Eating with impunity: The ups and downs

When Dr. Boyer told me the fact they want me to take in so many calories and the fact I have to eat several smaller meals meant I could practically eat anything with impunity, I thought I'd practically be in hog heaven.

Look out buffets. Look out O'Boys all-you-can-eat-ribs Tuesdays.

But the truth is I can pack away about 8-9 fluid ounces of food at a time. A bite or two too much and I feel sooo bloated that it practically puts me down for an hour.

So much for eating with impunity. The doctor wasn't kidding when he said it'd take about a year to heal, and most of that would go toward healing my stomach and surrounding areas.

A full month after surgery, I'm feeling so much better. I'm eating food. I'm sleeping in later than a few weeks ago. Staying up later. And when I eat, I eat for calories. Imagine that. Just a few months ago I was eating salad bars and counting every calorie I could avoid. Now I'm eating cereal bars, Little Debbie snack cakes, and whatever else I can take in during these mini meals I consume to get my calorie count up to maintain my weight. Oh, and that's way below where it was a few months ago.

But on occasion I get a bit overconfident. I'll eat just a tad too much fruit cocktail or too much house special fried rice, and the price I pay is this bloated feeling that borders on nausea. I hope that these meals will slowly begin to stretch my stomach a smidge, but so far that doesn't seem to happen.

But in time, Dr. Boyer said, my stomach will stretch a bit and by the end of a year it should actually allow me to eat larger meals, though never as much as I used to eat.

And if you recall, it's not such a bad thing that my meals will be smaller.