Friday, October 30, 2009

The Next Milestone

Today, when I returned home from walking, I weighed 170.5 pounds. That means that I have lost over 130 pounds since we began all this. Additionally I have 5.5 pounds to go to reach my weight goal. I honestly had thought that perhaps I had "bottomed out" in terms of my total weight loss. Certainly my weight loss has slowed the last couple of weeks, and I certainly am not dissatisfied with where my present weight is, but today I am down an extra pound and a half suddenly. Thus, I have broken the 130 pound weight loss barrier.

Additionally earlier this week I purchased some new sport shirts. Thank god for Walmart and $9.00 polyester cotton blend plaid sport shirts. The news is the shirts I bought were size medium and they fit me great. I have gone from size 3X (and was approaching 4X), to size 2X, down to 1X/XL, then size Large, and now I am a size medium. I cannot even imagine how many decades ago it was that I could wear a size medium shirt (hell, a size medium anything:)

So this process continues and I am still progressing. I also received the results of blood work ordered by my endocrinologist in the last week. My Hemoglobin A1c was 5.1 (that's about as good as it gets for those of you not informed about diabetes) and all my other tests, i. e., cholesterol, vitamin D, etc. were equally perfect. Thank goodness not only for this surgery but for our dietary regimen and for our swan who sacrifices her own diet to eat right along with t and I in terms of our "gastrointestinally challenged" diet.

Thank you once again for all the support so many here have lent us.

All the best,

Tom

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you've imagined.

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Seven Month Anniversary Photos

Seven months ago, Master and T were still in the hospital, still recovering from the surgeries. Those were difficult and physically painful days, and it was very hard to keep sight of the hoped for benefits of what they had just gone through. Today, we stopped to take pictures -- seven months later. What an amazing journey.









Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Cheesecake


This blog was intended to be (and has been) about our family's journey into and through weight loss surgery. We meant for it to chronicle the changes and the challenges of this major shift in our lives, and we wanted to capture moments as they happened so that we could look back when it was all over with and examine where we'd been...


Here, as at our other blogs, we track stats, and we have begun to notice an interesting phenomenon. It seems that roughly half of the hits that we experience at this site come from people interested in our experience with bariatric weight loss surgery. The other half, almost exactly 50%, are from people who are looking for cheese cake recipes!

Really.

It gives me pause. I wonder how significant cheesecake is in the workings of the world, that half of everyone out there is looking for the secret of the perfect cheese cake... Perhaps the answer to everything lies in this simple, delectable, unassuming dessert. Maybe we could win the hearts of the people of Afghanistan, convince the conservatives that there is really no issue at all with allowing marriage equality, find a way to provide everyone with health insurance, solve the financial crisis, and raise the test scores of every school child if we just created the perfect manufacturing and distribution system for cheese cake. Perhaps this is the work to which we ought to convert our entire military and industrial complex?

Half. Half of our readers want to know about just one thing...

swan

Victory!! Final Goal Reached

Yesterday, without acclaim, swan adjusted her weight scale, above here on our Blog, to reflect a one pound weight loss she experienced yesterday morning. Now mind you, swan is the non-bartiatirc surgery patient member of our polyamorous triad intentional family, but the lifestyle changes that t's and my surgery have kicked off have effected every one of us in the household. I only wish it wasn't her curent bout of what we have humorously been calling the "Hiney Flu" (H1N1) that had precipitated this final weight loss.

Swan has now lost 25 pounds since we began all this last March. She is the first of us to reach the top end of her optimum weight range. While she did not begin this, thank goodness, with morbid obesity, she too is experiencing health benefits from her weight loss.

Our swan has reached the magic 25 BMI: the standard of health for us all.

We couldn't be more thrilled and proud for her.

Thank you for all you've done to support t and I through this transition, from endless nights sleeping in a recliner chair next to my hospital bed as I struggled with my post-operative infection, to forgoing eating what anyone would consider anything close to a "normal" diet along with your bariatric surgically challenged dining/family partners, to walking with me, to now, having the courage and discipline to achieve your health goal.

Thank you for doing all this to prolong the time you will be Mine Always and All Ways.

I love you so much.

Tom

Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you've imagined.

Sunday, October 18, 2009

One Year Later

A year ago, as our family dressed up to go to the major fund-raising dance for Master's agency, we took some photos...















Last night, we were, once again all dressed up, ready to go out for an evening of fund-raising. Himself was slated to be the Master of Ceremonies. Once again we took some photos before we left for the evening. They pretty well speak for themselves...













Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Milestone Reached October 7, 2009

Today I awakened and staggered off to the bathroom for the daily weigh-in. I was 176 pounds. My baseline weight last March 9 was 301 pounds. I have now reached 125 pounds weight loss in under seven months from my baseline weight. This represents another 1/4 of a hundred pounds lost, so I feel like it is noteworthy. Technically this means I have 11 more pounds to lose until I attain the original weight goal recommended by my bariatric surgeon of 165 pounds. He was quite pleased with me when he gave me my 6 month check last week. He said that rarely do patients do as well as I have in this time period, and he knew I was not done yet.



I will likely attain the goal he set at 165 pounds. I am probably going to push on past that. The more accepted weight/height charts suggest that for my 5 feet 8 inches my ideal weight is within a range of 139 pounds to 169 pounds. I have seen some of the more high end charts that have based their prescribed weights on those that maximize longevity. They suggest my ideal weight as 151 pounds. My Cardiologist has suggested I use that as an end weight. At 150.5 pounds I will have lost 50% of my weight. That seems like a goal worth pursuing and so I will. So to date I have lost 125 pounds and have 25 more to lose.



I haven't tracked us as a family for a while. As of now, between the three of us, we have lost 221.6 pounds. Damn, by the time I reach my new goal we will have, between the three of us, almost lost 246 ponds plus any further loss by t and swan:) We will have lost a good sized football player worth of human mass:)



It helps so much to have chronicled this journey here. Looking back on it is amazing for me. Much of what has empowered that dynamic has been the tremendous support readers here have provided us all.



Thank you all for your support.



All the best,



Tom



Go confidently in the direction of your dreams. Live the life you've imagined.

Saturday, October 3, 2009

Hips Hips Hooray! They are smaller today!

I AM WEARING A SIZE 14 PANT TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have not been this small since I was 12 years old and involved in sports year-round. I pulled on the jeans I had been wearing and they looked plain silly. Handfuls of denim at the hips on each side. They were 18's.... I had skipped a size when I bought this style, thinking that I could wear them big for a bit and then the 14's would be tight for a while....but NOOOOOO!! These 14's are JUST RIGHT!

I have not been moving, weight-wise. Sorta depressing, but there is a bunch on the plate right now....but I must be shape-shifting or sumptin!

T, off to go do the walker-dance with Mom!