Yummy chocolate hearts

There is a big, red box of chocolates in my office desk drawer. They are Dove chocolates so they are not the cheap crappy kind either. I got them as a gift for Valentine’s Day which happened to fall on the third day after I got my band. I’m not mad at the person who gave them to me (my mom). Actually I think my feelings would have been a little hurt if no one had gotten me chocolates. I mean, just because I am choosing to have a lap band doesn’t mean that I never get to have a chocolate candy again. It really bothers me to be told I can’t have something – to the point that I usually pig out on it just to show them. So thank you Mom for the chocolates and for treating me normally. I am sure that when I do get to enjoy them, they will be lovely.
I went to the movies on Friday night with my two daughters and their two friends. I had four girls with me, ages 6, 7, 8 and 9. I ordered a large popcorn for them to share and two sodas for them to split. Normally I would sit and munch popcorn through the coming attractions and the movie, but since I don’t think buttered popcorn qualifies as a “soft food”, I didn’t. When the movie was all over, there was at least half of the tub of popcorn left that the girls didn’t eat. I realized that had I been eating the popcorn, I would have eaten as much as all four girls put together. Wow!
I really think I overdid it with activity yesterday. I took my usual walk in the morning with my dog – about 30 minutes. And then after church the weather was so fine that I thought it sounded fun to go for a bike ride so my daughters and I rode to a nearby playground. I didn’t think it would be a big deal since it was a flat ride and only 8-10 blocks. Later I went to visit my mom and she and I walked our dogs around her neighborhood. By the end of the day, I had some pretty serious pain around my port, especially while standing.
I’ve also been getting really hungry and I’m afraid the soft foods are not especially satisfying. I’ve been eating lots of cottage cheese and soups. I had my first protein shake yesterday and also ate more calories than I’ve had since the surgery – in no small part because of the shake. With milk it was 220 calories. At the end of the day, however, I’d had over 70 grams of protein which exceeds my RDA so for now I’m not going to worry about the protein shakes, I think.
I’m looking forward to my next weigh-in on Thursday and am having to fight the urge to weigh sooner. I know that I can get too obsessed by what the scale says so I think it is best to stick to once a week for now.
I’ve heard that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results. Most dieters can relate to this idea as we’ve gone for years and years trying to lose weight by doing the same things and then feeling horrible when it doesn’t work for us. Congratulations to this “band” of brave souls who have had the courage to actually try something different. We recognize that our poor results in the past were not the result of our lack of effort but were instead the result of engaging in a futile and ineffective activity. Yeah lap bands!