308!!!  Today is our wedding anniversary.  #44 already!  I've got a hair appt this afternoon and need to have my blood drawn to check my INR because I'm on Warfarin.   Then I plan to get some more Sugar-free Cherry Limeade at the local Super Walmart.  That is the BEST sugar-free pop I've ever tasted.  I drank a lot of Diet Sunkist Lemonade yesterday, and I think that is what made me itch all over in the evening.

So I'm thinking I should drop below 300 within the next 2 weeks!!  I can hardly wait!  I need to lose about 25 inches from my waist; that keeps me humble.  We still haven't joined the rec center yet.  But I can't have a discussion about it with Bob today.  For one, it is our anniversary.  And two: Miranda and Amelia are here doing laundry.  With such a small house, one can hear everything said within its walls.

I'm curious to know what Bob thinks of my menu pages.  Blanks for us to fill in for meals and snacks.

310.2  Hooray!  Glad the plateau has passed.  But I know more plateaus lie ahead.

I can hardly wait to lose enough--I'm hoping by tomorrow--so the second digit is a zero in my weight.  And then I will be thrilled beyond belief to finally get below 300 so the FIRST digit will be a two!!!

It must be a rare occasion to find anyone who looks forward to such a high weight as a goal in lowering their weight.  And then to be so joyful in the anticipation.

I found myself wanting to apologize to Andrea and Madelyn for seeming not to enjoy what they made for meals!!!  It points out how I learned (probably from childhood) to eat a lot to make others happy, to not insult their cooking.  I'm not blaming my parents, but it has been a habit.  While I might not have apologized directly, I do remember saying to both that I enjoyed the food, but that I was watching my portion size.  What I ate was enough, but I realized that often I have eaten beyond satisfaction to please a host.  I even kind of apologized to a waitress at Famous Dave's for not finishing my soup!  "It's delicious, but I didn't have enough room in my stomach to finish it."

Can you believe?  Apologizing to a complete stranger--one who I will probably never see again, and if we did meet up again, we'd not remember that restaurant visit--for not eating my soup.  AND for not taking the rest of it home!  At least taking leftovers home, it says "I like the food, and I'm not going to insult you and the cooks and the management."

But it doesn't always go like that.  Often I have left food and made no comment.  Well, none to the employees.  I have apologized to Bob for wasting food at restaurants when I leave it uneaten and do not take the leftovers home.

It must have been frustrating to my mother when it came to feeding us kids.  She was born in 1910 and married in 1933, during The Great Depression.  Her family was poor, as were most back when she was a child.  Between her background and the rough financial times when she and Dad started their family, it was great that they were able to care for and feed their family.  We were taught to always "clean our plates."    After all, there were plenty of less fortunate children all over the world who didn't ever have enough to eat.  Membership in the clean plate club was how we showed our appreciation.  But then, two of us girls had weight problems growing up, thus the frustration for Mom.

Someday I might mention other factors I believe added to my seeming determination to remain obese.  But I wonder if that is really even necessary in journaling today's plans and efforts to eat right, exercise, and lose weight.

Going forth with prayer in living today!

We are in MN, staying with Ryan's family.  Today Bob and Larry Kastel went to the state fair for a few hours.  Becky and I stayed at their house and I used her light table to trace patterns onto fabric for the 2 baby quilts.  After that, we went to Panera for lunch.  Then to a favorite quilt shop in Anoka.  I bought fabric and a pattern for a handbag and some fabric for the baby quilt backs.  The feeling I get in such quilt stores is exactly what I felt as a child when I went into the neighborhood store/candy to buy candy.  DROOL!!!!  It's a magic world.

After dinner, we played dominoes the rest of the evening.  What a great time!!!

Becky and I both had gastric bypass.  Becky got all of her excess weight off and then gained maybe 30 lbs. back, but she fits normal sizes.  As noted earlier, I foraged my way back up to and beyond my pre-surgery weight.  That happens to lots of GB patients, but they are not the ones the surgeons boast about.  You don't see pictures of us in the literature in the bariatric surgeons office.  Anyway, Becky is one of my closest friends.  And her husband us one of Bob's closest friends.

I didn't have breakfast because I got up only with time enough to get dressed and comb my hair before we left to get to Kastel's house.  Lunch was soup and pasta salad and a whole grain roll.  Water to drink.  Dinner was tacos at Becky's.  Crystal Light to drink.  I didn't eat much today, which was probably not the best.  I should have planned it.  But it is a holiday weekend, and we were very busy.  So when in doubt, I left it out.  (Food, that is.)

Will be glad to weigh next Wed morning.  Hope I drop a couple of pounds!

I am getting so impatient.  Supposedly we get more patient as we age.  I think we just move slower and mistake that for patience.

August 12 was 17 days ago.  Weighed 318 that day.   This morning I recorded 316, but that was with the water retention the lasix hadn't yet cleared.   I could probably minus a pound or two and say today's wt is 314.5.  But over 2 weeks, I've lost only 3.5 lbs!!!   That is sooooooo pitiful!


We will return to Watertown next Tuesday.  I will weigh late Wednesday morning after the lasix effect is over.  That will be my lowest weight of the day.  (I have been recording my weight from that time of day here in the blog.)  I can guarantee my lowest weight by taking these measures after taking lasix:
     1)  not drinking anything until after urination has stopped
     2)  not eating anything until after urination has stopped
     3)  weighing naked (!)

I routinely do 1 and 2.  I routinely weigh wearing underwear and a light gown.  I need to stop obsessing about how to see my lowest weight.  My greatest fear is that I will step on the scale and 3 or 4 pounds will have jumped back on!  I would like to weigh under 300 ASAP!!!  Today Bob and I weigh about the same.  He is over 6 feet and looks just awful.  That means at 5'4" I must look like Jabba the Hutt.  I avoid full length mirrors and look into any mirror only briefly.  I get sick when I see pictures of myself.  That is not who I am inside.  I think my weight is what makes me have trouble sleeping Saturday nights: my church friends will see me. I dread putting on a dress and trying to make my hair interesting enough to distract from my piles of flab.  I am trapped inside.

Tomorrow will be a better day, as Scarlet O'Hara says.

I know God loves me.  I don't deserve it.  

Turns out that I lied.  I did not weigh myself after the lasix pill was done doing its magic.  We spent the morning getting ready to leave for MN, which included Bob frying up some Little Smokies and making me eat half of them.  (Humor/sarcasm; I am responsible for what I eat, not Bob.)  I LOVE sausages, and he browned them just the way I love.  It is actually "blacking" them as I grew up with a mother who cooked the living daylights out of meat to kill the "trichinosis" that was undoubtedly in every speck of it back in the 1940s and 50s when she was raising her brood.  So YUMMY on this morning's sausage.

I must admit I DID weigh myself shortly after taking the lasix.  (Maybe after my first urination.)  And I weighed 316, wearing my housecoat.  Bummer.  But still NOT 348!

Amen!

Yesterday I was disappointed that I was plateauing.  Then today I ate a sandwich with 2 slices of bread.  After a grease fire in the oven, we took our dinner guests (the LDS missionaries from our branch) out to eat at the luxurious Burger King! I had a Whopper Junior, small fries, and diet soda.  Next week, we plan to fix the same menu and be very careful when putting the chicken into the oven.  Then we can feed the missionaries our potatoes in the oven along with Martha Logan chicken, which is cooked first in a frying pan and then baked in the oven.  The fresh broccoli we hadn't started to steam when the fire occurred we will take with us to MN this weekend.

Anyway, back to the plateau. . . .   Eating about 3/4 lb of grapes for breakfast helped me "feed" my impatience over the plateau.  The bread I ate today, while not really an awful wandering off my plans in following the DASH diet, made me feel kind of guilty.  But I was brave and stepped on the scale this afternoon, and was amazed to see I had dropped a pound since yesterday morning!!!  I wonder if I would have lost more if I had not eaten so much.

So I will weigh tomorrow morning before we depart for our drive to MN.  I will weigh again when we return next Tuesday.  Today's afternoon weight was 312.4.  Will it be higher in the morning?  I hope not.

Can hardly wait to get back from the holiday weekend and open a rec center membership!  Looking forward to building up my lung power and endurance by starting on a stationary bike!

Hope to learn about doing pictures from my son Ryan this weekend.  Bringing the laptop with when we visit.

313 again.  It would be nice to lose a pound a day, but it's rare.  You hear on TV ads how so-and-so lost 100 lbs in 90 days.  And you see how so-and-so lost lbs and lbs of belly fat after using certain pills or a certain belly band while exercising.  But my real life is less remarkable.  Yes, I feel a bit down that I haven't lost faster.  But my goal of being in the 290s by September 25 lifts me up.  Short term goals keep us on track best.  If I make 145 my only goal, 168 lbs is what I need to shed!!!  And seeing that I STILL need to take off more than half of my body weight is pretty deflating!!

But on the other hand, when I get to 145, I will have lost 203 lbs from the highest weight I can admit to.   My highest on the scale was 348, but that was after I had had the flu for a couple of days, so was most likely dehydrated.  That was the reason I felt safe to weigh that day last spring.  It was probably the least I could weigh at that time.

So 35 lost.  But then, I have lost that amount several times in the past few years.  But then I would put it back.  My bariatric surgeon told me when I went in for an annual check that if I hadn't had the surgery I'd probably weigh 500 lbs!  I told myself that is what he needed to tell himself.

Lots of things going on today.  Miranda says she will be over.  I have to type up the program for the Primary sacrament service presentation.  I have to make several batches of suckers.  I should embroider at least one quilt square center.  I have 34 to do for the 2 baby quilts for babies due Oct 28 and Dec 3.

I'm tired just thinking of what is coming up today!