The WHO has classified Obesity as a disease, a chronic, relapsing disease. It is terrifying the thought that no matter what, one cannot let their guard down - not even for a moment. Too many factors are at play, and weight gain will always be around the corner for me and for millions of others.
The facebook post
There was this post on the facebook support group the other night that scared the living shit out of me: this person was 127kg at their heaviest, reached 70kg after gastric bypass, but after almost two years is now 102kg and is desperate. That is my worst nightmare, and I couldn’t find any advice for them or comforting words to say. It’s so easy to advise somebody to go back to basics and start dieting. After the gastric bypass a weight regain must feel the ultimate of the defeats, the psychological impact must be enormous.
What I felt like replying was to start doing a series of things that… I am attempting to do myself, but I need to work on it in earnest again.
The red flag
Even with the food problem (the fact I cannot basically eat anything) the “bad” things still manage to go down pretty easily. Not as easily as before, thankfully, but still…. I can manage 1 full soya ice cream, or a full soy chocolate pudding - and when I’m hungry and I do want to eat (as opposed to “I’m hungry but I know I’ll eat just 3 bites”) I have two of them. And they go down. Of course, given the high sugar content I then feel dizzy, uncomfortably full, need to lie down and I’m out of sorts for at least one hour.
However, the fact that I have done it raises red flags and alarm bells all over the place. One ice cream every now and then it’s fine, but yesterday I had 3 of them during the day/evening and that’s not something I want to accept.
The food diary
I want to focus even more on what I am eating, ensuring the awareness never slips. I need to write a proper food diary - a “holistic” one though, not just a list.
If you know me, you won’t be surprised to hear I built an awesome spreadsheet for this - one that I can share with both my clinical director, the dietician, and the psychologist.
I want to be able to see the time things happen at, I want to see patterns. I want to see what I eat, and (if not too lazy that day to weigh it) the quantity of what I’m eating (20gr of meat is quite different from 60gr, and they both look pretty small on the plate!). I want to look back and see how my stomach tolerated each food or liquid, and I want to look back and read up how that food or liquid made me feel: happy? Sad?
I intend to use the food diary intensively with the psychologist, it’s all down to the head isn’t it? Well, we’ll see what he thinks of the idea.
Progress
I am still losing weight: I am 88kg, which is amazing. I bought a small little ring ten days ago and I have to go and get it resized as it’s just too big for my finger already (my hands must also have been very warm that day I think). I bought 3 tops and they are UK size 18, and a EU/IT size 46! I’m almost normal. Unreal feeling. I bought them in normal shops, just normal shops - you know, the ones you go to rather than click through!
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