Day two and the realization I will never win Survivor

Everything I read tells me it will get better, but LORD am I hungry. I know now that I could not survive on a desert island. I am giving this two more days and then I am eating my cats.



Ok, not really, but if I had a pet pig he would be in serious danger.

Pre-Op testing

Double Blog. I know. Lame. But, I wanted to document the pre-op testing experience. Liz, I know you are using NYU also, so if you have not gone already, here is what you can expect.

I got there at 11 and gave them the papers I had already filled out from Dr. Ren. There were questions about allergies, drinking, smoking, weight, family history. The usual questions. When I was talking to Angela--the nicest nurse ever--she also asked questions about where I will be recovering. If there are stairs or an elevator. Luckily, I am going to my parent's and there is an elevator, but I wonder what they would do if it was a walk-up. While Angela was asking questions, Michelle was giving me an EKG.

Next step was giving blood. I have bad veins. They have been small and hard to find since I was a child. The extra 150 lbs. has not really helped that all that much. Last time I went to my PCP they stuck me 10 times. TEN GODDAMN TIMES and still I had to go out to a lab. Anyway, Angela and Michelle were really nice and only tried once. Then we moved onto my hand. Eventually they got enough blood, but I am NOT looking forward to the IV next week.

Then I met with the anesthesiologist. For 5 minutes. Literally. She told me to not eat anything from midnight on. Not even a mint or gum. Nothing. Then she said ok see you in two weeks. Should we have talked about more? I am hoping they have a few more questions on the day of or I might get nervous.

Next stop was chest x-ray. Took ten minutes. I was out of there by about 12:15 and would have been sooner, if my veins weren't so shitty.

So there you have it. The pre-op testing.

My god. Hunger has made me so dull. I apologize if you have slogged through this post to this point. My gift to you:

The Highs and Lows of the Band Journey

Approved! Approved! Nilsa called me today. I had started convincing myself that it wasn't going to happen and then they called. I am so relieved and nervous and giddy.

Two weeks from today, my life will be completely different. The obvious things will change: less food; less weight; more energy. It is the unexpected things that are terrifying. I have never been thin. I have no idea what to expect.

What if my face changes and I actually don't have "such a beautiful face" when thin?

What if I have an apron that I can't afford to have tucked?

What will I hate about myself if it isn't my weight? I am going to really have to have a long talk with Vera about changing our game plan with therapy. For years, we have been talking about my weight. Then we were talking about my relationship. Both of those things will be non-issues pretty soon.

But despite all of the nerves, I am so excited and happy. I KNOW this is the right thing for me. I KNOW that I need to make a change that I can't go back on. I KNOW I will be successful. Know what else I know? I AM REALLY HUNGRY!!



My pre-op diet started today. So far I have had: 2 20oz shakes (chocolate mint & strawberry); a sugar free jello; a sugar free popsicle; 2 cups of spinach with fat free italian dressing; and a cup of beef broth. I have another shake for later and then I am going to take an Ambien to put me out of my misery.

I thought that by starting early with a modified diet, I would be prepared for the real thing. I am so not. 75% of this hunger is probably in my head, but wow. It blows.

I promise no more itemized lists of what I ate. SO boring, but if I don't keep my fingers busy I am going to start chewing on them.

Now We Wait

Well, it's the home stretch. My papers have been submitted to United Healthcare. This surgery has always seemed like a certainty to me. From the second I decided to do it, I have not doubted that I would have it done. Now that there is actually a chance that someone might tell me no, I am a little panicky.

I was totally confident until someone called from NYU on Monday and said that I needed a 5 year weight history. I have not gone to the doctor regularly for 5 straight years. I hate going to the doctor because they always tell me to lose weight. Um thanks. I hadn't thought of that.

I do go to my gyno regularly because I always convince myself that I have STDs. Not because I am promiscuous anymore or because I have symptoms. More because I don't have symptoms and I saw a Law and Order once where a guy had syphilis and killed a bunch of people because he didn't know. Apparently it scarred me. Irrational? Yes. I often am.

Anyway, my old gyno was a hot guy. Not advised. I would find myself afraid to tell him stuff because it was embarrassing. I would also primp and get nervous like it was my wedding night. None of this was good, so I found another doctor.
I called the office to get my records and the woman told me 2 weeks minimum. For those of you who hang your hat on my every word, you know that my surgery is in two weeks.

In the end it worked out. I don't need the 5 year history and now I just wait for my approval. Because it has to come. I will sell my body and go self-pay if need be. There is a large porno market for the rotund as I learned from an ex-boyfriend . . . but that's a blog for another day.

Eureka!!

WARNING!!! SERIOUS FOOD PORN AHEAD

My family had a big BBQ this weekend. Now when most people think BBQ, they think about hot dogs and hamburgers. Right? Please let me list for you the food that was there yesterday:

• Hot Dogs
• Hamburgers
• Chicken legs
• chicken cutlets
• steak
• sausage
  
• stuffed fish
• macaroni and cheese
• macaroni salad
• spaghetti salad
• sweet potatoes
• peas and rice
• cupcakes

and if that is not enough . . . propane stoves:

one for frying fish
one for frying chicken
and one for frying TWO turkeys

Is it any wonder that we have a history of obesity, diabetes, and high blood pressure in our family? MY LORD!!!!!

I think my family may have an unhealthy relationship with food. All of the research that I have done for the band has really made me think about food and the role it plays in my life. I will not list what I ate yesterday, but suffice it to say, I hit almost all of those bullet points.

I think in order to be successful with my band, I might need a new family. Does anyone want to adopt me. Preferably a family of athletes. I imagine their BBQs are a single pack of turkey dogs and a side salad.

Now on to something serious.

A friend of my cousin brought her 8 year old daughter and my cousin and I noticed her eating a hot dog behind a tree. When we questioned her mother, my blood boiled. Her father keeps telling her that she is getting fat and criticizing everything she eats, so now she eats in secret and hides food. EXCUSE ME?!?!?!!?!? Her mother sounded annoyed by it, but not nearly as outraged and furious as I felt. I am still pissed. This little girl is a beautiful child and clearly a healthy weight. But even if she wasn't, her father is a jackass that is guaranteeing a daughter with a lifetime of eating issues. PS: her father is morbidly obese.

I felt really impotent and the only thing that I could thing to do was tell her my story. I told her how when I was a child my grandmother used to tell me that I looked like a cow and that I was getting fat. I started hiding food and eating in secret. I stuffed up the toilet in my house by trying to flush down the wrapper from a bag of potato chips that I wolfed down in the bathroom. I learned to eat when no one was around and then eat again with everyone. I ended by telling her that I now weigh 300 hundred lbs and I am weeks away from having something permanently installed in my body because I can no longer eat like a "normal" person. I don't know if it made any difference, but I didn't know what else to do. I hope to Christ that her mother is strong enough to fix the damage that has already been done and to kick her husband in his self-hating fat ass the next time he says something like that.

Big and Little(ish)

I am going to Jamaica in February 2011 and my dream is to wear the sassy red tankini that I bought post-LA Weight loss in 2007. It is a 16. That is 16 regular not 16(W). For my skinny friends who read my blog: those distinctions are VERY important when losing weight.

I started swimming a few months ago to lose weight for the trip. Please note that I did not change my eating habits at all, so weight loss was not forthcoming. I bought any old bathing suit that I could find. In other words the tankini top does not even match the bottom.

Today I fished the red one out of the closet where it has been buried since 2008 when I tried to put it on again and subsequently fell into a deep depression.




Jeez. You really don't realize the difference between sizes until you put things side by side. That red top looks tiny next to the gargantuan black one.





What is really funny about this situation is that as a super-sized person, I can look at a size 16 and think it looks tiny. I have heard small people refer to a 16 as if it was the kiss of death. "Did you see her? She's wearing a 16 now. She should be ashamed of herself." (Ok. So I have never heard anyone make that exact statement because that would mean I was hanging out with really big assholes which I try to avoid, but you get the picture.) For some people in this community, a 16 is a dream. A goal. I am one of those people, but with a little hope and a lot of determination, that red tankini (and it's brown strapless sexy cousin) will be too big for me in February. Either way, next summer those bad boys will be on the Bandland Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants highway to another bandster who appreciates that sometimes being a size 16 is the greatest feeling on Earth.

Foiled Again

Now I remember what I wanted to blog about. I am going on a trip for work to Baltimore. The trip was planned for August 23-25. My first thought? ROOM SERVICE!! You see we get a $100/day food allowance. Someone once said "That is a limit, not a goal." Obviously, that person was only an average eater because to a chronic overeater like me, that sounds like a clear challenge.



The last time I made this trip I ordered such a feast that I thought I was going to have to have my stomach pumped. Why? Because I could. Because the anonymity of room service let me order my heart's content without the shame of sitting in a restaurant behind a sagging table. People bringing me food while I sit on my duff is one of my favorite pastimes.

Because though I am not an emotional eater, I am a food addict. I will keep going after I have eaten so much that I have to lean to one side. Why? Because it tastes good and because I can. I long for the days when I can't.

Anyway, my whole point was that this trip was falling one week before I start my pre-op liquid diet. Could it be more perfect? Could I be more blessed than to have someone else paying for Baltimore crabcakes one week before I trade it all in for Muscle Milk light and some chicken broth?

Apparently my dance of happy glutton joy was too much for the Gods to handle because they smote me. The trip got moved to August 31. One day into my liquid diet. So now when I call down to room service, I will not be getting the creamy crab dip and the soup and the entree and the dessert. I will be ordering a small cup of steamed spinach with a slice of lemon.

FUCK.

I am a little worried about being lethargic and cranky when I am with my clients because I am supposed to be dazzling them. I hope that I can fake it and make it through the meetings without peeing every twelve minutes.

I will do this though. I want my liver to be a tiny little raisin of an organ. So dainty that Dr. Ren takes a picture of it and includes it in the pre-op packet. Dream big I say.

I'm Back!

I have not posted since my sobfest a week ago. The drama quickly escalated to such a crazy place that I couldn't even be sad anymore. I just had to laugh. Who can maintain angst when faced with a Russian madame and a whodunit caper? I'm the kind of person who needs to move on from crappy situations. (Rebecca, that was for you.)

Anyway, I really do feel so much better. I am back to focusing on my impending banding. I cannot stop telling people. I hope it doesn't bite me in the ass, but for now everyone from the guy in Starbucks to my great aunt twice removed is getting an earful about the band.

I don't really have much to say today, but I just wanted to let everyone--all 4 of you faithful followers--know that I am ok. Better than ok. I am exactly 1 month away from changing my life forever and I can't stop smiling.

I also wanted to thank Maria and Grace for commenting and lifting my spirits.

What's Your Worth Anyway?

I want to talk about two words tonight. Worth and Anyway. Let's start with worth. I suppose now is as good a time as any for some history. Buckle in and get some wine because this is going to be a long one.

I started my first diet when I was 12. I remember being around that age when a boy I had a crush on called me Thunder Thighs. And just like that a lifetime of low self esteem was born. I have always been fat. The thinnest that I can remember being is a sz 12 when I was a senior in high school. Even then I thought I was huge. No one else was a sz 12 and they all had high school boyfriends while I did not. Therefore, I was fat and unlovable.

Not sure how much to put out here on the internet, but in for a penny, in for a pound. Angie posted something similar recently and I thought it was really brave. My reaction to feeling fat and unlovable was to "love" lots of people. Put bluntly, I became something of a round heel. I tramped my way through college and my twenties. It didn't matter that I was fat because did you see the hot guy that I hooked up with last weekend. Who cares that said hot guy didn't want to date me. I am lovable because he chose me. I can see now that I was giving my self-worth to these boys. I was only as good as the last man who wanted me.

What all of that sluttiness means is that it wasn't until I was 34 that I had a real relationship. I had my share--and probably yours--of sex, but no real love relationship. So rewind to 2009 when I met a guy who I just adored. He had substance abuse issues that started when he was a teenager. They say that people stop growing emotionally when they start using. So here he was basically 18 and here I was basically 15 with my first boyfriend. I have a very fledgling sense of self-worth and he has a long history of addiction.

Recipe for disaster.

Here we are 18 months later. We made it for a year and then it all fell apart. Actually, it started unraveling long before then, but I just didn't want to see it. (That self-worth thing again.) We split up and I decided to get a lap band 2 weeks later. (My therapist would probably have a lot to say about that timeline.) I've been so happy and determined. This community has been such a crutch for me as I dealt with the break-up and I have really started focusing on me again. I have felt great.

Then he came back to town. He's been here for a week and I have cried almost every one of those seven days for some reason. He has a new "friend." It's all so juvenile and high school and I don't even want to talk about it, but tonight was sorta my undoing and I just need to get it out.

She emailed me tonight while I was out with friends (damn facebook!) and told me the one thing that was certain to be my absolute undoing.

"He told me that you two stopped having sex because you were so fat."

She could have said anything else and I would have just laughed at her crazy ass and moved on. But this just hit so close to every insecurity that I have ever had that even as I type this I am crying. I know in my head that I can't give whatever small sense of self-worth I have nurtured to this evil bitch and my disaster of an ex. But, I am so heartbroken. I got so comfortable around him that I didn't even mind walking around in my bra. I finally felt like I was loved for me and apparently all along he was disgusted? unhappy? I don't even know.

That brings me to the next word. I talked to him the other day and he said "I never cared about your weight. I loved you ANYWAY." Such an unassuming, but damaging word. Note that he didn't say I loved you for you. He said I loved you anyway. Almost like saying despite how unlovable your fat ass was, I loved it ANYWAY.

Ugh. I am rambling. My emotions are just so raw right now and I can't even write my way out of this spiral of self-pity and sadness. I just want to remind myself and anyone else who may be in doubt that your weight is nothing except the amount of tissue, muscle, and, yes, fat that surrounds your soul. It's your heart and soul that matter and whether you are fat, skinny, or on your way to skinny--you deserve love. Not the kind that comes from a guy who won't remember your name. The kind that comes from inside yourself. My inner coffers are a bit low right now, but I'll be damned if I don't build them up again just to spite that asshole.

So, I decided that I was going to do a pre-op diet dress rehearsal and start replacing breakfast everyday with protein shakes. This was prompted by not one, but two different co-workers commenting that they are going to wear helmets the first week of my liquid diet. WTF?! I'm a nice woman!

Dr. Ren's office gave me a list of protein drinks that I can choose from and one of them was Carnation Instant Breakfast--No Sugar Added. I chose that one because according to the sheet you can have 6 a day as opposed to 5 of the other kinds. Once a glutton always a glutton.

There is no delicate way to put this, so if you are easily embarrassed or don't like to talk about bodily functions in mixed company, move on.


I was crippled all day long by toxic gas. I am not even kidding. I could have powered a small sub-division. It lasted until about 6pm. I drank that damn shake at 9am. Clearly, Carnation cannot be drink I choose. I had to keep going for walks and crop dusting the empty hallway. "Eww. You pig. Why didn't you go to the bathroom?" Well, I did at first. I got comfortably settled in a stall and was all prepared to be civilized when SOMEONE THREW OPEN THE STALL DOOR. The lock was broken. She screamed. I screamed. And because I was startled, I ripped a loud one right as I was screaming.

Today was one of my most shameful days. Selflessly, I have documented it for all the bandsters in the world to learn. Carnation Instant Breakfast will only humiliate you. Get the Muscle Milk Light and preserve your dignity. (It comes in Cake Batter flavor!!!)

Pick Me!!!!!

The only way that I can get through the next six weeks is to steep myself in all things lapband. Thus, I have spent all weekend reading blogs. (Thanks ladies!)

Band bloggers are really like a team. It is amazing how everyone shares clothes and support and friendship. I have been pimping my blog the last couple of days because I WANT IN!!

It's like I just discovered a new series of books. They all have the same basic story, but the characters are different so each is a unique novel. The strangest part is that while intellectually I know that this is the course that I have set for myself, emotionally, it really feels like I am just reading a story.

I am not explaining this well. Basically, all of this rambling just to say, I want to be a part of this team and no matter how many times I tell myself I will be, it just doesn't feel real. I am sure it will on August 30 when my pre-op starts, but until then I am just enjoying all the reading.