I started the journey toward this surgery in many ways about six years ago. My wife had a roux en y bypass, and I just wasn't ready for it. My insurer at the time did not approve lap band, and I could not handle the idea of malabsorption. I knew there would come a time when I would take a step like this. I was also in law school and didn't want to interrupt my studies.

Fast forward to January 2010. I'm an assistant public defender, and I got a message from my new insurer that a twelve month life coaching/supervised diet would be required for surgery. I decided at that point it was time do do something about my 479 pound self and signed up to begin orientation at Commonwealth Surgeons in Richmond, Virginia. They treated my wife right, so I feel comfortable with them. I went in expecting fully that I'd be resigned to lap band since I am still not a fan of malabsorption. That's when I heard about the VSG. My insurer, Anthem, wasn't approving that procedure but I could hope that would change. I got to start my year of waiting in June (paperwork troubles on the insurer's part), and I found out in December I could get the Sleeve!

I finished my coaching in June only to find out my psychiatrist had not completed the written evaluation. It took nearly all of June to persuade him to finish what he started in February. I then ran into a mistake on the part of my surgeon's office that happily they worked with me to correct and we literally beat the clock on getting the surgery scheduled in August without harming my clients by about 5 minutes. I have pre-op education on July 20 and blood work on August 2.

I got down to 416, and I settled in now at about 425. I don't have high aspirations -- 250 would be outstanding, and anything south of 300 would just about tickle me pink.

Have I missed anything?

Welcome Jimmy! I am hoping for mid-August myself, my last supervised diet visit is tomorrow! Make sure and stop by the 2011 forum and post in the August thread!!

Well, congrats for getting here! That is a great day in my opinion (it is my mom's b-day). Good luck on your journey and again congrats on getting a date!

Congrats that you were approved and will soon have a surgery date! Woo Hoo! Wow- to the year long supervised diet- never heard of one that long. But you are done now and ready for the next stage! Good luck to you with your surgery and continuing on this journey!