Category: Weight Loss Journey

Last week was my 6th month check up.  When Linda & I went to the Dietitian for the first time a month after my surgery, the goals the gave me was 276 pounds at 6 months and at a year, 239 pounds.  During the visit when they recalculated the target weights, the numbers were different. They wanted me to be at 257 pounds at 6 months and at a year 206.

So based on our first meeting, I hit my numbers, with these new numbers, I’m 17 pounds heavier then I should be.   I personally can’t see me hitting 206 but who knows.

The good news is that I am still doing well. I have very little stomach issues. I am gaining more energy (still pretty anemic but I’m seeing a Hematologist for that issue). Linda & Chris are planning to get me clothes for Christmas (50 inch waist with a 28 inch inseam, a 3X in polos & t-shirts and a 20″ neck size for dress shirts if you are wondering).

I’ll continue to keep everyone posted. Thank you for the support and well wishes! I appreciate each of you so much!

My stomach surgery was on 5/25/21. As a reminder, they took out a big part of my stomach to remove a tumor that was there causing bleeding and nausea. The great news was that the tumor was benign. That means I didn’t have to worry about chemo or radiation, all I had to worry about is a new stomach the size of a plastic Easter Egg.

The first 3 weeks after surgery, I was on a liquid only diet. Once that ended, I moved to a soft food diet. I was able to eat most things but I needed to stay away from most starches (bread, potatoes, rice, pasta) raw vegetables (no salads, carrots, broccoli, etc) and of course any sweets. As of this week, I’m free to eat almost anything, I just need to see how my new stomach handles the food. Because of the smaller stomach, I am eating less and I still need to focus on getting plenty of protein when I eat my meals.

Thanks for keeping me company on this food journey. I appreciate the support.

Overall things are going OK. I’m tired of just drinking protein shakes and I really miss solid food. But the biggest issue I’m having right now is insomnia. Normally, I have no problems going to sleep at night but over the past few days, I’m really struggling to go to sleep.

I just lay in the bed and sleep won’t come. My Doctor gave me a prescription for Ambien but that isn’t helping. It’s 11:50pm on Wednesday night and I’m sitting at the computer not being able to go to sleep.

Hopefully this is just a phase I’m going through and soon I’ll get back to my normal pattern but for now, I’ll just try to power through this time period.

After my surgery I will be off work four to six weeks.  I have several goals about exercise (I will need to walk starting almost immediately after the surgery and work my way up to 30 to 60 minutes a day), Food (for the first 21 days I’m on liquids only, for the next 60 days I will be on soft food only), weight – my target weight loss in the first 90 days is 45 pounds.   All those goals our health focused,

I decided to add a few mental health goals as well. I’m going to re-watch a few of my favorite TV shows including Firefly and Sports Night.  I’m hoping to interview Lynette Corolla and Brian Koppleman for the podcast (both have responded via email that they are opened we just haven’t locked down dates).  I’d like to use my network to get a couple other “celebrities” on a podcast as well.

Any thoughts on other things I should do during this month of recovery?