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TLDR: I am getting closer to surgery and can't seem to stop my RECENT daily habit of binging drive-thru fast food, which I do when I get anxiety about something. I hope someone can help. Full disclosure: I am about 2 months pre-op. The only thing I have remaining before my bari office submits my file to insurance is my last nutritionist meeting. I knew the psych eval was going to be a big deal, so I decided super honest with the psychologist. He cleared me for surgery, providing I get established with a mental health counselor and resolve my binging before surgery. I have been diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder, major depressive disorder, and PTSD (I also have severe obstructive sleep apnea and PCOS). I have now been seeing a counselor for a few weeks. Also, the counseling center's doctor prescribed me Prozac, which hasn't kicked in yet as I've been taking it for less than 2 weeks. My counselor has told me that her office (or the insurance?? idk) doesn't allow her to provide counseling on the symptom of binge-eating, but rather the childhood trauma behind it. I understand why that's important, but I can't wait to resolve my feelings about the trauma (could potentially take years!) to stop binge-eating and get WLS. I will continue counseling beyond my surgery date, but for now I also want to do what I have to to get the surgery! I talked to my bari office's APRN and nutritionist, and they said they have a list of eating disorder-specialist psychologists I could see, but I have Medicaid, and it's very hard to find any doctor outside of basic community health clinics who accepts Medicaid. They also said maybe the Prozac and regular counseling will help and that I won't need the specialists. I have a book that I think could help me, called the DBT (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy) Solution for Emotional Eating (recommended by other WLS patients who have my same surgeon). But for some reason I can't get myself to actually read it. I have some kind of mental block about it. I am willing to hold off on my surgery until I resolve this, but I really would like it to resolve in the next month or so, considering that just a couple of months ago I was not having this fast food issue. Not to this degree, anyway. Plus, eating fast food every day is expensive, and I have gained 6 lbs, which I must lose before submitting to insurance. I have little coping strategies for when I get anxious and want to go get fast food, but I keep ignoring them. 😕 Would appreciate any help at all! I'm getting desperate.

I used to go through the fast food drive thru, til I had my surgery-whoops, no point if everything is going to hurt me! BUT my going there was (in my head) was a "reward" for getting through a stressful day at work. It helped me to take a cup of ice water out of work with me to sip on. Until you have to go on the all liquid diet, bring one cookie from home, leave it wrapped up in your car, and between that and the water--may just help...

I didn’t have any “food funerals” in the sense that i didn’t eat any more than i normally ate. But what i “normally” ate was probably equivalent to one big huge ongoing food funeral, lol. Nor did i go out of my way to specifically eat “special” items. I changed my eating habits on the first day of my 2 week pre-op diet, and went forward from there, that’s it.

yep. Water weight from the IV fluids. I've heard of some people gaining 10 or more lbs from it. It takes a few days for it to work it's way out of your system. In the mean time, if it's stressing you out, then just stay off the scale for a few days.

Feeling suicidal is a huge red flag that you need to find someone to talk to VERY urgently. Imagine if it was your best friend saying what you have just said…how would you help them? What would you say? Be your own best friend and seek help, be kind to yourself. It makes me so sad to read your post. I suspect you are going through a very real grief process, being angry is part of it….you will reach acceptance if you allow yourself to go through the process. It’s Ok to not feel Ok sometimes you know. It’s normal. You aren’t alone, you have reached out with your feelings and it’s a privilege to be able to ‘talk’. You will be Ok eventually you know, but it will take time, courage, talking and acceptance. xxx

It should not be a issue in regards to the surgery as after surgery for some it eliminates sleep apenea... I have a machine. I personally love it. Before i was getting maybe 5 hours of sleep. Now i sleep for 8-9 and sometimes 10 hours if i dont need to go to the bathroom lol. There is a shortage of machines because a while ago one particular brand Phillips was recalled. I personally have the resmed airsense 10 and love it.

I wish I had really understood the psychological impact of losing weight beforehand. Massive weight loss may trigger a lot of painful emotions and make you come to painful realisations as well. As an example, these two things are what I am struggling with most: 1. People treat me differently (makes me feel anger and grief) 2. Men are noticing me again (triggers anxiety and fear) I really thought I had all my ducks in a row before surgery, but I’m glad I have a therapist I know and trust who can see me at the drop of a hat. I’d really recommend anyone to make sure they have solid emotional and psychological support before starting all this. 🍀

I wish I knew that some people never lose their hunger after surgery. No one ever mentioned this as a possibility and when I told people - and mentioned this on this forum! - people said, no, it's just head hunger. When I told the psychologist for my surgery center, she said that 20% of her patients never lose their hunger. It's very hard because you can't eat much at once, and it's not good to graze, because then you just "eat around" the surgery and don't lose weight. They ended up putting me back on metformin, which has helped a lot.

Grapes, while a delicious little snack, will give me bowel cramps and purging diarrhea the next day. Fun! But goddamn they're tasty little buggers.

Went to A&E they took bloods and urine and all is fine other than low iron and calcium. My stomach feels fine to them and they suspect it’s mild gastritis. They’re given me lanzoprazole and paracetamol