ouroborous

Well with today's "coming to jebus" moment at the nutritionist -- realizing that I'm eating too much, too fast -- I'm sure that the weight will start coming off faster for me. I'll be going from 1200+ cals per day wolfed down to 800 calories per day chewed slowly and carefully.

Well, I just had a very informative nutritionist appointment, and I followed it up with a quick jaunt over to the doctor (one benefit of going to PSSC is that the nutritionist and surgeon's office are across the parking lot from each other!) First, the surgeon cleared me to take the OTC omeprazole. This is good because (1) the prescription capsules were a pain to get and to consume (the little grains went EVERYWHERE) and (2) I felt like the OTC version -- which has an enteric coating -- was much more effective. So far today I've had 20 mg of omeprazole (the doc wants me to take 40 mg/day for now, instead of 80mg/day) and I feel pretty good, acid-wise. Second, both the surgeon and the nut. agreed that I'm consuming stuff WAY too fast. Specifically I'm drinking too much water! Given that I'm consuming 100-120 oz day, both the nut. and surgeon agreed that that's likely what's causing the reflux. No room in the inn, so the water just forces acid to bubble back up. I honestly never even considered that; I drank water to SOOTHE my throat, but maybe it was making it worse. So now I'm not supposed to drink more than 80 oz/day, and I'm supposed to pace myself so that I'm not consuming more than 12 oz/45 minutes. I'm also supposed to stop drinking 30 minutes before and after a meal (thought I only had to do that on solids!) and stop consuming anything 1-2 hrs before bedtime (when my reflux is worst). So, I'm relieved that I may have a solution for my reflux that doesn't involve massive, massive amounts of drugs. I'm trying it out today -- so far, so good. I'm a little annoyed that my first nutritionist (who I won't mention by name, but with whom I'm currently attempting to cancel ALL of my followup appointments) didn't tell me ANY of this. Keep your fingers crossed. If I can tame this reflux, the sleeve will be a breeze! Oh, and yeah, I'm supposed to be targeting 600-800 calories/day. The first nutritionist didn't mention THAT, either!

Heh. This is why weighing yourself too frequently is a bad idea... I'm going to see the nutritionist this morning, and they're going to weigh me. So, since I wanted to get my weight before eating Breakfast and drinking a couple of pints of Water and putting on all my clothes (that's a few pounds right there), I stepped on the scale. ARGH... still not below 300 -- 301.0. The big picture is that I'm still down 14 pounds in 15 days, so I shouldn't complain. It's just that I really, really wanted to be below 300!

Sassie, I'm very sorry you're going through this. Knowing that folks like you are dealing so gracefully with REAL complications makes me embarrassed to be complaining so much about my paltry acid reflux. I hope you get better soon.

I'm glad that it's becoming more socially acceptable to be an unbeliever. Twenty years ago -- even ten -- people would assume you were a pedophile or something. Hope all of us infidel sleevers are doing well!

I second (third) this. Tell them that you've had abdominal surgery and shouldn't really be doing hard core work for a month or so. You don't have to go into details if you don't want to (although frankly I'm telling everyone since I don't have any problem with people knowing).

Oh I almost forgot. I have a Weight Watchers branded digital scale and it's very reliable and weighs up to 350 lbs. Highly recommended.

Posture and foot placement are surprisingly important with these scales, unfortunately. Try to make sure you always stand up straight (and you're not leaning to either side or forward/back), and try to always place your feet in about the same location on the scale.

Yeah, the regular sleep deprivation is probably the worst part of all of this. I could deal with the reflux if it wasn't keeping me up at night.

Well my doc's assistant told me to take 80mg/day for now. I figure that for the short term that's not too big of a risk. The Carafate doesn't seem to do much, but the doc says it helps protect the tissues from the acid, so I'm trying to take it to prevent the reflux from damaging my esophagus or sleeve/stomach lining. Yeah, I'm staying away from heavy food for a little while, but I can't skip the CPAP. I don't sleep at all with it. The question is what is the right pressure; I think it's a little high right now since I wake up with MAJOR dry mouth (when I sleep), but the problem is that if I lower the pressure, I wake up with apnea attacks. And my apnea attacks seem to trigger reflux attacks, so... It's a pain. I keep trying to remind myself that this is only a phase in my healing, and it will pass... but when it's 4am and I can't get any sleep and I'm scared that it's going to be like this forever, it's hard to be all calm and optimistic and zen-like about it.

...another rough night, up most of the night with acid reflux and a swollen throat (that felt like it was closing up). I took more drugs than I care to mention. I finally turned the corner after I took some liquid Tylenol (I dunno, maybe it helped the swelling go down?) and forced myself to use my wedge pillow. The wedge pillow definitely helps a lot with preventing more reflux (although obviously it does nothing if I'm already raw and swollen). The problem is it's too tall; it's got a 12" rise and I feel like I'm sitting up, not lying down, and have a hard time getting comfortable. I've ordered another one from Amazon that got rave reviews from folks with reflux, and it's only got a 7" rise. Hopefully I can begin regularly sleeping on that one and "heal" my reflux. It's still a major pain trying to juggle all these meds and treatments -- omeprazole, Carafate, Mylanta, hot tea, heating pad... They all have their own limitations and restrictions, none seems to be 100% effective. I just can't wait until I'm out of this burning, choking acid phase. It's really for the birds. When I'm not troubled by acid, I feel great! And I'm losing weight fast. It's just that when the reflux flares up I'm MISERABLE and panicky and can't sleep.

I never feel hunger; sometimes my stomach growls, but that's ALWAYS acid for me. Are you on a high enough dose of the acid blocker? Trust me, you can have mild to moderate GERD and not even know it (for the longest time I thought I just had really bad allergies!)

Sorry you're in such pain. Once I was off the narcotics, liquid Tylenol was my best friend!

It didn't "fix" my reflux, but it did seem to help. At this point I'm desperate enough that I'll take anything :thumbup:

This is more of an "aha" than a question, but I think I just discovered that my leather belt (which I've had to tighten SEVERAL notches since I last wore it) may be worsening my acid reflux. I was having some more reflux today and I vaguely remembered a web page about it saying to not wear clothes that are tight around the middle, so I took my belt off and -- the reflux went away. I was all excited that I'm wearing skinnier jeans and a tightened belt, but I think I can live with things being a bit more baggy if it helps the reflux!

I'm not a doc or a nutritionist, but... 500 calories for a day sounds VERY low to me. Maybe you're feeling hungry because... you're hungry? Starving, literally. From what I understand of weight loss, sleeve or no sleeve, extreme caloric restriction tends to backfire. Some of the most successful people I've seen on here have said that sometimes they can actually lose more if they INCREASE their calories a little (or change up what the calories are composed of). Again, this is just my uninformed opinion, but still... 500 cals a day seems EXTREMELY low, especially at 7 mos. out! I suspect that you're feeling hungry because your body really needs nutrients, especially with lots of physical activity.

Congratulations, Angie! See, I told you you'd do great!

No preop diet? Yikes... Good luck! I'm sure you'll be fine!

Well, I just ran the numbers. The odds of serious complications are extremely low; leaks are 1% or less, and infections are even lower. Dr. Billing and Dr. Landerholm are both EXCELLENT surgeons. Dr. B did a sleeve and hiatal hernia repair on my girlfriend in the same operation with zero complications, and Dr. L did a straight sleeve on me with zero complications. If you're really worried, you have to budget more -- I think a 5-10 thousand dollar cushion would be sufficient. But honestly, the odds of this are so low -- especially if you comply with ALL of the doctor's orders, including the pre-op diet, to the letter -- that I just didn't worry too much about it.

I shave my head, so I think I may be the only person on here that's NOT worried about hair loss :scared0:

So far today, I've had: 1 premium Protein shake (160 cal, 30g protein, 5g carb) 1 Chobani greek yogurt (120 cal, 16g protein, 13g carb) I plan to have: 1 Jell-o sugar free chocolate pudding cup (60 cal, 2g protein, 14g carb) 1 cup Safeway Signature baked potato Soup (440 cal, 12g protein, 21g carb) -- this is my big "splurge" for the day 1 cup home made apple sauce (low sugar, don't know counts on this!) 1 more premium Protein Shake (160 cal, 30g protein, 5g carb) So, if I use Nutrition Facts and Analysis for Applesauce, canned, unsweetened, with added ascorbic acid for the apple sauce (which makes it 102 cal, 0g protein, 27g carbs), this works out to 1142 calories, 90g protein, and 85g carbs. That's a tad high on the carbs, great on the protein, and a bit high on the total calories. Omitting the baked potato soup or swapping it for something different would probably help a lot (just omitting it would get me to about 800 cals, 78g protein, and 64g carbs, which is not too bad, and swapping the apple sauce would help my carbs). Overall, I'm still losing weight like gang busters, so I'm not TOO worried, but I'll definitely talk to the nutritionist about this tomorrow.

Yeah I could definitely eat less. I'm never hungry at all, and I just eat because I feel like I SHOULD eat, you know? I'll talk to the nut. about it. Does the maintenance day help? If your ticker is up-to-date, I think we're just about on par in terms of weight lost. I've just been focusing on getting enough Protein, Water, and Vitamins. My discussion with the nutritionist should be interesting!

Congratulations! You'll be great!

I felt exactly the same way. In fact I didn't even get really NERVOUS about the surgery (and I'm a MEGA hypochondriac) until the morning of the surgery. And then it all happened so fast that I was sleeved before I had time to freak out. Now, post-sleeve by 13 days, I feel so... NORMAL that I have to remind myself that I had a major operation and to treat my body with care and follow all the guidelines. So I think what you're going through is very normal!

The insurance companies pretty much count on people giving up (or dying, to be honest). It's unethical, unfair, borderline illegal -- and just the way the system works. I did a self-pay. It was a guy-wrenching chunk of money to pay out of pocket, but I'm gambling that in the long term, the health benefits of weight loss and other things (cheaper food budget!) will even out.