Lunch ... Seriously????

It feels so weird to eat less than my 3 year old son.. just unimaginable ! It is so odd to not think about food 24/7.... sometimes when it is way past dinner time my family asks "Ummm... did you forget about dinner?" .. ummmm YES !!!!! Sometimes for lunch I will just grab a small handful of pretzels and be content... other times I eat a 1/2 sandwich or so... and then I just grab all kinds of junk and eat it...lol Today it was pineapple, pretzels, and cheese. Once I took the picture of my lunch I realized that it may be a little too much. It is such a habit to over fill your plate but I always think about what is on the plate before actually eating it....that seems to help me ! and I Never never NEVER go back for seconds !!!

Here is a pic of lunch today....



I ended up putting 1 piece of cheese back and about 5 of the pineapple chunks back... feel full and satisfied ;-) Yeah I know this is not the best choice for lunch... but I could be stopping at mcdonalds for a big mac meal.. .. lol

No oil on the Beach in Navarre Florida.. yet ;(

I am a photographer in the Florida Panhandle and most of my work is centered around the beach... Beach Weddings, Family portrait sessions, beach Senior sessions and such. The oil really has me on the edge of my seat. I honestly don't think it is going to be as bad as we fear, but I just don't know yet. Had a Family Beach Portrait session in Navarre Florida today and it was just gorgeous. Had about a 30 minute break between rain downpours but it was nice to see there was NO OIL in Navarre Florida yet... I am praying for a miracle that it just "skips" the panhandle of Florida but that is just never going to happen !!! So sad, I have lived here my entire life and to see the beach black is going to break my heart... and the animals that this will affect is going to be devastating... Here is a pic from today from my cell phone.. Might be one of the last pics of an oil free beautiful beach :(

Nothing new... except a pic ;-)

Nothing new and exciting happening around here.... my summer portrait season is gearing up so I have been super busy with that... but I do have a new pic to share ;-) Tuesday in a spur of the moment decision I had my nose pierced ;0) yes I love it, no it did not hurt, yes I can still blow my nose, no I did not put a big hoop in it...lol I was going to do it for my 30lb weight loss celebration, but hey... 28lbs deserves a celebration too !!!




... barefoot Jen

1st fill

Starting a blog late is a chore... there are so many things I need to talk about to catch up. I will take my back posts day by day as I think about them. I had my 1st fill a few weeks ago. I was 6 weeks postop. I have a 9cc Realize band, it was empty after surgery. My surgeon (yes the intern...lol) put 3cc's in it during my fill. No anesthesia to numb it, I just laid back and took a big breath and the needle was in. You can feel my port very easily (thank goodness) so it was easy to find. Once he had the needle in he fished around the port for a little bit (45 seconds or so) and then I heard a pop, he said "You hear that? that means it is in." So, nothing to it.

He gave me a glass of water and told me to take a sip... that went well
He told me to take a bigger drink... that went well too
He told me to DOWN IT...lol I told him NO ! he said YES !! lol
he wanted me to feel what a tighter band does when chugging water, it felt a little odd and yes I could feel something trickling down slower than normal.

I was on liquids for the next 24hrs... the first meal I had was grits, eggs, and toast. The grits and eggs went down fine but the bread was a little tricky. It did go down but was so slow that I opted not to take more than a couple bites... Not sure I am ready to experience something getting stuck !!!

I can eat bread now fairly easily, I chew really well and take super small bites. Sometimes I can feel the tightness of my band so I take smaller bites on those days . It is really weird, some days I am tighter than other days... What is up with that?!?!?!?!?

ok... gonna go... here is a pic... just random because I cannot make a post without a pic...lol..... barefoot jen

This is a pic of my son and a couple of our bulldog pups from this past Christmas ;-)

Getting closer to my 60 day goal ;-)

I burn out EASILY... so I decided to make my goals a bit tough... I figured that since this band is new I will have more will power. My goal is 10lbs every 30 days. May 25th my goal was 232lbs...did not reach it so I am hunkering down trying to get there FAST so I am not so far behind for my next 30 day goal. I stepped on the scale this morning and I see 234... yahooooooo ! I am going to try REALLY REALLY hard to get to 232 by Wednesday... Pray for me !!!!

Went to a skating party today and my cousin snagged a pic of me... I don't normally mind pics but she got a FULL BODY PIC of me... then posted it on facebook...lol Not so sure I am ready for any full body shots...lol But of course I will share it with my band buddies.....


and YES those are my skates, YES they are old (my mom bought them for me when I was in 7th grade), and YES they still fit, and YES I can still skate ;-) ... Barefoot Jen

WOW:-) Band Buddies ROCK !!!!!

I was thrilled to turn on my computer this afternoon to find that I now had 14 followers... I am thrilled, overjoyed and quite frankly surprised...lol I am not a very exciting person...lol But boy did you band buddies make my day !!! Thank you bunches and bunches ;-)

of course no blog post is complete without a picture.....I should really take a new pic... this one is from last summer ;-)

Let's go back in time a lil bit ;-)

Since I am a late blogger I figured I should go back (before I forget...lol) and tell you about my surgery day. Before I start I am going to apologize for my grammar and sentence structure... It will not be correct ! lol When I start rambling I use "....................." a lot, it helps when you don't feel like writing with correct comma placing... and yep there will be misspelled words too... just over look them ! lol

I had my surgery done at Shands in Gainesville by Dr. Cendan. Although I KNOW that Dr. Cendan did not officially "DO" my surgery he was there...lol Shands is the University of Florida's teaching hospital....so I had a student surgeon... I know that is not the technical term but you get what I mean...lol But the surgeon that I did have was wonderful, very caring and was really interested in ME...

My surgery was on March 30, 2010 around 9am... the Dr said the surgery lasted about and hour and a half. I really only have one complaint with the surgery process... they wheeled me into the operating room AWAKE... YIKES !!! They gave me some meds to calm my nerves, I guess it worked but it is scary rolling in there then a dozen people around you and talking and hooking you up, but as soon as they said to "count" I don't remember ANYTHING ... which is a good thing. They had told me they would wake me in recovery to ask me questions and that I would have a tube down my throat, but I would most likely not remember it... and I don't . They WOULD NOT let me take my glasses in with me, and I hated that. I am blind as a bat... my vision is 20/400 which is VERY BLIND...lol and yes my glasses (which thankfully for contacts I dont have to wear) are thick, very thick ! Once out of recovery I asked them to find the person with my glasses and they said they could not find her... but she was there, I don't think they went and looked for her...lol I do remember that I did not have a catheter once I woke up, which I know some people do and some don't so I figured it was worth mentioning. Here is what I see when I don't have on my glasses.. so naturally I was bugging anyone that would listen about my glasses... whining to all about why couldn't I take them in there with me...lol But no one listened !


I was in my room by 2pm, and up walking by 3pm, and going to the bathroom by 3:30pm...lol I had a student nurse that thought I could not walk without her assistance... so I humored her and let her walk me around the floor one time. The entire time she was looking at her watch like she had something to do... so why the need for her to go with me? lol So when when we got back to my room she proceeded to walk in the door... I had to stop her and tell her I was going around 1 more time... she was dumbfounded, looked at her watch, and walked again with me...lol Everyone said walk walk walk walk to get rid of any gas so that is what I intended to do ! I let her off the hook after the second time around, I told her I was finished and sat in the chair in my room... but after she left I went for another walk...lol So gas was actually never a huge problem for me until I got home... about day 4 it was uncomfortable but bearable... the heating pad cures all gas in your belly !!! But you may want to buy 2 heating pads... gas tends to travel to the rear of your shoulder, so you need a heating pad for the front and back...lol

I was released the next day by 4pm. That morning I had to go for an upper GI so they could check for leaks.. all went well with that. About lunch time they said my potassium was low and was going to give me some through my IV... OOOOHHHHH MYYYY GOODNESSSSS ... potassium going through a vein in your hand is NOT FUN... it hurt so bad ... I handle pain very well and that crap HURT !!! It felt like my hand was on fire, I literally almost yanked the IV out of my hand ! The nurse came in and told me there was not much she could do but she could slow it down. She did that and it helped a little but my hand was still on FIRE, she wrapped my hand in a hot washcloth and that did the trick, but with the IV dripping slower I was going to have no use of my hand for like 4 hours. Dr. was ready to release me and I told him about it and he said "Just give it to her orally in liquid form" ... YAY, it did not taste good at all but was much better than via IV !!!!!

The ride home from Gainesville to Pensacola is about 5.5 hours... my fantabulous little cousin Hannah was my caretaker and she did a wonderful job ;-) She is so funny... while in the hospital she was so sleepy from our all night driving, so when we got to the room she crashed ;-) I had flocks of interns coming in every few hours... yeah just like on Grey's Anatomy... and she zzzzzzzzzz all the way through it. A couple interns even laughed a little... it was funny !

Pain was totally tolerable, once off my pain pump at 11am or so the day I was released I did not take any pain meds until I went to bed at home that night. Bed... well not really bed, I did not even attempt the bed for a few weeks. My stomach and body was in too much pain when in a horizontal position...lol so I sat up and slept in the recliner for a min of 3 weeks before even attempting to lie down flat...lol

Shands Hospital was great... the call button does not seem to work because it is anywhere from 5 minutes to 30 minutes before anyone attends to your call, thank goodness it was no emergency..... but aside from the flocks of interns visiting it was very peaceful. I was in the new wing of the hospital, everything was super nice. Each room has a built in "sofa' that folds out into a bed so there was a crash place for Hannah to sleep and play on her computer... and yes they did have wifi ;-)

No, I did not take any pics... shame on me again !!! Just was not in the mood to deal with "before" anything ... I was looking to the future and still am... I know what I look like when I am FAT, no need to remind myself...lol Now when I lose the weight I will post a new pic for ya EVERYDAY !!!!!! lol