cygnusatratus

I had a lot of IV fluid retention with surgery and I had lost 29# pre-op. (no drain either) At my 1 week follow up I was heavier than day of surgery. In the next two weeks it all started falling off until my third week stall kicked in for 3 weeks... So the point is your mileage may vary, and a couple of weeks is not enough of a time frame to even start to get worried about being a slow loser (if you know you are following the plan).

I should say that mostly my "pains" are between meals (walking up in am is bad!) but not exclusively between meals. I get the sharp upper chest type pain at meals sometimes if I go too fast or get too full, that pain is a different animal altogether and in a completely different area.

2.5 months. Freezing cold. Can't wait for summer where this will be an asset. I've always run hot my whole life but since immediately after sleeve, cold cold cold. Metabolism must be shutting down to conserve energy. Stupid tricky body...

Yes, have patience. I know it is hard (for me too). You may even stall here. I did from 2.5 weeks to nearly 6 weeks. Then I lost a pound per day for two weeks. Since then it is unpredictable. I just stick to plan and relax.

So I was sleeved December 13th and I'm happy with my progress so far. My growing concern however is my slowly increasing stomach pain for at least the last month. Now maybe pain is the wrong word. It's a deep empty gnawing feeling that could be perceived as real hunger. It is centered on my abdomen a bit higher than midway between belly button and sternum. The only pre-surgery feeling I can liken it to is when I was extremely hungry and was way past a mealtime. I know the common response is "acid" and that may be the real answer but a few things make me question that. Over the last month, instead of weaning off my PPI I have actually increased to twice a day, switched from Prevacid to Prilosec, and added multiple Zantac 150 per day. None of this seems to impact what I am feeling and over time it just seems to get slowly worse. I never have acid reflux or burning in my throat or esophagus that I notice. I have "slimed" / vomited a few times since surgery from eating a few bites too much and the bile never burned my throat. Eating does not necessarily calm this feeling down as sometimes I experience it while I am eating or shortly after a meal. My pre-op EGD was normal and I've never had acid problems before. In fact my first month and a half post op was pretty darned easy and uncomplicated with no hunger or pains. I am seeing my doc in a couple of weeks for month 3 f/u and I'm going to see what they have to say of course, but I figured I would ask here as well. I don't want to have another EGD, and aside from this uncomfortable stomach, everything is going well. So has anyone had something like this and what did it turn out to be and what did you do to get over it, if anything? Thanks for reading!

Very healthy looking too!

So to me I still look as fat as ever in the mirror but last night I had an almost scary NSV! Almost 1am as I was getting ready for bed I remembered it was garbage night. I was already stripped down and I'm pretty sure in my sedate neighborhood I'm the only one still up and about so I took the garbage to the curb in my boxers. As I was hurrying to get back in out of the cold before a car drove past I saw the shadow of a man against my house, cast by the streetlight directly across. For a split moment I was freaked out until I realized it was in fact my own shadow and I didn't recognize it immediately. The shadow had love handles but was no where near round like it used to be. I actually stopped to gawk at it in disbelief for a while. So I guess much of my weight is still hanging off the front and is still offensive to me in 3D, but my 2 dimensional profile isn't looking half bad! If you are struggling to notice your progress, take a page from a groundhog and see if your bare shadow scares you. What's the worst than can happen? Six more weeks of winter?

I just went back and calculated month to month losses based on "surgeversary" dates and added to my sig. It looks good broken out that way and makes me feel better, considering I'm dead stalled 80% of the time. My target for month 3 is -16 and I have 21 days to drop 9 more. Looks very doable but I never know when I'm going to stall completely for 3 or 4 weeks.

I'm a guy and I don't lose fast. I lost fast on pre op diet and on liquids post op but since then has been a stall about 80% of the time. The other 20% of the time I lose nicely. It's extremely frustrating because I see no rhyme or reason to the pattern of stalls and losses. I wish it was steadier, but so far I'll take the results; though I feel it isn't a good sign for me long term. Also, I do have lots of hunger type stomach pain lately. I may need to add an extra Prevacid per day. Right now I take one and also Zantac 150 at least once or twice per day... I'm hoping I get happier before my 3rd month appointment.

Yep. And it's a lot more than head hunger. My stomach often feels empty and achy only an hour or so after I eat now. It's kind of a gnawing feeling. This only started around 6 weeks out but seems worse each day. I don't know if its acid but I chose not to discontinue my Prevacid because of it. I really don't like it at all. I miss that first month with no hunger.

I stalled for 3-4 weeks about 2 weeks post op. Then I lost rapidly and steadily for almost 2 weeks (another 14 pounds) and now I'm stalled for a full week again. I've never been addicted to drugs but this is what it must be like lol. While I'm losing I'm king of the world and want to do anything i can to make it never stop. While I'm stalled I'm depressed and nagged by fear that I'll never start losing again. Highs and lows. At least I can laugh about it.

My understanding is that Aetna needs one weight per year for the two years. Just have your Doc report your highest weight for each of the last two years. Also, don't forget that Aetna seems to have a hidden requirement for a letter of medical necessity from your primary care. My surgeons office panicked about mine and my PCP delayed that forever until I almost missed my surgery date...

Had an interesting day. I tried a higher calorie day to see what it would do to or for me. I'm normally around 700/day with 20g or so carbs. Today I ate a scrambled egg and a half with some cheese and crumbled bacon, a 2.5 oz cheeseburger grilled at home with 95% lean beef, no bun. Half a dozen baby carrots lightly dipped in ranch. A protein shake in 12oz of 1% milk and then dinner was a medium sized slice of brick oven pizza with cheese, sauce, grilled chicken, and roasted red peppers. The pizza was an experiment and I was frankly surprised I even got close to being able to eat a whole slice without problems considering the burger and carrots became painful at the end of lunch. My wife has been depressing on me about never being able to eat normal food again so I showed her (and myself) I could, even 7 weeks out. I have been in a 4 day stall where I've actually gained a pound so today was an attempt to shake things up and show my body I'm not starving. I'll be back to normal low carb low calorie tomorrow but today was over 1000. I think it's a slippery slope now that I know I can fit that much and feel fine so I'm resolving that even if this works to kick start weight loss I won't do it more than once every two weeks.

Anyone who is stalled should really check carb levels. If I eat over 40g of carbs per day I can actually gain weight overnight. Under 20g of carbs and I lose really well. Everyone may have a different level of carb tolerance where your body wants to store water and glycogen. Mine has always been very low.

So I did some experimentation last night with some good but unexpected results. The background: I'm 6 weeks post op with a total pre/post loss of 63 pounds, current weight 333. I've always been a 12cm pressure on my cpap and the pre-op study confirmed that. I use an auto cpap and I knew post-op that 12 was too much so I changed it to range starting at 10 and going up higher as I needed it during the night. I've had worsening stats in the morning ever since surgery though and horrible dry mouth and plenty of air in my sleeve. I've even tried mouth taping to keep me from blowing out my mouth. My leaks were .6-.7 range with AHI in the 6-10 range. Pre-op my leaks were around .3 and AHI was 4-5 range. I had tried lowering starting pressure to 9 but the auto titration was still increasing me overnight to over 10, with bad mouth leaks and waking up with a moonscape on my tongue and gums stuck to teeth. Last night I threw caution to the wind and set my min pressure to 7.4 and my max to 9.8. Results: no dry mouth this morning, max pressure reached 8.2 overnight, leak was a paltry .16 and AHI was an unheard of 2.0! So my theory is that the old start pressure was too high causing high mouth leaks which the machine compensated for by increasing the pressure and just compounding the problem because it cannot tell mouth leaks from mask leaks. I expected my leaks to go down but to see my AHI go down too was a pleasant surprise that may indicate my bad stats since surgery were central hypopneas and apneas cause d by more pressure than I needed. At this rate I could be off my cpap in a few months, and I've been on that thing since 1993!

Not that I advocate self adjustment but I've yet to see a model where the clinician menu can't be easily accessed to adjust your own settings. On mine you hold down a certain 2 buttons while plugging it in. I do find I'm choking/coughing a bit just this last week on it. This surgery has really thrown my cpap therapy for a loop. So worth it though.

I'm having the stomach air issues as well, along with horrible dry mouth that I never had pre-op. One night my gums got a cut because they got stuck to my teeth. I've noticed my AHI and leak scores are all worse post-op. I've turned down my pressure range on my s8 autoset, but it seems to be adjusting up anyway during the night and my AHI is slightly worse at the lower start pressure. I'm loving this surgery but my cpap which I've used successfully since 1993 is now making me crazy. I also feel slightly worse in the mornings now. I can't wait to break up with the little monster. Also I've heard (anecdotally) that at a pressure in the 5-6 range cpap isn't doing much and can be discontinued once you get that low. But please check with your pulmonologist.

I asked Dr. Elariny about this. He says he only oversews if it looks like a portion of the staple line might need it (i.e. some issue with staple line being imperfect)

I fInd that doctors are quick to blame weight for any number of medical issues when they don't have another answer readily available. Sometimes they are right though.

You might lose more too as a side bonus. I stalled as soon as I got off liquids.

I've done one. It wasn't required for my surgery though. It was easy for me. They take your bp, monitor you the whole time, increasing speed and elevation to increase your heart rate to target range. So if your heart rate goes up fast with moderate speeds, that's all you need to do. I only had to walk fast, vs run. It's over pretty quickly too.

40 calories per thin mint, 5.5 carbs, .2 protein. 2 fat. Don't ask how many calories in a case. Yes this is from pal

I havent tried those and I haven't seen the carbsmart yogurt. However the yoplait is 14g of carbs and contains sugar. That may be fine for most folks but my body won't let me get away with that too often. And I read that yoplait is being sued as to whether its regular greek yogurt is even really Greek yogurt, or yogurt at all for that matter. http://www.startribune.com/business/162301436.html unclear if this applies to the 100 calorie version that is new.

Fage 0% plain. 7 carbs with no added sugar. I flavor with low carb protein powder. Dannon light and fit Greek is flavored and only slightly higher carb but with added fructose. Fructose should be classified as a poison.

I couldn't drive but I worked from home the rest of the day. They knock you out. I had noo symptoms afterward. They are checking you for barrets esophagus and ulcers and things like that so there are no surprises for your surgeon. My EGD was done by my gastroenterologist.