Diagnosis: Obese & Eggs on Ice

Lovelies~

I've been so swamped this week, I haven't even had a chance to update what turned out to be one of the worst weeks the Mistress has had in recent months....UGH.

I went to my new Ob-Gyn to get a check on the large ovarian cyst I was diagnosed with last fall. At that October check up, I was told that I would most likely not only need surgery, but would need my entire left ovary removed. I had been in a great deal of pain and was very nervous about needing surgery-- again...I had cysts 10 years ago and had laparoscopic surgery to have them removed.

So, first I got the good news: The cyst had shrunk and I won't need surgery. Yay!

Then we started talking about fertility.

I'm turning 37 this June and the Doc had me take a blood test to determine my FSH levels-- it's a test to find out if I have "diminished ovarian reserve." Basically, to figure out if my eggs are drying up. The doctor said, "Even if your levels are normal, I'd suggest freezing your eggs if you're not planning on getting pregnant right away. 36 year old eggs are a lot better than 40 year old eggs." True, but I was a little startled by the suggestion--- freezing eggs is expensive and seems sort of dramatic.

Then again, I have a friend who is 39 and pregnant who told me last week, "START NOW! It took me 3 years to conceive!!! Don't think you can just snap your fingers and get pregnant when you want!"

JP and I have been talking a lot about babies lately-- specifically, about securing a financial future for ourselves so that's possible. I mean, we both have regular money coming in now, but it's far from a "financially secure" situation.

My eggs are probably getting old and I need to put them in the freezer. It's a troubling thought.

But I'm burying the lead.

The nurse put me on the dreaded Doctor's Office Scale. Let me preface this by saying that I: 1)was fully clothed 2) had a belly full of coffee and breakfast and 3) hadn't pooped. Sorry if that's TMI!

The scale read 176 pounds. MY PRE-BOOTCAMP WEIGHT!!!! WTF??!!!

But that's not even the worst of it. Dr. Feel Good says, "Parker I see you've put on 15 pounds since your last visit in October."

He gets on his laptop, starts typing numbers in and says, "Well, at 5'11 and 176 pounds, that puts your BMI at 33. That puts you in the Obese category."

I'm sorry, did he just say, OBESE?????

I mean, some over-indulging in wine and cheese may have tipped the scales a bit, but OBESE? ME????

To his credit, he said, "Well, you don't look obese."

And then, in his esteemed medical opinion voice, he tutted: "A healthy weight for you would be about 145. I think you should lose 30 pounds."

Then, to add insult to injury, he said that trying the controversial HCG Diet would be a good option for me. (That's when you inject yourself with a pregnancy hormone and starve yourself for a month eat 500 calories a day for a month.) "Give it a try and email me what your results are!"

Awesome.

I burst into tears as I was leaving. It was just too much to handle. I tried to wrap my head around the bottom line: I'm obese with old eggs. More tears.

I sat down at my computer at work and pulled up a BMI calculator. Here's what it told me:

24.5 NOT 33!!! I would actually have to weigh 240 pounds at my height to have a BMI of 33. What kind of calculations did this doctor do? I was furious. And very relieved.

I have a serious problem with this doctor's approach--- from giving me false information to suggesting a dangerous diet. Had this been 5 years ago, it could have catapulted me into a dangerous tail-spin into eating disordered behavior. Fortunately, I'm stronger than that now and will not be going down that road. But it could have been a horrible trigger for me.

Crappy doctor aside, my weight is on my mind. What started as a plateau has definitely turned into a slide in the wrong direction. I'm really struggling with the best way to proceed. Both The Plan and Chrono-nutrition backfired on me. I'm working out for between 45-90 minutes a day 6x/week and I would have expected far different results by now!

That leads me to believe that I'm eating the wrong things, drinking the wrong things and simply going about my diet in the wrong way. Flirting with one diet and trying another one, but not sticking to anything is not going to get me to my goal weight.

Here are what I believe are my biggest culprits:

1. Coffee with fattening creamer in the morning. I drink International Delight's Irish Cream and it's way more calorie/fat laden than I thought. I Tb is 35 calories!!! (And the Mistress likes her coffee light and sweet....that's a lot of 1 Tb's!)

2. Wine with dinner. Most nights.

3. Portion Control at Dinner. Despite a pretty moderate breakfast and lunch, my last meal of the day can border on a binge-- often with second helpings. This is the penalty for being such a good cook!!

MUST. GET. CONTROL.

I also suspect that the medications I was on and weened myself off of have resulted in a sluggish metabolism and perhaps an under active thyroid.

I am not a "power bar and shake" kind of girl. Yeah, I can do an occasional Think Thin bar for breakfast. I even tried one for lunch last week, as Tracy's Dynamic Eating Plan prescribes, but I was starving all afternoon! I think they taste "fake" and they just do not satisfy me.

My gut feeling is that I simply have to go back to basics: Lean protein. Veggies. Fruit. Fewer carbs. Cut out the alcohol. Burn more calories than I'm taking in. It's not brain surgery. But damn, it's hard.

Here's where I am on this.....I'm not willing to live on steamed chicken and broccoli. It's not realistic. It's not me. But I'm also not going to accept 170+ pounds. I'm just not. Losing 30 pounds? Prolly not gonna happen. But maybe 20? I don't like thinking about numbers at all, but I've got to keep myself in check, here.

Any and all suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

xxoo