SerendipityHappens

I went to Mexico, My doctor sent me home with instructions. I also LOVE watching Dr Alvarez' youtube channel Endobariatric He also has a weekly live radio show and does a podcast of it at obesitychat.com You can send him questions and he'll answer for you. Though if you just go to his youtube channel nearly every topic imaginable is addressed

This man http://mybodygalleryformen.com/photos-30868-body-shape.htm?StartAt=0#.UkbHnxBq2VA is 6'1" a 34 pant and Large shirt. Check out the site and you can get an idea of what you might look like at different weights. I've been using the mybodygallery women's site since I started my journey and I'm even a participant, uploading my photos and clothing sizes every 20 pounds or so.

Many people who are fortunate enough to keep their hair think it's something that they did.. "oh, I ate a lot of fat in my diet and always hit my protein goals, THAT'S why I kept my hair".. or "oh I took biotin and brushed my hair with a boars bristle brush 1000 strokes a day and that's the secret" Unfortunately it's NOT that simple. I ALWAYS take all my supplements including biotin, I eat a diet high in fat, I ALWAYS hit my protein goals, I use Nioxin shampoo... and I still lost hair. I KNEW I would because I lost hair after my gallbladder surgery too.. For many of us, it's just a side effect of any surgery.

I was down 45 pounds from surgery day at my six month mark.... I also lost 50 pounds in the three months PRIOR to surgery so that my body had already had that initial big loss period prior to surgery... AND I'm eating a lot more calories than many sleevers so that contributes to my slow loss also... but as long as it's SLOW LOSS and not NO LOSS, I'm happy.

Your upper arms won't spring back, but you should hopefully lose the volume in them and then a shirt will contain them. My upper arms are glorious bat wings, I have lost a LOT of volume in them and I'm DEFINITELY going to get an arm lift at some point. But they fit easily into shirts and I never have to buy a larger size due to them... My issue is with my CALVES. My calves have hardly lost any weight and many pants will not fit them! Even some BOOT CUT styles will not go over my calves! YIKES! Right now it's fine because I still have a big lower stomach so I'm wearing size 20s... but if my stomach keeps going down and my calves don't, I'll NEVER be able to get them into a size 16... AND they say you lose a size or two when you have a tummy tuck.. but what will be the point if I can't fit anything over my calves??? Yeah, I feel your pain!

I do not have aspergers, BUT once when receiving the results of those corporate personality/workstyle tests.. the test administrator pulled me aside and suggested I get tested for it. I do not believe I have it, but I definitely have many of the characteristics.

I was cleared for everything at six weeks! Pickles are one of my favorite non-protein snacks!

I met and married my exhusband at 360 pounds. I met my most recent exboyfriend at 340 pounds and we broke up two months ago. I went back on the dating sites at 240 pounds and 41 years old. It's maybe a little different... now I get men who tell me that I'm too small to be in the BBW category. I also get messages now from men who are not necessarily "chubby chasers" I live in a small city (harrisburg, pa) and I received about 5 contacts a day.. maybe ONE of those is from someone I might be even remotely interested in. After two weeks on the site I met a great man and we've been dating exclusively for over a month.. He's 8 years younger than me, kind, funny, athletic, and extremely handsome.. oh and he's single, straight and employed. SCORE! He thinks it's great that I've had the surgery and that I'm still working toward my goal. He says that I'd be fine if I stayed as I am, but that it's good I'm working to meet my own goals. In order to have success on a dating site, here is my strategy: Be VERY clear about my bodytype and size without being self deprecating. Post many pics at realistic angles including a few full body shots. Put yourself in the correct bodytype category.. If you are more than 30-40 pounds overweight you belong in the BBW category.. if you are 20-40 pounds overweight you can use the "little extra" category and if you're less than 20 pounds above ideal weight you can get away with "average" if you want OR "a little extra" Meet lots of people! I can't even count the "coffee dates" I've been on over the years. Unless you're totally turned off or creeped out by someone, then meet up for coffee in a SAFE PLACE without giving him any of your information. If you hit it off you can have a longer date later.. or turn it into coffee plus something else. If you don't hit it off then you've only spent a half hour of your time and you can move on.. I'll tell you this new guy I'm dating had horrible pictures online.. His profile was nearly empty and he didn't have great grammar during online messaging (he's not a native english speaker) BUT I didn't have anything to do that night so I decided to meet him at the local pizza place for a quick bite (well he ate, I just had some diet tea)WOW! I'm so glad I did, We hit it off right away personality wise and we have fantastic physical chemistry. Don't waste your time becoming attached to people you haven't met yet. Seriously, MEET as soon as you can. Otherwise you spend time building him up in your mind and he builds you up too.. It's better to just meet in person right away. Good luck to you!

I was not allowed to consume fresh juice until six weeks out. I juice frequently and it's a FANTASTIC way to get all of those wonderful micronutrients from the veggies. The only thing is that I just have to be careful of how much fruit I'm using. I try to stick with kale or other greens, cucumbers, lemons, ginger, celery and just enough apple or orange to make it palatable. And I do enjoy an occasional carrot-apple juice when I'm not trying to be all low carb. I juiced right up until my surgery and I had a fantastic recovery with very little inflammation of my sleeve.. my incision sites healed so quickly I was discharged from the hospital with only one Band-Aid. I don't know, but I think the juicing really helped make my body ready for surgery.

WOOT WOOT!!!! I never get tired of ONDERLAND posts! I've been chasing Onderland for a VERY long time so I can imagine how THRILLED you must be right now! Can't wait to join you!

I regularly gain 5-7 pounds depending on where I am in my cycle. Also if you were eating low carb and switched to regular carb then you can experience a small gain as your body replenishes glycogen stores.

I ate all of those things at 2 months out. I was only restricted from certain foods for the first six weeks while the staple line was healing... for example, I couldn't have berries due to the possibility of the seeds getting stuck in the healing staple line. Some people might struggle with kale since it's a bit fiberous, but it wasn't a problem for me at all... I pretty much have a sleeve of steel!

Amen. I totally understand when people who were relatively lightweights without a lot of comorbidities regret surgery and say that life was better before. Or when someone has complications that they're dealing with. Life may have been better before... But for those of us way up in the 300s or who already have serious comorbidities, then the risks of surgery are WORTH it to us. This is not a cosmetic procedure simply because we don't like being fat, this is giving us our lives BACK! I'm six months out and haven't felt this good in 20 years. Having the surgery has helped me stick with my wheat free diet so my body is free of inflammation for the first time in decades. I have minimal knee pain now, the joint pain in my hands is completely gone. Miraculously my thyroid function has returned to normal (this is VERY uncommon so I don't want anyone thinking that their thyroid will normalize due to diet change/surgery) I can ride a bike... I even fell off my bike a couple of days ago and the only thing that got injured was my pride! I couldn't imagine the pain and injury falling off my bike at 360 pounds would have caused. I am experiencing an extremely positive outcome from this surgery. I recognize that not everyone has this same outcome, but I took the risk because the alternative was for me a 100% certainty that I would continue to live in misery.

I managed to keep all my hair until the four month mark. I am now six months out and the shedding has stopped and I'm just not so patiently waiting for regrowth. I had painfully thin and fine hair to begin with so every single strand is precious to me! Currently my hair is about as thin as it was when my hypothyroid was untreated and at its worst.

There is absolutely nothing that I can never eat again. Grapes, citrus, pineapple, soda, sesame seeds, fibrous veggies, alcohol -- all things that were restricted for me for a time, but once I was fully healed, no issues whatsoever. The only thing I don't eat is any wheat products.. but that's due to an intolerance unrelated to the sleeve.

Some doctors remove it as routine, but that is falling out of favor since you really do benefit from having a gallbladder so if you CAN keep it you should try to. Most people who have it removed at the time of Bariatric surgery, already have some stones so the doctor just goes ahead and takes it out at the same time as surgery. Many people develop gallstones during rapid weight loss but not everyone. Some doctors prescribe medication that can help prevent the development of gallstones.

Mine was pain in my stomach that radiated to my back, I couldn't tell if it was a back ache or stomach ache. I would also experience vomiting... sometimes bile. I'd feel a bit better after vomiting. At first my attacks were very infrequent.. I had one attack and then not another one for six months. By the end, I was in constant pain.

Listen to your doctor for sure.. If he says you're good to wait, then no problem.. Most people do the surgery as a prescheduled surgery that they might schedule a few weeks out anyway... I'm just saying if there's any question or if the doctor recommends immediate surgery, then DO IT. For me, I never even went to the doctor until I wound up in the emergency room. I knew I had issues with my gallbladder for YEARS, but I never went to the doctor because I was afraid of surgery. My own foolishness put me at greater risk because if I had done it sooner, I would have had a shorter surgery and could have prepared my body better.. oh well, live and learn right? Edited to add: It doesn't take YEARS for everyone to develop serious issues... some can develop these issues in a matter of weeks or months.

Be careful with the new whey shots, despite their name, they're not a high quality protein and not really recommended for bariatric patients because they're mostly collegen. Yes Whey! is a better choice if you want to do the protein shots.

Be VERY careful with gallbladder issues. I didn't want to go to the doctor with mine and I put it off for too long. By the time I addressed it, I was in the emergency room begging to die and I had to have emergency surgery to remove my gangrene ruptured gallbladder. What should have been an easy surgery turned into quite an ordeal....The doctor spent more than an hour scraping foul infection and pieces of the rotten organ off of my liver. He said he had been a surgeon for 20 years and that it was the grossest surgery he had ever performed (his words not mine!) Most people who have gallbladder surgery are released the next day.. I was kept in the hospital for several days due to sepsis. I was very close to death. Don't be foolish like I was. Listen to your doctor and address the issues ASAP. When done as a non-emergency procedure under good conditions, gallbladder removal is a simple operation with an easy recovery... but if you wait too long like I did, you face the possibility of many complications, including, sepsis, organ failure or death... and a terribly painful recovery and long hospital stay!

Flew from SanDiego to Boston. No issues whatsoever. I got an aisle seat so that I could get up and walk frequently during the flight.

Looking GREAT!

My doctor told me as soon as I wanted. I would have felt "ready" after four or so days, but I was staying at my sister's and my boyfriend was 300 miles away so I didn't do it until I was about two weeks out. As far as birth control, I don't use any or need any since my 41 year old eggs are all used up.. I know for most women even if they were previously infertile, they need to be careful after surgery because weight loss can resolve fertility issues.. but there isn't anything that can be done once your eggs are no longer viable.

Well you look quite a bit younger than I do so I'm going to guess 32?

I'm in my 40s but I'll chime in anyway, Mine improved from diet! Prior to changing my diet my knees were in so much pain I could barely make it through a 7 hour shift. I could no longer close my hands all the way and I had given up crocheting because it was painful. After about a month of a wheat free diet, about 90% of my pain is gone. My hands are 100% pain free and I have complete range of motion in all digits... and my knees still have some aches but it's NOTHING like before.