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Anxiety about malnutrition from DS



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Hey all, first time posting here and I've been dealing with this for months now. I got the duodenal switch about 7 or 8 years ago when I was about 16. Crazy young I know, and to this day I still question that decision and probably always will because of my age. I've had a great experience as far as weight loss goes, but as I've gotten older I've gotten increasingly worried about malnutrition/deficiencies developing over time. I'm religious about my supplements, and I literally got my bloodwork done earlier this week so I'm good about that. However, the anxiety about potential deficiencies that I feel like might go undetected in bloodwork (for instance I know B12 tests can be inaccurate in detecting deficiencies) or that there might be a time that supplements become ineffective for me is becoming extremely difficult to bear, keeping me awake at night, causing anxiety attacks, making my life miserable, etc. All to the point where despite not technically being diagnosed with any deficiencies, it makes me regret the surgery and feel like I'm going to get severe side effects or die an early death because of this decision. My entire family has had the procedure and I'm the only one who really deals with this to this extent so it's difficult for me to cope. I have appointments with my primary care physician and plan on contacting my surgeon to discuss these risks more with him, but I have the feeling that this anxiety will persist as my anxiety causes me to have doubts about the ability of modern medical science to adequately monitor the effects of a procedure this radical. I realize that all of these concerns are likely what should have deterred me from the surgery in the first place, but at the time my family, medical team and myself thought it was a good decision.

Tl;dr: having extreme health anxiety about longterm nutritional complications despite doing everything by the book and don't know what to do about it.

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Hey all, first time posting here and I've been dealing with this for months now. I got the duodenal switch about 7 or 8 years ago when I was about 16. Crazy young I know, and to this day I still question that decision and probably always will because of my age. I've had a great experience as far as weight loss goes, but as I've gotten older I've gotten increasingly worried about malnutrition/deficiencies developing over time. I'm religious about my supplements, and I literally got my bloodwork done earlier this week so I'm good about that. However, the anxiety about potential deficiencies that I feel like might go undetected in bloodwork (for instance I know B12 tests can be inaccurate in detecting deficiencies) or that there might be a time that supplements become ineffective for me is becoming extremely difficult to bear, keeping me awake at night, causing anxiety attacks, making my life miserable, etc. All to the point where despite not technically being diagnosed with any deficiencies, it makes me regret the surgery and feel like I'm going to get severe side effects or die an early death because of this decision. My entire family has had the procedure and I'm the only one who really deals with this to this extent so it's difficult for me to cope. I have appointments with my primary care physician and plan on contacting my surgeon to discuss these risks more with him, but I have the feeling that this anxiety will persist as my anxiety causes me to have doubts about the ability of modern medical science to adequately monitor the effects of a procedure this radical. I realize that all of these concerns are likely what should have deterred me from the surgery in the first place, but at the time my family, medical team and myself thought it was a good decision.
Tl;dr: having extreme health anxiety about longterm nutritional complications despite doing everything by the book and don't know what to do about it.

I'm the same

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      On day 4 of the 2 week liquid pre-op diet. Surgery scheduled for June 11th.
      Soooo I am coming to a realization
      of something and I'm not sure what to do about it. For years the only thing I've enjoyed is eating. We rarely do anything or go anywhere and if we do it always includes food. Family comes over? Big family dinner! Go camping? Food! Take a short ride or trip? Food! Holiday? Food! Go out of town for a Dr appointment? Food! When we go to a new town we don't look for any attractions, we look for restaurants we haven't been to. Heck, I look forward to getting off work because that means it's almost supper time. Now that I'm drinking these pre-op shakes for breakfast, lunch, and supper I have nothing to look forward to.  And once I have surgery on June 11th it'll be more of the same shakes. Even after pureed stage, soft food stage, and finally regular food stage, it's going to be a drastic change for the rest of my life. I'm giving up the one thing that really brings me joy. Eating. How do you cope with that? What do you do to fill that void? Wow. Now I'm sad.
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      1. LeighaTR

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    • Alisa_S

      On day 4 of the 2 week liquid pre-op diet. Surgery scheduled for June 11th.
      Soooo I am coming to a realization
      of something and I'm not sure what to do about it. For years the only thing I've enjoyed is eating. We rarely do anything or go anywhere and if we do it always includes food. Family comes over? Big family dinner! Go camping? Food! Take a short ride or trip? Food! Holiday? Food! Go out of town for a Dr appointment? Food! When we go to a new town we don't look for any attractions, we look for restaurants we haven't been to. Heck, I look forward to getting off work because that means it's almost supper time. Now that I'm drinking these pre-op shakes for breakfast, lunch, and supper I have nothing to look forward to.  And once I have surgery on June 11th it'll be more of the same shakes. Even after pureed stage, soft food stage, and finally regular food stage, it's going to be a drastic change for the rest of my life. I'm giving up the one thing that really brings me joy. Eating. How do you cope with that? What do you do to fill that void? Wow. Now I'm sad.
      · 1 reply
      1. summerseeker

        Life as a big person had limited my life to what I knew I could manage to do each day. That was eat. I hadn't anything else to look forward to. So my eating choices were the best I could dream up. I planned the cooking in managable lots in my head and filled my day with and around it.

        Now I have a whole new big, bigger, biggest, best days ever. I am out there with those skinny people doing stuff i could never have dreamt of. Food is now an after thought. It doesn't consume my day. I still enjoy the good home cooked food but I eat smaller portions. I leave food on my plate when I am full. I can no longer hear my mother's voice saying eat it all up, ther are starving children in Africa who would want that!

        I still cook for family feasts, I love cooking. I still do holidays but I have changed from the All inclusive drinking and eating everything everyday kind to Self catering accommodation. This gives me the choice of cooking or eating out as I choose. I rarely drink anymore as I usually travel alone now and I feel I need to keep aware of my surroundings.

        I don't know at what point my life expanded, was it when I lost 100 pounds? Was it when I left my walking stick at home ? Was it when I said yes to an outing instead of finding an excuse to stay home ? i look back at my last five years and wonder how loosing weight has made such a difference. Be ready to amaze yourself.

        BTW, the liquid diet sucks, one more day and you are over the worst. You can do it.

    • CaseyP1011

      Officially here for a long time, not just a good time💪
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