Tummy Tuck Pre-Op Appt and Other Good Stuff

I had my two-week pre-op appointment for the tummy tuck today. Yay! I am very excited. I decided to have the surgeon do both a vertical and a horizontal incision, so I'll be filleted open like a fish. It's actually called a "fleur de lis" incision." This will maximize the amount of skin they can take off and improve the final results of skin tightness and super-awesomeness.

All the skin in the shaded area comes off and is restitched together on the edges.
I get to keep my belly button, though. And if my stomach looked like this illustration, I wouldn't need a tummy tuck.

I am soooooo excited. The surgeon says I can expect excellent results: I'm really just down to extra skin and very little fat. What fat there is will be liposuctioned out (they also lipo that little pooch at my pubic bone, something that is very common with lots of weight loss). Then they'll tighten up all my abdominal muscles, overlap them and stitch them together. Cut off that excess skin and stitch me back up!

He says underneath the extra skin I am a very petite person, so the post-op change will be very dramatic. You'll all get to see that because I'll be running around naked everywhere I go once I'm healed up. ;) Or at least in my jog bra and shorty running shorts.

What do you mean this outfit is inappropriate for work?

I found out that I'll be off my bike for at least four weeks, and not running for at least three. I told him I liked biking more than running and asked to switch the figures. :) He said the leaning forward hunched over on a bike will not be so great for my recovery. Oh, plus, I have to wear a compression garment for six weeks! Ack!! Twenty-four hours a day, ew. I knew this, but I didn't realize I'd be wearing it for so long. Oh well, it's worth it.

To compensate, I am going on two long group rides this weekend: a 42-miler on Saturday and a 34-miler on Sunday. I'm not concerned about these distances - the mid-30s have been no problem whatsoever and I am looking forward to bumping up my distances. There are many, many cool cycling events starting in the spring and I will be participating in as many as I can!

I also have my new Wednesday night riding group, the ones I went out with last week. They do that ride or a variation of it every week, and so will I. I am really looking forward to it tomorrow. I'll be logging as much time on the bike as I can before my surgery!

Switching gears, I should recap the Zoo Dash 5K from Sunday. If I were an organized woman, I would have avoided scheduling a 5K on the weekend of the Snohomish River Run. But my daughter is very into the 5Ks and wants to do one a month, at least. I want to do anything I can to keep her motivated, so away we go. I was very lucky that Jen was willing to do this one with us, because I had a bit of a kid-scheduling snafu: nothing to do with my 7yo except bring him along! Accordingly, I registered my daughter for the race, but not me. Then I brought my 7yo's bike with us and he and I navigated the circular path around Green Lake on the fringes of the event. For awhile, he was really good about staying in my sights, but I guess he was familiar enough with the lake and confident enough in his navigational skills (which, I must say, have always been uncanny) that he frequently started taking off ahead. This left me with little choice but to run after him while Jen stayed with Alli and kept her motivated and moving.

Some of my peeps.

My quads took great umbrage at running again the day after the half marathon. But they did it, and they didn't complain too much! I was shocked pleased. Thus far, except for going down stairs, I have not suffered much post-event.

And here's the cool thing: while running the lake, two coworkers actually separately saw me *running the lake.* So I had some sort of rock star status yesterday at work when some coworkers knew I was doing the half on Saturday and some saw me running on Sunday...they think I am a great athletic beast. :) I played it non-chalant: oh yeah, just another weekend in my life, haha.

In an odd post-Huffington Post event, a coworker saw me on the aol.com webpage yesterday and sent me the url. Oops. When I agreed to the interview, I just assumed no one would see it, haha. Silly me. How on earth I would be seen and recognized on the aol page - that's just crazy talk. So I had to threaten him encourage him to keep his mouth shut about it. Then I had to confess the blog's existence to my Sugar Daddy and my MTB friend since I talk about both of them here occasionally. Neither cared. Sugar Daddy said he didn't recall signing a release to have his photo included and MTB friend said my blog looked interesting but seemed to be largely about me. Doof.

It's not that I'm ashamed about who I am or where I've come from or anything like that. And my weight loss has certainly been plenty public. And I am guilty of making selected coworkers look at the same nekky lady pictures in person that I've posted on the blog. You know, it's just one of those world-collide things.

Finally, on the dating front, I'll do a brief update since I haven't in awhile. Boy, do I ever love my bicycle. Things are slow in the romance department - I am still seeing Lance Armstrong from time to time, and possibly the tall Clint Eastwood-eyed motorcyclist. Lance works nights now, plus plenty of side jobs. I have been busy, busy with my group rides and my kids' sports; picking both of those over time with Lance. I really want to get comfy with the group rides and hopefully make some friends, because the big organized events next spring and summer are very, very important to me and I want to hit the ground running. Err, hit the pedals spinning. Something. So, mostly Lance and I talk on the phone and text. He is a big, big cycling cheerleader and full of lots of support and advice. He's a different caliber athlete, though, and has a hard time scaling back, so he's encouraging me to jump a little higher than I'm ready to. Go ride fifty miles, a hundred. I wouldn't know where to begin - I suppose I could do my routes twice...eh, I'll just wait for the training program I plan to sign up for in January.

Clint Eastwood - well, we make plans but he gets called into work a lot, plus he's recently moved from Oregon and is terribly homesick, I think. He works 4/10's and spends most weekends back home. So, mostly, we just make plans. That's okay - he's a nice guy and very sweet but boring as heck.

See, some mind shift occurred in me over the course of this year. Now, these nice guys who just sort of hang out, the way I always have myself...well, they now don't capture my interest. I wanna go ride my bike. Every weekend, Clint and I talk, and I'm doing the rides or the races or whatever, and he is "just relaxing at home." He is very sweet about cheering me on, but boring as ufck. Pardon my Rfench.

He's a diversion. I am needing diversions like this less and less.