These Are the Pros and Cons of Bypassing

Written around midnight after a really horrific reaction to high fructose corn syrup. I've been pondering this post for a while, particularly as I celebrated my two year post-surgery anniversary on January 20th. A lot has changed over the past two years.

That zombie-like moaning you’re perceiving at the edge of hearing is me, curled in a ball, in agony, having bid a violent farewell to my very healthy dinner—chicken breast, green peas, and brown rice. And Orangina.

Now, when Orangina hit the market a few decades ago, it was billed as an Italian soda. I always found it delicious—tart, slightly sweet, and not terribly fizzy. Post-gastric bypass, that not-fizziness is a good thing. HOWEVER… Orangina is now bottled in the States, and no longer comes in the lovely little dimpled bulbous bottles of my youth. It comes in Americanized soda bottles and is bottled by the Motts Corporation—y’know, the apple sauce people. Well, unbeknownst to me, they put high fructose corn syrup in the fucking Orangina. The label has a blue badge on it with “12% juice, 2% pulp,” creating an illusion that you just might be ingesting something healthy with your fizziness.

Nah.

I read the label AFTER the vomiting started. You’d think you could trust something bottled by the Mott’s people.

Nah.

There happened to be a bottle of their cinnamon apple sauce on the table; I read the label. Sure e-fucking-nough, HFCS. *slams head on the desk* Bastards.

I have written a post before about HFCS; I have called the Corn Growers Association a bunch of cunts. They are, and they’re poisoning us with that shit. I may not be a doctor or a chemist, but y’know, my reconstructed digestive system doesn’t lie. I can’t ingest that crap—I can tell when I’ve taken a large hit of it because I feel pukey—that awful feeling in the back of my throat, it’s like a crawling sensation, the feeling that whatever has gone down is heading back up.

I hate that. I cannot tell you, in any combination of words, how much I hate that. I cannot abide vomiting, and I’ve had to do a lot of it over the past two years because, hey, my new stomach is even fussier and more precious than the old one. The only good thing about throwing up right now is that, because the part of my stomach that produces acid is closed off from the pouch my surgeon created, the food tastes the same as it did going down. NOT a great advantage, but at least I'm not dealing with the burn in my throat from the acid. Just the pain from the heaving.

I don’t know if I’ve blogged about the gastric bypass before. I know I’ve talked about some of the aspects of it, but here, now, just a little over two years later, it seems like a good time to actually talk about it in depth.

I have no regrets about undergoing the surgery; when I first was told that the gastric bypass was the only surgical option—that I had far too much weight to lose for the lap band option (the way my superior surgeon put it is that if it’s 60 lbs or less, it’s about banding. If it’s more than that—and my goal is to lose over time 250 lbs or reach a size 16—it’s the gastric bypass)—I was incredibly depressed. I mean, I felt like a piece of shit. A very fat, very disgusting piece of shit, a complete utter loser, a waste of space on the planet, a piece of human detritus who had nothing to live for and no reason to exist. Fat does that to you. This society has no forgiveness for fat people. I’ve blogged about this before—the societal prejudice against the obese is horrific, and while I understand it, I don’t support it. Like every issue, there are multiple factors involved, and while, yeah, there are some seriously fat, lazy, stupid people out there, obesity is not a simple issue. Our food supply—our poisoned food supply—is at the heart of it. Our laziness as a society is also at the heart of it. And while I do not support the vegans and can never be a vegetarian, I do believe we need to be a hell of a lot more careful about what we put into our bodies, and it’s about fucking time America woke up and demanded the overhaul of the FDA.

Like the rest of our fucking government, those corporate cocksuckers have been bought and sold by the food industry years ago. Think I'm kidding? Do a little research on the rise of obesity, cancer, diabetes, ADD, and ADHD and you will find some very direct correlations with the processed food industry.

But I digress.

Anyway, the months leading up to surgery involved a lot of preparation, education and adjustments. My weight yoyoed ridiculously up and down by about 30 pounds; the only figure that has stuck in my mind is 455, which is what I weighed one week before surgery.
Yeah, you read that right, four hundred and fifty-five pounds. Size 36 or 38W, a 6X.
I don’t weigh that now. I’m still slightly north of 300, but not by much. Surgery, diet and exercise has seen to that. I can actually wear jeans again—size 24W, a size I hadn’t been able to get into in over 20 years.

Seriously.

Friday night, I tried on a bra that was a band size 42. I could get it clasped (and still breathe) without a bra extender. I haven’t been able to do that since high school. Yeah, I’m proud. (I’m still a DD cup, thank the Gods. I love my tits, and while I could bear being a C cup again, I’m happy with the DDs.) This means I can try on my 44 bras and they should fit! Huzzah! This time next year, I’ll be able to go to Victoria’s Secret and successfully shop there. May sound like a silly thing, but that’s going to be my three-year-anniversary treat: a Victoria’s Secret bra. Go me.
Last night, to Jim’s concert, I wore a size 26 shirt. That may not sound like a big thing (well, it IS a big thing, literally), but for someone who couldn’t even get a size 32 button-down shirt closed a few years ago, it’s a fucking miracle. I started cleaning out my fat clothes a couple of weeks ago, and all the size 30 jeans are going to Salvation Army. All the INCREDIBLY fat clothes are already in the bag, and the size 13 and 14 granny panties have been thrown out. I’m wearing a size 11 in undies; one more size to drop, and my shopping options open up immensely.

All of my size 26W jeans are getting loose; they go on tight after the wash, but within a couple of hours of wearing… waistband is loose. And I discovered last night I need to put a couple more holes in my belt.

This is how I’m measuring accomplishments—the size of my clothes. The other way is the extent of my workout in the gym. I found my old gym notebook last week; the diary with the chart I kept when Keith first started training me back in 2002. I can’t tell you folks what it felt like last week to get on to the elliptical and do four minutes and keep up a speed over 3 mph. Two years ago, I couldn’t walk without a cane and couldn’t walk more than a few feet without breaking into a flop sweat and not being able to breathe.

Now… even with two knees that need replacing, I can walk a block without a stick (I took my fancy silver-headed stick to the show the other night, but left it in the car). I can carry, lift, move… I don’t need to fear about being trapped and unable to get to where I need without assistance. All the damage hasn’t been undone, but so much of it is getting better. That’s all I care about.

Last year, my best friend—who hadn’t seen me in three years—couldn’t believe the change. “Oh, my God, Lee, you have a neck again! You have hips!” said to me in a voice filled with wonder. My other best friend, the first time I went up and outpaced her in a walk around Fort Anne… she had been convinced I was going to die if I didn’t go through the surgery (and she was right, to be honest).

I’ve been lucky. I’ve had enormous support from my friends and some of my family. Not everybody gets that.

So far, I’ve talked about the good stuff. Now… the bad stuff. Food is a problem. Food has always been my enemy; as much as I love the taste of good food, I am allergic and sensitive to so much (Christ, I wish I could eat seafood and broccoli and sweet potatoes!) that I never know what’s going to go down and stay, or what’s going to have me bent over and worshipping at the porcelain altar.

It sucks. I can’t eat high sugar or high fat foods, ditto high starch. I miss, miss, miss pasta and rice. Ditto most ice cream, and Ben & Jerry’s and Hagan Daas… *sigh* I kicked the soda habit as part of the prep for surgery, but fuck, I miss Pepsi. I miss Russell Stover Chocolates—just discovered that THEY use HFCS. Shit. I miss fried steak, french fries, potato chips, all that great tasting poisonous shit.

The weirdest thing that’s happened (and I’m feeling a bit strange talking about it) is the change in bowel movements. It used to be ginormous logs; now… well… now… errrrrrrmmm… there have been several occasions when I wanted to go and get my rune dictionary because it looked like I was shitting rune scripts. Seriously. It's utterly gross, but it's also fascinating in a really sick way. Vile. And we won't discuss the stench. You'd think bypassing the stomach acid would make things smell better.

Nah.

The other weird thing is that I can no longer burp like Barney Gumble. No more earth-shattering belches that earned me the respect of immature guys everywhere.

Alcohol… I’m the cheapest date on the planet. The good thing is that I get drunk VERY quickly. I am the only designated driver who can get hammered early in the evening and be sober enough to drive just by having some food, taking a piss, drinking a pint of water, and waiting an hour. For real. I get COMPLETELY faced on a single drink but will be sober within half an hour. And I don't dare drink alcohol without food on my stomach unless I want to turn scarlet and burn up. Stuff goes into me, gets processed immediately, and out it goes. This is how I know it was the HFCS and not the tequila from the night before: I'd already processed that out. Trust me on that one. *shudder* I found out just how quickly my body processes stuff a couple of years ago whilst drinking copious amounts of rum with Highlanders and I thought they were going to have to take me out of the Citadel in an ambulance to have my stomach pumped because I couldn't puke.

GREAT FUN!

So that's the story. It's been two years; I'm hoping to finish the last big push on the weight loss over the next nine months. I'd like to lose four more sizes by the time my birthday rolls around in November. I keep my ass hauling in the gym, I'll do it. Besides, now that I've accepted cougardom, I want a tighter body to chase the hot young things with. ;-)

Cheers, kids. Happy freakin' Monday. Is it April yet?

Shooting the Black Dog, Part 7: Mother's Little Helper

Well, I may have jumped the gun on the bipolar issue, and I gave myself the clue I may have needed to solve the problem.

I commented earlier in one of the Black Dog posts about medication--the fear of the loss of efficacy of the meds because it has happened before. You want hell... being at war with your own mind and every thing that you try to fix it stops working after a while... it's why the idea of needing the Xanax more has had me freaking. What had me even more upset was the idea that the Effexor's efficacy may be earing off. I've been on Effexor XR since 2003--it's been the best fucking drug I have ever taken for this mess that is my brain.

Well, I had a little brainstorm the other day. My doctor upped my dosage last February after the suicide attempt, from 150 mg to 225 mg., and lucky me, they didn't make a caplet that size, just a horse pill. So, after a bit of an argy-bargy with the doctor, I got him to prescribe three capsules per day to make up the dosage. (Didn't help that the fucking 226 mg horse pills, even though generic, weren't covered by my worthless health plan, so instead of $10/month for the generic 75 mg or 150 mg capsules, it would have been $45. I shit you not. May not sound like a lot of money, but when you add in the money for the inhaler, the Singular, the levoxyl, the other inhalers... the supplements that are no longer covered by the fucking tax-free account... Yeah, the meds cost keep climbing.)

One of the things that can happen with broken switches in the head, because they are chemically activated, is that too much medication is as dangerous as too little. I have gone through this before, usually with the thyroid.

Yeah, the thyroid. That which has fucked up SO MUCH. *slams head on the desk*

So, if the thyroid--which has dicked things around so badly before--has stabilized, perhaps, just perhaps, thought my thinking brain, perhaps it's the OTHER head med that's off now. *BING* Lightbulb appears over the redhead. And because of the way my med is being administered, I can do this without involving the doctor to see if the hypothesis is correct. (And go back to the higher dosage if the lower causes problems.)

And the other part of this is that I may have to vary the dosage at different times of the month. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I am the living chemistry experiment, and with the exception of the occasional indulgence of marijuana, all of it legal.

Sad. But better than another attempt to check out. I came too close to success last time, and succeeding would mean failing at world domination, and that would utterly fuck things up. ;-)

It's not even that I fear Death; I met him once, back in '95, while I was dealing with the aftermath of the miscarriage. The ex was being his completely utter dickhead of a self, I was going through hell, housesitting for a friend (which was what kept me from checking out--the thought that she'd have to come home to a corpse. Just a complete violation of hospitality, and when having to chose between relieving extreme soul pain by violating the most ancient of courtesies and honoring hospitality, well, I just had to take the course of honor. Because I'm funny that way). Anyway, the episode got so bad, I started hallucinating. Or perhaps I was seeing what was really there, who knows? I know enough about the subconscious and filters and the human need to deny reality to believe that anything that can unhinge the modern mind is screened out, which would make the mad people really the sane people because they had a real grasp of what was there, but then... that's crazy talk. ;-)

ANYWAY... at the lowest moment, when I was right on the edge, Death was there in the doorway, waiting like a lover, arms open, a figure of light, and I knew that if I stepped into his embrace, there would be no more pain. It would all be over--the pain would finally end. And this was the only lover I could ever trust 150% not to hurt me. All I had to do was surrender.

I am not good at surrender. You may have figured that out about me. While I do have a submissive side, I am definitely on the equal footing/dominant side of the sexual spectrum. I wanted to cross the room--I wanted the release he was offering. But I also knew the price of surrender. I have never, ever been so perfectly poised in balance between life and death as I was at that moment. Of course, I chose to fight on. Because I'm like that--I never take the easy way.

I can't say I regret the choice; there will come a day when he returns, and it will be my time to surrender, and I hope I'm at the age where it's been so long since I've had it, I welcome the attention of a young man. ;-)

(Yes, I find my own drama highly amusing. I have to. If I didn't, I'D BE DEAD. So laugh along with me, will ya?)

But I digress...

Since the gastric bypass, I am not supposed to take large tablets because my stomach tissue is a bit delicate: the bottom part, where all the acid lives (the stuff that breaks down everything), is cut off, so it's harder to digest things. It's why reputable gastric bypass programs require you to go to a nutritionist and attend support group meetings--so you learn the proper way to eat after surgery so you can stick to the program and actually have some weight loss success, not just in the short term, but so you can keep the blubber off.

Of course, with my elevated stress level over the past few months, things have fallen by the wayside. Like it or lump it, I'm going to have to cut back my coffee intake. (My internal four-year-old is on the floor, throwing a massive tantrum at the moment, kicking and screaming, and insisting this will not happen. I will spank the little bastard and knock 'im into line. Because it's my INNER four-year-old. :-) I'm also going to have to get back on an eating schedule--I've skipped breakfast too much of late, completely gotten off my Greek yogurt kick, and we won't talk about all the missed supplements.

Argh.

And the insomnia. And the headaches. And the mood swings.

Argh.

And it's winter time, so all I am craving is comfort food. Luckily, my idea of comfort food is stuff that I've worked pretty hard to adapt to healthier versions, and I happen to be an amazing fucking cook, if I do say so myself. (Can I just say how flattered I was when one of my baristas, when I was talking about holiday baking, raved about the Guinness mac 'n' cheese--an experiment, the very first attempt. You know you're good when... ;-) *sigh* So it's time to put up a bit pot of beef stew and Guinness mac & cheese (with three cheeses & Greek yogurt mixed in, and don't forget the grilled chicken... now I'm hungry, dammit).

So, my game plan... because I am not going to let the Black Dog win...
1. Cutting back the Effexor dosage to 150 mg a day & taking it ON SCHEDULE.
2. Remembering my multi-vitamin. ON SCHEDULE.
3. Eating a PROPER breakfast. BEFORE 11:00 a.m.
4. Ass BACK in the gym.

Four easily achievable things, the combination of which should get me down to a size 20 by April and a smaller bra band. Provided I can get my brain to function through the fog of anxiety and residual depression and stress. *slams head on the desk* So tired of being told how strong I am, and that if anyone can conquer this, it's me. I'd be good with Prince Charming rescuing me right now, even if it was just for a weekend and a long, hard shagging. Seriously. I'd never be comfortable with a permanent rescue--I really prefer standing on my own two feet, and don't trust anyone trying to solve my problems for me. Life doesn't work that way.

But I'd take a short-term rescue... a little pampering... possibly involving a hot tub, champagne (optional), lots of Lush bath bombs & massage bars, a king size bed and a lot of sex... Yeah, that would work.

*sigh* IF ONLY!

Although... going to the gym means exposure to... muscles. Muscles. On men. Oooooooooo... *swoon* *dreamy smile* Sweaty, hard working muscles... Lickable, kissable, delicious MUSCLES... OK... motivation acquired. Most women, offer 'em chocolate for motivation. Me? SCENERY. Loooooooove muscular arms... forearms and biceps. And thighs... *sigh* Rugby Boy... The thighs on that man... (we won't talk about his other parts and the great ink; there's a reason I kept the pics. And the vid!) *swoon* Yeah, I can forego carbs for the joy of muscles. And the chance of getting a nice set of 'em nekkid!