Rootman

What you didn't throw them out the window or stuff them to the bottom of the hamper? You ain't no kinda' man !

Despite what I've been told one member of the group coming back did NOT have a passport and merely had a copy of their certified state stamped birth certificate, their drivers license and a winning smile. It took maybe 5 minutes extra to pass him but we made it through. Better safe than sorry though.

Great! Reminds me what I used to tell people, "There is at least 2 if not 3 skinny people trapped inside me screaming to get out!".

Just after WLS the wife got me a new belt. She was sick of my old one with the stretched holes and it bent all up to wrap around my rotund belly. I started out in the third hole, just enough left to tuck under the belt buckle and touch the first belt loop on most pants. Yesterday I had to punch two more holes in it and found the LAST hole was comfortable. The belt now wraps half way around me and touches the MIDDLE BELT LOOP in my slacks in the BACK. Yes, my belt wraps 1 1/2 times around me. Wow! I NEVER thought I'd see the day. BTW: Size 36 slacks are getting baggy, maybe time for some 34s?

Woot! What a fox!

WooHoo! Way to go girl! We're all proud of you.

It worked for me, YES it IS a culture shock and they don't have the same "standards" as they have in the USA. I was so sick and tired and going down hill I didn't think that I would survive the winter if I didn't do something right away. Typical approval process is 6 to 9 months for my insurance. I had the money, the vacation and the "want to" to do it so I did. I've lost almost 160 lbs since then. If you are at all worried and fretting over it then by all means DON'T DO IT. Your peace of mind is worth a lot.

This is true for calcium CARBONATE, not necessarily true for calcium citrate. OTC stomach acid relievers like TUMS are calcium carbonate and I can tell you for a fact that they can cause kidney stones and that they are VERY, VERY painful. OP: I think your doc was also not wanting to irritate your tummy with a lot of Vitamin pills during the first few weeks. What he says is true, the vitamin craze is largely fueled by profits and not medical necessity or even common sense. As Tiffy points out a good multi vitamin, some Iron and possibly calcium citrate just make good sense and are CHEAP and good insurance against health issues caused by vitamin deficiency. Once you have symptoms of a disease or problem caused by vitamin deficiency it is usually too late to fix the issue just by resuming vitamin uptake, these issues need to be resolved by invasive, expensive and sometimes painful methods whereas popping a multi vitamin is cheap, easy and PAINLESS. So follow the docs orders for a few weeks or months, at some point a multi, iron and calcium are probably in order given the small amount of natural Vitamins we gain with the small portions we sleevers eat..

Same thing happens when she ages and things start drooping, she gets self conscience. I do my best to ravish her and make sure I love her body no matter what she weighs and no matter how it "hangs". I tell he often how lovely she looks and follow it up with plenty of physical attention. She's just a little dinky thing at 4' 11" so there is no way I'll EVER get close to her 119 lbs. It works for us.

Congrats! You'll be there before you know it! Best wishes!

So I've been an insomniac for decades and like 10 years back I went to the doctor and got a scrip for anti depressants and anti anxiety drugs, slept pretty good for a few years. Then it started again. Then he gave me a scrip for a sleep aid - which worked for about 6 months. Now I'm off EVERYTHING - and BTW - it is HELL ON EARTH coming off both Paxil AND Xanax reliance! Then WLS and a massive drop in weight. I slept pretty well for a few months afterward, even got off my CPAP after dropping 100+ pounds. Now I get 2 or 3 hours a night if I'm lucky. I started taking 3.5 ounces of red wine every evening for heart health and in hopes the slug of alcohol would help me sleep. It helped for a few nights - probably all in my head. I lay there and toss and turn and force myself to "rest" instead of getting up. If I get up and do something like read or watch TV I'll be up all night doing it. I've taken hot showers, take melatonin sub lingual. I have a heated mattress pad since I am now cold all the time since losing the weight. I am comfortable in bed, the room is very dark and quiet - I even wear ear plugs. OTC stuff may work for a week or so then stops. So anyone got any tips on how to sleep well?

Prior to WLS I was borderline hypertensive, the doc put me on different meds and both made be immediately and suddenly nauseas - not fun. So this is one of the many things that gave me a kick in the a$$ to go forward with WLS. Now 8+ months out and nearing 160 pounds loss I seem to be swinging the other way - HYPOtensive! I use the BP monitor at the gym and it consistently reads low, I pretty much disregarded it because who trusts a clunky old machine the size of a breadbox that gets used and abused and never calibrated? Well after about the 4th or 5th low reading in a row I finally broke out my own home machine. Idle since shortly after WLS. It's one of the typical home machines, small size, it takes your BP 3 times and then averages them. My result today 108 / 60 ! The result the other day was 102 / 55. So I see a trend. My resting heart rate went from ~90 to 58 also! I don't feel dizzy, no fatigue, no blood in the stool and no pains anywhere - except after a long swim, the I ache all over. Last week during a mini family reunion I went swimming with the kids and was surprised at how long I could hold my breath, it seemed like forever! I swim at the gym 3 times a week and use a snorkel - my neck is stiff from MANY injuries and a snorkel allows me to breath without torquing my neck around, so I seldom hold my breath for long using it. So should I be concerned? Or did I just get that physically fit in 4 months at the gym that I now have incredible BP, heart rate and lung capacity? I always seem to worry about the stupidest things!

I actually got a tad of hunger at 6 months. Not that monster I had within me pre-WLS that DEMANDED I feed it NOW, just a gentle nagging feeling when I needed to eat. I take in maybe 900-1300 calories a day. I also burn off a lot swimming 3 times a week. My weight loss has ground to a snails pace compared to what it was, just 1-3 pounds a week, sometimes it see-saws up and down a few pounds. Most say that at about 6 months you stomach is totally healed and your system has adjusted to the new diet. You will also probably lost a great amount of your weight, I had lost close to 150 pounds by then. We all wish you the best on your journey.

Mine was immediate and a total change. All of a sudden I hardly sweat at all and was COLD all the time. Pre-WLS when I got out of bed the morning it was soaked in sweat and had a sour smell, it was so embarrassing. On dark sheets I could actually see SALT stains around the edges. Just this past weekend I did not shower either Saturday OR Sunday - I'm ashamed to say that I was just to lazy and my wife said that I did NOT stink. So hopefully yours will change too.

Thank the lord NO. I had enough problems without that kicking my a$$ too !

Well typically the LENGTH will not change just the width. My size 12 shoes rattle around and I have to tie them up real tight to keep from losing them. I suppose I could try a size 11 but I have a lot of 12's and still have a wide bridge. I DO notice hat my feet are a lot more bony looking, but there never was a lot of meat on them as it was, just slightly less now.

SNIFF! - OK, who's cutting up onions around here? - SNIFF! Man, that has to make all the misery you put yourself through wort it in an instant!

Cool! Look forward to looking down and seeing Mr. Johnson without leaning over too

Congrsts! I too just got belo a BMI of 30 and became "just" overweight last week, it's a wonderful feeling!

This is a real issue and I'm sorry if it offends anyone. This is about the only site I regularly visit that is related to health so I thought I'd bring it up and see if anyone had any ideas. When the wife and I made whoopie last week ago I noticed my seminal discharge had a slight yellow color to it. I thought it was odd but was not concerned. Last night we did it again and I noticed this time it was BROWN. Nasty looking and kind of scary too. This morning we tried again for no other reason then to check it's color and it was brown again. I've searched online and a few suggestions are blood in the semen, perhaps due to a broken blood vessel, perhaps because of an injury to the testes.. Well I don't remember doing and injury to the "boys" but I have been exercising a lot lately. I swim Monday and Wednesday's for 1/12 hours for about 2 miles total each day. I swim an hour on Fridays for about 1 1/3 miles. I ride a stationary bike Tuesdays and Thursdays for 1/2 hour each day and then do about 1/2 hour resistance training too. Could I be "traumatizing" my testes with all of this? I feel no pain and have no stinging when I urinate, just dark semen. Anyone ever experience this? Could it be due to diet? I don't eat anything unusual or anything in excess. I'm going on 7 months post-op for my sleeve and am still losing between 2 and 4 pounds a week.

I too have noticed a "different" look with most WLS patients, the abdomen is fuller and like you say sometimes a "dunlop" on the belly. The rapid weight loss leaves some sub-dermal fat as well as excess skin. HOW MUCH is determined by genetics, age and sheer dumb luck. I have been very, very fortunate, I have very little belly and not much hanging skin. My belly button droops into a slight "frown" and that's about it. My arms are fairly firm as I have been exercising quite a bit since surgery. YES, you MAY look like you are melting but the benefits of getting rid of so much excess fat are still worth it. There is always surgery to remove it.

We had a mini family reunion this weekend, me, my wife, my sister, her hubby, her two kids and her 11 grandkids as well as my brother and his 2 kids all met at a local hotel that had a wonderful indoor pool in an atrium - man that made it nice especially in the 100+ degree heat we've been having. I was the only thin male adult there, my 13 and 15 year old nephews actually outweighed me! I can see it's going to be tough hanging around them though, I started grazing / snacking on the stuff they brought with them, Cookies, fruit Snacks, chips - you name it - and GAINED 1.5 pounds! I'm obese again after just dropping below a BMI of 30! Man this sucks! I love them all to death but I just cannot hang around them for long due to the bad eating habits and over supply of fattening foods. Now I know how I got to be 375+ pounds in the first place!

I've never heard of it either at ALL as a "complication" of VSG - I mean it can happen for a variety of reasons during ANY surgery but the VSG is done completely BELOW the diaphragm, not ABOVE it in the pleural space where the lungs actually are. I hate to suggest it but I think your doc is goofy

I took pills whole right away, had no problems with any of them. It'll be a month or more before you can eat enough to get enough Protein to stop the shakes, although you will probably drink them for months or years sometimes to supplement your protein intake on days you just don't eat enough.

Yes, bring DVDs books magazines etc and forget live TV, catch up when you get home. You'll only be there a few days anyways. The programs are of course in Spanish unless the place you are staying caters to English speaking patients. There are usually lot of people to talk to and other stuff so you won't get bored. And of course you will sleep a lot too. As far as an adapter for the laptop, are you asking about POWER adapters by any chance? If so then NO you will not need any adapters, MX (Canada as well) like the USA is uses 110 volts rather than the more common 220 found in Europe.