...3...

I freaking love Scott Pilgrim! I had a different #3 lined up but I saw this and decided it was the one. No other #3 would work.

So my good DS pal Heidi started a thread on OH that got people thinking about all the things they want to be able to do post-op. This is a sensitive subject for me but it really is a very good subject. So many people who aren't overweight have no idea how many things we just cannot do. They have no idea how much we miss out on, even the simplest things. So I am going to step WAY out of my comfort zone and post my own "skinny bucket list" of sorts.

Stephanie's Skinny List:
--in no particular order--
*Shop at ANY store that I want, particularly Victoria's Secret, Forever 21, Lucky, Charlotte Russe
*Wear SEXY panties and actually look/feel sexy in them
*Wear high heels- I'm talking at least 4 1/2 inches
*Wear red lipstick- I know this one will throw some of you but red lipstick looks so much different on a thin face than it does a round one!
*Wrap a normal sized bath towel around my entire body
*Be able to take a bath and have the water completely cover me
*Sit in a restaurant booth without it digging into my gut
*Sit on a plastic chair without holding my breath (because you know- holding your breath helps you weigh less, lol)
*Have a much more X-rated sex life (I won't go into too much detail here, you get the point)
*Wear bracelets that actually fit over my huge ape hands
*Wear head bands that won't slide off my head
*Go to water parks and play on the slides
*Wear a bathing suit in public
*Walk the mall without getting winded
*Get pregnant and have a healthy pregnancy
*Go to the baseball or football games and fit comfortably in the stadium chairs
*Be able to use both arm rests at the movie theatre
*Live in Arizona without going all summer in long sleeve shirts to hide my grandma arms
*LOOK my age! I'm 26 dammit, my 23 year old sister is NOT my daughter!
*Look good in leggings/jeggings/ or skinny jeans...or jeans in general!
*Wear boots that go up higher than my ankle
*Sit on the bed without it sounding like it's dying
*Sit in my office chair and have the arms hit the table before my belly
*Be able to bend over enough to give myself a pedicure
*Go to any amusement park and not have to freak out the entire time wondering if I'll fit in the ride
*Ride a bike again
*Play Just Dance w/o looking like a retard (ok I probably still will, but at least I'll be a skinnier retard)
*Start my "career" that requires a much higher self esteem than I currently have
*Not look at every person in a room to see if I'm the biggest one
*Not feel like everyone is judging me or secretly making fun of my size
*Not HAVE to ride shot gun because I can't squeeze my fat ass in the back seat of a coup or because the back seat belts don't fit me
*Fly comfortably in any airplane seat w/o a seat belt extender
*Jump on a trampoline or a bouncy house
*Go paragliding
*Go sky diving
*Be proud to go to my 10 year high school reunion
*Not have to buy necklace extenders
*Go jogging
*Run a marathon
*Get massages without being afraid of if the table is big enough or if the masseuse is grossed out by my fat back
*Get a Brazilian bikini wax w/o having to hold my gut up and go doggy style on the table and grossing out the waxer (I haven't had this experience but this fear prevents me from trying)
*Sit on any furniture w/o fear if it buckling under my weight
*Not be forced to shop at Lane Bryant, Torrid, and Old Navy plus size
*Not have to buy maternity tankinis so that the top goes down low enough to cover my gut
*Just over all feel more comfortable in my own skin so that I can go out and live and enjoy life without my weight holding me back!!!

I'm sure I'll think of WAY more, so maybe there will be a "part 2" to this, but for now this is a good list. And I'm late in posting this anyway as it is now 2:23am on day 2, not day 3. Oh well.

Today was productive! I bought a recliner! It's small, kinda flimsy, cheap- but you get what you pay for, it was only $150 brand new. I was going to get a used one from Craigslist but my friend freaked me out about bed bugs and ticks and stuff so I got the heeby geebiez and decided against that rout. I was going to rent one from Rent-A-Center, but it was going to cost about $130 for two months, and the recliner wasn't that much bigger than this one, so I figured for a few more bucks I'd get this and keep it as long as I want. It's cheap, I wouldn't buy it if I wanted to really use it a lot for a long time, but it really only has to last me a few months and then if it decides to die, then I won't be too heartbroken.
I also got pretty much all of my cleaning done. I still have a few things but not much.

Tomorrow (later today) I am going to make my post-op soups, finish cleaning, and then just RELAX the rest of the day. :) I'm starting to get excited!

...4...

HOLY COW...4 days! Today is my last official work day, although I will probably end up working overtime tomorrow. Hey- I've got a lot of medical bills to re-coup from!

So I got brave today and made my first protein shake from one of the many samples I got from VitaLady! And I made it in my Blender Bottle for the first time!





I tried ProBlend 55 in Mocha Cappuccino

The stats are as follows:
Calories- 275
Fat- 3g
Sat fat- 1.5g
Cholesterol- 42mg
Cabs- 7g
Fiber- 0
Sugars- 4g
Protein- 55g
Sodium- 105mg
Pro-Digestive Blend- 115mg (idk what this is)

This is a whey protein and you know what??? I don't hate it!! :D Really I don't. My thing has always been texture. The pre-made protein shakes don't taste bad but they are so thick and that triggers my gag reflexes. For this one I poured the whole sample packet into my blender bottle. One packet is one serving and that's 2 scoops. I filled mine with skim milk, NOT water (bleck!) and I poured about 8oz into it. I shook it up really good and then added about 5 ice cubes and shook some more. It was really frothy and foamy (another gag trigger of mine) so I let it "settle" for a couple minutes and when it looked smooth and creamy I braced myself, took a deep breath, and took a swig. And it's not bad at all! I'm not sure I'd say it tastes anything like a mocha cappuccino, but did I really expect it to? If I want that taste I'll try the Click protein powders that EggFace uses to make faux frappuccinos. :) So I'm rather pleased with myself and with my first real test of protein powders.

The million dollar question- would I buy this flavor in a tub? (for future reference, this will always be the million dollar question and it means if I like it enough to shell out the $$ for a tub of it)...and the answer is- probably not this flavor, but I would absolutely buy more samples :) and I'm excited to try more flavors by this brand.

Well I suppose I better TRY to get back to work, although I'm pretty convinced it's a lost cause at this point. I hope you all have great weekends!

...5...

Well my BANK ACCOUNT lost a lot of weight today :/ I had to pay my surgeon's fees today- freaking $3,500! And I still have to pay $4000 to the hospital! I feel nauseous.

I also got a copy of my pre-op blood labs. I am just staring at them trying to figure out how to read them as I type this.

Hmm- everything actually looks pretty good other than my cholesterol seems to be high! That's surprising, I've never had high cholesterol! I'm not sure there's much I can do about that in 5 days though. My HDLs are high at 62, so that's good, but so are my LDLs- 171 :/ my overall cholesterol is 210, which is high but not SUPER high. I don't think that they did things like my vitamin levels, so I may try to get a PCP to order them before surgery, even if I don't get the results back in time, just so I have something to compare. Idk...depends on how much that would cost me, I am B.R.O.K.E!

I just made a peanut butter milkshake with low fat- no sugar added vanilla ice cream and Jiffy all natural peanut butter and skim milk. YUUUMMMM. That's a liquid I can be ok with ;) LOL.

I hope everyone has a great weekend! See ya tomorrow :)

...6...

Only two more work days after today and then I'm officially on my weekend and then leave! Yikes!

So today is more of a confession blog. Ready? Here it goes:

I CAN'T DO LIQUID DIETS!!!!!!

I just can't...not when it's not a physical necessity. After my lap-band I had to be on a liquid diet for recovery and I did fine, because:
a.) I wasn't hungry
b.) Even if I was, I knew I was healing and the thought of putting food down there scared me
c.) I was asleep most of the time from the pain meds that I didn't really have time to sit around and think about food

But pre-op, when it is not exactly physically necessary and I DO have all day to sit around thinking about how hungry I am and all the food I'm not eating--that just flat out sucks! I tried, I really did, but I give up! I am going to follow Dr. Keshishian's plan which is only 2 days of a pre-op liquid diet. However I'm not stuffing my face until then either. I am having MOSTLY liquids all day, and then maybe one small actual meal that doesn't consist of a lot of meat or carbs or sugars.

I feel kind of like a failure :( I know others of you are doing your liquid diet just fine and sticking to it. I am embarrassed to admit this to you especially since there is no excuse why you could do it and I can't. But I'm still losing weight so my kidney will be in good shape, I'm still cutting out intestinal clogging foods so I'll be all clean for surgery. And by allowing myself a small meal once a day, I will also not go insane. So this just works for me. I applaud and admire those of you who can do the pre-op diets and survive.

I did try a new protein drink yesterday:

OH YEAH COOKIES & CREAM!

I think my review is biased because by the time I had this yesterday I was in a foul mood and the last thing in the world that I wanted was a protein shake. So I made faces, made gagging sounds, stuck my tongue out- generally acted like a child over it. In reality, looking back, it wasn't so completely horrible. I do like the chocolate flavor better, but if you like less chocolate and more vanilla you might like this one. The thickness still gets me a little, but I'm trying to get used to it. Maybe when I'm making my own shakes w/skim milk it won't be as bad.

Thanks for reading :) Until tomorrow...

...7...

ONE WEEK!!!!!! Oh wow, just one more week from today and I will be switched! This crap-band will be out of me and I will be on my way to a new and healthy life! I am so excited!

I've started up my full liquid diet again. So far it's not awful. I'm kind of combining a bunch of different diets from different surgeons since my center doesn't have a DS specific one. Right now I'm following Dr. K's pre-op liquid diet since it seems to be pretty open. I can pretty much have anything as long as I don't have to chew it. I haven't had a protein shake yet today, but when I do I'll review it on here :)

7 little days is all that's left! I've gotten more accomplished so I'm starting to feel better. I still feel like I have a lot to do, but the list is dwindling.

Today was a bit of a shock though- my surgeon's office gave me a prescription for a bowel prep prescription. She said I could take that or drink a bottle of magnesium citrate, but I figured pills might be better than that nasty liquid stuff. Ha- my prescription cost me $40!!!! A bottle of magnesium citrate is only like $3! FRICK! And I have to take them every 15 minutes! There are 32 of them! I am going to be living in the bathroom the day before surgery I swear! Should help me drop a few lbs pre-op though :)

Ok so what is left to do?

*Get a cheap used recliner off Craigslist

*Order SpongeBob pillow to help recover faster (it will!)

*Finish all laundry

*Call office to ask about bowel prep pills and how many/often to take

*Call hospital to get copy of blood labs

*Pay surgeon's fees

*Pay hospital's fees

*Finish making ICE folder

*Pack hospital bag

I think that's it! I can do this :) No sweat Ace!

...8...

Ok I'm caught up :) That was fast! My schedule is all honked up since I've got SO much going on. I almost forgot I had to work today, lol. We got new schedules and it's completely crazy and makes it sort of hard to pre-plan anything. The good news is that I had a 3 day weekend this last weekend and thanks to the new schedule at work I'll have 3 day weekend this upcoming weekend, and then the next day I'll be off for surgery for a couple weeks! Yay :) So I should have a pretty chill week if I can force myself to calm the eff down. Gooosfraba!!

I made taco muffins for dinner last night and was going to post a picture for you all but they were gobbled up so fast I didn't even get a chance! They were super yummy and so much fun!! :)

One week from today I will be sitting on the toilet all day "prepping" for surgery the next day! OMG! I can't believe it's almost here! AHH!

...9...

Well I fail at math. Monday is 9 days, not Sunday. Oh well :) And I was super busy so I missed a couple days of posting. Everything is going good though- just dotting "i's" and crossing "t's." I decided to draw up a living will and appoint a power of attorney. It just makes me feel better knowing that everything is taken care of should the worst happen.

I am going to keep this one short, I have catching up to do!