So sick...

So I spent Saturday with the sweetest baby in all the land and she was sick all day! It was the saddest thing I've ever seen. But now I'm sick! So I got a sub to go on our field trip today and I've been lying on the couch all day long. I'm so hoping to feel better tomorrow...

Speaking of tomorrow, it's the end of my first Liver Shrinking Diet! I don't have the energy to post about that right now, but I will. I have lots of thoughts about it. I've lost at least 15 pounds - I hope to get an accurate count tomorrow.

Wooo-Hoooo!!!! (LSD Day 8)

So, as it turns out, I don't HAVE to eat that stinkin' sandwich every night! I just have to eat something low fat with less than 300 calories. WOW. I'm the most excited girl that you have ever met at this moment. I wish I could have the last week of choking down that nasty thing back, but hey - then I probably wouldn't enjoy this moment quite so much. Who would have though I could get so excited over choosing my own 300 calories?

In other news, I weighed myself today for the first time since I started this whole LSD excitement, and I'm down 11 pounds. So with those two things I finally feel like I'm going to make it through this. It's a good thing, too, because I was pretty close to becoming a complete basket case.

My weekend with Abby

I got to spend the weekend with the sweetest niece in the world this weekend. Mom has off next week, so Abby is staying with her to give Kay some time off. So Mom and I drove down to Charlotte and picked her up Sat. morning.

Abby is 15 months old now and TOO cute for words. She has all these sweet curls and big blue eyes. And she's so much fun...she runs around everywhere. Mom says she has two speeds - fast forward and asleep. It's completely true. She's starting to say a few words - "bird", "dog", "baby" but she randomly applies whichever word she's saying at the time to everything she sees :) She does call Kay Mama, say "uh-oh" when she drops something, and yells "Yay!" when she's happy.

We took her to a playground where she got to do three of her favorite things - climb, go up and down ramps (the child loves ramps), and slide. She can do the slide completely by herself - climb up, go over, sit down and slide, get down, and go back and start over. More proof that she's gifted! (At least to this proud aunt) Today we took her swimming, which was so fun. She likes to walk up and down the ramp into the water (shocker), but is not such a huge fan of her face going under the water.

And she's having a baby brother in September!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Have I mentioned lately that I love that baby? She's a little shy when she first sees new people, but she recognizes my parents and me right away when she sees us. I'm going to go see her a lot after surgery so she still recognizes me as I get skinny :)

LSD Day 6

Well, I am sticking to the Liver Shrinking Diet but can't say that I'm enjoying it. It is INCREDIBLY hard to not eat all that good food out there...especially when you have to sit and watch others eat. It was a rough week, but this weekend was especially hard because I wasn't as busy. I was also with my family and traveling, which made it even more difficult to stick to. But I did.

The pre-op diet was what I was dreading the most about the whole thing and now to have to do it twice is really taking a toll on me. I'm cranky and cry easily. My poor kids this week....watch out!

I'm considering letting myself order DVR if I can lose 3o pounds before surgery (which is a realistic goal, with 4 of those 10 weeks being on the LSD!) It's only something like $12 a month, but I'm really not sure that I can afford even that. Maybe I can look through my statements and find a recurring payment that I'm making that I'm unaware of that I can cancel...that sort of thing happens to me all the time :) But I would LOVE to be able to watch the shows I want, when I want. Most shows I like come on after I want to be in bed, so I stay up too late watching them. So we'll see. 8 more days to go....

Happy 27th, Kay!

I would hate for my sister to think that I remembered my brother's birthday and forgot hers, so...

Happy Tax Day Birthday Yesterday, Kay!!!

LSD Day 2

So it's day two of the Liver Shrinking Diet and it's had definite ups and downs. Yesterday was no problem - even went out to CiCis with 2 girls from the OH board and watched them eat pizza and was fine. Today was different. Most of the day at school I felt AWFUL - tired, nauseous, dizzy, headache, congested, you name it. (Ok, so maybe the congestion was from the pollen and not the LSD - you wouldn't believe the pollen around here) At one point I had to just tell my kids to go do math tubs because I was too nauseous and dizzy to even talk to them. Even walking in from recess one of the girls I teach with said I looked like I was about to fall over.

I had some drama with paying the fees from a traffic ticket so I had to go down to the court to pay it today, which meant that I didn't have time to exercise before I met with Sue (my "life coach"). This worked out very well, because it meant I got to go home and take a nap. I felt sooooooooooo much better after my nap and was able to get my second shake in on the way to see Sue. She wants me to find things that make me happy to look forward to each day now that I can't use food for that purpose. She said that don't have to be 10 on the happiness scale, just anything that I can look forward to. (I asked if I could use taking a nap! She actually said yes, but the nap sounded more like a necessity so we should chose something else as well) I haven't thought of anything yet - not that it has to be the same thing every day.

So after I left Sue I went to the gym to swim and ended up doing a water aerobics class which was fun. I may try and do it again sometime. I'm not having much luck getting this nasty sandwich and green beans down for dinner, though. I'm not hungry at all - right now I'm having more trouble getting in what I'm supposed to eat rather than wanting more.

Oh, and I have tried two new things - strawberry yogurt and baby carrots. Both were completely disgusting. They both made me gag. *sigh* I have no idea how I am going to start liking new things!!!!!!

An exciting new twist

So I met with the nutritionist for the first time tonight. I have been DREADING this meeting, since I know that what I eat is the worst thing about my health. And I just don't know how to start magically liking new things! It's taken me a long time to get in with her and apparently I waited too long, because in exciting news...

I get to do the two-week liquid "liver shrinking" diet TWICE!

Apparently my surgeon's office has decided that at the beginning of meeting with the nutritionist, we should go ahead and do the liver shrinking diet to "jump start" our weight loss and get us motivated. Of course, then I have to start the Nutripoints system (which is NOT a good one for me, not that anyone will listen when I say that), and two weeks pre-op go back on the LSD. Yippeee!!! Here's what I have to do every day for two weeks:

Breakfast - Carnation Instant Breakfast pre-made or Slim-Fast High Protein (they are very specific)

Lunch - same as breakfast, with the addition of some fruit (which I don't like)

Snack - cottage cheese or yogurt (don't like either or these) or I can choose from baby carrots, grape tomatoes, or cucumber slices (don't like any of these) Here's what my nutritionist - the expert who's supposed to help me make this work for me said - "Oh, just try it." Because for the last 30 years I've just been avoiding them for fun.

Dinner - sandwich made with 4 oz. of Healthy Choice or Hillshire Farm 97% fat free turkey, chicken, ham, or roast beef and two slices of Nature's Valley double fiber whole grain wheat bread. 1 cup non-starchy vegetable.

I think that's it. So, there's clearly quite a bit of flexibility on this plan. I also have to get in 64 oz. of liquids during the day which includes all the usual no-sugar, no-calorie suspects but also fat-free broth, fat-free jello, and sugar-free, fat-free fruit flavored popsicles.

So like the obedient girl that I am I have gone out and bought all of this tonight (at 10:30 - I need to start setting bedtimes and sticking to them) and I am going to try one new thing a day. I'm not super-excited about this, so wish me luck!

Happy 24th, William

I forgot to say yesterday -

Happy Birthday, William!!!

Little brother William turned 24 yesterday, and I actually got to see him as we were all in Charleston celebrating his birthday (and sister Kay's, whose is on Tuesday)

You know, not everyone can be this cool...

Well, I rallied...

So after Thursday's miserableness, my kids had a half day of school on Friday.  So we got a half day workday with an HOUR for lunch! So I spent my lunch hour walking the track at school and got back on schedule with the exercising.  I'm prouder of that than is justified :)

So now I'm in Charleston, visiting with my family and the cutest baby in the world.  So they will walk with me today.  Uh-oh - I think the baby's up - I better go!

Ramblings from an exhausted failure

So this has not been my best day. I did not exercise, so am now way behind, and will probably only get in 2 of my 4 exercises before I go back to see Brian next Tue. 3 if I'm really super dedicated and find time to work out on Sunday in addition to driving back from Charleston. I feel AWFUL about this. I just started and I'm already failing.... I've also eaten horribly today and have to record it all on my food log to take to the nutritionist Mon. night.

So I left for work at 7 this morning, taught all day, spent the time I was supposed to be in pre-school IEP meeting looking for the people who would tell me that it was cancelled, did my team's copying for the week, drove all the way to the other side of town for a "New Teacher Focus Group" until 6, got stuck in traffic for an hour on the interstate on the way back, went shopping for my sister's birthday present, went to the grocery store and got a piece of pizza for dinner - ate it in the cafe there, and then went looking for a present for my brother which I never found. So I finally got home at 9:30 - exhausted, without exercising, and minus a birthday present for my brother.

It's 10 now, and I still have to pack and get my house ready. I'm leaving straight from school tomorrow to head down to Charleston to celebrate my brother and sister's birthdays. Who knows what I'll do about a present for my brother....maybe it will come to me in a dream.....

I don't handle failure well, which means at this moment I'm ready to quit this whole stupid pre-op routine. Maybe the whole thing. And just stay fat forever. It gives me an excuse for being miserable, right? And for being single - what if I was thin and no one wanted to marry me? Then all I would have to blame would be that I was an obnoxious, no fun person.

I'm going to just go to bed - I'll pack in the morning. Night.

Dinner w/ "da girls"

Just wanted to post a shout out to Sarah, Cynthia, and Meg. You girls ROCK and I forget how much I miss being friends with the people I work with....or maybe it's just you guys that I miss ;) I forgot the things I was supposed to say about you. Maybe something about Cynthia drinking, or Sarah getting food poisoning, or Meg having a posse of helpers?

Bragging on my mom

My mom is a great teacher. Really. For a while she worked at a special school for kids with severe behavioral and emotional problems, and now she works at what passes for an "inner city" school in Lynchburg and she loves it. She's great with the kids. She spends more time and money on that classroom than you can imagine. Probably the only things she spends more money on than her classroom is Abby. And that's a toss-up.

So, here's the story - she has a regular volunteer in her class. Apparently this girl's brother is Leland Melvin. While that might not be a household name, in Lynchburg that's pretty exciting because this guy is from Lynchburg and he went up into space to visit the international space station to do something or other. So one of the kids in my mom's class was drawing a picture of an astronaut (on the 11x17 paper that my mom buys herself to run stuff off for her class because she likes it better), and Mr. Melvin's sister was volunteering and saw it. Somehow it worked out that they had the picture framed, and he got to present it to the astronaut at this ceremony that was being held for him. It was a big ceremony with city and state leaders - this picture wasn't the WHOLE ceremony, just a part of it, but my mom took the day off to go do it with him. She was so proud of this kid and kept talking about what a great thing it was for this kid. That's just the way she is. She's great.

So I'm posted the video of the news story . If you stop it at about 47 seconds and see the woman standing clapping in the pink sweater, that's my mom. At 1:27 there's a close-up of the picture the kid drew, and at 1:37 you can see the kid presenting it to him with my mom's principal in the background.

Serious withdrawal

Do you think that I could be having withdrawal from Diet Coke? My "life coach" (and I, in theory) decided that I should just give up soda cold turkey this week (I, of course, had to agree to do it, but I didn't want her to think that I was weak or unwilling to try!) It has NOT, contrary to what people seem to think, made me feel better. In fact, I think it has made me feel worse. My head has been hurting and I'm just generally feeling yucky. I am also about to die to have a Coke. Let's face it, I'll probably go ahead and have one before I go back to her next week. It will still be a serious soda reduction.

My exercise has also been upped this week to 4 times a week, 1-3o minute session, 2-40 minute session, and 1 - HOUR AND TEN MINUTE session. Now, that long one I spend 45 minutes in my "light" heart rate zone and 25 minutes in my "moderate" so it's not really hard. But it is booooooring. And I basically have to do it on the treadmill because otherwise it's pretty hard to keep my heart rate down in that zone. And I feel bad taking the treadmill at the gym for that long. On the subject of exercise, I would like to add that it also does not make me feel better like it is supposed to. It makes me feel better in a "I-checked-something-off-my-list-for-today" kind of way, but not in a "I-have-more-energy-and-feel-healthier" kind of way.

While I'm grumbling - I'm still sick over my Heels losing and not making it to the championship game, and I have been stuck inside with the kindergarteners in the rain FOREVER I think. Today we had no specials AND no recess.

So, to sum up, I'm grumpy and I don't feel good. I think it's best that I go to bed now, and pray for a better day tomorrow......

Do you know that I love....

praise and worship songs? They are so my favorite part of church. I love them all the time, but especially when all those people are singing together. I know it's corny, but I often get more out of the songs than I do the sermon.

And at 7 a.m.....

I was woken up, again, by the cats. This time as one of them tried to fight with the cat outside the sliding glass door by loudly making scary noises and throwing himself at the glass. Good technique. I am so putting these cats on Craigslist.

Then it was back to the office to use the bathroom again...in the rain....

A long, long night...

I do not think that the tarheels performance last night is even worthy of me writing about. Except to say this: If you played like that all the time, I'm pretty sure that my junior high girl's basketball team could have beaten you. Pitiful. And now, no more basketball until October. I hate this part...

So I TRIED to go to bed right after the game - around 11:00 - but couldn't really sleep and ended up not falling asleep until around 12:00, but still waking up several times. Not a good thing. I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm posting this at 5:30 a.m. What am I doing up, awake, and posting you may ask? Glad you asked. Let me tell you.

Around 5, I was awakened by a loud crash and the sound of water running. I don't know if I have ever mentioned before that I have 2 cats that are basically the devil in disguise. They are completely wild and crazy. So I figure that they have somehow turned the shower on and freaked out. I get up to discover that it's not the shower, they have somehow sprung a leak in the hose leading from the toilet to the wall. There is water spewing all over my bathroom floor, making a deeper puddle every minute.

First I try the always-handy duct tape, which only succeeds in making the water spray in a different direction. Then I go to get a bowl to catch the water and the phone, thinking that as much as I feel bad about it, I'm going to have to call the apartment complex's emergency number and get someone over here before my whole place floods (this is an advantage to living in an apartment!) Finally I realize - DUH! - that right in front of me this whole time was a knob to turn the water OFF. So I turn it and the water stops spewing.

So the immediate problem is solved and I'm left with a flooded bathroom and no toilet (which I really need to use - this is my only one!) I mopped up the bathroom and went down to the office (I have a 24/7 code because the hot tub and "gym" are in there) to use the bathroom. I figure I'll call the maintenance guys in the morning (yes, in the morning. I'm going back to bed!), but now I feel like my bathroom has to be clean before I call them. So I guess I'll do that first.

*sigh* Can I please move back in with mom and dad?

Back to the grind...

Well, we've been back at school for 4 days now....wow. I really can't wait for my new job. This one is taking all that I have. I get so frustrated and angry, and I lose my cool, and then I regret it, and then it just starts all over again....

In other news, someone REALLY does not want me to exercise. In addition to the heart rate thing not working in the pool and the stolen iPod, here's today's story. I was in such a bad mood and my head HURT like anything and I was tired and didn't feel good. The plan was to go to a faculty baby shower after school, go work out, and then go to my first support group meeting - one with my surgeon's office. The pregnant girl was out sick, so the shower was cancelled and I was so fed up I emailed my C'ville teammates to see if they wanted to go out to dinner. I was going to skip it all, and go eat and vent. One of them could do dinner, but I changed my mind. I decided I would just feel more guilty if I skipped everything, so I went home and lay down briefly (didn't really help) then headed off to the gym. I packed stuff for the treadmill and the pool. I checked out the pool and it was almost empty, and I was suddenly psyched about swimming. Then I couldn't get the stupid heart rate thing to work. Once I finally figured it out and went to the pool, it was totally full. But I was already in my suit and had showered, so I was wet, so I decided to get in the hot tub and wait for a lane. I waited about half an hour for an empty lane - and this little tween did totally steal one from me - before I realized that I had to leave to make it to the support group. So I left, angrily. I did, however, enjoy the support group. They were awesome - funny and supportive and, though some people talked more than others, there wasn't that one person that talks all the time that you want to shoot. So that made me happy.

Yes, I know that I had options tonight - I could have asked someone to share a lane (although I've never seen anyone do this at this gym, it did happen at my old one), or changed and gotten on a treadmill. Or even gone back after my meeting (it would have been 8:00 before I even got there) Yes, I know they're just excuses. But DANG. So now that my exercise has been upped to 3 hours a week in 4 sessions (thanks, Sgt. Brian!) I'm really going to have to go every day to meet my goal. I can do it, though :)

I met with the "life coach" this week as well and "we" decided that I should just give up Cokes. No more. Period. This stinks. It is not fun at all, and it's only been one day. We'll see how that goes. I may have to ease into that one...

Next week I go to the nutrition class (which I'm irritated about b/c I've already read the book and I do not have patience for people telling me things I've already read!) and back to exercise with Brian. Then the week after I meet with the nutritionist for the first time (I bet she's never had a case as hard as me!), exercise with Brian, AND back to Sue, the life coach. This week I did the exercise, the life coach, and the support group. I am so totally busy with pre-op appointments, it's making me a little insane...