ouroborous

Oh, I agree completely. **** shaming (and please be aware of the context of me using the word "****" here) is still terribly fashionable. God help you if you're a woman (of any orientation) with a strong libido. I think things are changing. But maybe not fast enough...

Well, I don't do it ANYWHERE but here, trust me. I even waffled and thought about deleting this post because I thought it was just too vain! But it's true. I LIKE my body now (and apparently others do, too ) And this is the "Success Stories" forum, after all -- if my story of going from being a giant blubbery tub-o-lard to a sorta hunky middle-aged guy can motivate one guy to get the sleeve and/or do the hard work necessary to build and strengthen his body, then it's worth a little good-natured teasing over bragging a bit Now if I could just get rid of the last saggy bits around my midsection. I've 99% decided to get a tummy tuck/lower body lift for that, and then -- watch out, world! Thanks for the kind words. And ladies... ah, this is a g-rated forum, so I'll shut up

I think that there are a lot of previously "kinky" ways of being that are breaking into the mainstream. Now that being gay is no longer forbidden or naughty, other shades of sex are the new "hot topic." I'm polyamorous -- my girlfriend and I both enjoy other lovers, despite having been together for almost ten years. We disagree with the notion that love and sexuality are something that gets "used up" and so can only be shared with one person; our experience has been that the more people we love (in all meanings of that term), the more we're capable of love (including with each other -- our relationship is stronger than it's ever been). Up until recently I had thought that I was in a teeny, tiny minority. Society tells us that the only acceptable sexuality is one man, one woman, missionary position, lights off, to make babies. Imagine my surprise when we finally went to a polyamorous potluck dinner, and it was FILLED with nice, attractive, interesting, NORMAL people like us. No slavering deviants, no serious mental illnesses, just normal people who like (safe) sex and enjoy it with multiple partners. Wow! We're not kinky or deviant, after all; we're definitely in the sexual minority, but that's okay -- we're not broken or mentally ill or morally defective, we're just in the minority. And that's okay! Moral of the story? Most things that most people think are "naughty" or "kinky," aren't, really. And I think that the 50 Shades of Grey phenomenon isn't really about BDSM suddenly becoming acceptable (it always WAS acceptable), but rather because society is suddenly deciding that it's perfectly okay to talk about "non mainstream" flavors of sexuality. It's okay to be who you are, people -- gay, straight, monogamous, polyamorous, swingers, single, coupled, in a "clan," a furry, into BDSM, a Dom/sub, into ropes, fire, whatever. Just make sure everyone is consenting adults and having a good time (and please, folks, practice safe sex!) and just remember: It's okay to be who you are. Sexually, too. It's really okay.

My recovery was a breeze. The day of the surgery was the only tricky day, because I was still drugged up! After that, I just followed my doctor's advice about foods and liquids to a "T," and sipped, sipped, sipped Water and walked as much as I could. By the end of day two, I was walking around the block, and be the end of week one I had more energy than I could ever remember feeling. The only hard part was remembering that I was still freshly healing inside, so to be gentle with myself. It was a walk in the park Remember that on the internet, you tend to hear more from the people who had a BAD experience than you do from the people who had a GOOD experience, because who gets online to say "everything's fine, nothing happened, smooth sailing!"

I tell everyone, up front, that I've had weight loss surgery. I don't judge other people's decision to keep it to themselves, but I frankly don't understand it. It's not something to be ashamed of -- why would it be? You made a difficult, frightening, and painful decision to do something that betters your health and appearance and longevity. You've gone to a great deal of trouble, and altered your eating habits *forever* in order to be around longer and be healthier for your loved ones and yourself. In my book, that is something to be *immensely proud* of, not ashamed of or hide. Like I said, I'm not judging; everyone has different lives and different needs. But especially in a dating situation, I'm up front about it -- in my online dating profile (yes, I have one of those) I mention that I had weight loss surgery in May of 2010, and it was an enormous success. This gets me off the hook at restaurants, I just tell them "surgery" and smile, and they help me pick out a more VSG-friendly meal and remind me to get a to-go box. And nobody that I have ever met has EVER made a negative or snarky comment. Nobody has EVER seemed to judge me (I can't tell what they're doing in their head, but their body language and words have been positive). Nobody has ever been anything other than supportive, and congratulatory, and sometimes curious (in fact, heavier people have often taken me aside later and asked me for more details, and confessed that they were considering it for themselves!). Again, it's your business and your choice. But I think that we need to stop shaming people who make the important decision to get this procedure done -- it's not a failure, it's not a flaw. It's a tremendously courageous and positive step. And I don't think I'd want to date anyone who couldn't be supportive of my choice to nurture and take care of my physical self; I mean, let's face it... the kind of woman I want to be with will love my physical self as much as my mind and heart, and will want it to be healthy. So why should she judge me for taking the best steps I know of to make that physical self healthy and happy. youknowit: I'm sorry it didn't work out for you, but you seem very connected and articulate, so I'm sure you'll meet someone amazing soon (if you haven't already!)

I'd party with Bacchus

Most of them...? There are a few -- a very few -- denominations that believe that all that is required is faith (and even here I'd differentiate "faith" from "pretending to believe in something because you're scared of being wrong"), but most of them have lots of rituals you have to do, specific moral codes you have to adhere to, holy books you have to read and/or memorize, regular worship you have to practice, and more, if you want to get into their version of heaven. When you add up all the things you have to do to be a good (Christian, Muslim, Jew, Hindu, Buddhist, Shinto, Zoroastrian, whatever) it's a fair amount of work.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal's_Wager The idea is that if you believe in God and he doesn't exist, you've lost nothing, whereas if you DON'T believe in God and he DOES exist, you burn for all eternity. So, you should believe in God. Problem with the argument is that the two sides are not equivalent; you don't just have to believe in God to get into heaven, you have to go to church, live by a particular moral code, dress a certain way, act a certain way, and so on. Many people are willing to pay the price, but getting into heaven is certainly not FREE. Similarly, you have to weigh the LIKELIHOOD of God's existence vs. the cost/benefit. If -- like me -- you think it's very, very, very unlikely that God exists, then that "burn in hell for all eternity" thing is ALSO very, very very unlikely. Finally, the ultimate rebuttal to someone who's reformulating Pascal's Wager is simply this: okay, I'll believe in God... which one? You see, there are dozens -- hundreds? -- of religions, each claiming to have the One True God, each claiming he has to be worshipped a certain way, each threatening some horrific punishment if you don't comply, and each completely incompatible with the others. It's simply impossible to believe in/worship all of these gods, who each claims to be the One True God, so no matter which one you choose, there are far more possibilities that you'll choose wrong than that you'll choose right. So, without knowing which god to choose, how can you make a choice based on logic? No, Pascal's Wager SOUNDS good, but it's actually just nonsense. Believe or don't believe, folks, but don't try to pretend that your belief in God is logical. It ain't; it's called faith, either you have it or you don't, and in God -- I don't.

Sorry to quote out of context, but this sounds like a manic episode; a lot of people who are diagnosed with depression are actually bipolar (manic depressive) and when you put them on antidepressants it brings out the mania. And mania is characterized by grandiose actions without thought of the consequences, up to and including delusions. I'm on antidepressants, and they do wonderful things for me -- remove my anxiety, keep me from dwelling on negative things I can't control, help get me "out of my head" in social situations. So I try to make sure that antidepressants don't get a bad name. But the flip side is that they are powerful drugs and should only be taken if you're being closely monitored for, e.g. signs of manic behavior. It makes me angry when doctors prescribe these powerful psychotropic (mind altering) drugs and then basically just turn you loose. It's our modern medical system, which is more driven by profit margin than patient care, that I blame. Ideally, sounds like your ex should have been on some kind of stabilizer as well as the antidepressant. But I'm not a psychiatrist

So, my trainer's got me doing barbell squats (4x12 reps) as the start of my legs routine. It's brutal (all quads/hams, with one calf exercise thrown in for good measure), but effective. The only thing I'm not sure of is form -- specifically, foot placement. I know that I'm supposed to place my feet a "little more than shoulder width apart), but doing that seems to put a lot of strain on my knees as I lift the bar. Specifically, as I lift, my knees want to separate, and if my feet aren't placed right, that seems to put a lot of torque/twisting motion on my hips and knees. Fortunately, I'm not doing much weight on the bar yet, so I haven't injured myself. But I'd really like to correct my form BEFORE my weight gets higher. Anyone else dealt with this? Got any tips on form for barbell squats? (NB: I'm using the Smith machine for the squats; without a spotter, it's all I feel comfortable with right now.)

Yeah, I don't really have access to my nutritionist anymore, and it's too expensive to pay out of pocket right now. But the signs are really pretty strong that there's something nutritional going on: I perked right up tonight after I ate my dinner. I think that like most things, there's a bit of "all of the above" going on, but I really think that the key for me is proper eating, so I'm going to try to add more calories, especially on heavy gym days. Thanks, all!

So, backstory. I have a family history of depression and anxiety. It sucks, but it's just a part of my genetic makeup, so I deal with it. I'm on an antidepressant med, and I think that MOSTLY it controls it. But my mood has been swinging lately, and I'm not entirely sure if it's a medication issue or not. It certainly COULD be; this is a new med and my body might still be adjusting to it. But... I have two "confounding factors" (as we science people like to call "monkey wrenches" in a good theory). First, my sleep has always, ALWAYS sucked. I have NO idea what my pressure on my CPAP is supposed to be -- I have sleep apnea. My last overnight sleep study concluded that I didn't NEED CPAP anymore, but when I sleep without it, I keep waking up and feel like I don't get any rest. Second, nutrition. This, to me, feels more relevant; let me explain why. I've recently started really "upping my game" at the gym -- working out with a trainer, going in almost every day, working out HARD instead of half-assed. I'm seeing progress, but I also notice that my energy and mood really seem to drop after the gym. It's not just normal sore muscles fatigue, nor is it the "I just worked out hard so I'm breathless" version. It actually feels like I'm sleepy! Like I want to just lie down and sleep; my eyes get heavy, my limbs feel leaden. I think I'm very close to my long-term "maintenance" weight now. I don't think my body has much more in the way of fat reserves to burn off, so if I am nutritionally deprived, I don't have a built-in source of calories at hand! And I haven't really changed my eating habits; I'm still eating 1200-1400 calories per day, mostly Protein. That's great for losing weight -- and I'm still losing, rather rapidly! -- but I'm not sure it's a good maintenance diet, especially when I'm burning 500-600 calories per day at the gym! I mention this because it seems to make me sleepy, and often for me "sleepy" and "depressed" feel VERY similar (in the past I've known I was depressed because my sleep wasn't up to to par). If I'm running a significant caloric deficit, my "depression" might actually be just "out of fuel." I'm sure it takes calories and micronutrients to manufacture serotonin and dopamine in the brain, so this sounds plausible. Anyone else have this experience?

MyPlate says I've consumed 1304 calories so far today, 158g carbs, 51g Protein, and 37g of Fiber. I'm sure I've burned off 500 calories -- I was working out until I was dripping sweat and unable to stand up at the gym for an hour, and I just got back from a brisk 2.5 mile walk. So my net calories for the day are 700-900 (so far). This is a typical day. Note that I'm being conservative with my counts; I'm overestimating how much I ate of things like my fiber chips or raw almonds, so probably my net calories are in the 600-800 range. At 3 pm. I'm at a BMI of 27.2, and my body fat is about 22%; I don't have huge fat reserves left. I suspect I need to bump up my daily calories to about 2000 or so if I want to maintain this activity level and still keep a healthy weight.

Thanks for the advice! I love squats -- I think they work wonders for my lower body. I just don't want to hurt myself, and it sounds like you've got good advice. I'll try it out, and pester my trainer to help me with my form.

I've started working on my own private weight/fitness tracking site. http://gym-bunny.herokuapp.com/weights It's still early days -- if you click on the "weights" item, you can see that my weight timeline is hard-coded into the app (well, it's in the database). What I really want to do is add workout information, sets, reps, and so on, and get the same charting capabilities that I have for weight. What's nice is that I built the weight graph as a reusable component, so as soon as I figure out the data schema for the exercise stuff, it should be as simple as adding another page to the app to display it. Yes, I know that a lot of this functionality is replicated elsewhere, but no site (Livestrong, Fitocracy, etc.) is exactly what I want. Either they're trying too hard to sell you stuff, or they have a clunky interface, or something. So, since I'm a programmer, I figured I'd do it myself To be added: Multi-user interface/login capabilities (right now it's all me, all the time, but it needs to support multiple users). I'm intimately familiar with how to do this, but it's a hassle in initial development, so I may just leave it single-user for now. Even if people on the internet trash my database on Heroku, I can just reset it by uploading my dev database. Add/edit/delete data points via AJAX Mobile testing! I'm using a clean, bootstrap responsive layout, but I haven't hit it on my phone/iPad yet; I need to make sure that everything looks good and performs well. I'm especially nervous to see if the charting engine (jqPlot) works on resource-constrained mobile devices. Yes. I'm a geek.

Well, long time no see! I haven't had much to report on the sleeve front, so I haven't been online much, but I've had a few notable notables lately, so I'll summarize. First, I hit my new goal of 210, and passed it! Today's weigh-in was 205.9, which is amazing. I might actually break the 200 lbs barrier! At 6'1", that's a pretty good weight for a 42 year old, especially considering that my muscle mass percentage according to body fat analyzers is quite high. I'm working out a LOT, and I just signed up for a new gym for 9 months, for a 15 week session with a personal trainer (spendy, but that's part of the motivation), and I'm carefully controlling my food intake. I'm dating much more actively lately, and seeing a lot more attention from the ladies. It's great and fun! Second, I think my calories -- or maybe just my carbs -- may have been too LOW! I found I was getting very tired and worn down by late afternoon, almost sleepy. I was compensating with caffeine and trying to go to bed early (tough when you go out on a lot of dates!). But after a training session yesterday at 8:30 am, I suddenly felt VERY sleepy -- not winded, not muscle-tired, but like I literally wanted to lie down and sleep. And when I've felt that odd, heavy, lethargic feeling in the past, it's always been nutrition-related. So I've brought in a few healthy carb Snacks to work, and I'm trying to intersperse healthy snacks with my normal eating. At 205 lbs., I no longer have to be on my restrictive, 1100 calorie/day "fast loss" diet, anyway -- especially considering that I'm working out with weights, doing cardio, and so on every day.

Thanks for the info!

I know this is an odd sort of question, but I was wondering if I could expect any uptick in libido after losing significant weight. I have a medical condition that leads to low testosterone (which won't go away with weight loss), but I was wondering if anyone had noticed a better libido after WLS. For me, every little bit helps; I'm only 39, there should be SOME kind of interest there!

Well, I went for a massage, and it was... very interesting. I did end up getting physically aroused at a couple of points (I suppose it's a physiological thing), but due to how professional the establishment was, and how well I was "draped," it was not a problem. And the interesting thing is that I had a couple of odd "flashes" of emotion. Towards the end of the massage, as I was lying there, on my back (basically, my most vulnerable), getting a completely non-sexual massage, I had these odd moments of "trust" and "vulnerability." I think I flashed back towards being a little boy, being completely trusting and open. I really don't think it needs analysis beyond this, it was just a sort of regression to a more trusting state. Unfortunately, it WAS towards the end of the massage, so shortly after experiencing it, this feeling of total trust and "letting go" of worry about who was touching me and why, the massage was over. But there's a glimmer of... something? on the horizon. I've scheduled another, longer massage with the same outfit on Monday. We'll see how that goes. I feel like my strategy of treating touch shyness as a phobia and desensitizing it just like you would any phobia, is paying off...

Well I had an appointment tentatively scheduled for a legit massage tonight, but then they wanted to set me up with a male practitioner. Even though I'm looking for a LEGIT massage, not a "happy ending," this was beyond what my comfort level could handle and I canceled the appointment! Oy.

So, since this is TMI... I recommend you stop reading if reading about, erm, anatomical details makes you uncomfortable. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . You have been warned So, this question is for the guys, but ladies -- maybe there's a parallel? I've been having some... ahem. SORENESS lately. On a very, ahem, private part of my body. OK, we're all grown ups here -- on my penis. Specifically, it's external, on the underside. As a sexually active male, the first time I realized this was going on, I immediately freaked out and rushed to the doc. for a full STD screen. I play safe, but... you can't be too careful, right? Well, the doc tested me for everything we could think of, from simple to scary, easily dealt-with to chronic, viral and bacterial. I had blood drawn, I got to have my doctor man-handle my junk (oh, joy), I peed in a cup. The good news is: I'm clean. The bad news is: I still have no idea what's up. So what's going on? Why's Mr. Happy sore all the time? The doc couldn't tell me, but he told me not to worry about illness or disease, because he couldn't find anything with about a dozen different tests. I was thinking about it yesterday and I realized something: I'm skinnier. I mean, a lot skinnier. Two years ago, I was wearing giant, baggy, 48 inch waist jeans, now I'm finding that my 36 inch waist jeans are "comfy" and I can easily fit into 34 inch waist jeans when I feel like being all 'sexy'. The soreness could just be -- drum roll, please -- chafing! I realized that it hurts in EXACTLY the place where Mr. Happy would be rubbing against my boxers when I'm out walking in my new, snug jeans! Couple that with the fact that I tend to wear fairly loose-fitting boxers (and they're made of cotton, which is warm and snuggly, but can turn into sandpaper with enough movement!) and you may well have a recipe for OUCH. Today I'm wearing 36 inch jeans instead of 34 inch, and I'm wearing my snug-fitting lycra boxer/briefs instead of the cotton boxers -- they fit much snugger, and they have a very smooth, almost silky texture. That, plus the looser jeans, and I bet you I'll discover that all of my scary "soreness" goes away within a few days. Such are the joys of being a man, and a hypochondriac, and losing lots of weight. Gents, be warned!

I ended up writing a long response, and deleting it. Suffice it to say that counseling is NOT for me. I know counseling works for some people, and for them -- more power to them. For me (and yes, I've done it, when I was younger -- years, and years, and endless, grinding years of it) it was just talk, talk, talk and no actual progress. All my progress happened when I WASN'T in counseling, and I felt more positive about myself to boot. So, I'll stick with what works for me.