Weight Loss Stuff and Life Stuff

It's a WLS blog, and don't you forget it! At very nearly 11 months post-op, there aren't a lot of new revelations about the weight loss process or the surgery itself going on right now. I'll jot down some thoughts I've been thinking:

• Gastric sleeve is the new normal. I honestly feel "normal" and don't feel like a bariatric surgery patient, e.g., I think my mind and such are all caught up with "this is just how I am" now. I don't spend much time thinking about how my innards have been changed, etc.
• The new normal is pretty different, for me, from the old normal. I'm one of the few patients that has different food issues post-op. Primarily lactose intolerance, but I don't "blame" the surgery for that, because I was already struggling with that a bit before surgery. It was definitely amplified post-op. So when I read Sheila's post about yummy Greek yogurt concoctions, I know that whew, boy, I couldn't touch a 6-ounce yogurt without rolling around on the floor in pain! But FUNNY - I can eat frozen yogurt no problem. Maybe since I just get these tiny portions...anyway, I can eat Greek yogurt, too, but just the tiniest bit or it makes my stomach hurt. Cottage cheese also makes my stomach hurt. Spicy foods...tabasco sauce...overly peppery things...these are the ones that pain my heart to have to cut back on so much. Me likey spicy! My sleeve...not so much.
• Oh! I thought of this when I was going through the medicine cabinet this morning. I saw a anti-nausea patch from my surgery in there. At the time, I thought I had screwed up my eyes by touching the patch and rubbing my eyes. I don't think so now - I think after the anesthesia, my eyes were screwed up for a few days. Just a little out of focus. That hadn't happened to me with prior surgeries (and I've had a bunch, ha). It was like old-woman eyes accelerated. And sadly, I am starting to learn about old-woman eyes first hand. Sigh.
• You can be every bit as stupid post-op as you were pre-op. I still have many times where I eat until I'm overstuffed. It hurts, it is a bad feeling. I have long heart to heart talks with myself about how silly it is to cause myself pain with food. So while the physical logistics of stuffing a big tummy are different than stuffing a sleeved tummy, you can still cause damage to yourself.
• I am honestly, genuinely getting so much better with my eating! I've always been a good eater with a big appetite. I eat veggies and nutritious foods and all that. But post-op, it is amazing the choices you make just continue to get better and better (if you allow yourself that wisdom). It's funny how you just naturally start weeding out the bad foods: this doesn't sit well in my tummy, that will leave me feeling hungry soon, this will taste good and fill me up. I feel like I'm making all these grown-up choices I was supposed to be making all along, hahaha. Love it!

That's enough of that for now. I am so happy to be where I am, so happy to have had the surgery. Last night, my parents met me at my daughter's orchestra concert. Of searching for me in the bleachers, my mom said, "I had to remind your dad that we're looking for a tiny woman now!" :)

Life stuff - my needed car repairs turned out to be a non-issue! Well, a bit of an issue. I took the car to my neighborhood shop, which I love, and no one, including blog readers, is allowed to 'dis. Love them and they have been good to me and I trust them.

Which makes it harder to say that I want to kick their arses right now. But I love them, and they meant well, and everyone has a "miss" now and then. My car was intermittently losing power, at the most inconvenient of times. Typically when I was accelerating from a stop light or stop sign. BAM! No power. Lots of engine lights, engine still running but not revving, car not going anywhere. Turn off the engine, wait a minute or two (an INTERMINABLY long time when you are stuck in the middle of an intersection!!)...car starts and runs fine. Little car drives perfectly every second until it is doesn't. And then you're stuck in the middle of the darn street.

The neighborhood shop ran the engine codes, checked things out, said they *hoped* it was the accelerator sticking and the associated accelerator computer module freaking out. They could not replicate the problem, of course. They had it in a couple times (without charge) and said they thought replacement was the best course of action. If it wasn't the accelerator stuff, sadly, it was going to be the car's central computer (power control module) and that was going to be big bucks. So for about $280 out the door, they replaced this stuff. Several days later: same problem. I bring it back in, they say it's going to be that module, which I'll need to take it to a dealership for.

Yesterday, I took it to the dealership. Here's the good news/bad news part. Dealership calls me up: problem is a frayed wire. A something or 'nother resting on a something or 'nother, shorting out, causing the loss of power, causing the engine codes, etc.

That'll be $125 for the diagnostics (that my shop does for free, ummm, when they get it right) and $65 for the labor. "Can I have the old wiring harness to take back and show the shop?" I ask. (They had blah-blah-blah'd about a wiring harness.) No - there's nothing that needed replaced, they just fixed the wire. Uh, I think I bought about $400 worth of electrical tape on this project, plus untold time loss spent broken down in intersections with sweat dripping down my face.

Now. I will take the invoice back to the original shop (not having any frayed wire to produce), just because they will want to know what the issue really is. It's not like they could return the parts they put in my car. I would love it if they would say something like "Gosh, your next coupla oil changes are on us!" But I won't push it. I am a little vexed, but will survive.

Dating. I am meeting the Capricorn tonight after work. We'll see. Gosh, we've emailed so much over the last several days, meeting him seems like a mere formality...but also weird. I don't like online dating. This is something I plan to pull from my repertoire (although that is hard, because really, it's the most accessible path to dating). I'm nervous meeting him - I can get pretty sick feeling about just showing up to the place. Really, he is the one I have enjoyed emailing with the most since I've dabbled in online dating. Smart, funny, interesting. Ugh, he has no money, of course. But a good job and his act together. Really, for this transitional time, I'm willing to accept "can take care of yourself." I believe my online profile actually has the phrase "GROWN-ASS MAN" in it, hahahaha. (Remind me of a little sidebar to this that I should write about next.) It would be so convenient for me to "marry up" next time around. Really, if I met someone who's income matched mine, we could darn near be a power couple. Not one of the 1%, but, you know. Doing good. Also, if I received child support or didn't have kids, neither of which are viable options, I'd be living quite comfortably. Thus is my lot in life, to earn a good living but be cobbling together money for SBUX tea from my change stash in my desk. ;)