Starting a new chapter in my life…

I started this post last Thursday, but it being the last day my boss was in the office, I decided to postpone until I was a little less emotional. Anyhow… a couple of months back I was at a point where I was just fed up with myself.  I have put on all but 5lbs since my surgery 4 years ago, and while I am generally active, I haven’t enjoyed exercise for a while.  Gus started running back in the spring, and I thought it would be fun for us to do it together.  Trail running is all good, but once I hit the pavement, I was sore for like 3 days after the run, unable to run the days after because of the pain.

I was looking through the Kaiser online services and came across this program called Medical Weight Management.  After reading up on it and deciding it was time to do something, I signed up for the orientation in July. Leading up to the first meeting, I was pretty excited.  A vacation from food sounded awesome!  Not having to worry about what to eat for 16 weeks was a dream since I struggle with it daily.

The first meeting was an introduction to the program, and it was a relief to find out we didn’t start the food replacements until the second week.  Our facilitator, Kelly, is a really nice lady and is really upbeat and has a great energy.  I even like my classmates!  I’ve been in group settings before and I can usually find one person that will bug, but this group seems to be super awesome so far. I was worried about starting this new program having so many big changes going on in my life right now (Older brother living with me, 1st wedding anniversary coming up, my mega super awesome boss leaving the Academy), but my good friend, Bea told me that it’s good to have a bunch of changes going on at once, and big ones like this are the best motivator to keep going.  I hope she is right!

We started the meal replacements last Thursday (9/1), my boss’s last day in the office and the beginning of my 5 day weekend for the Labor Day holiday.  I wouldn’t recommend starting this on a holiday weekend if you can avoid it, but since I’m on Kaiser’s timeline, I didn’t have a choice.  The first day wasn’t so hard because I was sad about Don and other things at work and I was too focused on that to worry about food.  Friday was a bit harder, though I was home most of the day with Gus and my brother.

Saturday, Gus and I had dentist appointments in San Ramon, then headed to Millbrae afterward for the Art and Wine Festival downtown.  Talk about a test!! I had my 2 shakes before leaving and brought my 2 bars with me to eat for later meals.  Everyone knows why they go to these festivals…the food!! Who doesn’t want fried calamari with fries and a turkey leg on a stick??  The smell is overwhelming while we’re walking down from Alex’s house, so I stopped at Starbucks for an iced passion tea.   It’s no replacement for fried food, but it kept me at bay.  However, since I didn’t buy all that crazy expensive unhealthy food, I had money to spend on arts and crafts!!!  I left with 2 pairs of awesome earrings and some air plants, way more satisfying than a grease-filled tummy.

I went to a ping-pong tournament at my former boss’s house on Sunday.  Another great test for being around food and not being able to have it.  I brought a coffee with me so I had something to sip on while I was chatting with people.  Then I switched to mineral water the rest of the day.  People were interested to hear about my diet, too, so it was kind of nice to be able to talk about it.  At the end of the night, there was a champagne toast, so I did have a tiny sip because it was a super special occasion.  And how can you turn down a limited edition Andy Warhol Dom Perignon?? Exactly! It was the best sip I’ve ever had, too haha

As for the meal replacements, they are pretty good.  We’re allowed to add non-calorie flavorings and spices to the shakes and soups, I’ve been living off Vanilla shakes and diet orange flavoring this week!  The chocolate shake with a little cinnamon is good, too!  I can’t say I love the strawberry shake, but it’s edible and I won’t order anymore going forward since it’s not my favorite.

So far though, I feel pretty good.  Tuesday morning I woke up STARVING and it took until lunch time for it to go away, but since then I’ve felt pretty good.  Today is day 7 and per my scale I have lost 9lbs.  We’ll see tonight when I go to class and do the weigh-in.  This has to be the only time in my life where I’m excited to get on the scale!