I had vsg 4/4 and my first 24hrs of recovery was miserable! The nausea and dry heaving were horrible and i couldnt get comfortable. I am now 5 days post op and things are much better. Just a little sore and tender. Biggest struggle now is getting Protein in[emoji21]🤢 which makes me want to vomit. Good luck and congrats!
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using BariatricPal mobile app
I had vsg 4/4 and my first 24hrs of recovery was miserable! The nausea and dry heaving were horrible and i couldnt get comfortable. I am now 5 days post op and things are much better. Just a little sore and tender. Biggest struggle now is getting Protein in[emoji21]🤢 which makes me want to vomit. Good luck and congrats!
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using BariatricPal mobile app
I had vsg 4/4 and my first 24hrs of recovery was miserable! The nausea and dry heaving were horrible and i couldnt get comfortable. I am now 5 days post op and things are much better. Just a little sore and tender. Biggest struggle now is getting Protein in[emoji21]🤢 which makes me want to vomit. Good luck and congrats!
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using BariatricPal mobile app
I have officially started my vsg journey! Anyone else at this stage? And a couple other questions how is your support system? How is your significant other handling it? I ask because mine says he's supportive but has concerns about after surgery...like if I lose a bunch of weight I will leave him if I start getting attention from other people.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using BariatricPal mobile app
I have officially started my vsg journey! Anyone else at this stage? And a couple other questions how is your support system? How is your significant other handling it? I ask because mine says he's supportive but has concerns about after surgery...like if I lose a bunch of weight I will leave him if I start getting attention from other people.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using BariatricPal mobile app
I have officially started my vsg journey! Anyone else at this stage? And a couple other questions how is your support system? How is your significant other handling it? I ask because mine says he's supportive but has concerns about after surgery...like if I lose a bunch of weight I will leave him if I start getting attention from other people.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using BariatricPal mobile app
Hi BrandiJo,
I received my referral to the surgeon yesterday. My first appointment with the surgeon is 8/9. Because of insurance requirements, my doctor supervised weight loss program has to be in effect for six months before surgery can be scheduled.
My husband is a great support since he just had the surgery in April. He is doing well so far and has no regrets. He is totally onboard with my decision to get sleeved too. I can relate to your SO's concerns tho. We have had several discussions about how we will handle any increased attention from others as our weight drops. Keeping communication open, honest, with a good sense of humor has worked wonders! 😀
Wishing you the best of luck! Hope to follow your journey as it goes along.
Thank you.
It was early last year when I was diagnosed with this. I was starting to pick up a lot of symptoms due to obesity and multiple comorbidities. My blood pressure was at peak in 2016 175/115, heart rate was 100-110, liver function tests were in the red and indicating severe inflammation and irritation. hba1c indicated newly diagnosed and quickly progressing diabetes (peak 7.9).
A few notable side effects that should worry anyone..
- Severe edema on the legs. I'd push into the middle of my legs with my thumb and it would leave a pit indentation that would last like a full minute and the skin would return to normal. This is one indication of progressing liver dysfunction, along with other things.
- Darkening of skin pigmentation (acanthosis nigricans) on my neck and armpits with a velvety texture (to the touch) as a result of extremely quickly progressing diabetes and insulin in the blood (plus insulin resistance).
- Extreme accumulation of fat deposits in abdominal region resulting in distention (this is far more common with males -- females tend to distribute it around other areas, but they can accumulate it the same way as men generally indicating far worsening condition) -- my stomach was 61 inches at peak last year, pant sizes were too small at 50+
- sleep apnea. This one's pretty obvious. On the sleep study I had roughly 55 apneas per hour, normal people have 5 or less.
While I started to understand these conditions, I noticed I wasn't losing weight enough. It wasn't until my extensive pre-op diet that i learned anything significant. Normally I notice people in our WM program get 2-4 week pre-op diets like people here. Because of my weight, abdominal distention, and because I'm a male and male adipose tissue tends to be a lot more solid than females, they gave me a 3 month pre-op diet.
I was given Glucerna as my pre-op diet drink that went from Feb 1st to April 20th. I tried for the first week to tolerate the stuff, changing flavors, adding cinnamon, trying to dilute the taste by having broth with drinks of it. None of it worked, I couldn't have more than 2 a day. My RD (dietitian) demanded 6 a day. I told her a few days into it that I had trouble consuming these, I was regurgitating them because the taste was so terrible and no attempts to mask the taste worked for me. She freaked out to holy hell. I saw her a few days later at my surgery prep class, she was teaching it along side a bariatric RN. I told her in person that she cannot freak out like that, and if she does, I will just lie to her.. that it isn't conducive to our relationship for her to go nuts. She apologized and it seemed she understood. Fast forward a week after that, she does a follow up call, I'm still having troubles getting up to 6 Glucerna a day, but because I'm suspicious of her now I say I'm up to 4 out of 6. She freaks out again, but this time she threatens to talk to my surgeon and halt my surgery. She wants to do a follow-up call with a new case manager the following week.. I make sure to lie to this person, and to the RD when she follows up a few weeks later. But not even a week after that last convo where she threatened my surgery I immediately started researching on these forums as well as other bariatric programs what pre-op diets they use, and why. They all pretty much turn out to be a modified Keto diet, so I start this a few weeks into February and continue it all the way to surgery day, losing nearly 80 pounds from the pre-op alone.
In the meantime, only a month into the pre-op and a lot has drastically changed with my body. My March 1st bloodwork shows for the first time in over a year perfectly normal liver function. My hepatologist smiles for the first time ever in an appointment, she sees those results, does a Fibroscan, which reveals at least 50% improvement in my liver stiffness (stiffness is associated with advancing liver disease, normal livers are soft), sees I've lost tons of weight already, and is thrilled with my progress.
Likewise, my blood workups from early March (I have a revolving 3 month diagnostic/panel) show significantly improving blood sugar (hba1c) from 7.9 to 6.3 to 5.7 (right at the stage between diabetes and pre-diabetes, except I'm taking Metformin and Forxiga at the time). Repeated fasting glucose shows perfectly normal levels at 4.4-4.6 but because of the hba1c (which is a 3 month average given the period your red blood cells carry around the sugar) being 5.7 they elect to keep me on both them.
Before surgery all my medications were as follows:
- 1000mg metformin (fast acting) 2 times a day (2 tablets, each one 500mg, they're huge), for diabetes
- 10mg Forxiga, fast acting, also for diabetes
- 10mg hydrochlorathiazide (HCTZ), first-line treatment for blood pressure, is a Water pill
- 75mg metoprolol 2 times a day (beta blocker, reduces HR and blood pressure)
- Prevacid and generic lansoprazole, 30mg once per day, although I preferred it every other day or every third day, PPI for reducing stomach acid
- Cipralex/Escitalopram, latter being the generic and Cipralex being brand name, treatment of extreme night time anxiety caused by sleep apnea
...
Post-surgery the changes to my medications were:
- 1000mg metformin (fast acting) 2 times a day (2 tablets, each one 500mg, they're huge), for diabetes
- 10mg Forxiga, fast acting, also for diabetes (off this completely)
- 10mg hydrochlorathiazide (HCTZ), first-line treatment for blood pressure, is a water pill (off this completely)
- 75mg metoprolol 2 times a day (beta blocker, reduces HR and blood pressure)
- Prevacid and generic lansoprazole, 30mg once per day, although I preferred it every other day or every third day, PPI for reducing stomach acid Prescribed Pantoloc (pantoprazole) 40mg for 6 months due to surgery and prior EGD/barium pre-op showing moderate reflux
- Cipralex/Escitalopram, latter being the generic and Cipralex being brand name, treatment of extreme night time anxiety caused by sleep apnea
Down to 4 medications as of April 20th.
Regarding the symptoms:
- Edema in my legs have completely disappeared. I used to not be able to see my ankles either before pre-op, now they're back to their normal bony self, and my legs are clearly defined now by my muscles again. Pushing a thumb into my leg reveals no pits.
- The darkening pigmentation on armpits and neck have receded significantly and are almost completely gone, nobody but me notices them anymore.
- Sleep apnea has significantly improved. This leads to promise in terms of getting off Cipralex, but the doctors asked me if I wanted off it and I said not until my apnea is 100% gone.
- My first visit to a doctor post-op last week and without hydro had a RHR (resting heart rate) of 50-60, and a normal pulse of 77 (from 100-110), blood pressure was 103/81, which is an enormous improvement.
I have a blood workup (ie blood sugar/liver panel) in a little over a week from now, and I think that might decide if I stay on Metformin or if I'm off it (I expect another great improvement).. likewise with metoprolol, but because my weight is still high as of today (back and forth between 265 and 266, about 100 pounds down from my weight early this year), and second number of blood pressure still being moderately high, I might still be on it for a while, will likely be off it by the end of the year.
I kind of thought against this but here is a picture of my liver on surgery day (April 20th) following my pre-op diet that I already showed another member in PM when I was discharged:
The white spots I want to follow up with my hepatologist on to see if thats fatty (very good news if so, means liver is very much on its way to being completely healed) or fibrosis (not terrible but would mean I've still got improvement just not as much/fast). Nonetheless all the nurses and my surgeon on surgery day who saw my liver mentioned the livers form looks great, the color is nearly normal. What matters to me now is what my hepatologist thinks. I'll prob make an appt with her tomorrow to see her sometime shortly after my blood workup.
My mother's obesity and all the problems exacerbated because of it. Uterine cancer to lung cancer (5 years now) stage 4; chemo three times, diabetes, just watching her try to move, etc. She told me, "Never end up like me" So, that's where I'm at. There are like a million other reasons, but that's the biggest one for me.
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