My whole life, I’ve been fat.

At the best of times, I’ve managed to cut down to husky, but this January was not the best of times. After I tore my ACL dancing at a wedding (story for a different time) and the birth of my daughter (who you absolutely will continue to hear about), exercising and eating healthily went out the window. My weight climbed to an all-time high. After some encouragement from my wife and a desire to be there for my daughter, I decided it was time for a change.

That change involved removing half my stomach.

It’s called a gastric sleeve. The bariatric surgeon goes in, staples the stomach down to about the size of a banana, then removes the rest of it. The surgery is laparoscopic, which means they only make a couple small incisions instead of a big honkin’ scar across your belly. Aside from the first couple days in the hospital, recovery is at home.

So now I’m on my way back to a new normal, and this site is where I will discuss my personal journey, as well as detail the various recipes and (ugh) lifehacks I can come up with that makes this process easier.