Sheribear68

Lol. Yeah, after working all weekend and being completely on-point with food I had a blast last night with taco salad bar. I ate the hell out of some guacamole and toritilla chips, and drank an entire bottle of Chardonnay all by myself. It took 4 hours, but I finished the whole thing and I’m not one bit sorry about it (except the headache I woke up with, lol) Today is a 16:8 and I’m going to alternate 16/8 with 20/4 til Friday. I’ll feast on Friday and then go back into another weekend of plain ole 16:8 I picking up an entire weekend extra (25 hours) and starting on Wednesday won’t have a day off for 11 days straight. It’s going to be BRUTAL, but I’m going to push through it using IF as a way to help me hold onto my sanity

At the age of 50, I knew going hard-core anything really wasn’t on the table for me. Especially at the start of this with a healing from surgery body and still carrying around so much weight. That’s why finding Pilates was such a life saver for me in the beginning. I’ve started getting more aggressive on my treadmill and can’t wait to start actually running again. I’ve always loved running (even though I’ve never been a natural for it) and I fully give running credit for saving my life over 10 years ago. I had turned 40 at the end of 2008 and decided to make another stab at losing weight and getting fit. Well I lost 40 pounds over 8 months and started running. It was when I would go on my longer runs (4-5 miles or more) that I would notice chest pains. That made me go to my PCP who saw I was 40 and recommended a mammogram in addition to the ekg. Turns out my chest pains weren’t heart related, they were because I had a tumor in my left breast. Would’ve never found it til too late according to many doctors. Anyway, exercise for me will never be triathlon/iron man kind of stuff, but I do love getting a bit of a sweat on and I love the control that Pilates gives me over my body now.

LOVE this! Your hair looks like it might be gaining in some fullness, but your body continues to get skinnier. Woot!

Yay I’m so excited you’re gonna try the 16:8. I find the structure to be very soothing and it removes stress to know I’ve got between 11-7 to eat most days. Then again, if life throws an unexpected curve ball at me, I eat at whatever interval I can and just go back to it the next day. The biggest comfort for me is that TRE (time restricted eating) is always available for me to pick back up any day of the week depending on my schedule. I’ve been modestly successful in month 6. Lost 6.8 pounds over the month of August and since I had a feast day yesterday (first OU game of the year and we had a big party ) I don’t plan on weighing in til Thursday or Friday. Tomorrow and Thursday I’ve got 20:4 fasts planned and will stick to 16:8 today and Wednesday. My goal for September is to lose 5-6 pounds, which according to my surgeon might be a bit of an overreach, but I’m going to try for it and not get discouraged if I don’t make it

Okay so I literally could waste pages here quoting and commenting on everyone’s cute outfits. Looooooooove all of them. Side question: how many of you guys are currently struggling to find your style? I’ve spent so much of the last 20+ years wearing whatever I thought made me look the least fat/whatever was available to purchase in my size and what my pocketbook could afford. Now that I’ve moved from a size 22/24 and my size 12s are getting slightly roomy, I’m about to start my fall purchases in size medium/10. As I do this, I realize that I’m still gravitating to some of the “same old, same old” kinds of looks and I’m startled by the fact that I honestly have no idea (besides my necessary requirement for comfy shoes) what I want the new wardrobe to look like

You know, I’m wondering the same thing. The only days that I have seriously IFd, I didn’t do anything I’d call hard-core. Congrats on the triathlon and the great labs. Sometime in the next week I’ll go by DLO and get mine run and then I’ll know how I’m doing I don’t have any big fasts planned for this week. I’ll be in survivor mode with a crazy work schedule and almost every minute not at work scheduled within an inch of my life. It can’t be helped— I’m covering shifts on most of my days off and it’s football season now. Which means when I get off work tomorrow night, I’ll have a house full of drinking and eating people to watch the game. I must confess: I’ve got a bottle of Chardonnay with my name on it and I’m thinking I’ll just skip dinner to drink it. Lol, my restriction won’t let me have that and food and the wine so I think tomorrow only the wine will win. At this point in time, the only way this girl can fit in over 1,000 calories a day is to drink them. Seriously though, I’m giving myself this one evening with family,friends, and football before settling down for a long grind over the next 2 weeks

This was from over 12 hours ago, but I had time to barely shoot my OOTD before heading to work. Today’s temp was COLD. pretty sure the high was only in the mid-80’s. Brrrrrrrrrrr Glad I picked up a couple long sleeve shirts over the last couple of weeks

Just found this thread! CONGRATS on your surgery tomorrow and as soon as you feel up to it, please let us know how you’re doing. My biggest piece of advice if you haven’t already is to find the thread for people having surgery in August/September so you can share advice and troubles together.

This. I found a couple of really nice consignment stores within a few miles of home. It has been such a saver on the pocketbook, plus it allows me to pick up some nice stuff to reward myself as I cycle down. For example, I found a very nice Polka Dot Lauren dress to wear to a wedding this summer for $12/ then returned it for resale the next week and they gave me back $4 store credit on it. I’ve now gone down enough sizes (size 22 on surgery day to a size 12 today) that I’ve actually sold back a few of the pieces I got in early summer. It’s nice because I’ve got almost $100 store credit and will be looking to get some fall clothes once I’ve lost another 7-10 pounds and have moved into size 10s

Okay so I’m about to have labs drawn next week for my 6 month PO. My lipid panel on my 3 month was horrendous, but I had lost over 50 pounds so it definitely was a contributor. Surgeon and I discussed me seeing my PCP if this go round of labs is still elevated (or God forbid, worse) I probably won’t know anything for 2-3 weeks, but I’ll try my best to remember to post an update here

I just love jeans and t-shirts. 💕

Ugh. Quote is broken again on my pad. I ended up only doing 1 slider (1/2c cottage cheese) The reason is I wanted to bump my protein up after doing a 24, then 18hr fast on consecutive days. About to have dinner and I’m at 51gm protein. Yay me. Lol

That’s amazing that all of that goodness was under 1200 calories. Wow, I used to weep at the thought of 1200 calories (like how could I possibly not be STARVING on that amount) and now it seems so... decadent I’m going to chow down on my Protein ramen Soups ( will be 35+gm protein), then plan to eat sliders til Pilates tonite. dinner will be some kind of meat and veg (still need to decide) I’ll probably eat dinner late for me (around 8 pm) Edited to add;   Weight was only down 0.4 pounds from yesterday, but at least it’s the lowest number I’ve seen so far.  167.6

Okay. Saw my surgeon a couple of hours ago. I’ve officially lost 78 pounds since surgery day and he laughed when I was bummed that it wasn’t an even 80. According to him, I’ve lost right at around 80% of my excess fat, which qualifies as “success” in his book. When I discussed that while I was very grateful for the 80 pounds, my ultimate goal was another 23-25 more. He nodded and agreed that it was a totally reasonable goal, but to allow that it might take another 6 months for that to happen and to not be alarmed if immediately after that I find 5-10 pounds of “bounce”. He says that if I keep on running my program the way I have been, I should be able to get there. And in case I do not get there, then it’s my body telling me I’m not meant to be there. When I asked him what someone with my BMI and progress should expect on a monthly basis, he said 4-5 pounds max is what I could expect. That number somewhat bums me out (I was hoping he’d say 7-8) but his numbers make more sense within another 5-6 month time window vs my goal So I’ve got some labs ordered that I’ll do sometime next week and I won’t know results of those til about this time next month. I’ve got a FU with my NUT in 3 months, but my surgeon says he doesn’t need to see me til I’m 12 months P.O. He also told me he’s taking me off of the ursodiol (he jokingly said that I’ll never again lose 78 pounds in 6 months so there’s no need) and wants me off of my pantoprazole. One big reason is that med leaches calcium from your bones and that coupled with my VGS and carrying around less body weight, and being post-menopausal can lead to bone density issues later. He said to keep up with Pilates and my walk/run/incline training on the treadmill and I should be fine.

Hmmm. This is confusing. One thing that puts the fear of God into me is that I’ll lose the restriction I’ve got. Thankfully that hasn’t happened yet, but I’m not even 7 months P.O. yet. I do know that whenever I extend fasts beyond the usual 14-18 hours daily, I notice rebound construction the next day. After completing my 24 hour fast yesterday, I’ve had zero interest in food. A lot of that is because I’ve got a sore tooth and have been running errands all day, so I’m planning on a protein bomb around 1-2 pm. That will still give me a 18 hour fast on top of a 24 hour fast, but it is what it is.

Okay so had my 6 months PO visit with my surgeon this morning. Went well and I’ve lost 78 pounds since surgery day. Lol, he laughed bc I was disappointed it wasn’t an even 80. He told me that even if I didn’t lose another pound, he’s calling this a success, but said it’s totally reasonable (and doable with work and focus) to lose another 25 vanity pounds. It was nice to hear that as far as he’s concerned, it’s up to me and there won’t be judging either way. I’m at the tire shop getting a nail out of one of my tires, then off for a celebration pedi

Okay so at my surgeons office for my 6 month follow up and then running errands, then pedi later.

I’m betting this is correct. Oh my, I’ve always worn dresses at the knee or lower because I just hate all the chub my knees carry. Well I’ll have to try on dresses in shorter lengths for funsies over the next couple of weeks and see what they look like.

Okay so I ended up NOT buying this dress bc it was fitting me a bit loose in places and they didn’t have one a size smaller, but I wanted to post anyway, lol I was struggling this afternoon and was grumpy and emotional so I went shopping to try on some clothes to refocus myself on my plan. Sigh....I want to wear shorter dresses so badly and my legs just look so chubby. Also, I get bruises on my shins all of the time at work

I’m quite surprised I haven’t had issues. Moment of complete honesty: I took my ursodiol for all of 2 weeks PO. It made me nauseous and I was barely eating 80 calories/day so decided I was just going to have to take the risk of my gall bladder needing to be removed. So far I’ve been lucky, but maybe that’s where me having a slow and steady loss has been a blessing rather than a curse. Now watch.... next week I’ll probably have an attack from out of the blue and need to have it taken out

So today was a trial, and honestly it wasn’t because of my fast. I’ve been told I don’t have a cavity or anything wrong with my sore tooth. And I can guarantee I trust the dentist, because he’s my dad. So when dad told me he thought I just had some gum inflammation and there wasn’t anything to fix, I got grumpy. Then I got a call on my way back home that the Pilates studio still doesn’t have power so all classes were cancelled. Now I’m double-grumpy. And at that point it was almost 4:30 my time and I still had 2 hours til I was scheduled to break my fast I got home and almost caved and drank my protein shake. What I did instead was head to a strip mall and try on some clothes. I didn’t buy any (except for some new yoga pants), but it kept my mind on my goals. FYI guys, no idea if I will drop any poundage this week, but my bod is still shrinking like crazy. Tried on some size 12 clothes and some were actually LOOSE. Just sat down with 1/2 a PP shake for 15gm protein and then I’ll try to eat some leftover pork and salad in a bit. Overall today was a huge success as far as staying on plan went

This is where different clinics and surgeons really are apparent. We were all told that protein shakes never counted as water because they counted as “food”. Not even protein broth was to be considered fluid. Therefore we were told to have an absolute minimum 64 ounces water or else we wouldn’t have as much success. In the hospital, SF popsicles got counted as 1 ounce water, but besides that and zero cal sports drinks that was all we could count. And they watched... if you didn’t consume 64 ounces water in 24 hours, you weren’t allowed to be released. I was told by my insurance company that I was approved for one day only so i really felt the pressure to get the water in. Now though it feels weird and I feel really bad if I don’t have at least 80 ounces. I get so thirsty and headachy and I get cramps. I have no idea how people can drink so little bc I feel absolutely horrible unless I’m drinking all of the time

Loooove that dress! Looks so stylish and comfy and figure-flattering all in one. Dang you gals all have such fabulous skinny legs. This is exactly why I’m going to try to push for the last 15-20 pounds lost. I’m overall happy with my body right now unless I’m wearing shorts or dresses. Then my little stumpy pudgy legs show and I realize I’ve got to get my booty in gear Y’all are rocking it!

Yup yup yup! I was the lady who other women looked at in horror whenever I gleefully announced I was getting a bilateral breast reduction for free because of the breast cancer the year before. I happily trotted into the surgery center that day and went from a G cup down to a B cup in a single morning. The first time I ran after healing and didn’t have to wear 3 workout bras to keep from getting black eyes, I broke down and cried with joy. The other day I was in Pilates and doing side plank and almost fell over because the wrinkled skin on my inner arms was that distracting. Lol, even at an underweight size 4 in my early 20’s I had cellulite and thunder thighs so I’m not noticing the inner thigh wrinkles, but my butt is another story. I refer to it as “bari-booty”. It’s essentially a series of winkles that starts around my sacrum and ends up ending in the fat rolls of my upper thighs. Yeah.... need to find a procedure that moves all the thigh fat up to my booty when this is done.

Okay sweetie, please do not blame yourself for that. It wasn’t the cinnamon apples, it’s something else deeper and these are the head issues we all have to come to grips with. As the only “fat” kid out of a trio of siblings, my heart breaks for your daughter. I also had a skinny mom (and kudos to you, you are now a skinny mom also) and that compounded my shame. I felt like I had somehow failed the family and the irony is that I wasn’t actually fat, fat. I just felt fat compared to everyone else. IMO, the best thing for your daughter would be to see if she’s interested in working with a registered dietician and quite possibly a therapist specializing in adolescents and maybe even weight loss. My experience in being a daughter and having had a daughter (mine is 22) is that mother/daughter relationships—even the very best of them— are fraught with pitfalls and can be a veritable minefield in the best of times. Please please please do NOT blame yourself in this though.