Damn Mosquitos

I had to go the emergency room yesterday. Apparently, I'm allergic to mosquitos. I had about elventy-billon bites starting at my toes and moving up my legs and a few on my arms. I got them at the pool while I was working, so I went to the clinic and used my worker's comp--they sent me to the ER because there weren't any appointments open at the clinic.

The doctor gave me a hydrocortisone shot and told me to take Benadryl every six hours. And try not to get bit anymore. Which means long pants at the pool when I'm not in the water. Ick. I feel better though. I actually was feeling like the little buggers had poisoned me or something. It was hard to swallow and my skin was crawling. And I had a monster headache.

On a brighter side, still no treatment effects from the Alli. I've been really vigilent about not eating too much fat at each meal. Tonight I still weighed 312...3.5 pounds down. But when I weighed 312 the other day it was in the morning, when I always weigh less. So I'll weigh again in the AM. My goal right now is just to break the 300 pound barrier. I'm trying not to get to freaked out about dieting. Just focusing a little harder on what I'm putting in my body.

I'm really loving our new house. It just feels really good to be in a place where I don't feel like I have four other people sitting on my lap 24/7. Not that I mind a little togetherness with my family, of course. But five people, a dog and two cats in 400 square feet is just too much. Surprisingly, we all fit 1000 square feet just beautifully.

Our Cingluar phones don't work at all in McGill, so we called Verizon to set up new service yesterday. Turns out that Verizon has a discount for government employees--and I was able to put our service in my name without a deposit, which was a real nice surprise. Shhh...we got Adrienne a mint chocolate phone for her 15th birthday in a month.

Did you hear that? My baby will be 15 in a month. In six months she can get her driver's permit. In a year she can drive herself to the tenth grade. In a few weeks she'll be in high school. In four years (four!) she'll be going off to college. Holy hell. She's visiting my sister in Boise for two weeks. I miss her so much, but she's having a ball.

I'm going to college this fall, taking four classes online. I'm really excited about it. I've decided to go for a degree in social work. Our little community college here has a 3/1 program with UNR--three years at Great Basin College and then the last year is University of Reno classes given here in Ely. I'll end up with a UNR degree. Our area has this program where if you work in rural Nevada for five years your student loans are forgiven, so I've decided to go ahead and apply for them. I feel a little anxious about going so far into debt, but I think it'll be okay. Hopefully, I'll end up with a grant or two as well.

I went back and forth (and back and forth and back and forth) about whether to go for a degree in education or one in social work. I'm just not sure I want to be a teacher, even a special education teacher. By the time I graduate, Nick will have graduated as well and I think maybe I've had my fill. Also, I have some pretty strong oppositions to so much of public education that I think I'd maybe end up bitter about things like teaching to the high-stakes tests.

I don't have to decide today, of course. I'm just taking basic classes that will go for either degree. In the next year or so I'll have to make a choice, but not today.

Quickie

Still no internet, so this is just a fast post. I'm still doing well on the Alli. I ate too much fat yesterday and I felt like crap, but didn't have any treatment effects (thank God for small favors.)

TMI Alert!

When I went to the bathroom this morning, the toilet was full of floating fat that really does look (like the website says) just like pizza grease. It wasn't painful or anything, but gross. And a serious wake up call. Because Alli only gets rid of 25% of the fat that you eat--which means that 3 times that was still in my body. On my belly.

I weighed 312 this morning. Down 3.5 pounds.

Moving

We found a much nicer place to live and we moved over the holiday. It's a duplex with 1000 square feet that feels like a palace compared to what we came from. I'm so upside down, I can't remember if I've already told you all of this already.

The duplex is in McGill, which is so tiny that we don't even have high speed internet out here. I haven't gotten the disc for dial up yet, so updates will be sparce for a few days.

I've lost two pounds so far and I feel fine. I haven't had any "treatment effects" at all. I have been eating much better, because I'm not interested in experiencing anal leakage, even once. That was the whole point, afterall--for the Alli to help me learn better eating habits, not for it to make me able to eat horribly and still lose weight. I'm feeling fine!

Giving My Alli A Try

So I decided to try the new Alli pills. It was sort of an agonizing decision, because I want to be able to do this on my own. But apparently, I can't. Or I won't. Or something. It's been a year and I'm only down about 10 pounds from my highest weight.

What finally made my decision for me was the psychological advantages to using Alli. You can't eat a really high fat meal or you'll have some pretty nasty side effects. So on top of making it so that you're body doesn't digest twenty five percent of the fat that you eat, it helps make it necessary for you to learn to eat healthfully.

Yesterday was my first day. I did something I haven't done in a long time, I wrote down everything that I ate. When you're taking Alli, to avoid the side effects, you're supposed to eat no more than 30 percent of fat with each meal. (They reccomend less than 15 fat grams. I'm not there yet, but I'm getting there.) So what this did was make me think before I got ready to eat about where the fat in my meal was.

I don't know why I'm shocked that I'm fat. Even paying attention and really trying, I ate a little more than 2000 calories and 29 percent fat. If I'd eaten what I wanted to, what I would have just a day or two ago I would have:

1. Had peanut butter on my toast in the morning, instead of just jam and no butter.
2. Eaten a bunch of crakers with my tuna at lunch, and had some cheese, too.
3. We had McDonald's for dinner. I had the South West salad with grilled chicken (sort of nasty by the way. I hate McDonald's grilled chicken on a salad, it's sort of slimy.) My regular thing to eat at McDonald's is a Quarter Pounder with Cheese and a medium fries, and chocolate chip cookies.

If I had eaten normally, I would have doubled my calories and tripled my fat grams. Holy Crap. It's a wonder I don't weigh 500 pounds.

Anyway, I'll start posting and letting you guys know how the Alli is working for me. My starting weight is (sigh) 315.5.