CowgirlJane

My hubby was incredibly supportive when I was banded back in 2001. Heck, he even pureed food for me to eat...lol. He went with me to my appointments, really, everything you could ask. I distinctly remember how concerned he was over everything but then also celebrated in successes and complimented me on my looks. Well, after a couple of years I had regained everything lost plus some and had lots of problems etc etc. He never said a negative word. Fast forward nearly a decade and after trying everything AGAIN and i still weighed 300# I decide to revise - originally thinking of the RNY but wound up with the sleeve. He told me basically that he wouldn't oppose it but he was not thrilled. He wouldn't talk about it. He never went to a single doctors appointment except for the actual surgery since he had to drive me. Well, also the band removal surgery - so twice. He and my son came and visited me (I stayed one night) and they did make sure I wasn't left alone during the first 24 hours home (doctors orders). So, fast forward to almost 11 months later and nearly 120# lost - he has still not gone to a single doctors appointment. He has never complimented me on how I look, how hard I have worked, how much I have lost etc. He never asks anything about my progress and is indifferent to what or how I eat. He often brings junky food in the house and it is my problem to deal with. I finally said to to him the other day that he has never complimented me and that I don't feel very attractive to him. His answer "I have always found you attractive". End of conversation. So, here is my perspective on this whole deal. I WISH he was showering me in compliments and joy but the truth of the matter is this is my journey, not his. The band promised all this great success too and all it really brought me was hell. I am thinking he is thinking that the jury is still out on this sleeve thing. It does kind of hurt me that he doesn't tell me I look great, but in the big picture I need to find the motivation from within. The junk food in the house is an issue so I have him put it in a cabinet that I just don't open on a routine basis. That helps. I would caution anyone, especially with small children to NOT make any big decisions about your relationship during this time. The surgery and losing weight can cause alot of turmoil, emotional ups and downs etc. In the end, it might be that the spouse has his own reasons for why he is being "Unsupportive" and at least for me, it is not a reason to end a relationship. I know he wants me to be successful and happy, I think he is just afraid to get invested in it as of course I have failed over and over again. I want him to believe along with me that I can keep this weight off, but I can hardly blame him for being a skeptic. For some spouses, it could be insecurity, but put yourself in his shoes and I guess you can understand where some of that might come from. Give it time and do remember that this is your journey and in the end you make it what it is; our spouses are pretty much just along for the ride anyway.

What you are going through is normal. After effects of the surgery, the stress of doing without chewable food for a long period of time and as you lose weight, your body releases hormones stored in the fat - all that can make you emotional/depressed/moody whatever. It does get easier. Alot easier, but it takes time. My advice to you when you are feeling depressed is to remind yourself of why you did this. "Eye on the prize" kind of thinking. Consider writing a journal or some way of getting your feelings, hopes and dreams out there. Read inspirational success stories - do whatever you need to do to get your mind positive and knowing that this will help you meet your goals. You don't know me from adam, but my life has been utterly saved by being sleeved. The quality of life has gone through the roof. You will find thousands of stories of people who 6 months out and beyond have lost massive weight and are now living a much better life.

Vanity sizing is crazy. In the mid 1980s I got into a size 9/10 weighing about 140-145. My goal this time is 160 so I was thinking a size 12. Well, I weigh 189 and am wearing size 14 pants (non stretch jeans and slacks) and skirts. I even fit into a pair of size 12s that must have run even bigger. On the top, I am probably more of a 14/16 as I carry alot of weight around the midsection and back. I want to lose another 30 or so pounds so I am now thinking that is going to put me back in the 10 range! Women's clothing sizes mean nothing though, when I read sizing charts they are not even consistentent between different brands.

Yes, it is doable, but they usually talk in terms of excess weight lost. I am told that losing 60-80% of "excess" weight is typical with the sleeve, but there are people who lose 100% of their "excess" weight. It takes more effort to get there including exercising and making sure you maximize the "honeymoon" period and lose as much as you can the first year. I plan to lose about 90% of my excess weight (going by the BMI charts) to get to my personal goal of losing 150/ weighing 158. I am just over 30 pounds from that goal and I am almost 11 months out (surgery was 12/12/11)

Sounds to me like you are doing just fine. I found that the stage you are at was very difficult. I didnt have regrets, BUT it seemed like "eating" became the center of the universe and yet I could hardly eat! For me, I started feeling more human at about 6 weeks out... by 8 weeks out I felt like i was starting to really get the hang of it. By 3 months out, I felt GREAT. I just want to give you hope that this is temporary and you will reach a much more comfortable point before too long. So, I worked closely with a NUT as well as the surgeon and I got lots of great small tips. - I could not stand the taste of Water. Herbal tea because a real life saver as I could drink it slightly warm so it seemed to settle in the stomach easily and it tasted good. I add a little bit of stevia to sweeten. This set in my stomache even better then crystal light. I can drink plain water now, but i still drink herbal tea! - Like others have said, fluids are more important than anything. The first week post op I used a shotglass and basically had goals for how often I needed to finish the shot glass. By 3 weeks out I was using a cup, but doing something similiar - setting timing goals for finishing. Making sure i took a sip every X number of minutes type thing. - I too used the Protein drink from costco - the chocolate. I think each carton has 30g protein and is about 11 ounces, something like that. Anyway, consuming 2 of them I think I counted as 3 cups of Fluid. - Vitamins are a longer term type issue compared to water which is so critical to get in daily. I think we all respond differently to the stress of the surgery, but i was a perfectionist about vitamins and all that. It was probably an expression of my fear of failure. I wonder if your being inconsistent with them already is attributable to your mixed feelings about having done this surgery? - Depression or at least the blues is pretty normal. You describe it as a feeling of uncertainty, I felt it as a little bit of an emptiness. It followed a similiar path as my physical recovery I already mentioned, better at 6 weeks and doing great at 3 months. - I was given some rough guidelines round expected weight loss. It is based more on percentage of excess weight lost. It is hard to compare raw numbers because a person with 200 pounds to lose is going to lose alot more in the first month then someone with 50 pounds to lose. What you report sounds pretty on track to me though. Keep posting - ask your questions as they come up thats what this forum is for! Hang in there and i know you will be feeling better soon.

I was a revision from band to sleeve and just want to mention that beyond the hassle - your risk of serious complications is much higher for revision patients. From a risk point of view, doing the one surgery that works for you the first time is much better.

I had the exact same fear pre-op. I could have written that post except my story is worse - I had already failed with one bariatric surgery (lapband in 2001). I was afraid of regaining PLUS having complications from the surgery - like I did with the lapband. This was my argument of why I didn't want to give surgery another try. I was talking to my sleep apnea doctor who was the doctor who recognized that my obesity was killing me with the 52 BMI and encouraged me to consider surgery and he made an excellent point. He said well, what IF you do regain half the weight back... or even all of it over 5-10 years? That is still 5-10 years with 100% an improved quality of life - don't you think it would still be worth it? I had to answer honestly - YES! I am committed to it being different this time. This time it will be permanent. Like you I have made that promise to myself before, but I have to keep trying and I need to believe that this time is different.

You look great! I have similiar experience - overall pleased as punch, loving life 100+ pounds lighter but i do have the occasional "down" day. This is a lot of change

I am sorry, but in my book telling a morbidly obese person to just "eat less and exercise more" is like telling a diabetic to make more insulin. The people out there who have never been more 25 pounds overweight have no idea. I have come to believe that once obesity has you in it's claws your odds of getting out alive without drastic intervention is very very very low. I used to think I was just lame and lacked self control to eat right and exercise. That I was somehow "broken" that I lost 85# (was still well over 200#) on weight watchers and within 5 years had regained 51 of those pounds. I tried every diet, every program, therapy, tried OA I had short term success with some (WW being the best) but I could not seem to really get significant amount of weight off and keep it off. Then, what got scary in the last year or two before my sleeve, I couldn't even lose a small amount of weight, nothing was working. Well, what I have come to understand, based on info from my surgeon, from articles I have read, and reflecting on my history and so many stories I have read here.... That the body's response to obesity is to crave more food and to restore the weight anytime you do manage to lose a few pounds. Yes, we do have lifestyle choices to make and need to take responsibility for that, but without the surgery, morbidly obese people have very little chance to become normal weight (or anywhere near).

NUT told me that many people stop losing after "about" a year BUT if you keep working the sleeve, following the rules there is no reason you can't continue losing. I plan to!

In answer to your question, I feel that the sleeve does a much more effective job of reducing hunger. Having said that, realize that not everyone remains hunger free for the long term. Mine started ramping up after about 7 or so months. Somebody came back on these forums a while back and his appetite returned at about 2 years post op and he was regaining so looking to revise to the DS or RNY. I am mentioning this because some people think that post sleeve they will never feel hunger again and that just isn't true for many people. Most people see a disappearance of hunger for awhile and even when it returns it is much less intense then pre-op but you can't completely rely on that alone. Anyway, sleeve is great compared to the band!

Sorry, I missed the posts that already covered my point! I did want to say that it is kind of scary to think it didn't work. I feel confident that by the time you are on solid foods you will be feeling that stop signal and this surgery does work. I could not lose weight to save my life for the last several years no matter what diet program I tried. Look at my stats - the sleeve does work. I am saying this in hopes to give you some reassurance - hang in there - it gets better!

Another thought - my NUT told me that immediately post op you may have some nerve damage and may not be "feeling" things. She really cautioned me to eat by the numbers in the early weeks - following the portion and timing guidelines they gave me (we had basically week by week guide). Maybe slow down, go a little easier even though it feels like you have no restriction.

Thank you for sharing your story! I was sleeved in April 2000 by Professor Dr. Rudolph Weiner in Frankfurt - I was living there at the tim. Great surgeon and he did use the Lapband (which is what was approved) but I really did not get the follow up care i needed. When i came back to the US, the band was approved by then but no docs would help me or see me since they weren't my surgeon. IT shocked me really, I mean if you have open heart surgery does that mean you need to live in your cardiologists zip code the rest of your life? Anyway, I ditched that crapband in Sept 2011 and was sleeved in Dec 2011 and so far it has worked out great! I m sure it will for you too!

Thanks for sharing your knowledge about strength training! I am passionate about it, but alot of my info is really outdated as I learned it all way back in the stone age (1980s actually). I keep thinking I need to get updated education since I don't really know what the current thinking is. I do the old 3 sets. First set is enough weight to do 12 or more reps without dying. Second set, I shoot for fatigue/can't lift anymore after around 10 reps. The last set, a little more weight and I am tired now, so I get to maybe 8 (or even 6) reps. Of course I rest between each. What I notice is that doing this I feel like I get a tougher workout then the static weight. I typically do one day a week upper body (and do 30 minutes on elliptical), another day lower body (and 30 min elliptical) and one day a full body workout/strength training. I am currently using machines, I have not yet gone back to using free weights like I used to. Curious what an up to date trainer would think of this!? I do have a gentle criticism of your initial post. Alot of us were given orders to not lift more then about 10 pounds, or do any twisting or anything like that until more like 4-6 or even 8 weeks out. I know that the sleeve is basically healed at 3 weeks out, but I guess they have a reason for that margin of error and I would never counsel someone to go against their surgeon's recommendations. Some of us were freaking exhausted at 3 weeks out too, making it through a workday was about all I could manage. Anyway, I just did daily walking until about 2 months out when i joined the gym and started with Water aerobics and then eventually got back into the strength training and elliptical. My excess skin is definately there but not as bad as I feared considering how much weight I have lost and how many decades I have been obese. My on

I agree it is no big deal that the same questions are asked and answered over and over... but, also realize that might be a reason not every question is answered by more experienced people, that's all. Don't take it personally, there are alot of people (myself included) who want to be supportive but it would be a full time job to keep up with all the new posts so it is a little random as to which ones get answered.

Sure! My meaning is this - many morbidly obese people try to not be noticed. The dark clothes, the standing in the back in photos.. yadda yadda. Who are we kidding? Everybody sees us. We wear this obesity issue out there for everyone to see. Loved ones worry about our health. Mean people are just mean, and the insecure ones are afraid it will happen to them and are just grateful there is someone fatter then they are. Even if their motivation isn't "bad" people talk about the very overweight people and we are kidding ourselves if we think nobody notices. Having said all that, I totally respect people's desires to keep it private. I did that when I was banded, it actually didn't work out (ie my trusted sister blabbed to people I hardly knew and I overheard it - it was very negative and hurt my feelings a lot) so this time I just said, what the heck. Everybody that cares about me will root for me and the heck with the rest of em. What is interesting almost a year out and people seem to have forgotten how fat I was. I shocked the heck out of my son showing him a "before" picture - hardly recognizable to either of us. My brother asked me how I had lost so much weight and I had to remind him I had WLS. Funny people.

In answer to some specifics - yes I follow the drinking/eating rule because I want to be successful Portion size varies, early on they are tiny tiny but as your pouch matures you can and will eat more. I will be a year out in Dec and I still eat using a small teaplate. A half a sandwich is a huge meal for me. I often have a half sandwich without the bread. I think I ate half a burger once, but took one of the buns off. My nutritionalist pounded me in the head over and over again that maintaining small portion sizes at meals combined with not grazing are the two most important things to never forget for long term success. I don't drink soda as it is toxic and fizzy, I don't drink beer because it is fizzy. I have had the occasional glass of wine and even a cosmo with no problems. Eliminating what we call slider foods is a key success factor. chips for example, go down WAY too easy both presurgery and after. Slider type foods combined with grazing (eating all day) are two good ways to "fail" with the sleeve. The thing of it is, when you are eating so little, it needs to be really nutritious food for your health. Dense Protein first followed by veggies, followed by complex carbs (whole grains, etc). Junky carbs need to go away. You are asking the right questions!

You are right to be concerned, there are risks to this surgery and don't let anyone tell you otherwise. I would also like to point out that while you may be relatively healthy now, you are healthy until you aren't. Many of us felt like we were healthy fat people and then overnight all these issues started showing up. Being so overweight ages you before your time. I am only 48 but have wrecked knees due to the decades of lugging all this fat around. None of us can tell you what to do, but I think I would have been a better parent had I been closer to a normal weight when my kids were growing up. They never said it, but I am sure it was embarassing to have a 250-300# mom. I did play with them, but didn't have much stamina. As the years went on, I was exhausted all the time. I have regrets about that, I really do. Having said all that, do your research, realize that one of the risks is that you may not make it to goal. Lots of sleevers wind up losing 60-80% of their excess weight - is that "good enough" for you? I decided that it is, but I am also working very hard to beat those percentges, but I just think people should go in knowing the stats.

I haven't really figured out anything that works except following the rules. Dense Protein followed by greens/veggies. Minimal fruit and whole grains. Skip junky/carb/snacky food entirely. Eat a set number of times per day (ie no grazing). Drink lots of Water, but separate from meals by at least 30 minutes. Exercise. Recording what you eat on a tool like myfitnesspal.com helps keep it very "real" no fudging. If anybody comes up with something less annoying to get this weight off, lets go in business together and sell it on late night infomercials. Anyway, I empathize, my weight loss has slowed to a crawl that I think it qualifies as stall.

I didn't know this. As I mentioned in another post I have this between my thighs. I am curious how long it takes to go away... I haven't really noticed an improvement yet although my blood sugar has been really good since surgery. I wasn't diabetic before but had the metabolic syndrome of borderline blood sugar.

Thanks for sharing your success!!!

Yeah! So glad to hear you are doing better. Seems like most of the regretful posts turn out this way and I am glad you are one of them!!!! Looking forward to hearing of your ongoing successes!

Try different ones - none are great but some are more tolerable. I guess the way i could do it is because I had to. The ones I settled on was the chocolate premixed ones I bought at costco called Premier Protein. Low carb and 30 g of protein. I found the Syntrax nectar to be the best one for mixing up. It is really low calorie too. I made all sorts of creative shakes using their basic choc and vanilla and mixing sugar free flavorings. You can get a sample pack of the syntrax and try all their fruity flavors too.

In all that blathering I forgot to mention a very important point. I knew my band HAD to come out due to risk of complete closing off, but I was too scared to be sleeved. Doctor also thought having the surgeries a few months apart would reduce risk of leaks. I was so glad I did it that way because about 2 days after the band came out I was hungry beyond reason. I mean, 24/7 drive to eat was out of control. I went to a bariatric doc (not a surgeon) who really "gets it" and gave me an eating plan that let me eat alot without gaining alot. That 2.5 months of living without the band, before being sleeved made me realize that needed to be sleeved or I would weigh like 600# someday. It was so strange, it was like being banded changed something in me because once it was gone I had the drive to eat like I never had in my life. It was scary, but it also solidified my committment to the sleeve and making it work. this is probably why I love the sleeve so much - even though my hunger has returned now, it is just normal hunger not this all consuming drive to eat. I am praying that it remains so.