Weight Loss While Pregnant?!?

My name is Coleen, and this is my "Drop it with Chocolate" weight loss blog. I'll warn you ahead of time that there will be some information on here that's TMI. Too bad, it's my blog :-) Before I get too far, here's what you need to know to know the basics of my day to day life:

*I'm 32
*I'm married to a WONDERFUL husband, Matt, who just happens to be a little disabled at the moment so I am the sole bread winner for my little family. (I don't point this out because I'm upset, I point this out so that when stresses get REALLY bad...as they tend to...there's a bit of understanding of my situation).
*I have 3 beautiful (most of the time ;-) ) children thanks to my husband bringing them into my life when we got married. 14 year old girl, 13 year old boy, and a 10 year old boy. They currently live with their egg donor, which I will keep my feelings about to myself...just in case. Never know who ends up finding these things!
*I'm 7 months pregnant with my first home grown little boy. This also adds to the stress, of course. Not to mention the emotions, body changes, etc.
*I currently work full time helping large businesses sell online, and attempting to keep them in line with the rules of the website that I work for.
*I had gastric bypass 3 years ago. I started at 325 lbs and the lowest weight I hit (a little over a year ago) was about 135 lbs.

I'm sure there's more to share, just can't think of it off the top of my head right now. I'm sure I'll share more as it becomes relevant :-)

Ok, before I get too many people freaking out about my trying to "lose weight" while 7 months pregnant, hear me out. I'm 5'4 and started out at 142 lbs at my first appt with the ob/gyn. I knew that the whole idea of pregnancy after gastric bypass could get tricky, but honestly it wasn't exactly planned. I know that it's meant to be because there's NO other way things would have lined up so perfectly (disabled husband, I only have 1 ovary, on bc at the time, although I was on antibiotics for a short period of time also. Yeah, I know what antibiotics do to bc, but I thought that it would still be a long shot with the rest of the issues).

Oh, did I also mention I have ADD? I do. This is important as I tangent easily :-)

So pregnancy and gastric bypass. My body is already completely different from most people's, and just when I was getting used to my body's eating schedule & style again, I start growing a little boy in me. This changes everything. All of a sudden, I'm eating only junk, getting sick a LOT, constantly SO hungry, and wanting to eat and not wanting to eat at the exact same time. With my daily stress load (I refer you to bullet points, above), I have made it through the last 7 months by getting through day by day the best I can. Eating what I can when I can, and I'll admit that I gained an unhealthy attachment to Dr. Pepper (which is SO odd since I never touched the stuff before I was pregnant). The ob/gyn mentioned that the Dr. Pepper was ok because it would help my body with the whole ADD thing since I can't take adderall while pregnant. This was my "permission" which allowed me to think that I could just drink as much as I wanted and I would be ok.

Well of course, this was not ok. Again, I was just getting through every day the best I could...some days feeling like I was eating everything in sight and other days feeling like I wasn't eating enough to sustain even just the baby, let alone myself. I take my prenatal vitamins and stuff, but with the gastric, how much of that do I really absorb? I was constantly wanting something better for this little one. He definitely deserves it.

I have been dabbling with the concept of Xocai Healthy Chocolate. This company isn't hugely known yet, but it's there. They came out with the healthiest energy drink I've ever seen back at the end of last year. About a week ago I attempted to give up my Dr. Pepper and the Xe Xoçai Energy™ Drink has been a life saver. It really works with keeping me awake and going. Right after I found out I was pregnant, the company started talking about a meal replacement and weight loss plan that they were working on. They selected 50 people to be a part of the trial and study. My sister, Jennifer, was one of the lucky few to be selected. I wasn't planning on trying it until at least November because, well, baby. Jennifer is an RN, and the more she learned about the meal replacement the more she started to check into whether or not it was safe during pregnancy. It's entirely healthy (a lot healthier than I have already been eating). She checked in with the Dr. who is overseeing the trial (who had nothing to do with Xocai before this trial so there's no bias), and he said that this would actually be a lot better for most pregnant women than how they were eating already. I definitely fall into that group!

I've been gaining too much weight throughout my pregnancy. I didn't know if this had to do with my body processing food more quickly because of the gastric so I was ALWAYS hungry, it had a lot to do with the crap that I was eating, and of course the Dr. Pepper. When I stepped on my scale a couple of weeks ago and saw 185, I panicked and messaged Jennifer to say, "Ok, I need to order this stuff NOW." We were both busy and I lost the urgency as I kept myself off of the scale. This last Monday, I had an appointment with my ob/gyn and I was up to 192. The 50 lb mark. I know that there are pregnant women who gain that much (and more) but weight gain in general scares the crap outta me because of where I started before gastric. I've also been scared that with how much I've been eating with this pregnancy, what if my stomach stretches more?

This brings me to my decision (I know, finally!) The Xocai meal replacement plan will consist of me replacing 2 meals a day with the X Protein Meal™ Shake, combined with an 1800 cal (because I'm pregnant...1200 for women & 1500 for men) diet consisting of mostly lean proteins and fruits & veggies. There are other suggestions, but I'll post them at a later time. This is already getting too long!

Because this is a new product and I don't have any pregnant women to watch and compare with, I've decided to keep a daily blog of my progress/concerns/discoveries...pretty much how I feel and what I like and don't like on a day to day basis. We'll see how this goes!