MacMadame

Some of your questions just depend on your insurance. About going back to WW, some surgeons want you to lose a certain amount of weight and they base it based on your weight at the time you have your consult. So you probably don't want to lose weight before then because you want every pound to count towards your pre-op requirement.

Good luck with your surgery!

If she's on here, you should be able to find her profile and send her a PM.

Sorry, I don't. But you might want to ask on the main forum and also do a search. I'm pretty sure Hashimoto's has come up before.

Hi P-body- I'm from California so I can't help you with finding support in Thailand. But for the post-op dieting, I really like my surgeon's plan: Protein is 70-100 g a day, keep carbs under 40g and fats under 30 g. This is really easy during the thin liquid stage (first 2-3 weeks). I think it might be harder once I move to softs. But he and his partner have experienced really good results with this diet for all his patients, regardless of surgery type.

Sometimes the runny nose is a full signal. But sometimes it's acid reflux. Do you think you have acid reflux? It makes me feel hungry but full at the same time. Does that makes sense?

Congrats on your weight loss. So how's your restriction going?

Good luck to you.

The surgery works on your tummy, not your head. But with the tummy help, it can make it possible to work on your head. (Hope that makes sense.) For myself, I tried to do as much head work as I could pre-op and my surgeon has a counselor on staff for post-op. I recommend The food and Feelings Book if you are someone who eats to stuff down feelings and The Emotional First+Aid Kit: A Practical Guide to Life After Bariatric Surgery for everyone, even those who aren't such emotional eaters.

Just makes sure your neighbor gets a modern DS -- where they give you a VSG stomach and don't take as much of the intestines away and she should be fine. Plus once she stops making so much ghrelin, she may change her attitude towards food. Right now she's got a devil in her telling her that cake and cheeseburgers are yummy, yummy, yummy and that's she SO hungry and she just has to have some.

You can be tacky without hurting people's feelings, I think.

Did you have a hiatal hernia repaired? Because that's going to make you a lot sorer than someone who didn't.

People have been asking to see my different hair colors. Here's a progression: Pink highlights - pink on Flickr - Photo Sharing! Blue highlights - blue on Flickr - Photo Sharing! Cranberry, more all over - cranberry on Flickr - Photo Sharing! The blue is the most flattering picture of me, but I like the cranberry color the best.

No, just day dreaming. :-D If you guys can drool over fried Snickers, then I want to drool over my favorites.

She was heavier at some point in her career than she is now. I tend to think she looks fantastic pretty much all the time. But her mouth definitely has a strange shape.

Hey, carrots are awesome! But not as awesome as cherries. Those are my favorite food ever.

The reason it's not more standardized, IMO, is that nutrition is an area with not that much research behind it and so there is not a lot of clinical data to go on. So each doctor is interpreting some general guidelines in their own way. The general guidelines are: 1) Losing weight before the operation can make the liver less slimy, which makes the surgeon's job easier, plus 2) Weighing less at the time of surgery makes the surgery safer 3) You need to eat very lightly in the first 2-4 weeks while everything is healing up, but particularly lightly in the first 2 weeks So some surgeons ask all their patients to lose weight -- even though there is no correlation between weight loss pre-op and success post-op. Some only ask the heavier patients to lose weight. Some require it, some just suggest it. Some are very specific about how they want their patients to lose weight and some leave it up to the patients. As far as the diet is concerned, there has been a trend in the US to let patients progress from liquids to mushy to regular food very quickly and there has also been a rise in slip rates. The doctors I investigated who had good slip stats all required *at least* two weeks of liquids of some kind, sometimes more and no regular food until at least 4 weeks, but usually more like 6 weeks. I would have trouble having any faith in a surgeon who progressed his patients faster than that without any clinical data to back it up. But some surgeons are very conservative, putting their patients on 1-2 weeks of Clear Liquids and 1-2 of full liquids when this article I read about bariatric nutrition published by the ASMBS says that that there may not be clinic evidence to support being on a clear diet more than a day or two. I was on clears at the hospital and then "thin" liquids for 2-3 weeks. Thin liquids are clears plus Protein drinks and milk (basically). They don't include everything on "full" liquids like oatmeal and applesauce. Those come with "softs" which is anything you can get through a straw the beginning, followed by anything you can mush up -- like tuna fish -- for 2-3 weeks. Then progressing to regular food "as tolerated". You don't move to each stage based on the clock, but based on what you are tolerating. So at two weeks out, if I'm still having issues with thin liquids, I'm not supposed to go to softs. Likewise, some people don't get to regular food until as much as 3 months out because they aren't tolerating anything but soft food. The basic diet doesn't change based on surgery type, but I bet most bandsters progress faster than the rest of us with cut stomachs. I would be surprised if I started doing soft food as early as 2 weeks. We'll see but my sleeve is kind of swollen right now and I'm having a horrible time *slowing down* so I still get pain when I drink my shakes too fast. Until I can go a whole day without that kind of pain, I won't go to softs.

I think depends on when in the day you get banded too. If your surgery is in the last afternoon, you are more likely to stay over because no one wants to come to discharge you late at night.

I've tried an underwire a few times since the surgery and never lasted more than a few hours. Sometimes even a non-underwire bra doesn't last.

I just got sleeved last week. I was in moderate pain. I believe very strongly in taking pain killers though. If you don't take them, your pain keeps you from recovering as fast and from moving around. So I went nuts with the morphine in the hospital. It made me loopy but I felt like I hadn't even had surgery. I had no drains. I was a little afraid of a leak, but someone on another board died of a blood clot while I was in the hospital and that freak me out more. I had a PE once before it was not pretty. So I have been moving, moving, moving and drinking, drinking, drinking so it doesn't happen to me. I'm still on thin liquids. This is like clears plus Protein drinks and milk. But not applesauce, oatmeal or cottage cheese like you get on full liquids. I can go to softs in a week if I feel ready. As of today, I can't see being ready though. So I may be the full 3 weeks on thin liquids. (It's 2-3 weeks depending.)

I understand where they are coming from, but I agree that it's sad. My son's gf's dad has pits. They are actually very friendly and sweet dogs. But all animals are unpredictable at heart -- even the best trained ones, which his most definitely are not -- and, if a pit is unpredictable and decides you are a threat and attacks you, it's jaw is so strong that it can inflict major damage and even kill you. So they are kind of like ticking time bombs that way. Yeah, have a heart. Some of us are still on liquids! As a side note, I've been off my blood pressure meds since the surgery. I have to monitor my blood pressure and it does fluctuate wildly, but it stays under 140/85 which is the point where I need to go back on them. So, I'm not home free yet, but it's looking good.

Hey, my FIL lives in Paradise -- right near you. I didn't realize there was anyone out there doing bariatrics. I figured you'd have to go to Sacramento. That's good to know.

It was cold enough yesterday that I turned on my electric blanket.

And I can't wait!

Good luck to you.