Appointment #1:

So, I had to be there at the clinic by 8:15 in the morning, to get all my labwork done:  the obligatory urine sample, followed by bloodwork.  Then, I had to take off my shoes to get weighed and find out my BMI, that lovely measure of how much fat is riding heavily on my bones.   I was hoping they would let me leave my shoes on for the weigh-in, so that losing the first few pounds would be as easy as switching to sandals next time, but  these people are old hands at this! My body mass index was frightening–as was my weight, both of which I’ll leave off this blog, thank you.  I was particularly fond of getting my waist and hips measured.  Then, the EKG–to make sure I was in good enough shape to go on the program.

The next step is the meeting with a nurse to discuss all the risks.  She’s a great person, so this went quickly and smoothly–except for the point where she casually mentioned some of the possible side effects, including dizziness, bad breath, temperature changes and “sudden death.”  I have to say that it took me a minute to get past that last one.  I asked  if they had ever experienced this particular side effect with any of their patients and was very relieved to hear her say, emphatically, “no.”  Since I don’t want to be the first instance , I’ve decided that I will actually follow the program to the letter instead of trying to be the fastest weight loser in history (which, due to my competitive nature, could be a risk for me).

My friend, Kim, who is going through this program with me (bless her wonderful self) said she particularly liked the moment when they asked us to sign a statement saying that we  agreed never to sell the liquid diet protein drink to our friends.  She had a great picture in her head of our friends lining up to try to buy the product from us in a dark alley!

Appointment #2:

This was actually two appointments.  I spent an hour with a nutritionist, designing an eating  program for “Week O,” the week where you do a combination of the Optifast liquid drink and food, so that you can transition into the total liquid diet without your body going into shock.  She offered me limited choices from foiur food groups. They do this on purpose.  For one thing, they don’t want you to have to think about food as much as you’d have to if you had tons and tons of choices for meals–and, for another, they want you to start thinking of food as nutrition instead of all the other things that roll around our brains and get us in trouble, such as food as comfort, food as fun, food as joy, food as reward, etc. etc.  So, I chose my 3 fruits, my 4 vegetables, my 2 starches, and my 4 proteins, and then she walked me through how I would come up with, for instance, a typical dinner.  I could have 3 ounces of salmon, with 1 cup of cooked acorn squash, 1 cup of cooked tomatoes or onions, and, for dessert, 1 cup of Greek yoghurt with 1 cup of frozen blueberries!  I was thrilled.  I had feared a much stricter regimen for the first week.  Each day, I start out with the liquid diet, then, after 2 hours, have another liquid diet drink plus a fruit from my list, then, 2 hours later, lunch (consisting of 3 oz of protein, 1 cup of raw vegetables from my list), then, 2 hours later, the liquid diet, then, 2 hours later, my dinner, and, finally, before going to bed, a snack of a string cheese or 1/2 cup of cottage cheese!  That’s the routine for this week, coupled with 64 ounces of water each day and 2 vitamins (1 in morning, 1 in evening). 

After the nutritionist, I had my first visit with the doctor, who turned out to be not the old hag with the wagging finger that I had feared but a young  (very knowledgeable) woman who looks like she’s still in her thirties–and with a wonderful sense of humor!  She gave me a check-up, and then we spent an hour going over my weight gain/loss history, from birth, trying to figure out what went wrong each time.  It appears that my main problem is not losing weight–it’s gaining it back.  So, we’re going to focus on that in my program.  We also talked a lot about balance–and the need for it.  Why does this not surprise me?  It seems like everything I’m doing this year comes back to trying to find more balance in my life.  Oh, and we talked about stress management.  Another big surprise!  Funny how sometimes the things you need to know are right in front of your face.

She warned me that I have to “surrender myself to the program.”  In other words, there is no point in walking around, looking like a victim in front of my children or feeling sorry for myself.  And, at the other end of things, there is no point in trying to beat the program and lose weight faster than anybody else.  I just have to take this on as something I’m doing now to help myself–something important that could change my life forever, for the better.   I walked out of her office, with my liquid diet products in hand, ready to take on the world.

Day One:  I chould have chosen a better day to start the program–other than the one where I was signed up to chaperone my 8th grader’s field trip to the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, Tennessee.  It was interesting, trying to get in my 64 ounces of water, while dealing with the joys of Port-A-Johns.  It was also interesting, sitting there eating my cottage cheese and carrots while my daughter and her friends wolfed down curly fries and funnel cake.  The most interesting thing, however, was that it wasn’t hard–the way I had thought it would be.  I had a program.  I had a schedule.  I knew just what I had to do.  I also knew that Kim would kill me if I didn’t get off to a good start.  So, I sipped my water, drank my liquid diet (in the convenient little throw-away container) and came home to my unbelievably delicious, nutritious salmon dinner.  Life is good.

Related posts:

1. Signing up for a Hospital Weight Management Program and Wonderful Grown-Up Children
2. Jane’s World: “Week Zero” on the Weight Program
3. Jane’s World: Week Three on Full Liquids and the Joys of Fake Nails
4. Jane’s World: Week Two on Liquids
5. Update on My Weight Loss

Tags: Hospital Weight Programs, Liquid Diet, Losing Weight, Optifast

This entry was posted on Saturday, October 3rd, 2009 at 7:40 am and is filed under Health, Main, Weight Management. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.