BurgundyBoy

@Nana Trish Your husband must be wondering what wonderful karma led to this skinny woman moving in with him! Astounding differences in your current and past photos. Just astounding.

@Kio I think you are on to something here.... am going to try diced bacon bits in yogurt.

@Felicite Greetings! and look forward to your posts!

So, it turns out about 20% of people after WLS end up with much lower heart rates. I was in an hotel about 6 months ago and measured my pulse before arising, and it was 42... I thought I was going to die or something. I've always been pretty fit even when fat but this flipped me out. Turns out the medical literature is full of this. It is almost never clinically significant, just means our hearts are happy they don't have to work so hard to pump the blood around.

@Cardamom77 you just have to add the toenail painting to the NSV chain! Congratulations are so in order. Do you have any kind of health stories as well, like lower this or that, or medicines you have thrown out? and I love it when one of us is not recognized!

@NerdyToothpick It's the Demons. Personally, I would arrange for an exorcism. My understanding is that the Pre-Exorcism diet includes protein, few carbs, not much salt, and some form of Expulsionary Exercise. (I think the diet is dried crickets or something like that that have been sprinkled with no-salt water). So given the Exorcism there is no reason to increase your protein, lower the carbs, up the exercise and water.

@Lori88 Thanks for the post - good for us to hear about how the Adults maintain themselves.

Yup. With me, my sleep apnea had worsened before my surgery and I was waking up every night with a racing heart, no doubt because before I had awoken I had been apneic. All gone as the weight went away...

Great pics, and even better story!

Hi @AustinJ sorry to miss the recent post, been on/off the Forum with work. What outstanding loss and progress you have made. Your joints and body parts must be hollering with joy as they carry so much less! Not meaning to pry, but am guessing you also have a blood pressure that is a lot lower too? Health is not just a lower weight, it's all the other stuff that comes with it! I had a DEXA scan back in January that said I was 25% fat - "dead normal" they said for my age. I think they are very useful to get some perspective on one's status. There is so much mental baggage we carry around body image that we can be misled about what is healthy and what is not.

Hi @EmmaNoel I missed this thread last month, apologies - you are looking great and you have been really successful. I'm a few months ahead of you in the WLS game... finding that if i DO go off my diet, I can regain my equilibrium with a few days of keeping to the basics - low carbs, lots of fluids, some exercise and high protein. Sometimes after travel abroad I come home up 4 or 5 lbs from when I left (even after as short a period as a week), and I know it has to be mostly water/salt weight, .... and it goes within a few days too. I'm thinking we have the tools to do this maintenance stuff, it only takes a modicrum of mindfulness, checking weight every few days, etc. I think @Res Ipsa's comment from back in April is really valid - this isn't something to overthink, it's just staying on the Yellow Brick Road. (Anything that is as successful as WLS has to be relatively simple). Dealing with weight maintenance now reinforces my belief that 90% of this is in our heads. The anxiety and worry around regaining weight probably consumes more of our thinking than just doing what we need to do to stay on the YBR!

@kristinwitha_k Great photos and you are looking wonderful! What a lovely vacation! (Was in northern Italy August last year... and decided gelato was a protein food . Like you grew somewhat weary of cheese and salami plates at restaurants but that was my choice --- our apartment allowed me to cook up some lentils and other pulses for variety)

Gorgeous! Weather improving here in MetroBoston too and spent part of the morning doing gardening and shrub trimming - feels wonderful!

Hi Jade, I could drive the day after I got home. My pain regimen included acetominophen, a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory (naprosyn), and an opiate. I tried to take the opiate just at night which allowed me to drive during the day. re: returning to work, I was able to do some things the same week and would think two weeks is very reasonable. I had to take more time because a lot of my initial recovery period was also oriented towards physical therapy for my hips and back; I ended up doing exercise of one form or another (principally walking and swimming) for 2 hours a day then.

How long ago did you have surgery? Could you have an adhesion, e.g. some scar tissue formed around your intestines?