Most of you who know me know that I recently had a tummy tuck. I wanted to blog about my experience for a couple reasons. One for an informational type tool and two because my life is pretty much an open book.

I have been thinking about doing this for quite some time. I have been less than pleased with my body for a long time. After having Kaleb at such a young age I was spoiled. My body went right back almost immediately after giving birth. Well then along comes the BIG boy Ayden. I weighed over 200 lbs when I gave birth to this almost 10 lb baby. My belly had stretched until it couldn’t stretch anymore. Then fast forward to 2009. Pregnant with Taylure. weighing over 200 lbs with her as well and then having a c section. I came out and my body (belly) was destroyed! Literally. I had this belly flab that wouldn’t quit!

I went on multiple diets, took diet pills, worked out, but nothing worked. Then the thought of plastic surgery came to mind. I rode the fence about it for so long. I thought I wanted to do it and then would talk myself out of it because of the cost and basically just being scared of having surgery. I finally decided it was time. You only live once, right?!?! And, I am to young to feel this way about my body.

I went for my consultation in early April and scheduled my surgery for April 27th. I was nervous and super excited! Now I want to kind of walk you through the process thus far…

April 26th- Surgery Eve. Super excited. Stayed up super late because I had tons of things running through my mind!!!

April 27th- surgery date. It was a 2 and a half hour surgery. I got into recovery and felt very drugged and somewhat sore. I needed to pee before I could leave the hospital. Problem, I could not pee. I drank 4 diet cokes, a sprite, 2 waters and had fluid and could not pee. Late that afternoon it finally happened for me and I got to go home

April 28th- sleep was not so great the night before. Slept almost all day. Took a sponge bath. in alot of pain.

April 29th- Mine and Joe’s 6 year anniversary. Definetely not what Joe had in mind for celebrating I’m sure.

April 30th- Really wanting to take a shower and shave. Sent alot of crazy fb messages. Thank you paid meds! Kimmy came and washed my hair for me. Went to the Dr. Took a shower. And shaved. WOOHOO

May 1st- Pulled my pain tubes out myself. Not the most painful thing but very uncomfortable and weird. went to Dr. again and had my drain tubes removed. very painful and weird feeling.

May 2nd- Pretty good day. Slept mostly

May 3rd- pain back:(

May 5th- drove for the first time since surgery. very awkward

May 7th- Drive again today and feeling alot better. Still sore but coming along.

That is it people, that is a run through of my first few days of surgery and how I felt.

I am SO happy that I did this! It has been a roller coaster of emotions. I have cried alot. Tried not to laugh, sneeze, cough or breathe in to deep. All these things hurt! Now for some photos. I can honestly say that I have the funniest sister in the universe. She had me laughing, my loud crazy laugh, right before surgery. The nurse had to come in and tell me to keep it down. Thanks Kimmy for making my time right before surgery so much fun. I love you. And thank you all for all the encouragment and kind words!!!

I HAD to update my facebook status right before surgery

The nice RN gave me a smiley face

Kimmy was making her teeth look rotten and thats one of the things I laughed at very loud

My drain tubes or as Joe called them, my plastic balls

One of my ouchies

My before/after photo. 4 days after surgery

Thanks for following along with my tummy tuck journey. I will definetely post updates here. Maybe the next picture I will post, will be me. In a bikini!! Woot

I have been so nervous about posting this, but have wanted to for some time now. There are alot going on in my life right now. A lot of great things and some not so great things. I will start with the great things! Joe was promoted recently. He has been with Wal-Mart for 12 years and finally got promoted after multiple times trying. He will be a co manager and hopes to be store manager one day. Next, THE BEST THING!!! Our lawyer has finally got the paperwork drafted and sent to kaleb’s father so that Joe can adopt Kaleb. We have been waiting for this to happen for a long time!!! And finally, our last BIG news….Im getting a tummy tuck at the end of the month. Now, before all you haters look down on me for this…;) just know that I am doing this for me. So that I can feel good about myself like I once did! I am so excited about this that I can hardly stand it!

Now onto the not so good things…Taylure has been having a rough time adjusting to her new daycare so we are shipping her back to Little Hands. I am nervous that she will be nervous making the adjustment back there again. In a perfect world, my kids would be perfect little angels and never pitch fits and never talk back but guess what. This isnt a perfect world. They talk back, they pitch fits, they do things sometimes that makes me so mad. but, you know what…They are wonderful, loving, HILARIOUS kids that i could not live without.

Next, I have been having a rough time trying to balance my life. My priorities are not where they shoudl be. So a quick word to my incredibly wonderful clients: My turn around time for photos are going back to 2-3 weeks. I am not saying they will always take that long, but I have to spend more time with my family. I am stressing so much about having pictures done quickly for my clients that I am taking alot of time away from my family. I CANNOT and will not take time away from my kids anymore. I will not come straight home from work, cook dinner and then instead of playing outside with the kids, edit because I NEED to get finished. I mean I know I can get the photos finished when they go to bed, but I stress to much! I hope you all understand that you guys are so important to me and my small business. I appreciate each and every one of you. I appreciate the fact that I have lots of repeat clients, I am so lucky to get your referrals to your friends and family. but, I have to make sure that when my kids grow up, which they are doing way to fast, that they don’t look back and say that I edited alot instead of playing or spending time with them. I truly love you guys and hope you understand;)

On that note, I think I am going to take the kids to Dollywood tomorrow!

I talk alot+Poor Sabra+a mouse trap. All three of these things tie into each other. I don’t know if you are like me and somedays you just get tired of hearing yourself talk?!?! Well right now, I wish my husband and I could chat online (even though we are sitting right next to each other) or knew sign language. Seriously, I feel like I have talked ALL day. And, the bad part is, I know my voice is annoying because I have heard it on tape before. I talked alot at work, well because I had a ton to do today. Then after work, I had a hair appointment with Sabra. Poor Sabra has some major allergy problems going on right now and I feel like she probably has the allergy problem + a headache migraine now also because I talked her head off. You can definetely tell I have children and don’t have enough adult conversation time. I told her about Taylure’s favorite word being butt crack now, Joe’s promotion, about us being in the process of Joe adopting Kaleb, my IUD I had put in and a bunch of other random stuff. Well she listened like she always does and made me feel like what I was saying was interesting. And, she even laughed at what I was saying a few times. Well I got in my car to leave and it just felt….um…quiet. That is when I realized it was because I had noone to talk to. I had no one to talk to!!! So, what do I do…I turn my radio up and start singing. Loud. So that I could still hear my voice. That got kinda old so I called a couple of my friends so I can tell them some of the same things I had just told Sabra. Bad part, no one answered.

Today was a great day, but boy does my voice feel worn out. I need to make a personal goal to listen more than I talk;) Thanks for listening everyone!

Maybe poor Tyler was trying to give me a clue here. Ummm, to maybe STOP TALKING or he was going to snap my mouth shut;)