My first post here after lurking for MANY months! I just had my appointment with my doctor after completing all my testing. It took me 2 1/2 months to get the appointment which was very frustrating. I'm glad I called to schedule it when I did! I had no idea how backed up she was due to Covid. She will be getting information from the hospital within the next two weeks for January OR availability and will be able to give me a surgery date soon. It feels like this process has taken forever! When I was done with all my pre-op labs/testing in the beginning of September and couldn't get an appointment till mid November, I started to lose focus. I couldn't even start to prepare myself dietwise and ate whatever I wanted. Now that I can see the end (or beginning depending on how you look at it), I am excited and can start my preparations. What did you do or not do to help prepare yourself prior to surgery?

Congratulations! We will keep our fingers crossed that they can get you booked sooner rather than later. the waiting game is tough, but you've made it this far!

Personally, I started taking my vitamins, made sure I was during 64oz of fluids a day, and started cutting back on carbs and caffeine to get into the habit and ease the transition.

18 minutes ago, Sleeve_Me_Alone said:

Congratulations! We will keep our fingers crossed that they can get you booked sooner rather than later. the waiting game is tough, but you've made it this far!

Personally, I started taking my Vitamins, made sure I was during 64oz of fluids a day, and started cutting back on carbs and caffeine to get into the habit and ease the transition.

good idea with the vitamins! I know I need to stop drinking diet coke and up my water intake immensely. I am not looking forward to the caffeine headaches when I stop the diet coke (I don't drink coffee) but I know they will only be temporary.

Those are great changes that you made! I did the same things about 2 months before my surgery and it really made things so much easier! By the time surgery came I was already in ketosis so after surgery it wasn’t another challenge my body had to adjust to, not to mention carb and sugar withdrawal. Great job!

One thing I did before surgery was train myself mentally to ignore the smell of foods due to where I live, there is food literally everywhere when I go out. The other day when I went for my post op there was dunkin donuts, then burger king, then mc donalds on one side, then there was papa johns followed by white castle on the other, back to the other side there was a pizza place, then a chinese food restaurant, then dominoes, and across from the dominoes, a little caesars. Depending on where you live and if the smell of food makes you hungry, I'd say it's something good to work on.

Another thing you can work on is sipping water on a timer to get yourself use to how you'd be taking in water prior to the surgery. Try out different kinds of protein shakes/powders to see if you find a few you like. If you have an unhealthy food or foods you really really like, you could start looking up recipes for healthy alternatives to them and maybe try some of them out while you can; just note that is possible your taste buds can change with surgery.. mine did unfortunately so I find the protein shakes I enjoyed before quite disgusting in taste now. Get use to not having sugar in things too because sugar can be really *really* bad as it has the possibility to cause dumping syndrome.

2 hours ago, LurkieKitty said:

One thing I did before surgery was train myself mentally to ignore the smell of foods due to where I live, there is food literally everywhere when I go out. The other day when I went for my post op there was dunkin donuts, then burger king, then mc donalds on one side, then there was papa johns followed by white castle on the other, back to the other side there was a pizza place, then a chinese food restaurant, then dominoes, and across from the dominoes, a little caesars. Depending on where you live and if the smell of food makes you hungry, I'd say it's something good to work on.

Another thing you can work on is sipping Water on a timer to get yourself use to how you'd be taking in water prior to the surgery. Try out different kinds of Protein shakes/powders to see if you find a few you like. If you have an unhealthy food or foods you really really like, you could start looking up recipes for healthy alternatives to them and maybe try some of them out while you can; just note that is possible your taste buds can change with surgery.. mine did unfortunately so I find the Protein Shakes I enjoyed before quite disgusting in taste now. Get use to not having sugar in things too because sugar can be really *really* bad as it has the possibility to cause dumping syndrome.

Great advice! I hadn't thought about trying to get used to "sipping" water. Thanks! I have heard that many find the RTD protein drinks too sweet after surgery. I just bought some Premier Protein Vanilla to try. Any favorites?