Big Girls Don’t Cry

Photo credit: Jaypee Online 

Well where do I start ladies?  My husband and I have decided not to go ahead with IVF treatments because the drugs that I have been on have not allowed me to ovulate.  Instead I became quite ill on them.  Not to mention all the stress that has come along with it.

When my husband and I finally agreed to stop I felt kind of relieved.  This may sound kind of strange but in all honesty I just couldn’t handle taking all these drugs and then going on the scans (which were horrible and painful) only to be told that my follicles had not grown.

I became ill this last two weeks especially and have not been able to go to the Gym at the doctor’s orders.  This has pis@#$ me right off.  I am probably back to square one and have to struggle again now to lose the weight that I gained while I was ill.

Well thank God for my inspiration queen Angie All The Way who has shown me that by moving on and not giving up you can still be a WINNER.  So I am gathering all my strength (what ever is left) after the emotional realisation that we may never have children. 

My head is like a merry go round and it just isn’t stopping.  I have been spinning out of control and I don’t like it.  So after I have recovered I will get my Gym bag and my water bottle and off I go on Monday to my beloved Fernwood and go nuts. 

Nothing relieves stress like a good strong structured workout.  My husband and I will continue trying for a baby but we are not going to go crazy about it and basically just be spontaneous and hopefully I will lose more weight in the next few weeks and my body will be on the mend again.

Till the next time!!

Photo credit: Dafina 

I had my third scan this morning and guess what my follicles didn’t grow which means that I won’t be ovulating any time soon.  I was so upset and disappointed that I cried all the way to work.

Basically this nurse advised me that even if I lose a whole heap of weight it still may not make me ovulate.  So I am thinking that I am wasting my time and money on something that may never happen.

Not to mention that I am an emotional wreck, feeling sick all the time and being moody.  This is not what I want.  I knew this would be hard but never in my wildest dreams thought it would be like this.

You might be saying to yourselves that it has only been a few weeks of this process but let me tell you they have been very intense weeks.  The medication, the waiting, and the awful scan you have to do. (The scan hurts).  Then lastly the disappointment of them saying oh well the follicles haven’t grown.

I think after talking to my husband tonight we might give this whole process a miss.  If they can’t get me ovulating with drugs then what hope do I have?  I know when I talk to my husband tonight he will be really upset at the news and he will definitely want to give all of this amiss.

I feel like I am falling apart and the realization that I may never get pregnant has hit real hard.  Because now it is all a reality where as before I even went through the testing stage it was all a possibility, now it is looking bleak.

  Before and After pictures of Angela 

I have found a very inspirational woman online recently, just by searching other blog’s of interest to BGDC.  I was especially interested in this young girl because her blog was amazing.  She has written her diary entries of what is happening in her daily life as well as her weight loss story.  She also has some interesting articles of the facts about food, nutrition, and all kinds of health issues associated with being obese.  She has recipes, menus and ideas and links to other people’s blogs that have ideas of what to eat.

What really stood out for me is that once reading her blog and commenting we had sustained a repour and I knew she knew what I was going through myself.  Let me introduce Miss Angie All The Way to you ladies. 

Her strength and determination has inspired me not to give up, even when I have felt very low and just wanted to quit.  I haven’t because reading her story and the journey she is taking still has helped me personally to stay on track. 

Angie is a 28-year-old woman from Halifax, Canada.  She works full time, has a wonderful fiancé, and has only recently started blogging.  Angie was kind enough to allow me to delve further into her journey of weight loss by agreeing to do an interview.  The transcript is featured below this article.

As all who are trying to shed some pounds know, it is a never-ending battle to keep this up.  It is a life change and that means that you have to fight to stay on track.  It won’t just fall in your lap.  It will be the hardest thing you probably do.  So I hope Angie’s story helps each and every one of my readers to find the courage that she has given me to continue on with my journey.

We can gain support from people like Angie and myself - sometimes our family and friends don’t know how to support us and therefore with the wonderful group of people out there who are doing the same thing as we are should definitely stick together and help each other through the very tough times. 

The times that you don’t think you can exercise any more, the times when you overeat and you think what is the point and quit.  This is a time to all stand together and be strong.  We can achieve anything with great support systems like this.  Don’t give up ladies we can do this together.

I am sure I can speak for Angela in saying that we both hope you enjoy this article and if we inspire one person it was all more worth doing. 

THE INTERVIEW

Tell me about when you decided to start your weight loss?  What was the contributing factor that pushed you to do this?

I was always chubby as long as I can remember beginning in elementary school.  In high school, I was overweight, but remained active playing soccer and basketball.  I loved playing soccer and I always attribute my healthy self-esteem - despite being unhappy with my weight - to my involvement in sports.  In my final year of high school, I sustained a knee injury playing soccer, which prevented me from continuing being active in sports.  It wasn’t until I was 22, that I had surgery to repair my knee and from the time of my knee injury to the time of my surgery, I had let my weight creep up to 298 lbs.  

I was happy in every other aspect of my life.  I had found the man I am now marrying, I had graduated University and additionally completed another college program and starting work in the real world.  I had achieved most everything I had wanted to achieve up to that point in my life accept, of course, I was unhappy with my weight.  Then came the craze of Dr. Phil and his Ultimate Weight Loss Solution. 

For the first time in my life I was ready to face losing weight and ready to give it a sincere effort.  My knee was fixed and I had no excuses.  I jumped on that bandwagon and was successful at losing 28 lbs.  I can’t remember exactly why I stopped, or the day I stopped, but I drifted away from that regimen through what I can only explain to be boredom!  Sure it was a healthy way to lose weight, but I got bored and that was that.  I never did re-gain that 28lbs back even after going back to my previous lifestyle.   

Two years passed and I was 270 lbs.  Any person who is that overweight can relate when I say not a day (or hour) would go by that I was not saddened that my weight was not where I wanted it to be.  Then came February 19, 2006.  I don’t know what it was specifically about that day that made it “the day,” but I remember thinking to myself that here I was again, another new year had come and the first month was already gone and the second month was almost over and I had still not taken control of my obesity. 

Another year would come and go and time would still pass by even if I didn’t take that step to commit and I decided that there was no way that I was going to be standing there another year later in the same position.  No way.  Immediately I knew that through all of the diet programs that have flown through the mainstream through the years, Weight Watchers was the only one that I had not heard negative things about and it was a program that was still alive and well. 

It was healthy and I was going to do this right.  I was only going to do it once and so I was willing to take the safest, most healthy approach to slow and steady permanent weight loss.  I signed up online that day and promised myself that if I found that the online program wasn’t working, I would switch to attending meetings.  Even though I was nervous and excited about my new commitment, I knew that if I kept it private it meant that I was hiding behind the fear of failure.  I knew that if I spoke up about it, I was creating my own element of accountability. 

Because I was not a meetings member, I needed to create my own real feeling of accountability.  At first it felt almost embarrassing to admit that I had joined a weight loss program because I was in such a state of denial I felt that I was almost “admitting” to others that I had a weight problem which is absolutely ridiculous because that’s a problem that is obvious to anyone who sees you!  That was the day I became real with myself and my need to lose the weight.

How many years have you been trying to lose weight?

Having been overweight for most of my life it was something which was always on my mind constantly, but not something I actually had attempted for real many times.  There was the one time I mentioned on the Dr. Phil’s Ultimate Weight Loss Solution and before that, there was only one other time when I was a University student and during my working summer, I committed to healthy eating.  There were no scales and I got a lot of attention from people who commented on my success.  It felt great, especially not being tied to a scale at all, but once I got back to school and back into the student life routine, it didn’t last and I eventually gained it back.

How do you feel each week when you lose a kilo?

In Canada, we weight ourselves in terms of pounds, which actually seem a little bit more encouraging when you see them drop off more quickly than kilos would.  A healthy weight loss in pounds translates to about 2 lbs per week and that was where I held steady for many many months.  At first it was so exciting to see that scale dropping lower and lower each week and I would have weeks where I would lose more than 2 lbs too.  However, because I knew that I had such a long way to go stepping on that scale every week, I tried really hard not to be too emotionally affected by what it said.  I began recording my losses like it was any other day.  I realized that a day would come where the scale wouldn’t be declining so steadily, so by not attaching too much of an emotional response to the result, I knew it would help me get through the stages where the scale would go up or stay the same.

When you exercise, how did you feel the first time you did that and how do you feel now when you exercise? 

As I mentioned before, I had always been relatively active, even at my largest, but there is no comparison whatsoever on how much easier it is to do after losing such a large amount of weight.  I was able to compare the drastic difference because unfortunately I was in a terrible car accident when I was about 30 lbs into my weight loss that rendered me immobile for months.  I had broken my hip and my foot and suffered various soft tissue injuries to my neck and shoulder.  I was completely unable to exercise for a very long considerable period of time. 

I worked at physiotherapy for a very long time to work up to being at a point of being able to exercise normally again.  Ironically, during that time of immobility, I had lost the majority of my weight without meaningful exercise.  Good healthy nutrition was entirely to credit.  There was no way I was going to let it stop me from getting to my goal because I knew that it would only make me feel worse, given my current situation.  By the time I was able to try regular exercise again it was like I had an entirely new body and I experienced what it was like to exercise like a “normal” person and feel what it felt like.  Everything is all relative, and you become used to the body you are in, but it was not nearly as difficult to sustain the same period of time of cardio.

I know for me the menus are the hardest things to juggle, how did you tackle your menu planning and how has this affected your other half?  Do you cook separate meals?

I find the menu planning and grocery shopping a very challenging part because it takes constant attention and effort.  This was the part that I just had to accept.  There is work to losing weight and you have to put in the time and effort required in a consistent way to be successful - period.  This is particularly difficult in my house because my other half is a very picky eater who does not eat vegetables or even regular staple foods in most households.  So to answer your question, yes I do end up cooking two separate meals almost every day for my Mister and myself.  I have gotten quite good and cooking for “one.”  Having said that, he has been so supportive of my weight loss and efforts to better health and has tried very hard not to let his own issues with his picky eating affects my food decisions.  I still remember on my first birthday after jointing Weight Watchers Online, he looked up a cake that he could make me that was low point! 

I am trying to fall pregnant and this is why I am doing this, on a personal level, are there any health issues with you? Or are you just trying to get fit and healthy because you want to be healthy?

This is so so important.  As I mentioned above, I was in a very serious car accident where I sustained serious injuries.  One of which was a dislocated and fractured hip, even though I was already 30 lbs into my weight loss at the time (and so very proud), the doctor could not stop stressing how important it was that I LOSE THE WEIGHT.  My hip injury was serious and the more weight I carry on my body, the more stress my joint would feel and the inevitability of arthritis would rear its ugly head much sooner.  At that point, I was still 240 lbs and he did not believe that I was going to continue with my weight loss.  He was a great orthopaedic surgeon, but lacked bedside manner to say the least. 

No matter how many times I stressed to him that I had my weight problem under a control, he would always look at me like I was a drug addict who had been sober for a week and couldn’t be trusted.  It was devastating.  I also plan to become a mother in the next year or so, in addition to the obvious reasons to be a healthy mom, the additional weight gain during pregnancy will inevitably be bothersome on my hip, so getting down to a healthy weight before becoming a mom is extra important to me. 

What is the thing that most motivates you when you are feeling down and feel like you want to quit?

As you know, I started to blog.  Through blogging I have been introduced with the greatest, most supportive comrades a person could every encounter that understand all of the ups and downs through the weight loss journey.  I am first and foremost inspired and encouraged by all of my fine ladies who check in on me daily.  They are amazing individuals.  I try to be as positive as possible in every aspect of my life, but there are of course going to be times when you’re not feeling so great.  When I get the courage to post during those times, my girls are always there to bring me back up and remind me how far I have come.  I try not to focus on the small set backs and keep the perspective on what I have overcome and how far I have truly come on this journey so far.

What exercise do you undertake to stay fit? - Please do a list in point form.

• I started running! I am so very excited about this because this was not fathomable when I was at my heaviest, or even as I was losing weight. The impact of running just wasn’t doable. I am running my first 5km race at the end of May and I am committed to crossing that finish line with open arms.
• Strength training is very important as well. Even with the struggles I have with my shoulder, I am working hard in this area. Having lean muscle mass at my goal weight is another goal of mine.

Do you have a source of where people can go to find healthy recipes?

I am a member of Weight Watchers Online Weight Watchers Canada  and that is a huge resource for recipes and the like.  In addition, I have found Spark People to be an amazing site.  It is a free site that provides tools to track food, weight loss, recipes, message boards, exercises etc. 

Lastly, what would be your most important advise for others who are trying to lose weight?

My biggest piece of advice to those trying to lose weight is to be 100% honest with yourself.  You have to accept what it takes to be successful with losing weight and you have to be consistent.  DON’T ACCEPT ANYTHING LESS!  Successful weight loss is not for chumps! ;-)  Anyone can do it, but you need to be realistic and serious.  Life is chalked full of obstacles and set backs that will try to stand in your way form time to time, but it’s all about learning to be flexible and not to let it take over your direction. 

If you find yourself whining, you are most likely making excuses for why you didn’t or couldn’t.  You have to become good and knowing yourself and recognizing excuses when you hear them.  Learn to move past set backs quickly and not to let them keep you down.  Your mindset IS the driving force behind your success, so stay positive and keep going no matter what!  Show yourself what you are made of and it will be the biggest personal accomplishment of your life.

A picture of Angela Now April 2008

Photo credit: Cindytoo

By the way I have lost another 100gm this week.  Also I have changed my work out by adding more things in there.  Well not me but my lovely personal Trainer Julie.  I tried the new program for the first time today, couldn’t do all of it and misunderstood one exercise and ended up lifting 6kg weights on each hand.  It was a bonus.  I tried using the cross trainer and I almost killed my self on it.

Haven’t done real well on the food front but am still trying very hard.  It has been really hard to find things that are healthy and that my husband likes too.  I am so busy and tired now that I just can’t be bothered cooking two meals.

Even though I feel I haven’t made a big progress I know that most of what I am feeling right now is not me being negative but all to do with the drugs that I am on.  It has really messed with my feelings a lot more than I expected them too.

The last thing I want right now is to feel like I want to give up.  I haven’t yet and hopefully I will have the strength to get my @#$% together.  Excuse the French people but I am trying to stay very calm and not doing a very good job of that.

My clothes are still getting loose on me and that has cheered me up a little.  Not to mention that if I was in the right frame of mind right now I would be happier about the result and more focused on what will happen next week. 

I am off to the Gym tomorrow and will do my best to get all that aggression out of my system and come home and just relax and gather my thoughts.

Photo credit: Apostolis L 

I went for my scan and it wasn’t what I expected.  My doctor did the scan for me and he didn’t find any big changes from the last scan.  This means that the follicles had not grown.  The whole purpose of this medication is to get me ovulating.  I am not currently doing that and it has been driving me crazy.

While I was waiting to be seen, all I kept on hearing is two pregnant women talking about ovulation this, and how their system of getting pregnant they should sell that secret. BLAHHH BLAHHH BLAHHH.  I say that because I am being polite.  In my head I was swearing at them to shut up already.

For obvious reasons my reaction was totally irrational and I have this women’s intuition if you want to call it that - and my gut was telling me that I wasn’t going to have good news in there.

Needless to say I was devastated and now my doctor has put me on two Clomid tables a day for 5 days and yet another scan on Monday morning.  My husband has been getting stressed out about this whole process.  My side effects have been affecting him too.  The emotions and the mood swings have been a tad much.

I can tell you that I started the new dose on Wednesday and it is Friday now and my stomach has blown right up.  You should see it.  I have been eating things and not being able to finish because I am that bloated it has been making sick to eat too much.

I don’t know how much more of this I can handle and it things don’t look my way soon I think that we will stop this treatment all together and just try to accept that this won’t happen for us and get on with our lives.  I do however have just that little bit of hope that God won’t let me down.  Yes, I have been praying every night that my body can do this.

I have also been thinking that my work out regime has been kind of saving my life right now.  The stress you feel and all that pressure has to be released somewhere and I have released it at the Gym and not on my husband.  So it has really been a blessing in disguise.

More next week.

I am having my second scan tomorrow and I am not looking forward to it.  After all who likes being poked and proded.  My husband and I have been going for it every second day (which is killing us) but we are hoping for good results - hopefully a little baby.  That whole process has been quite funny. 

It’s like you have plan when and where - I might have to ring him to come home one day so we can get busy.  You would only see that in a movie but let me tell you it is heading that way.  I can say we have been having alot of fun along the way.

My second scan will determine whether or not the eggs have grown, hopefully they have and are almost ready to be released.  The bad thing is that by my taking Clomid it has given me some side effects.  I have been feeling nausious, head aches, feeling like I want to vomit.  Not a good feeling, it has been hard at work always feeling dizzy.

I not only have my scan tomorrow but I get to see my Doctor as well so I can ask a million and one questions.  We haven’t discussed what other procedures I will have to undertake.  I might have to do an IUI procedure - but let me cross that bridge when I get to it.

Photo credit:  Wallegree

In Natural News [dot] com they have an article that basically says that if a mother to be is obese that she is putting health problems from her obesity onto her self and more importantly her unborn child.  They are asking, is this a form of child abuse?

This article greatly concerned me because not only am I obese but I am trying to get pregnant and it is very distressing to think that people out there are thinking these sort of things. 

The fact is that unless you are obese you really have no idea how hard it is to lose the weight, and if you somehow mange to lose it, it is a whole other thing trying to keep it off.  And sometimes it is a medial problem that makes it difficult no matter what you do to lose it.

There are so many articles online that state this or that and it is very scary to think that your weight could cause harm to your baby.  This information is freaking me out.   Ezine Articles have given us this article by Beverley Brooks. 

It contains all the things we should know before falling pregnant if we are overweight or obese.  Not to mention the things that can go wrong, not only for you but also your baby.   They also have some good links that you can look at in the bottom of the page of that article.  Well worth a read.

Photo credit: Porkan Beans

Well it is day 13 of my cycle.  I am feeling still bloated and a little sore.  My scan went ok, they found 2 eggs but they were still a little small.  I am due for another scan on Wednesday.  Hopefully this scan will show that they are big enough to be released.  It has been a very emotional time, the last couple of days after stopping Clomid this is when it all started with the emotions.

I would just seem very edgy and at home on Friday the day of my scan I came home and sat on the coach and started crying, for no reason at all.  It was very strange because they did tell me that my hormones would be all over the place and I would get very emotional.

I know this is only the start of this process and I know things will get much worse emotionally.  It doesn’t help that I am very sensitive in general and this medication has made me into a blubbering sook.  I have said that to my self after the big cry.

I guess you should try to think with your head and realise that it is your mood changing due to the drugs and not really you.  This is how I have been able to control these outbursts happening at work. 

My gynaecologist will be at the clinic on Wednesday so he can take a look himself at the scan.  I will be instructed what course of action to take next at that time.   Until then I have to grab my husband and go for it (you all know what I mean).  This has been the fun part of all of this.

We both have been trying to have an open mind and use laughter to get us through all the pressure we are under.  It works some days and other it doesn’t.  We are doing out best but it has been so hard to try to stay calm, especially with me on this medication. 

I have been trying to think of this as step one, and not deal with step two until we have to.  I guess this is why I am doing ok and not lost my mind completely.    More details as they happen.

• transvaginal ultrasound

Photo credit: crlygrl34 

It is my 3^rd day on Clomid and I am starting to feel the bloating.  I have my scan scheduled for Friday 18^th which is the 11^th day of my cycle.  This is to determine pre ovulation.  I am praying to God that all goes well there and I am very nervous about the scan.

My husband and I have kind of warmed up to the idea of having a child and have even been excited about it.  When I say warmed I actually mean heated because we have always tried to just say hey if it doesn’t happen we can buy another dog. 

The problem with this is that this could all fall in a heap and I may not be pregnant at the end.  This knowledge kills me to my core, and my husband even though he would never admit that. 

I even went to K-mart tonight to pick up a lay-by (Australian term) and walked through the baby section.  I saw so many tiny cute things for boys and girls and I almost started to cry whilst in the store.  Because I just couldn’t bare it if we couldn’t after all this medical stuff get pregnant.

I have always dreamed of having a child since I was a child of 5 years old.  This may sound strange but it is the truth and even at 5 I knew I wanted to meet a wonderful kind man to marry and always I had in that picture a little girl.  She will be called Isabella, although if she were a boy then he would be called Nicholas. 

So you see failure is no option, I refuse to give up on this because the truth is I would be such a wonderful mum, caring, giving and always bring laughter to the house.  To be able to do that for a child is I guess every woman’s dream.  I know it is mine. 

PS. I am feeling quite emotional right now, it is the Clomid ( I am hormonal ).

As you all know I am well on my way with my weight loss.  I have lost I think around 2 kg and 7.5 cm off my whole body.  This is really really great because I didn’t think I would even get this far.  Especially now that I am on Clomid tablets, they make you bloat.  This is an uncomfortable feeling.  I did my work out today and it went ok considering last week I only went once to the Gym.  Please take a look at my chart and see the progress I have made against all odds.  Tomorrow is pay day and I have some shopping planning I have to do to make sure I have enough of everything. 

As you may have realised eating every 4 hours is the key.   Always eat your breakfast, and always try to have snacks available when you need to snack.  Make sure you have plenty of low GI vegetables like lettuce, zucchini, egg plant, that is all I can think of right now though I am sure there are much more.  Wholegrain breads are great too because you must eat your carbohydrates to give you energy during the day. 

More soon.