Kaj

August 5th, 2 weeks beginning July 22nd on a very low carb (<30 gms) diet that I'm going to do as an all liquid, Being sleeved by Dr. Faulkenberry Southwest Bariatrics, Austin TX. And scared messless.

ROFLMAO!!!! This ALSO resonates with me, damnit!!

Ohhhhh. This resonates SO strongly with me, complete with my favorite pejorative!!

Well, I see my surgeon on this Wednesday the 3rd and hope to get a surgery date that day. I'm hoping he will schedule me for the 23rd of July or at the very least the 30th or the 6th of August at the latest. I am ready to get this done so I can start this "journey" as everyone calls it. I'm feeling like a slug lately. I am worried that I won't have the motivation to exercise after surgery - especially when I do like this weekend and spend the whole weekend laying around the house. Last weekend I helped my husband shear one of our angora goats and after 3 hrs in the heat, on the ground, wrestling to keep her still so she wouldn't get cut by the shears I have gone to work and come home and flopped down each night. Not real good for keeping the old metabolism. Anyway, I'm hoping my body won't hurt so much once the weight starts to come off and that I have the energy to actually climb on the treadmill everyday. All you lovely sleeved 60s keep up the good work and all of us still waiting, keep our chins up. Kaj

You aren't invisible, but this is a huge community. I have found that the more immediate replies/support comes if you get involved in one particular forum...like age related or whatever. Facebook also has some good groups.

​Pre-op. I'm shooting for July 23rd surgery date. No idea yet if that is possible - it might be farther out. I see the Nut and exercise physiologist on June 10th, then my surgeon for consult and hopefully to schedule my date. I am Federal insurance and first letter approved. And this will probably make no sense but one of the reasons I'm looking forward to my surgery date is that I'm looking forward to that 2 wk vacation. <lol>

WeeWers- you probably articulated exactly where I'm coming from with sentence...and then I find myself wondering why I would even be concerned about "pretty" at 60 yrs old, thinking I'm a grandmother, I'm not supposed to be "pretty"....maybe even I'm supposed to be soft and round. <shakes her head> Lord I'm SOOOOO vain.

Speaking for myself only here....Not sleeved yet, however, I gotta say...I love the taste of caffeine free diet coke, cold, room temp, fizzy, flat, in a can, in a bottle, first thing in the morning to swallow my pills, last thing at night to wet my throat. The coke I crack before I go to bed, sits on my bedside table and if there is coke left in it when I get up, I drink it. You speak of 12 step meetings: I know many and addict (name the drug) that can sit in a bar all night and maintain sobriety but gets triggered when they drive down a certain street past a certain liquor store, I know addicts that manage to learn moderation, and I know addicts that use harm reduction to try to minimize the damage their behavior may cause. Everyone has a different level of functioning and a different way of coping. Total abstinence doesn't work for everyone, just like moderation doesn't work for everyone. We are individuals, not a bunch of carbon copy cookies. Ultimately, we all have to make our own choice. After surgery, I may drink a diet coke again and I may not. At 60 years old, I'm pretty sure I am far enough down the road of life to answer only to myself. A behavior is only pathological if it causes a problem with functioning, IMHO...

ROFLMAO!!!!!

It is not likely I will be able to get reconstructive surgery and I'm trying to determine how I feel about this *before* I have taken the step so I will be prepared *after* I have surgery.

I'm Austin and will be using Dr. Faulkenberry with Southwest Bariatrics..aka Capitol Surgeons Group. They will br submitting for approval for me in mid-May. I researched him thoroughly and found no negative reviews, 0 mortality and haven't been able to find any complication stats on him either. On another site his patients are telling me they have not heard of any complications either. He is named a surgeon of excellence by the Centers gor Excellence and I will be sleeved at St. David hospital which is also a Center of Excellence and he is the Medical Director of their metabolic and bariatric program. Based on all this, my assumption is his surgical skill will be very good also.

I plan to try others. I like yogurt anyway and frequently take it with my salad for lunch. I probably also ought to go find a recipe for a goats milk yogurt that will work as we have just recently begun the switch over since out goat is giving about a quart or more a day in addition to feeding her kid. We figure once the kid is off her, we will be getting a gallon or so a day. I know it sounds weird, but I am really looking forward to the liquid stage. One of the easiest times of my life was the 11 months I spent on Medifast - I didn't have to think about food. I knew what I would be having, no options. Life was sooooo much easier for me.

hmmm. Guess I'll hold my nose when I eat it. Of course, I'm nowhere close to having to worry about it as I haven't even gotten to the point of being submitted to insurance.

I have to ask - *what* is the deal with greek yogurt? Why is it, or is it really, better than regular yogurt? I bought some Chobani to try it out and I gotta say; the taste was adequate but the smell was seriously nasty. If I can not eat it, I'd be just as happy.

I wear a medical alert flash drive bracelet with all my meds on it, information about my meniere's disease in case I have a severe vertigo attack in public. They look pretty scary and I don't particularly want to be mistaken for being severely intoxicated or high. I'll just add information about the VSG procedure to that.

Huh. Never thought about being denied kids meals at restaurants. Interesting. I just assumed my husband would just do more of what he already does....eat what I can't/don't.

ROFLMAO!!!!!!!!!! Love it!

Thanks for the boost and the support, Wrinkle. It *does* help.

I have told my husband and two friends, neither of which have any contact in any way with my job or co-workers. I am choosing to not tell my sons (grown) until and if I choose to do so. What I do with my body and my health is nobody's business except my husband. I plan to tell my colleagues and supervisor that I'm having hernia surgery. I work for the federal gov't and they are a bit rigid in their process for requesting time off so I have to cover a lot of bases AND I carry a caseload of 25-ish clients that have to be covered while I'm gone. That being said - my weight, the loss of, the gain of, the total of - is no more open to office discussion than is what I do or don't do between my bed sheet. In my world the only person from whom I want input is my husband because what he or I do impacts the other. But that is just me. I'm this way about every part of my life.

Many, many positive luck vibes coming your way..

Not yet. My patient coordinator will be submitting to my insurance for approval in mid-May. Once I get approval, they will give me a date. I imagine it will be sometime in June or July. I'm trying to make sure I have enough PTO built up to cover 2 weeks off in case I need that much time. I'm nervous, don't know what to expect or how to even begin to ask for the time off or what I'm supposed to tell my job about *why* I want, no need..to take that much time off and ask my colleagues to cover my caseload. I'm thinking I'm going to ask for the time off and say I have to have a hiatal hernia repaired. I figure that is something that is important enough to justify the time but not so major that I wouldn't have some leeway in the timing of surgery. I want the time to pass so I can just do this. I'm tired of looking at myself. I'm tired of eating and feeling guilty and resentful and rebellious with a f**k it attitude and eat crap I know is bad for me, is stupid and self defeating only to then beat myself up over every bite of even frigging plain lettuce for the next few days. This waiting is killing me. (Can you tell I'm a little over-wrought?)

Well, my "patient advocate" has received my 3 month Dr. supervised documentation, my lab-work showing I'm a non-smoker and not now nor have I ever been treated for drug or alcohol abuse. She says she will submit to my insurance in mid-May. I'm feeling pretty good about the choice to do this, but am apprehensive about the recovery period - I will have a limited amount of PTO and am worried I won't be able to heal enough to go back to work by the time I need to; I'm also worried I'll keep being a slug - right now, I come home and flop until time to go to bed. I should get on my treadmill, but after all day climbing stairs delivering groceries, doing home visits, etc, my knee hurts like hell and the last thing I wanna do is climb on the treadmill and aggravate it more. I am just really NOT a huge fan of exercise. I keep wondering if that will change with weight loss. I think I am more worried about failing after the surgery than I am about the surgery itself. Anyway - just checking in with everyone, I love seeing all the success and even reading about the difficulties and seeing them eventually be addressed and overcome. Keep doing what y'all do. You each are an inspiration to me.

Tats do migrate/smudge with weight change, but then gravity also impacts them. I have a wrist band on my left wrist of my 3 sons' names. It has not changed in looks or position regardless of age or weight. Nor has it been a problem for IVs as a good vampire (IMO) doesn't need to see to hit a vein - it is done more by feel. I have a unicorn on my right upper breast - it is about 3" tall and 2" wide. I got it prior to my 3rd pregnancy in 1982 and despite weight loss and weight gain and lactation/breast feeding, it has only gotten more muted due to aging. 5 dog paws on my left ankle above the ankle bone - no changes. 2nd degree Reiki distance healing symbol on top of my left foot - no change. However, I have a tribal floral that goes from my shoulders to mid butt cheek and it is inter-twined with english ivy that drapes off my right shoulder, winds through the tribal from right to left then trails down my outer thigh before wrapping 3x around my calf and finishing off running onto the top of my foot. I have seen it change in sharpness and clean, straight lines as I've yo-yo'd over the years AND as I've aged and gravity has pulled at it. Seeing the changes it has experienced, I am expecting to have some loss of neatness and symmetry with a large amount of weight loss simply due to the sag of the stretched out skin on my back and sides. You are looking at a minimum of 3 weeks healing time, if not more. You are currently anemic which means you are not likely to be a quick healer due to lack of white blood cells,,,the design and placement should be no issue at all in so far as design, sharpness and/or - however if it were me, I would wait until after the surgery so as not to have just put your body through one healing then expecting another; plus thee is always the chance of infection even in the cleanest shop due to a number of factors. You don't want to go into surgery with infection or the potential for infection running rampant in your body.. My 2 cents is for you to wait until after you have healed and are past the point of infection. If you want this design on your wrist, then another 6 months is not going to change that and will also give you the best ability to heal.