cerenatee

Kburn! It's me, the Black female with the dreadlocks. LOL. The one you've been hanging with. Glad to see you're on VST. I was suppose to have my surgery on the 8th but I changed it to the 9th. I'm about to take a nap, if this horrible drain will allow it. I can't wait for the doc to come and take this freaking thing out.

Hi ya'll! I'm back and I'm sleeved. It happened Thursday and I'm alive to tell the tale. It was rough for a long minute there - vomiting, pain, exhaustion - but I made it through. Friday was loads better and Saturday was ok also. Sunday, today, has been rough. I'm tired and this freaking drain hurts. I don't know if it's infected or not but it hurts to move around, even a little. The doctor is coming by tonight to remove it so we'll see. I don't have a ton of time but I wanted to let ya'll know I'm ok. I'm about to head off to take a nap. I'll update some more later. Hugs everybody and thanks for all the well wishes and prayers.

At Costco's. I think it's on the spice aisle.

EDITED TO FOCUS ON ME AND MINE I couldn't do my doctor's 2 week diet and I plan to be just fine on the sleeve. I think the point you're missing is if I could follow a diet, I wouldn't need the sleeve. When I get the sleeve, I will be physically restricted from over eating. I will also be less hungry since 65% of my ghrelin should be removed. I will also be fuller quicker. I had none of that going for me on the 2 week low-carb, high Protein diet my doctor wanted me to follow.

If I'm remembering correctly, my hubby spotted the spice aisle, put 2 and 2 together, and that's where the bouillon bases were. Without him, I would have walked right by them. costco confuses the crap out of me. A Lighter Me asks that their clients do a 2 week low carb diet - 2 or 3 Protein shakes a day and 1 meal of salad and meat. Then 3 days before surgery you do a clear liquid diet. The 2 week diet did not happen. I tried it. I couldn't do it. I moved on. I'm sticking to the 3 day liquid diet because it's the most important one to me. I need my body cleaned out and it'll give my liver a chance to shrink if my liver needs to shrink. My bmi is 38.9 so hopefully a big liver will not be an issue. If it is, it just is. If I could stick to a low carb diet for 2 weeks, I wouldn't need the surgery.

My surgery is Thursday so I started my 3 day clear liquid diet today. It started out ok. When I woke up, I drunk the bottled laxative and had a bottle of Water. A couple of hours later I had a SF strawberry-orange Jello cup. A few hours after that I had a SF pineapple popsicle. That's when all heck broke lose in my head. I normally eat around 12:30 pm or around 5:30 pm. At 5:30 pm, a popsicle was not cutting it. I was thinking of Chili's or S&S Cafeteria but looking at jello and tea. The hungrier I got, the madder I got. Then I thought about all the people whose doctors don't even require them to do a pre-op diet and I really got mad. Suffering for the sake of suffering does not go over well with me. Thank GOD, I remembered I bought some chicken bouillon at Costco's. I bought the organic Better than Bouillon chicken base and beef base. I didn't think chicken broth would help but I went and heated up some water anyway. Ya'll, it was awesome. The sun came out, birds started singing, and rainbows filled the sky. It was clear, it was hot, and it was DELICIOUS! The label states it has chicken meat and broth so maybe that's why it's so good. Whatever the reason, thanks to the geniuses at Superior Touch, I just might make it 72 hours to have my surgery on Thursday. So I'm spreading the word - BUY ORGANIC BETTER THAN BOUILLON CHICKEN BASE! I know there are a lot of cooks on here but I'm not one. I don't cook. I haven't used my stove in years. I mainly use the kitchen for the refrigerator - my sodas and leftovers are in there. I also use the glasses if I buy a 2 liter soda. So for me, even heating up water to dissolve chicken base is a big deal. It's out of my comfort zone. But I did it. I'm making tiny changes and they're sticking. I'm going to have another cup of broth in an hour and after that another popsicle. After that it'll be my bed time and I'll have one day down.

It's sucked. I was just about to do a post on it. Thank GOD for organic better than bouillon chicken base from Costco. It's been a God send. I know I couldn't have done it without that broth.

I'll keep you updated on the good, the bad, and the ugly. Please pray for me if you remember and you get a chance.

Luckily, it all got worked out and I'm leaving her Wednesday for surgery on Thursday. Lord help me.

So I spoke to Ronda, with A Lighter Me, and changed my surgery date to May 9th. I wanted the 8th so I wouldn't miss the first day of summer school but I decided I'm not doing summer school this semester. I need a freaking break. Thankfully, it worked out well since Dr. Lopez has too many surgeries scheduled for the 8th. I think he's at 5, when he usually does 2 or 3. On the 9th he only has mine and one other person's scheduled so I feel better about it. But OMG, the fight with United to change my reservations. Generally you pay the change fee and the price difference and it's no big deal. Well the customer service rep ran my card, but the United system didn't update, so she tried to update it again, which ran my card again. The second time, she got a decline, because I'm broke. I had enough in there for one change fee and that's all. What followed was the most frustrating sequence of events, that took freaking hours, and finally had me contacting the complaint department, their facebook page, and the VP head of customer service. As a disabled veteran, I was not freaking playing. You can't put a hold on someone's money and then blame them for not having more money. Thankfully, a complaint rep called me back a few hours later and fixed everything. So I'm now a May 9th patient. I drink my laxative and start my 3 day liquid diet in the morning. Any May 9th people in the house?

Yipee!! Someone else that's a vet. The coordinator isn't being discouraging about the surgery, she's over the bariatric program and gung ho for the surgery. She just wants me to have it through the VA and not in Mexico, which I can understand. She's done no research about my doctor, about the facility, or about others who have had the procedure there. The only experience my the VA bariatric surgeon has with Mexican surgeons is correcting their complications so he's really not thrilled about people having the procedure there. Which is again understandable. He never sees all the people who are fine. He only sees the ones that have complications. And he forgets that every surgeon has complications. I spoke to the coordinator again today and she's still trying to convince me not to go. She wants me to do the move program, lost 5% of my weight, then have my PCP refer me to the coordinating surgeon in Columbia, then have that surgeon refer me to Charleston, where the surgery is performed. So after I lose 13 lbs in 6 months, not more cause if I drop below a bmi of 35, they won't do the surgery, I have to convince my PCP to refer me, then she has to convince the Columbia surgeon to refer me. Then, if all that is a go, I have to pass the psych eval when I have drug abuse, alcohol abuse, and sexual abuse in my past. That's just going to be lovely. So that's 3 opportunities to be denied the surgery after waiting 6 months to have it, plus another month or two for them to act on my request. OR I can just have my surgery this Wednesday coming and not jump through any hoops. It's a hard choice, believe it or not. A part of me does want to have a program that follows me, and a doctor to call when I'm worried, and it would be awesome to save my money. $4500 isn't much but I really appreciate having it sitting in my savings account, just collecting interest and giving me peace of mind. Of course, I would normally spend 3/4th of that in 6 months eating out but there's something about dribbling the money away that feels ok when spending it all in one big chunk seems crazy. I don't know. I look at what I was and what I am and to think of postponing my surgery for 8 months just to be told no? I don't know if I would be ok. Here's a current pic of me (I'm the girl with the crazy big breasts): Here's a pic of me in 2005 with my sons and my mom. I'm in the rust-colored dress: I went from a average size woman to a severely obese woman in 8 years, mostly due to medication that's still affecting me. That's crazy to me. I don't want to live like this another year.

I hate saying "studies have shown." If you google "bariatric surgery sexual abuse" or "bariatric surgery drug addiction" or "bariatric surgery alcohol adidiction" you'll get links to research study abstracts that go into detail the latest findings.

Oh, the math and thinking questions test your reasoning and cognitive ability. Can you really understand and follow what's going on around you. It might sound crazy but some people struggle to follow an entire conversation. The tests just show are you in your right mind logically.

LOL. Believe it or not, that sounds like a normal psych eval. (Yes, I've had more than one). Many people who were addicted to drugs and/or alcohol, transfer their addiction to food. So when you take away the food, they go back to alcohol and drugs or shopping, sex, exercise, even eating disorders. It can get crazy. He was just trying to determine if that was a risk for you and something you need to watch out for. In addition, study after study has shown that a large percentage of WLS patients have been abused, especially sexually, men and women. They don't talk about it, they don't think about it, they eat. Again, you take away the food, you take away the coping mechanism. That's a problem. Studies have shown that people that have been sexually abused lose significantly less weight with WLS than people who haven't been abused. It shouldn't disqualify you but it's something he should point out to you so you can be aware of it and address it if you see it popping up in your life. If you're open, you're honest, and you're willing to address any issues that may pop up, you're going to be fine.