chowchows

I started out about a 40 bmi. I've lost about 55 lbs and am 11 months out. I do feel some small amount of restriction and that is all that is keeping me where I am these days. My cravings are through the roof. I'm trying to get back on some kind of plan, but I feel rather lost right now.

Struggling myself these days guys...haven't lost any in over a month. I'm trying to stay positive though and you guys are a help. I haven't been on this board in awhile, but I realize maybe I need to to inspire me. :-)

Congrats to you both!!!

I was just coming on this forum to ask you what they planned to do LMom. I'm glad you were able to get surgery so soon. Hang in there! My plication was easy, but my GB surgery hit me like a ton of bricks. I have heard that it takes a year to recover from a surgery...so when we have two in a year or so, I'm sure it adds up. Take care of yourself and try to keep a positive attitude! (I know, it's hard)

Hope all goes well..keep us posted!

Enjoy this time of not having hunger and try to maximize it by doing exactly what your doc said about getting in Protein and fluids. Your weight loss is fastest right at the beginning, so the less hunger you have now the better in my opinion.

For me, if I can use this plication to go from morbid obesity to mild obesity, I would have won the health battle I couldn't win before. For me it is not about that ideal number, nothing about me has ever been ideal, it is about moving the needle closer to healthier.

amen!

Very well said MauiJax...it's a journey, not a destination!

Do you mean keeping it secret from your doc also? That might be hard, but from everyone else it is definitely possible! Everyone I have told has been surprised. They expect someone with wls to lose like 30 lbs a month and with plication it is more gradual and you will be able to eat like a pretty normal person. I didn't tell my doc for several months, but after I developed gall bladder issues I had to come clean because they could see it on the ultrasound.

I for one value what TijuanaPlication has to say. I wish I had seen more of the truth (good and bad) before I had surgery. When I had surgery there was such a scarce amount of information out there. I would have probably still had plication, but it would have been nice to have more info. I think most people are going to take all the posts, both positive and negative, and weigh them against their own situation and personality and then make their own decision. TP isn't bullying anyone, and she isn't saying she is giving medical advice (far from it, her signature implies just the opposite). On the other hand, when you say you are a medical professional, that lends some weight...however, unless you are a gastric doctor, and have specifically treated a patient in particular, I don't think your advice is any more weighted in my mind than that of TP. I don't mean to be mean...just to say that we are all in a similar boat here. We are all either post plication or are thinking about having it, and ALL information is valuable. I wouldn't want to censor anyone, just because they critique something that I like or something that worked for me. I want to hear what everyone has to say...it's all been very helpful, and I don't want to see ANYONE bullied on these boards for their opinion. I'm not looking for drama..in fact just the opposite..let's all be supportive of the active exchange of information and encouragement. Despite the fact that TP's plication didn't work for her, she has been a big cheerleader of each and every one of our successes along the way-that takes some character, I think it would be hard for me to be happy for other's weight loss if I had stalled out!

I actually had a bad night this week..lots of pain in gallbladder/liver area and lots of acid. Overall though (95%) of the time I feel fabulous and my acid is much less and I have no issues with GB or anything I eat. I thought I had an ulcer too, but they said no. Hang in there and please let us know what the GI says! Have you had an endocscopy?

Thank you so much, Chow Chow.. I think my plication has stretched but I still have more restriction than before wls surgery. Gall bladder surgery went fine, the nausea and back/chest pain has gone, and I think most of my starving, gnawing hunger pains are gone. Inially, it made my acid reflux much worse, but they told me to give it a month. It seems to be getting better and better. I am glad that you posted it might even take longer..it is good to have hope! I still have little pains on right but I would take those over the starving pains or anything else I had before.

The pains on the right side were pretty intense the first month or so. If I eat a lot of fat nowadays, I get pains over there sometimes, but not always. That's really the only side effect I still have these days. Glad you're feeling better!

Sorry for the delay in writing, I don't come on this board much anymore. I felt kind of bad for a month, then just ok for another month, then I felt normal again after that. How did the actual surgery go? I would definitely give yourself time to heal. I felt immensely better post surgery, but compared to where I was that wasn't saying much. I look back now and realize that it is still a healing journey for a couple of months after surgery. Did they tell you how your plication looked while they were in there? Hope you get to feeling better fast!

Now that I am am past the gallbladder issues I can eat anything I want without any issues. It might not be the sugar, it might be the fat affecting your gallbladder. That's what was going on with me, and at first it only happened with sugary items...as it progressed it was almost anything I ate that bothered me. Hope you get it figured out and that it ISN'T GB issues!

I totally get where you're coming from on pretty much all you said. Congratulations on the 70 lbs!

I know! It's amazing how many calories we can still consume in one sitting! Hip surgery went well. Having pain, but have good meds!

Glad everything went well!

That is awesome news on the weight loss! Good luck on the surgery!

Was just looking back over my posts, and realized these might be helpful also so I wanted to put links all in the same posts. When the pain first started I thought it might be a leak but my doc thought it was acid reflux. After a few days that seemed to make sense as it would come and go, and I decided that I had developed horrible acid reflux that I would have to live with. This went on for almost two months and then I passed my first gallstone, but I thought it was dumping syndrome. My experiences were somewhat different from the stories I read on the vertical sleeve board, and it would make sense that our bodies are slightly different and therefore might react differently (and each individual person might react even more differently), so I thought linking to these might help Mermaid, or anyone else having these kinds of issues. Of course, pain might be something totally unrelated to acid or gallbladder, so talk to your doctor.

Oh my, can I tell you about what I thought was acid reflux, and instead turned into a horrible gallbladder mess! Here are the threads concerning my saga:

My trip to the ER

questions about surgery

back in ER and had surgery

Feel free to ask any questions. This is just my opinion, but I have never heard of gallbladder issues getting better. I am 1000% better since I had it out. I am two months out from surgery and the few issues I had with digestive problems shortly afterwards are gone. I eat what I want and do just fine. If I had it all to do over again I would have insisted they take it out the first time I was in the hospital! Hope you find the answers you need to get to feeling better. Gallbladder issues are no fun! I have heard from more than one person that a gallbladder attack is worse that labor with no pain meds...and when you are having one a week it gets old quickly! Oh, and turns out that what I thought was acid was pain extending out from pancreas and gallbladder...I have no more 'acid issues' now that my gallbladder is gone!

Don't know if it's the same thing, but the pains I get are not acid. Everyone thought they were for a long time, until they did so many tests on me with the gallbladder issues. They are a combination of gas or overfullness and the scar tissue I have developed around the plication. I no longer get the full stop feeling I got early on, I just start hurting now as I eat more.

I'm so sorry to hear about all of these things you have been through. I wish you a continued success in healing/getting better! Take care!

I spent nearly a year receiving "treatment" for a compressed disc in my back. My primary care physician at the time diagnosed me with a compressed disc in my lower spine. The machine he had in his office was basically a fancy version of the inversion machines that reduce pressure on the lower spine. He conveniently had the new machine in his office. I stepped up for those treatments because I was in pain and not willing to seek further surgical treatment.

After nearly a year of those treatments with little benefit, the primary care physician at the time referred me to have a series of steroid shots in my lower back.. During the second or third trip (I think you can only have 3 of these shots per year), the doctor giving these shots asked a series of questions because the first shots had not relived my pain significantly. He had me do a series of test questions that required me to do things like touch my toes, bend over with my legs crossed, etc. It's been a couple of years ago, so it's hard to recall the specifics.

The "steroid" physician then elected to put a shot into my sacroiliac joint rather than my lower back. It was the most painful thing I have ever been awake for, but it also helped. I weighed about 315 at the time. I gave up sugared soda then and dropped to around 295, my pre-plication weight. Losing that 20 lbs and doing the stretches the doctor told me about have helped me avoid a recurrence of that pain. Anytime I have felt my right hip bother me, I try those stretching exercises and they help.

Thank you for all the info. I really appreciate it!

Thank you so much, Mednar, for your support and understanding. You have been an inspiration with your excellent weight loss and dedication to exercise.

I second that!

I'm sorry to hear you're not well. I had a couple of years with right side hip pain that wasn't properly diagnosed. I was finally diagnosed with SI joint issues that required proper stretching techniques. Those exercises have helped me greatly. Doesn't sound like the same issue, but that pain is debilitating.

How did you come to your diagnosis on this? What kind of doctor was able to help you? Thanks!

I had mine done at the end of April 2011. I have lost essentially 50 lbs and gone from a 22/24 to a 14/16. Okay I guess, but not as much as I wanted. I have only lost about a pound in the last 3 weeks. I think I may be getting to the end of my losing.