desperateforchange

I've been adding Benefibre to my daily smoothie. I've also taken Senokot S at night which seems to help things along the next day. It is natural and comes from Senna. You can also get it in a tea form in the supplements area of your favorite store. I wouldn't go with ex-lax as you can get dependent on it.

Yes Please! I would love a copy! stellabella60@hotmail.com Thank you for your hard work.

Wow, this is really unbelieveable. I'm sorry your sister is having such a bad time. I was sleeved by Dr Kelly 15 days ago. I threw up once shortly after I woke up from my surgery, they came in and gave me anti-nausea thru IV port. From then on they were in my room every 4 hours injecting anti-nausea into my IV. I find it hard to believe that they are letting your sister continue to dry heave. I never ever had to ask for it again. Also pain meds. I never once had to ask for pain meds, they were medicating me like clockwork with anti nausea, pain meds and something to protect my stomach, until I had my IV removed the morning of my discharge. My mom and I also do not speak spanish and we had no trouble communicating with the nurses. I'm not sure why you are having such a rough time of it. You had better speak with Dr Kelly or Trish when they come in to see you. This is not right and it is not typical of any experiences that anyone has ever reported coming from Dr Kelly. I hope this gets better for your sister.

This forum has a person on it that had surgery with him in September 2010. You could contact them for more information. http://www.obesityhelp.com/forums/vsg/4245638/Anyone-have-anything-to-say-about-Dr-Ramos-Kelly/

Don't give up! You can do it! I bought an unflavored/unsweetened Protein powder from costco. It is called 100% Isolate by LeanFit. I mix it in my smoothies and although it has a slight "protein" flavour, it beats some of the others. I think there is another one at GNC that is less thick, more like an iced tea powdered mix. My friend told me about it but I have yet to get in there to try it. Go talk to a supplements expert and find out how else you can get your Proteins. You have to get your head into it. If this is something you really want, you will do what you can to get there. If you are constantly thinking that it is tasting gross and you are anticipating that, then you will never get that out of your head. Just don't quit! If you really want to change your life, and this is the way you have chose to do it, know that this pre-op phase and the first few weeks post-op are just temporary. "Real" food will come soon.

Well said!

Thanks! What kind of pain did you have. At your incision site or internally or was it gas pains? That is unfortunate but to be expected I guess. I don't think I have my ticker set up properly. My highest weight was 233 before starting my journey, before my 1 week pre-op liquids, etc. I went in to change it and I've forgotten my pin now. lol. I am down to 221 today. Yay!! My goal is 140, but how does one know what their goal actually is. It is just a number and I think my body will tell me when it is at goal?? I don't really know. If I go down to 135 I would be happy with that too but I don't want to be too skinny .

I am 8 days post-op and have had a very uneventful time. Except for the 5 small incisions on my stomach, and a copy of my leak test x-ray, I feel so darn good, I can't believe my body went thru all that it has. February 3rd: After arriving at the Florence Hospital after a nice ride from the airport with a friendly driver named Carlos I met Trish and Dr Kelly. I immediately felt at ease meeting these two. No time was wasted in prepping me for surgery. I had blood work, IV port inserted, blood pressure, temp taken, medical history. Then the cardiologist came in to ask a few questions and give me an ECG. Shortly after, around 5:30, I was wheeled down to the OR, where I saw Dr Kelly, the anesthesiologist, and the scrub nurse. Dr Kelly came over, held my hand and asked me if I was ready. I said "I am so ready for this". He warned me of the anesthetic going in and that is all I remember until I woke up in my room trying to pull the oxygen mask off my face. My mom was with me and I am so thankful. She had a full size bed to sleep in in my room and we had a private bath with shower. Also a TV on the wall with about 4 english speaking channels. She was able to eat 3 meals a day in the Oasis of Hope dining room. It is for the alternative cancer patients and their families and everything there was very healthy. No sugar, lots of veggies and fruit, very little meat and a couple of fruit/veggie juices available per day. The surgery went well with no complications. I was up walking around @ about 4 am Friday morning. The worst part for me was the IV pole and the nurses coming in several times in the night. I was nauseous a couple of times but only threw up once. Feb 4th: Spent the next day and evening sipping on ice and water, walking around, napping, getting regular doses of pain meds, anti nausea meds and antibiotics and chatting with my family on Skype and Facebook. <br style="text-indent: 0px !important; "><br style="text-indent: 0px !important; ">Feb 5th: The morning of my discharge, before I got discharged, my mom and I went for a walk down to the beach. It is only about 3 blocks from the Florence hospital. We put our feet in the ocean and it was awesome. They removed my drainage tube (weird feeling and little painful) and IV port just before they took me for my leak test Saturday around 11 am at the Angeles Hospital. The taste is gross. Have gum or breath strips handy and a water to pop in your mouth after you are done. That will help tremendously. Then we got checked in to the Lucerna. My mom and I walked down to the Rio del Plaza and shopped for about 3 hours. I bought some bandaids @ the Gusher Farmacia @ the Plaza. They are Nexcare in a green and white box. They are 50mm x 101 mm and there are 10 in a box. You will want to change your dressing and these are a good size but they gave me a horrible irritation. They are adhesive all around. You may want to get some Mepore dressings (available at our Walmart behind the pharmacy counter) and bring them with you. I purchased them before I went but never thought to bring them with me and really wish I would have had them. They are a nice soft gauze with adhesive all around but not irritation. Anyway, we had to take a cab back to our hotel because we had too many packages. LOL! Met up with Trish the moment we got out of the cab at the hotel, and she had my discharge package for me. She introduced me to some yummy chicken broth powder available at the Costco here. Try to get a hold of some. It is called MAGGI and it is sort of like OXO but has way more flavour. It is very tasty. So I asked if she could pick some up for me and I would pay her. She said she would just take us there, so we went to Costco Mexico. Very cool. Just like our Costco but the cafeteria is outside. <br style="text-indent: 0px !important; ">She then took us to Revolucion and we shopped a little over there. Got a smokin' good deal on some silver jewelry from a vendor that Trish knows. I was ready to walk away, when I told them I couldn't afford what they were offering and then they called me back in to give me a better deal. 2 earrings and a set of bracelets (bangle style) for $60. Originally wanted $180. This is a gift for my girls who wouldn't have appreciated the price, so I was tickled with that offer. My mom got a Jimmy Choo knockoff purse for $75. He originally was offering it to her at his best price of $145, haha. So fun! We walked lots and I felt so good. Not tired or sore or anything. Amazing!! I had such an awesome sleep in the hotel room our first night out of the hospital. Lucerna is a top notch hotel and the beds are really comfy. My mom woke me up @ 4:30 to tell me to roll over, that my snoring was keeping her awake, so it must've been a deep sleep. Feb 6th: Dr Kelly and Trish came by our room early on to check up on me and my incisions. Had a little visit then they left and mom and I walked to the mall again. We had missed alot of stores and had a few more gifts to buy. Again, I felt great. Mom and I had lunch at a nice restaurant in the mall. It was called California something or other and had a menu more familiar to us. You could have a fajita or cheeseburger. My mom had the buffet. I had soup. We walked around and shopped for a few hours, then walked back to our hotel. We had supper that evening with Trish and Dr Kelly and his little boy Richie. We had a nice visit and a good talk about some of the goings on with a certain patient coordinator. Feb 7th: Woke up at a decent time, showered, repacked and got ready to go home. We were able to sit out in the sun for about a half hour before our driver was there to pick us up. It was beautiful out. We were heading back to -30 C so we really enjoyed the heat of 25 C. AHHHHH! Very nice driver, had a nice visit while waiting to cross the border. His name was Jonaton. Got us to the airport and we had enough time to have a relaxing lunch @ Chili's before we had to board our plane. ADIOS Amigos! Like everyone else has said, walk, walk, walk. Try to get down to see the ocean if you can get someone to go with you. I was up in the middle of the night walking and I've had very little gas pain. Just a little in my chest that feels like a burp caught sideways. Nothing like people talk about with the pain in the shoulders etc... Eight days later and I'm still having a liquid diet except for yogurt. Getting bored with it and can't wait to move on to solids. I have had constipation and have been taking Benefibre and just picked up some Metamucil. Other than that I have nothing else exciting to tell you. It has been wonderful so far. I can't wait to start seeing some results.

Hey Sadie! Congrats! I'm off to see Dr. Ramos Kelly 02/04/2011. Me too am SO excited!!!

I am sorry for the situation you are in and I hope the right answer will come to you. I am booked with Dr Ramos Kelly on February 4th. I researched lots before I came up with my decision to go with Dr Ramos Kelly. Go with your heart. That is what I did. I have a friend who is facilitating for another doctor and she would have benefitted from me going with her doctor. The price was beyond my reach (I am self pay), and Dr Kelly was over half the price and had twice the experience. The other doctor's facility was more like a 5 star hotel but didn't feel I wanted to pay double just to recover with a view of a golf course. I wanted my doctor to have experience. I struggled with my decision for many days, losing sleep, feeling anxious, worried about my friendship, etc...My head told me to go with my friends doctor, but my heart was telling me to go with Dr. Ramos Kelly. I finally made contact and once the ball started rolling I had no more angst about it. If it feels right, do it. If you aren't sure, then maybe it is best to wait until you know. And you will know. None of us want to live with regrets. Good luck with making your decision.

I worried about this too. I didn't want my kids to worry. When I got my date, I sat them down and explained it to them. I also told them that I didn't want anyone to know about this but our immediate family. When the time comes and people start noticing the new me, then it will be up to me to tell my story. They had a few questions so I googled VSG and showed them the drawing of the sleeved stomach. Showed them drawn pictures of laparoscopic surgery and a few before and after pictures. I answered their questions truthfully but not too graphically. They are as supportive as 15 and 13 year olds can be, and they are excited to watch my transformation. I have serious regrets about not doing something like this earlier, when they were little. We would have had way more fun with a lighter, more energetic me!