This is me. Ive been wondering how well I'll do with water after surgery, which is this wednesday. I'm a big water drinker. Probably 100 ozs a day. At least i have one thing in my favor, with the weather cooling off, it won't be as hot and shouldn't need as much.
I worried about this, too.
Most of my life I've been a huge Water drinker. Even as a kid I can remember being at friend's houses and they'd comment on how often I'd ask to get some Water.< /p>
I almost quit football due to idiot coaches who'd used water rationing as a motivator.
I carry around a water bottle at work all the time.
I say all that to say this: I was very concerned about this leading up to my surgery...perhaps more concerned about this than any other aspect.
I'm 11 days post-op and can say with great confidence that me drinking enough water is not going to be a problem.
Day 1 in the hospital it was just ice chips and I was highly concerned. Second day I was on pace for 4 oz of water an hour and I had to chart it.
Day 2 I drank around 80 oz
Day3-11 I've been drinking just as much water as I wanted....on par with what I did prior to surgery.
Those first couple days may be weird.....but I'm betting you'll come through like a champ and be able to have no issues meeting your water goals.
Hang in there.
Hi, you can call me Uncle Buck, and I'm a fat guy. The scales really don't support that statement these days, thus my screen name. However, once a fat guy, always a fat guy. I'm a bit more than two year out from surgery. I came within 15 pounds of my goal weight, which is good news-bad news. I'm content where I am, but I'd really like to get that last 15 pounds off to say I made it. To do that, I need to get my head back in the right place, which is why I'm here.
I was born a dirt poor fat guy. Men in my family fall into one of two categories: skinny as a rail or ginormous. I was one of the genetic lottery winners who fell into the ginormous category. I don't remember a time in my life when I wasn't fat. There have a been few times when I was able to lower the tonnage a bit, but it never lasted. Sound familiar to anyone?
I'm probably also not telling anyone any secrets by saying that fat kids aren't generally treated very well by the little monsters known as children. I was not the exception to that rule. My childhood could not be called enjoyable. The best I can say about it is that it ended. I did learn a couple of fairly valuable lessons. The first was that if one gives a damn about what others think of them, it makes for a long childhood. I got over that. I also came to the realization that there was a lot bigger world than the podunk town where I grew up, I just needed to get there. Finally,I learned that I don't like kids and certainly didn't want any of my own. Little quasi-clones of me running around? The horror, the horror!
I mentioned earlier that I didn't exactly hit the genetic lottery in the gravity category. I did do fairly well in the brains category. Life got better for while when I hit college. I coasted through four years to my first bachelor's degree. I graduated out of the largest college at a pretty big school. Order of walking was by ranking, and I was the fifth out of about 500 people of walked that day. Not too shabby. However, I also found that I still didn't really know what I wanted to do with my life. At that point I made the biggest mistake of my life: I decided to go to law school.
Not to say that I didn't do well there. The genetic brains came in handy again, at least on paper. I graduated in the top 10 percent of a somewhat prestigious state school. However, I didn't really consider the reality that intelligence and ability usually don't mean squat, particularly in a highly competitive field. I didn't have any of the big three going for me: lots of money and high level contacts, a father/grandfather/uncle with a legal practice that I could move into, and I wasn't a hot female. About that time I started going through a process which became a recurring theme: everything looks good until the interviewer sees me, and at that point I may as well just leave. So I found myself with student loan debt that rivaled the trade deficit and no career prospects (remember the dirt poor bit from earlier?)
I chased a legal career for about 8 years with no success whatsoever. I don't want to sound as though I'm whining, but I think the primary reason for that was my weight. Okay maybe I'm whining, this is my spiel, I'm allowed. I had to come to grips with the fact that my window of opportunity had closed, and I had to come up with plan B. I remembered good advice I read once: if you want to get rich, do something that has to be done and no one else wants to do. I cast about for that job, and came across the occupational health and safety racket. Job that is needed: check. Job no one wants to do: check. Once can make pretty good money at it: check. Sign me up. A couple of years pursuing college degree number three in safety, and I actually found a job where they wanted me and didn't seem to care about my weight. Score!
Another unexpected consequence of changing my career was meeting my wife. I had given up on the concept of female congress, as a rule they don't care for ginormous guys. My wife didn't mind, and she actually got my sense of humor. Life was definitely looking up.
As most do, I wanted to advance my career. I did all the usual stuff, completed professional certifications, got college degree number four, a masters, yada yada yada. All I need now to bat the academic cycle is a PhD. Then that problematic interview game started again. Straight back to having outstanding phone interviews, and just watching the consternation on their faces when they actually saw me. You'd think I had a booger on my face or something.
This is where weight loss surgery comes in. I knew about it of course, but my basic idea was not just no, but hell no. I had been a bit of a curiosity in that I hadn't had any serious health problems associated with the ginormousness. However, my wife couldn't say that. She had weight loss surgery, and did fantastic. About the time she was at the peak of her fantasticness, I poured my copious arse into a plane seat and flew to yet another interview, to know within five minutes that I didn't have a hot dog's chance at a fat guys' convention of getting that job. I decided enough was enough and scheduled my initial consultation with my bariatric doc.
There's really not much to say about the process. The insurance company approved immediately, my surgery happened 90 days after my initial visit. The surgery went great, no complications. I was back to work in a week. The weight came off exactly as it was supposed to. I dropped about 140 in a year. One thing I did find interesting was that fact that my doc told me my stomach was 50 percent longer than an average, non-ginormous person. I don't want to use that as an excuse, but it did make feel a little bit less like an unmotivated slug.
I decided to try the job market again. If nothing else, it's a great way to see the inside of airports and meet new and boring people. Three job interviews. Three job offers. I talked my wife into letting me take number three.
The good news: I was finally making the money I should have been making 15 years ago. The bad news: people don't pay you a lot of money for taking over programs with no problems and in which everything is running smoothly. My stress level over the last year and a half has been quite high. Stress is not good for trying to get the last 15 pounds off. I don't think my diet could have been a lot worse. Every day I get on the scales expecting the weight to be coming back. Every day it stays right around 240. Having only 15 percent of a stomach can be a very good thing. I've had to remind myself that my life is not going to get less stressful, and the surgery isn't going to let me get away with being a sluggard for long. It's time to get back to business. Thus, this process of getting my head in the right place.
As an aside, you remember when I said my family produces either stick men or ginormousness? One of the reasons I never wanted children was an assumption that they would be ginormous like dad. Thus, me taking a dip in the gene pool was not a good idea. My brother was one of the stick figures. One of my nephews hit the ginormous gene lottery. People assume that he's my get. Remember my comment about the horror? He's 14 and already approaching 300. I really wish I could spare him the years that my weight cost me. At the same time, I guess he needs to find his own path. I suppose the cycle continues.
I really didn't plan on posting this, I just wanted to spew it out and then delete it. On second thought, I think I will post it. Anyone who has made it through to the end of this diatribe, my hat is tipped to you.
Considering that just 7 days ago you had your abdominal muscles cut in a few spots, i would let them heal for while. Just think how long it takes any wound to heal before you can apply any kind of tension on the tissue
My work is somewhat physical and i asked my doctor today (I'm 10 day post-op) when would i be able to return to normal physical activity including carrying 20-30 lb here and there and some climbing on ladders and such. He told me to wait about a month post op. This "about a month" rule of thumb is assuming you went through a normal healing process with no complications,
nunid got a reaction from Dub in Tomorrow is 7 days since surgery