I'm on YouTube

While I love the higher quality video available on Vimeo, I recognize that way more people use YouTube and if I wanted to be a part of the community of surgery "vloggers", I had to get my videos up on YouTube!

I created a whole new account there and will only be using it for surgery-related video. The bonus to this is I don't have to password-protect them like I do on my Vimeo account. When I post here on the blog in the future, I'll include both videos so you can choose which to watch!

So here you go...


Check me out on YouTube!

PS ~ I really wish you could choose the video still they show for the video. Why am I always making a stupid face in them?

Ian's Boston Eats

Ian had to go to Boston for business this week for 3 days. He got a fridge in his room so he could try to eat right, but with coworkers he spent all day with at the office, he had to eat most of his meals out. Since he was only 7 weeks post-op this was a little bit challenging, but I think he made some pretty good choices. He texted me photos of some of the things he ate and I wanted to share them here.

Philly Cheesesteak with pickles. He was able to eat 1/2 of the sandwich filling (no bread) and some pickles...

This is the stuff he bought for his hotel room:

Water, flatbread crackers, deli slices of chicken breast and reduced fat provalone, laughing cow cheese spread, cherries, and ice cream. Unfortunately since his coworkers went out for almost every meal, he didn't get the opportunity to eat much of this.

Garlic shrimp served with broccoli & cheese sauce (and that other thing is a grilled lemon I think.) He was able to eat all the shrimp and a little bit of the broccoli.

Personal size 10" pizza, which he was able to eat just one slice of! They had a huge gift card to spend and had lots of food at the table, and everybody was sharing... so this was an interesting experience for him but he did great.

Most of his other meals were leftovers of these meals, or some of the things in his room. Thanks for sharing your experience honey!!

One nice perk as a post-op is that since his company pays for his food expenses on these trips, he didn't have to feel bad about not being able to eat much of his meals.

Two Month Update

Today is my official two month 'surgaversary' :) Things have definitely slowed down this month but I've made some progress. During this 2nd month I lost 13 pounds.... bringing my total loss to 50 pounds in 2 months :) I have also updated My Stats Page to include my newest measurements.

I can see a LITTLE bit in the photos, not too much... I had a few changes in measurements... not too much lol.

Now for new progress pics!

In an effort to see all the positives, here are the things I DO notice :)
- My face is still getting smaller
- My waist is indented a little more
- Lost a little more off hips and stomach
- From the back I can tell my stance is less wide
- The shorts I am wearing this month are a size smaller than the shorts I wore in last month's photo :)

This month most of my inches lost came from the hips, lower stomach, and waist. Interesting how it caught up since I lost so much on top the first month (very little change this month up top.) That explains though why all my shorts got too big! If you want to see all of the detailed measurements for this month, check out my stats page. Most of my measurements were a lot less change than the first one... BUT... there was ONE that was more! Can you guess which one? It was my upper arm! The first month I lost 1 inch, this month an inch and a half. Whoo hoo... I think swimming is helping ;)

And now for my 2 Month VIDEO UPDATE!!!! Hope you enjoy... as usual the PASSWORD is healthupdate

2 Months Post Op Video Update from Christie Stearns on Vimeo.

If you want to catch up on my previous videos, check out  my Videos page!!

New At Starbucks: Artisian Snack Plates

Pulled through Starbucks the other day for my free ice water and saw these advertised. What a great thing! Healthy snacks on the go. Our society could use a lot more of these!! They are called Artisian Snack Plates and (at least here at my sbux) come in three varieties: Fruit, Nut & Cheese Plate, Protein Plate, and Chicken on Flatbread with Hummus Plate.

Any of these would be fine for me to eat, but since I'm still eating such small amounts I went for the Protein Plate. Wanted to give it a try so I would know if it was a good on-the-go option for me. I picked it up when it wasn't really meal time so I actually ended up eating it at home. :)

I thought this was a great option for a (relatively) healthy meal on the go. At 8 weeks post op, this still made two full meals for me. At the first sitting I had one of the 2 cheese slices, 1/2 the hard boiled egg, 1 apple slice and some grapes. At the 2nd meal I had the other piece of cheese, the rest of the egg, the rest of the apple and grapes, and about 1/4 of the bread with the peanut butter & honey spread on it. Threw the rest of the bread away. It is nice to know options like these are out there - along with ALWAYS FREE ICE WATER - great options for road trips, travel, on-the-go, etc since you can find Starbucks almost everywhere now.

Full Nutrition Info Available Here

They do make this look so much prettier on their website, don't they?

I plan to eventually try the other two snack plates also. This one was right in the middle as far as calories. The fruit, nut, cheese is higher (but would also pack more protein) and the chicken and hummus one is lower in cals (also with more protein!)... I'm excited to try them sometime.

If you are interested you can read about the content and nutrition of all three offerings here:

Fruit, Nut and Cheese Snack Plate

Chicken and Hummus Snack Plate

Protein Snack Plate 

Interestingly enough, the Protein Plate has less protein than the other two. Lesson learned.
Hope this has been helpful! I was so delighted to find out about these!

Chicken Alfredo Flatbread Pizza

I've been meaning to share this for quite some time! I made up this little "recipe" for making flatbread pizza at home in one of my favorite varieties - chicken alfredo :)

All ingredients were purchased at Super Target:

1. Flat-out brand Artisian Fold-It Flatbread (splits nicely into two circles.)
2. Sargento Reduced Fat 4 Cheese Italian 2% milk shredded cheese
3. Buitoni Light Alfredo Sauce
4. Hormel Natural Choice 100% Natural (No Preservatives) Carved Chicken Breast - Grilled
5. Garlic Powder, Italian or Pizza Seasonings, Garlic Pepper

The first step is to put the sauce on the flatbread. I used 1/8 cup per pizza.

Add garlic powder, italian seasonings and garlic pepper on top of the sauce, to your personal taste. I personally like LOTS of garlic, and a little of the others :)

Add 1/4 cup of the 2% milk italian shredded cheese blend to each one. Top with about 1.5 oz chicken breast. Important for WLS people -spritz a small amount of olive oil on top of the chicken to keep it moist during cooking. It stays tender this way!
Sprinkle a little more garlic powder, garlic pepper and pizza seasonings on top.

Bake in toaster oven (or conventional oven) at 325 degrees. In the toaster oven this takes 8-10mins.

Voila!!

These are a great size for post-ops. We love them. Sometimes can't finish them, sometimes can. I will add on the nutritional info I calculated as soon as I can but I do know it is 26grams protein!!! And 220 calories.

Classes & Support

I have been meaning for quite some time to thoroughly investigate all of the classes and support groups available to me... the bariatric program at the hospital puts out a really good newsletter with this information but I just haven't gotten into it for a while. I was particularly interested in these monthly menu planning classes they offer... I was waiting on a friend who wanted to go with me, but she flakes out on everything so I am going to just start worrying about ME and start signing up for things!

Since we had our last nutrition class last night, I learned about more of these things and really got into my newsletter and looked at everything I'm interested in.


Firstly, there is a monthly support group meeting in my area on the 1st Tuesday of every month. This is free. Definitely going to check that out in August.

Then, there's the menu planning classes! Each month is something different. In August it's a grocery store tour with lots of great information. These classes are on the 2nd Monday of each month and cost $20.

A seminar I've been interested in since the beginning is: Pregnancy After Bariatric Surgery. Don't need to go right away but definitely want to go. This one is free and it the 4th Monday of each month.

Finally, I am most excited to learn about bariatric exercise classes near me. Not even 5 mins away. He has 2 regular weeknight classes each week. One included Zumba, low impact aerobics, and strength training. The other is low impact aerobics, "core & more", stretching and conditioning. These are $15 per class. He also offers Nordic Walking on Sunday mornings, and in the summer he offers Walks in the Mountains!! It would be so much fun to do these things with other bariatric patients and not feel like the only unfit person in the room.

Here are a few pics from their website that have me excited...

I can't do those classes all the time since they do cost money and I already pay for a pretty expensive gym membership.... but it would be great to get in something different 1-2 times a month and meet people.

Excited!! Time to RSVP to some of these events and get them on my calendar!

8 Weeks Post Op

I am now 8 weeks post op and I weigh 262. This is a total loss of 48 pounds. I am thrilled with that! The scale wasn't budging but suddenly it did and here I am. I just have to keep hanging in there and know that it will go. :) My official 2 months will be coming up on the 20th so I still have 6 more days and I'm hoping I'll hit -50! At the 2 month mark is when I will have more official photos and measurements to share. For now though, here's an unofficial photo of what I look like today:

Okay okay.. I still have white legs!! But I think they are getting a LITTLE bit better from all the pool-going :)

Those are the smaller Wal-Mart shorts by the way.

In other news - my blood pressure is in a good range. Today it was 122/70. I don't know what it was when I started, but I know it has improved. Ian's used to be dangerously high before surgery (150/120) and now it's 110/70!! Wow isn't that great?? Ian's stats today at his 6 week appointment was that he has lost 37 pounds. So proud of him!!

We had some really good experiences there today. Kim, the director of the bariatric program at the hospital, was who our appointment was with today. She asked us questions and wanted our opinions because they are trying to make the program better for Sleeve patients. Same thing with our nutrition class today... we spent 30 mins afterward talking to the nutritionist and she took down lots of notes about what we had to say because they are totally revising everything in relation to sleevers. It sucks we had to go through it ahead of the curve, but I'm glad that our insights may help those that come behind us.

Also ~ something really interesting! They told us today that one of the news channels wants to do a little spot on us. I don't know any more than that but I said they could give the lady my phone number and so hopefully soon I will know more.

One more thing. I love crock pots and especially post-op they are great because it helps keep the meat so much more moist. We were using a tiny one meant for sauces because our regular one is just WAY too big. The sauces one though was tooooo small, and also had a crack in it. We picked up this little beauty which is 1.5 quarts (our sauce one was 1/2 a quart, my big one is 6 quarts!)... this size is perfect. I got some chicken breasts cooking in it with broccoli cheese soup pretty much immediately:

If you're interested, it's only $15 on Amazon! :) We love it.