Post-Op Week 93: It Messes With Your Mind

Slow and steady wins the race, right?   This week I went veggie heavy and it seems to have paid off.  So I’ll be doing that again this week too.  I really like how I feel when I eat veggies, so this will be something that I continue to do.

Things at work are starting to slow down just a little, so I’m looking forward to being able to spend time at the pool and slowly get back into a fitness routine.  I want to get back down to the lowest weight I have been during this whole process by the time I see my surgeon again in July for my 2-year follow up appointment.  I think it is possible since it is 11 pounds away.  It will be tough, but I think I can do it.  Or at the very least, I can get awfully damn close to it.

I’m also starting to think about new goals to set for myself.  For example, next Memorial Day weekend, I would like to participate in the Carry the Load walk in Dallas.  It’s a walk that benefits a foundation that assists veterans, first responders and their families.  I want to do more things like that when I can.  But I also want to be in good shape when I do it too.

This week, I’m prepping roast broccoli, pesto roasted potatoes, cumin roasted carrots, and sauteed peas and carrots to eat.  I’ve also got some strawberries to snack on, and some asparagus to eat with my dinners this week.  I’ve planned to pack a salad for two lunches this week as well.  I’m not going full on vegetarian, but I do like how eating more plants makes me feel.

I was thinking the other day about what I had eaten for the day, and I worried that I’d eaten too much.  Then I realized that the sum total of what I generally eat in one day is what some people eat at one sitting.

It blows my mind that what I eat in one whole day, I used to be able to eat all at once.  And then have room for more.

This is a complete and total mindfuck, and no one ever tells you that pre-op.  NO ONE.

There are so many moments like this, and you don’t realize it until you’re firmly entrenched in the life that besides cutting out most of your stomach, you’ve also permanently altered your thinking about what you eat, when you eat, how you eat, and how much you eat.  It’s like thinking about eating becomes front and center in your mind, even though you may have never intended for it to be.  Yet there it is:  what are you having for breakfast?  When are you having lunch?  How much protein did you pack with you today?  What time is dinner?  Did you make breakfast for tomorrow yet?  There are days I feel consumed by food, and I really, really hate it.   I also feel like my perception of food has been grossly distorted, just as my perception of my self has become distorted.

And I worry that I will never be whatever normal is.  I worry that I will never experience what normal is supposed to be.

Whatever that is.