Surgery: A Year On

November 13, 2020 By Lise Quintana in health Tags: bariatric surgery, diet, food, recovery, weight loss 1 Comment

If you scroll back just a tiny bit, you’ll see that I had weight loss surgery a year ago.

What I was told before and directly after surgery was that there would be a “honeymoon period” of twelve to eighteen months. During that time, the weight would come off kind of no matter what I did. And, for that most part, that’s been true. But a lot of things have changed.

Nothing spicy
My stomach is tiny. I can still eat only less than 8 ounces of food at a time. Spicy food has a tendency to irritate my stomach, making it even smaller than usual, making me instantly nauseated. It’s sad, because I used to put Tabasco on everything, eat pickled jalapeños with my eggs and beans, love a good vindaloo. Nowadays, if it’s spicier than green Tabasco, it’s out.
Nothing bubbly
For a while, I tried little sips of lightly carbonated beverages. I swished them around in my mouth for a while, then swallowed. It was fine. Then I tried with regular soda. Again, fine. Then I tried just drinking something carbonated. Tiny sips. I had maybe two, and then felt the most alarming sensation I’ve felt since surgery. One of my biggest problems is not being able to burp. It sounds hilarious, but the feeling that I’m going to burst from the inside out isn’t funny. The gas bubble makes it up to about my throat and no further. It feels as though I could I could truly injure myself.
Nothing starchy
As odd as it sounds, three bites of bread, pasta, rice, or potato fills up my stomach quicker than three bites of meat. Maybe it’s because starches have more air incorporated in them, and when I get air in my stomach, well, see above. I’m not saying I don’t eat starches. I’m just saying I can’t eat a lot of them at a time.
But not too much protein either
Back in January, I had an attack of gout. I’d never had it before, and it was kind of alarming, but I went to my doctor, got some meds, and it was fine. He asked me if I knew what caused gout, and I told him I had heard it was from eating a rich diet and drinking too much. It’s why it’s called “the disease of kings.”
“Rich in what?” my doctor asked. I hate when people ask questions that they have the answers to and you don’t. It’s rude and wastes time.
It turns out that the answer is “protein.” Which put me between a rock and a hard place because the additional protein was called for after surgery. I’ve cut down on protein, and I’m fine.
Watch the sugar
Thanksgiving. Christmas. Easter. Birthday. Halloween. What do they all have in common? Tons of sweets everywhere. And the problem isn’t so much the calories I shouldn’t have as the fact that the sugar hits my system like a ton of bricks. My heart races, I lose focus, I start sweating. It’s not a pleasant feeling at all.
Alcohol is out
The last time I had gin (my favorite) was in February, when I poured myself a nice gin and tonic to enjoy during a Zoom meeting (yeah! in February!). After a single sip, my face felt flushed. After a second sip, it felt sunburned and went tight. I excused myself and went into the bathroom to look in the mirror – my face was beet red and the kind of swollen where my smile lines were white creases. So…that’s out.

Before surgery, I would have looked at that list and thought “that’s not living,” but there are a few things that make it okay.

Before surgery, restricting my intake meant dealing with intense cravings. The kind of addict thinking where, even when I knew the thing I wanted was killing me, I rationalized why I needed to have it anyway. Every pound was a struggle, and I consistently lost. After surgery, I don’t miss the food. It’s alarmingly easy to forget to eat for long periods of time. The strangest thing to me is that things I used to love no longer appeal to me. Almost nothing is as tasty as I remember it being.

The result is that as of today, I weigh less than I have at any other time in my adult life. My BMI is within the normal range (not that I care, but my doctor seems to feel it’s important). I feel amazing – healthy and energetic and as happy as anyone can be in 2020 (although things are looking up).

I’d say it was worth it.

How to Recreate Your Life

November 4, 2020 By Lise Quintana in fire, personal Tags: awkward, fire, loss, possessions, replacing Leave a comment

It’s the same every time.
“Where are you from?”
“Bonny Doon.”
“Oh, no! Were you affected by the fires?”
“Yes. We lost everything.”

…..crickets….

I always feel like a bit of a fraud saying we lost “everything.” We had packed up some stuff the night before – a few changes of clothes, our meds, our important documents, our computers, and the dogs’ food, crates, medications, and blankets.

So, we didn’t lose everything.

In the first few days, we had an unending caravan of Amazon trucks dropping off the very most basic things we’d left behind. Underpants, socks, pens. We were living in my mother’s spare room, so there was a limit to how much we needed to replace. When we moved into a rental house and found ourselves in the position of having to create a household from nothing, there was another round of Amazon deliveries and trips to big box stores.

I’ve come to see that there are four different kinds of buying I’ve been doing, and I really have to evaluate every purchase to see which kind it is before I hit “buy.”

Absolute necessity
There were things we needed that we had zero of — things like baking pans, cloth napkins (we’re hippies – paper is a no-no), cleaning products, basic spices, a bed, etc. These are easy. If I can’t carry on a quotidian task without it, it’s a necessity.
Re-creating the old house
Although we’d already identified quite a few things from the old house that we’re not replacing (good-bye, harp), I keep stumbling over “we had it at home, so we should have it here.” I really have to talk myself down from buying things like huge rugs, cute little tables, my famous steamer trunk office. I mean, there’s a very good chance that I will put some of those things back, but I have no idea what the space is even going to look like right now, so I can’t start buying large, furniture-type things for a house that doesn’t exist yet.
Filling up the rental house
This place is nearly as big as our hold house, which means that there are miles of bare walls, open floors, and empty counters. At our old house, we had to create space for things because every nook and cranny was full. It’s hard to resist the urge to look at the space we’re in and think “this corner could use a little table,” or “I should get a lot more plants.” I have to keep reminding myself that we’re not staying here forever, and when we leave here, we’ll be moving into a space less than half this size.
Filling up the new house
I’ve already decided on the themes for each of the rooms, which will dictate what kind of stuff I’ll want to get. I’ve been buying smallish things that will go into the rooms -— hourglasses for the Pratchett room, a pair of raven lamps for the Clarke library — but apart from the furniture we need for daily functioning, I’m afraid to buy any large furniture until I know what the new house will look like and so what spaces we’re trying to fill.

Everyone wants to give us things to replace what we’ve had, but that’s not quite right. Then they want to give us things in themes we like, but we’re not quite ready for that. The one thing I have received from my friends that I will always accept, that I will take a zillion of no matter where I’m staying, are books. My friends have really been coming through there, and I know that once we get into our new house, I’ll already have my friends there with me.