Hi my name is Tia. I'm 25 years old and I'm a mother of two beautiful children. My daughter, Emily, who is almost six..and my son, Bryan who is four years old. I got married August 14th, 2016 to the love of my life Cody. He is a daycare teacher & I work jewelry sales in walmart. We are both slowly making steps toward bettering every aspect of our lives. Just in November I recieved my high school diploma. Just last week we discovered Cody lost over one hundred pounds since we started this journey. I had lost 78 and it's slowly going back up. He started at 450lbs even & is now at 323.7. When we started this journey two years ago it was because I was diagnosed with Lupus. My endocrinologist told me that if I didn't lose weight in a quick yet healthy way, that the Lupus would complicate my life way sooner than it had to.

My husband immediately jumped on board and we started hitting the trails almost every day. We are in smaller portions and we started noticing huge differences. I felt like I was becoming a better mother because I could get in the floor and play with my kids and not feel like I was dying.

I had many plateaus but suddenly I hit this one that paste longer than usual. So I went and saw my pcp and she reffered me to a nutritionist to get some advice on the right things to eat. I followed Dr. Heathers steps to a T...still stuck. So then I start changing up my exercise..still stuck. So I go back to the doctor and she did some tests and her and the endocrinologist agreed that the Lupus had begun effecting my weight loss. Lupus in some weird way was litterally fighting me on this. I was heart broken...all that hard work to avoid surgery in the first place down the toilet.

So here I am..six days before surgery scared to death and praying God gives me this second chance at life. I'm so scared I'm going to mess this up and I refuse for that to happen. My babies need me..my husband needs me. So I'm thinking this was a wise step..finding a support group and talking to people dealing with the same thing. This is who I am now♡

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Welcome to the site!

As a heads up, if you're scared you might want to look more at posts from people who are at least 2 months post-op. The first two months post-op seem to be pretty miserable (I'm in the third week right now), but after that most people tend to say it's the best thing they've ever done.

Do you have a good support team? It's great that your husband worked on weight loss with you! My therapist has been invaluable dealing with the emotions of this process, so I highly recommend finding one if you haven't yet.

My wife has Lupus, rheumatoid arthritis and Raynaud's disease. The place where I had my surgery, Trinity Medical in Tijuana, also has other clinics. The do cancer treatment, stem cell therapy and immunotherapy. Immunotherapy is what you want to look in to. The cost is just slightly more expensive than my sleeve. If you want my coordinators information just send me a message.

I'm not trying to talk you out of the sleeve but I will say that my wife isn't heavy but her bmi is around 29-33 depending on how active her Lupus is. When it flares she starts to gain weight and then she goes from quinicrine to prednisone and her weight continues upward until the lupus is under control and she can get back to her regular meds. You may have a problem with food, medications or both.

I personally don't have any tips, however, I am on a fb group page where people who post say this way of eating has helped them. Maybe google "Keto diet with Lupus" or something similar.

I have rheumatoid/psoriatic arthritis. While not the same as lupus, inflammation drives all of the auto-immune disorders. There hasn't been any good studies done, so the data is mostly anecdotal, but my rheumatologist said there was a good chance having the surgery would lower my overall inflammation because the stomach tissue that's removed plays a role in inflammation (secretes many inflammatory hormones) as do the fat cells. While it doesn't promise remission, my experience has been that once the post-op inflammation/flare died down, my overall inflammatory factors have declined and the meds are working better. So we won't have to pursue biologic therapies anytime in the foreseeable future. So the surgery can help beyond just the weight loss. It's not a guarantee, by any means, but it might help overall.