Ten years 'after' and going strong – Susan Maria Leach

The primary point of having bariatric surgery was to give ourselves a line in the sand, a permanent tool to HELP us to make better choices through negative reinforcement and portion control. However, it does not work on its own. We need to use this tool to attain our goals of better health and a new life.

IF we run back to the Doritos and ice cream when we have a problem or are stressed, it indicates that we may need an ADDITIONAL layer of help in the form of therapy. When we consistently override our surgery, it means that our obesity was not about food it is about comfort.

It takes a concerted effort to see the Doritos on the store shelf, overrule our inclination to NOT touch them and pick them up. We feel the guilt as we lift them and probably even look at the bag or nutrition stats. We think again… make the decision to PLACE THEM IN OUR CART. While we walk around the store, we see the Doritos every time we place another item in the cart, yet continue to override what our brain screams when we see the bag. Have we made the decision that we don’t care? Perhaps, but mostly we JUSTIFY the decision so it’s NOT us. The chips are for someone else and we just will have a few, our day was bad, we have been so good on our plan, and we want them and DESERVE them.

As we near the checkout, we pick the bag up from the cart and place them on the smooth black conveyer belt and watch them ride towards the hands of the checkout person. As she picks them up, our heart beats faster, and we feel guilty again. We think about this thin girl wondering why a 275 pound person needs Doritos – mocking us. Shame and Guilt. When our groceries are packed, we pick up the bags, place them into the car… we carry them into the house. We remove them from the grocery bag and put them on the shelf of our pantry. When no one is looking we grab that bag, and tear it open… all the while KNOWING we need to make a different choice and could STOP this slide at any time. When we get to this stage, it isnt about the taste of the Doritos chips, it about wanting and deserving the comfort – in one defiant motion. We want to show whoever said we can’t have them, that we CAN have them – even if it’s our own voice.

By the time we have crammed the Doritos or ice cream or danish or bagel or potato chips or crackers or candy into our mouth its not about the taste its about the comfort and that we WANT to feel that comfort – we dont care that we may fail – we want to taste that familiar taste. We want it. We deserve it.

Its a cycle… and here comes the punishment… the shame and guilt. Its not about the food… its what the food that we cant have represents to us.

Stop looking at foods and telling yourself that you CANT have them. When you CANT have something, you want it even more and it becomes an obsession or drive. I try to look at it differently – I can have anything I want. I can have Doritos IF I want them, however I choose to NOT eat them. Rather than someone or some thing having the power over me, I HAVE THE POWER TO MAKE MY OWN CHOICES. Its my choice to eat or not eat them, and I CHOOSE to NOT eat them. The choice and thus the power is all mine.

If you have eaten a food that has too much fat, or too much sugar, or have eaten too much, I am sorry that you feel sick. Dust yourself off… get rid of the poison you brought into your home. DON’T BUY ANY MORE. Find something else to use as a reward or comfort. When we handle a package more than ten times – it means we had more than TEN opportunities to STOP  the slide, get off the track and allow our surgery to work for us. Sometimes we need help beyond our own body and surgery – and need help for emotional eating. Take back your power from the food – the power is YOURS – it has always been yours.  Use your power!

A recent article about nutrition in Body & Soul magazine really made sense to me when it said we should think of our body as the earth and if we want to plant a life-giving vibrant green garden we need to make sure the soil is rich with nutrients.  You can’t grow a plant in bad dirt! A beautiful herb garden will wither and die without food and water!

I thought of the years prior to my gastric bypass surgery, my eating habits and nutritional apathy and realized that for most of my life I had been stripping the ground yet still expected to have a strong life. Years of losing and gaining weight via starvation dieting, prescription weight loss pills, the terrible habit of not eating all day then overeating once I got home from work, had all taken a toll on my health and metabolism – throwing me into early menopause and worsening my thyroid condition; but the most obvious consequence was my morbid obesity and need for gastric bypass surgery.

Now that I have my life under control nearly ten years after bariatric surgery, I have put the nutrients back into my body and encourage my good health through a nurturing and positive attitude. I didn’t have weight loss surgery to have a skinny, ragged, scrawny body; at age 48 I have worked hard to have a fit, radiant, strong body and mind.

What we eat matters not only to our size but to our well being. Pay attention to what we eat and why we eat it, in order to understand our motives and make better choices.  Having a positive focus is a major part of post op living and growing our healthy and vital garden. We need constant reminders to notice and dwell on to the major obstacles we have already overcome rather than obsess over the distance we have left to cover.

We have to water the herb garden! Eating breakfast is one of the healthiest habits we can adopt and for me one of the hardest to maintain. With one little change in our morning routine we can feel more energized, focused, and leaner. Breakfast boosts metabolism and has a clear connection to maintaining weight loss. In a recent study of over 3000 people who had lost at least 30 pounds and kept it off for a year, it was found that 78% ate breakfast 7 days a week while 5% ate breakfast either 6 or 5 days a week. A protein smoothie, a scoop of ricotta with sugar free preserves, a scoop of chocolate protein made into a mug of warm cocoa, even a rolled up piece of ham or cheese will boost morning metabolism, allow us to burn more calories, increase concentration and fill in the nutritional gaps.

If this makes sense to you, start today in preparing your soil to ensure it is rich and able to support growth of your beautiful and healthy plants. Eat breakfast to fuel our day, take good vitamins, eat fewer ‘bad’ carbs plus more lean protein & vegetables and move our body every day. Let’s treat ourselves with kindness and praise for our accomplishments – love for who we are at this very moment.  It takes about 90 days to develop a habit and this one is for an abundance of  life.

Eating calcium-rich foods is a better method to strengthen your bones than taking calcium supplements alone, according to researchers from Washington University in St. Louis.

In the study, women who consumed an average of 800 mg of calcium per day in the foods they ate had higher Bone-Mineral Densities  than women who took 1000 mg of calcium in supplement form.

Go back and read that last line again… and this time really think about it! It’s amazing.

Interestingly, if you’re going to choose one or the other, food appears to be the winner. However, a combination of both food and supplements may also be beneficial.  Women who got at least 70 percent of their calcium from food AND took calcium supplements, had the highest Bone Mineral Densities of all and took in a combination of 1600 mg of calcium per day.  So once again Balance between Food and Supplement is the key.

So what does this mean to a bariatric patient? It means that we need to pay attention to what we eat and choose foods that contain calcium. Instead of a sugar free pudding cup, choose a half cup of yogurt with a few mashed berries to satisfy our 3:00 afternoon craving for a snack – in addition to adding probiotics and great health, it adds over 200 mg of calcium to our day. I am not talkin about the processed dessert type yogurts, like  that ‘carb counter master’ garbage which is basically thickened water – choose REAL yogurt, or Greek yogurt that contains calcium and protein off the charts.

Have a cup of skim milk each day that adds over 400 mg of calcium to your bottom line and only costs you 100 calories. Many of us used to adhere to the belief that milk was bad for a bariatric patient – BUT, with the numbers of us who have serious deficiencies, we need to think about BALANCE when we choose our foods. Drinking an eight ounce glass of skim or 1% milk in order to take in 400mg of calcium, plus vitamin D is a smart choice – look at what you get for what you ’spend’ !

Instead of iceberg lettuce or even romaine – choose spinach, as 2 cups of baby spinach gives the body 200 mg of calcium plus it tastes GREAT! Make my Baked Vanilla Egg Custards as a calcium rich source that is as delicious as it is healthy. Buy Vitamin E enriched eggs to boot!

Pay attention to the foods you eat… small changes make a huge difference. We absorb the vitamins and minerals from fruits and vegetables differently than when they are synthesized in supplements – as they contain organic compounds that interact with the micronutrients and the body in ways we are just beginning to understand.

Calcium is not a joke! After breaking my leg in our motorcycle accident a few years ago and discovering that even with all the supplements I took that I had vitamin D and calcium deficiencies I knew I needed to make some serious changes. I plan on living a lot of years and my bones need to carry me there. Sure supplements are important but it appears that the calcium rich foods we EAT are the ones that COUNT!

The problem with egg salad or deviled eggs is that most people boil their eggs – and they end up with a bowl of green and white sulfur stinkin mess! When you boil eggs a chemical reaction takes place and the green sulfur collects around the edges of the yolk. IF you start with the basics of how to cook the eggs, its a mild light dish that is perfect for a summer supper or office lunch.

Get out a saucepan that can fit six eggs in one layer on the bottom. Fill with cool tap water so there in one inch of water that covers the top of the eggs. Place the pot on the stove, turn to high, and hang out until the water looks like it is getting ready to come to a boil – about 3 or 4 minutes depending on your stove. TURN DOWN THE HEAT to low and set your timer to fifteen minutes.  We are looking for hard cooked eggs with a beautiful yellow yolk, not hard boiled eggs with a green coated yolk.

When your timer goes off – dump the hot water into the sink… run cold tap water over the shells for a few minutes until they are cool enough to peel. Cut in half to marvel at your delicate perfectly cooked yellow yolks! Your deviled eggs will soar to new culinary heights now that you have this tip.

Put your eggs in a bowl, chop, blend with 1 tablespoon Greek yogurt and 1 tablespoon Hellmanns Light Mayonnaise, a little salt, a few grinds of black pepper and that’s the dish. Serve with tomatoes for a yummy lunch that is easy on the pouch.

I get more email requests for my red sauce than I do for any other recipe I talk about. My Italian family, or mi famiglia, has cooked this fresh tomato basil sauce for a hundred years. It’s my favorite recipe and technique to share with people that I love. Mi famiglia also does a slow cooked 8 hour sauce filled with meat, but that is for a cool fall day. Our quick tomato basil is a wonderful light summer sauce!

I use this sweet and snappy sauce on everything – to sauce grilled chicken, sliced steak, shrimp skewers, to simmer mussels… I love it in a dish to eat with a spoon, but mostly I love it to spoon over Ricotta Cheese.

It takes just five ingredients and twenty minutes and is perfect for all food stages.

Grandma Helen’s Tomato Basil Sauce

3 tablespoons olive oil

4 garlic cloves  – DONT use the pre chopped stuff in a jar PLEASSSSSEEEE

Pinch of crushed red pepper flakes

One 28 ounce can Italian Crushed Tomatoes

One bunch of fresh Basil

In a heavy large saucepan, heat the olive oil, over medium heat. Peel and slice the garlic; add to the oil and gently cook for one minute. DO NOT brown the garlic… if your oil is too hot, move the pan off the burner. Add a big pinch of crushed red pepper to the pan -  this does NOT make the sauce hot, it just gives it FLAVOR.  We are infusing the garlic and crushed red into the oil… so the flavors fully blend with the tomato.

Pour in your big can of San Marzano Italian CRUSHED tomatoes and give it a stir. (if you can’t find San Marzano Italian tomatoes, use MUIR GLEN organic crushed tomatoes, or Cento crushed tomatoes) Add 3 or 4 whole stems of fresh basil. Just take them out of the package, put them into a little bouquet and toss them in whole! Turn down the heat to medium low and bring your sauce to a simmer. Season with a good teaspoon of Kosher salt (use Kosher salt or sea salt in your kitchen as it has better flavor, and is less salty than the old fashioned stuff in the round box)… 8 to 10 good turns of a fresh pepper mill… and a half cup of white wine if you have it. (if you are using the wine, pour half a glass for the cook as well!)

Let the mixture bubble like crazy over low heat for 8 to 10 minutes, giving it a stir now and then. As for the other half of the package of fresh basil; pick off the leaves into a stack (about 10 nice big leaves), tightly roll them up into a cigar of basil. Cut across the roll, into very fine slices, and fluff the shreds.  This is called chiffonade if you want to impress people.

Stir in your chiffonade of basil, cook another 4 to 6 minutes – and that’s the dish. My favorite dish is to serve my sauce over a scoop of ricotta with shaved Parmesan. Serve to your family over a dish of corkscrew or farfelle bow tie pasta.

Mexican Crab and Shrimp Salad

This recipe is good for all food stages… it is soft and easy to eat for even the earliest post ops.

This very lightly sauced seafood is an excellent hot weather meal. Use all crab or all shrimp – I have also used scallops that I have lightly grilled on skewers (but then that would be cooking!)

One 1 pound can of Jumbo Lump Crab
1/2 pound cooked peeled medium shrimp
1/4 cup Greek Yogurt – important to use Greek as regular is too thin and too tart
2 tablespoons Hellmann’s Light Mayo
Juice and zest of one lime
2 teaspoons Tabasco Chipotle sauce
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
pinch Kosher or Sea salt
fresh black pepper

Whisk together the yogurt, mayo, lime juice, lime zest, chipotle, cilantro, salt and pepper, until smooth. GENTLY fold in the lump crab and shrimp.

I was talking to another nine year post op today that I knew way back when from the OH message board. Patti B has a whole new life growing vegetables and selling them at the Farmers Market… so we chit chat a lot about what is in season – and that happens to be corn and tomatoes!

She mentioned making a grilled corn and tomato salsa and the bells began to ring! Guess what we are having for supper? I had planned on salmon but chicken breasts were just $1.99 per pound so our grilled corn and tomato salsa will be spooned over sliced grilled chicken breast.

Let’s make the dish… please note that while corn is a healthy part of a balanced diet, it is NOT appropriate for early post ops. Many doctors and nutritionists don’t want patients eating corn for several months. So pay attention to your professionals! While it is a vegetable higher in carbs,  it isnt the main meal, but simply an accent salsa for the grilled chicken.

Chicken with Grilled Corn and Tomato Salsa

Preheat the grill by opening up all the way to the highest setting.

Husk the corn, remove the silk and place on a tray.  Smash the thick part of each chicken breast with a few whacks of a meat mallet so they cook more evenly. Sprinkle both sides with Adolph’s Meat Tenderizer ( I love the garlic flavor version!) and take the corn and chicken out to the hot grill. Place the chicken on one side, and the ears of corn on the other. CLOSE THE LID.

Back in the kitchen, take out a large bowl and whisk together the juice of one lime, 2 tablespoons olive oil, 1/2 teaspoon salt and a few grinds black pepper. Stir in 1/4 cup chopped cilantro and set aside. Cut a couple ripe tomatoes into small wedges or dice.  Add to bowl with lime dressing.

Turn chicken and rotate corn on grill.

When chicken is cooked through but not overdone, remove to a platter, along with corn. In the kitchen, hold each ear of corn vertically resting the flat end on the cutting board and cut downward through the kernals, removing them in one smooth slicing motion. Turn and repeat on the other sides. Do not cut too deep – just slice through the mid point of the kernals. Place the corn you have cut from the cob into the bowl containing the tomato and lime dressing. Toss to coat.

Place one chicken breast on the cutting board and cut into half inch slices… fan on plate and spoon on some of the Grilled Corn and Tomato Salsa. Let’s Eat!

When I lit the grill to make dinner, I realized that with the AC still not working, I just didnt feel like cooking… so out came plan B… a cold supper of Salsa Fresca and chips, Mexican Crab and Shrimp Cocktail – a couple of cold Modelo’s for Ty and a bottle of Fresita sparkling wine infused with wild strawberries for me. A perfect birthday dinner out on the patio.

Since it was warm in the condo, Ty and I sat outside all afternoon in the beautiful ocean breeze. He fiddled with his iPhone and marveled that he could actually see our patio on Google Earth.  I can’t say that I would have rather had been anywhere else on earth today. It was a wonderful birthday for my husband – we just enjoyed the good food, and then laughed about birthdays gone by and sang to the Genius Playlist.

Its funny how bariatric surgery changes everything. Years ago, we would be in a restaurant for every celebration and I would have ordered the most high calorie items on the menu – appetizer, a couple of cocktails, lots of buttered bread, entree, and of course my own dessert with an after dinner drink with my coffee.  Our dinner today was fresh and light – and we both truly enjoyed it.

The key to life after a bariatric intervention is to be happy with all that you have, rather than dwell on what you don’t. In fact if you look at it as CHOOSING to not eat certain foods rather than NOT being able to have them, it won’t mess with your head quite so much. IF you tell me that I cant have something, it makes me want it even more and I struggle with being punished that it has been taken from me. ‘YOU CAN’T HAVE CAKE’ is very different from ‘I choose to not have that cake’. If I give myself permission to have anything I wish, but make it my own choice to NOT eat certain foods, it gives me power and makes me even stronger.

This is what I chose to eat today… the perfect birthday meal on a hot July afternoon. Welcome to our party! Sit down, let me fix you a plate and pour you a glass of Fresita.

Ty turns seventy one years old on Sunday and I haven’t even thought about it until now.

He is a total cake whore, so there must be cake. I need to go full sugar for him because sugar alcohols nearly KILL him. I have honestly never baked a real sugar cake after my surgery. I have been known in my previous life to whittle away and eat an entire cake a sliver at a time in 24 hours so it’s better that I just not go there. I don’t keep any real sugar in the house, other than a jar of honey tucked away in a cabinet.

While grocery shopping I decided that a berry shortcake would be a great choice – Ty loves strawberry shortcake and since we have no air conditioner this weekend, I don’t want to turn on the oven.  I managed to assemble a pretty darn good looking birthday cake with Sara Lee pound cake, heavy cream whipped with sugar free Jello pudding powder, and strawberries. Once he saw this in the fridge, there was no saving it until tomorrow!

Happy Birthday honey!

Tropical Depression Bonnie… ahhhh, Tropical Storm Bonnie. Should be a lovely weekend. There will be no grillin.