So much to do - so little time!

As I sit here writing this, it is Friday evening - I just finished my last day of work before being out for 3 weeks on disability.  The work week has been hectic!  My department is only 5 people and 2 of them have been out all week, so I am doing at least 2x as much as I usually do.  It's good though, as it made the week FLY BY!  It was a bit stressful today, as my Fridays are 10-hour days and I barely had time to get up to go to the bathroom!  All in all, I love my job - I love working from home - I am really good at what I do. I might actually miss working while I am out. We'll see!

In the evenings after work this week, I have been tackling my big pre-surgery To-Do list!  Some days have been much more productive than others.  I learned on Monday that my mother and father are going to be driving into town and staying the night Saturday before we leave together on Sunday to travel to my out-of-town surgery.  Eek!  The original plan was for them to fly directly to Dallas, but their plans changed and they decided to drive instead. 

A little bit of back story... my parents are pretty young (52 and 53, respectively) and I still consider myself pretty young (32).  My husband and I bought our first house last year, and we have been planning for over a year to have a big family Christmas out here in the new house... kinda a delayed housewarming party.  Well, knowing this, I have been making big plans on what I want to have done in the house before everyone sees it for the first time!  I wanted to make a good first impression to my parents (show off a little bit - let them see how well their eldest daughter is doing!) but now they arrive Saturday and that throws a wrench in my plans.

The first issue is what they're going to sleep on. 
My husband and I sleep in the only bed in our house. We *BARELY* just bought our own bedroom set after having the mattress sitting on the floor for 2 years since we moved to this state. Not wanting to make my parents sleep on the couch, the first order of business was to order an air mattress.  And I didn't stop there! I also ordered a mattress pad, sheet set, comforter, and pillows. Don't tell my husband that I spent $300 on all that.

The second issue is where they're going to sleep.
Our house is a 3-bedroom, with one bedroom our dedicated office (since I work from home). Then we have the master bedroom, and a 3rd room, which we were using for storage.  Because I didn't want to make my parents sleep in the living room, the new project became to prepare the 3rd bedroom and make it guest-ready!

Here's the mess that it was before:

 Not pictured: Closet and 3 suitcases stuffed full of clothes!

After 5 hours of sorting, folding, collapsing boxes, finding places homes... the room was ready to put the new air mattress in!  Here's the proud 'after' picture:

 

Not pictured: ORGANIZED CLOSET!

 I finally went through the bedroom and cleaned it up. It's a little too 'bare' for my tastes, but it'll do for a short-term solution. I'm hoping that by Christmas, we have a much nicer guest bedroom!  The 5 hours of hard labor left me a bit dizzy and light-headed... I think I may have over-exerted myself a bit.  My energy isn't what it usually is (having been on day 4 of the liquid diet at that point).

Whew!  My parents have somewhere to sleep on Saturday.  Now all that's left is the long list of house cleaning that I have to do for my parents arrival -- not to mention my actual pre-surgery checklist!  My mom is not 'white glove' at all... I just want to make her proud of me.

 Anyway - much more to do and not much time left!  48 hours from now I will be in the hotel in Dallas, awaiting surgery the next morning!  Time to make the time fly by keeping myself busy!

No Longer Pre-Diabetic!

As a Duodenal Switch patient, I will need to be diligent about getting lab work done, and tracking my numbers so I do not become vitamin deficient in an area.  I am pretty excited about this "job" I will have (I love planning, numbers, spreadsheets!) and I don't mind taking vitamins.

Well, today as part of my pre-op planning, I acquired my lab results I had done in January as well as a copy of the lab work done just a few weeks ago.  I entered both into the spreadsheet and came across something amazing! 

I am no longer pre-diabetic!  My A1-C is in a normal range!  I'm so incredibly happy! 
My 3 months of self-prescribed dieting before surgery has paid off.  Diabetes runs in both sides of my family, and I have been "at risk" for many years. I used to think of diabetes as an eventuality for me... but I have dodged the bullet by making good choices and focusing on eating healthy to prepare for my weight loss surgery!

This good news has definitely put some wind in my sails and is making this week's liquid diet easier to handle.  Only 4 more days to go!

Change of Heart - I am going to have DS Surgery!

I have been wanting to get rid of my lap-band for over 4 years now. My husband had a co-worker who also had a terrible experience with their lap-band, and that is where I heard that there is a thing called a "revision" in which you can get your old surgery redone to have another form of weight loss surgery.  I started researching other weight loss surgeries available, and decided that a Gastric Bypass (RNY) looked like the best one out there.  I made an appointment back in June with a surgeon and told him I want an RNY revision.  He presented the other 2 major surgery types to me: the Sleeve (VSG) and the Duodenal Switch (DS) as well, but I didn't want a VSG and I had never heard of a DS, so I didn't listen much.  He said I had to eat 100g+ of protein each day with the DS, and that sounded like too much, so I stuck to my guns and told him I wanted an RNY.

Shortly after that appointment with my Surgeon, I joined the ObesityHelp community.  In that time, I have read posts on the forums from countless individuals who had experiences with the band, RNY, VSG, and DS. I became somewhat of a 'regular' on the RNY forums, and also read the General Discussion forum, the 50+ BMI forum, and the Revision forum daily.  With all of this reading, I gained a TON of useful information to help me with my RNY, as well as gained information about the other surgeries - their strengths, weaknesses, typical diets, vitamin requirements, and different success rates. As I heard more and more about the DS, I became more curious. The more I tracked my current food intake, the more I realized that 100g of protein is actually something I could do.  As I kept reading and hearing stories from others, the more I came to want the DS.

My biggest concern with my revision weight loss surgery is long-term regain.  I was blown away by the Excess Weight Loss statistics presented at DSFacts.com (LINK).  I will share the most dramatic and impactful statistic (in my opinion) here:

RNY

EWL% at 1-2 years 48%-85%

EWL% at 3-6 years 53%-77%

EWL% at 7-10 years 25%-68%

DS

EWL% at 1-2 years 65%-83%

EWL% at 3-6 years 62%-81%

EWL% at 7-10 years 60%-80%

This was the information that 'sealed the deal' in my mind.  If I was going under the knife again to have another weight loss surgery, I needed to go with the surgery that has the best long-term success rate.  I discussed my findings and my desire to change my surgery to a DS with my husband. He was hesitant at first, but after explaining the success rate difference and the difference in diet, I had his full support.  I called my Surgeon's office the next day.

My surgery is in a little more than a week, now.  Today is a Friday and I start my liquid diet on Monday.  I am both excited and anxious for surgery to get here!  I have no doubts about my decision to change surgeries; only more confidence that I made the right decision, and thankfully I made the decision in time to change!

I chopped off my hair!

I usually grow my hair long then donate it every 4-5 years or so.  Because I will probably lose a lot of hair due to my WLS, I decided to donate before surgery, in case I am not able to again.  My hair has never been this short before, but I love it!  I can't wait to try out a bunch of new short hairstyles!

If you are interested in donating YOUR hair, I highly recommend Pantene's Beautiful Lengths. Their wigs help women fighting cancer!

Failed Again...

I have fallen down again in my journey to eating better and overcoming my food addiction.
Tonight, I ate an entire batch of cookies. 1 dozen large brown sugar cookies. 

I made the cookies over the weekend to ship to a friend (long story... I lost a bet and owe him homemade cookies).  I resisted eating them for 2.5 full days.  I packaged up the cookies in disposable packaging, and had them sitting on the kitchen counter and not yet in their shipping box, as I hadn't found the right box size yet.  I looked at them every time I passed by... I considered taking just one, I considered eating them all and I resisted for 2 days. 

Today I failed myself and gave in to the temptation.  I was home alone all night, with a day of eating well all planned out (in advance) on MyFitnessPal.  The cookies have been on my mind for 2 days and nights, and all day while I was at work.  I wasn't hungry; meals were already planned.  I just couldn't stop thinking about the cookies.  I convinced myself that no one would know if I ate all of the cookies, then quickly made another batch in time to ship out to my friend tomorrow.  No one would know, I could get away with it.

For some reason, I didn't stop myself from opening the first half-dozen already nicely packaged for my friend.  The cookies didn't even taste as good as I thought they would.  They were just a clump of baked sugar, flour, and butter.  But I kept eating them.  And eating them.  Before I knew it, half a dozen was gone.  I felt sick to my stomach -- from eating so much and from the amount of PURE SUGAR coursing through my veins.  I grabbed the 2nd half-dozen and brought them into my office. I then ate those over the next hour.

Then, high on sugar and my food addiction feeling satiated, I went back to the kitchen to start whipping up another batch of cookie dough to 'hide' the evidence of my mishap.  I made the cookies, cleaned the kitchen impeccably, and saw no evidence that I had baked another batch of cookies tonight, besides the fresh dozen sitting on the counter.

Over the next several hours, I came to terms with what I did.  I texted my husband and confessed to my binge-eating crime.  I decided that I would come clean on my blog as well.  I logged the main ingredients to the cookies in today's MyFitnessPal entry so I would be forced to SEE how many calories, fat, and sugar that I ate.

Here it is, for you to see as well:

 

I ate almost 4,000 calories today as I binged a dozen cookies.  I don't feel good about it.  The sugar rush was not worth the guilt I feel hours later.  The small instant of satisfaction will not be worth the weight loss stall I will have this week because of it.

My surgery is scheduled for 2 weeks from today.  I would like to think that I will not allow myself to eat like this after surgery - since there are much more physical consequences for eating this way.  I feel like I may have started by post-surgery dieting too early, and without the TOOL of surgery in place, I am failing at it and self-sabotaging like I have done with diets in the past.

The final step I am going to take to make sure this never happens again is somewhat extreme:

I have thrown away the sugar and brown sugar that is in the house.  We now only have Stevia packets.  This is the 2nd cookie/cookie dough incident now, and I clearly cannot trust myself with sugar in the house!  With that gone, we have no high-sugar items left in the entire house.  

Is there any reason I will need White Flour post-op?