vikingbeast

Honestly, I only had to take little baby sips for a few days. I could take Water no problem after that. Now I do split my supplements into a couple of "rounds" (at least until I get those Vitamins that @lizonaplane recommended!) because the amount of water I need to take that many pills does fill my pouch.

That is astonishing. Well done! And inspirational. I am closing in on double digits down from my start weight (in old money!) and can't wait for that to happen.

Don't be discouraged. And don't beat yourself up! Be nice to our friend greenwitch17, she's pretty awesome.
The delays are unfortunate. Did the former office at least get you started on whatever program is needed for your insurance to cover? Some insurances like to see 3 or 6 months of "medically supervised weight loss" 🙄before you can move forward with surgery. Or there are all sorts of other hurdles, like getting sign-off from your psychiatrist, etc.
As for the depression—many of us have been there. I am discovering that my weight was a HUGE part of my depression, both emotionally ("why can't I lose this weight, what is wrong with me") and physically (obesity causes depression which causes obesity, etc., etc., etc.). I am on a quarter dose of my antidepressant which feels liberating because I don't have many bouts of depression anymore even on such a low dose. They're going to try to take me off in a couple of months, and I'm curious whether that will actually happen. (My depression manifests as lethargy and The Impossible Task™.)
You will get there. And we're here for you both now and later. And a year from now you're going to be living your best life, #hotgirlsummer or whatever hashtag we're using next year.

I had exactly the same thoughts... if I can drop this weight like this during the pre-op diet, why can't I just... continue?
But I couldn't have, and I talked to my surgeon's staff about it.
The pre-op diet (not that I had one necessarily, I put myself on it so I didn't go from nought to sixty in one day) is meant to be a crash diet. It is meant to shrink things and get a little visceral fat off you so that it's safer to do laparoscopic surgery. It is not sustainable long-term without surgery, and it is not meant to be.
The other thing is—all or nearly all of us have binge-eaten in our past. Whether we have a healthy or unhealthy relationship with food, we've all overindulged. Well, after surgery, you literally CAN'T binge... and, bizarrely enough, most people don't WANT to. The first time you take ONE BITE too much, you will really feel that restriction and the resulting sensations (for me, it's massive chest pressure, and terrible gas that causes me to spit up) will make sure you learn what "full" feels like.
I was a pizza eater. I could demolish an entire pizza myself in one sitting, because once I started I couldn't stop. Yesterday (just over 7 weeks post-op) I delivered pizza to my daughter's dress rehearsal, opened up the box, took a slice, had one bite, shrugged, and threw the rest of the slice away. It's like my body's been given this tool and it is forcing my brain to reckon with how I eat/ate.
I wish I had found this site and gone for this surgery ten or more years ago. When I was nervous about the surgery—I had exactly the same thoughts as you—my family reminded me that I had tried REALLY hard, and never gotten below 330, then gained it all back until I was two cheeseburgers shy of 400 lbs.
I went below that 330 mark 13 days after surgery. I'm now closing in on TWOsday, and I honestly feel like a different (and happier) person.
Ultimately, only you can make the decision, but I think you'll find the ratio of yeasayers to naysayers here at BariatricPal to be massively tilted in the "yes do it" direction.

I chose to do the surgery because I was tired of being held back, energy-wise, by carrying two of me around everywhere.
I'm an aspiring filmmaker and photographer. I've been at this for 3 years, and my weight was holding me back because I would go into a shoot knowing that I had a finite amount of energy to work with and I better make it count. I had to tap out early from a once-in-a-lifetime shoot over the summer because after I had dragged all my gear up the stairs I was too tired and sore to keep going for much longer. I fainted while taking a friend's wedding photos over the summer because I overheated.
Additionally, my content is on YouTube and I was constantly worried that someone would discover my "dirty secret"--that the "Betty Badass" urban explorer they were watching was morbidly obese. I'd go out of my way to edit around portions of my footage where you could see my reflection in shop windows, etc, because I didn't want to be made fun of. My fear of my own camera kept me from connecting with my audience.
I decided to appear on camera for the first time two weeks after my surgery--I told myself it was time to be fearless and if someone had something to say, they can watch me shrink over the next year and eat their words. I managed to accumulate about 3-4 months of content before my surgery that I'll be putting together while I'm recovering, and I can't wait to hit the road again. I can't wait to be able to actually ride my motorcycle. I can't wait to not get winded going up stairs.
If I can survive this process, I can survive anything. There have been moments since the surgery I've felt like I was walking barefoot through hell, but I'm starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I know how indestructible I am now.

So I can be around longer for my children and be around for my future grandchildren. I also wanted to be healthy and not short of breath all the time. I was 349lbs in March 2021 and started my gastric sleeve journey May 14 (342lbs) and I’m 271 and about to have surgery Nov 15. I’m so excited!!

I did it to get my life back. I didn't want to waste any more years of what's left of my life as a self-loathing shut-in, which is what I'd allowed myself to become.
And it's already working. My self esteem is slowly returning, my energy is back, my happiness is growing. I can see the sunrise on the horizon for the first time in 17 years.

I had exactly the same thoughts... if I can drop this weight like this during the pre-op diet, why can't I just... continue?
But I couldn't have, and I talked to my surgeon's staff about it.
The pre-op diet (not that I had one necessarily, I put myself on it so I didn't go from nought to sixty in one day) is meant to be a crash diet. It is meant to shrink things and get a little visceral fat off you so that it's safer to do laparoscopic surgery. It is not sustainable long-term without surgery, and it is not meant to be.
The other thing is—all or nearly all of us have binge-eaten in our past. Whether we have a healthy or unhealthy relationship with food, we've all overindulged. Well, after surgery, you literally CAN'T binge... and, bizarrely enough, most people don't WANT to. The first time you take ONE BITE too much, you will really feel that restriction and the resulting sensations (for me, it's massive chest pressure, and terrible gas that causes me to spit up) will make sure you learn what "full" feels like.
I was a pizza eater. I could demolish an entire pizza myself in one sitting, because once I started I couldn't stop. Yesterday (just over 7 weeks post-op) I delivered pizza to my daughter's dress rehearsal, opened up the box, took a slice, had one bite, shrugged, and threw the rest of the slice away. It's like my body's been given this tool and it is forcing my brain to reckon with how I eat/ate.
I wish I had found this site and gone for this surgery ten or more years ago. When I was nervous about the surgery—I had exactly the same thoughts as you—my family reminded me that I had tried REALLY hard, and never gotten below 330, then gained it all back until I was two cheeseburgers shy of 400 lbs.
I went below that 330 mark 13 days after surgery. I'm now closing in on TWOsday, and I honestly feel like a different (and happier) person.
Ultimately, only you can make the decision, but I think you'll find the ratio of yeasayers to naysayers here at BariatricPal to be massively tilted in the "yes do it" direction.

The gas is seriously no joke! But the more you walk around, the sooner it'll be gone. Ask your nurse if you can have chewable simethicone (a.k.a. Gas-X), it helped me IMMENSELY.

Did you buy new, closer-fitting clothes?

The gas is seriously no joke! But the more you walk around, the sooner it'll be gone. Ask your nurse if you can have chewable simethicone (a.k.a. Gas-X), it helped me IMMENSELY.

My coach wants me to get a weight vest, load it up to where I was when I started, and try to run even just 400 m. I'm skeert.

Seriously, I keep trying to contrive a reason to fly somewhere! But a lot of places I could fly I'd need a rental car, and they're rarer than hen's teeth and more expensive than Fabergé eggs when you do find them. But it is on my list.
I got to check off one of my Purple Goals (my list of NSVs) yesterday—I had a business lunch and arrived second, and my lunch date had gotten a booth. Normally that would be a huge embarrassing thing because I couldn't have fit at all. Yesterday I just scootched right in there and actually had to lean forward over the table to eat what little I did eat.

Thank you for your thoughtful post. Right now I'm scouring through the "NSV" thread that was quoted above, and my heart is letting some joy come in thinking of these things. Having lost some weight before, I can recall how GOOD some of them felt. So freaking GOOD!
Congratulations on your being thisclose to the twos as well.
I never thought I'd see 300 again, and I did just before my pre-op diet. That, also, was a reminder to me of where I've been, how far I've come, and where I want to be a couple years from now. ♥️

I had exactly the same thoughts... if I can drop this weight like this during the pre-op diet, why can't I just... continue?
But I couldn't have, and I talked to my surgeon's staff about it.
The pre-op diet (not that I had one necessarily, I put myself on it so I didn't go from nought to sixty in one day) is meant to be a crash diet. It is meant to shrink things and get a little visceral fat off you so that it's safer to do laparoscopic surgery. It is not sustainable long-term without surgery, and it is not meant to be.
The other thing is—all or nearly all of us have binge-eaten in our past. Whether we have a healthy or unhealthy relationship with food, we've all overindulged. Well, after surgery, you literally CAN'T binge... and, bizarrely enough, most people don't WANT to. The first time you take ONE BITE too much, you will really feel that restriction and the resulting sensations (for me, it's massive chest pressure, and terrible gas that causes me to spit up) will make sure you learn what "full" feels like.
I was a pizza eater. I could demolish an entire pizza myself in one sitting, because once I started I couldn't stop. Yesterday (just over 7 weeks post-op) I delivered pizza to my daughter's dress rehearsal, opened up the box, took a slice, had one bite, shrugged, and threw the rest of the slice away. It's like my body's been given this tool and it is forcing my brain to reckon with how I eat/ate.
I wish I had found this site and gone for this surgery ten or more years ago. When I was nervous about the surgery—I had exactly the same thoughts as you—my family reminded me that I had tried REALLY hard, and never gotten below 330, then gained it all back until I was two cheeseburgers shy of 400 lbs.
I went below that 330 mark 13 days after surgery. I'm now closing in on TWOsday, and I honestly feel like a different (and happier) person.
Ultimately, only you can make the decision, but I think you'll find the ratio of yeasayers to naysayers here at BariatricPal to be massively tilted in the "yes do it" direction.

I did not have a lot for some reason but it is not at all uncommon to have doubts pre surgery. It is a major surgery which is a major decision. You are the only one who knows what’s truly best for you but my guess is that you are doing this because you have already tried everything else. Try to focus on WHY you want the surgery? And your non scale goals. You started down this path for a reason. What is your why and what do you hope to gain. There is a thread on here called “weirdest non scale victories” that I think everyone considering WLS should read. It will help you if you don’t already have a list on non scale goals for after surgery.

Like @lizonaplane, I get this if I eat too quickly. It does dissipate but it hurts! Maybe try to get a small timer (if you have Apple devices, Looping Reminder is an app that you can set for, say, every three minutes... it taps my wrist and I eat a bite).

My coach wants me to get a weight vest, load it up to where I was when I started, and try to run even just 400 m. I'm skeert.

Seriously, I keep trying to contrive a reason to fly somewhere! But a lot of places I could fly I'd need a rental car, and they're rarer than hen's teeth and more expensive than Fabergé eggs when you do find them. But it is on my list.
I got to check off one of my Purple Goals (my list of NSVs) yesterday—I had a business lunch and arrived second, and my lunch date had gotten a booth. Normally that would be a huge embarrassing thing because I couldn't have fit at all. Yesterday I just scootched right in there and actually had to lean forward over the table to eat what little I did eat.

Like @lizonaplane, I get this if I eat too quickly. It does dissipate but it hurts! Maybe try to get a small timer (if you have Apple devices, Looping Reminder is an app that you can set for, say, every three minutes... it taps my wrist and I eat a bite).

Seriously, I keep trying to contrive a reason to fly somewhere! But a lot of places I could fly I'd need a rental car, and they're rarer than hen's teeth and more expensive than Fabergé eggs when you do find them. But it is on my list.
I got to check off one of my Purple Goals (my list of NSVs) yesterday—I had a business lunch and arrived second, and my lunch date had gotten a booth. Normally that would be a huge embarrassing thing because I couldn't have fit at all. Yesterday I just scootched right in there and actually had to lean forward over the table to eat what little I did eat.

I will say that I have multiple friends with diagnosed PCOS that have had WLS (two sleeves, one RNY) and they can't believe they didn't do it sooner.
But just a reminder that a sleeve is a TOOL. It basically gives you some time to figure out how to reevaluate how and what you eat, and develop not only a new way of eating, but to make it an ingrained habit. So basically your choices are diet + exercise, or diet + exercise with tool. And it sounds like you've already tried diet + exercise.

So now that I'm down a significant amount of weight, I get more people telling me I look younger. Maybe because my face isn't all stretched out?
I also notice that people are much nicer to thinner people than they are to fatter people. That annoys me (I am still the same person!) but it's just bizarre. Someone flirted with me the other day and it took me a while to realize it was flirtation.

Seriously, I keep trying to contrive a reason to fly somewhere! But a lot of places I could fly I'd need a rental car, and they're rarer than hen's teeth and more expensive than Fabergé eggs when you do find them. But it is on my list.
I got to check off one of my Purple Goals (my list of NSVs) yesterday—I had a business lunch and arrived second, and my lunch date had gotten a booth. Normally that would be a huge embarrassing thing because I couldn't have fit at all. Yesterday I just scootched right in there and actually had to lean forward over the table to eat what little I did eat.

@catwoman7 has it exactly right on the NSAIDs—Aleve is right out, too.

My bariatric Vitamins literally were gummies. I mentioned it to my surgeon and he said just chew it thoroughly ("enjoy that artificial berry flavor from the New Jersey Turnpike," were his exact words). As long as the amounts of each on the back were what he wanted, he didn't care. No issues with gummies.