My pre surgery brain just got the best me. I decided on cereal for my snack....my special K protein. The serving is 3/4 cup. I decided I needed a little more than three quarters of the cup. Poured my milk, sat back down ate a few bites and then looked at the bowl and realized I really can only eat a quarter to half a cup of anything. What was I thinking?

Good food!

I've decided that since I eat so little in amount now I want to make sure what I am eating tastes GOOD!  Been scouring the internet gathering yummy, low-carb, low-cal, low-fat recipes.  Tonight... cauliflower crust pizza. 

I found several recipes for it and decided to try this one... 
http://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-detail.asp?recipe=1606756

Of course, being me, I had to change it up just a little.  Oh... and confession.  I totally messed the WHOLE recipe up when I mixed it up the first time.  I forgot to  cook the cauliflower after I riced it and added the cheese, eggs and spices.  Ooops.  I went ahead and put it in the oven to see how it would do.  It actually was ok.  It held together fine.  You could kind of 'see' the bits of cauliflower and it had more of a crepe texture (it was also a little thicker in the pan that I spread the other on the cookie sheet).  Thinking of using this one to wrap a little bit of gyro meat and tzatziki in.  Or maybe ... I dunno.. I'll think of something. 

So here is how I changed the recipe a bit for mine...

1 1/2c. cauliflower (riced)
1 1/2c. shredded cheese (1/2 six cheese italian blend and 1/2 cojack)
2 MEDIUM eggs (because this is what I had)
some garlic powder, a pinch of salt (which I don't think it needed really but was hoping to take the 'cauliflower' taste out a bit) and some italian seasoning blend.

Ricing the cauliflower was much easier than I thought.  I have a salad shooter so I just put it through there with the grater cone.  I decided it wasn't quite fine enough so I put it all through a second time and it came out beautifully. 

After mixing it up and spread it out on my pizza stone.  Next time I think I would spread it just a TAD thinner in the middle to make it a bit crispy.  Baked at 350deg for 25minutes.    I took it out and decided to flip it over thinking the sort of 'glossy' top would be better on the bottom.. I think that was a bad move.  First I'd recommend spraying the stone or using parchment paper as it was a bit tough to loosen.  Also the underside (now the top) was a bit softer and I think the sauce soaked into it too much. Forgot to take a pic before I put the sauce on but here it is with sauce (and you can see my 'mistake' crust in the background too)...

 I topped it with sauce and toppings and then placed it on my pizza pizzazz to finish cooking.  Some buddig brand ham.. about half a package.

 

About 2/3 of a fresh mozzarella ball from aldi and some hormel turky pepperoni mini's.....

 

 

And the final product....

 

 

 

 The underneath was wet and seemed like the sauce kind of soaked right through (thus the leave the shiny side up stuff above).  After cooking I removed it and put it back on the stone to cool.

I ate most of it with a fork but it wasn't soggy... just softer in the middle.  But it was GOOD!  And the crispy edges were especially good.  Next time I'll leave it shiny side up! :)  

I put this into the calorie calculator on MyFitnessPal and got these stats ...(for the pizza cut into 8 slices with all of my toppings included also the pizza was small.. probably 9-10inches)

Calories 145
Carbs 2gms
Fat 9gms
Protein 11gms
Fiber 1 gm
Sodium 335mg

Bon appetit'!

Ignore this jibberish... can't figure out how to delete it...145

= C

9

11

1

335

Back at it....

Sooo... it's been a while since I've been here but the deed is done.  Had my Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy on Jan. 30, 2013. 

The first few days were a bit rougher than I expected.  Well the first 2 weeks really. Had to stay an extra day in the hospital because I couldn't get enough fluids in, felt pretty crappy for a couple weeks, needed a bag of fluids at almost 3 weeks out because I wasn't doing a good job of getting fluids in again. But things are falling back into place now. 

So far I am down about 17lbs since surgery.  About 10 of this was in the hospital and it's taken a while for the rest but I think things are just balancing out with fluids and stuff. 

In the beginning I was trying to push the foods so I could get away from the protein drinks.  I'm now realizing they are inevitable ...at least for a while.  If I get two 'shakes' in a day plus some food I can get both my protein and fluids in that I need.  I'm experimenting with different shakes/flavors and finding a few I can tolerate.  This morning... cherry cheesecake.  Not too bad.  :)

The one thing I'm having trouble with is volume.  My eyes are still WAY bigger than my stomach.  After 40+ years of eating the way I have it's hard to believe that you are FULL with 1/4-1/2 cup of food.  Many of the people who've had WLS have told me 'oh, you can have a couple bites of something and be satisfied'.  I'm still learning that I guess.  If it tastes good I want to keep eating it.  Of course I'm not an idiot... I've learned that I pay for it in pain and nausea if I do... but it's not satisfaction yet that keeps me from eating it... it's fear!   It's early in the game though.  I'm giving it some time. :)

Hello again....

I know it's been a while. I'm just not very good at keeping up the blog thing. But here we go again. Today I started my preop diet. This consists of three protein shakes per day plus one small meal of 300 calories or less. Yeah. I am starving. But it made it through. it's going to be a long two weeks. Surgery date is January 30. I'm excited and nervous at the same time.

I have to say I'm pretty proud of myself. I am down ALMOST (about 0.5lbs to go!) 20lbs since I started this journey Sept. 6. I've been obsessively using MyFitnessPal to track everything that goes in my mouth and it's totally paying off. I tried on all of last years jeans yesterday ... most of which would NOT have fit this year if I hadn't lost this... and most of them are borderline too big (don't look terrrible but are a bit too comfy so I know they'll look saggy soon) and even had one pair to get rid of! Today I thoroughly enjoyed shopping at Goodwill and buying stuff that was xl/1x instead of 2x and 3x! I even bought one sweater that is just an L... a bit snug now but in a few weeks should look great!  And the best part... I know I'll enjoy it for a few months and then get rid of it because it will be TOO BIG! (thus the goodwill shopping only!)

Lazy Blog

Today I'm going to be lazy and just repost my facebook post here...

 

  I just wanted to update y'all on something. I was a Skeptic (yep, with a capital S) about the whole 'oh, if you don't eat crappy white carbs you won't crave them'. I thought people were lying... either to me or themselves. I gotta say... they really were right!!!!! I have not given up carbs entirely bu...

t I am really limiting them and realized this morning that I don't CRAVE them like I did. Sure, sometimes I think something sounds good once in a while but for example... we ate at Texas Roadhouse last night... I gave M my croutons from my salad and didn't eat ANY of the rolls (had one TINY bite of  M's and it wasn't even that good). I did have half a baked potato but that was it. The other night I made some chocolate chip cookies (don't get all excited on me... just the ready to plop on the cookie sheet kind). I made 4 for him and 2 for me. I ate my 2 cookies (and counted the calories) and I didn't find myself thinking 'hmmm... wonder if M is going to eat all of his?'. So.. for all of you that I raised my eyebrow at... you were right! :)

There ya have it.

Next up... new TOOLS! :P

Today was good.

So today was my second appt. with the docs office.  It was good.  They were pleased that I have lost 8lbs according to their scales (I've lost more since my highest weight but started before seeing them) and thought my food plan in general is going ok.  Still need to work more on getting away from the diet coke...eventually and now need to start making 'better' choices within my calorie range.

  The other discussion was my 'psych eval'.  It 'revealed' that I have some issues with emotional eating.  WOW... really?????  This just strikes me as so funny.  I am pretty sure that most (and I do mean MOST) of us got to be where we are because of some 'emotional eating'.  So.. this means I need to do a few 'counseling sessions'.  Honestly, I'm happy to do it.  I could use someone off whom I can bounce my thoughts about this stuff.  "Why do I notice that sometimes I'm not hungry but I really am craving the TASTE of something...it's a 'mouth hunger' more than a head hunger, and what do I do about that?"  "What will I use to cope when food is no longer an option?" "Is it normal to feel gung-ho about this one day and terrified the next?"   So, I'm happily go along with these but sure hope they won't hold up my surgery date.

  The way it works is until you are close to ready for surgery you just see the dietician and the nurse.  Once you are closer then you are scheduled to see the doc again for a presurg. visit.  Today she said my weight gain is good and if I can get a couple of counseling sessions in before I see them next month then I can see the doc in December with possible early Jan. surg! :) 

Overall I feel really good about this but some days are hard.  I'm just tired and just want to eat something EASY.  Unfortunately EASY is generally chock full of calories... sigh.  But... I move on as I have to.  :)