Eight Months Post Gastric Bypass

Its been a long time, four months, since I wrote a diary update on this blog about my life post gastric bypass. I’ve been keeping an open Facebook album on my personal profile and of course there is Instagram (over there in the sidebar on the right) but I felt like it was time for a proper written entry in my post op journal .

My eight months surgeriversary has just been and gone.
The time just seems to be flying by this year, which is most excellent as its currently winter in New Zealand and I want the winter to end, and whilst the rate at which I am losing weight has slowed down a lot, my numbers are still decreasing each and every month. I currently weigh just over 90 kilograms (200.8lbs) and have lost over 65 kilograms (144lbs) since starting my pre-op diet in October .
I still weigh myself weekly (okay, okay I lie – I usually weight myself daily) however I’ve had to come to terms with there being a few plateaus and just before my period comes, a little gain. The first time this happened it was terrifying. I had surgery, I wasn’t supposed to gain any weight! But I wasn’t doing anything wrong, my body was just doing its thing. My first big stall was even more terrifying especially when I had been enjoying the heady highs of the dramatic post op weight loss. I knew it would slow down eventually – it was just more like a big handbrake slide than a gradual nana jog when it did.

Today, its more about adjusting to the new norms, my new lifestyle. Eating is becoming more of an fuel equation than something I do because I am bored or want something just for the taste or satisfaction. I still find waiting to drink after eating a bit of a pain and while I have had the odd glass of wine, I barely drink and can’t manage more than a standard glass.
We have eaten out a few times and its nice to be able to work out something I can have, and enjoy, at the majority of restaurants and cafes. Even a Wendy’s small chilli and a slice of Dominos pizza! I try and choose a place prior to leaving home so I can look at the menu. If there isn’t an entree or starter that I like the look of, I’ll choose something from the mains menu but I normally consider something that Ken will finish off for me or that I can put in the fridge and have for a meal the next day. I loathe wasting food!
I still stick as close as possible to the 10 grams rules – nothing with more than 10 grams of fat and/or 10 grams of sugar per 100 grams BUT I have a wee issue with snacks and what are known as slider foods. Hallo Peckish Salt & Vinegar crackers. I mean goodbye.

Since March, I have been working on a recipe book in association with Andrea Schroder who is the Director of Weight Loss Surgery Ltd here in Hamilton. Andrea is a bariatric nurse and quite amazing – she managed to talk me into catering the WLS Mat Hatters Tea Party and then collating the recipes I was using and adapting into the WLS Version 2 cookbook – along with more recipes that other patients had created and were enjoying. It went to the printers on Sunday and I let out a huge sigh of relief. It was full on – I loved it but I’m currently on kitchen strike. No more cooking and photographing of food for me for a little while!

Nurture and Nourish is being printed and should be available in bound form at the end of the month. I hope to have a downloadable version for sale early August. If you would like to know when its ready – please subscribe to the blog and you’ll be the first to know.

Every day I am learning more about my body. About the signs of hunger or being full. About how my head still often rules and about how I can manage and hopefully continue to build on good habits and squash bad ones. I blogged the other day on the tools I use to win the Battle of the Brain and beat Head Hunger and Comfort Eating. We’re not there yet, but we will be one day.

Ken and I went on holiday to Rarotonga in the Pacific Islands and I spent a lot of time on the beach in a bikini. With zero fucks given for how I looked. Walking down to the water to swim, and out of the water back to my lounger, I felt strong and confident. Regardless of how I look, that confidence is one of the main reasons I decided to have surgery. Confidence and health. What a wonderful investment!

I get a such a buzz out of dressing in the morning and also shopping. My poor bank account. I am a little bit (but not really) concerned that I have replaced a food addiction with a shopping one!! What a thrill it is to be able to walk into a shop and find something I like – something that is in fashion or of the styles I like. I must stop though, I’m running out of space in our tiny wardrobe and I will need to do another wardrobe clean out very soon.
During the day I work with a very close friend of mine and I’ve always thought of her as one of the most stylish women I know. We both get dressed up for work – hair, makeup, eyelashes, great outfits – and I love it. I’m pushing my own boundaries with some of the clothing choices I am making and it is all adding to the confidence I don’t feel like I have to fake any more.
And the selfies. I’ve taken more photographs of myself in the last 3-4 months than in the last few years!! I think selfies are wonderful – whats more empowering than liking how you look in a photograph (or the mirror)?

I’ve given up caring what other people think. Quite soon after surgery a few friends were quite prickly about what I had done and it really bugged me. I didn’t ask for their approval, but I really wanted their support.
I have found support in other places, particularly online through Instagram however it has become apparent that people there can be just as prickly, just as judgemental and just as bitchy. Oh well, they can all get fucked. There are of course, as with any group, the ones that are there to share their place and their experiences and thats wonderful. Weight Loss Surgery is full on, the recovery is only a little bit physical, it is a lot mental, so having people going through the same as you on hand 24 hours a day, it is quite amazing and very helpful.

We might be part of a group on a journey (god I hate that word!) but the path we take is our own.
We, and actually I mean me, have to stop comparing myself and looking for validation from a group of people who don’t know me. Who really don’t care about me. In fact the biggest learning I have had in July is