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svetlanabelikova · 4 years

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JOURNALING V

content warning:

weight loss/talking about weight

medical/surgical discussions

it has been awhile since i updated anyone casually interested in this part of my life, hasn’t it.

well, part of that is b/c i’ve been busy. holidays and everything, also i’ve started a work out routine, but i’ll get into that in a moment. also i didn’t have any doctor appointments for like, literally 3 weeks straight, which was nice. much better than speed running it like i had been.

today is 11.11.19, (make a wish if you believe in that sort of thing) and i’ve decided i no longer want surgery.

let me back up here.

so, let me re-read my last post just to remember what i need to fill in... ah yes, the fun i had w/ the x-ray. that feels like it happened months and months ago.

well, since then , i’ve been trying to get my life a lot more organized. i’ve started a (bullet) journal (mostly b/c i love watching the aesthetic set-up videos on youtube) and in it have been tracking my progress by the numbers. for the first few weeks of trying to lose weight, i was weighing myself every other day, sometimes more than that. i became obsessive and felt like the numbers weren’t enough. i wasn’t losing enough and one weekend i had gained back like 1.7 lbs or something. but seeing any increase in the numbers upset me. even though when we are talking about 1 or 2 pounds in someone that’s got over 300 of them, it isn’t the same as if someone is more like a buck fifty.

being able to put it down somewhere physical and then keep a log so i can see the numbers adding up or going down in a catalog has been very helpful for my mental health. having just the numbers on a paper has allowed me to watch my weight go from 349 in the beginning of october to where it currently is (or was as of 11.6 i only weigh myself every other wednesday. why wednesday and why every other week, i don’t know. it just seemed like more than once a month but less than every week. a good distance between not enough and too much) which is 329 lbs.

when put to paper, 20 pounds in a month is, i think, great. i know everyone says “oh the first 10-12 pounds comes off so easily!” but not from where i’m standing. i have been working for those 20 pounds.

speaking of working, let’s dig into that piece of proverbial pie i teased earlier.

i have a work-out routine. which is the first time i’ve said that in,,, probably ever. i know while in school i technically had one in p.e. class but let’s be honest. i did not give it my all and would take any opportunity to skip if i could. now it is just me, alone w/ my dark synthwave music and the pedometer built into pokemon go.

yeah, i could download a real work-out app that would track this stuff for me, but my phone’s memory is full to bursting and listen, i need to walk my buddy and eggs. i’ve got friends on pokemon go that need gifts and it is already built-in w/ this new adventure sync, so might as well use what i have.

so, i work out every monday, wednesday and friday night. i usually leave the house a little before 9pm and try to be back a little after 10pm. just about an hour. in that hour i walk down my street (which is pretty long imo), around the corner to the pokestop at the park, around the park, back down my street and return home. in the beginning i just walked around my street, or just to the stop (which is 0.7km from my front door) but as i’ve built up stamina, i’ve been able to walk all the way around the park. actually my goal for november, is to start walking around the park twice a night, at least once a week.

on average it is about 3,400 steps(or roughly 3.5 kms) and an hour of activity, 3 nights a week. i doesn’t seem like a lot but:

1. it is an hour of cardio every other day that i was not doing before, and 2. additional movement that adds up

i walked a combined 40,881 steps in october 2019 while working out. that is on top of whatever else i did while shopping or playing w/ the kids or what have you.

and i plan to add more. i found a great video on youtube that is all about basic, beginner yoga for curvy people. the instructor talks about doing yoga to your size and abilities and not letting anyone tell you that you can’t do yoga b/c you’re fat. i don’t buy into the idea that yoga can directly help you loose large amounts of weight, but what it will do is help build up muscle in my legs and relieve tension in my back, which will then allow me to walk longer and w/ less pain. after forty minutes or so of fast walking, my knee starts to scream and my back burns. hopefully by adding in this yoga that concentrates on thighs, calves and back, where most big people have issues, it will help me target issue areas, deal w/ them in a low-impact way, then save energy and build up stamina to push myself in other ways.

i also want to eventually start adding weight training into my work-out routine. gods, it still sounds so bougee to say i have a ‘work out routine’, but there you have it.

i’ve also begun to overhaul my eating habits. for breakfast, 6 days a week, i have a protein shake. water and soy milk mixed w/ a plant-based protein powder and an additive of instant coffee. sugar free, dairy free. and awful. i hate them. i’ve tried a few different ones and they are all fucking awful, but i drink them anyway.

i also usually eat a salad or soup for lunch. i’ve been finding a lot of really great salad combinations on top of rediscovering my love of salads. when i first went vegetarian, i was big into salads but eventually, it became easier to buy those premade, frozen veggie-friendly meals. like all that Amys’ food or the MorningStar brand (which still conjures ideas of satan-worshipping vegans, but hey, i can dig it). i’m trying to find pre-paired salad meals. i found this really good asian inspired salad that had friend wonton strips and a wonderful sesame seed sauce. so good. each bag can make 3 lunches for me, so it is great to stretch them out. also did you know that most cans of soup are technically 2 servings? i didn’t.

that was probably my biggest problem w/ food that i’ve addressed: what constitutes an actual serving size?

before last month, i assumed a serving size was what looked right. like in the case of the soup, i assumed if it all fit in a soup bowl, it was 1 serving. 1 can of soup can fit in 1 soup bowl so it would make sense, right? nope. 1 serving of canned soup is actually about half the can or roughly 1 cup of liquid. which doesn’t seem like a lot.

so i’ve stuck to salads. 2 and a half cups of salad is like, i don’t know, 35 cal. so, i can go hog wild, prepare a giant ramen bowl full of salad w/ carrots, onions, a sprinkle of slivered almonds, a splash of lite raspberry vinaigrette, and some sliced, uncured ham and that is lunch, baby!

dinner is pretty untouched, other than i eat on children’s plates now. i heard somewhere from some dietian on a show or something that eat on smaller plates, like children’s plates, helps trick your mind that you are eating more than you actually are. your eyes see a plate full up w/ food rather than eating a little food on a large plate, it is the same amount of “little food” but looks more filling on a little plate. i don’t know if it is true, but i feel like it helps me portion food out better. if a helping of potatoes can’t fit in the little sectioned off children’s plates, it is probably too much potatoes. rip

dessert has been downsized, if i have it at all. 3 thin oreos rather than like, a bowl of cereal. a 1/4 of soy ice cream rather than however much i can pile into a small bowl.

so that is the update: breakfast is a protein shake lunch is soup or salad dinner is served on a child’s plate dessert is 3 thin oreos.

maybe this week i will start keeping a calorie count, just to get an idea of what my average is compared to the 2,000 cal/day suggestion.

ok, so that was already a lot, but i did mention that i had suddenly taken a large left turn when it came to the surgery. my last journal update was all about how i was excited to blind, no walkthrough, speedrun this so i could get cleared for the surgery on like january 1, 2020. well, ha ha, nevermind.

this latest class i went to was enlightening. i mean they all have been so far, for different reasons and in different ways. the first class was about what kind of choices we had. did we want to take mediation? did we want to go to food addicts anonymous? did we want surgery? so this new class i went to on 11.7, was a follow-up to the surgical path.

i was already on the fence about disfiguring my insides. the idea of slicing off 2/3 my stomach rearranging my intestines already sounds horrifyingly frankenstineian to me. it sounds like something midevil doctors would come up w/ while snorting morphine or something. but, i was assured that it was the best option, that it was incredibly safe, it was done all the time, it had great success, etc.

i allowed myself to be talked into it. i relented and bought into the dream they were spinning for me.

not after this class. the amount of insanity that is involved, even beyond, again, the whole cutting off and throwing away 2/3 of your stomach, there is some buck wild rules you have to abide after the surgery. i wrote them down (which i was the only one that did. in a class of 9-10 people, i was the only person taking notes and the only person horrified by what i was hearing):

- lose hair first 3-9 months (me, a person w/ thin hair: oh yikes) - will need to take as many as 12 vitamins a day (me, a person that hates taking any medication) - will not be able to take any medication other than liquid/pills will pass thru tiny stomach too fast to be effective (me, a person that hates liquid medication w/ a passion), only tylenol allowed; all medication from doctors must be liquid or chewable - 70% of patients need a follow-up surgery (WHAT) - no smoking (that’s fine) no alcohol (hang on....) after surgery. ever - ideal meals after surgery: 60-100g protein, 40-80g produce, no carbs, no sugar (wait...) - eat a meal every 4 hr.s or so (that seems like overkill) - no carbonated drinks, no drinks w/ sugar/cal (but i love my fizzy drinks :c this is bullshit) - chew each bite 20-30 times, every meal should last a half hour (that’s normal for me anyway, i’m a slow eater but idk how i’m supposed to chew soup 20-30 times) - 30 min.s of activity/day (got that covered, chief) - go to support groups (no thanks, don’t wanna listen to other ppl complain and the idea of being open to other ppl,,, in real life, where they can see me? absolutely not, how dare you) - 64oz of liquid/day (is that not normal? i already drink that much, if not more) - only able to drink a shotglass amount of liquid at a time or risk vomiting (WAIT) - drink every 15 min.s, possibly even during the night (HANG ON) - no drinks w/ meals, stop drinking about 30 min.s before meal and don’t resume until 30 min.s after meal otherwise it will wash food away too quickly to be absorbed by tiny stomach (HOLD THE HECKIN’ PHONE)

at w/ that, the instructor ended the class b/c there were no questions. i was in shock. all i wanted to do was be like those tik tok kids that recreate meme images but i wanted to become the living embodiment of this gif:

literally, i looked over at my mom, who was sipping on a soda and scrolling through facebook for most of the class and went “nevermind, i don’t want surgery”.

i think she thought i was joking. she laughed and waved it off, but the... the existential dread i felt in that moment. this,,,, this was what old howard was shooting for when he wrote about all that cosmic horror. this feeling that i was the only one seeing the insanity in that classroom.... i was the only one that realized that it was madness. how would a person drink 64oz od liquid a day, broken down into 1oz at a time, but not w/n an hour of eating and also having to eat every four hours. that means you’d have to somehow shove 64oz, broken down to 4oz an hour, for 3 hours, then not drink anything for an hour, over only 16 hours. you couldn’t drink anything for 4 of those hours while you eat your tiny baby meals for your tiny baby stomach. i’m not great at math but it doesn’t seem physically possible to me and yet everyone in the class were just nodding their heads like “yes, of course old chap. perfectly reasonable.”

i’d rather continue to starve myself, and work-out. theoretically, if i continue to lose about 20 pounds a month, i will lose my goal weight by may 2020. sure it would be faster w/ surgery. it might be technically easier w/ surgery but everything in my mind tells me that the surgery is wrong. that it isn’t sustainable. i don’t want this surgery and i certainly don’t want the second stage of this surgery 10 yr.s down the road. if you think cutting 2/3 of your stomach out is upsetting, the image of the second step surgery in which they take that rough banana shape of a stomach and stretch it out into what is effectively, A STRAW.

A STRAW.

and once more: A STRAW!!

i could get behind having a banana-shaped stomach, but a straw in which the food literally just,,, falls through you is grotesque.

gonna be a big, fatty NOPE from me, chief. hard pass.

#;journaling series #personal

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