It was with fear, actual fear that I did my weigh in last night. I was scared of what might happen if I hadn't lost any weight this week, or only lost a few hundred grams, I was worried about how committed I could remain to this if I didn't get a reasonable result. Not a good feeling to have, bordering on obsessive, unhealthy and a bit scary.
Thankfully though I did get a reasonable result. I'm quite pleased with it in fact. Now I really must make sure I measure myself weekly as well because I have been told time and time again that while I may not have a big difference on the scales it's almost certain that I will with the measuring tape and this may be what I need to keep me going on the weeks when the scale doesn't look as good as it did last night.
I still don't really feel any thinner, my clothes are definitely no looser but I think regardless of that, in the mirror it looks like there may be less of me around the tummy (a problem area of mine).
I was sceptical but I am actually nearing my first "mini goal" which was to get below the "Obese" range on the BMI.
So anyway here are the numbers:
Height: 160cms/5ft3in
Start Date: 28th Dec 2008
Start Weight: 81.4 kgs
Current Weight: 77.6kgs
Lost this week: 1kg
Total Loss: 3.8 kgs
Start BMI: 31.8
Current BMI: 30.3
Goal BMI: 23.4
Goal Weight: 60 kgs
Goal Date: December 2009
Monday, February 16, 2009
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Fires
A small diversion from the usual programming today.
It is exactly one week today since the worst bushfires in Australian history killed at least 181 people, destroyed almost 2000 homes, left approx 7000 people homeless, completely flattened at least 2 towns maybe more, and also killed an estimated 1 million native birds, reptiles and animals.
Above: Kinglake, Feb 2009, from www.news.com.au
It's been a long week, an awful, sad, horrifying, angry week, and with the knowledge of at least one friend who lost his home and a couple of others who were threatened, a difficult time to be away from my home state. But my sadness can't be even a minute fraction of what those who have been closely involved in this tragedy must feel.
I encourage everyone who hasn't done so already to please donate to the Victorian Bushfire appeal, the CFA, or Wildlife Victoria.
It is exactly one week today since the worst bushfires in Australian history killed at least 181 people, destroyed almost 2000 homes, left approx 7000 people homeless, completely flattened at least 2 towns maybe more, and also killed an estimated 1 million native birds, reptiles and animals.
Above: Kinglake, Feb 2009, from www.news.com.auIt's been a long week, an awful, sad, horrifying, angry week, and with the knowledge of at least one friend who lost his home and a couple of others who were threatened, a difficult time to be away from my home state. But my sadness can't be even a minute fraction of what those who have been closely involved in this tragedy must feel.
I encourage everyone who hasn't done so already to please donate to the Victorian Bushfire appeal, the CFA, or Wildlife Victoria.
Australian Red Cross Bushfire Appeal
Victorian Country Fire Authority
Wildlife Victoria Bushfire Appeal
Victorian Country Fire Authority
Wildlife Victoria Bushfire Appeal
RIP all the victims of the Victorian Bushfires
Saturday 7th Feb 2009.
Saturday 7th Feb 2009.
Monday, February 9, 2009
First official Weigh In on CS
I did my fist official weekly weigh in last night and while the result isn't as good as I had hoped it isn't all doom and gloom either. Maybe my body is just taking longer to react to all the changes of CS, maybe it's taking longer than usual to clear out all the redundant carbs and sugar that were left over!
Whatever the case I have made a small amount of progress, so while I am not exactly thrilled I am a little more optimistic than I was before.
Height: 160cms/5ft3in
Start Date: 28th Dec 2008
Start Weight: 81.4 kgs
Current Weight: 78.6kgs
Lost this week: 600gms
Total Loss: 2.8 kgs
Start BMI: 31.8
Current BMI: 30.7
Goal BMI: 23.4
Goal Weight: 60 kgs
Goal Date: December 2009
Whatever the case I have made a small amount of progress, so while I am not exactly thrilled I am a little more optimistic than I was before.
Height: 160cms/5ft3in
Start Date: 28th Dec 2008
Start Weight: 81.4 kgs
Current Weight: 78.6kgs
Lost this week: 600gms
Total Loss: 2.8 kgs
Start BMI: 31.8
Current BMI: 30.7
Goal BMI: 23.4
Goal Weight: 60 kgs
Goal Date: December 2009
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Weight loss after Thyroidectomy
Last night I did a stupid thing. I had a vague recollection of hearing/reading that people had trouble with weight loss after having their thyroid removed so I decided to do some research to see if I could determine how successful people are at losing weight after having a thyroidectomy.
The news is not good my friends, not good at all. In the hundreds of various forum posts I trawled through, the many thyroid support websites I visited I could not find one person who said they had successfully lost weight after a thyroidectomy. Many many people had posted their tales of woe in desperation, asking if others had managed to do what it seemed they could not, only to have dozens of responses from others in the same boat. Nobody said "yes, I've done it, and you can too". All I found were story upon story of people who either hover around the same weight or continue to put on weight, despite good healthy diet and exercise. It was all pretty discouraging really, in fact it was downright depressing.
I found an interesting website called "Stop the Thyroid Madness" which goes into great detail about how the majority of Thyroid patients are being incorrectly medicated. In a short simplified version, we have two major thyroid hormones our body naturally produces, T3 and T4, in the old days they used to medicate this condition with natural thyroid hormone. Then in the 1970's a new "wonder" synthetic T4 arrived, theoretically our bodies are supposed to be able to convert a percentage of this T4 to T3 but it seems for a very large amount of patients this simply does not happen and they continue to suffer the symptoms of an underactive thyroid.
In the old days a patient was medicated according to their symptoms, if you were still having hypothyroid symptoms your medication was increased/changed. Nowadays it's all about numbers, if your lab work is within the "right range" they consider you correctly medicated, they don't care how you feel.
Despite being "correctly medicated" I still have the following symptoms:
Hair Loss
Brittle Nails
Constipation
Dry Skin
Weight Gain
Forgetfulness
Foggy thinking
Tiredness, major tiredness, exhaustion
Lump in the throat like a wad of phlegm is always stuck there (not a listed symptom but others have described the same thing)
In short I am miserable, I've been miserable for years and nobody can fix it.
Since having my thyroidectomy I have had my blood done at least twice a year (by 3 different doctors) and every time I am told I am correctly medicated and nothing else can be done.
I have been told I have Depression, possibly PCOS and/or IBS, nobody will treat these as thyroid symptoms because the numbers say my medication is right.
Combination T3/T4 therapy is still available, T3 is also available on it's own as a supplement to the synthetic T4, but the overwhelming majority of Doctors will not prescribe them, they favour the new synthetic, "proven" drug, they favour the numbers.
Probably the saddest, most enraging thing I read on that website was the story of a woman that was very overweight and on complaining to her Doctor he told her to get up at 5am, exercise like mad, only eat a few small portions of nuts through the day and a salad at night. When she told him she couldn't possibly live like that he responded that she apparently didn't want to lose weight too badly then.
I cried last night, I had a good long cry. I am wondering what hope I have in getting to 60kgs when I have a chemical in my body that is fighting me every step of the way. How long can I stay motivated to exercise every day? How long can I maintain a diet that doesn't allow me to eat all the things I love like rice, pasta, potatoes, and bread without result? How long can I continue like this if I don't lose weight? Or if the weight loss is so small, so insignificant that I feel like I am going to explode out of frustration?
The news is not good my friends, not good at all. In the hundreds of various forum posts I trawled through, the many thyroid support websites I visited I could not find one person who said they had successfully lost weight after a thyroidectomy. Many many people had posted their tales of woe in desperation, asking if others had managed to do what it seemed they could not, only to have dozens of responses from others in the same boat. Nobody said "yes, I've done it, and you can too". All I found were story upon story of people who either hover around the same weight or continue to put on weight, despite good healthy diet and exercise. It was all pretty discouraging really, in fact it was downright depressing.
I found an interesting website called "Stop the Thyroid Madness" which goes into great detail about how the majority of Thyroid patients are being incorrectly medicated. In a short simplified version, we have two major thyroid hormones our body naturally produces, T3 and T4, in the old days they used to medicate this condition with natural thyroid hormone. Then in the 1970's a new "wonder" synthetic T4 arrived, theoretically our bodies are supposed to be able to convert a percentage of this T4 to T3 but it seems for a very large amount of patients this simply does not happen and they continue to suffer the symptoms of an underactive thyroid.
In the old days a patient was medicated according to their symptoms, if you were still having hypothyroid symptoms your medication was increased/changed. Nowadays it's all about numbers, if your lab work is within the "right range" they consider you correctly medicated, they don't care how you feel.
Despite being "correctly medicated" I still have the following symptoms:
Hair Loss
Brittle Nails
Constipation
Dry Skin
Weight Gain
Forgetfulness
Foggy thinking
Tiredness, major tiredness, exhaustion
Lump in the throat like a wad of phlegm is always stuck there (not a listed symptom but others have described the same thing)
In short I am miserable, I've been miserable for years and nobody can fix it.
Since having my thyroidectomy I have had my blood done at least twice a year (by 3 different doctors) and every time I am told I am correctly medicated and nothing else can be done.
I have been told I have Depression, possibly PCOS and/or IBS, nobody will treat these as thyroid symptoms because the numbers say my medication is right.
Combination T3/T4 therapy is still available, T3 is also available on it's own as a supplement to the synthetic T4, but the overwhelming majority of Doctors will not prescribe them, they favour the new synthetic, "proven" drug, they favour the numbers.
Probably the saddest, most enraging thing I read on that website was the story of a woman that was very overweight and on complaining to her Doctor he told her to get up at 5am, exercise like mad, only eat a few small portions of nuts through the day and a salad at night. When she told him she couldn't possibly live like that he responded that she apparently didn't want to lose weight too badly then.
I cried last night, I had a good long cry. I am wondering what hope I have in getting to 60kgs when I have a chemical in my body that is fighting me every step of the way. How long can I stay motivated to exercise every day? How long can I maintain a diet that doesn't allow me to eat all the things I love like rice, pasta, potatoes, and bread without result? How long can I continue like this if I don't lose weight? Or if the weight loss is so small, so insignificant that I feel like I am going to explode out of frustration?
Friday, February 6, 2009
The Inevitable results of losing 30 pounds .......
..... or in my case 1kg which is probably about what my undersized boobs weigh.
I saw this today whilst surfing flicker (one of my favourite things to do) and just had to laugh. I have a warped and twisted sense of humour and I expect I will be relying on that to get me through this at times so expect to see some fairly nutty stuff pop up in here.
Anyway I digress, I saw this cartoon and just had to laugh, because it is oh so true, the first place it goes from is the boobs, everything else stays the same.
Is this how I am going to look in six months? Diet? CartoonOriginally uploaded by popcornfeet
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
And so it begins ......
I started CS on Monday, today I am at the end of my third day.
So far I have had the following shake flavours:
Strawberry - nice
Caramel - not brilliant but tolerable
Banana - nice
Caffe Latte - blergh, foul
Vanilla - nice
Chocolate - hmmmm, not sure if this is tolerable or just plain yuck
I've been having fruit, nuts, or sliced ham or chicken for snacks.
On Monday night I had a small tin of tuna with a huge salad, Tues night I had a palm sized grilled chicken breast and huge salad and tonight I had an omelette. Mon & Tue night I wasn't hungry until about 9pm which is when I had my last snack for the day. Tonight though I was hungry an hour after I had the omelette.
The omelette was 2 eggs, spinach, mushrooms, onion, tomato, capsicum, ham and a small amount of tasty cheese. Now I am starting to think there wasn't enough veggies in it but I've had my last snack for the day (a small apple) so I can't have anything else.
Apparently alot of people go though a bit of a carb and sugar detrox in their first week of this program, the main effect of that seems to be feeling week, tired, and really bad headaches. This supposedly hits most people between day 2 and day 5. I have had a bit of a "lead-head" feeling but nothing too dramatic and it's the end of day three so I am hoping it stays like this.
Finally - water, another important part of the diet, at least 2 litres of water a day. And this is where I have really surprised myself, for the past 3 days I, me, the person who HATES water and only ever drank soft drink or fruit juice has drank at least 2.5 litres per day!
Of course the really hot weather (45 degrees every day) helps immensely!
One strange thing though is despite all that water I feel thirstier now than I did when soft drink and fruit juice was all I drank, and I drank half the amount of those as I do water, very weird.
To sum it up though, I am not toooo hungry (yet), I'm not feeling toooo deprived (yet) and I am in relatively good spirits (for now).
So far I have had the following shake flavours:
Strawberry - nice
Caramel - not brilliant but tolerable
Banana - nice
Caffe Latte - blergh, foul
Vanilla - nice
Chocolate - hmmmm, not sure if this is tolerable or just plain yuck
I've been having fruit, nuts, or sliced ham or chicken for snacks.
On Monday night I had a small tin of tuna with a huge salad, Tues night I had a palm sized grilled chicken breast and huge salad and tonight I had an omelette. Mon & Tue night I wasn't hungry until about 9pm which is when I had my last snack for the day. Tonight though I was hungry an hour after I had the omelette.
The omelette was 2 eggs, spinach, mushrooms, onion, tomato, capsicum, ham and a small amount of tasty cheese. Now I am starting to think there wasn't enough veggies in it but I've had my last snack for the day (a small apple) so I can't have anything else.
Apparently alot of people go though a bit of a carb and sugar detrox in their first week of this program, the main effect of that seems to be feeling week, tired, and really bad headaches. This supposedly hits most people between day 2 and day 5. I have had a bit of a "lead-head" feeling but nothing too dramatic and it's the end of day three so I am hoping it stays like this.
Finally - water, another important part of the diet, at least 2 litres of water a day. And this is where I have really surprised myself, for the past 3 days I, me, the person who HATES water and only ever drank soft drink or fruit juice has drank at least 2.5 litres per day!
Of course the really hot weather (45 degrees every day) helps immensely!
One strange thing though is despite all that water I feel thirstier now than I did when soft drink and fruit juice was all I drank, and I drank half the amount of those as I do water, very weird.
To sum it up though, I am not toooo hungry (yet), I'm not feeling toooo deprived (yet) and I am in relatively good spirits (for now).
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Last meal of the condemned
We went out for dinner Friday night. My appetite had decreased in the last few months (ulcer medication?) and recently I have just been having an entrée serve of chicken satay sticks with rice for dinner. But not this week, in light of what is coming I decided to splurge a bit and ordered chicken parmigiana with chips. It was delicious and even though I was full about halfway through I wanted to keep eating because it tasted sooooo good, the chips at that pub are incredibly yummy.
I think chips are one of the things I will miss the most, there is alot of things I like that I can still have as long as I am careful about how much I have or only do it occasionally but chips are a complete no-no and I must admit I will find that bit tough.
So I decided to do a pre-Celebrity Slim weigh in and found to my surprise that despite not really dieting I had made some progress by myself. Just me on my own with the Wii Fit, not as much as I'd like over a month but something at least, more than I actually expected really, although I don't think it is noticeable when you look at me.
Hopefully with the CS that figure will improve.
So without further ado, my new stats:
Height: 160cms/5ft3in
Start Date: 28th Dec 2008
Start Weight: 81.4 kgs
Current Weight: 79.2kgs
Lost: 2.2 kgs
Start BMI: 31.8
Current BMI: 30.9
Goal BMI: 23.4
Goal Weight: 60 kgs
Goal Date: December 2009
I think chips are one of the things I will miss the most, there is alot of things I like that I can still have as long as I am careful about how much I have or only do it occasionally but chips are a complete no-no and I must admit I will find that bit tough.
So I decided to do a pre-Celebrity Slim weigh in and found to my surprise that despite not really dieting I had made some progress by myself. Just me on my own with the Wii Fit, not as much as I'd like over a month but something at least, more than I actually expected really, although I don't think it is noticeable when you look at me.
Hopefully with the CS that figure will improve.
So without further ado, my new stats:
Height: 160cms/5ft3in
Start Date: 28th Dec 2008
Start Weight: 81.4 kgs
Current Weight: 79.2kgs
Lost: 2.2 kgs
Start BMI: 31.8
Current BMI: 30.9
Goal BMI: 23.4
Goal Weight: 60 kgs
Goal Date: December 2009
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