Sleeved36

Wow! What a rough journey!
You deserve all of the health and happiness that is coming your way!
Rooting for you!
The first 2 weeks after surgery are usually the worst, not trying to be a downer. Just want you to be prepared and know that it only gets better from here!

I weighed in at the doctor's office and I'm down to 345.1! That makes 38.8 pounds lost since June 29, 2018. I'm uploading a screenshot of the trend from the LoseIt! app. As you can see, I had a big uptick in weight in late July and mid-August and it took a bit to re-lose that same weight again.

Hi,
Your story brought back alot of memories for me.. my mom had chrones disease and went through a lot of the same things as you did. She was diagnosed in the late 80's and went through countless surgeries until in late 97 she went in for a stoma repair and caught a staff infection.. she had 2 months in hospital to get rid of that and then had another surgery on the stoma in Jan 98. The next morning she got up from her bed to be walked around the hospital corridor and collasped and died. She had a pulmonary embolism. She was only 52 year olds. It was such a sad story because she went in for a stoma repair and never made it out.. Sorry just your story brought alot back. I hope you have great success and this will help you deal with your chrones easier.

Thank you! Prednisone is the worst drug I've ever had the misfortune of taking. If you look at the photos, all of the stretch marks are because of Prednisone. When it was first prescribed, I was on an ultra-high dose. I gained over 75 pounds in about three weeks. My skin never recovered. A couple of years later when the doctor said I needed to take it again, I said no way. That was when I opted for the first surgery back in 1995. It is the only drug that has ever made me rage. I was a mess when I was on it. Aside from the weight gain, I was so short-fused no one could stand to be around me. Once I stopped taking it, that all went away. IMHO, Prednisone is evil, plain and simple...

As for the Keto diet, I've tried it and the high fat made me ill and gave me acne really bad. I'm basically doing a modified keto, modified Atkins, which is high Protein and low carb. It has helped so far.

So, I have promised to share my story with anyone who is interested. I’m not simply a bariatric surgery patient. Feel free to ask questions about what I have gone through. I am not shy about talking about my travails and have lots of experience with surgery in general. The photos I am sharing may be disturbing to some people. I am scarred and have an ileostomy. If you are squeamish, you may want to skip the photos.

Here we go… Get your popcorn, this is a very long post.

My name is Andy. I turned 52 in early July. I am single and live alone with my dog. I’ve been heavy most of my life. But, my journey is about my chronic illness and the effects it has had on me and my body.

I have Crohn’s Disease. I started having symptoms when I was 15. It got really bad when I was in the Navy, but it was in 1990 that I was first hospitalized because of it. I was, at first, diagnosed with ulcerative colitis and started on medication. This seemed to help for a while, but it kept getting worse. In 1995, when my doctor said I had to start taking Prednisone again, I opted to have a radical surgery to “cure” me by removing the organ of choice for this autoimmune disease. On April 20, 1995, I had the first of three major abdominal surgeries at Northwestern University Hospital, in Illinois. I had my entire large intestine removed and an internal pouch was made out of my small intestine to take the place of my large intestine. The surgery took almost 12 hours to complete. It was done open incision; laparoscopic surgery of this type was not perfected until the early 2000s. (My youngest brother had this exact surgery performed in 2012 laparoscopically. Crohn’s disease runs in my family.) This pouch was connected to the exit and I had a loop ileostomy for three months while the internal pouch healed. Yes, I pooped into a bag hanging from my stomach for three months back then. Then, after the three months, I went back in for another surgery where they closed the ileostomy and dropped my intestine back inside. Things went well for a couple of years, then I got sick again.

I moved to California and started a new job in 2002. When I found a new gastroenterologist in southern California, he did some tests and said I did not have ulcerative colitis, but Crohn’s Disease. (The difference between these two irritable bowel diseases is ulcerative colitis only attacks the large intestine, but Crohn’s disease can attack any part of the digestive system.) This doctor started me on an infusion medication called Remicade. This was the first medication that ever really worked. I took it for about 14 years until I developed antibodies to it. I kept taking it even though it was not working because the doctor never had me tested for antibodies.

In 2014, I moved to Idaho. I found my current gastroenterologist, who is the best doctor I have ever had. He put me on Humira. This is a self-injectable medication that also worked for a while, this time about two years. When he saw that the Humira was no longer working, he ordered a blood test that would see if I had antibodies to it. This is when I found out that I had antibodies to both Humira and my previous medication, Remicade. I was then switched to Cimzia, which never worked. I just keep getting sicker and sicker. (The worst part of having Crohn’s disease is there are no outward signs that you are sick. I looked fine but felt like crap all the time. No one at work believed I was sick)

One of the side effects of my surgery in 1995 was scar tissue in my small intestines where the ileostomy was. Because of this, I periodically have small bowel obstructions that usually require hospitalization. To date, I have had 17 small bowel obstructions. These usually clear themselves while I am in the hospital, by not eating anything (NPO) and having an NG (Naso-gastral) tube inserted up my nose and down into my stomach, to remove any contents using suction.

Let’s jump ahead to last year – May 2017. I had yet another small bowel obstruction. I was hospitalized as usual, but this time it did not clear. I had been in the hospital for two weeks and then they decided I needed surgery to clear the blockage. When I was talking to the surgeon before the surgery, he said I had a 90% chance that I would come out of surgery with a permanent ileostomy. This was not the case. In this second major open abdominal surgery, the surgeon was able to remove scar tissue strictures from the outside of my small intestine and they immediately inflated and the blockage passed. I got lucky. The surgeon told me that if I had another small bowel obstruction, he would be forced to remove my internal pouch and give me a permanent ileostomy.

In August of 2017, this is exactly what happened. A bit after 4 am on August 21, 2017 (yes, the day of the total solar eclipse – I’ll say more about this in a minute), I went to the emergency room and was admitted about 8:30 am for yet another small bowel obstruction. I had been up all night throwing up and getting sicker, so I was exhausted by the time I got to my room. About 10 am, the nurse came in and asked if I wanted to go out to the parking lot and watch the eclipse. I was so sick and exhausted that I said no and slept through the entire event. (I live in one of the areas where people came to view the event (eastern Idaho) and I missed the entire thing because of this damn disease…) When the surgeon came in later that day, he said that he had scheduled me for surgery on Wednesday, August 23, 2017,, for the removal of my badly diseased internal pouch and give me a permanent end ileostomy. So, again, I poop into a bag.

So, on August 23, 2017, I had the third major open abdominal surgery. One thing to note here is this was the third time I had been opened up in the same place – from just above my belly button, vertically down into my groin. My wound had barely healed from the surgery in May and the surgeon was cutting me open again. This ended up being a long recovery.

There were two issues with this surgery: the first was the placement of the ileostomy. The surgeon placed it in the scar tissue from my ileostomy that I had back in 1995. This has caused issues with the seal on my bag.

The second issue was the surgical wound. While I got much better since the badly diseased part of my small intestine was surgically removed, the wound did not want to heal. I was in the hospital for over three weeks and eventually sent home on with a wound vac. This device keeps constant suction on the wound and removes any blood and body fluids from the wound, preventing infection and speeding healing. The problem with my wound this time is it was not closed properly and it took over four months for it to close enough for me to stop using the wound vac. I was able to finally return to work in January of 2018.

Back to my gastroenterologist. I went to see him in Februar 2018 for a checkup and an intestinal scope, called a sigmoidoscopy. This is basically the same as a colonoscopy, but they use a much smaller device. It is about the same size as an endoscope. When this procedure was over, he said to me that I needed to lose weight. (He basically says this every time I see him, about every three months) This time, I was sick of hearing about it so I asked him for a referral to see a dietician to help me with my weight and my eating.

About a month later, I get an unexpected call from a bariatric surgeon’s office near where I live and was invited to a seminar. I went and after the presentation, I went to ask the surgeon a couple of questions about whether or not I was a candidate based on my surgeries. She said that it was not out of the question, but she would need me to make an appointment to be sure. I was seen in late March 2018. When I met with the surgeon, she asked me to lift my shirt and show her my abdomen. She took one look at my scars and said she could do nothing for me. She referred me to a bariatric surgeon at the University of Utah, who I met with on June 29, 2018. Because I had already started the journey, according to my insurance, back in March, the doctor placed me on the fast-track to get everything done. Since June 29th, I have had 14 appointments in Salt Lake City, about 210 miles south of where I live.

During this first appointment, I also talked to the bariatric surgeon about my other issues and he referred me to a colo-rectal surgeon, also at U of U. I met with him on July 20, 2018. We discussed revision surgery on the placement of my ileostomy and the removal of internal scar tissue around my small intestines on the left side of my abdomen. He said that these things need to be done and that he would coordinate with the bariatric surgeon. The bariatric surgeon was more hesitant and needed much convincing. I finally was able to talk him into performing both sets of procedures during the same operating room visit. I was finally approved for everything and am scheduled for surgery on September 6, 2018.

In early August of this year, I was finally approved for yet another Crohn’s medication – Stelara. This, by the way, is the second most expensive medication in the United States, behind only Harvoni (which is used for hepatitis C). Stelara costs about $20,000 per dose and I have to inject one dose every two months. So far, it is working.

So, to recap – on September 6, 2018, I will be having a vertical sleeve gastrectomy, performed laparoscopically (prepped for open, but he is going to attempt laparoscopically first) by Dr. Volckmann as the first procedure performed. While I am still under and after Dr. Volckmann finishes, Dr. Pickron will come in and perform a revision on the location of my permanent end ileostomy and attempt to remove as much scar tissue from my small intestines as he can. This will be performed open, through the same incision location and scar tissue that has been used now three previous times.

I am also posting photos of what I look like without clothing, with privates blocked out. Since my surgery on August 23, 2018, only my doctors have seen me this way. And the last photo is of my "surgery" haircut. I hate to deal with my hair in the hospital so I just cut it all off before I go in.

If you have made it to this point, thank you for reading my story. I have never written it all down before and as such, have never shared everything with anyone.

Thank you so much. I did a LOT of work before surgery to work through my mental illness issues and my eating disorder. I am only a couple of months post-op, but I had already done the work to learn balance is key. I find it very disturbing on here, so many vets who post regularly say so many things that suggest highly disordered eating behaviors and it worries me what newbies who haven't gone through all the therapy I have are learning.

fluffy it's going to happen. I guess sometimes jealousy, sometimes other reasons that we will never know. The good news is that as you progress you will surely find that you never needed them in the first place:)

EXACTLY what i needed to hear. I'm only 2 weeks out but the future sounds worth it all. Thank You. Sadly, I've already lost one friend of 16 years from jealously I think? Sad, but I'm staying strong and moving forward.

Love love love this post! As someone relatively new to wls (1 mo post op) I can tell you that I feel like I'm going to print your post so I can reflect on it when I am further along in my journey. Thank you for sharing and congrats to you on your success.

Thank you so much for sharing!! I may come back to your post periodically for its sage words. <3

Thank you, @sharonintx! Wisdom from a vet is always appreciated! Congrats on 5 years worth of success!

I had gastric bypass, but all of your points translate to us as well. Can't agree with you more, and I'm only 10mos out from my surgery. Congrats on your success! And YES, everyone should spend some time really dissecting the what/when/why they go to food as a comfort or a compensator. It's not the most comfortable thing in the world, but will be the biggest reason why you have long term success. I also found a new passion in doing active things that I never thought my body could do - it's incredibly empowering to see your body accomplish things you never thought it could do. It definitely drives me to see just what I can get my body to do lol

Hello fellow sleevers. I have been on this site very little in the past couple of years but have logged in today to respond to a question. Since I'm here, I feel obligated to tell you all the things I've learned after 5 years.
1. The people that told me my approach to living life with the sleeve was all wrong and that I would fail, gain weight in a few years, stretch my sleeve, and regret my actions are mostly gone now. I have seen a couple of them around but the most are long gone. Do not pay much attention to the know-it-alls. They know no more than anyone else and are just as likely to fail.
2. Obviously you want to follow your Dr's instructions but don't get too hung up on strict rules and diets. If you make reasonable decisions and balance your good and bad food choices, your sleeve will do most of the work for you. I have eaten anything I wanted since day one. I try to pay attention to Protein etc., but I do not deny myself anything. You have the sleeve for a reason. Let it do it's job. Don't force it to hold more than it can and do not deny yourself the things that make you happy. Balance - just do it.
3. WLS is much more than losing weight. It is getting to the bottom of the issues that cause us to compensate with food in the first place. Pay more attention to your mental well being than the numbers on the scale. Your long term success depends on it.
4. Know that even after you reach your goal weight you will still be the same person with the same insecurities. Being thin changes nothing. If you did it for health reasons then hopefully those will no longer be an issue, but the person you are and how you feel inside doesn't change from losing weight. That has to change on the inside. No way around it.
5. Know that once you have made the necessary changes inside and out there will be some people that don't relate to you the same or just plain don't like you anymore. Also know that what they think is completely irrelevant . Physical and mental changes for the better intimidate those with small minds. Don't give them a second thought.
Thanks for reading.

Rooting for you! It WILL happen! 🤗
Wearing my wedding ring again has been 1 of my favorite NSV!

This is a tough one bc there is no guarantee how your body will react.
I had the sleeve, but totally would have had RNY if I had GERD preop. I had terrible GERD when I was pregnant and I never want to go through it again! I have serious compassion for all of you out there with chronic GERD.
You said you read a lot of research. Just curious, have you read any that included the elevated risk of esophageal cancer with chronic GERD?

Went shopping yesterday: I officially DO NOT wear plus sizes anymore!
A whole world of possibilities has opened up! It is exciting and overwhelming.
BYE Torrid, Lane Bryant, and the scary back corner of Macy's!

I have had many NSVs in the last 6 months since my surgery:
Not worrying about fitting in the seats at the amusement park TUCKING IN MY SHIRT...I've never actually done that Having my kids arms go the whole way around when they hug me New clothes, new shoes Riding bike again after 10+ years Feeling proud I am almost 6 months post-op. No regrets, only wish I had done it sooner!

Celebratory weekend with family and every meal I shared with someone, I no longer have to eat everything I order. I can even simply throw it away ... Liberating

Everyday. I need the accountability in my life.

Daily.
Get up.
Make the pee pee.
Strip off the jammies.
Pull the scale out of the time out closet.
Get on.
Groan.
Record weight.
Put the jammies back on and start day.
💁‍♀️

I’m in the daily camp, after I shower, and before I eat/ drink anything, unless I wash my hair and then nope. I do plan to back off on the weigh ins as I get more secure in what I’m doing.

For me it’s been good to catch the stalls and see the fluctuations in real time. Did I eat not so healthy - I’ll see it, did I go on a long walk, I’ll see the connections. For me it’s a quick way for me to be accountable (and honest) to myself as I’m horrible at food logging.

While traveling for two weeks where I had no access to a scale and because I was so busy/active it didn’t bother me. But I did loose that connection on what I ate/activity.

Twice daily (sometimes more often). Yes, I’m obsessive. Yes it can dictate my mood for the day. Stalls can be particularly painful for me.
Even when there is a clear hormonal reason why I might be fluctuating up, it can still bum me out.
For me, weighing is part of my morning ritual. Its an important reminder every morning to stay on track and be healthy.
I have lost weight a million times before bariatric surgery and every time I regained it was because I stopped weighing myself everyday.
I do wish I could stop the panicked evening weigh ins though. Once a day should be enough. My family has threatened to hide my scale but I would literally run out and buy a new scale and hide it!
i do not recommend that anyone else engage in my insane behaviour!

I’m one week postop. The day I got home from the hospital I had my kids hide the scale. I don’t want to focus on my weight at this point. If I could opt out of weighing in at my follow up appointments I would. I don’t need to see it fluctuating and stressing me out.

At six weeks post I’ll ask for the scale back and weigh myself once a week Monday mornings.

I Have SOOO much respect for those of you that can weigh daily and not let the stalls and fluctuations get you down! I think I could some weeks, but my head space changes so much! You all are an inspiration though, It gives me so much hope to see how well everyone is doing, no matter their schedule or lack there of with the scale!

@GreenTealael Removing it! Genius. lol, not even kidding. I cant get rid of the one in my house completely...but I might try hiding it between weigh ins. Dont need it sitting there staring at me when ever I have to visit the bathroom.. .

I weigh weekly on Monday mornings... It keeps me trying through the weekend since I know my I'm going to weigh in Monday....