One year Bandiversary!

This is a post we all publish - we have so many expectations and fantasies and goals in mind when we first set out on this path or weight loss with the help of the band.  But I think for most it's always different to what we imagine.

I wanted to be much nearer goal by now and I am feeling a bit forlorn.  I just got Ben to take some comparison pictures of me in my undies (aren't you lucky!) and at first I just felt disgusted and horrified by my big jiggly belly, and the rest.  But then I looked at the photos I took of myself this time last year and the difference is definitely a significant one.

With my mental health being what it is, I think I should feel madly proud of myself.  I am certainly an emotional eater.  I still am.  The band has not changed that.  And the fact that my emotional needs are great, having lost 50lbs (still at 197lbs this morning) is an incredible achievement.

So despite just a bit of disappointment about not being somewhere nearer my goal, I am damn proud and happy with my accomplishments.  And that bit of disappointment shouldn't go to waste, I want to use it to motivate me into getting to goal in my second year of being banded.  I think I accept now that it's just going to take more time than I want it to.  But the wonderful thing about the band is that it (for the most part) keeps you in enough control not to gain everything back as soon as you (temporarily) give up, and that's what has led me to be successful so far.

I wish this had a happier tone, but I'm poorly with a cold, sitting in bed, still trying to shake the negative feelings that bubbled up when I looked at my pictures.  Despite that, I'm posting them so that I can look back and see where I've come from.  And hopefully the photos I take this time next year will make me proud.

Certainly one of the greatest things about this year and the band has been all of you.  I feel like I know you, I think and even sometimes dream about you.  I feel loved and supported and informed by all your stories.  We're all very lucky to have each other through this.  Thank you so much to all my 91 followers, and please, if I'm not following you, leave me a comment with a link to your blog, because I want to be following you back.  And finally to anyone who is recently banded or pre-op or just trying to decide - for me, getting the band was one of the best decisions I've ever made, I haven't regretted it even once and I know that not only would I not have lost 50lbs, but I would've gained and been bigger than ever and more miserable than ever.  So go for it!  Now don't cringe at my photos!

October 2011:

October 2012: