Through my first week back at work that is. It was a huge relief to have something to do and to see that my two weeks off hadn't left me too tired/weak to do my job.
Food wise right now... not the greatest. I'm making every effort on my part to eat healthy the only thing is that I've obviously healed well since I eat about the same as before surgery. I have noticed a slight decrease in portion size but nothing that I can really be excited about. I used to have some bad eating habits in that I rarely prepared healthy meals. When I would get home from work I would just pull whatever was quick and easy from the cupboard or freezer. And we all know that if everything you're eating is pre-packaged and prepared you are not eating properly. So I have been trying to make meals every night. That way I also have leftovers for lunch the next day and that will save me from other bad food choices. I used to buy lunch everyday! It was a rare occasion for me to brown bag it but I need to make a habit of this now. It will also help my bank account too! I have been uber tempted lately by all the easter candy in the stores that seems to be making its way to the common areas at work. I cannot resist cadbury mini-eggs to save my life! Those little milk chocolate eggs with the vanilla candy coating might as well be crack cocaine for me, I have no will power when it comes to them.
Unfortunately on the weight front I'm up a little bit. I'm putting this partially down to my period which is a total pain, literally. The last two months have been really rough for some reason. Cramps strong enough to make you bend over in agony while your working. Also I'm eating more. That nice little drop after surgery is probably due to my initial "restriction." I'm scheduled for my first fill on April 21 so I can't wait and I'm praying that I get restriction the first time around. I really would like to atleast maintain my weight or not go above the 203 I reached with the pre-op diet. I feel like if I went above that 203 I'd be failing somehow. I know the dieticien told me I'd most likely put on weight after sugery and before my fill but there's still this sense of "Come on! You have the band, so what if it isn't filled! You should still be losing weight." Wrong attitude I know, but it's how I'm feeling about it.
Lots of Love - Les

P.S. Thanks for the words of advice Sarah! It's good to know that I'm not the only one that was hungry once they were back on solids.

So yesterday would have been my two week post-opiversary. How's that for making up occasions and words! I'm feeling good. All of my incision are healed up nicely. Only thing is that the staples around one are reacting pretty ugly so its a good thing that they're coming out on tuesday. I've always had a sensitivity to metal for things like jewelry mostly to anything made with nickel.. even if it was nickel that has been plated but I didn't even think going into the surgery that the staples would be a problem. Oops! Guess I was wrong about that one. I think they will leave more of a scar than the actual incisions. I've been using tea tree oil on them religiously now to try and keep the infection of them down and will continue to do so once the staples are out to speed up the healing.
Food is.... back to normal. I am not feeling any less hungry than before surgery so this really sucks. I can eat rice and bread just fine unfortunately. I'm kind of worried that maybe I stretched out my pouch already??? It just seems like I eat and eat some more just like I used to without feeling any fuller. Is it possible that the food is just moving through my band that quickly since it isn't filled? I know that the dietitien told me I could expect to gain weight after surgery until I get my first fill which is a month away now. But really should I not feel any sort different fullness feeling at all? I did when I first started on mushies and solids but that didn't last long. I'm such a worry wart and I'm scared that I maybe have sabotaged myself already by unknowingly overeating and stretching my pouch. If anyone out there that might be reading this did you experience any/no difference once you'd healed but before your first fill? I guess I'm looking for some reassurance/guidance. Yes this is kind of normal or No you should really go see the Doc's.
Since it is two weeks out I thought I'd weigh in and measure up so here are the numbers:
21Mar09
197.5 pounds down 5.5 pounds from day of surgery
Bust 47 inches down 0.25 inch from day of surgery
Waist 45.5 inches up 1 inch from day of surgery (Yeah... Don't know what that's about?)
Hips 47 inches down 0.75 inch from day of surgery
I'm happy with these numbers and realize that they probably will stay around the same until I get a fill. I have however set myself a goal of 195 pounds to lose by my fill date. Since I've been told that I will probably gain I feel that losing 2.5 pounds in a month is pretty realistic. Maybe I'll even surprise myself and lose more! Wouldn't that be nice?
I'm back to work tomorrow and so happy to go. Never though I would say that. While I do love my job everyone likes time off... but I've been soooo bored. It will be a relief to be occupied and busy!
Lots of Love - Les

So where to begin, again. Uhm, after surgery while in recovery one of the nurses commented on how great I was doing and that I was fantastic for having had a general anesthetic and that "it's almost as if you haven't had one at all!" I guess that's good, right?
My perogie went down just fine yesterday, in fact I had two. Kind of worried. I know I haven't had a fill but should I not feel some restriction still since things have to move along through the stoma that is most likely still swollen? Not feeling a decrease in appetite what so ever. Today I made a white sauce and threw in some cheddar cheese into it. Then I steamed some asparagus until it was really soft and put a bit of the sauce on top. It was great. Later I had some steamed brocolli and cauliflower with the sauce. For breakfast I'd had about 1/2 cup of rice pudding and I've also managed to eat about a 1/2 cup of jell-o today... Seems like a lot doesn't it??
I have to admit I'm getting kind of paranoid about my band maybe having slipped in my mess of a sunday night. How will I know if it has? Shouldn't I be in pain or something... or not being able to eat anything? I guess I will give the good doc's a call on monday. I have an appointment on the 24 in the evening to get my staples taken out. I can't wait. They're driving me nuts. It become almost obsessive that I check them to see if everything is healing and blah blah blah.
My parents are having pizza for dinner and I'm totally jealous. It smells amazing. It has black olives on it and it still smells/looks good... I HATE black olives.
Oh I did my measurements when I started the meditrim and the day of surgery. Here they are:
22Feb09
210 pounds
Bust - 48.5 inches
Waist - 48.5 inches
Hips - 48.5 inches
I was not surprised at the weight. The measurements however horrified me. I hadn't realized that my "curves" were in fact at a point that I was just, just, I guess fat all around.
7Mar09
203 pounds down 7 pounds
Bust - 47.25 inches down 1.25 inches
Waist - 44.5 inches down 4 inches
Hips - 47.75 inches down .75 inch
Overall I lost 7 pounds and 6 inches in two weeks. Not bad if I can say so myself.
I cheated the other day and stepped on the scale and it said I was at 198.5 pounds. That's not offical though, but I'm still excited!
Lots of Love - Les

I got banded on the 7th. I am now 5 days post op and feeling great. I've never been put under anesthesia before so that was interesting. I remember everything before. The super cute scrub nurse Phil coming to get me and walking to the OR. Getting the IV put in, a blood-pressure cuff on my right arm and whatever that thing is on your finger (measure pulse or oxygen content of blood, maybe both). The next thing that happened was Phil sticking some things on me don't know what they were for either. He then brought over an oxygen mask and told me to take deep breaths.... and then I woke up in recovery. Uhm... what happened to two hours?? I didn't even know I was getting the anesthetic already and then it was all over!
So I was all groggy in recovery and kind of antsy since my feet were absolutely freezing! I felt sorry for the nurse, my heart rate keep jumping around. Kind of settling and then jumping back up to about 110 beats per minute. They were kind of worried at first but then it settled. She kept having to run back and forth to me cause the machine monitering my pulse etc beeped every other minute. I also felt bad for her cause after I woke up she gave me a little sip of water and told me to just rest and go back to sleep for a bit. Little did she know that I absolutely cannot sleep if my feet are cold. Every night, even in the summer, I heat up a magic bag in the microwave for 3 minutes before bed just so that I can put it on my feet, without it... I need atleast two pairs of socks, a pair of slippers and my dog to patiently lie on my feet until they're toasty before I doze off.
So what could've been an easily passed two hours in recovery sleeping was instead me looking around and being inquizitive. I was home that day by dark I remember so it must have been no later than 7 o clock in the evening. That night I mostly slept and had the odd sip of water. I was sooo dehydrated. So day one post op I was doing good too. I'd had water and juice on hand all day was feeling good. Somewhere along the way I decided to have some pudding. Bad idea. My stomach totally retaliated against it. Was up twice during the night with severe nausea and a lot of dry heaving. It was sooo painful. I actually ended up having to phone my Dad at work and get him to pick up some gravol suppositories pronto since I couldn't even keep liquid gravol down and the taste of it just started the gag reflex on its on.
After my rough sunday night I took it pretty easy on monday and tuesday. Kept on using the gravol and stayed on water/juice only for monday and then added some jello on tuesday. I tollerated the jello well so I made some cream of mushroom soup and took the immersion blender to it. Went down smoothly. Yesterday I managed to eat a whole tin of vegetable soup (campbell's veg to be exact yummy) partially blended and it went down smooth too. So my dieticien had said that I will be able to tell when I'm ready for mushies so I'm going to try a perogie tonight... basically mashed potatoe and see how that goes. I've been getting a lot hungrier yesterday and today so I guess that means the swelling is going down and food is passing through much more easily.
My incisions (all 5) are healing well, they don't hurt. The only discomfort I have is when I'm sitting up kind of under the largest incision where the port is I sometimes get a weird almost tugging sensation. Is this normal? Maybe just the band and the line attached to the port moving or something? I don't know. I've been lying down a lot so I will need to start sitting up more and letting this sort itself out or get used to it I guess. Ok this is really long and I haven't even covered everything so there will be more to come!
Lots of Love - Les

I cheated :( Went to see a movie with my neighbour and couldn't resist the popcorn. I probably had about 2 cups, and he bought me ring pop's cause he's so sweet and thought that they were "lower calorie" and I felt guilty saying no... really I just have had enough of this 600 calorie crap. I'm tired, exhausted beyond belief.
I've only got 4 sleeps until I get banded! Still sure that I'm doing the right thing though.
I do believe that I will need a new name for my blog though. I could stick with Life of Leslee but I think I should mix it up. Some ideas I have are:

• Lap-Band and Leslee or Leslee and Lap-Band
• Now you see me, Now you don't
• Losing Les or Les Losing (oh yeah... lots of people pronounce Leslee with more of a "z" sound, I use an "s" so it would be like less)
• Living Light with Les or Les Living Light

And that's all I've got for now. For the few of you seem to be following me (Hi and thanks by the way!) What do you think, and might you have some suggestions. So I'm going to go an be lazy and watch some TV or something.
Lots of Love - Les

Until being banded that is. Sorry it's been a while since I've posted. This whole pre-op diet has kind of thrown me out of my routine. I've been tired tired tired, and for the most part just unpleasant to be around. I was a little concerned cause in the week I've been on it I've only lost 4.5 pounds. Which is a great accomplishment for me but it seems that most people lose a dramatic amount of weight on the diet and I'm worried that me not losing as much is of concern for some reason my liver isn't shrinking or whatnot and that they won't be able to do the surgery. :( Yikes! I worry a lot so I sent out an e-mail to the dietitian and she said not to worry. She expects me to lose about 10 pounds in the two weeks so... I'm practically halfway there and that maybe I just don't have as much fat in my liver to lose. That was somewhat reassuring but at the same time I'm still totally worried and paranoid.
So happy March everyone I can't believe time has gone by this fast but isn't that the way it always happens. Only 5.5 more days of meditrim and then I will be banded and off to a new start.
Lots of Love - Les