Moving right along

I had my second appointment today at the Surgical Centre where I'm having (hoping to have) surgery and a Lap-Band inserted around my stomach.

Things are progressing quickly compared to stories I've heard.  Way up here in Canada, our single-payer health care system (aka "universal" or "free") does not cover the cost of the Lap-Band procedure, and in many provinces does not even cover other types of bariatric surgery.  Since I'm self-employed and have the benefit of our health care system where most things I'll ever need are provided for me, I have a pretty craptastic secondary health plan.  Covers a bit of dental, a few hundred dollars of medication, and some other odds and ends (great hearing aid coverage!), but doesn't even come close to paying for something like Lap-Band.  Which, from what I've heard, might be a blessing in disguise.  Yes, I will need to come up with about $18,500 on my own, but on the other hand, I don't need to wait for bureaucratic insurance claims to be denied and appealed, denied and appealed, nor do I have to spend months losing weight in order to prove I can lose weight (a policy that seems really bizarre to me).

So, basically, it looks like my surgery will be October 11, 2013.  I really like the PA (physician's assistant) at the clinic - she's awesome.  The surgeon seems a bit... dry...?  Crusty...?  But he's not the one I'll be dealing with for care, fills, and support after, it's the PA and her nurses.  In the next month and a half, I'll have a physical exam, an appointment with the dietitian, an appointment with a psychologist, the pre-op diet (yuk!), then it's just a matter of paying the nice people with scalpels, and I'll be off and running.  Literally and figuratively.

Now, I know y'all don't really know me yet... (sometimes I wonder if I really know myself).  So here are a few numbers I put together to better introduce myself:

• 31 - years old (32 in a month)
• 303 - number of pounds I currently weigh
• 180 - the weight I was in high school, when I was a competitive swimmer
• 69 - inches tall... :)
• 2.9 - GPA in undergrad studies
• 75 - number of kilometres I've hiked in one trip (took 6 days!)
• 32 - number of US states I've traveled to
• 8 - number of Canadian provinces and territories I've visited
• dozens - 5K and 10K runs finished
• 2 - number of half-marathons completed
• 2:32:32 - time on the faster of the two half-marathons
• 0 - number of runs I've completed since 2005 :(
• 169 - the weight at which my BMI will be in the "normal" category
• 185 - the weight at which I think I'll be happy
• 1 - boyfriend (aka manfriend)
• 2 - stepsons (manfriend's kidlets)
• 1 - cat (Marbles, Bengal x tabby)
• 1 - dog (Rocky, boxer x English bulldog)
• 8,756,491 - times I've attempted weight loss in the last decade or so...

- Kat xxx