I am so excited/nervous only 4 days away from WLS that took 15 years to commit to. 1/11/16 will be the day that I can always remember that I changed my life for good! I would love to keep in touch with anybody who is having surgery around the same time I am. Other than my Mom & of course my wife of 16 years, I have not told anybody! It would be nice to message with someone who knows what you're going through and having the same LIFE CHANGING journey around the same time. I would love to have some sleeve buddies, whom I can trust, support and help along the way and vice versa! Of course this journey won't be easy for any of us, However with this tool that is getting done to us (VSG), if we all stick to it...there is no doubt we can all accomplish our own personal weight loss goals!!

There are many advantages to not telling everybody in your life about getting a VSG, however the biggest negative is the lack of a support system I won't be getting. I have lost over 50 pounds over last 18 months to prepare for this surgery however I find most people whom have not been overweight their entire lives (LIKE I HAVE) really are judgmental about WLS and overweight people in general. It makes me sick and really question what the hell is wrong with these people! So personally speaking I choose to keep it private since I think this will be hard enough journey to accomplish without these negative nellies, making the situation even harder. I envy the many people on here that have such a great support system of friends and family but unfortunately I don't! I am not on Facebook so would prefer private messages/conversations. If interested, send me a message or post in this thread. I wish everybody good luck with their upcoming VSG and WE WILL SUCEED! Sorry for the long rant

I live in NC & am having the sleeve done Tuesday Jan 12th! Very excited..I, too, have been overweight all my life. I am

56y/o and have been trying to have WLS for more than than 10 years. God's timing is perfect though & everything has just fit into place. Since June, I've lost 40 pounds under supervised weight loss period required by insurance. I've lost 15# just on pre op diet. Much luck to you & stay in touch!

Congrats on such a great amount of weight loss prior to surgery. Glad to see so many of us having it around the same time. For somebody whom has considered WLS for 15 years, finally the time is perfect as well. Best of luck and God Bless. Keep in touch!

Holy crap guys, it's almost game time freaking out a little

Lol I woke up and said the exact same thing to my wife, I originally thought why do I have to wait so long! Now less than 48 hours and I am like Wow this just got so real!

I just keep saying to myself that I have mentally preparing for this day for at least 15 years and I have never been in the shape I currently am (walking 90 to 120 minute & 5 to 6 miles per day)

I have lost 60 pounds last 18 months in preparation for this, so there is not a better time for me to do this then now.

We all got this!!

Good luck to you all and please keep in touch with your progress!!

Hello everyone congratulations on ur new life changes I'm having my surgery on Wednesday 1/13 I can't wait I'm not nervous I'm more excited about everything I just in a lot of pain nd I keep having these headaches nd I can't take the medication that really helps with the headaches bcuz it has aspirin in it so I just have to deal with it or take some tylenol with codine nd I have to take that after surgery if needed but I don't want to take now nd need it later nd my body rejects the medication so I'll b in pain from the surgery so I'm stuck in a situation... Best of luck to us its a new year nd new us coming soon....if anyone would like to add me as a friend please feel free.... I'm sorry I'm from Illinois an hour from Chicago

Hello everyone congratulations on ur new life changes I'm having my surgery on Wednesday 1/13 I can't wait I'm not nervous I'm more excited about everything I just in a lot of pain nd I keep having these headaches nd I can't take the medication that really helps with the headaches bcuz it has aspirin in it so I just have to deal with it or take some tylenol with codine nd I have to take that after surgery if needed but I don't want to take now nd need it later nd my body rejects the medication so I'll b in pain from the surgery so I'm stuck in a situation... Best of luck to us its a new year nd new us coming soon....if anyone would like to add me as a friend please feel free.... I'm sorry I'm from Illinois an hour from Chicago

Best of Luck to you and everything will go GREAT. Just think a year from now where we all will be at

I actally sent you a message a few days ago since I saw we would be getting our surgery around the same time. Keep in touch and let me know how yours goes this week and I will do the same!

I can't believe I am less than 24hrs away from Surgery. Not even able to put into words everything that I feel and that is in my head right now!

Hi everyone. I was reading the blog and see that you all are being sleeved in January. There is a private group on Facebook called January 2016 sleevers from bariatric pal and it's really great. Since we're all going thru it and around the same time it has been a tremendous support. Check it out if you all want. Good luck to you all.

I would love to join the group! I'm not telling a lot of people about my sleeve tho. If I become a page member will my other friends see that I became a member of the page

Sent from my HTC6525LVW using Tapatalk

They will not I believe bc it is a closed group and no one on my friends list can see I'm in the group as I also am not telling anyone but a very select few.

I was sleeved on thursday. That procedure went very smooth. I am a little tender. I had my hiatal hernia fixed. That is rough. I feel like i have a marble in my throat and can feel everything go down. Doc says the swollen esophagus can take 6 weeks to go down. Kinda feels like something is stuck. Im going to limit how much I talk to help with the healing and will watch it closely. Walk,walk,walk after surgery to get rid of the gas.

my surgery date is the 20th. a lot of family know about my surgery but more concerned with problems that have been going on so they do not even think of the weight loss part of it. the biggest critic is my younger sis and she asked her dr. what he thought and he told her medical problems are the reason and weight loss the best results that shut her up good luck to you on this journey

Sorry it took me so long to update this thread. Thanks for the many personal messages sent to me over this last week. Crazy to think exactly a week ago this second, I was getting a VSG. So I thought it would be beneficial for others who are considering WLS for me to post the Good and the Bad so far 7 days post op that I was surprised by. I know I am only just starting my journey but these are things I was not prepared for, if that makes sense.

Bad:

1) Anesthesia: I pretty much was in a coma state for an additional 9 hours after surgery was completed. They tried everything to get me awake and had no luck. Once I was semi-awake I spent the next 12 hours trying to put words/sentences together and to be honest it was not easy. So without putting the blame on anybody, somebody messed up big time with my anesthesia. My wife actually passed out, out of fear after trying with my sister and nurses to wake me up for hours. They were putting huge shots into me and I was not even flinching. My eyes were pretty much rolled back and it scared them all. When I finally came around I had no clue where I was or what was going on. So this was not even one of my fears going in but by far the worst part of the surgery for me so far.

2) Taste/Smells: I had read about this going in but did not expect to be such a drastic change. For two months Pre-Op I tried so many different shakes, sugar free puddings, sugar free jellos etc… so that once I got home from surgery I would not have to waste time trying new items and I would already know what were my favorites. Pretty much everything I liked pre-op, I absolutely hate now and what I did not like pre-op, I love now. For me this so strange, I have been a vanilla lover for over 40 years, now I only like chocolate. Hopefully this will eventually change. Normal everyday food, smells are so intense. I was not prepared for this. I have yet to have a meal with my family since food smells overwhelmingly strong. When I open the fridge to get skim milk out it is like being in a Garden of food. I smell everything!

3) Sleep: I was expecting sleep after surgery with pain relievers and such to be so much easier. I knew I was not going to sleep well the two nights at the hospital but I pretty much did not sleep for more than 3 hours each night for first 3 nights at home and I never took a nap during the day. Lying down is by far the most uncomfortable time for me so far.

Good:

1) Pain: The pain was never nearly as bad as I expected or lead myself to believe it would be. I did get my VSG done Robotically so not sure if that made a huge difference but after three days I was off all pain meds. Hope it stays that way. Gas pains are not nearly as bad or frequent as expected either. However hiccups were much worse than I imagined!

2) Exercise: I thought it was going to take me much longer to get back to where I was pre-op (walking 5 to 6 miles daily) I am already doing over 4 miles a day and am not pushing myself too hard. For me, I think it was huge to get in the best physical shape I could for a morbid obese person months prior to surgery. Besides losing 30 pounds last two months prior to surgery (Over 60 total in last year prior), exercising 75 to 120 minutes a day was a huge plus for me. I think it really helped with my recovery time as well.

3) Hospitals & Surgeon: My Dr. & his Bariatric Team were amazing in every aspect. You hear how surgeons are usually stereotyped and I lucked out because mine was exactly what I needed. He was personal but also a huge motivator to get me out of bed and walk, walk, walk. He even a few times visited me just to do laps. His lead Nurse was an angel. All I kept saying to myself was I put off WLS for 15 years because of fear of hospitals/Drs. Etc… I was so stupid but better late than never. There are some genuinely amazing, kind people who work in this field and I should not have let prior horrible experience’s with Dr.’s going all the way back to my childhood put this off for as long as I did!

Hope this helps others in one-way or another. Had my one-week weigh in today and was already down 11.25lbs. First time in the 200’s in over 15 years! If anybody has any questions feel free to message me or post in the thread. Good luck to you all both Pre-Op and Post-Op!