It's 1:30 in the afternoon and I'm sitting down to my little afternoon rest before going to pick the first grader up at school. Today has been fairly normal...chores, pilates, school drop off and mid-day preschool pickup. Like many days, there's been a lot of food happenings. I made egg burritos for the kids and hubby for breakfast, packed my daughter a cute well balanced bento lunch, and made the boys some grilled ham and cheese sandwiches at lunchtime. In addition I've been working on a baby welcome meal to be delivered later which included slow roasting some pork, making a pan of mac and cheese, mixing up and salad and baking cookies.
So today has been a little more food work than the average day, but certainly nothing too uncommon. It's not uncommon for me to make three meals a day since someone is usually always home in my house, or for me to be making a meal to share with someone at church or save in the freezer for later. I make cute lunchboxes, bake bread, and stir big bubbling cauldrons of marinara to freeze. I order and pick up the donut holes for church and manage the coffee supplies and volunteers. We are the bread baking rotation for our church's communion, and I often can be found posting food pictures and recipes on Facebook.
My husband and I like to buy strange food at the Asian market, try new restaurants and recipes and order organic meats from local farms. We grow herbs in our garden and make delicious things with it. We grow cabernet franc grapes on an arbor in our yard and make our own wine from it. We watch cooking shows on the Food Network.
In short, we are foodies. It's part of our lifestyle and part of our identity as a family. My husband is the bigger foodie and better cook than myself, but over the years our tastes have grown very similar and he's taught me many of his kitchen skills.
Our six year old is even a little foodie in training who likes Sriracha on her eggs and almost had a heart attack when she got a waffle maker for Christmas.
So when I began to research bariatric surgery and what it would mean for my future lifestyle, there were some things that I was unwavering on. I didn't want to eat diet food for the rest of my life, or not be able to enjoy cooking for my family. Things crossed my mind like...will I be able to eat at restaurants, will I be able to eat spicy food, can I still drink wine?
And now as I am rounding out the first year of this journey, I am happy to say that I feel like a totally normal person. I eat completely normal food at my 1 cup portion. Because sleeve patient experience far less dumping sydrome than bypass patients (mostly due to the removal of the pyloris), the only restriction I have on fattening foods is that higher calories could impede my weight loss. But I can have it...little by little, if I want to.
I was telling my husband just last night how nice it is to finally truly enjoy REAL foods without fear or hesitation. There were many many years where I consumed a lot of 'fake' foods...no fat, no sugar, lots of prepared and diet meals. And sure, during that time I was skinnier but I was certainly not healthier. I think everyone is starting to finally starting to come around to the idea that the low-fat diet fads of the 90's were simply not good for our bodies, and I know for sure it wasn't good for mine. And frankly, I still got fat didn't I?
There were many decision that lead me toward having this surgery, and one of them was that I knew I needed to be able to eat real foods and still lose weight at the same time. Of course going toward the path of surgery is certainly NOT everyone's answer for making that happen, but for me it has been.
I know that in an ideal world, I would have been able to have self-control and moderation with these real food and not gained so much weight in the first place. I know many people who successfully live that way. But well, I didn't...and that ship has already sailed.
But coming back around, heading toward the land of the skinny...I find it refreshing to get here without diet coke or fat free cheese or those fake potato chips that have warnings about anal leakage.
I feel normal and healthy and like I'm very much still a foodie.
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