Four weeks on 1 mg

SW ⟫ 207.7 | CW ⟫ 175.4 |

Ozempic: ⟫ 1 mg

Coming to the end of another week and I’m not quite sure how I feel. Obviously Sunday was absolutely awful but it certainly made the numbers on the scales go down. They also appear to be staying at the new low – or in the vicinity – so part of me feels like I should be pleased? The other part of me is standing back in horror thinking that if the best way to get the scales to go down is to be sick, actually throwing up, isn’t this just another form of eating disorder?

By no stretch of the imagination am I thinking about making myself sick on the regular. But I don’t really seem to have constipation or diarrhoea lately (please don’t take this as a taunt or jab – I don’t need either of them to return to remember just how awful they are); I’m not sure how much food restriction I’m feeling; hunger pangs are rare but I can definitely eat even if I’m not hungry. It kinda feels like what was working in the beginning isn’t working now.

I know I have a tendency to panic and I don’t want to do something stupid or drastic – we’ve had a pretty steady week food-wise. The biggest change was having take out today because I went for a couple of tattoos. I had my koi filled with colour (ouch), and also covered up a small tattoo on my forearm that I didn’t like. I’ll lob a picture of the forearm one below.

We had fish and chips. Normally, I either have kebab meat with salad in a pita, or occasionally a small fish and small chips. For some reason this evening – whether it was because it was the first time eating all day or because I was tired after the tattoos, I ordered a large fish and small chips. I barely finished a third of the fish (the cats ate well tonight) and left about a third of the chips. Admittedly, I had a McDonald’s McFlurry and a chocolate and raspberry pie (they’re celebrating their 55th Birthday or something), but apart from three boiled sweets during my tattoo session, I didn’t eat anything else today.

I guess we’ll see what the scales show. It has been a tough week – living together as three adults is not easy, and it requires real effort and thought to not fall back into ‘Mommy mode’ which messes up the dynamic. Knowing that Gidget isn’t going back to university this year means all three of us know that, for the moment, we’re stuck together and we need to figure this shit out.

I don’t even want to think what might happen if we don’t find a way to make this work.

It’s something like 6 am and I need to sleep. I guess I’m hoping writing this shit down will help me in some way – whether it’s just getting it out of my head or being able to return to it and see how I was feeling. I guess I can say this is four weeks on 1mg successfully completed, but I can’t help but wonder whether a shift to something like Zepbound or Rybelsus might help me? Or am I just looking for something external to do the work? Gah, I need sleep!

The Mind-F*ck that is Choices/Decisions

SW ⟫ CW ⟫ GW

207.7 ⟫ 192.2 ⟫ 186.93

Ozempic ⟫ 0.5 mg

Well, I appear to have entered the world of the mind-fuck. On Monday, I had my telephone appointment with Violet, my Endocrinology nurse. She was very pleased with my progress and said if there are any issues getting hold of Ozempic to get in touch with her as she will push for them to prescribe Zepbound which is the new semaglutide that has just been approved. I was riding high on that and my birthday weekend despite having a very upset stomach and feeling like death.

Today, Violet calls back to give me a heads up that the surgery team would be in touch with me soon with regard to potentially getting the gastric sleeve in May. MAY! I thought it was going to be December at the earliest because of the wait times so in my mind, I had another 10 months to see just how much weight I could get off and maybe not even need the surgery. Less than half an hour later, the phone goes and its the surgery administrator wanting to book me in for a face-to-face with the anaesthetist and practice nurse next Friday!

I was high on flippin’ Big Narstie because my knees were hurting and I was desperate for sleep, so I had to try and be ‘normal’ but inside I was freaking out. I couldn’t make the first appointment they offered me, so I am now booked in for late March with the anaesthetist and February 26th with the nurse.

I can honestly admit that I am freaking out. It was one thing to think I had ten months to make a difference and perhaps not have the surgery. May just feels so soon and my brain is running through scenarios like a pair of squirrels fighting in a sack.

* if I turn down the surgery and determine that I can do this on Ozempic or the like and then what happens if there are supply issues or I get too sick and can’t continue on it? Does that mean I have to start the whole process for weight loss surgery all over again?

* if I go for the surgery, what if that means I’m not giving the non-surgical route time to work? Surgery is irreversible – am I ready for that?

* there are so many people fighting for a place on the wait-list and I’m thinking of turning it down – am I insane? Stupid? Panicked?

Pretty much the best scenario that I can think of is if the anaesthetist says that I’m currently unsuitable and they give me longer to lose some weight – going into surgery at over 400 lbs is no joke and I want to give myself the best chance of survival. And then maybe I’ll be able to get it off with the Ozempic or whatever in the meantime?

I feel like such an idiot being so freaked out about this – I’ve been trying to get this whole WLS thing sorted for nearly four/five years and now it might be happening, I’m bottling it. I know it’s not that simple – when I first started this journey, Ozempic, Trulicity, etc weren’t exactly well known and I was stuck at the bottom of a deep, dark hole looking up and wanting to cry.

Stripes was so helpful – she listened to my stoned ramblings, made sense of them and then just made it okay. No, we don’t have the answers but we have time and we have a plan. And we just stick to that. So, I keep taking the injections, survive the side effects (seriously, the toilet issues have been unreal ) and lose the weight. If and when the anaesthetist tells us if I’m suitable, we move to the next step.

And we have Violet on our side. She has been instrumental in keeping me going – always so empathetic, helpful – if she says she’s going to chase someone, she does, and her honesty and willingness to go above and aboard has made so much difference to me.

Tomorrow is injection day and I think I’m going to stick to jabbing the back of my arm as I think there have been less side effects this week. The scales did go down to 191 kgs the other day but we’ll see where things lie tomorrow morning at ‘official’ weigh in, 2024 has been a trip so far!