DangerMouse007

I spent some time last Halloween weekend with a friend of mine that absolutely loves Vodka. She made me a small drink that consisted of vodka and some kind of juice. I can tell you it hit me hard really, really fast...as in within about 5-10 minutes after drinking it. But I also came down from the buzz fairly quickly as well...maybe 30 minutes after the drink. I've always been a bit of a light weight though since I very rarely drink alcohol.

This is a question I've asked myself several times over the years. When I see pictures of myself when I was younger (before 9 years of age), I was very skinny. Before that time my parents would send me to after school daycare. There they would feed us a small snack and then send us outside into the playground until our parents came to pick us up. When I was 9, I started walking the mile home from school. Even with that exercise, being home alone for a couple of hours before the parents got home opened up the entire refrigerator for me, leftovers and all. I still remember when I turned 13 years old, I had to take a physical to play football. On the paper I turned into the coach I was 5'10" tall and weighed 215 pounds. I never grew another inch. On the team though we had my best friend who was 6-foot tall and 240 pounds, and another guy who was 6'4" and 260 pounds. We made quite the defensive line at the time! Strangely enough I was a pretty decent long distance runner. I loved it! I remember clocking in a 6.5 minute mile which seemed pretty impressive for my size and age at the time. When I got to college, we had to take a couple of PE credits, and I elected to do weightlifting. Our pass/fail grade was based on how much weight we could bench press and leg press divided by our actual weight. There was quite an incentive to hit the weights hard and lose some weight. I started my first freshman semester at 265 pounds and got down to 238 pounds a year later. I would do the weightlifting class Monday and Wednesday afternoon then head home and run 3 miles. Then my sophomore year it all fell apart. I became a delivery driver for Papa John's. Oh, yeah! Free food!! It was all over after that. Unfortunately I don't have any weight statistics from when I was 19 until I was 31. I never went to the doctor or made any effort to weigh myself. My guess is that I got upwards of 350+ pounds before 2003 when I started exhibiting symptoms of diabetes. I didn't recognize those for what they were though, and I really loved the weight loss that came with being a hardcore diabetic. I felt like I looked good, but oh man, was I feeling crappy in other areas. When I finally saw a doctor in 2006 I was 300 pounds. He immediately put me on insulin, and I gradually got up to 390 in a year. I've documented what happened next in other threads, but I stayed at around 390-400 until late 2010. I was put on Victoza and lost about 60 pounds over the course of a year. Then I put it all back on in 2012 and then some. It was in October 2012 when I went to see my cardiologist at the time that I realized it was probably time to do something. His scale didn't go over 400, and when the nurse left me in the examination room, I lost it and broke down. That's when he recommended WLS. I still resisted the idea of doing it but finally last year I got up to 440 pounds due to a new blood pressure medication that caused me to retain Water, and just bad eating habits. Went to a seminar right before Christmas last year, met with the surgeon in February, and had RNY surgery in August. Looking back, I don't think I was really all that self conscious of my weight. To me it was just a fact of life. I didn't like to cook so I always took the easy way out with burgers, pizza, etc. It was pretty darn easy to do where I lived with over a dozen fast food joints within a few miles of my home. Even when I was losing weight between 2003-2006 with all the diabetes symptoms I had going on, I ate and drank whatever was within reach. There was one time in 2007 I think it was that I had gone to Six Flags Magic Mountain in California that I had something happen that was really embarrassing for me. I tried to get on one of the roller coaster rides, and the seat restraint that went down into my lap wouldn't lock all the way. The ride wouldn't start until that was fixed. The ride attendant literally tried using his legs to push the restraint down, but my stomach kept it from locking down correctly. I ended up getting kicked off the ride because of that. That was quite a walk of shame off the ride and out the door after waiting an hour to get in the door. I don't know. I'm only 3 months out now post-op, and I look forward to seeing what the future brings as I lose more and more weight. Doc says I will probably stop at 220, but that leaves me still above what I was when I was 13 years old. I would love to be able to get much, much lower than that.

Been about six weeks since my last update, so... Stalled out again in mid-October but started losing weight again the week before Halloween. I'm basically down 49 pounds now since August 10th. Went to the chiropractor for my lower back issues, and have been seeing him 2-3 times per week since early October. My back is feeling better and better. I now feel confident I can actually walk long distances without having to stop and sit down every 100 steps or so. Not too much trouble with foods, but I stick to what I know works for me. Some issues I had include chicken wings. I baked a handful a few weeks ago. Was only able to eat two before I had that "pain" in the pouch. Wasn't too much longer that I purged what I had eaten. I documented an issue with a salad at Chipotle about a week or so ago as well. Took a handful of bites, and it came back up not much later. Not sure I've experienced dumping yet. I had a "different" experience this last weekend. Was visiting with friends, and we went to a mall. We stopped at a yogurt shop, and I had a very small cup with strawberries, cherries, and pineapple. About 15 minutes after I finished it, I had to run to the bathroom with diarrhea and an increased heart rate that lasted for about 10 minutes. Not sure that's dumping though since I felt fine after my heart rate came down with no intervention from me. Had to go buy a new light jacket for these "cooler" months since the one I had bought last year when I was at my heaviest looked way too big on me. Same thing with jeans. I haven't gone to buy new shirts yet, but the ones I have look way too big on me unless I tuck them in. So all's good. A little disappointed with the stalls, but all of my weight loss to date has been with little to no exercise due to my lower back issues. With that going away, I think I can start doing more walking and maybe running which should help with the weight loss.

I second the Bariatric Advantage chews. I've tried chocolate and raspberry and like them both; I'll buy lemon soon. I buy them off of Amazon; the price fluctuates but if you can get the 60-count bags for around $14 and free Prime shipping, I think that's pretty comparable or better than other places that don't have free shipping. The only thing to worry about is that the expiration dates (at least from the ones I've bought) tend to be pretty short (a few months), but if you have to take a bunch per day (I take 4 per day), then you should be all right. In other words, I don't buy in bulk.

Next flight is tomorrow, Friday. Going to go with the Dramamine chewables again since they seemed to work well on my return trip from D.C. earlier in the month. I wrote earlier that this flight would be a one hour hop then four hours, but I realized I'm not flying in and out of Baltimore but Chicago so I have two flights of about 2.5 hours each coming up. I work at night, and my flight is in the early morning so I'm heading to airport straight from work. I'm sure I'll have no problem sleeping on the flight...fingers crossed. Now my next concern will be one that doesn't really have anything to do with motion sickness. I live alone so knowing how much I can eat and being careful in chewing my food and making sure I don't eat fast is easy. However, on this trip, I'll be with family and friends for the first time. I've made them aware that my eating habits have changed quite a bit, but I know that we'll be eating out for most, if not all, meals. I haven't really gone out to eat much here at home. Going to be an interesting experience. Anyway, just thought I would update my own thread.

Ouch! I had almost the same experience this last Monday, and I'm nearly 3 months post-op. I stopped at a Chipotle and had a salad. I've never been there, and I was surprised at how "big" their salad was. Everything on it was stuff I had eaten before separately: pico, Beans, rice, steak, guacamole, and lettuce, so I figured I was good. The only thing I hadn't tried yet was sour cream. But nope. Took maybe 5 bites, started getting that tightness feeling in my pouch. Walked out of the restaurant, went to my truck, and I started getting that feeling that I was due for an explosion. I ended up stopping on the side of the road and purging what I had eaten. I was very disappointed and a bit scared. That was the first time something like that happened after just a few bites. I might not try that again. As far as the first restaurant. I was 3 weeks post-op, and on my plan was limited to soft Pasta, drained out Soup, and tuna (no salad or raw veggies yet). I went to a movie theater for an INDIANA JONES marathon that also happened to serve dinner food (pizza, hamburgers, salads, wraps, etc.). I e-mailed them ahead of time to explain my dietary restrictions, and their head chef met with me to discuss my options. He told me I basically had the whole kitchen to work with in making something I could eat. He ended up making me a tuna pasta which worked great for me.

My doctor recommended not having anything hot or spicy for at least 12 weeks post-op. That was actually supposed to be today (or yesterday, 10/28). A few weeks ago I was out of town and went to a restaurant. I ordered a garden salad with chicken. I read all the ingredients thinking it was normal stuff but somehow missed the pico de gallo in it. Took a bit, realized what it was and decided to go as slowly as possible eating the salad. I was fine, and I've added salsa, jalapenos or serranos to my food ever since with no issues. I was a few weeks early with it, but I'm ok. So as others said, you may want to ask your doctor/nutriontionist, wait a bit longer post-op, and go slowly.

I fell in love with Victoza a few years ago. My doctor prescribed it for me around Thanksgiving of 2010. It took a couple of months, but I noticed that my appetite was nowhere what it was before I started taking it. And I was losing weight (both of which are "side effects" of Victoza). All in all I lost about 60 pounds in a year by Thanksgiving of 2011. Unfortunately it pretty much stopped working for me at that time, and I gained all that weight and then some in 2012. One of the reasons I elected to go with the bypass surgery.

My surgeon and his assistant calculated my "goal" weight based on excess weight versus ideal weight (which I think was 160 for my height), etc. I don't remember the percentages off hand, but they came up with 220 pounds for me as my goal weight. That seems a bit high for me so my personal goal is below that. We'll see how I progress I guess.

It is something to remember that's for sure. I lost 24 pounds my first 3 weeks post-op, was flat for another 3 weeks, and then melted off another 15 pounds quickly (in less than 2 weeks). Unfortunately now I've been on another lengthy stall. It's all part of the process but definitely a bit frustrating.

I thought the same thing when my doc said no flying, but I just did what he said. LOL! Maybe their doctors make sure to let their patients know to move around as much as they can while flying so that they're not in the same position for more than 1-2 hours at a time. Somebody else brought it up, but I would make sure you have the right foods available to eat at your destination. And make sure your family is aware of your dietary needs.

I was told not to do any major travel for at least a month post-op. My doctor and his team were worried about blood clots post-op. I purposely scheduled my surgery after a 10 day trip across the country and didn't schedule another flight until about 2 months post-op. So first off I would recommend at least being able to get up and move around every hour or so while you're traveling. I'm guessing your doc would say the same or something similar. As far as pain, everybody is different, but I only had some discomfort for a day or two after I came out of the hospital. That was normally due to how I sleep (on my side) which irritated a couple of my incisions. Fortunately I never had any issues feeling weak. I was pretty much moving and walking around as soon as they moved me out of the recovery room after the operation. Good luck and have fun!

Could be dependent on how long you've been diabetic, and the quantity of insulin you were taking pre-op. I've mentioned in other threads that I've been diabetic for about 12 years give or take, and the amount of Levemir and Novolog I was taking was rather astronomical. Post-op, I do still have to take insulin, but it's very little especially compared to what I was taking before. I just met with my endo last Friday, and he thinks by next Spring (about 8-9 months post-op) I could be completely off the insulin as I lose more weight. However, there is still a small chance that I will have to continue to take small quantities of insulin the rest of my life. Be patient and have faith.

The question I have is in regards to "head rolls or folds" that some of us have on the back of our head. Hopefully that makes sense. Do men that have these "head folds" pre-op see that these go away as they lose weight post-op maybe over many months or years and end up with a "smooth" head? Can't imagine there is a head exercise for that...is there?

@@beachgal2935 That list needs a thread all on its own, I think. LOL

My surgery date was August 10th. My highest weight was 440 (about 3 months before I first went to see my surgeon), surgery weight was 369, and I'm currently 330. I have not had much of an issue eating anything recently other than bread and corn tortillas. I did have one biscuit a couple of weeks ago, but it practically melted in my mouth so I had no issues with it. Any other bread doesn't really sit well; not even toast. Corn tortillas frustrate me since I'm Hispanic and used to eat just about anything with tortillas. Ha ha! It's interesting to read about others getting their Proteins through shakes. I asked once about that and was told to basically stay away from "liquid calories" and to stick with solid proteins. I've cooked mainly shredded ground beef recipes, or really soft cooked meat so that's my Protein. Grilled or baked chicken as well. Unfortunately I haven't really adjusted how much I cook; I end up with lots of leftovers and tend to eat the same thing several days in a row or vacuum seal and freeze it for later. Only fruit I've tried is watermelon.

I did take the chewable Dramamine yesterday afternoon before my flight back home, and that seemed to work. I took two of them, one about 3 hours before my flight with food and one about an hour before my flight. I didn't feel the plane at all which is the way I'm used to flying. I also was asleep most of the flight. My next flight at the end of this month is a bit longer (1 hour hop, change planes, then 4 hours), so hoping the chewables work as well then. I did see the Bonine at the CVS I went to; I'd never heard or seen it before, but I usually have tunnel vision when it came to Dramamine. It always seemed to work in the past.

I am certainly open to trying new things. I came out to Washington DC to see the Redskins-Eagles game yesterday. Yesterday morning about an hour before getting on the Metro out to the game, I took another Dramamine just in case I had motion sickness. It was a pretty long ride as Metro rides go, and sure enough, right near the end my mouth started filling up with saliva. I was almost desperate enough to try and get off the train early to settle down, but I managed to fight through it. It probably didn't help that I was facing the opposite direction that the Metro was going. On the way back to the hotel, I was fine, but I made sure I was facing the direction the Metro was traveling. I've not tried the chew-able tablets or up-ing the dose (I only took one pill each time I did). There's a CVS across the street from my hotel so I'll see what they have available. I'm already extremely nervous about my flight back so psychologically I may be a bit of a wreck by the time the plane takes off.

Just went through this thread for the first time. Lots of differing opinions. I was seeing a nutritionist before I decided to get the gastric bypass through my endocrinologist. She was great spending nearly an hour per session with me going through portion size, the different foods I should eat or avoid, etc. Then when I started the six month pre-op program with my surgeon I started seeing his nutritionist. She wasn't nearly as helpful mainly going over the post-op diet plan in regards to the different phases. I only saw her twice in the six months pre-op. Now that I'm about 2 months post-op, I have yet to see her, and I don't have any appointments set up. I guess it's something I could do. My appointment with my endo got pushed back to this upcoming Friday so I'm thinking of asking him if I could just start seeing his nutritionist again.

That is definitely something I look forward to as well. I don't fly that much (maybe 8-10 times per year), but I'm ready to get rid of the seat belt extension. However, you said something about it being illegal to use your own extension? I guess I never ask or get offered it because I always use my own and haven't heard anything from the flight attendants. I primarily fly Southwest (98% of the time) and JetBlue. At the moment I still use the Extra Seat Option on Southwest which is one thing I'm going to miss when I get "skinny". I really enjoy not having somebody sit next to me.

Same here. Took BP medicine for a few days post-op, but my blood pressure would get very low. I would also get the dizzy spell when standing up. I stopped taking it about 3 days out. I haven't been on it since (nearly 2 months), and my blood pressure is fairly stable and "normal". Love it since that was easily my most expensive prescription medicine that I was taking at the time.

I've lost nearly 90 pounds since the beginning of February, about 33 since my surgery in early August. I have noticed that I definitely have some "extra" skin on my arms already. I've been working on some exercises with dumbbells and curl bars to try and curb that. Hopefully, anyway. As far as plastic surgery experience, I posted in another thread...before I had my RNY surgery, I had talked to a guy that had gastric sleeve surgery in the summer of 2014. He started at 475 pounds six months pre-op and dropped down to 180 in a year. He had lots of loose skin in his arms, stomach, and thighs. I asked him if he had tried working out, doing strength exercises, etc., and he said he had not. My understanding, with the insurance he and I had, insurance would pay for plastic surgery only if it was medically necessary. For this, it had to be something like rashes that were as a result of the extra skin that couldn't be cured/fixed with other treatments for 6 months. He had just had plastic surgery, though, when I talked to him, on his arms and stomach area. He was going in later to do his thighs (may have to follow up with him since it's been about 3 months). I didn't care for the scars he had on his arms because it looked like he had cut himself, but somebody replied in the thread I posted that those eventually go away. And to be honest, I still felt that he had some extra skin he still could have gotten rid of in his arms, but my knowledge of that of sort of thing is pretty limited. That's pretty much my only experience with plastic surgery for loose skin. Sorry it isn't my direct experience.

Cool, I'm thinking I might actually shave my head. Ha ha!

Not with the pain you're having, but the instructions I received from my doctor with the Milk of Magnesia was to take 1 oz per hour until I went. Took 3 oz/3 hours, and IT happened.

Ah, sit ups, the bane of my existence. But I have childhood issues.