I am so horribly disappointed right now. I cried all the way home from an informational seminar for the doctor I want to use -- a 45 minute drive.
Seminar was fine, I didn't have questions that could be answered right then (mostly for the nutritionist, etc. rather than the doctor as I've been researching this and reading all your stories, advice, good times, bad times), but afterwards the gal that handles some of the insurance tells me that UHC will require 6 months of supervised dieting or 3 months if I have a supervised diet, pay for an exercise person, and something else I can't remember because I was in shock. UHC never mentioned the supervised diet to me when I called them to find out whether I was covered and what I needed to qualify. My BMI is 47.whatever the ticker says, and I have sleep apnea and severe hypertension. Perfect candidate for weight loss surgery!!!! The doctor even quoted statistics that people 100 lbs. or more overweight are not successful with diet and exercise alone with keeping it off (don't yell -- I know there will always be exceptions to that, but in general...).
I've been so excited about the whole banding thing and finally being able to get the full feeling sooner so I can stick to the life food change (ie diet). This was a huge blow to me and now I have to try to not let myself sink into a bad depression.
I was a chunky kid and somewhere between 18-20 years old my weight took off, quickly ballooning up. I'm 46 and have been morbidly obese for the last 20 years. I've tried diets, feel like I'm starving and then fall off the wagon once I hit a plateau that goes on and on (4 months was the longest I waited out a plateau before giving up). Since I've been on a new BP med that is finally keeping the blood pressure down from stroke level I've gained 10 pounds -- my fault with, I truly believe, an assist from the meds. I'm not going to be on this supervised diet and suddenly get a different result. When I did Weight Watchers -- that was supervised and I lost weight, felt miserably hungry all the time and then hit the 4 month plateau). I'll do it because I'm desperate for the help the band can offer as I work to eat right and exercise.
Now I can add to my worry that by open enrollment time at work they'll change the insurance and banding won't be covered. Plus the fact that I've way more than met my deductible of $800 for the year already with tests I've had done to make sure I wasn't having any major heart issues, plus the new CPAP to replace the one that was quickly dying. Which also meant I was closer to my maximum out of pocket for the year and would have been able to save money on the 20% I have to pay for the surgery. Then there is the fact that my primary care does not have office hours conducive to those of us who work from 8am to 5pm Monday through Friday -- any guess as to what her office hours are??? So now I have to take sick time and vacation to go see her for the supervised diet, plus pay the office visit copay, etc.
I'm trying to figure out where the heck I'm going to come up with the money for all of that.
If anyone is still reading... sorry, just needed to vent and see if I could stop crying.
I know that if this surgery is what I'm supposed to have then it will work out somehow but I feel like somebody sucker punched me right now.
Horribly disappointed
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