Busted! And thank you to Sarah.

Those of you who are "friends" with me on FaceB00k will have seen this already, but I want to share it here too. It's a little conversation I had with my darling boy (aged 3 years and 1 month); it went like this

Arthur: 'I want a Mummy biscuit.'
Me: 'What's a Mummy biscuit?'
Arthur: 'It's got chocolate on it.'

Totally busted.

(But don't lecture me on setting a bad example to my child. No doubt there are plenty of other things I do that are even worse and he's destined to be a chocolate-eating sociopath/psycopath with no teeth.)

And talking of being busted, here's a very pertinent comment that Sarah left after my last post where I moaned about not being able to eat (enough) 'proper' food and turning to sliders (ie chocolate) instead:

"Are you eating the chocolate because you can't eat anything else or telling yourself you can't eat anything else so you can eat the chocolate?"

And, do you know what, that hadn't even occured to me. Talk about a lightbulb moment. Ever since I read Sarah's comment I've been making much more of an effort to eat 'proper' food, and actually think about what/how I'm eating rather than simply turning to the chocolate because I expect to have an issue and therefore think it's not even worth trying. And as a result, I ate some fish for dinner on Monday evening, 3/4 of a cheese sandwich for lunch yesterday, and half a pepper, cheese, ham and onion omelette for dinner last night. And I ate a LOT less chocolate as a result.

Sometimes I wonder about where my band brain has gone!

Confused. Sometimes Frustrated

My band is frustrating me at the moment. It seems to have gone into 'too tight' mode again; or at least what I consider to be 'too tight'. It's not so bad that I can't still eat and/or drink. It fact it's not so bad that I can't even do both at the same time (if I'm very careful.) It's just that it feels that I've slipped into that mode of not being able to eat enough of the good foods and therefore I'm supplementing my intake with sliders (mostly in the form of chocolate.)

Is this just wishful thinking: what I'd like to be able to do is eat more of what I consider to be 'proper' food - you know, fruit, veg, meat, everyday foods - in order to get some more nutrients/goodness in my system, and in the hope that it will stop me eating so much crapola. But, is it wishful thinking? If I have a very small unfill, will I eat more good things, or simply eat even more crapola? Dare I take the chance?! The last time I had an unfill, when things had got really, really tight, I went crazy in the eating department and managed to gain 24lbs in about 12 weeks. That. Is. Not. Good.

However, the other thing that is frustrating me is that depsite having good (or is it too much?) restriction, I've only managed to shed 6 of those pesky 24lbs since my fill in January.

So, I can't eat much regular food; I supplement it with bad food; therefore I still consume too many calories; therefore I shed the pounds. What to do?

But in happier news, which makes me wonder if all my moaning above is pointless, when I weighed this morning I did see a new (second time around) low of

13st 10lbs - 192lbs - BMI 31.9

(a total loss so far of 70lbs - 24lbs to go)

And this is what makes me confused. Because right now, having seen this weight, I will think to myself 'Yay, that's the whole point of this band thing - you eat less, you lose some weight', but the next time I'm struggling over a few mouthfuls of something that I really want to be able to enjoy (ie dinner, most nights) I'll be thinking 'Is it worth it? I just want to eat some food and enjoy it'. Gaaaaaaaah!

Woop Woop! And Tina is a Genius.

At last, at last, at last, at last. Another 1lb gone.

13st 11lbs - 193lbs - BMI 32.1
(a total loss so far of 69lbs - 25lbs to go)

I think what may have helped is cutting down on the coffee. I've gone down from three or four mugs a day to one or two. It's not that my coffee itself was loaded with calories, since I only drink it with the addition of a little skimmed milk, but what was going on alongside the coffee - ie, the biscuit-shaped accompaniment to that steaming hot mug of Joe. It is nigh-on impossible to drink a cup of coffee without eating a biscuit (or three, or perhaps enjoying a slice of cake or some chocolate) at the same time, isn't it? Or is that just me?! Anyway, I'm wondering if cutting down on this little habit of coffee + sweet snack is what has helped with finally shifting another pound?

Tina over at Losing It actually made this suggestion to me in a comment on one of my previous posts where I talked about coming to terms with staying at (or around) this weight and being satisfied with it. She mentioned that perhaps I could just change one little thing and see what happened - here's part of what she said:

"What is one thing you can change tomorrow? You don't have to give the cookies, cakes or coffee up yet..just cut back one this next week-one cookie less per day or one coffee less or one walk more..something like that. Give it a week and see if it helps."

Tina, you are a genius!

(And, believe it or not, the heartburn helped too, or else I might never have been moved to cut down on the coffee. Perhaps it was a sign from the Band Gods.)

Not So Bad

It seems cutting back on the old coffee-ola seems to have done the trick with subduing the heartburn (touch wood.) After Alison commented that strong coffee but not lattes give her heartburn I decided to make my coffee with a slightly smaller scoop than usual (rather than the Mt Everest style heap I usually throw in the cafetiere) and add more milk. So far, so good. Phew; I'm very glad, cos giving up the old Java Joe would have made me v. sad.

In other news, the pesky scales are still stuck on 13st 13lbs or 13st 12lbs. Ho hum. Still, as hubby pointed out at least I'm able to sit with him and Arthur and eat breakfast, lunch and dinner (albeit small portions) which I really struggled to do when my band had got super tight. You win some, you lose some (or don't lose some)!

Hope you are all keeping well out there in Banded Blog Land. I read Steph's post about how so many of us are falling of the blogwagon - perhaps it's difficult when we are this far into the journey to be blogging 'I lost a pound, I put it back on, I stayed the same' whereas previously it might have been 'yaaay, my new lowest low' or 'NSV' or 'I reached goal' on an almost daily basis. I also sometimes feel that I'm under pressure to blog for fear of falling out of the blog loop, or being forgotten about; I don't want either of those things to happen, but I also don't want the blog to feel like a millstone round my neck whereby I feel guilty if I haven't updated in a while. I also have another blog (which I'd started waaaay before the band blog) which I have to update so that keeps me blogging busy. It's tricky, and I sure don't have the answer.

Heartburn Heartbreak

A little update on the heartburn situation; it would seem that coffee is the culprit (although there may be other things that will set it off that I've not yet identified). And that is more than a little heartbreaking. I LOVE my coffee, and usually drink 3 or 4 large cups a day. I get all excited when I see Starbucks and really enjoy sipping on a caramel mocha. So, I've cut my coffee consumption to one mug a day, and that is generally sipped slowly over the course of the morning (with many visits to the microwave to reheat it in between - nice...)

So, I'm going to give it a little longer and if things don't improve then I guess I'll be heading back to the surgeon for a(nother) little unfill. Bah.

Heartburn

I seem to be suffering from heartburn, again. The last time I had this was back in August/September last year when my band was really much too tight. Then I had the unfill from heaven, the day before B00Bs, and all was good in the world. Since that unfill I've had two 0.5ml top-ups, which has taken me to 8mls in a 10ml band. That's still 1ml lower than where I was in August/Sept when the terrible heartburn started plaguing me.

Anyway, what I wanted to ask was - if you are banded and you get heartburn, is it right to assume that it is caused by the band? Does anyone else who believes their band to be at a good level of fill (ie not too tight) suffer from heartburn?

I know coffee can be a trigger, but I'm not sure I can give it up. (And don't ask me to give up the chocolate either...)

Just to Confirm

A little thought snuck into my head that some readers might think that my post yesterday was a little bit down-in-the-dumps or whingey. I just wanted to say that it wasn't meant to sound that way, if anyone did read it like that. It was just a sort of means of saying to myself

'This is where I am, so get used to it or do something about it'

Getting used to weighing just under 14st (somewhere around 194-196lbs) certainly isn't such a bad thing when you consider where I started (18st 10lbs/262lbs); I think it's just that having been as low as 12st 6lbs (174lbs), being a bit heavier is a little disappointing. Although I have to remember that getting down to 174lbs involved eating almost nothing and having constant heartburn for about a month because my band was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too tight. Right now I'm eating regular food in small portions, which is where I want to be because I don't want my little boy looking at me and thinking 'Why doesn't mummy eat anything?' when we sit down to breakfast, lunch or dinner together.

Looking back at my blog to the first time I reached 14st (18 February 2011) I can see how happy I was, so I need to regain some of that feeling and be grateful to have come this far. How can I not be happy at having lost 5st?!