Water water water .. UG!!

Water pill or no water pill. Am I the only one that struggles with this? I don't want to keep using this as a crutch, but it seems like I do over and over again. This time I lasted an entire week before caving and taking one.

It all started out with reaching that small goal of being in the 260's. It happened for a day. One day. Then I went camping. I was down 37.7 lbs the day I went camping.

We went to Zions National Park with our trailer in tow. Zions is well known for their fantastic hiking trails. We got there fairly early. Ok early for me which was before dark. George and Carlos took off on the scooter and Roberto and I decided to take a drive through the park. We stopped at one of the shortest hikes there. Its called Weeping Rock. This trail is only a quarter of a mile long, but very steep. I wanted to tackle this hike now that I was down some weight as the last time I went I stopped half way up it and used the excuse there was too much ice and I would fall. Roberto being the sweet guy he is offered to pull me along. About half way up I had to stop to let my heart rate slow down and catch some breath. I told Roberto to go ahead and wait for me at the top. After one more stop and every one passing me I made it to the waterfall. My throat was burning and my nose was running and I thought I was going to pass out, but I made it!! After taking about 5 minutes to get my heart from pounding out of my body, I got to look around at the fall. It was very pretty. I thought for sure I must have lost 10 lbs with that hike.

Here is the proof!



The next day, the cutest grandbaby in the world showed up and I went over to the river beach and played with him feeling really good that I was moving around instead of just being lazy and staying at the camp. I won't mention that my three boys were off hiking/climbing the Watchman mountain which took them about 3 hours. Someday I will go with them!!

As usual, I ate some of the food, but not much. The second day my mom came and took us to dinner, I didn't order anything just took a couple of bites from her plate. Didn't even eat the huge dessert she ordered. I was planning on hitting the 40 pound mark when I got back.

Well wouldn't you know that I struggle with every single little benchmark so why should this one be any different? I got home and weighed the next day and after not weighing for three days I had gained a pound. WHAT?!?! Grrrr!!! I started a detox program the night before and thought maybe it was my body getting used to that. I thought I was going to wait it out. I know its impossible that I actually gained fat, so it had to be water weight. For whatever reason my body was holding the water. The next day I gained a half pound, then the next day was a pound and the next day was another pound. You can only imagine my dismay!! WTF!!! For me to actually gain a pound I would have to eat about 5,000 calories. That is enough over what it takes to maintain the body weight I have right now to actually gain a pound of fat. I would put my calorie intake between 1,000 to 1,500 a day. I should be losing weight. So this leads me to believing this is water weight. I wake up and my face is all puffy and I just know its going to be a bad day on the scale.

So why is my body struggling so bad with water weight? I have mentioned this in past posts. I went to see my surgeon yesterday and he didn't have an answer for me. So I will have to go on my theory alone. It must be the types of food I am eating along with getting frustrated over not losing weight or gaining weight that I know is water so taking my water pill, but not liking the water pill so only taking it a couple of times so my body is reacting to that by holding more water. My water pill I am talking about is a prescription I received while seeing the Fat Doctor. Thats what I called her she was a physician specializing in bariatric diets. Its called Maxzide with 75mg of Triamterene and 50mg of HCTZ. The HCTZ is the diuretic or what helps your body release water. I used to take this every day. When I tried to get off of it I was miserable. My body swelled up so bad it hurt. It took me quite a while before I could stop taking it completely. This is why I do not want to get into the habit of taking it again. Another big reason I don't want to take it is because my friend who is also taking the same for high blood pressure ended up in the hospital when they doubled his HCTZ to 25mg. Holy cow! I was taking twice that for about six months.

Needless to say when the scale went up to 273.3 today I took the damn pill. I will deal with the consequences later!

On a good note:

The docs official weight loss for me is 34.4 pounds. This is not where I wanted it to be, but dang its still good. I got the clearance to only go back every three months. My blood pressure was 124 over 80. I am happy with that. The doc assured me the need to burp every time I eat will pass.

You might recall that I made a commitment to purchase the family annual pass to the rec center. I kept that commitment. I purchased it about a week and a half ago and used it for the first time tonight. I had a blast!! And I went all by myself. I called all of my kids (hello.. this is the reason I bought the FAMILY pass!) to see if anyone would go with me. Every single one of them were busy. Hmmmm .. I am thinking they just knew that I was going to show up like the nerd who goes swimming, snorkle, face mask, and fins with the little blow up sea monster that fits around your waist. Well I had everything but the floaty. I don't need one, I float very well all by myself.

So I show up to the pool with all my equipment and the lap lanes are full. I am not sure why I thought I would go unnoticed, but I did. As I am walking to the lap lanes and I see all the swimmers who know how to swim making great laps, I think "maybe I will just head to the kiddie pool and walk around". That did not happen.. well not yet anyways. A very cool rec center worker asked me if I wanted him to find me a lane. I said .. um no I think I will just head over to the kiddie pool. He said .. no.. let me find you a lane. These guys will share with you. Um.. well... ok.. I say thinking that this was crazy and wanted to just crawl in my bag of stuff. He found me a lane alright .. sharing with mister "I have been swimming for 20 years" in a speedo and goggles. Are you kidding me?? Isn't there any little old ladies or a kid who also doesn't know how to swim?? Oh well... what can I do but jump in. We agreed (me and my lane partner) that I would stay on one side and he would stay on the other. Thank God I took my equipment out of the packaging BEFORE I got there at least I didn't have to look like a dork who just bought the stuff. I pretended like I knew what I was doing. I was practicing for my diving trip to Hawaii of course!! I put my mask on then attach the snorkle. I get in the pool and then put the fins on. Trying my hardest to look like I knew what I was doing .. all along knowing I was looking like a complete dork. I put my head in the water and start to go .. two feet later I am up sputtering and trying to pull my mask off because it is full of water. Ug! I can't reach the ground because in those two feet it has dropped to at least 6 feet. I am surprised the life guard didn't jump in! Fortunately, my mask is fogged up as well so I can't see if anyone is laughing their asses off at me. I dump the water out of the mask and try again.. it takes me several laps before I decide to try the snorkle with just the goggles (you know the ones that just cover your eyes). I only go a few feet before knowing for sure this is not a good idea. I can not breath underwater without getting water up my nose. So I settle back in using the face mask with the snorkle. I deal with the water and actually end up doing laps for about an hour. I didn't count how many laps I did, I just know for every one I did my lane partner did two. Oh well .. who cares. I was happy I was exercising and enjoying it. I later went into the kiddie pool and walked the length using the water dumbbells the center provides. It was very cool and I stayed there in the kiddie pool for another half hour and felt great!

I have made a mental shopping list. I want to get a swim cap as my hair kept getting caught in my mask. I want to get a nose plug so I can swim with the goggles and the snorkle. I want to get a bathing suit. Swimming in shorts is ok but they do not dry like a suit would which means different short each time I go swimming. I have learned that I need to use the kiddie pool first to do my laps with the dumbbells because it closes 2 hours before the lap pool does.

So the question will be.. will I go shopping tomorrow or swimming.

I am so grateful I had the Sleeve Gastrectomy. Even through all of the struggles I am over 30 pounds less than I was at the beginning of the year!!

Ok get ready for a laugh.. here are the pics!

Here I am in my gear!



Well I deleted the fins picture. I think it was showing off the "girls" more than the fins and that was not my purpose. :) Sorry guys!!

Here are the swimmers in the next lane which were swimming like the pros