Thanks, beth and Steph, for those really sweet words. I hope things go for you both like you want them to!

I find it's easier to adjust when you don't really have a choice. I am already eating a bit more of soft/liquidy food than I was a month ago, so I have to be careful about that. Last month, when I tried to have the full six ounces of yogurt, I felt ill. Now, I can eat it all with no problem, as long as I take my time and eat it over thirty minutes.

Good work, Kathy!

sometimes it's just easier to make pasta for dinner.

Pasta is the only thing I've found myself craving since the surgery. Not ice cream, not chocolate, not even cake, but pasta. I saw this really good-sounding recipe for black pepper and parmesan pasta in the America's Test Kitchen magazine I picked up a few weeks ago, and I've been dreaming about that dish since then.

Oh, well, some things I have to forget about.

I cut out pasta (except on rare occasions) and find I don't really miss it. Used to be my goto meal. Of course, part of the reason I cut it out was it often made me feel ooky, so aversion therapy.

Speaking of which, I had one too many cups of coffee this morning. It makes me feel vaguely queasy. Just starting to feel less so.

That's the other thing I'm surprised that I'm not missing--caffeine, in the form of what was my twice-daily Diet Coke. I haven't had either carbonation or caffeine since the day before Thanksgiving.

I love pasta. I can live happily without meat (and have done so at certain points), but take away my pasta and I cry. See also: bread.

I find it incredibly easy to live without meat but i can't live without rice. Just a little bit turns steamed veggies and sauce from a side dish into a meal in my mind. The same way that some people don't feel it's a "meal" without meat: i require a starch for a meal. Sweet potatoes count. I can't begin to explain that rationale.

I have cut all my starches way down. No potatoes, white flour, pasta or rice, and the only bread I eat is this stuff: [link] And I find brown rice nom nom nom.

I don't miss it much--way less than I thought I would. I still eat some sweets and once a month or so, I will have french fries or white pasta.

The only starches I've had since the surgery, other than a few saltines, some tortilla chips, and some Club crackers at various meals, was a Wendy's potato with sour cream and chives before Christmas, a double-stuffed potato from my dad's Xmas dinner, and about 2/3rds of a mini-baguette from Panera before NYE. That baguette was a huuuuge mistake, but the others weren't so bad. However, since my order of food types is 1) Protein, 2) Veggies, 3) Fruit, and 4) Carbs, starches are too far down on my list for me to eat.

I just realized that I've seen the same woman playing "grandmother who had no idea her grandson was involved with guns/drugs/etc." on three different episodes of Law and Order. Good for her for getting work, I guess, but they can't find any other actresses who can play that part?