springclark

I decided to head out to find a new and different way of getting my protein. I stopped by GNC, they are having a big sale until June 22 with buy one get one half off on everything. I got myself a little blender bottle and some Amplified Wheybolic. I ended up getting the fruit punch flavored, though the guy helping me said that the vanilla with orange juice is a good way to go as well. Now to only find orange juice that won't have a high sugar content eh?
 
Tastes very good and is a welcome change from my chocolate-flavored protein. There's also a return policy so that if you don't like the taste of anything you buy there you can return it. I'm a happy customer!

Just a quick blog post while I have this on my mind.
 
I need to drink more water. My goal today is to drink all the water I need to when I am supposed to. I have 12 oz down so far this morning.
 
I woke up a few times last night to use the restroom and to re-up my pain pills, but then I went right back to sleep. I got out of bed at 8:30 and started drinking water. One of the things I've been religious about is taking a shower. I feel so much better after my showers. Completely energized.
 
What do I plan on doing today? I think first thing is I'm going to get out and do some walking this morning. I will try to get three sessions of walking in today.
 
My mobility is a lot better today. I sat up out of bed without my stomach muscles screaming at me. And I had to pick up a towel off of the floor this morning without any pain. All good things!

I'm writing this entry a bit early today. It's my first full day at home. I attached a screenshot of my MyFitnessPal progress for the day. I'm using MFP to ensure I'm getting all the protein I need while staying under the sugars and fats for the day.
 
I didn't sleep well at all last night. I'm hoping that the sleep gets better. I was able to get a few hours of sleep in from 2 to 5 am this morning before I finally got up. I didn't end up following the food schedule I wanted to today. Mainly because my sleep was all messed up. I'll try again tomorrow. I took all the meds and my multi-vitamin I was supposed to take and had a BM finally. I was worried about not having one. I had a little bit of help though, because I took a suppository.
 
One of the food suggestions during this phase for me is cream of wheat with a scoop of protein powder. I use chocolate light muscle milk to mix in and it tastes so good! My worry is that I don't have the ability to feel full yet so I'm eating it very slowly. Cream of wheat changes its texture very quickly to hard and dry once it's out too long. So I got two good bites in before it got hard and I couldn't eat anymore. Anyone with any suggestions would be nice. It's one only thicker consistency things I can eat right now and the taste is so lovely.
 
For dinner I decided to try some fat-free yogurt with the unflavored Unjury protein powder. I found is that once I mix the powder in to the yogurt, the yogurt is a little too watery. Probably the temperature causing that. And though it says it's unflavored, I could still taste there was something different about the yogurt. It's sort of the same reason I don't do those unflavored mix ins for fiber or drink miralax in water. I can always taste the change and it makes me not want to finish whatever it is I'm eating.
 
I decided to try out one of the trazodones that I had left over from last year when I stopped taking them to see if I could sleep this afternoon. I took a 50 mg tablet and it worked almost instantly. I slept for a little over 3.5 hours. Waking back up felt so nice.
 
My best friend made dinner for the family today. Spaghetti with italian sausage and some garlic bread. I snuck a small bit of the garlic bread and immediately felt icky. I chewed it up until the point where there was hardly anything in my mouth and swallowed. Then for about 10 minutes I felt like it was lodged inside my esophagus. That was a stupid move, one I won't make again.
 
I had 76 grams of protein today from the small amount of muscle milk I had in my cream of wheat, premium protein chocolate shakes - I had two to make up for not eating much at breakfast, and the unjury protein packet for dinner with my yogurt.
 
I'm getting tired of the current set of meal choices. I'll have to change some things up tomorrow to keep things interesting.
 
My mood today started on the sad side. But after waking up from my nap this afternoon I felt a little better. I need to get a little bit of walking in tonight before it gets much darker. I weighed myself and I'm close to losing all of the water weight gain from my time in the hospital. I peed so frequently yesterday that I dropped 6 pounds from morning until about 5pm. By tomorrow morning I should be back to my weight I was at before going into surgery.

So here's my first blog post on the site. I just had my surgery on Friday, May 24, 2013 at OHSU in Portland, Oregon. The surgeon told my boyfriend, Will, that the surgery was textbook, and everything went very well. I woke up with a foley catheter and no drains, which I was very happy about. My pain has been manageable as long as I take my pain meds on a regular basis. I'm on liquid Tylenol and oxycodone for my pain. I was lucky in that my surgeon was able to call in a prescription for the tylenol to my local pharmacy so that I didn't have to buy a bunch of the smaller bottles over the counter.
 
A little background on what I went through leading up to surgery. I made the decision to get WLS in November 2013 after a second endoscopy showed that while my ulcers in my stomach and esophagus were healing, I had a hiatal hernia and needed surgery to fix it. Oh and I needed to lose weight, which would help with the acid reflux. I was at the point where I would wake up in the middle of the night choking on stomach acid that I was aspirating into my lungs. By December I was at OHSU going through their WLS orientation. It didn't take long for me to get all the testing done. I needed a pap and a parathyroid hormone test, and I had already had all the other tests completed in the last 3 months, my PCP just needed to send over the results to OHSU. I also completed a psych review.
 
One of the requirements from my insurance company before they would approve surgery is that I needed 3 consecutive months of visits to a dietician. I was travelling for work and ended up missing out on my February appointment and had to start over in March, April and May. My last appointment was on May 1st which is when OHSU submitted for approval. We heard back on the approval in a week and I was scheduled for surgery for May 24th. I think my journey from when I made the decision to have the surgery to my surgery date was a relatively short period of time with few hassles.
 
I had to make a lot of changes in a short amount of time including quitting smoking, soft drinks, and becoming more mindful of what I ate. I think the hardest thing for me was to slow down my eating. I am used to quickly eating and moving on to something else. I didn't like the idea of chewing for long periods of time and really didn't enjoy what the texture of food in my mouth after chewing it for a long time.
 
I have two kids, Brieanna is 15 -- she turns 16 in another month and Sylar, who is 11. I was lucky to have my children when I did because right after I had Sylar in 2001, I went menopausal.
 
Brie is a typical teenage girl who has ups and downs almost hourly. It's a roller coaster ride with her at times. She's finally figured out that her grades in high school are very important and has turned herself around academically. Sylar is very different from her sister, but just as smart and enjoys being athletic. I'm sure I'll mention the girls a lot if I continue blogging.
 
Let's see, I also have two cats. Mr. Mushy face is a lynx point himi and Zim is a black domestic short hair. I love my cats so much. I never thought of myself as a cat person yet four years ago my best friend suggested that I get a cat as a pet since I live in an apartment. I got both cats at the same time and they were such a welcome addition to my family.
 
I have a boyfriend, Will. We've been dating for a little over a year. We've had a lot of drama since we started dating. Brie really doesn't like the fact that I am dating again. I chose to stop dating in 2008 and focus on my children. Before that I was in serial relationships from the time I was a teenager. It was a good period of time for my family. Just me and the girls. When I decided to start dating again after 4 years of being single, Brie took it very hard. Every day we still are having to work through her passive aggressive tendencies with regards to Will. Though she's improved greatly over the year we've been dating. I'm just taking it one day at a time right now with the relationship. I don't know if it will last, but I'm going to give it my all while I have the chance.
 
I got home from the hospital around 11 am yesterday morning. I was really looking forward to being able to sleep through the night in my own bed. Yet here I am writing my first blog entry. Since it's Memorial Day weekend, I'm going to have to wait until Tuesday to call my PCP and get a follow-up appointment made for after the surgery. If I'm still having trouble sleeping, I'll bring it up with my PCP.
 
My anxiety level has dropped significantly since the surgery. Most of the things I was worried about were the unknown aspects of the surgery. What was my pain level going to be? Would I be able to tolerate anything in my pouch after the surgery? What about drains? Luckily I didn't have any drains when I woke up and I'm tolerating everything I've tried so far. I haven't had any nausea to date. Though I did get a little spell of it after I had some liquid colace (a stool softener) at the hospital. The surgeon was quick to change out the stool softener to senna after that.
 
I'm going to give blogging a try for a bit to see if it helps me organize my thoughts for the day in addition to chronicling my post-op experiences.

A few days ago my stomach started itching. Then, my legs, back and hips. Last night I looked down at my hips and noticed a rash that spread from my upper legs, up my thighs and onto my back. None on my stomach yet but it's still itching like crazy. I immediately went to the internet and found that docs at times attribute it to the pain meds.
 
I contacted the on call docs at the hospital where I had my surgery and explained the situation. The doc who helped me said the same thing, take some benadryl and then she suggested taking tylenol or advil for the pain to supplement if I don't want to take my prescription pain meds. I reminded her that as a gastric bypass patient I am not to take ibuprofen at all anymore (this leads to ulcers and the last thing I want is another ulcer in my stomach).
 
So last night I took my benedryl and passed out. This morning I got up super early and as I was sitting at my desk reading through the news and chatting with a friend when I remembered that I had this same reaction before. Now I never get rashes, mind you, so when I do get them it is a memorable occurrence. The last time I had a rash it started out very weird. I would scratch somewhere and overnight I would develop an itchy, highly-painful rash there. It began to spread wherever I itched until it was all over my body and hurt so much I finally called the doctor. By then then the rash had taken over some large areas of my body and it hurt to even touch the skin. Even my chin and my neck were covered and in pain.
 
The culprit? The cheap-ass multivitamins I bought at the store (Womens 1 a day) and started taking. The doc thought that I had been into some poison of some sort because the look of my skin screamed poison. He gave me a shot of something and sent me on my way. The rash started to clear up and I stopped taking those stupid vitamins.
 
Fast forward to a week ago when I started taking these Flintstones vitamins. I bought them because the surgical team insisted that I need the iron. As far as I can tell, unless I have an iron deficiency I won't need the iron. I have been postmenopausal for over 10 years now. I'm going back to use my chewable gummy multivitamins that I first bought for the surgery for now and my appointment with my PCP is on Wednesday. I am already putting together a list of questions that I want to ask. The cool part is that my PCP did her residency at the hospital where I had my surgery done in the bariatric patient ward. So she is very familiar with my individual needs. Additionally, the office that I visit is focused on naturopathic care, augmenting with medical treatment when necessary.
 
Up to the surgery I was taking the vitamins bought at my Dr's office (Equi Fem). I could buy them anywhere, I just chose to get them at the office for convenience. And boy were they good vitamins. No limit to my energy and they made me feel good all over. I could really tell when I didn't take my vitamins. Problem is, I believe I need a chewable vitamin now, which means I probably won't be able to take my old vitamins. So now I just need to know what to do. Can I take the chewy multivitamins without iron and be fine or is there another option that will give me back the energy that I am missing without taking my old vitamins?
 
Also on the evolving list of things to discuss with my PCP include when would be the best time to take my cholesterol, insulin, and hormone level tests again. I'm not diabetic, but I am insulin resistant and I'd like to see if there's some progress made on that since last time my labs were ran.

Hey, Everyone want to hear a "Joke"? What the hell is wrong with people. Seems we can't win for loosing. Based on a true story. I was told a "Joke" involving a gastric bypass surgery patient that was successful in loosing weight. Now let me remind people that I myself have also hade gastric bypass and the person telling the joke knew this.....So I hear the crude "Joke" and I have been told I have a great sense of humor a time or too. And can indeed if you will take a "Joke". This "joke was not funny to me in any way shape or form. I will not repeat this so called "joke" but what I will say is this.... Some people are ignorant and hurt full that is just the way it is. Later I imagine the same joke being told about myself they just need to change two names and this crude joke would be told on anyone that has had WLS. And it is sad. The point I am trying to make is this. Be yourself and if you are just a little over weight or morbidly obese like I once was. Make the change for yourself not what other people think or say. Because in the end you can not stop people from being hurtful to one another. . If you think the dirty looks or crude "jokes" about your weight will stop once you are at a "health" weight it will not. Some people will just find other faults to judge others by and be hurtful. That is just the way it goes But what you can do is distance yourself from those people. Has anyone else run into situations like this? If so how did you handle it?

Well here it is... My very 1st blog ever! Over the last 10 months I have been obsessed with reading blogs and watching the YouTube videos of other's as they go through their gastric bypass journey's. I have been looking forward to the day when I could make my own video and have my own before and after photos. Finally the day is almost here for me! I am having a gastric bypass on June 5, 2013. I am both excited and scared. The surgery in itself is not what bothers me, I work in surgery and see wonderful outcomes every day... what I am afraid of most is my LOVE for chocolate. I have done very well on my 2 week pre op liquid diet, I have lost 17 lbs, and have been working very hard mentally to keep myself from having one last reese's peanut butter cup! It's funny all of this time I've been thinking I would be fine, because I'm not a BIG eater. What I am finding out though is that I am and have always been overweight because I'm a BAD eater. I had a chocolate addiction. All that I can do at this point is keep marching forward and hope that I am one of those that gets dumping syndrome!

Hello Everyone! I'm very happy to report that I finally received my approval from insurance and have a surgery date...yea!! June 19th, 2013 for roux en y gastric bypass is the big day for me. This has been a long time coming as I started this process back in November of 2012. I won't bore you with the lengthy details that prolonged my getting to this point, however I will say that my general anxiety disorder was a concern that needed to be addressed before they would proceed with me. I'd like to say that I'm just naturally an intense and nervous nelly, however the psychiatrist opened my eyes to some things I didn't know about myself. Though I was not happy about not getting approved right away, the counseling was the best thing I could've done. As you can imagine, I'm both scared and happy! For all those that have gone before me, if you have any suggestions or advice I'd love to hear it. Feel free to comment, post , or just smile at me for that matter. Thanks for taking the time to read this. Take care! Kelly

6 days out of surgery & I am feeling better. I have an occasional tweak of what I'm assuming is gas pain & I don't have the endurance back yet but I am definitely feeling better. I've been up & out: grocery store, Farmer's Market, etc. Strangely enough, even though I'm still on liquids, everyone else in the house still needs to eat That first day home was really bad until my Dr prescribed an antinausea med for me. One tab & I felt so much better. I was able to get liquids down & feel better. Now I'm getting at least 2 shakes a day down & quite a bit of other liquid. Probably not the 80 ounces I'm supposed to but I'm getting there. I've had a couple of bites of motzerella cheese & some hummus. Felt good to taste something other than shakes & crystal light

Had my surgery on Monday 4/15/13. The whole day is a anesthesia induced blur. I don't remember leaving post-op. I woke up in the recovery room & was basically in & out of it the entire day. No pain but then I was barely conscious. My hospital stay was not so great. How are you supposed to sleep when people keep coming in all the time!? I know they need to check on patients, but damn. I did my walking but I had a lot of trouble with my breathing. I finally used the incentive spirometer and it got better within a day. I almost didn't get to go home yesterday because of a temperature. It was 100.4 at the highest. I dropped down a little but I was told I wouldn't get to go home until my temp was under 99.5. Well, I hated being in the hospital. I've rarely been so bored. So maybe I didn't put the thermometer under my tongue the next couple of times they took my temp. Just maybe.... Today is my first day home all day & I'm in more pain & have more nausea than I've had so far. I'm having a hard time getting liquids down. Even water tastes bad to me right now. Gotta say, I'm not thinking this surgery was such a good choice. I've never had a "real" surgery before so I didn't know what to expect but this sucks.

By this time tomorrow I should be out of surgery or darn close to it. I'm scared senseless & hoping the clock goes slowly today. I know the surgery is fairly safe & my dr has a good record but I'm still mostly scared about the surgery itself. I'm sure I'll have issues following surgery but I'm not worrying about those right now. I'll have to deal with them because there's no other choice. I just want to make sure I see my babies grow up.

3 and a half weeks post op & I feel so good it's hard to believe how crappy I felt. I fit into pants that were too snug before surgery, too! I am able to eat almost anything without trouble - have not tried breads, etc yet because it's on my "no-no" list. That's okay - don't need it I even had a few sips of iced coffee today - 5 days early because I'm such a rebel - lol! I've eaten out a few times, too & managed to find good choices that didn't bother me. Oh and the best find: no sugar added Klondike bars!!!! OMG!!! Thanks to my mom for buying them for me!! Only 3 grams of sugar & they taste fabulous!! I hope everyone is feeling as good as I am

I am currently 6 days out of surgery-weight loss is over 10lbs. I feel absolutely wonderful! No real pain from surgery. Finally got a good nights sleep last night as I could finally get totally comfortable. I am super happy I decided to do this. Not only for heath reasons but for myself in general!

hi
this is my first blog ever i had the Gastric Bypass on the 17th of April, everything went great was up walking that night only spent 3 days total in the hospital im off liquid diet and im on soft foods im down 35lb. and thats really good i never lost weight like this befor and i have not had to take any of my meds i was taking befor surgery
my open cut is doing good and the only thing and i dont know if any one else has this but when i drink something that is to cold my stomach has like a spasum for just 30 sec are less. My husband and close family members say they can see that i have lost weight but i cant tell yet this is a hard road to go down i new it wasn't gonna be easy but i had to make a life change so i would be here for my husband and kids thank you all for reading this it helps to know im not the only one going thrue this

Done my first ever 5K Run/Walk today in Johns Creek, GA. Rained the whole time and the temp was pretty cool. But it was a lot of fun and I didn't even think on the wet and cool weather. Think it was better than if it had been one of the 100 degree days we sometimes get.
Also had a friend in the 5K that had gastric bypass surgery just 2-3 days ago and she also finished. She did real well through the whole 5K.
Kinda look forward to doing another one sometime, maybe soon. :-)

 

About me and where I'm at in my journey to getting healthy...
 
My Story… Born and grew up in NC. Now living in GA. I used to be a long haul truck driver seeing the USA through the windshield until a wreak that screwed up my left knee and back which put a stop to that job in 1992 making me walk with a cane today. After that, I had a life of not working and spending a lot of time on my rear end doing not much of anything but letting my body go to waste. But who sees that coming when one has not much of a purpose in life anymore. Mind and body pretty much went down hill.
Then around 2007 I had neck surgery on my cervical spine where they fused 3 disc together. Shortly after that I started feeling run down all the time, just no energy to doing anything and feeling bad most every day along with stinging and feeling of pins sticking me in my fingers and toes. Went to get checked out and found out I am a diabetic, have an inactive thyroid, have neuropathy that effects the nerves in my fingers, legs and feet and I now take 5 pills a day so I can walk, ride bike or just simply keep my balance. Doctor said I have been a diabetic for at least 25-30 years. With visit to doctor, I learned that I weighed 383 pounds. I couldn’t believe I had gained that much weight. So I decided enough was enough and I joined a gym and have loved going. Changed the foods I’m eating and in 13 months, I lost 96 pounds. Shortly after losing 96 pounds, I learned I have cirrhosis of the liver, spleen and some other stuff going on. Doctor said it come from being a diabetic and being over weight for so many years. But it’s not all bad. Doctor says not to worry about it if I get weight down and keep diabetes under control, then good chance my liver can heal itself. The good news so far is I’ve lost enough weight that I haven’t needed any diabetic meds for over a year now.
But with those problems coming up it is stopping me from losing weight, no matter what I do. I haven’t lost any weight in almost nine months. But I’m not putting on weight either. Maybe because I keep up with my working out and eating right. So now I’m working towards getting Gastric Bypass Surgery in hopes it can be the answer to saving my life. At least all my doctors seem to think surgery should help me.
 
So that’s all, no problems here and I guess that’s all there is to say about me… :-)
 
I protest!! This thing called getting back into shape is turning out to be a lot of work. Wasn’t near this hard getting out of shape!