Beef jerky is mah friend
So I haven't been talking much lately about my whole weight-loss-surgery experience, mostly because there isn't much to say. Just plugging along. Down 67 pounds now, w00t. The biggest noise of late is getting into a good routine at the gym instead of being sporadic about it.
I have formed some pretty standard eating habits, in case anyone's curious how a post-op eats. The protein thing still rules my life, as it must. I'm supposed to eat six times a day; I rarely manage this. Four or five, easily, but hardly ever six. When I get to work I have one slice of wheat toast with peanut butter and a pint of skim milk. That's good for 14 grams. Lunch is the iffiest meal because I never know what's going to be available in the cafeteria. Some days I don't eat anything. Some days I have soup. So many of the entrees have chicken in them, dammit, and if they don't the serving size is just too huge and it's a waste of money. Some days I get a black bean gardenburger, no bun, with cheese on it. I put salsa on top. I can eat one of those in a couple of stages. Eat half, wait an hour, run downstairs and reheat, eat the rest.
If it's a gym day, I get a protein shake from their cafe on the way out. I don't know how they do it but they make protein shakes there that taste good. I've tried at home and they don't taste as good. But then, my gym is a magic place. That's another 26 grams protein. Either way when I get home I usually munch on some beef jerky, which is about 13 grams protein per ounce. Honestly between that and the protein shake I can get almost all my daily protein, but the more, the better. Later on, I have a small dinner, usually consisting of whatever I cooked on Sunday. Turkey meatloaf, or soup, or chili, or whatever. This week it's homemade spaghetti sauce, which I have 1/2 cup of over 1/2 cup noodles. Most days, in the evening while I'm writing I have a skinny vanilla latte. That's another 15 grams protein.
This varies. Sometimes I just can't take a single more bite of beef jerky and I have nuts instead, or string cheese. Sometimes if I feel the need to crunch something I have popcorn. Some days I eat more. Some days I just can't abide the thought of food at all and I have to force myself to eat anything. That's why it's good to cram in all that protein when you can stand to eat it, to make up for the days when all you can bear to eat is four Triscuits with Laughing Cow.
All told, this usually comes to about 800-1000 calories. The stomach-size thing is pretty wild. Like I had my peanut-butter-toast-and-milk over an hour ago and that left me feeling really full (one slice!). Still working on the milk, in fact.
I seem to tolerate most foods pretty well. The one thing that's a problem is MEAT. Any meat of the non-ground variety poses significant risk of porcelain-god-worship. I may get over that in time, we'll see. In the meantime, you never realize how damn ubiquitous chicken is, especially in healthy/low-cal foods, until you can't eat it. Overall I'm lucky. I have no problem being around people who are eating, or seeing food commercials on TV. It doesn't make me want that stuff. In fact I haven't had a craving for something I couldn't have for...gosh, probably three months now. Every so often I think it might be nice to have pizza. I could have pizza, in all likelihood, I just haven't. I did try french fries once. I ate about five of them. They didn't taste good and I didn't want them. I had a few fries out with Brian last weekend, too. One too many, in fact. Felt a bit too-full after that.
Knowing where to stop is difficult, because the line between "I'm totally fine" and "Whoops, I ate too much" is like, one bite. Plus, how much you can eat varies widely with what it is that you're eating. My "full" signal is still kind of broken, so I can't rely on my body's signals to tell me when I'm full. I have to watch out.
The thing I have to remember is that this is the easiest this will ever be. It will get not easier, but harder. It will get harder to keep to a nutritional plan as my body adjusts and starts wanting bad food again. As I get smaller it will get harder to lose, not easier. I guess I should enjoy the honeymoon period while it lasts!