiety or protein needs met. You have to play with what works for you. One thing I do is the "Cottage Cheese Volume Test". Google it and WLS and try it out. I found I can eat 9oz by volume of cottage cheese as of 12 months. I need to do an update for 18 months. That weighs a completely different amount than 4oz. Right? Cuz cottage cheese is dense.

Your diet composition and how frequently you eat determines how hungry you are for the most part. If I eat CRAP and carby stuff? I want to eat every 2 hours. It's hell for 2-4days to break that cycle. If I have a weekend of grazing and "treat" type foods with higher carb items and any alcohol? I want to eat like a beast for 2-4 days after. But if I eat my plan, work my plan, and do what I know to be true for my body and lifestyle and health status? I have "appropriate" hunger. At this point in your recovery, you should be able to make 3 hours between meals IMHO or longer. Missing a meal is not an emergency for me anymore--now that the initial phases of healing are finished. I regularly go 4-6 hours between meals or longer and I do IF for 16-20 hours on selected days without a great deal of hunger. But the more and more often I eat of very deeply pleasurable foods? The MORE of them I want to eat.

Ok, great response. So you should try to follow your doc. But you need to make notes for yourself. How does a "meal x" make you feel. Do you get hungry quicker? Do you feel tempted to eat off plan afterward. Does it interfere with your weight loss goals? How quickly are you losing per week? In general post meno women will lose much slower than others. How many calories are you eating per day and what macros are they suggesting? You need to switch over to My Fitness Pal (free). You will just eat your carbs then mentally subtract out your fiber. It allows you to track up to 5 macros. I will post a day of food below for you to see. I just mentally know if I eat around 40 total carbs with most of the carbs coming from veggies/dairy/eggs/nuts-seeds/a bit of fruit, then I will be between 15-30g of net carbs roughly each day. I don't stress about anything in my diet (except getting in enough calories with higher fat foods--cuz I don't do well with them). Ditch the powdered sweeteners and replace with liquid stevia drops. I use some flavored and the original. I like Vitacost, SweetLeaf, and Better Stevia brands and our HEB brand is also pretty decent. But I keep the use of these pretty low cuz of the cephalic insulin response. You MUST do something EVERY DAY to move!!! This isn't negotiable in my estimation--especially if you are in a hormonal deficit/challenge and have PCOS. It's hotter than hell here. I walk in my house. Seriously. I walk laps around the interior of my house. I walk/run for 1+ hours a day everyday. (if at all possible). I do miss some days, but it's a big deal if I do. I only lost on average 1-2lbs per week. In the early days I lost 3lbs per week but that didn't last long. There WILL be stalls. The are inevitable. I had to be between 650-850 (towards the lower end of that range) to lose those amounts each week. I had very few treats or cheats during the super active losing phase. And I didn't believe in everything in moderation when I never had moderation before. So you will have to decide how many carbs and how many cals you're gonna follow from your doc and how it actually nets results for you.

Breakfast this morning! Homemade eggwhite delight (made with egg whites, HEB blackforest ham, 2% kraft deli deluxe cheese) and 1 cup of arugula spinach blue cheese salad. There were no survivors. ring. ring. Hello McD? There's a new clown in town who ain't messin' around! All this gorgeous and filling food for 121 cals, 15g protein, and 5g of carbs. I swear it's my super power... Ooops! I lied. I couldn't finish it all. Here are the afters. I will just add them to lunch.

OMGosh! Love that dress! You look fabulous!

Good luck! Thanks for the update.

I like the top outfit best. I'm not sure I care for the second. It's too big looking on your, especially through the bust/arms and waist area? But looking awesome otherwise!!!

Is this for your fancy schmancy meetin'? You look FABULOUS! Love the dress, the shoes, the toenail color! It all works girl!!!

Congrats! Awesome report. Thanks for the update!! (Also, your diet will help you go through the pre-op liquid diet so much easier and will make your post surgery 2-6 week period SO much easier!!) Cudos!

Oh thank you SO much for saying this!!! I meant to bring up this point in my preaching above!!! That there are SOOOO many in the IF thread who have walked the walk for months now!!! Any one of us will be happy to help. And that the best thing is to jump into the thread, and start posting and asking questions!!! We'll all be thrilled to help! Not singling anyone out, but especially peeps like @GreenTealael, @sillykitty, @matt, @sheribear68, @AZHiker (don't know why these aren't highlighting) and so many others!!