Bottomless Pits and Lost Pounds

The day after I wrote my last entry, my stomach became a bottomless pit. I started eating nachos and didn't stop until I just about ate my entire body weight. Then I ate crackers with cheese on them. Then a Whopper from Burger King because, for some reason, I turned into The Very Hungry Caterpillar.

I started freaking out because a) My new stomach is not supposed to handle all this food, and b) I got this surgery so I WOULDN'T EAT ALL THIS FOOD! Yes, withdrawals from food addiction suck ass. But not as much as being able to feed that same addiction! Fortunately I have a friend on Facebook who got the surgery who has been giving me great advice about what to expect while I go through this.

My friend told me that the kind of massive-binge-eating hunger that I used to do on a daily basis before the surgery comes when a weight-loss plateau is about to end and you're about to lose 10-20 pounds over the course of a few days. She said it had something to do with the body needing extra calories to have energy to burn fat for energy (seems weird, like turning on a switch to turn on a light switch to your home, but also kind of makes sense). It's the same reason why a lot of diets have a "cheat day".

Well, she wasn't kidding. As of yesterday, I was at 304 pounds. That's an 11-pound loss in a single week, and 64 pounds overall! Woo-hoo!

I'm loving how my stomach is looking right now. I am, however, not liking the loss of muscle mass. I need to be lifting weights and drinking more protein shakes. I also need to be doing more cardio. Really, I just need to be getting to the gym, period. I don't want to be skinny. I want to be buff.

You Know What Sucks Worse Than Addiction?

Withdrawal. Withdrawal sucks ass.

Like I said in my previous post, I didn't stop being addicted to food when I got my surgery. I just can't feed my addiction anymore. And it feels shitty.

I would like to be able to eat a meal without feeling like an alien is going to burst out of my chest, but it's not going to happen. I can eat half a sandwich before I'm banging my fist on the table in a fit of pain. It makes me just want to avoid food altogether.

But, there is good news. I'm down to 312 pounds, from my original weight of 367. For my Canadian friends, that's going from 166 kg to 141. I'm very happy about that.

Strangely, it's showing up more in my waistline than on my scale. I've only lost five pounds since my last entry, but I've lost more than a few inches off of my stomach. My work pants, which were already being just barely held up by a belt, are now a mass of bunched up cloth that droops far below my belt-line. Why I'm losing lots of body fat but not seeing it on a scale is a mystery to me, as I have not gained much in the way of muscle mass. In fact, in that department, I'm struggling to lift the same kinds of weights I did pre-surgery. I lost a lot of muscle mass when I was on medical restriction, so I have to start from the bottom and work my way back up.

As far as fitness goes, I can do a mile run in under 12 minutes now. My goal is to get below 10 minutes before I do the Cupid's Undie Run on Feb 15th (btw-donate now! All donations go toward the Children's Tumor Foundation.)

For all my Canadian friends, that means going from 12 minutes to under 10. ;)

My diabetes is all but vanquished. I can't take my medications anymore without going hypoglycemic.

So I have all the benefits of losing weight with me, but can't shake my fucking addiction. It makes me glad I did have this surgery. As much as it sucks, if I wasn't physically unable to eat thousands of calories in a single sitting, I'd be off this diet right now and I'd gain back all the weight I lost in a couple of weeks.

I'm stuck on this diet, whether I like it or not. :)

Locked In A Room With My Dark Passenger

When I decided to get gastric sleeve surgery I thought that my addiction to junk food would end. Boy, was I wrong.

I still am addicted to junk food. I crave pizza, sugary foods, Whoppers, cheesy fries, and so on. I do not crave healthy fruits and vegetables.

But even though I'm still addicted to junk food, I'm now physically unable to engorge myself on all the food that was making me fat in the first place. While this is good, it's like taking a crackhead and locking him in isolation so he can sober up. The man doesn't stop craving crack, he just doesn't have access to it anymore.

Drug addicts refer to the voice in their head that tells them to do the drugs their "dark passenger". My dark passenger has gone from being a powerful, commanding presence to one that whines and begs for a fix. He still has psychological power. But my body is simply unable to listen to him.

I'd be lying if I didn't say that that's not a happy experience. But I will have to learn to adjust to this new life.

As far as my weight loss goes, I hit a plateau after I lost 50 pounds. My weight hasn't budged since Monday. I talked to a friend who has also had the surgery and she said that's normal. I can expect to go a week or two without losing any weight, then lose 20 pounds overnight. I'd rather just see it come off a couple of pounds a day like I was the first few weeks after the surgery, but as long as it comes off I'll be happy about it.

I'm also back to work, which is why I haven't written in a while. I'll make it a point to write more. I want all of my experiences to be documented.

The Gym, Dicks, and Praying for Death

I woke up at 4 a.m. today. This isn't uncommon, as I have a job that requires me to get up for work at 4:30 in the morning, so my body is used to it.

After sitting around on the computer for about an hour-and-a-half, I decided to make a trip to the gym, damn my weight-lifting restrictions. I'm tired of the muscle loss that has been coming along with the fat loss. My workout was going to be light-just weight lifting-two sets of eight on each muscle group. In and out in 30 minutes.

I had to cut my workout short when I had a funny feeling in my stomach. I knew it was probably my muscles protesting being used for the first time in over a week, but I wasn't taking any chances. I had worked my abs, back, chest, and upper arms, so all in all it was a pretty thorough workout. I can finish the rest tomorrow, which is just legs and forearms.

After I got home, I decided to try some scrambled eggs to see if I could handle it. I had three of them, which was a huge mistake. I was doubled-over in pain for the next hour. I really need to learn to stop eating when I'm full. I made a Facebook post saying "If you try a new food after bariartic surgery, only eat in small amounts, otherwise you will be praying for a merciful death."

One of my friends who has had bariatric surgery warned me that I'd also get bad results eating spaghetti, so I'll avoid eating that for a very long time.

On the weight loss front, I've lost 45 pounds now. Not too shabby.

(I'll ask my family to avoid reading the rest of this. Okay, mom, I fucking warned you!)

I've now lost so much body fat that I can once again see my dick when I stand up. You have no idea how awesome that is unless you've actually been so fat that your gut actually overlaps your cock.

I Feel Fat...Did I Eat Too Much?

Have you ever been really hungry and made a food run that you regretted later? Let's say you're going out to a restaurant with your significant other, and feeling hungry, you order two appetizers to start. You gobble them down, get your main meal with all the add-ons, and when the waitress asks if you want dessert, you order one of those like a starving Ethiopian boy. And you also had two margaritas, because why the fuck not?

Two hours later, you're at home. You're hungry again. How in the fuck did you get so hungry? You don't know. But you're ready to go out with a spear in hand and slaughter your food hunter/gatherer style if that's what it takes. So you put some chicken wings in the oven and eat those.

You're not hungry anymore. You're extremely full. You probably ate somewhere between 3,000 and 4,000 calories in a few hours and you hate yourself. You promise yourself to go to the gym tomorrow and beat yourself up (and you do, because you really want this full feeling to go away).

That feeling that you have, where you feel like you ate too much food and your stomach feels distended, is what I've pretty much been feeling 24/7 as of the past few days. A few bites of cottage cheese, a couple pieces of broccoli, even a few swigs of any liquid are all it takes for me to feel stuffed. I keep asking myself "Did I eat too much? Why am I so full? I feel fat..."

Then I do the math and find that there's no possible way I'm eating more than 900 calories a day. And yet this day is the day I've eaten the most since the surgery.

My surgeon said that after two years, my stomach will finally be able to hold half of what I ate. I think about that as I'm feeling full so easily and it hits me:

I will never be fat again. Sure, I'm still fat now, but that's ending quickly. I'm losing about two pounds every day. I'm down 44 pounds now from my peak at 367. At the end of the first 90 days after surgery (when all restrictions on my eating and exercising will be gone), if I lose just an average of a single pound per day I will have lost 110 pounds. At 257 pounds, I will no longer be fat. Even if I could eat half of what I ate before the surgery, I would still only be able to eat, at best, 2,500 calories a day. If I exercise regularly, that would be more than enough to keep myself svelte, and even if I got lazy and didn't work out (fat chance), I wouldn't be consuming enough to make me fat, just unfit.

There's no going back. Damn, that feels good to know.

Why You Never Trust A Surgeon To Do Internal Medicine. Also, I've Lost 40 Pounds

I went to see my surgeon yesterday for my post-op appointment. He asked how I was feeling, so I told him I was feeling great (I am). He then looked at my medications. He noticed that I was still taking Glipizide (since most of my diet is G2, which contains enough sugar to make me hyperglycemic), but it was at 2.5 mg a day, the lowest dose a person can take.

"I want you off of that immediately", he told me. "That drug makes you fat."

Yeah, doc. It also creates insulin for my body to process sugar, without which I would die. I know eventually my body will be able to get rid of sugar on its own, but that day hasn't arrived yet. Until it does, I'm going to need my pills.

He was also insistent that I give up protein shakes as soon as I return to solids because they're "artificial food". Ugh. Yeah, doc. Because all the body-builders are getting fat off of that stuff. But the man is a total anti-GMO nutjob, so he swears up and down that unless it's non-GMO organic that it's all going to kill you.

Still, he's a damn good surgeon, and I haven't had any complications. You can be a good surgeon and not know jack about internal medicine. Just like I'm a good EMT and I don't know anything about internal medicine-it's simply not the area I'm trained.

But anyway, I'm cleared to go onto the next step of foods, which is light solids. So yesterday I ate some cottage cheese along with my protein shakes and G2. I've also been putting down applesauce, finger jello, and yogurt the past few days, so that makes me ready for step two, which is soft vegetables. This also puts me into the recovery diet phase I want to be in. My plan was always to drink 32 oz. of homemade juice, 60 grams of protein via shakes, and to fill the rest in with a single small meal. Now that I can eat vegetables, this is achievable. When I'm able to get back to the gym (next week, according to the doc), I plan on working on not just gaining back the muscle I've lost on this diet (which has been quite a bit), but I want to get completely ripped.

Speaking of what I've lost, I'm now down to 327. This is 40 pounds down as of three weeks ago, when I started the pre-op diet. I'd like to be 50 pounds down by the time I go back to work. Just a nice number to start with. :)

So, I Got My Period...

Yep. At least that's what my mom told me.

She asked me today if I was in any pain, and I told her it feels like a constant tight squeezing around my solar plexus. She then revealed that that's what a woman typically goes through once a month.

Thanks, mom. I already feel emasculated for not being able to lift more than 10 pounds or go driving on my own. Just toss another log on the fire!

That said, ladies, I'm sorry for every joke I've ever made in that department. This hurts like hell, and I'd hate to have to deal with it every month.

Anyway, my instructions in this stage of the post-op diet are to be on strictly liquids. I've been drinking G2 so I can get some electrolytes in and don't just flush all the salt out of my body. I still have to take some of my Glipizide to keep my blood-sugar levels under control, but barely an eighth of my old dose. My blood pressure has skyrocketed since the surgery, so I'm taking all sorts of meds for that as well. In a day or two, I'll start buying some fruit and vegetables to make freshly squeezed juice. It'll have a lot more nutrients than the sport drinks I'm consuming, which any nutritionist can tell you is typically shit in terms of health food.

The doc said that as soon as I can consume 64 ounces of clear liquids, I can start adding protein shakes. So after taking down 64 ounces of G2 I had one of my leftover Atkins shakes from my pre-op diet. They go down much easier than the sugar-water, and I was able to finish one in about five minutes (compared to the G2, which took about 16 hours). So much to my surprise, I'm ahead of schedule on when I'll be able to eat solid foods. This is a very good thing, as I don't want to eat nothing at Christmas dinner. Sure, I'll just be eating steamed veggies, but at least I'll be eating something.

Aside from the mild, chronic-pain in my solar plexus, the only real problem I'm having is the boredom. This surgery has knocked out every one of my vices (even the healthy ones like weight-lifting), and I'm very limited in what I can do with my daughter, so I've been finding myself just spending all my time on Facebook. I hate not being at work. I thought I'd like the time off, but I can't stand it. I need something to do.

I know my wife bought me a video game for Christmas. I asked her to give me one early, but she's swearing up and down that she didn't buy me one. Suuuuuure, honey. Babe, you can't lie worth a shit!

Anyway, if any other relatives bought me a video game and wouldn't mind parting with it now, when I'll actually have time to play it and won't be stuck in school and work between January and April, it'll be greatly appreciated. Please let me know, as I am bored as fuck right now.