For anyone who's done a weight-loss surgery, the post-op diet is brutal. A week of clear liquids--- think broth and water, Powerade Zero, and sugar-free Popsicles. That's literally just about it. Then you graduate to a week of 'full liquids', which means low-fat strained soups with 'cream' in them; cream of chicken, cream of broccoli, cream of asparagus, whatever.

ButWednesday---- oh, Wednesday is going to be a glorious day! Wednesday, hark the herald angels will sing, there will be rainbows in the sky and the blind will see.

Wednesday I graduate to pureed food.

Now that still doesn't tickle my culinary fancy, but right now the idea of being able to actually CHEW something is making me do a Snoopy dance of glee. It's been almost three weeks of sipping things through a straw, and now I'll be graduating to the toddler phase of my new life. I will be noshing on things that, while they're the consistency of baby food and pudding, presumably they might involve texture and taste and some exciting options. I plan to make chicken salad and egg salad and refried beans and I even read a recipe for low-fat ricotta mixed with a spoonful of marinara to trick yourself that you're eating 'noodle-less lasagna'.

I'm currently fifteen days out from the procedure and I feel awesome. I'm thirsty a lot, which sucks when you can't just chug a bottle of water to slake that, but otherwise everything is peachy keen. My staples came out easily and the little tiny cuts are healed up; I feel like a weird vampire or something, they healed so fast, but honestly there's just tiny scabs left and when those drop off I think it's going to look like someone put little hyphen marks on my belly in a few spots. I'm pale as hell so I don't think anything's going to legit scar up Frankenstein-monster-style. About 95% of the swelling in my belly's gone down, and I sleep on my stomach now, get up with minimal discomfort, etc. The pain meds are a thing of distant memory. Hard to believe that two weeks ago during the auditions for my best friend's horror movie I was wincing in pain every time I twitched or had to shift position in the chair.

I've been walking a lot, which is part of the goodness too. They recommend it to get the blood flowing, and honestly I love the feeling. I went to the flea market with my family on Saturday and we walked the entire thing; my grandma had a walker but she kept right on truckin' alongside me and we did really well together! We also walked around the grocery store, and I've been parking further away from my buildings on my college campus and hoofing it to class without any problems.

The scale today read 312. I choose to believe that's an error, because if not then I'm down quite a bit of weight since Wednesday and I'm also only 12 pounds away from kissing the 300s goodbye forever. And that I am more than a little okay with.