Between not eating very much and working out a good amount, I’ve lost a significant amount of weight and inches. What a surprise! *cough*

I should have posted this a couple days ago, but Evan decided to go get himself sick on all those daycare germs, so instead of a romantic dinner with Jason while Evan partied with his buds at Parent’s Night Out, we left work early on Friday and spent a less-relaxing couple of hours in the emergency room with a very unhappy baby who had a 102 fever and a bad cough. Turns out he had an ear infection and a nice cold to go with it, and our romantic dinner reservations were cancelled. No romance for us! So, without further ado, here are my results after one month:

Weight: 228 – down 23 pounds

Measurements:
Neck: so, I magically measured my neck as 4.5 inches last month and didn’t notice, which means this month the Fitbit graph says I gained more than ten inches here. Unless I inherited the Incredible Hulk’s neck overnight… not accurate. We’ll check in here next month.
Bicep: -1 inch
Forearm: -.25 inch
Chest: no change
Waist: -4.5 inches (and you can see a HUGE difference – as Jason said, “Your stomach doesn’t stick out past your boobs anymore!”)
Hips: -3.25 inches
Thighs: -2.5 inches
Calves: no change

Total Inches Lost: 11.5

And I totally reported that measurement as only 9 on Facebook because I was eyeballing it! The Fitbit dashboard, unfortunately, doesn’t have a good way to look at previously logged measurements in a numeric value; they’re just plotted on a graph and you have to hover over each point and see the value. And last night when I entered the values, I couldn’t get the current data point to show up. It shows up today, though, so I got to do real math instead of relying on my (apparently questionable) eyesight.

So, shorter story – great month! The weight loss will slow to a steady 1-3 pounds a week, so next month’s numbers won’t be so dramatic. Then again, I’m working out a lot – more on that in another post – so my loss could continue more rapidly here at the beginning.

Next week’s post-op adventure: my first fill!

Needles and I have a… well, let’s call it an armistice. I know they’re a necessary evil (when you’re pregnant, doctors treat you like a giant pincushion), but I’ve agreed not to loathe them with the fire of a thousand suns if they agree not to poke me on the regular. But – talk about storming the barricade!

As part of my pre-op testing, I had to have no fewer than 30 different fasting blood tests run to be cleared for surgery. What they were all for, I have no idea. But imagine just how much blood has to be drawn to make sure there’s enough blood for all those tests. And because of some inconvenient lab closings ([sarcasm] Thanks, Obama! [/sarcasm]), I was forced to drive to the lab in the basement of the hospital rather than a convenient non-description office or storefront closer to home. I also had to take time off work; I typically schedule appointments like this first thing in the morning before work, but Jason was traveling so I was solo parenting, and Evan also happened to have his one-year well baby exam the same day. So – long lunch break it was.

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In addition to a lingering feeling of despair because I didn’t know how we were going to pay for surgery, I was also sent home from the bariatric surgeon’s office with a list of pre-operative tasks I had to complete before I could even schedule my surgery. I’m fairly Type A about those sorts of things – give me a list or specific instructions and I will follow them to the letter. So in less than two days, I had all my appointments scheduled.

First up – pulmonary testing. I had no idea what this would involve. Would I be hooked up to machines with probes and monitored over time? Would I have to check into the hospital afterward from the strain of the tests? Turns out, none of the above. In fact, checking in at the hospital (where the testing took place in a convenient lab about 20 steps from the lobby) took longer than the actual tests. What were the actual tests? I put a clip on my nose and blew into a tube. And then I sucked air from the tube. And then I blew into the tube again. I went back and forth, doing each thing a couple times while a technician wrote things down and printed out graphs and numeric readings that meant absolutely nothing to me. And my “scary” pulmonary testing was done after a whopping five minutes. Turns out I didn’t need to block out that 90-minute chunk on my work calendar.

Unfortunately, I don’t think all my testing will be this easy. Next up – meeting with the surgeon’s dietician to learn just how awful my eating is now and just how restrictive my diet will be after surgery.