nursnhearts

My name is Julia I am 3 weeks post op. My weight loss struggle began after the birth of my second child (now 20). Before his birth I was very active, exercised all the time I stayed healthy and trim! Within 6 months after his birth I gained 60 lbs and I still exercised my diet was the same, my exercise habits were the same and it was as if I kept hitting a brick wall. It was very frustrating to say the least so I accepted the weight gain thinking "this is the way I'm supposed to be". After about 10 years of trying every diet, and exercise known to man I found out I had hypothyroidism at first I was elated thinking getting on medication would help me get my weight back on track, boy was I ever wrong! I gained another 40 lbs after the meds til I hit a top weight of 233 with high blood pressure, sleep apnea, weight bearing joint pain due to my weight and a cholesterol of over 300. My 5.4 frame and my weight and all the co-morbidities made me realize when I read a study about people with my issues only 50% of those people lived another 15 years max! It scared me into action. I started my sleeve journey in 2011 because I had heard about the sleeve but I wasn't going to rush into anything this major. I spend countless hours on the internet researching everything I could about this procedure vs the gastric bypass! But then I started thinking since I have hypothyroidism then why would I bother since I can't get weight off. So I came across an article about hypothyroidism and sleeve surgery, seems that they ghrelin in the stomach sometimes creates a "roadblock" if you will for hypothyroid patients and when that portion of the stomach goes away that creates the hormone ghrelin it removes the roadblock. I took this to a surgeon friend I worked with and they told me that was something they were finding out and was new information. I realized at that moment when she told me this that I had hope for the first time in many years that I could actually get this excess weight off of me and get healthy, I am on the road to healthy now. So far to date I've lost 30 lbs, 14 of that was preop and 16 after surgery. Im so happy I found bariatric pal! It has helped me countless ways preop and post op. I wish and pray to all of you who are on this journey a healthy and happy new you!