Awesome Shoes and Excellent Clothes

How cute is this dress?  Have you tried bamboo clothes?  So light and soft, it's like wearing nothing.  If your skin felt like super-soft, stretchy bamboo viscose.  But it doesn't .  Go, now and get yourself a cute dress from Organic Bamboo Clothing.  Great for morphing shapes. 

Gah!  Look at these shoes!  So comfortable; so light.  If you're a fan of flexible shoes, you need to know about Merrell's Barefoot collection.  And, you need to go get a pair right now.  Very little cushion between you and the ground but with surprisingly ample arch support.  Odddly, my feet aren't nearly as fatigued as when I wear my 5 Fingers.  Unlike the 5 Fingers, you can wear socks with these.  Unlike the 5 Fingers, you don't look like a dork.  Love these shoes!

Got My Corset Tightened

Goodness.  I got my 3rd fill on Tuesday.  Big difference.  Immediately after the procedure, I had a 20 ounce protein shake that took 20 minutes to drink. 

 

Today, that same drink took over an hour.  I might be a bit swollen and need to take it easy (liquid diet) for a couple of days to see if this more extreme restriction eases up.  Most solids (and some liquids) resulted in productive burping after 2 tablespooons of food.

Fingers crossed that things get more comfortable (but not too comfortable) in the next couple of days.

I'll use this experience to practice the golden rules of successfully banded:

• Small bites, no bigger than a dime.  Put fork down.  Chew.
• Stop eating when you sense the first whisper of fullness.  No need to continue eating past the point of discomfort.

Such foreign concepts, right?  The guzzling and gobbling habits I perfected over the last 43 years will take time to unlearn.  I remain amazed at this tool that's helping me unlearn those habits.

Monday Cycling

Coach says we're taking a tour of the heart rate zones.

Goals

Have You Seen My Body Gallery?

Cool site.  I've been trying to find out what the ideal BMI (24.9 - 18.5) looks like on a 5'6" woman and found this site:  My Body Gallery. 

Fascinating!  140 pounds can look amazingly varied depending on body shape and muscle mass.  Enjoy.

Morning Power Drink - The Pre-Breakfast of Champions

Switching from normal vitamins to liquid vitamins was one of the hardest things about about the band.  Liquid vitamins are caloric, too, adding about and extra 110 calories a day.  Here's how I start each day:

In one 12-ounce glass of water, add:

1 ounce Nature's Source of Life for Women (50 Kcal)
2 heaping teaspoons (1 powdered, 1 not) psyllium husk (25 Kcal)
2 tablespoons Floradix Cal/Mag (60 Kcal)
1 teaspoon Nordic Naturals Omega 3D fish oil (45 Kcal)
Juice of one small lemon (improves the flavor of all the above)

Swirl it all together with a fork and gulp it down before the psyllium husk coagullates into a gel.  Mmm good.

2nd Fill...Wearing Off!

Isn't that an icky picture?  It's what it feel like when the fill-induced satiety and meal satisfaction wears off.  Like slipping down into a hunger hole.

Glad I though ahead to make an appointment for my 3rd fill next Monday.  I'm noticing a rapid change from just two days ago: 

1. My morning hunger has returned in a big way,
2. The sausage link and tofo scramble, which was about 1 & 1/2 cups didn't leave me feeling full or satisfied.  I definitley could have kept eating.
3. The sausage link had no problems going down.  This type of meat would have been a problem last week.

So..strategy time.  I may be white-knuckling it a bit until next Monday.  I'll try to up my protein, make sure I'm keeping liquids and solids seperate at meal time, and track, track, track to those blindly eaten snacky bites don't start adding up.

Neat Book: BandWagon by Jean McMillan

Just read a Jean McMillian's great book on strategies for success with the adjustable gastric band.  Her thorough, friendly style of writing was comforting and informative.  Jean's ability to add perspective of the early part of the banding process (surgery through the first couple of fills) and keeping the big picture in mind is particuly helpful. I plan on reading the rest of the book in the bathtub tonigt.



Dinner

Asian veggie burger bowl.  All but 4 bites came home with me.

Today's Strategy: Eat Breakfast Like a King and Dinner Like a Pauper

Yesterday I ate lightly at the beginning and finished the day by eating, in 3 hours, more calories than I had in the first 8 hours.  I woke this morning with NO hunger and am still feeling too stuffed to try my usual fiber and vitamin waker-upper. 

Reverse strategy today:  More protein and calories in the AM vs the PM.

5am:  Coffee
7:30: Lightly hungry.  Steak and pasta:  350 Kcal, 18 protein
8:30:  8 oz water
9:30:  8 oz water
10:45:  Hungry.  Fiber and vitamin drink:  140 Kcal
11:30 8 oz water
1:30:  Hungry.  Steak, artichoke and cottage cheese:  375 Kcal, 25 protein
3:30:  Snacky.  Almond Roca 140 Kcal.
5:30:  Dinner out. Not hungry.  French fries, red wine, salad:  300 Kcal, 3 protein

Kcal:  1305; protein:  46

Tracking Hunger and Fullness Cues Today

7:30:  Not hungry.  Vitamins and fiber drink.  140 Kcal, 0 protein.  8 oz water.  Full.
8:30:  Coffee;  8 oz water.
9:30:  Hungry.  1/2 Artichoke w/lemon & olive oil; Cottage cheese:  295 Kcal, 25 protein.  Full.  Artichoke  feels a little "twisty and turny", but not stuck. 
10:30:  16 oz water
11:45:  Hunting for something sweet.  Not hungry.  Two Sees Truffles:  180 Kcal, 2 protein.
1:30:  Very hungry. Pasta with chicken:  175 Kcals, 10 protein.
1:30:  Small piece of soft pretzel:  50 Kcals.  0 protein.  (Bad idea.  I probably irritated things a bit by challenging my pouch with such a soft, bready bite.  By the second bite, I knew  I shouldn't have had it and greived the loss of not being able to eat any more pretzel.)
2:30:  8 oz water
3:30  Feeling snacky, but not hungry.  Coffee and pumpkin seesds.  285 Kcal, 12 protein
5:30  Almond roca:  70 Kcal
7:00  Steak salad & pasta:  580 Kcal, 32 protein
8:00  Cake:  104

Totals:  Kcal:  1879 and 81 protein

Feeling at the end of the day:  Overfed and overfull.

Full!

Yesterday I felt the lap band advantage with great, satisfying fullness after my 4 small meals and that satiety lasted about 3-4 hours after each meal.  Fantastic!  It's working!  So, I'd going to keep an eye on this fullness/volume/satiety equation over the next couple of weeks and try to pinpoint when it the satiety goes away and the need for volume increased.  I hate elaborate tracking systems so I'll try a post it note and post it here at the end of the day. 

Tuesday Body Pump

60 minutes of circuit weight training.  Done.

The View

Coming back from Bremerton. 

2nd Fill

After white-knuckling the last two and half weeks with hunger (and losing no weight, either..double bonus!) I found out at the bariatric surgeon's office that I didn't have to wait for a whole month for a second fill.  I could have just come in when my hunger told me it was time to get the band refilled.  Ooohhh...  Got it.

I also found out that it'll take 3-5 fills before I really feel the full effects of how this band works.  Apparently, it takes multiple fills to fill up all the nooks and crannies of the band before it's full enough to begin constricting between the stomach and the upper pouch.  Ooohhhh... Got it.  Good to know.  I was having visions of being the first band patient that always felt hungry with their band. 

So, two down, and let's figure two more to go before we get some really serious satiety out of a cup or two of food.

Now, I must have read about needing multiple fills before maximum satiety hits and that you can go in more often than once a month for fills if you need, but boy, I sure don't remember it.  I'm also likely one of those people who has to live it to understand it.  Damn dominant kinesthetic learning style.  It's all words and theory until I live it.

Onward with living...

Interesting Study on Food Addiction

Context  Research has implicated an addictive process in the development and maintenance of obesity. Although parallels in neural functioning between obesity and substance dependence have been found, to our knowledge, no studies have examined the neural correlates of addictive-like eating behavior.


Objective  To test the hypothesis that elevated "food addiction" scores are associated with similar patterns of neural activation as substance dependence.


Conclusions  Similar patterns of neural activation are implicated in addictive-like eating behavior and substance dependence: elevated activation in reward circuitry in response to food cues and reduced activation of inhibitory regions in response to food intake.

http://archpsyc.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/short/archgenpsychiatry.2011.32

I have activation in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the caudate in response to anticipated receipt of these gummy Japanese candies:

Two 20 Minute Walks

I had a tight schedule today but managed to get in two brisk 20 minute walks in two of the most beautiful neighborhoods of Seattle:  Queen Anne and Capitol Hill.    Here are the cherry blossoms on Capitol Hill.

Best breakfast ever!

Artichoke with lemon and olive oil.

Cinnamon Roll Post

Having a lap band that need filling is much like driving a car with a very loose parking brake:  you can drive almost normally with just a little bit of annoying drag.

I tested the theory that white, doughy bread is problematic for a banded pouch.  Not this one.  The medium-sized, house-made roll from Kens Market went down smoothly.  Problem was it was a GD cinnamon roll!

That was at 3:30.  It's. 6:30 now and I'm still not hungry. If that changes later tonight, I'll have a bit of cottage cheese.

Enough experimenting for today.  And enough driving with the parking brake on.

What's Going On.. 7 Weeks Post Surgery/ 2.5 Weeks Post 1st Fill

I've had two cold, back-to-back since the beginning of the month.  This is after a couple of years without a substantial cold and I'm certain it's due to the surgery, subsequent healing and lack of regular supplementation and a decrease in physical activity.  Looking forward to getting firmly back in the wellness saddle very soon.

I'm surprised at how little time I got out of that first fill.  At this point, just 18 days after the first band fill, I'm ravenously hungry between meals and really not feeling very full after a medium-sized meal.  I understand that's to be expected and it'll take 3-4 fills to find the "green zone" (see below)

When there is no restriction between the banded part of  the stomach and the bottom, ALL the habits and urges to overeat during meals, to eat between meals when you're not hungry, and eating at night just to relax come roaring back.  I'm trying to keep a tight lid on it until April 11th when I go back for my second fill.

Returning to Greenlake Nutrition's Women's Emotional Eating group has been helpful.  A new 10-week worshop began this week with this session's theme being:  "Setting Loving Limits".   What a perfect concept to practice while I spend the next two weeks waiting for my next band fill.