They wouldn't have known it was me!

I love butterflys! I took this photo at the Butterfly Enclosure at the Melbourne Zoo. It is one of my favourite places at the Zoo. I am hoping to get a butterfly tattoo when I have recovered from both surgeries. I consider the butterfly a symbol of freedom!

Anyway, what I was going to write about was a little experience I had today when I showed the photo at the start of this blog to two people. I am talking about the photo with me in a green shirt and black skirt. One of the girls who saw the photo has only known me for the past 2 months and the other for the past 2 years. When they saw the photo, both of them said that they wouldn't have known it was me!! I couldn't believe it and had to ask were they telling the truth!! I cringe at those old photos now and don't ever want to look like that again.

Andrew made a comment the other day that I could have become upset about, but he was saying something lovely really. He said that when he looks at those old photos, he can't believe he wanted to be with someone so big. (Before I could get upset....) He then said that it must have been love and that he could see the person I was inside and that is why he was happy to be with someone of my size. I used to wonder also why he (or anyone) would want to be with me being so big. I thought people would be embarressed to be with me! But my lovely Andrew has stood by me the whole time and is so proud of me. He very often tells me what a wonderful job I have done and how wonderful I look now. He doesn't even mind the sagging skin!! But I know he is just as excited as me to see how my body will be without the skin!!

I am still very focused on the surgery and find myself wishing the days to go quickly. I want to know how I will look! I'm still not scared or nervous, just full of excitement and curiosity as to how I will go with the recovery and what I will look like!

I must have patience though....................

The scales have caught up!

This is my darling cat Thomas. He sleeps where ever he chooses. Well, he makes me feel very happy and loved. But something else that has made me happy is the following:

I have written a few times about my feelings towards the scales and not wanting to have too much focus on them. Well, I live by this as much as I can, but I have to admit, that when the scales finally catch up with the hard work I have been doing, it sure feels great!!

This morning the scales have shown a loss of 1.8kg over the past week. I am pretty pleased with that. The weight I am now, puts me so much closer to what I have been aiming for. Since learning I have about 10kg of skin to be taken off, it is easier to see the weight of 80kg very clearly in my future. I had been aiming to be at 90kg for surgery, so that I would come out of it around 80kg. But now, I can see it is possible to be under 90kg for surgery and that excites me a lot!!!

I still want to keep my focus more on how I feel and look and how my clothes fit. Well, today I have walked around on such a high, feeling really good about the looseness of my jeans and the strength I feel in my legs! I managed two good jogs this weekend. I am trying to have at least one 30 minute jog over the weekend, and the other day doing shorter jogs mixed with hill walking. The 30 minutes is getting easier and easier and I am not so tired or sore afterwards.

I have been trying to mix up my exercise and eating to try to keep my body from getting used to how it is now. I tried a lighter day of exercise during the week and then on another day I ate more protein than usual. It seems to have done something!!

I really think it is all about finding what suits your body the best. I also believe that particular task is a life long learning situation. Things are constantly changing, so our routines need to adjust also.

As I say, this time it is for life!

So many thoughts running through my head.........

I have some very different feelings about myself now. I am working hard on believing I can be skinny and that I will be a skinny person. I think that is hard to grasp. I have never been a skinny person!! I won't have a belly sticking out - or hanging down as it does now with the skin!! I will look totally different. I sometimes get the feeling that I am cheating having the surgery, that after 4 weeks away from work, I will come back and people will think I have lost a heap of weight. I will have a shape to my body that wasn't as obvious before. I will need different clothes again. I know I have done the hard work to get to this point, but it just feels like I am having the easy way to get to the shapely me!

But then my thinking switches, and I tell myself that I am shapely already and I have a figure, it is just hidden by the skin. I have to stand or bend in a certain way to see that it is ALL skin. Otherwise you could think it was fat still! But I want to believe the surgeon and live confidently that I have reached this point with all my hard work and determination.

I am more confident to lose these last kgs now, knowing that most of what I see is skin. I don't want to slacken off with my exercise and what I eat because I want to be in tip top shape and come out of the surgery at a great weight!! I can't stop what I am doing anyway, as it is my lifestyle now!! I don't want to make the mistake that it is all finished now and I can go back to old ways. OOOOHHHH Yuk, I don't want the old ways again. I like my new body (except the skin) and I love what my body can now do!! I love that I get itchy feet for the weekend so that I can get out for a run and walk. I love that a complete day for me is one that includes exercise and that I get up at 5.15am during the week to fit the exercise into my day, and I love that I can say no to fatty and sugary foods.

So many people acknowledge that weight loss involves a lot of mental change as well as physical and that is so correct. We get used to knowing ourselves as a certain type of person, with particular things we can or can't do, or will or won't try. That changes so much. Getting used to those changes is part of the battle.

I suppose I have to deal with these things as they arise. I can't predict how I will always feel or respond, as things about me seem to be changing so much and so often.

Well, life is a journey of learning and discovering after all!!

The skin is coming off!!

Yes, that's right, the skin is coming off very soon. I have seen the surgeon and he said I am very ready to have the surgery to remove my excess skin. He has estimated I have about 10kg of skin to be removed!!! The best thing he said to me was I was already a skinny person under the extra skin. He was also very pleased with the muscle tone I have developed. I was just so excited and pleased and oh so many emotions. I had to stop myself from getting teary in his office!

The examination wasn't all that glamorous having to be in the nude with someone prodding and poking the flab that no one usually gets to touch. The skin was being lifted here and there! He first examined me, drew on me with black texta, then wanted to show me in the big full size mirror what he would be doing, and then..................... photos! Photos had to be taken . Oh dear, the room was set up like a proper studio. I tried not to be too embarressed, but I was on such a high hearing him tell me I was ready for this ultimate step in my weight loss, that I didn't worry too much that the photos were being taken.
I will have two operations. The first will take off the skin around my torso. This will be 4 days in hospital and about 4 weeks off work. The second operation will fix up my legs and arms. About the same time in hospital and same time off work. There will be scarring, but I don't mind. I can handle a scar around my body and on legs and arms. I would rather the scar than what I see in the mirror now!!!

I just want to talk about the amazing feeling it is to have my hard work acknowledged by the surgeon. I have had a lot of people tell me how great I look, and what an amazing job I have done, but hearing these things didn't convince me that I had done such an amazing thing. I was just doing what was needed and didn't want to give up!
But now I have had confirmation from the surgeon. Someone who knows what he is talking about, and someone who knows what is needed to have been done before this surgery can be done. And not only hearing that I was ready for the surgery, but that I had great muscle tone under the skin and that I was skinny already. This is all something I have never heard before in my life. I have always been big, right since a child. And now I have a doctor, a surgeon telling me I am skinny!!!! I couldn't wait to get back in my car after the appointment to let all the emotions out. I had a quiet sob on my own before telling Andrew the great news.
When I calculate the 10kg of skin into what I still want to lose, I am left with only 5kg to lose to be at the weight I have been aiming for.
I plan to have the first operation in October, so I am hoping to have 5 kg well and truelly gone by then and I will be at a great weight for surgery. I am just so excited to think it is 5kg!! I have been really angry at the scales lately as they don't move very fast at all. In my mind I still had a lot to lose, but now that I know 10kg of it will only be lost by surgery, I understand my body going slower to lose the weight. I know I have been getting fitter and my clothes continue to get too big for me, but the scales haven't taken much notice of those changes!! So now I am really convinced that the scales don't mean too much!!
I am still feeling quite overwhelmed by it all, and maybe when I have actually booked in and have my date in October, it will sink in more. But for now, I am enjoying the thought of being a skinny person!!!!

If you would like to ask me any questions about the surgery or anything else for that matter, please feel free to email me - earnold@bigpond.com
I haven't written every detail about the surgery here, but if you are interested in knowing more, just email me!

Oh dear, is this really happening to me!!!!!!

Yippeeee - yes it is!!!!

I ran 4.5km!!!!!!

I can't believe it, I am so amazed at myself. As I have been writing, I have been trying to slowly build up my jogging endurance. I have been doing a gradual 10% increase of time running every week. This morning I had planned on running for 30 minutes. The big one!! This was the time I had been building up to.

I chose an 8.6km track that I had done a few times before. It has a good mix of flat and hills. The first half has the most hills. I set off running, and was feeling pretty good. I got to 20 minutes the easiest yet, so felt confident that I could get to 30 minutes. I was watching my watch and when it reached 30 minutes, I did a yippee and did a bit of a celebration lift of my arms. (Thankfully being 7.30am on a Sunday there wasn't anyone else on the track!!) But I decided I had just made it up the hill so I wanted to enjoy the downward run, so I kept on running. Now I am writing running, but I am talking a slow jog here. I won't be winning any speed races, but I am more interested in my endurance. As the minutes ticked over, I was hoping to get to 40 minutes without stopping. But my knee started to hurt a bit, so I thought that I had better be sensible and I stopped at 38 minutes!!!

I was so proud of myself and I wasn't feeling puffed and thankfully while walking, my knee didn't hurt. So for the rest of the 8.6km I did 7 minute intervals of walking and then running. I fitted 2 more running stints in. I finished the 8.6km in about 75 minutes. My knee hurt for a short while after I got home, but it is fine now.

Later, when I was out in the car, I drove on the track I ran the 38 minutes for and clocked my distance as 4.5km. The 7 minute running distances were around 1km each time. I feel so much more confident that I may be able to do the 5.5km in October for the Melbourne Marathon.

I am so amazed that I can do this. I encourage everyone who has a goal to keep working at it because the feeling of accomplishment when you reach the goal is amazing. I have been on a high all day. When I think 2 1/2 years ago I got puffed drying myself after a shower, I just shake my head at the major changes I have made in my life.

What foods do I eat?

Someone suggested I list the foods I eat now that I am on the Core program.

Firstly I am happy to report that I have enjoyed my first week on Core and have had a better loss according to the scales!!

What I have been eating is fruit, fruit and more fruit!! I have about 4 pieces of fruit, mostly apples and mandarines, and usually a serve of my stewed apples or tin pears for dessert.

For breakfasts I have been following a 5 day plan I had ripped out of the WW magazine. They have been a nice variety. I had weetbix and fruit twice during the week, a morning of cooked tomatoes, mushrooms and WW bacon (was a bit late to work that morning!), a smoothie one morning, and yoghurt and stewed fruit other mornings. I like to save my bread for lunch time usually.

Lunches I have had tuna and tomatoes, smoked salmon in a sandwich with tomato. (l love tomatoes!!), I had soup another day I think. This weekend I have made tomato soup and potato and leek soup for my lunches this week. I usually do my own recipe for soups, but I followed a WW core recipe this time.

Dinners I have had stir frys, plain old meat and 3 veg, pasta dish from a WW core recipe and steamed fish and veges. I did make roast pork last night, but made sure I only had a small amount of meat that didn't look too fatty. I only had 1/2 a roast potato also and then heaps of steamed veges. Dessert has been WW jelly and tinned pears.

Snacks have mostly been fruit and yoghurt. I have had popcorn made in the microwave also. I also have hot chocolates for snacks.

I have used the 21 weekly points for things like WW crispbreads, extra ingredients in my cooking and WW choc chip biscuits. I have tried to limit my sweet snacks so as to really have a good week of healthy foods. I am sure I will have more as the weeks go on though as I do love something sweet.

I'm glad I have had the prompts of the 5 day plan to work from as I wasn't quite sure the first few days and didn't want to stray so early in the week! I have printed off the 4 weeks that the WW site have for their 8 week challenge, so I will use these as my guide over the coming weeks. I don't follow it exactly but pick from different days to suit what I feel like. I didn't like the amount of pasta in the meals as I have really cut back on my pasta and didn't want to eat it as often as the plan said to.

I am going to stick at Core for a while longer I think. I have been keeping my portions as I usually do, maybe even a little smaller, just to give my body a good kick start! I haven't had any major hunger times either.

Its worth having a going with Core.

GP visit and someone didn't recognise me!

I saw my GP this weekend for a few things, and during the visit he took my blood pressure. I was so happy when he told me it was perfect!! He is so pleased with what I have achieved. When I first started my journey, I saw him monthly. He has always accepted me not getting on the scales for him and always happy for me to just tell him how much I had lost. He used to then compare it to something. When I said I had lost about 15kg, he said I had lost a child! Then one day, the amount I said he said I had lost a small gymnast!! An interesting way of looking at it!! I am very fortunate to have a GP who is easy to talk to and that I can trust.

On the way home from the GP, I stopped at the local Farmers Market. Someone who hasn't seen me for about 2 years, but we have had a few phone conversations was there selling her pies. I went up to her and said hello to her using her name. She looked at me vaguely saying "hello, do I know you!!!". I said my name and she almost fell over. She couldn't stop looking up and down at me! She was flabbergasted and said she knew my voice was familiar but she just didn't recognise me! She was quick though to make sure I hadn't been sick but I assured her I had worked hard to achieve this new me!! This is now the 3rd person who hasn't recognised me! It is an amazing feeling and I often wondered if that would ever happen to me. It really gives you a good buzz!