ShrinkingSaraVSG

Sweet Luckyone!! All the luck to you! I'm on my pre-op diet now! I would imagine you are as well!

Trying to see if I can find my surgery buddies at Dr.Alvarez's on October 7th? Or anyone else around the same time :-) Good luck everyone!!!

Hi all I'm having surgery on Oct 7th with Dr.Alvarez? Is anyone else around this date? Or near it? Same doc?

I'm on October 7th if you wanna chat.

I wish you luck Jenn. I have opted not to go the insurance rout (I love my father endlessly for all that he does for me :-) because I am not in a position to qualify with mine and I don't want to wait to get two secondary life threatening conditions before I have the surgery. I agree with what's been said here. Spending time in forums, info sites, and youtube is of great use. I love youtube. I plan on starting a video channel of my journey myself. I've just been given a surgery date for my vsg October 7th. I'm excited and scared. This is a big change a bit change that I have let fear keep me from doing. But I've let fear keep me from many things and that ends now. I'm 30 years old and have never, in the purview of my memory, known a weight lower then 220. Good luck. Message me if you want to share nervousness :-)

The reason why I would never consider it, you have no legal recourse if things go bad. However, many do based on price. Dr Alveraz seems to have a huge following and many You Tube success stories. I also feel sucess is increased with a great post op support group. I'm not talking about an on line group. I am still pre-op but attend the monthly support group where my proceedure will be done. I have learned so much and have had all my questions answered face to face with those that have been there and done that. At yesterdays support group we had a very good trainer that works with bariatric patients come in and talk about exercise for one hour. Than a group session for 1 hour. Great information. This support is available for life and its convient for me.

I agree a support group is a great thing. And might come into play. But I'm lucky enough that group in my town is open and you don't have to have done your surgery with them to go.

Hi!

I went to Mexico. I went with dr. Alvarez and I loved it. I was so nervous and read all the blogs and every piece of information I could find. I was obsessed with knowing everything. It was a breeze. I highly recommend it! I had mine done with dr. Alvarez July 15th. I started at 267. Today I am 185. It has been the best decision I ever made. I read people sayin that and would thing whatever but trust me. You will not regret it. Check out dr. Alavarez. Very nice staff. Right over the border was important to me and you can practically see the US from there. message me if you have any questions!

That sounds like me at this point right now. I've been in the forums, the blogs,watched all the videos I can. I've even been in touch with Susan to determine if he'd take me. He says he will. I've gone over it and over it. The only think I haven't done is commit and set the surgery date. I don't know what's making me feel freaked about at this point.

Thank you Andi. I don't know what it is. I've got it all set up. I've spoken with the patient coordinator done a health history. Talked about how to handle after care with my pcp and how long of a post op regiment I'll be on. All I have to do is say it's ago and set the date. But I feel irrationally scared to committing to it. But every time I try to give my mind a break and stop thinking about it for a couple hours I feel his sense of need. Like there's something inside me screaming you need this why are you so frightened.

Hi all I'm just researching. Some of you might notice I'm posting like crazy. I've done research and been watching videos and talking to people and a patient coordinator at the place I want to go but I've haven't taken the last step to book. But I've always believed in arming yourself with information. So question:

What kind of skin car regiment did you use to help with your skins elasticity and bounce back ability?

That's so awesome!

That's amazing makes me so excited! Congratulations!

You don't have to say you had surgery. I wouldn't think. When someone asks what are you doing. Just say that you're working with a doc and nutritionist on a new diet plan that seems to be working. That way you can write off the amount of weightloss to doctor supervision without mentioning surgery. But even that has pitfalls. What if they ask what is the diet? Maybe you could get away with saying they're just tailoring an eating plan to you specifically. Weight is a sensitive subject and I think most people are aware of that, I don't see why they wouldn't just understand if you said I don't feel comfortable discussing my weight.

I was told I'll need a three week liquid diet before surgery. I haven't scheduled yet. I don't think that's for me to lose weight before surgery. But I would imagine weight loss is inevitable with it.

Good luck through your process. I'm just getting into it myself. But I'm going self pay. My insurance doesn't do this kind of thing. I've found peoples vlog's on youtube very encouraging and helpful.

Hi everyone! So I am starting to go through the process of talking with a patient coordinator and figuring out how I'm going to do this. I'm going to be out of pocket in Mexico. I've talked with my doc, my insurance, and a local bariatric program and doing it through insurance here is just not going to be possible.

I don't fear the travel. And I don't really fear the surgery too much (a little because I've never really ever had one so it's all new to me). But I'm afraid that I'll be unbearable. I'm afraid of it changing my attitude and making me a different person. I have no memory of being anything smaller than a size 16/18 (age 12) I don't have that memory of what it's like to not be overweight/obese. I don't know who that woman will be.

What were your fears going into your surgeries? How did you deal and get past them?

With obamacare you can now get assistance paying yor premiums. Go to healthcare.gov and get that started.

Thank's Jersrose. But I'm on Medicaid and the hoops are extensive and time consuming. I've spent my whole life in this state of being obese and watching others live life. I don't think I want to spend another year doing it and jumping through hoops.

They offered me a slot on the 25th too. But I haven't scheduled yet. Gotta work out the numbers with my family first.

I'm doing my research right now and I think I'm going to go with Dr.Alvarez. That's about all I can say about it. In the past few months I've read so much, talked to patient coordinators, watched endless youtube videos (which to me have been soooo helpful and encouraging). If you look at youtube there are so many vlogs of people who have used the surgery well and not well. Arm yourself with information and go with your heart.

I went back to California to visit friends this summer. I thought it would be awesome to go to Raging Waters. But then I did a little research. Half the slides are two person only and if I went with anyone else we'd exceed the weight limit. Even though I was alone sitting at my computer I was devastated. I don't really like theme parks because I'm not an adrenalin junkie, I don't like roller coasters anyway. But I love Water parks. The realization that I can't even enjoy 75% of things at a Water park was a blow. I think I've made my decision now. I'm tired. I'm tired of being tired. Tired of being slow and unable/unallowed to do things. I've contacted a clinic and been approved as a candidate. Not to just see if I can rally my family around me for funding. A new graduate school graduate doesn't have the kind of insurance or money to do this kind of thing lol.

I just wanted to see every one's take or experience on this. I'm looking into and thinking about getting a sleeve. I'm starting to narrow it down to two possible doctors. I'm looking at going out of country since I have Medicaid. Apparently you have to do half a year of a doc supervised diet and a whole bunch of other stuff to qualify through them. As if I haven't already been on almost a dozen in the last years.

Anyway, what I wanted to ask was: how did you cope with emotions post-op? Did anyone find themselves needing to be a councilor for help?

food is such an emotional thing for allot of us and actually if it weren't for that part of it I probly would have considered this years ago. I have this fear that after the surgery I'll be grumpy or depressed or just unbearable to be around in situations where I have to eat differently from everyone else. My family gathers around the dinner table, my grandmother is queen of the kitchen, and even though she spent most of my childhood belittling me and taking food from me, she suddenly can't seem to feed me enough even when I say I'm good.

Did anyone wait to tell their families that you were having a weight loss surgery? I am being open with my father who is supportive and willing to help me with my self pay situation. However I have no interest in telling my extended family about my plans. I live in an area with two aunts, one uncle, three cousins, my grandparents, and great aunt and uncle. I have the urge to go through the process and just move home with my dad for the initial recovery. It's not that they wouldn't be supportive. It's actually that they would be too supportive...you know...that moment where supportive becomes insulting?

So what was the process like once you decided to go to Mexico for surgery? What's the red tape? Was it simple or difficult? Are you happy you did it or do you wish you'd stayed near home?

Just a quick tip, you may want to post your question in the Mexico & Self-Pay forum for more responses:

http://www.bariatricpal.com/forum/486-self-pay-mexico-gastric-sleeve-surgery/

I also found a couple of old threads that might be of interest (my apologies if you already found these):

http://www.bariatricpal.com/topic/240015-where-and-how-much-did-you-pay/

http://www.bariatricpal.com/topic/254474-gastric-sleeve-surgery-cost-mexico-and-united-states-self-pay/

Good luck!

Thank you! That was super helpful.

I was thinking of the band but from what I'm finding in my research I think the sleeve would be the best option for me.