supportivespouse911

I will be Having same day surgery July 23 at florence with Dr.Garcia... Anyone else going to be there then? My wife had hers done about 3 months ago at Mi hospital with Garcia and is doing amazing. She will be coming with me as well. She had met a few people that were going to be there at the same time as her on here so thought I would try too!!

My spouse is scheduled with dr Garcia at Florence Hospital. We fly in on July 23rd same day surgery!! Anyone else!? On that date? Or around??

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

After following my wife on her journey, I have decided to become a sleever myself! July 23rd, dr Garcia at florence. I am really excited. My wife has done so well and I am looking at it As a lifestyle change for both of us! Now we can both eat the same the rest of our lives! Not to mention being so much healthier and not overweight! July can't come soon enough!

My wife did great last night! Drank all her liquids all night and actually slept a bit. She showered this morning and I can't believe how great she looks. Doesn't look at all like she had surgery. We are just waiting for her to get her bandages changed, drain out and iv out and we should get to leave soon.
In my opinion- the better you do on the preop diet the better you will do after surgery. My wife only needed to do diet for 7 days but she decided to do it for 14 and then only needed to do Clear Liquids for one day but she did 3 and we both really think that it helps so much in the post op! One girl down the hall from us said she didn't really do the preop diet at all and only stopped eating 12 hours before and she was very sick after her surgery. Nausea and vomiting all night and pretty sore.... So as tough as it is... Stick to that diet cause it makes a huge difference it seems. Just an observation. I am not a doctor and I am sure there are people that have done fine not doing it. Just seems to be the common factor.
We will be getting out soon. Yesterday they gave us the folder with the post op diet stuff. Today when we leave we will get a bag of stuff with medications and everything else we need. We are excited to get back to the comfy bed at the Marriott and will probably head out to do a little shopping today!

My wife did great last night! Drank all her liquids all night and actually slept a bit. She showered this morning and I can't believe how great she looks. Doesn't look at all like she had surgery. We are just waiting for her to get her bandages changed, drain out and iv out and we should get to leave soon.
In my opinion- the better you do on the preop diet the better you will do after surgery. My wife only needed to do diet for 7 days but she decided to do it for 14 and then only needed to do Clear Liquids for one day but she did 3 and we both really think that it helps so much in the post op! One girl down the hall from us said she didn't really do the preop diet at all and only stopped eating 12 hours before and she was very sick after her surgery. Nausea and vomiting all night and pretty sore.... So as tough as it is... Stick to that diet cause it makes a huge difference it seems. Just an observation. I am not a doctor and I am sure there are people that have done fine not doing it. Just seems to be the common factor.
We will be getting out soon. Yesterday they gave us the folder with the post op diet stuff. Today when we leave we will get a bag of stuff with medications and everything else we need. We are excited to get back to the comfy bed at the Marriott and will probably head out to do a little shopping today!

It went really well. My wife was having a hard time sleeping comfortably so we asked for some medicine. They have her a very small amount of liquid to drink. No idea what it was. It was gross and made her nauseas. They said it was because she still has gas in her new little tummy so it was normal. She burped had some nausea medicine thru the iv and was sound asleep within minutes. She slept for a couple hours and then would have to pee.... That's how she is normally after surgery- she doesn't sleep and pees a lot. So every 2 hours we got up, peed, and walked. We got our roommate up and she walked with us too.
My wife feels great today. Showered, dressing change, clean clothes, Etc. she is walking a lot which is really helping too.
Support person note- I finally found a meal I really liked. Breakfast in the cafe downstairs is really good. Fresh fruit, fresh made omelette, potatoes and toast. It was really good. All for like $6 US. It was good. The nurses last night were just as good as the day and evening shift. They let you get some sleep too.... Lights turned down in halls and they were very quiet. My wife had an issue with her iv and they fixed it while She slept. They are having us move rooms which is no big deal at all... Right across the hall and now I will have a bed instead of a recliner thing and our roommates husband can stay the night tonight.
When you are here there is a nurse. Her name is Sam. She is great. She will be having the surgery herself at the end of the month so if you are coming then you will miss her. But otherwise- she is a day shift nurse with light colored hair. She is awesome. We all love her.
That's it for now. We did the first leak test and it went fine. My wife said it was gross but not that big of deal. You drink a small cup of contrast mixed with Water. She will be starting her trio of liquids in a couple hours- tea, Gatorade, and apple juice.< /p>

I got interrupted because she is out of surgery!!! She did great. What a relief. I feel like we have these milestones.... Finally got to the day of leaving to come down- check. Made our flights- check, made it across the border- check, made it to the hospital, check. Made it in and now OUT of surgery!
The phone they have here is great as well. I just called home. On our cell phones, besides the costs, there is a delay when u talk and I feel like my mother in law can't hear me that well so having that landline to use whenever we want to is great. My mother in law is not a real "I love you" person. She is a tough 5'1" Hispanic spitfire that shows her tough, aggressive, protective mama bear side most of the time- (unless she is with her grandchildren especially our new little guy) but when I called her and let her know her youngest child was out of surgery and perfectly fine- I could hear the relief in her voice and she cried she was so happy. She knew how important this was to my wife and as much as she wanted to fight her on coming down here, she supported her.
Off to the next milestone! sleep and walk. Sleep and walk. And walk some more! Hopefully no nausea. Tomorrow brings more walking, a leak test, and then some fluids!!

I am amazed at how well she is doing! And it is amazing to me how all of these patients are like their own family. I can say if you were in a position and had to come alone- it's actually ok. We have never met the people that are here now as patients. My wife had talked to some online. But that's it. And I feel like when we leave, we will be leaving our friends! It's weird. A couple people here are with people they know- their is a mother/daughter team and a niece/aunt team. All were sleeved. Our group (the 5 from our hotel) were split between 3 floors. One of ours is on the 2nd floor by herself. They will move her up to the third floor with all of us tomorrow I guess. The rest of our group is upstairs and we are with the group that got sleeved yesterday so getting their first hand experience is great. I love that we see them walking their laps and they stop and say hi and check on you and then when we are up walking we do the same. The one from yesterday's group that had real bad nausea is much betters now. There have been some people that were VERY sleepy afterwards and slept for quite a while and then there were some like my wife, that were wide away and ready to walk after. Some had nausea and some had none. Some have gas pressure/pain and some had none. So overall it really just varies it seems like.
Just be prepared to walk walk walk!
Update on the roommate thing.... It's not too bad. They finally brought me a bed (usually the support person sleeps in the other hospital bed in the room. On our lucky day they overbooked so we have a roommate). It's a recliner but its better then nothing. They did have the roommates husband go to the hotel for the night but he seemed perfectly fine with it. She had a different dr and Melissa- our coordinator fought for me to stay here and won she said. Sorry/ there's no way I'm going back to the hotel! Like I said- he seemed ok with it and I promised him I would make her walk.
Tips- nothing new other then don't plan on sleeping a lot as the support person. For one- I don't think the nurses stop or hospital quiet down really and two- everyone is up walking a lot I thought we would get all this sleep.... Not the case! But oh well! It's worth it!

It went really well. My wife was having a hard time sleeping comfortably so we asked for some medicine. They have her a very small amount of liquid to drink. No idea what it was. It was gross and made her nauseas. They said it was because she still has gas in her new little tummy so it was normal. She burped had some nausea medicine thru the iv and was sound asleep within minutes. She slept for a couple hours and then would have to pee.... That's how she is normally after surgery- she doesn't sleep and pees a lot. So every 2 hours we got up, peed, and walked. We got our roommate up and she walked with us too.
My wife feels great today. Showered, dressing change, clean clothes, Etc. she is walking a lot which is really helping too.
Support person note- I finally found a meal I really liked. Breakfast in the cafe downstairs is really good. Fresh fruit, fresh made omelette, potatoes and toast. It was really good. All for like $6 US. It was good. The nurses last night were just as good as the day and evening shift. They let you get some sleep too.... Lights turned down in halls and they were very quiet. My wife had an issue with her iv and they fixed it while She slept. They are having us move rooms which is no big deal at all... Right across the hall and now I will have a bed instead of a recliner thing and our roommates husband can stay the night tonight.
When you are here there is a nurse. Her name is Sam. She is great. She will be having the surgery herself at the end of the month so if you are coming then you will miss her. But otherwise- she is a day shift nurse with light colored hair. She is awesome. We all love her.
That's it for now. We did the first leak test and it went fine. My wife said it was gross but not that big of deal. You drink a small cup of contrast mixed with Water. She will be starting her trio of liquids in a couple hours- tea, Gatorade, and apple juice.< /p>

I am a supportive spouse and will be traveling with my wife who is being sleeved April 2 by Dr.Garcia at Mi hospital. We arrive Monday the 1st. I plan to document our journey with photos and information as we go! This is a very exciting time for my wife and our family. Such a life changing event. I am very proud of my wife for having the courage to do this as well as doing so much research to reassure me. I have to admit that I was quite skeptical about it when she first came to me but after all the research she has done, and after learning more- I am very excited for her. And support her 100%. We went through a very tough process with our damn insurance and after all the work, hoops we jumped through, time, and frustration she decided to look into Mexico and off we go in about 10 days. Currently we are in the preop diet. I say we because of a couple reasons- one- she is not doing this alone. I plan to be with her every step of the way and go through it with her. While I am not being sleeved- i know part of her success depends on me and my support. And two- I can stand to lose a few pounds myself. I just had our second baby (yes I am a girl as well) and would like to lose 40-50 pounds myself so what better way then to
Diet right along with her! So as I said... Research- done. Arrangements and flights- done. Protein Shakes, Vitamins, and all the other little things we need- done. Pre op diet- working on it! She only needed to do 7 days but decided to get a jump on things so started at 14 days.
I am hoping to either find more "support persons" out there or at least as I document my wife's journey- you can share it with your support person! I had many questions that we have found answers to and some we haven't. I guess we will get those answers along the way!

We have arrived! The pick up was very smooth... Called Samuel when we were by baggage claim and he was there within minutes! Pulled right up and picked us up! Off we go to cross the border!