CrowLuv

It's been so long since I came here and I'm disappointed in myself for that, it's such a wonderful forum with amazing people. 

But I'm back with exciting news: I had my surgery in August of 2019, and I met my goal of 180 by the fall of 2020! And even better: as of today I've far surpassed my initial goal and am now at 156lbs!

In hindsight, I made the goal of 180 never dreaming I would be able to go below that, and yet, in the back of my mind I always knew that somewhere in the 150s would be the absolute ideal for me, I just never thought that would be a possibility, even with this surgery. So this is a dream come true for me!

The mind is a very powerful machine, and I guess my mind clearly said "we're not done here" when I got to 180. I didn't even try to get below it, to be perfectly honest - it took no effort on my part, the weight just kept (keeps?) melting off of me. 

That sounds like the worst kind of humblebrag, almost cringe-level - but I truly don't mean it that way. It's just that I'm just completely gobsmacked! I never in a million years expected this to happen!

More good news: I started exercising with a program I'm obsessed with called Essentrics last October - heck, I've only missed a handful of days since I started. I never in my wildest dreams thought I'd be so excited about working out, that it would be the highlight of my day, even. But it is! I always haaaated exercise! But this program is downright enjoyable and I always feel something akin to euphoria at the end of my workouts. That's not an exaggeration. It's possible that doing this is why I kept losing weight, but I'm not sure, because it's not cardio-heavy at all...it's more like just stretching and moving your body, I guess kinda like a more "active" form of yoga, but NOT yoga, it's hard to describe honestly. Nothing fancy, it just really feels good for my body, I can't say enough about it. I can't imagine it burns that many calories since there is very little cardio involved, but I don't know because I don't do math and that's that lol.

But now I have a new goal, and it's a big one: get back to a nutritious, healthy diet (maintenance I mean, not active weight loss). I'm embarrassed to admit it, but I have to be brutally honest with myself, and this is the ideal place to do it - the fact is, my diet SUCKS. I haven't even tried to eat healthily for quite awhile now. I'm so ashamed of myself just typing that out, but I need to face it and admit it to myself before I can fix it.

I haven't participated on this forum for way too long, and that was a mistake. This forum is amazing and filled with such great people who always inspired me so much!

So now I'm back because, even though I'm at my goal, the fact is, this is a lifelong journey - it's not just the weight loss part, it's so much more than that. I need help getting my diet back on track. I need the inspiration and excellent advice I always found here. Just because I'm at goal doesn't mean I'm done - far from it.

So although I'm embarrassed that my diet (currently!) sucks, I can at least give myself credit for finally admitting it and setting my intention to change that. Being at goal weight does NOT mean I'm healthy. It's great that I'm exercising, but if I'm not giving my body the nutrition it needs, then I'm only hurting myself. If I took the giant step of having bariatric surgery, I owe it to myself to follow through with the WHY I did it - which was to become healthy again - and that is sooo much more than a number on the scale.

I'm ready to make the changes necessary to get myself into the healthiest state possible. I won't be perfect, nobody is, but it's time for me to truly commit to giving my body the healthy nutrition it deserves as best as I can. I don't know where to start though, it's like I need an entire education about it. But I'm ready and willing to learn.

I'm so happy to be back here because I know that inspiration is found everywhere here in this forum.  

Down 31 pounds in my first month! OK, so a month and two days, but I'm counting it anyway. 😆

At this point, I'm doing well overall. According to surgeons' instructions, I'm on soft foods for another week-ish. I'm so ready for solids - the soft foods can be such "sliders" and I have to be extra, extra careful.

For example, my refried beans + dollop of plain Greek yogurt + tomatillo salsa verde became a problem. I never felt satisfied and felt I could have easily had a much bigger serving. Then, far worse was when I made homemade hummus - holy cow it is SO GOOD, but again - felt like I could have downed a quart, no problem. 😂

It's (for me at least) extremely challenging to "eat mindfully" when the food is that soft. I mean for crying out loud, there's nothing to "chew on"! 😂

So, couple of days ago - I committed to no more refried beans and no more hummus. Farewell my delicious friends. Going to focus on chicken and tuna and eggs for the time being (ground up til mushy, of course). 

I'm hoping that once I get the go-ahead to introduce solids I will be able to feel the restriction. Because honestly? I'm only a month in, and I feel NO restriction. It's frustrating, but not the end of the world. Willpower was never my problem. But I'm so looking forward to that feeling I hear a lot on here when people say "Oh I ate half an egg and was SO STUFFED." This has....not been my experience. 😕

Really hoping that's because my foods are so mushy/soft right now. We shall see. 

Regardless, I'm 100 percent committed. I hear over and over how this tool is the most powerful for about a year, maybe/possibly a wee bit more. I will not sabotage that for the world. 

So - doing my happy dance at 31 pounds down - I'm in a "weight decade" I haven't seen in a very long time. And it only gets better from here!