Zom B

Hey I’m day 3 post op and I still feel muscle tenderness and bad gas. I sneezed last night and almost wanted to cry! The pain was excruciating
I finished 1 shake earlier and it looks like I’ll finish my second this evening around 8-9
fluids are good, Urine is light yellow. sugar free Gatorade is saving me right now! Might do some broth later

Congratulations! I had sx on 8/19/20 and have gone from 241 the day of surgery to 212 today. Tired of eating the same things every day but happy to see the weight loss. I went from a 3xl top to an xl and a 4xl bottom to a 2xl. I also have the straining or not at all problem but found out that more Water and two prunes a day are helping. Hope you get help too.

Saw my surgeon and told him about the discomfort. He said it’s most likely due to a stitch that hasn’t popped yet. He also put me back on stool softeners as well. Hopefully this and the prunes will get things going in the right direction. How is everyone doing?

Good afternoon, after a long drawn out battle to get the insurance to approve my surgery I'm scheduled for the 29th. I'm starting my liquid diet today. so far so good. this new flavor shake/ pudding is so good. I'm pleasantly surprised

Yay! Congrats! Good luck!

Hey ! Thank you My surgery is today I’m a bit nervous but trying to keep calm

Your doctor can give you something called bentyl to try that might help

Always a worthwhile discussion as so many are in this “constipation boat” with us. Everyone has been so helpful with suggestions, Miralax, MOM, Benefiber, Psyllium, Dulcolax, glycerin suppositories, Smooth Move tea, enema’s, along with increased fruits, veggies, increased fluids, consistently walking 2+ miles daily. Have tried each of these, and still do many, with great hope but nothing works more than a few days. Perhaps it truly is just an Irritable Bowel in grouchy mode from being messed with during surgery. It seems for many to ultimately resolve itself over time to a large degree...?🤷‍♀️
My surgeon prefers the Benefiber route, my PCP prefers MOM full dose daily until a good movement is produced and then a tablespoon of MOM nightly as maintenance. He added “your body needs the magnesium anyway”.
Sadly, the tbls. nightly doesn’t maintain. Ready to give Linzess, for irritable bowel (and not a laxative) another whirl.
Good luck Zom B, and thanks everyone for discussion.💝

O.K. So you had sleeve surgery a little over 3 weeks ago. And the problem that you were having was a severe allergic reaction to a cat. It wasn't the flu or COVID or a cold. Problem solved, that's good!
What concerns me the most is your inability to drink fluids. Your surgery was a little different than mine but your requirements should be similar at this stage. My requirements read:
"Drink 64-80 ounces of water or a low calorie liquid daily (1 sippy cup every 45 minutes to 1 hour). This includes any protein supplement in liquid form. [That means that your Liquid Protein shake counts toward meeting the 64-80 ounce Fluid requirement.] 75-90 grams of protein is required daily following surgery. Do not start your protein supplements until day 5 after surgery or until you have passed gas. If you are struggling to get all your protein in after 2 weeks from being released from the hospital, please contact the dietitians. If you find a brand of protein not on your list and it has greater than 20 grams of protein and less than 5 grams of sugar, you may use it."
So you are far enough out that your stomach should have recovered from the surgery and you should be meeting your daily protein and fluid requirements or at least close.
So my concern is fluids. Without the fluids your body will become dehydrated. You will become weak. Signs of dehydration are:
* Not peeing or having very dark yellow pee
* Very dry skin
* Feeling dizzy
* Rapid heartbeat
* Rapid breathing
* Sunken eyes
*Sleepiness, lack of energy, confusion or irritability
*Fainting
Severe dehydration is a medical emergency and needs to be treated immediately.
So it is a little difficult for me to understand how much daily fluids you are currently taking in by your description, but if you are not meeting the fluid requirement and not even close, then you need to focus your energy here. I would also recommend you contact your surgeon's office and explain your difficulties.

After my WLS I had a few family and friends (F/F) get WLS also. Post WLS is different for most everyone. I see it first hand with my F/F. People do feel hunger after WLS. Surprised me but it is true. The main thing is to reassure them that it will take some time for your brain to catch up to your new stomach. After awhile the brain adjusts and the hunger somewhat subsides. The saving grace is the restriction at the beginning will save you. No matter what your brain is asking for your new stomach cannot handle it. Your stomach will will stop you from over eating.
The most important thing that I advise those F/F that want to deviate from the program is not to. Do not deviate from the planned diet your medical team has given you. It is there for a reason. It is there to protect your new stomach from damage, it is there to help you start a new healthier way of eating and it's there to set you up for your future success.
This forum is good but if you can contact people "like us" and be able to talk to them when you feel that you're going to deviate you'd be much better off. I'm fortunate as I not only have F/F that I can call and talk to, I'm also a member of Overeaters Anonymous which also gives me another support group.
Don't ever despair that you didn't stick to the plan 100% learn from it and try your best to improve on it. Positivity I find will always help you more than beating yourself up. Good luck and congratulations on your new health.

Actually I was terribly hungry at that point and the surgeon said it was pretty common

That doesn't really make a difference. The point is that people get flak for "eating off plan".
People "confess" here because they're scared. They know they're going to get flak, but they're scared. Scared, they did some damage. Scared to go to their doctors because it's worse being scolded at the doctor's office than on an internet board. Scared, that they already failed or that they already gambled with their future success and lost.
But most content of this thought train is catastrophizing bullshit.
Now while it's not great to eat "off plan" when being in the early healing phase it's nothing really uncommon. Just look at this board alone.
Giving people flak doesn't help them though. People need encouragement to get up again, dust themselves up and continue doing better than they did before. Self-righteousness and pointing out that you yourself "are sticking 110% to the plan" is helping no one but your own ego (not talking about you personally here, mind you).

Thank you very much for posting this info!
I found COVID definitely had a major impact on my weight loss program. I was supposed to attend 10 education classes. Only got to do 2 of them before the classes were canceled for the foreseeable future. Fortunately, being in the revision boat, I still had a lot of the knowledge from the first go-round. And my dietician visit was a 20 minute phone call where I pretty much just confirmed I was still on the original diet plan they dictated for me and that it was working as I was losing weight every week. So no changes were really needed. There's been a lot of other COVID related changes to my post-op plan that I'm finding annoying, but ultimately it is what it is and I'm making the best of it.

Considering there are numerous people on these forums who've traveled to Mexico and paid for their surgeries out of pocket, thus not having to deal with insurance requirements or program requirements, yes. There are people who have had WLS and not met with a dietician pre or post-op. There are people who do not get detailed post-op diet instruction from a WLS team. Not all surgeons or programs are created equal. Some are very strict. Some are more lax. I take the OP at her word that her program was more lax and led to her trying to sate her hunger with a muffin tin egg fritatta bite (not an Egg McMuffin as some wrongly assumed).
Best of luck with your continued post-op recovery!

The OP explained much about the situation that led to her decision in this follow up post. She states that her doctor has not actually set her on any kind of a plan. She states that she had not yet had not had an appointment with a dietician and was looking forward to the appointment she had later that week with one so that she could have a guided plan to work from. The OP also stated that she used the feedback and advice given to adjust her habits and stick to pureed foods. OP also stated that she began to write down a schedule of her meals and to specifically focus on Protein for Snacks and meals. The OP's post was made over a month ago and I'm not really sure why it got resurrected. OP's meal in that post did not involve "2 slices of bread".

You must’ve missed the first reply which was a picture of what the OP actually ate- an egg muffin or baked egg cup. Lots of people missed that fact because the picture wasn’t in the original post.

Turns out you also missed the OP’s reply that she felt terrible after and was in pain but also planned on texting the surgeon to discuss what happened.

Berating her and telling her she needs therapy isn’t going to help, just like the enabling won’t. Compassion and empathy go a long way. We were all new to post-op at one point and nothing you can do will truly prepare you for it. Take a deep breath and realize the OP learned a valuable lesson from this.

Just as a point of clarification: she didn’t eat an Egg McMuffin (which was what I though at first). She said egg muffin and from the picture that she posted, it looks like she made a baked scrambled egg bite using a muffin tin. So, if that is the case, it’s certainly a better thing than an actual egg McMuffin, but still not the best option for 6 days post-op when the stomach is still healing.

Yup. I had that "head hunger" bad in the first few weeks & it really makes you believe you're hungry. MANY people on here have discussed having this on here. It is not uncommon at all. For most - it is all in your head, but perception is reality..

Had my surgery October 7th converted to bypass and hiatal hernia repair. Had someStill feeling pain and had some really rough nights. Last night was first night I slept through without any incidents. Turns out nurse in hospital told me wrong pills to crush and once I figured that out it made a huge difference. Loss of energy , sleeping a lot , walking a lot to move gas . Things are improving day by day. No issues with drinking Water or Protein Shakes.

Be careful with senna, it irritates the bladder. Although more so for me because I eventually found out I have interstitial cystitis. I tried Ayurvedic (Triphala but you can get a blend of herbs) they all say short term use. I’d rather not rely on anything but when you have a complicated medical history everything is complicated ... years ago I took zelnorm and it was good but got pulled from the market. My gastroenterologist gave me at least five medications to replace it and I tried but got very sick and I said no way. His answer well let me know if you find something that works ...
linzess is good but a bit inconsistent. When all else fails it’s worth trying since it’s not a laxative.
Honestly they don’t take it as seriously as you would think. I had a ct show severe narrowing of the colon. I have had bleeding. My gastroenterologist once said well unless I end up in hospital in an emergency situation then nothing they could do ... because My colonoscopies show diverticulitis. I’ve had for years usually you get them after age 60. Of course during colonoscopy they expand the colon with air they won’t see functional conditions. And they right off assume bleeding is hemorrhoids. Like I want to say that’s something natural like a cushion system to protect the bowels but it’s not natural to have bleeding.
sorry to sound angry. I am having some issue that my blood labs showed elevated liver levels I need them rechecked. And very pale stools. As well as bleeding, I’m just hesitant to see the gastroenterologist I sure as heck am not having colonoscopy again why you ask? Prior to my last one I had pelvic surgery and part of that surgery was damaged by the colonoscopy. And I had to have the surgery done again to fix it. The doctor was having to go in anyway due to endometriosis and he ended up finding out for sure ive interstitial cystitis. I’m just grateful he did fix it. But it meant more incisions and stitches.
stupid browser posted my message before I was ready and now I’m not sure exactly what I meant to say ...

Oh dear...I trust you’ve called Dr. re bleeding Constipation? My heart goes out to you on this whole issue...for many of us bowels are a challenge. Just when I think I’ve nailed what works- it doesn’t, so from my end I can’t really give good advice. Lately, what has worked for me is Swiss Kriss, which is senna and herbs. It is a laxative, however, and daily laxative is not where I want to be.

I see my PCP in a few weeks and am planning to give Linzess (not a laxative) another try. At 11 weeks out he suggested it and gave me samples to try. Deep down I felt I hadn’t given my body, fruits, veggies, fiber, more volume enough time, so after his samples were over decided against it-though it did seem to work. Now? Seven months out? I’ve tried it all and ready to give Linzess a “go” (pun intended😅).
Best of luck to you and keep us posted!💖

I am scheduled for October 29th! 😁I hope everyone's surgery goes wonderfully!

Oct 19th here!

Just had my surgery October 6th. Stayed overnight, home late afternoon on the 7th. Doing the Stage 2 liquid diet. I was offline for a bit and updating my info here now. Good thoughts sent out to all October 2020 surgery folks!

my surgery is less than 48 hours away and my anxiety has now kicked into high gear!