sjfink

I was scheduled for my lap VSG yesterday, but when they got in, there was too much scar tissue, so they've rescheduled me to next Tuesday at the hospital instead of the outpatient surgical center. There's a 50-50 chance that I may end up needing to have open surgery instead of laproscopic. Does anyone have experience with recovery from an open VSG? I'm assuming the recovery time will be longer, but trying to get some idea of what to expect!

Things didn't work out with my surgery yesterday. I had too much scar tissue from a previous abdominal surgery so I'm rescheduled for next Tuesday at Evergreen Hospital instead of the surgical center. I have another pre-op with my surgeon on Monday, and I'm expecting him to tell me that he might need to do my surgery open instead of laparoscopically. Hoping I can find people who've had open so I can get some idea of what to expect as far as recovery. Hoping 2 weeks off will be enough, but ultimately, I'll do whatever I need to do to get through this!

Haha! Already have headphones on my list of things to take with me! How long was it from the time you arrive until you were out of surgery? Trying to get some idea so I can let my support person know what to expect.

pudding and a shower… it's the little things! My pre-op is going great so far. Down 8 lbs since last Tursday. I had forgotten that the best part of being really low-carb, at least for me, is that I rarely feel hungry. More often than not for the last few days, I find myself eating because it's 4pm & I haven't eaten anything since Breakfast than because I'm actually hungry!! Did you stay overnight at PSB? How was that?

Six months supervised weight loss 1/3-7/2/15. Initial surgeon & NUT appt 7/13. Psych evaluation 7/16. Final approval from insurance 7/21. Surgery scheduled for 9/8. Could've had an earlier date, but waiting worked better for my schedule.

Another September 8th here! Start my 2 week pre-op low carb diet on Tuesday!

It is funny how different every program seems to be! The headache might be from caffeine withdrawal. Either way (carbs or caffeine), the headache should go away in a day or 2! I've been low carb off and on for years, so I'm glad that's our program!

I have my pre-op with Dr K & NUT this Thursday & start low carb officially next Tuesday (8/25). Are they having you do any liquid only pre-op or just the low carb?

I'm September 8th, too… 4 weeks from today!!

I live alone & have plans for a friend to stay with me for the first couple of days after surgery. I also have cats, and I'm wondering about having to bend over to feed them & clean their litter box. At what point is that kind of simple bending ok/not too painful? Just trying to make sure I've got my bases covered as far as help I might need. Surgery is one month from today!!

I'm in Seattle & my insurance required that I go to a center of excellence. I decided on Puget Sound Bariatrics with Dr. Kaufman because he performed emergency surgery (totally unrelated to WLS) on me a few years ago and saved my life. It seemed like the obvious choice when looking for a surgeon to give me my life back! Scheduled for September 8th!

I live in Seattle and my surgery is in Edmonds at Puget Sound Bariatrics. I was starting to get jealous of all of the Houston people in the group… nice to have a neighbor!

Welcome magicalwoman! Fellow Washington state employee here… Regence UMP has been great for me. My surgery is scheduled for 9/8. Where in WA are you/where are you having your surgery?

I had my surgical consult and first NUT visit on 7/13, psych eval on 7/16, and hoping to have final insurance approval so we can set a date in the next week or so (I hear that by this point in the process, my insurance is pretty quick to approve). Tomorrow is a fitness assessment, which I'm doing by phone... kind of odd, but I guess we're just going to talk about my prior workout experience and what I'm doing now. I still need to go in for a chest x-ray and baseline labs, which I'm planning to do some time this week. Things seem to be going smoothly, so hopefully it'll stay that way and I'll be able to get the surgery date that I want... 9/8/15! Now for the questions! I live alone and will be staying one night post-surgery at the surgical center. I've got lots of friends and family that live nearby (many within 3 blocks), but I'm wondering if I should be planning to have someone stay with me for a couple of days or if it will be enough to just have people checking in. I'm not so worried about during the day, more about the first night or two. Anybody do this while living alone? Is anyone else planning for an early or mid September surgery date? It's great reading about people who are a bit ahead, but hoping to find friends going through this together! And if anyone has any experience with Puget Sound Bariatrics, I'd love to hear about your experience!

Thanks for the input. I got my surgery date, September 8th! Of course, my sister's in-laws are coming to visit from England on 9/9, so my original plan to stay with her have changed. I've got a friend to stay with me my first night or two at home and another friend keeping tabs on me during the day. I think I'll be ok!

In my 6 months of medically supervised weight loss, I managed to lose 6 lbs. But somehow, in the 3 weeks since my 6 month appointment I've managed to lose 7 lbs. I haven't actively been doing anything different, but apparently, being able to focus 100% on just getting healthy is a way more successful approach than focusing on trying to lose (or even just not gain) weight! I still have work to do in getting myself going in the exercise department, but I'm feeling really good about my relationship with food these days!

OMG! I tried posting from my phone twice and the app crashed. Then I tried from my laptop, and the stupid thing gave me the blue screen of death!! Stupid technology! Aside from technology issues, I'm feeling pretty fortunate! This whole process has been so smooth for me,I feel like the universe is telling me that I really am ready and doing the right thing with my decision to get sleeved. My insurance confirmed that they had everything they need now, so I should have my final official approval sometime in the next week or so. Then I have my pre-op appt with Dr. Kaufman for all of my last minute questions, and an appointment with the nutritionist to get all of the details of the pre-op and immediately post-op diets, both scheduled for August 20th. Then I'm going out to the Washington coast for a few days with some friends, and back home to start my 2 week pre-op diet... and then surgery!! I know they require the 2 weeks of low carb, but I guess I'll find out if there will be any liquid diet at my appt next month. The low carb part will be easy since that's pretty much how I already eat. The biggest difference is that I'll definitely be tracking all of my food (though I may start doing that sooner, just to get back in the habit). I've been trying to pay more attention to how I'm eating and working on taking smaller bites and chewing a lot more... not as easy as it sounds! I'm still struggling with getting exercise in, but I'm determined to at least get up to 30 minutes at least 4 days a week before surgery. I'm just so excited to be on the other side and starting my new life!!!

Keep doing what you're doing, Perk... and you'll keep feeling better! I've tried logging in and out of FB from y computer, searching for the group and even tried the email link again, and nothing is working. I did find a couple of other groups for sleevers that look interesting, so I joined those. I'll keep you posted!

Thanks for all of your kind words and support! I'm sitting at the lab waiting for them to take my blood, but I'll try logging in and out of FB when I get home to my laptop & hopefully that'll let me see the group! And Perk, you asked about leaving a comment on my blog. I think the link is at the top of the post (at least that's where it is when I look from my phone). Wow… after I'm done with labs, my next step is pre-op appointments on 8/20!!

Thanks for sending the link to the FB group! I joined, but it's not showing up in my groups list. Any ideas?? And if anyone is interested, I just started a blog at https://sarahssleevedlife.wordpress.com/ So far, there's only one post... pretty much my whole story! Feel free to check it out if you're interested. Does anyone else have blog or any VSG blogs that they follow?

I just got off the phone with the surgeon's office… I'm officially on the schedule for September 8th!!! And I've also put in my leave request at work and scheduled my pre-op visit with the surgeon & nutritionist for August 20th. I'll get more details then, but at my initial visit they told me that they do a 2 week pre-op low carb diet. I can't believe this is really happening! I'm so excited!!

I'm so excited to find this thread! Just read all of the posts to date… here's my story. I started researching this surgery 15 years ago, but insurance wouldn't cover it back then. Flash forward to new job & insurance that does cover the sleeve! I was required to do 6 months of supervised weight loss before I could get the insurance referral. Had my 6 month visit with my PCP on 7/2 (lost 6 lbs in 6 months), & got my initial referral on 7/3. I quit smoking on 7/12, had my consult with the surgeon & first NUT visit on 7/13 & psych evaluation on 7/16. So everything is done that needs to be done for them to submit for final approval, which they were going to do by tomorrow. I'm hoping for a 9/8 surgery date! I still need to go have labs done & a chest x-ray, so planning to do those this week. And once we set the date, I'll schedule another appt with the surgeon & NUT & metabolic/body composition testing… and that's it! I'm really glad I quit smoking when I did, because I have to be 8 weeks smoke free before surgery… and I'll be 8 weeks on 9/6! I'm probably going to be out of pocket ~$2400, which includes 2 years of fitness & NUT follow up. And I'd love to be added to the fb group… imsjfink@comcast.net