Long time no post......

Opps. I cant believe that I havent posted on here since October. Time just seems to fly by.

So, what have I been up to? Nothing really.

October & November were hard weight loss months, or should I say no weight loss months. I was very bad for about 6-8 weeks where I ate naughty foods & didnt really pay much attention to my weight loss goals. I dont know what happened. Actually no thats not true, I do know what happened. I got off the wagon. Normally at this point on a diet I would start introducing bad foods back into my life as a 'treat'. It would then just spiral out of control from there. I would put back on the weight that I had lost & then some. Thanks to the band though I didnt put any weight on during those bad 2 months. I get really annoyed with myself now because I think if I had just stuck to my routine I would have lost 20kg by now. But I've only lost 14.8kg.

I had a fill about 2 weeks before Christmas. My doctor didnt put too much in because he didnt want me to be uncomfortable over Christmas. It took a couple of days to notice a difference since the fill. A week later I had lost 1.6kg. THANK GOD!!!!

Christmas with the band was great, not eating till I couldnt move was a nice change. I nibbled on a few chips etc before lunch on Christmas day but I didnt pig out as much as I did the previous Christmas. Then for lunch I had a small plate of roast veggies & pork. It was very yummy.

Since Christmas I have been trying to get back into my healthy eating routine. It has been hard at times, the last 3 months have been tough on me emotionally so its been a constant struggle not to run back to fast food etc when I get a bit depressed. Being on a strick budget has helped I think, when ever I feel like McDonalds or something I think about how much its going to cost me, usually then I decide to go home & get something quick out of the freezer instead.

In the next couple of weeks I'm hoping to start to slowly introduce exercise back into my life. I would like to bike or walk around my neighbourhood but am too embarrassed to do that at the moment so I've settled on doing pilates & fit ball exercises at home.

I'm hoping that in the next month I will loose another 5kg so I can finally hit my target of 20kg lost. In the mean time I will settle for having lost 10% of my body weight.

Hard Going

A lot of people think that having lapband surgery is a quick fix. That if you have it done then your just too lazy to lose weight any other way.

Lapband surgery is not a quick fix!!!!!!!

All your over eating demons are still there, the only difference is that you cant eat as much as before. You can still stuff yourself with chocolate & cake if you want. You just cant eat as much as before the surgery.

The past couple of weeks have been a real struggle for me. I'm totally stuffed if I dont have my little routine.

I have become lazy when cooking for myself lately. Usually when I get home from work I'll pop some veggies on the stove to cook while I go get changed & then cook a small piece of chicken or red meat. Lately I've been having take away. Not every day but often enough.

I can't eat as much take away as before my surgery but I can still eat it.

I so desperately want to get back into my routine. I cant afford to eat take away each week for dinner.

Part of my feels like such a failure for slipping back into old habits.

Its been 3 months since my surgery & I've only lost 12kg. On one hand I'm so happy that I've lost some weight, but on the other hand I'm so disappointed that I havent lost more. I thought I would be up to 20kg lost by now.

I have another fill appointment tomorrow. I hope that after the fill tomorrow that I will be at the right point.

PB & Constipation

PB (Productive Burp)

I had my first PB on Monday. I was playing on my laptop & eating some left over chinese food, after I swallowed a piece of chicken I took a sip of orange juice. Ok not a sip more like half a glass. As soon as I swollowed I had major chest pain. I've had food get stuck before so I knew the chest pain was because something was stuck, but this time it was 10 times worse than any chest pain I've had before. I could feel the OJ sitting in my throat. I thought the OJ would come up by itself so I ran to the kitchen sink to make sure I didnt vomite all over the carpet. After about 5 minutes to intense chest pain & no PB I decided that I should make myself vomite. I knew it was the only way to get rid of the pain. I had barely stuck my finger down my throat when up came the OJ. Man oh man what a relief. Its hard to believe that drinking OJ could cause you so much pain. The chest pain was worse than any pain I had after the surgery.

I dont want to have to go through that again. Since then I've been extra careful to chew my food properly before swollowing!!

Constipation

When I was thinking about having lapband surgery I asked one of my Aunts about her experience with lapband surgery. She told me about one of the bad things about the surgery was constipation. I kinda fobbed her off because I had never really dealt with constipation before (I have a mild case of IBS so constipation is never something I've really had to worry about).

Now I wish I had taken her more seriously. The last couple of weeks have been hard for me. I had my sister & Mum stay with me for a week so my little routine went out the window & have been battling with cramps, bloating & constipation.

I have been taking a soluable fibre supplement for about a week now but it doesnt seem to have had much of an affect. Over the weekend it got to the point where I took a laxitive to try to clear my system. The laxitive did work but had me running back & forth to the loo for a couple of hours along with some bad stomach cramps.

Yesterday I looked up constipation on the net to see if I could find a solution. An article that I read on a health website said that a lack of water contributes to constipation.

I've never really been much of a water drinker. I regularly get headaches due to lack of water consumption. So before I take another laxitive I'm going to dramatically increase my water consumption to see if that helps.

Fingers crossed!!!!!

Fill #2

I had my second fill last Monday. I was excited to have a little bit more added to my band to see if that would give me more of a restriction.

I was excited until I sat waiting for my surgeon to finish with his other patients. For some reason I then became very nervous. It had been 4 weeks since my first fill so I was worried that he wouldnt put more fill in my band.

After waiting for about 10 minutes one of the nurses came out & got me & took me to the scales to be weighed. The scales in my surgeons office are usually about 1kg heavier than mine at home. I had forgotten how much I had weighed at the surgeons office when I had my first fill so I was pleased when the nurse told me I had lost about 2kg since my previous appointment.

After waiting for another 10 minutes it was my turn to see the surgeon. After a quick few questions to see how I was going, I jumped up on the table. The surgeon added another 1.5ml to my band. Now I'm up to 7ml.

I was a bit nervous driving home, I was worried that he had put too much in so I wouldnt be able to keep anything down. Luckily I had a bottle of water in my car from earlier that day so I sipped on that a little to make sure I could swollow properly.

Its now been a week since my second fill. I can definatly notice a difference now. I have to be more careful about what I eat so things dont get stuck but thats a small price to pay for weight loss.

Now I can eat about half of what I was after my first fill. I find it amazing that after eating a meal the size of a bread & butter place that I'm full. Its hard to wrap your head around because I find that my head is saying 'thats not enough food, eat more' but my stomach is saying 'your full, no need to eat more'.

I'm sure I'll get use to it.

My 101 in 1001 List

1. Complete CIT Diploma course in Business Administration

2. Consistently lose weight

3. Ride bike around Lake

4. Get meaningful tattoo when reach weight loss goal

5. Get regular facials

6. Get laser hair removal

7. Whiten teeth

8. Give myself a manicure & pedicure every other week

9. Create a more realistic budget & stick to it

10. Go to the movies alone once every 2 months

11. Clean out car weekly

12. Volunteer at the RSPCA

13. Clean out wardrobe regularly & give old clothes to charity

14. Get up early (6:00) & go walking every other day for a month

15. Read a new book each month

16. Take regular pilates classes

17. Donate money every 6 months to a charity close to my heart

18. Buy at least 4 dresses & wear them regularly.

19. Take a girls trip with friends

20. Go away for the weekend by myself to somewhere I've never been

21. Take Sunday drives to small towns around Canberra

22. Go bushwalking

23. Go camping

24. Go to Tasmania

25. Go on a holiday by myself to Canada/America

26. Keep house tidy

27. Organise cupboards/wardrobes

28. Unpack ALL boxes from moving

29. Go through items in storage area & donate anything no longer needed

30. Buy desk for study

31. Buy curtains for bedrooms

32. Buy plants for each room

33. Keep plants alive

34. Plant herb garden in pots

35. Plant veggie garden in pots

36. Buy fresh flowers each week at local markets

37. Make one new recipe every other week

38. Take a cooking class

39. Make a recipe book

40. Eat at a new restaurant every other month

41. Spend all day in pyjamas watching series re-runs four times per year

42. Blog once per week

43. Blog about completed items on this list

44. Take a picture of each completed item (if possible)

45. Go one month with no unnecessary purchases

46. Save 1001 $1 coins in a Jar

47. Learn to play guitar

48. Buy myself something from Tiffany’s

49. Donate a toy under the Wishing Tree each year

50. Host a High Tea for my girlfriends

51. Go on a Haunted Ghost Walk

52. Get my Tarot cards/Future read

53. Spend a weekend at a health spa

54. Get professionally fitted for a bra

55. Get a completely different hair cut

56. Die my hair a completely different colour

57. Negotiate a pay rise

58. Learn how to apply make up properly

59. Buy myself a designer handbag

60. Buy myself a diamond ring

61. Buy a pair of Jimmy Choo shoes

62. Get an iPhone

63. Learn how to take better photographs of my jewellery

64. Create a professional website for my jewellery

65. Join a dating website

66. Visit a image consultant

67. Buy myself a painting from my favourite artist

68. Get paid for cake decorating

69. Buy a puppy

70. Cook one recipe from EVERY cookbook I own

71. Sleep under the star’s

72. Buy myself a decent DSLR camera

73. Have professional photo’s taken of myself

74. Walk along the beach again

75. Visit Diamond Beach

to be continued..........

A new year

Next week I will turn 28 years old. Usually in the past I have freaked out about my up coming birthdays. I would get really down on myself about how nothing much had really changed in the previous 12 months. Normally I am in the same place as I was at my previous birthday.

On my birthday I use to make promises to myself about how this year is going to be different, how the next 12 months arent going to be like the previous 12 months. No matter how many promises I make to myself or how many goals I set for myself, the next 12 months always end up being the same as the previous.

This year is different. I'm not freaking out about turning 28, knowing that in 2 short years I will be 30. Instead this time I'm celebrating that the next 12 months really will be different. I am loosing weight for the first time in a number of years. I feel differently about life. I'm not so scared to try different things, before my weight would hold me back, but more than anything the fear of not succeeding or not being accepted for my decisions has held me back. Having lapband surgery has taught me that I am in control of my own life & my feelings. No one can make me feel like a failure except for myself. If I want to try something new because it interests me then I should instead of worrying about how other people will react or whether I will look fat doing something.

This time next year I will be a better person. I feel like for the first time I have control over my own life. I'm not just coasting through life hoping that something will happen to put me on the right path. Its up to me to take control & steer myself onto the right path.

I feel so much lighter & more positive than I have for a LONG LONG LONG time.

I like this feeling.

Pampering

I've been thinking a lot lately about things have changed over the years.

A few years ago it was nothing for me to give myself a facial, manicure & pedicure each week. Since then its a miracle if you see me with nail polish on.

I try to take care of myself. I get my eye brows waxed once a fortnight & buy Aesop skin care products but the last time I had a facial etc was for my sister's wedding in June 2008.

I suppose the more weight I put on the more I wanted to hide from the world, and the more I didn't feel the need to take better care of myself.

To help my along in my weight loss/new life journey I've decided that I need to set myself one goal a month to achieve.

This month my goal is to give myself a facial, manicure & pedicure once a week. Also, each day I will make sure I moisturise my hands & stop washing the dishes without gloves.

Hopefully the weekly facial will help with my acne too. Even though I always take the time to cleanse, tone & moisture each day, I think my skin will really benefit from a weekly deep clean.

Fingers crossed I achieve my goal this month!!