I have been overweight my entire life. I only remember a couple years right before puberty that I was a decent weight. Since I started my period its been irregular. I took birth control for about a year, and afterwards had a bled for 6 months strait then not at all for about 2 years. Since that time I have been having a period every 6 months on the dot. My last period was 3 months ago. I started today 4 days before my surgery. Although I spoke with the surgeons office and they said no problem. Just one more thing I have to worry about. About 8 years ago (I can't believe its been that long) I had Emerg. Appendectomy, cut one side to the other for exploratory as my appendix burst. Worst pain ever to recover from and I started my period the day following my surgery. I don't know what my deal is. besides the fact that I have lost 14 lbs rather quickly. maybe stress? who knows... anyone else have this happen to them?

Thanks

Jul:ohmy:

My period started just before my surgery and I was so embarrassed. :blushing: I wanted to reschedule but the doc said no problem and wanted to go ahead. And I had to take off my underwear when I got into the hospital room. They just put some absorbent cloths under me. When they removed the catheter there was dried blood all down my leg. EWWWW.:thumbup: But it wasn't painful and every one was professional. No one said a word or gave me any funny looks. The MALE nurse who removed the catheter even offered to bathe me....I about died. :ohmy: I told him no my husband would take care of it.

But seriously, thats weird to have such an irregular period. Did you let you doctor know about that?

Yeah my doctors have all known, I am in the process of being tested for PCOS or another hormone problem, so far all blood work looks good. They were more worried about me if I didn't have one on or before the 6th month.

Sounds embarassing!!! I think I would die.... I won't reschedule, but for the sake of embarassment. Please please make it stop at least for the 3 hours during and after the surgery.

thanks, glad to hear I am not the only one!!!

Cheers!

I was irregular for years. Sometimes I'd only get it a few times a year. Then I had my second child (at 41!) and now I get every 28 days like clockwork. It's interesting because now I know how the rest of the world experiences this stuff. They always looked at my funny when I said I almost never got it. Plus now I can plan around it, if I have to.

That's the good part. The bad part is that I'm 50 and I'm as fertile as a 20 something. I'm supposed to be in menopause, or at least perimenopause.

I was regular 28 days on the money for as long as I can remember, and on the day of my surgery I got it, 4 days early. I wore a pad and the hospital stretchy undies for the surgery. It was fine.

Now, since then, my period is coming regularly every 24 days. Go figure....

i started my period literally after i took the pregnancy test right before surgery... :thumbup:

and ummmm ... it was quite a heavy flow and bled thru the protection... so much so that when i got up to do the first walk, it was dripping ... talk about EWWW, they freaked out, thinking i was bleeding from my incision...

embarrassing !!!!!

you'll be fine.

OK...this is TMI...but I can tell you Jtori that there is no need to feel embarrased...nurses and docs have seen it all and it is part of "nature".

That being said, I was thinking it sounded like PCOS which I have / had? I even asked a doc the other day...I had a hysterectomy last June and have no parts left...since I do not have ovaries do I still have polysistic ovarian syndrome???She said, "Good question"...anyway, I feel your pain...I bled 20 to 24 days a month for 1 year! then I had an ablation and it reduced it to @10 days!

NOw, it is heaven...by the way...I'm still anemic...and it has almost been a year??? But I am finally losing weight....Good Luck! Hang tough!

Good luck on your surgery next week! How exciting -- even if your . did drop in at an inconvenient time.

My periods are almost always regular now. Regular as in once every 4-6 weeks or so. Before, I'd go months without one, then have a couple, then months again... maybe 3 or 4 per year, sometimes less.

The weight loss must have caused some hormonal changes.

Due to going off b/c for surgery, I was bleeding heavy.. and I mean HEAVY. They said no tampons, so I wore a pad to the hospital, then when they told me to strip, I was emberassed and she put down towels and said don't worry about it. I was so much more freaking out about the cathetar at the time, so I let go of the emberassment.. then found out no cathetar hooray.. when I woke up they had taped a pad to me and put more towels done.. and the first thing I did when I could walk was go put a normal pad and underwear on.

Don't worry about it :thumbup:

I'm a med student.

I understand why it may seem embarrassing. But remember that the training process to become a surgeon requires years of really smelly, really bloody, really gross looking stuff. A little (or a lot) of menstrual blood won't phase any surgeon.

Well said Tropicana..good luck to you...are you banded?

Hi Everyone,

I realize that the menstruation issue was posted last month but I thought I would add to it anyway for anyone else out there who looks this thread up.

My lap-band surgery date is scheduled for April 30th 08 - a little over 2 weeks away! I am currently showing signs of a period coming on, some spotting right now, but I too was told that should I have a period it will not stop the surgery.

I have never been regular since I developed hypothyroidism 5 1/2 years ago. But the beginning of last year I started having extremely heavy periods, to the point where I could not get up from the couch. OBGYN placed me on various types of birth control where it would slow it down and I would bleed for weeks, or it would stop for a week or two and start heavy again, but none of the birth controls controlled the cycles. Labs were done and no signs of PCOS. It went like that for 5 months and then it was decided to have NovaSure done (Uterine Ablation) in July 07. That surgery made a HUGE difference for me as I really do not have periods. Stats show that women who had NovaSure done experience little to no periods. So in my case, I am having some spotting but this could be my only period.

Last Summer I learned that insulin resistance/high sugar level, and/or obesity contributes to HEAVY and irregular periods, which was probably what caused all my problems last year. Only I didn't learn about this until I switch to a new endocrinologist after the surgery. She did a ton of lab work on me and explained the whole insulin resistance and how it affected my cycles before the NovaSure. See, my previous endo of 4 years never bothered to check my glucose levels and I had continued to gain weight while under his care. So in August of last year I decided to change endos because he wasn't doing anything to find out why I was gaining weight. Anyway, the new endo explained insulin resistance to me and it was learned that that was causing my weight gain and menstrual problems.

So if anyone out there is experiencing heavy menstrual issues like this, speak to your OBGYN about the NovaSure. Its does improve the quality of life.

I've been worrying about that too. Mine has always been heavy, and never ending. I'm going on week 4 now, and am hoping and praying that I'll be done by the 29th when my surgery is. Does anyone know if by having this surgery and losing weight if your monthly gets more regular? I'm soooo hoping it will, I'm sick of this having it forever...

Edited April 15, 200818 yr by nesser081982

I have always had pretty regular .'s but after my 1st child I chose the Mirena IUD as my b/c of choice. It's good for 5 years, it is completely reversable, which is great! Had it removed after a year and a half to have a second child. Then got it again. After about 7 months, I don't have a real period. Just a couple days (if that) of light spotting... ... LOVE IT

My luck though, when it's time to have my surgery I'll probably bleed for a week...

I went to the doc a few years ago because of my infrequent periods (cause I'm 30 and should still be having them normally) and the doc told me that my weight was causing me not to have them. "It's nature's way of not allowing you to get pregnant" she told me.

Weight messes up our hormones for sure.

The crazy thing is that anytime I exercise for a few days, or just drop a couple pounds, I start my period immediately.

I'm thankful to all who posted about having their periods during surgery, because I'm afraid I'll be in that same category! This liquid diet which is helping me to lose pre-op weight has also triggered my period. There's no telling how long it'll last-- it has a mind of it's own!

Yeah when I was doing my liquid diet it caused my period or maybe spotting to start a few days before surgery which was a week earlier than it should have been. Luckily I do not get heavy periods and I was fine without any protection and after I was up a moving around I just put my underwear back on and I was good to go.