Well, I made it! (after pics)

[JamieLogical 8,708]

Today is my one year surgiversary and as of my weekly weigh in yesterday, I have surpassed my goal by one pound. My starting weight at the beginning of this process was 260. I was 236 on my surgery date. And I am now 164.

It's been a long road. The early days/weeks/months were rough. But for a long time now, I've just felt "normal". I eat 5-6 times a day. Always Protein first, but I occasionally have some treats. Juts yesterday I shared a piece of cake with my husband. I love not feeling deprived. If I want a treat of some sort once in a while, I have a little bit of it. I don't track my food or calories. The big thing to really get my head around through this whole process is that this is not a "diet". This is the rest of my life. I don't have any deadlines to meet with my weight loss. The goal was just to eventually get down to a healthy weight and stay there.

Were I on a "diet", I would have been tracking every calorie in and every calorie out. Sharing that piece of cake with my husband, I would have tracked those calories eaten and then tried to make up for it in calories burned so as not to "fall behind". I would have to "make up" those extra calories. Now... if I eat half a piece of cake, I don't sweat it. If it takes me a week to burn off those "extra" calories, what does it matter? What's a week in the grand scheme of things? It's definitely been a real change in thinking for me.

As for exercise, I've been killing it in that department. I've run several 5k races over the summer and plan to continue with my running and working on improving my time. I was pretty hard-core about strength training as well until my sister and her four kids moved in with us temporarily. That makes getting time to myself to SAFELY do strength training a real challenge, but I plan to get right back to it once they move out later this month.

So now, what you've all been waiting for: PHOTOS!

           

[OKCPirate 5,323]

Congrats, you look great

[MzB 297]

Congratulations! You look awesome. Also, I just wanted to say a big thank you for all the posts I see you make on this site, you are great at encouraging others.

[Babbs 14,681]

Yay Jamie! I remember when you were worried about how you were going to even do with your new personal situation, and you just rocked it! I think the stress has caused you to lose faster, lol!

You have always been one of my go to people for sound, well thought out responses and advice. I also felt kind of a kinship with you because you struggled with slower weight loss like I did.

You've done amazing, you look amazing, and every time I see your flat stomach and perky boobs it makes me want to move forward with plastics, darn it!

[dekathe 11]

What an amazing journey. I appreciate your stories and wisdom. I am a slow loser as well and you have helped me work on the balance that I need to make this journey. You look great! Congratulations.

[JamieLogical 8,708]

Yay Jamie! I remember when you were worried about how you were going to even do with your new personal situation, and you just rocked it! I think the stress has caused you to lose faster, lol!

You have always been one of my go to people for sound, well thought out responses and advice. I also felt kind of a kinship with you because you struggled with slower weight loss like I did.

You've done amazing, you look amazing, and every time I see your flat stomach and perky boobs it makes me want to move forward with plastics, darn it!

My personal situation got even more complicated a few weeks ago. My husband and I saw a house on the market and decided to go check it out. Well, once we did that, we HAD to have it. Of course, we didn't even have our house listed! We hadn't planned on moving out of our house for at least another year or two, so had done nothing in terms of prepping it to sell. PLUS, we had my sister and her four kids and ALL of their stuff in our house and garage!

So it has been non-stop work these last couple of weeks to get our house in some sort of shape to list. We made my sister get a storage unit and got one of our own and moved a TON of stuff into storage. Yesterday morning my husband and I put TWENTY SEVEN 35-gallon garbage bags full of stuff, plus a ton of loose larger items out with the trash. We had our driveway sealed, our living room carpeted, our porch redone.... We have literally worked from the time we got home from work until about 1:00 in the morning every single weeknight and from 8:00am until 1:00am every weekend day to get everything done. We got the house listed on Sunday and had two showings yesterday. We have two more scheduled for tomorrow and we have an open house on Sunday.

I've lost 5 pounds in the last two weeks between all the hard physical labor I've been doing and not finding the time to eat. At this point, you know how much 5 pounds in two weeks is! I was lucky to be losing a half a pound a week prior to this with just eating on plan and working out 4-5 times a week.

As for the plastics... I *highly* recommend them. I definitely look great now, especially clothed. The real issue I have left is my thighs. I have a lot of loose skin on my upper thighs. Someday I'm hoping for a thigh lift, but now with trying to buy this new house, the finances for that won't work for a while!

[Biloxigirl 70]

Congrats!! You look wonderful, cant wait until I reach my goal.

[AngelaWilliamsMD 290]

Great job, you look amazing! Very inspirational.

[borg/assimilated 576]

You have done so well! Congratulations! As another slow loser I have always been encouraged by your posts. Good luck with the sale of your house, so much work!

[Julie norton 2,850]

Great job Jamie. And congrats on a new house! How exciting and what a difference a year makes! Keep on posting and inspiring us.. It helps to read about others and their journeys.

[jess9395 5,449]

Congratulations!!!!

[saflo438 0]

You look phenomenal and I love your shorter hair!! I told my husband when I'm skinny I want short hair. Lol. Keep up the inspiring work!

[JamieLogical 8,708]

@@saflo438 I cut it off about 2 months post-op as a preemptive strike for when I started losing my hair. But I really liked it that length, so I think I want to maintain it there.

[saflo438 0]

@@JamieLogical when you noticed the hair falling out, did cutting it make it look better?? I'm nervous. I have super thin hair, and I am slowly losing a little but anxiously awaiting the clumps! Then I don't know what I will do! I'm taking Biotin but I don't think that's enough.

[JamieLogical 8,708]

@@saflo438 I was pretty lucky with my hair loss. It started around 3.5 months post-op and only lasted until about 5 months. It wasn't falling out "in clumps" but there was a lot of it all over the bathroom. I joked with my husband that hair were blood, our bathroom would look like a horror scene. Fortunately, I started with very thick hair so the visible loss was really only noticeable to me. I think everyone else was distracted by the haircut, which was the plan.

It started growing back right away, as soon as it finished falling out. Now I'm a year out and my new growth is a few inches long.