PorkChopExpress

Well, my plan is to get as lean as I can before I do anything, because I know that the thinner your skin is, the better your cosmetic result and the quicker the recovery. So I've got a ways to go before I have to worry about it Then I'll have to hope I can get insurance to cover some of it.

I bought all of mine from Bariatric Advantage. They have chewables that work pretty well, and don't take up space in the stomach once you let them dissolve in your mouth. The Multivitamin chewable is pretty metallic and I'm not super keen on it, but it's not candy The Iron chew is not great either. But the Calcium chew (caramel) is like a piece of candy three times a day, so that's nice. Basically, I take the multivitamin twice a day (morning and evening), the calcium three times a day, the iron once, and I also take Vitamin D because my levels were low. I have a sub-lingual B-12 that I take once a week (melts under your tongue). Lotta Vitamins. I think I paid somewhere in the neighborhood of $120 for three months supply, and after that's all gone I can go with normal over-the-counter vitamins that you swallow. But while I'm healing, I'm going to use these.

Well, part of the process is to get your mind right, and that's just dedicating yourself to the process. If you're still afraid you won't be able to "stick to it," then you need to really make sure you're committed to this...because it's not something you can take back. That said, the surgery enforces the new behavior...you simply won't be ABLE to eat the way you used to, in any way. Your new stomach won't let you. You can either embrace that and be happy about it (because that's why you're doing the surgery) or you'll just be frustrated all the time and regret the decision. I'm just over two weeks out and I'm developing new, good habits with my eating...reversing the bad habits that made me obese, in the first place. Changing my mindset, and working through my mental issues with food. It's a lot of change, and a lot to work through. But the proof is in peoples' results, so that's what I keep in mind. It's not a question of IF I will lose the weight, it's a matter of how fast

Oh man, that's the worst. I'm so thankful that both of my folks are still with us and still in pretty good health. I've always been pretty close to them, especially my Mom...I'm not sure what I'm going to do when they eventually pass. I know I'm going to be an emotional wreck for a while though. Hang in there, but I know what you must feel and I empathize.

Yeah, while I was on my pre-op diet, I had many challenges...especially at work. I'd go in one day and there was a big box of donuts on the kitchen table for anyone to have. Another day it was pizza night. Every time, I just gritted my teeth, hustled by and reminded myself that I really wanted the best result out of my surgery and that meant I had to follow the rules. But man, when your stomach's growling and you're missing real food, it's brutal

How big are your bites, and are you giving yourself 30 minutes with no drinking, before you start eating? I'm just over two weeks out (9/23 surgery) and I'm on mushy foods, I can eat meatballs, eggs, and chili with no problem...but my bites are very, very small and I make sure they are pureed consistency before I swallow them. Then I wait a minute or so before I take another bite. I'd say my bites are around the size of a pencil's eraser, or just a little bit bigger. You gotta remember, your stomach is now basically the size of an egg or so and it's still probably inflamed from the surgery, still healing. You can also cause it to swell by stressing the staple line, so you may have some more swelling that is causing it trouble. My surgeon suggests that if you have trouble like this when you haven't been before, to go back to a clear liquid diet for a day or two and see if that helps. It may allow the inflammation to subside. Grab some of the clear Protein drinks like Isopure (40g protein per bottle) and drink two of those a day, plus another 25-30 oz of Water. You'll have met both your protein and your water requirements on those days. More important, don't FORCE anything. If you're not able to do three meals, do two meals and focus on Protein Drinks the rest of the time. It's just a process and you don't have to be perfect, but you DO want to make sure you get your protein and water needs met. If that means holding off on mushy foods a bit while you heal, then do that. It takes about six weeks for your stomach to heal up, so we are still in the middle of that. Right now, eating stuff is basically just to train your stomach and get it processing food again, it's not really for nutrition - you still have to get most of the Proteins from drinks. So if your stomach is just not dealing with it right now, don't try to make it. Give it a break.

Brush a lot, keep it clean. Some of it is also that your immune system is going to be depressed for a while, because your nutrition isn't what it should be. That'll improve. As for things tasting different, a lot of people report that after the surgery. It didn't happen in my case, but I know it has for many people.

In my opinion, I can't resent anyone or anything when I'm the one that is abnormal and needs to be corrected. The world is not designed for the obese. I can't rage against the size of the seats in an airplane or in an arena, because they aren't made for me. They're made for the "normal" person. Obviously with obesity becoming an epidemic in the US, the definition of "normal" is kind of changing...but I don't think that's really a healthy or good thing. I cannot expect other people to modify their behavior to suit me, when it's ME that needs to modify his behavior. So I will do what I need to do in order to achieve my weight loss goals, and I won't expect anyone else to cater to me. I can control myself...especially now that I'm post-surgery and I have no real choice in the matter, and I'm not dominated by hunger. The diet you're on now pales in comparison to the two week, all-liquid pre-op diet most of us went through (some went even three weeks on it). Nothing but liquid or semi-liquid (sugar-free)...it's brutal, because you still have the hunger. Just soldier through it, because once you've had the surgery, none of it will matter anymore. You won't have hunger (only head hunger, which you can deal with) and you'll have to start focusing on re-training your brain to accommodate the new stomach. Nobody can really do any of that for you, it's all going to be on you. You're responsible for yourself, don't expect anyone else to change.

The surgical gas always takes 3-4 days to work its way out of my body, so that's probably where the burping is coming from. But the stomach's dealing with a lot of trauma right now too...so I think it behaves a little weird while it heals. Mine still seems to, over two weeks later. Lots of gurgling and noise. I'm told it goes away, in time. Just the stomach complaining, I guess I think you're doing pretty well on the fluids. Just remember that the Fluid in your shakes counts toward the 64oz right now, so make that your priority. The more Protein you get, the quicker you'll heal. Oh and as for the bowels, they'll start moving...and most likely they'll be black and kind of tarry. That'll be coagulated blood from the surgery. It clears up over time. But remember that you really aren't putting much of anything in right now, and won't be for a while...so the bowel habits are bound to change.

Gradually getting used to the new normal...every day gets better. I'm actually feeling really good physically. The incision sites are itching like crazy, so I know the healing is advancing. Still a mental disconnect with my portion sizes and what I "think" should fill me up, but I'm also getting accustomed to the new portion sizes. More to the point, I'm really eating slow, taking the full 30 minutes to eat even this little amount. That, in itself, is a massive change. I always wolfed down my food with reckless abandon. Now though, I find that I'm really enjoying the food I do get...just taking it slow, chewing thoroughly, enjoying the taste. I've just been doing it all wrong, all this time. Finally updated my photos on my profile, they need a "during" photo instead of "after" but I guess I'll just keep updating it whenever I weigh in. I'm going to stretch the weigh-ins out though, maybe once a month. I have always let the scale weight discourage me too much when it didn't say what I thought it should, so one month gaps should be good. I guess I'm also using this thread as a kind of journal I can look back on. But yeah...so far, so good! Baby steps, baby bites. Got to the gym five days in a row this week, gradually increasing my walking speed each time. Getting there.

Congratulations! My surgeon advanced me to mushy after just under two weeks, and that was such a relief. I was so tired of the liquid diet

Mine took longer because I went in for RNY but they converted me to the sleeve, due to some complications from a prior surgery and scar tissue. I think my total time was in the neighborhood of 1 1/2 hours.

This is what scares me silly about the idea of having skin removal surgery. I don't want to be deformed.

DEFINITELY makes me full. I'm supposed to have 1 Protein (1oz), 1 Tbsp of vegetable and 1 Tbsp of fruit at a meal. But the thing is, those meatballs weigh 1.3oz each basically, so I end up having to not eat my fruit, because I get full just on the meatball and a Tbsp of potato...but that's okay! I get my fruit when I have chili and four cut green Beans from a can...that leaves me room for fruit. Or I'll have fruit with my egg. But right now I'm on a real meatball and potato kick, I love that combo. I'm the kind of guy who can eat the same thing over and over again if I like it, I don't need a ton of variety. Also, I bought a tub of the pre-made mashed potatoes in the deli section and then later realized that if I only eat it a Tbsp at a time, I'm gonna end up throwing most of it out before it goes bad. So I'm trying to use as much of that as I can. I'll still probably only get halfway through it, and next time I'm going to buy a box of the powdered potatoes, and then just make it as I go. Cheaper that way. Just one of those things where I was still in the old mindset of portions and didn't even think that it would be WAY too much potato for me to get through in a week or so. We'll see how far I get on it But yeah, liquids go down pretty quick and they pass through the stomach into the intestine pretty quick, but even chewing up my food to puree consistency, it stays in the stomach longer. They said to wait 45 minutes after eating to drink again, and when I do that I still feel like I've got food in there and can't drink that much at a time. I think it helps "grease the wheels" to help the food go into the intestine though, because after 10 minutes or so I am drinking fine. So far, so good. But after almost four weeks of nothing but liquids, I REALLY appreciate having something with flavor I enjoy and texture, and the need to chew! And I have to say, it is bewildering but also kind of awesome that I hardly need anything to feel full. My food expenses have been annihilated by this surgery

Yeah, just give it time. I'm just over two weeks post-op and I've reached equilibrium now, mentally. It was a huge help, being able to start having "mushy" foods. The doctor gave me a list of stuff and meatballs and mashed potatoes was on it. I was ALL over that! I got some of these little turkey meatballs frozen at Trader Joe's which work out to just about 1oz each, and have a Tbsp of garlic mashed potatoes with that. That's a meal, and I can't have any more than that. It's INSANE, because just a few weeks ago I could have eaten that whole bag of meatballs and the half that tub of mashed potatoes in one sitting, and been fine! Reprogramming my brain to have a different expectation of how much is a "portion" and what I should be eating is the challenge, now.

I took them fairly regularly the first week, just because I really wanted to get walking and moving, but I knew that would result in soreness...so I'd just head it off at the pass with the Tylenol+Codeine I was prescribed. It worked really well and I was able to get up to about 2 miles a day in walking, about a week after surgery. At the end of the week, I stopped taking it and haven't really needed it again. I have a bunch extra, guess I'll keep it around for nighttime headaches or something!

My gallbladder ordeal was such a nightmare compared to the sleeve, it isn't even funny. The sleeve was a cakewalk, by comparison. I felt sick after the gall bladder surgery, and although I was diligent and walked as I was supposed to, I just couldn't seem to shake the full abdomen feeling. I had no appetite. Finally toward the third day in the hospital, I felt like I could try a sandwich. I ate it, then went to sleep. Woke up the next day and since I had successfully eaten, they were prepared to discharge me. I got ready, sat on the edge of my bed and suddenly the saliva started flowing like crazy, and I felt sick. I projectile vomited all over the room, twice...completely emptied myself. Turns out I'd developed pancreatitis...something they told me only happens for like .5% of patients. Lucky me. So this necessitated two more days in the hospital on IV fluids only, and I couldn't even drink anything...I had to be completely empty so the pancreas could heal. After I was discharged from the hospital, the bloated and full feeling in my abdomen didn't get better, no matter how much I walked or moved. I thought it was stubborn gas, but after a week I had to finally go to the emergency room, because my doctor said there was no way that should be the case. They had me do a CAT scan which revealed that about a liter of bile had emptied into my abdominal cavity. Apparently, the bile duct that was cut from the gall bladder wasn't tied off securely or something, and since it was able to provide a place for the bile to go, the sphincter muscle that would normally work off of pressure from the ducts was no longer opening to allow bile to leave...it was simply dumping into my upper abdomen, as it was produced. I had to have two drains placed while I was in the CAT scan (my only anasthesia was Morphine, and if you know anything about this drug, you know that it doesn't kill pain so much as make you not care about it...so I felt the whole procedure, I was just too loopy to care). I then had to go in and have a stent placed in the sphincter muscle so that it would keep the entry to the intestine open, so the bile would drain where it was supposed to and my bile duct could heal properly. After about a week, the drains weren't producing anything else and I was able to have them removed, then go in and have the stent removed. Finally, at long last, the ordeal was at an end. I'm two weeks post-op on my sleeve and I feel almost normal, with the exception of not being able to eat much, and with just a tiny touch of soreness in the abdomen when I exercise, but nothing big. So to me, this surgery was completely easy and I didn't have anything I'd really consider "pain" associated with it...but you gotta consider my history. I think even my umbilical hernia repair was harder than this one. The difference is, the sleeve is way more psychologically demanding.

If you had less to lose to begin with, you're going to slow down faster than most people, too. But do you know what your TDEE is? (Total daily energy expended.) You can estimate it online with a calculator, just google "TDEE calculator." That will tell you how many calories your body requires just to maintain your current weight. Then you figure out how many calories you're consuming every day. Get the calorie counts of what you eat, by weight. Add all of that, along with the calories in the shakes. Anything you put in your stomach. Then you subtract all of your calories in from your TDEE. That will tell you what your caloric deficit is. After you know that, then consider that a pound of fat is 3,500 calories. Knowing that, divide it by your daily caloric deficit. For instance, if your daily caloric deficit is 1,000 calories, then the result is 3.5 - that's how many days it will theoretically take for you to burn one pound of fat. Then check your scale and see if that's jiving, over a series of weeks. I'd suggest four weeks to get a good sample, because the body loses fat on its own schedule, not Mon-Sun. But with that math, you can see that the less of a caloric deficit you run, the less you're going to lose per day...and the less you need to lose, the lower your deficit will be. An excellent way to increase your fat burning ability is by building muscle. Weight training! Muscle mass is what burns calories and increases your TDEE. Cardio is decent, but weight training is super efficient. And of course what others have said - water! Very important.

Not a lot. He'll evaluate your medical conditions and history, basically just an opportunity for him to quickly determine whether you're a good candidate for surgery. Every surgeon wants their practice to have good successes and good numbers. He'll send you for evaluations as needed, depending on what he feels is necessary. Sometimes they do want you to go on a supervised diet to ensure you can follow the rules and be disciplined, depending on your starting weight. You'll probably do a cardiology clearance (they test your heart rate under stress) to make sure you have no heart issues, they'll have you do a psychological evaluation...there are several routine things which may or may not happen because some of it is insurance requirements. I suspect if it's a decent practice, they'll have a nutritionist that you will meet with to discuss the whole process. But if your insurance isn't going to require anything (make double sure) then I'll bet you could be in surgery within a couple months. Nothing to be nervous about right now, just go in and ask your questions!

My wife's in the same boat you are. She has had to wait to get hers until the summer (she's a teacher) and she has a break with enough time for recovery...she's very jealous of me. But she gained enough to meet the 40 BMI requirement and she's been maintaining at that weight so that when she weighs in at the doctor's office, she has a history of being at 40 BMI. It sucks to have to do, but in this case you have to game the system to get what you need. Insurance companies are the worst.