... by the time thanksgiving rolls around. You won't be able to eat much, but you can have everything. For me that was important to feel normal. I was tired of my diet being the focal point and talking point; I just wanted to quietly do my thing without everybody watching over me.
That's exactly how I felt too. I had my surgery in August of 2008 and the weight just fell off and people were constantly talking about it. I thought I would like that, but after a while, it got to be a real drag that that was all we ever talked about. Plus, it revealed that they thought I was really fat before, which no one ever said to me but it kind of hurt to know they were thinking it.
People were watching me while I was eating and just checking in on me all the time and I actually started telling people that I would rather they didn't talk about my weight, only I said it in different ways to different people. But Thanksgiving is a great example. I was so jazzed because I got to go to my cousin's family home with my son and his girlfriend and I got to wear nice clothes.
One of the other people there, my cousin's wife, had also recently had weight loss surgery. The difference was, she had told everybody about it. I watched her agonizing over food. She talked constantly about how hard it was for her to lose weight and how little weight she had lost. But she loaded up her plate just like everyone else. I felt really glad that I hadn't told anyone because of listening to what they were saying to her.
I just took a tablespoon of everything on the table and dabbed those on my plate like the face of a clock. Instead of numbers, there was a little dab of food at each position where the hands would point. I then took a tiny bite of everything and smeared my food a little bit and didn't make myself conspicuous, and it looked like I had eaten as much food as everyone else ate because there was just a little food left on my plate.
But there was already just a little bit of food on my plate when I started eating. So I was able to keep up the pretense that I hadn't had weight loss surgery without making anyone suspicious, and that was my intention.
I'm attaching a photo of myself, my son and his girlfriend from that Thanksgiving in 2008, about three months after I had weight loss surgery.
And I still have all those clothes. And they still fit.
Enjoy every moment of your post-op experience. Everything will feel so great in retrospect. Even if you don't notice it at first, before you know it you'll see a photo or catch your reflection somewhere and you won't recognize yourself.
