deletedsally

NSV for today is the pleasure of eating healthy food that I grew in my own garden! The week before I decided to have VSG, I had "directed" the planting of a vegetable garden in my back yard. My children and grandchildren had to do most of the work because my feet hurt too bad to walk and my belly was so big that I couldn't squat or lean over. The neighbors must have gotten quite a show, as I practically had to lie down in the dirt to help my grandson plant a seed. Anyway, since my surgery, I have been tending our little garden and just watching everyone else enjoy eating our beautiful vegies as they have started to ripen (because I was on full liquids/pureed food). Anyway...tonight I cooked fresh carrots, broccoli and yellow squash from the garden. I had a big fat Tomato that I was going to give away because I can't eat raw vegies yet--but instead, I peeled it and strained out all the seeds and made a fresh puree for the top of my chicken. What a blast to be able to eat a small meal of fresh foods and feel so completely satisfied!

Last summer my feet hurt so bad that I wore plastic Birkenstock type shoes in the pool. It was the only way I could stand and move around--even in the Water. I also had to have other people do all the pool maintenance...This may seem like a small victory, but to me it was huge: Todoay, I was able to vacuum my own pool and splash all around the pool playing with my grandson. No shoes! No pain! Just a fun day! These kinds of victories were the reason I chose to have the surgery. I'm amazed that it's only taken 4.5 weeks and 31 pounds to begin experiencing the benefits.

ONEDERFUL!!! I can't wait to join you...For me, there has always been something particularly humiliating about being over 200 pounds. I know that fat is fat...and there isn't a lot of difference between 199 and 201--but in our hearts and minds, there is a huge difference. Congratulations that you won't ever have to see those numbers again!

Medical research supports the fact that WLS does cure diabetes for a high percentage of people. Doctors are using the word "cure."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22787261/#storyContinued
Does Weight Loss Surgery Cure Diabetes?
More than 30 studies say yes, according to the ASMBS. One recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) found that 73 percent of people with diabetes who underwent gastric banding combined with conventional therapy achieved remission, which is defined as normal blood sugar levels and no need for diabetes medication. By contrast, just 13 percent of those people who received only conventional therapy went into remission. In this study, conventional therapy comprised lifestyle modificatons such as diet and increased physical activity, along with medication.
The people in the nonsurgical group lost just 1.7 percent of their body weight, compared with almost 21 percent among those who underwent gastric banding.
A landmark 2004 study in JAMA of more than 22,000 people who underwent bariatric surgery showed that type 2 diabetes was completely resolved in 76.8 percent of people, and it improved in 86 percent of people. The bariatric surgery procedures performed in this study included gastric banding, gastric bypass, gastroplasty, biliopancreatic diversion or duodenal switch, and others (such as jejunoileal bypass, a bypass of a section of the small intestine).
What's more, a study in the Annals of Surgery showed that 83 percent of 240 people who underwent gastric bypass were cured of their diabetes. Two studies in the New England Journal of Medicine found that bariatric surgery reduces the long-term mortality associated with obesity. In one of the two studies, the researchers found that long-term total mortality after gastric bypass surgery was significantly reduced, particularly deaths from diabetes.
Hutcher thinks the surgeries may benefit even people with diabetes who are not overweight or obese.
"We can do a diabetes-reversing operation without producing weight loss and without altering the stomach," he says.
Currently the National Institutes of Health guidelines recommend weight loss surgery for patients with a body mass index (BMI) over 40 and for people with diabetes or other obesity-related diseases whose BMI is over 35.
But many a bariatric surgeon including ASMBS president John W. Baker, MD, the medical director for Baptist Medical Center's Baptist Health Weight Loss Center in Little Rock, Arkansas, feel this cut-off is arbitrary and should be changed. "There is no clear rationale for it," says Baker, also the co- director of the Baptist Medical Center Bariatric Surgery Program.
This sentiment is echoed in a new consensus statement from the first International Diabetes Surgery Summit that will appear in the January 2010 edition of Annals of Surgery.
Setting the bar at 35 may do more harm than good for people with diabetes because it will allow their disease to progress to end-organ damage, Baker says. This may be more important than ever as the latest study shows that as many as 44 million Americans will have diabetes by 2034. That's up from 23 million today.
"We need trials that look at these surgeries in people with diabetes who have a BMI of 30 to 35," he says. If the studies are positive, bariatric surgeons can perform weight loss procedures on people with diabetes with lower BMI and ultimately save more lives.
"Surgery may resolve diabetes and when trials come out, it may give us impetus to lower the bar," he says.
Bariatric Surgery for Diabetes Saves Money
It's also much more cost-effective to treat diabetes with weight loss surgery than with conventional medical therapy, Hutcher says. "Non-surgical therapies can cost up to $33,000 per year for the entire life of the patient. Does the weight loss surgery cost that much? Heck no," he says. "The cost of weight loss surgery is usually less than the cost of one year's worth of diabetes treatment."
[Read more about bariatric surgery cost.]
How Does Bariatric Surgery Cure Diabetes?
Doctors know that bariatric surgery works at reversing diabetes; but what they don't know is how it works. "We have to do retrograde research to find out why this works, and in 20 years, this retrograde research and drug development may turn diabetes back into a nonsurgical disease," Hutcher says. "Finding out the why will turn diabetes back to a nonsurgical problem."
Some theories do exist, including the idea that shunting food directly to the lower intestine stimulates a substance called glucagon-like peptide 1, which can increase insulin production. Another theory suggests that hormones that prompt hunger may be dulled by rearranging the anatomy, so if they crave less sugar, people may be able to manage their blood sugar levels better.
Other questions remain regarding the role that weight loss surgery can play in treating, and potentially curing, diabetes. For starters, the ideal type of bariatric surgery for treating diabetes is not yet known. All of the studies have looked at different types of surgeries.
To help answer this question once and for all, The Cleveland Clinic Foundation is now recruiting for a five-year study of 150 men and women with type 2 diabetes aged 20 to 60 with BMIs between 30 and 40. The study will compare advanced medical therapy alone or advanced medical therapy combined with either Roux-en-Y gastric bypass or gastric sleeve surgery. Another question that remains is when the surgery should be performed ? that is, when diabetes is first diagnosed or down the road, when complications have already begun to arise.
Should Everyone with Diabetes Undergo Bariatric Surgery?
Not necessarily, says Hutcher. "This decision is up to the patient and the physician, but no obese patient with diabetes should be denied access to this surgery," he adds.
The bottom line is that bariatric surgery can play a big role in treating diabetes, according to Ren. "If you lose weight, your diabetes will go away, and when you regain the weight, the diabetes will come back," she says. "Diabetes is always lurking, and remission lasts as long as the weight loss lasts."

NSV for today is the pleasure of eating healthy food that I grew in my own garden! The week before I decided to have VSG, I had "directed" the planting of a vegetable garden in my back yard. My children and grandchildren had to do most of the work because my feet hurt too bad to walk and my belly was so big that I couldn't squat or lean over. The neighbors must have gotten quite a show, as I practically had to lie down in the dirt to help my grandson plant a seed. Anyway, since my surgery, I have been tending our little garden and just watching everyone else enjoy eating our beautiful vegies as they have started to ripen (because I was on full liquids/pureed food). Anyway...tonight I cooked fresh carrots, broccoli and yellow squash from the garden. I had a big fat Tomato that I was going to give away because I can't eat raw vegies yet--but instead, I peeled it and strained out all the seeds and made a fresh puree for the top of my chicken. What a blast to be able to eat a small meal of fresh foods and feel so completely satisfied!

Medical research supports the fact that WLS does cure diabetes for a high percentage of people. Doctors are using the word "cure."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22787261/#storyContinued
Does Weight Loss Surgery Cure Diabetes?
More than 30 studies say yes, according to the ASMBS. One recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) found that 73 percent of people with diabetes who underwent gastric banding combined with conventional therapy achieved remission, which is defined as normal blood sugar levels and no need for diabetes medication. By contrast, just 13 percent of those people who received only conventional therapy went into remission. In this study, conventional therapy comprised lifestyle modificatons such as diet and increased physical activity, along with medication.
The people in the nonsurgical group lost just 1.7 percent of their body weight, compared with almost 21 percent among those who underwent gastric banding.
A landmark 2004 study in JAMA of more than 22,000 people who underwent bariatric surgery showed that type 2 diabetes was completely resolved in 76.8 percent of people, and it improved in 86 percent of people. The bariatric surgery procedures performed in this study included gastric banding, gastric bypass, gastroplasty, biliopancreatic diversion or duodenal switch, and others (such as jejunoileal bypass, a bypass of a section of the small intestine).
What's more, a study in the Annals of Surgery showed that 83 percent of 240 people who underwent gastric bypass were cured of their diabetes. Two studies in the New England Journal of Medicine found that bariatric surgery reduces the long-term mortality associated with obesity. In one of the two studies, the researchers found that long-term total mortality after gastric bypass surgery was significantly reduced, particularly deaths from diabetes.
Hutcher thinks the surgeries may benefit even people with diabetes who are not overweight or obese.
"We can do a diabetes-reversing operation without producing weight loss and without altering the stomach," he says.
Currently the National Institutes of Health guidelines recommend weight loss surgery for patients with a body mass index (BMI) over 40 and for people with diabetes or other obesity-related diseases whose BMI is over 35.
But many a bariatric surgeon including ASMBS president John W. Baker, MD, the medical director for Baptist Medical Center's Baptist Health Weight Loss Center in Little Rock, Arkansas, feel this cut-off is arbitrary and should be changed. "There is no clear rationale for it," says Baker, also the co- director of the Baptist Medical Center Bariatric Surgery Program.
This sentiment is echoed in a new consensus statement from the first International Diabetes Surgery Summit that will appear in the January 2010 edition of Annals of Surgery.
Setting the bar at 35 may do more harm than good for people with diabetes because it will allow their disease to progress to end-organ damage, Baker says. This may be more important than ever as the latest study shows that as many as 44 million Americans will have diabetes by 2034. That's up from 23 million today.
"We need trials that look at these surgeries in people with diabetes who have a BMI of 30 to 35," he says. If the studies are positive, bariatric surgeons can perform weight loss procedures on people with diabetes with lower BMI and ultimately save more lives.
"Surgery may resolve diabetes and when trials come out, it may give us impetus to lower the bar," he says.
Bariatric Surgery for Diabetes Saves Money
It's also much more cost-effective to treat diabetes with weight loss surgery than with conventional medical therapy, Hutcher says. "Non-surgical therapies can cost up to $33,000 per year for the entire life of the patient. Does the weight loss surgery cost that much? Heck no," he says. "The cost of weight loss surgery is usually less than the cost of one year's worth of diabetes treatment."
[Read more about bariatric surgery cost.]
How Does Bariatric Surgery Cure Diabetes?
Doctors know that bariatric surgery works at reversing diabetes; but what they don't know is how it works. "We have to do retrograde research to find out why this works, and in 20 years, this retrograde research and drug development may turn diabetes back into a nonsurgical disease," Hutcher says. "Finding out the why will turn diabetes back to a nonsurgical problem."
Some theories do exist, including the idea that shunting food directly to the lower intestine stimulates a substance called glucagon-like peptide 1, which can increase insulin production. Another theory suggests that hormones that prompt hunger may be dulled by rearranging the anatomy, so if they crave less sugar, people may be able to manage their blood sugar levels better.
Other questions remain regarding the role that weight loss surgery can play in treating, and potentially curing, diabetes. For starters, the ideal type of bariatric surgery for treating diabetes is not yet known. All of the studies have looked at different types of surgeries.
To help answer this question once and for all, The Cleveland Clinic Foundation is now recruiting for a five-year study of 150 men and women with type 2 diabetes aged 20 to 60 with BMIs between 30 and 40. The study will compare advanced medical therapy alone or advanced medical therapy combined with either Roux-en-Y gastric bypass or gastric sleeve surgery. Another question that remains is when the surgery should be performed ? that is, when diabetes is first diagnosed or down the road, when complications have already begun to arise.
Should Everyone with Diabetes Undergo Bariatric Surgery?
Not necessarily, says Hutcher. "This decision is up to the patient and the physician, but no obese patient with diabetes should be denied access to this surgery," he adds.
The bottom line is that bariatric surgery can play a big role in treating diabetes, according to Ren. "If you lose weight, your diabetes will go away, and when you regain the weight, the diabetes will come back," she says. "Diabetes is always lurking, and remission lasts as long as the weight loss lasts."

Medical research supports the fact that WLS does cure diabetes for a high percentage of people. Doctors are using the word "cure."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22787261/#storyContinued
Does Weight Loss Surgery Cure Diabetes?
More than 30 studies say yes, according to the ASMBS. One recent study in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) found that 73 percent of people with diabetes who underwent gastric banding combined with conventional therapy achieved remission, which is defined as normal blood sugar levels and no need for diabetes medication. By contrast, just 13 percent of those people who received only conventional therapy went into remission. In this study, conventional therapy comprised lifestyle modificatons such as diet and increased physical activity, along with medication.
The people in the nonsurgical group lost just 1.7 percent of their body weight, compared with almost 21 percent among those who underwent gastric banding.
A landmark 2004 study in JAMA of more than 22,000 people who underwent bariatric surgery showed that type 2 diabetes was completely resolved in 76.8 percent of people, and it improved in 86 percent of people. The bariatric surgery procedures performed in this study included gastric banding, gastric bypass, gastroplasty, biliopancreatic diversion or duodenal switch, and others (such as jejunoileal bypass, a bypass of a section of the small intestine).
What's more, a study in the Annals of Surgery showed that 83 percent of 240 people who underwent gastric bypass were cured of their diabetes. Two studies in the New England Journal of Medicine found that bariatric surgery reduces the long-term mortality associated with obesity. In one of the two studies, the researchers found that long-term total mortality after gastric bypass surgery was significantly reduced, particularly deaths from diabetes.
Hutcher thinks the surgeries may benefit even people with diabetes who are not overweight or obese.
"We can do a diabetes-reversing operation without producing weight loss and without altering the stomach," he says.
Currently the National Institutes of Health guidelines recommend weight loss surgery for patients with a body mass index (BMI) over 40 and for people with diabetes or other obesity-related diseases whose BMI is over 35.
But many a bariatric surgeon including ASMBS president John W. Baker, MD, the medical director for Baptist Medical Center's Baptist Health Weight Loss Center in Little Rock, Arkansas, feel this cut-off is arbitrary and should be changed. "There is no clear rationale for it," says Baker, also the co- director of the Baptist Medical Center Bariatric Surgery Program.
This sentiment is echoed in a new consensus statement from the first International Diabetes Surgery Summit that will appear in the January 2010 edition of Annals of Surgery.
Setting the bar at 35 may do more harm than good for people with diabetes because it will allow their disease to progress to end-organ damage, Baker says. This may be more important than ever as the latest study shows that as many as 44 million Americans will have diabetes by 2034. That's up from 23 million today.
"We need trials that look at these surgeries in people with diabetes who have a BMI of 30 to 35," he says. If the studies are positive, bariatric surgeons can perform weight loss procedures on people with diabetes with lower BMI and ultimately save more lives.
"Surgery may resolve diabetes and when trials come out, it may give us impetus to lower the bar," he says.
Bariatric Surgery for Diabetes Saves Money
It's also much more cost-effective to treat diabetes with weight loss surgery than with conventional medical therapy, Hutcher says. "Non-surgical therapies can cost up to $33,000 per year for the entire life of the patient. Does the weight loss surgery cost that much? Heck no," he says. "The cost of weight loss surgery is usually less than the cost of one year's worth of diabetes treatment."
[Read more about bariatric surgery cost.]
How Does Bariatric Surgery Cure Diabetes?
Doctors know that bariatric surgery works at reversing diabetes; but what they don't know is how it works. "We have to do retrograde research to find out why this works, and in 20 years, this retrograde research and drug development may turn diabetes back into a nonsurgical disease," Hutcher says. "Finding out the why will turn diabetes back to a nonsurgical problem."
Some theories do exist, including the idea that shunting food directly to the lower intestine stimulates a substance called glucagon-like peptide 1, which can increase insulin production. Another theory suggests that hormones that prompt hunger may be dulled by rearranging the anatomy, so if they crave less sugar, people may be able to manage their blood sugar levels better.
Other questions remain regarding the role that weight loss surgery can play in treating, and potentially curing, diabetes. For starters, the ideal type of bariatric surgery for treating diabetes is not yet known. All of the studies have looked at different types of surgeries.
To help answer this question once and for all, The Cleveland Clinic Foundation is now recruiting for a five-year study of 150 men and women with type 2 diabetes aged 20 to 60 with BMIs between 30 and 40. The study will compare advanced medical therapy alone or advanced medical therapy combined with either Roux-en-Y gastric bypass or gastric sleeve surgery. Another question that remains is when the surgery should be performed ? that is, when diabetes is first diagnosed or down the road, when complications have already begun to arise.
Should Everyone with Diabetes Undergo Bariatric Surgery?
Not necessarily, says Hutcher. "This decision is up to the patient and the physician, but no obese patient with diabetes should be denied access to this surgery," he adds.
The bottom line is that bariatric surgery can play a big role in treating diabetes, according to Ren. "If you lose weight, your diabetes will go away, and when you regain the weight, the diabetes will come back," she says. "Diabetes is always lurking, and remission lasts as long as the weight loss lasts."

Some things we just aren't going to be able to predict--like how much your stomach will stretch--because we each eat differently and there are a lot of other variables as well. The question about cancer is one that I asked my surgeon. He explained that VSG is actually much safer than bypass surgery in terms of possible cancer. He said you can have your entire stomach removed and still live. With bypass surgery, because a portion of the stomach is sectioned off, but not removed, that portion of the stomach can't even be viewed with an endoscope. Additionally, what you would swallow for an upper GI would never make it to that portion to provide a good x-ray image, so it would be very difficult to know what was going on with the bypassed portion of the stomach if you were to develop cancer.