MinaT

Ha, I just found out about the one ounce cups that i will bringing home with me. I was told while in the hospital I have to chart everything (including pills) and everything has to go into the one ounce cup. I see a new obsession of mine coming soon lol.

Good Lucky Holly, so happy for you and will keep you in my prayers.

Since November 16th I have met with Dr. Shamsi once a month, kept a food journal on myfitnesspal.com and shared with the doctor. Six months and 60 pounds lighter, is a good start. I've gone through WLS "Is it Right for me" class, which explained all the surgeries, I have sat in group meetings, I have gone through psychological testings and met with their psychologist, I had a previous colonoscopy that they have the records, I had to get a release from my cardiologist, I met with their nutritionist, met with Dr. Stanish twice now and finally received my verbal approval from BCBSIL on Monday and I lucked out....twice a month they do a mandatory two Wednesday class from 1-3. If I didn't get approved until today I would have had to wait another 2 weeks for the next class to begin!! So two days after approval, I got into my first Wed. Class. The program at healthy4life through St. Mary's Hobart/Community Hospital Munster seems different than a lot of the ones I've seen here. They charge you a $600.00 program, out of pocket fee,before surgery. I paid $200.00 during my four month - pre-surgery nutritionist evaluation. Today the second $200.00 was paid, which paid for two weeks worth of protein shakes for the pre-op diet. Another $200.00 will be paid one week before surgery when I meet with the nurses to go over my medications and which meds to continue, stop etc. These fees gives us hotline number to the nurses to be used at any time, free access to meet with the nurses, free nutritionist/dietician access and nurses, and appointments for life. Sounds pretty good to me. Today's meeting was with a group of 5 that will be undergoing surgery with either Dr. Dong or Dr. Stanish. A few are getting gastric bypass the rest are getting sleeved. Dr. Stanish does not do duodenal switch any longer and I'm not positive, but I believe he's moved away from LapBand. We each received a packet and a special envelope that had Dr.'s prescription orders for tests he wanted. I need a mammogram, and an upper GI. I scheduled those the minute I got out of the office lol. Mammogram tomorrow, UpperGI Saturday. There was also a note saying that on April 1st I had an abnormal ekg and she needs to talk to me after the class. For some people that have heard of these places, Dr. Stanish and Healthy4life used to be out of Methodist Hospital. They recently transferred to St. Mary/Community and they are now working out their Center's of Excellence all over again. They were Centers of Excellence but they moved their program to a new hospital so they had to start all over. Though Dr. Stanish has been a surgeon over 13 years, and has done well over 1200 of these surgeries at Methodist, they are now at about 80-100 at St. Mary's and last week they did their second at Community Hospital. I will be their third done at Community Hospital. To become Centers of Excellence Bariatric Clinic like they were at Methodist, they need 125 at each hospital. Unfortunately, on April 1st I woke up and my chest was in pain. Every single breath hurt. I exercised anyhow, and finally realized it wasn't going away on its own, my husband said time to go to the hospital so I hurried and made a meatloaf for the family, took a shower and went to the ER. I was given an EKG, Chest Xray and a CT-Scan. They admitted me for observation. I was visited by my Internist the next morning, and he said that a cardiologist would be and I may end up getting an ultrasound of the heart or another ekg and I will probably be released. One of my Cardiologists' partners showed up and said I was having a complication from Lupus and I had pleurisy and sent me home without an ekg or ultrasound. Nothing was said to me regarding an abnormal ekg, which was taken while I was sitting in the triage. It was probably a lead that wasn't placed right. So, after the two hour meeting today, the nurse contacted my cardiologist, who left for the day but spoke with his nurse to see if he will sign another release or what I am suppose to do. I followed up the call and I pray my doctor just says yes and faxes a release, otherwise this will throw everything off track. My next appt. with cardiologist is July 15th, and I would have to try to get in before next Thursday, which is the day I meet with the surgeon to be given my surgery date. I should hear back tomorrow from the nurse from my surgeons tomorrow and I'll follow-up with my cardiologist tomorrow afternoon! No approval, no surgery. Keeping my finger's crossed. Back to the meeting: She said to quit caffeine now and from here on out, nothing to drink with sugar in it, including Zero Calorie Vitamin Water because it has 3-7 gm of carbs per serving. She gave us a bottle of ISOPure (grape) and truthfully it was quite terrible to me. I don't drink pop, crystal light or anything like it but this was pretty nasty to me. I guess it's going to be my new best friend for two weeks after surgery though. Ugh. I was told the day of surgery (even if it's at 6:30am) I will be allowed nothing by mouth, not even water, even that night until the next day when we will do our barium swallow. I've had surgeries, and I can tell you right now, this is going to be my biggest challenge. I'll want ice chips after surgery, I always have and this will be tough. I received my choice of 42 shakes, puddings, etc. today that will be used for the two week pre-op diet. They use New Direction I grabbed two variety packs to try the cream of chicken soup and different flavored and I decided to stick with chocolate and strawberry for the rest of them. I asked her about unjury chicken broth and she said she had some samples and she gave me the chicken broth to try now, in case I would like to use it during the clear liquid two week after surgery phase. She told us she recommends Optisource (you can purchase from Walgreens) it has all the vitamins and minerals you need and they are chewable vitamins. Must take 4 a day. She explained that the day of surgery we will receive a shot in the tummy and every day while we are there we will get this shot. It's to prevent blood clots. We'll get the IV and then while in surgery we'll get the catheter. She informed me that we'll remain in the hospital 3 nights 4 days as long as there are no complications. We'll be up walking that first day, several times, I'll have a morphine pump and we'll be given not sure if she said Torodal or Tramadol, unfortunately I didn't write it down. She said the next day will be clear liquids. Clear liquids will be two weeks worth. I will have a drain which will remain for at least a week. We will have compression stockings that blow up on their own every time we are in bed and not walking, we will be given antibiotics before and after surgery and we'll be using our spirometer 10 times an hour. Next Wed May 9th. is my second two-hour pre-op meeting and we'll be going over recipes for each stage. She will give us a spirometer and show us how to use it. She will teach us how to deal with the drain we will be going home with and how to clean out the drain. (ugh) As long as I get my cardiologist note clearing me for surgery, I have a meeting with Dr. Paul Stanish on Thursday 10th and we will schedule the surgery. He will tell me when to start my pre-op shakes and i will make an appointment for one week before surgery to meet with a nurse. I'll bring in my prescriptions and they will determine which ones I can take, which ones I need to stop and which ones I will need a new prescription because the size of the pills are too big. After surgery we will be given a one ounce cup and will have to write down each time we have an ounce of liquid, take oral medication, etc. My one week appointment with the surgeon, they will remove the drain. I haven't read anyone here talk about getting a drain, so it gave me the willies, never had one before. However, the good news is I'm less apprehensive about leaks because the drain will be a clue if there is a leak or not for the first week. It seems like this has been a roller coaster of things to do, emotions, worrying whether or not my previous adhesion issues will cause me to be declined, whether or not the Lupus will be an issue, whether or not the pleurisy was going to cause an issue, whether or not insurance will not approve me, it's been a lot of ups and downs. I've lost 60 lbs. on my own, major plus. Getting closer by the day though, and can't wait to be on the other side safely.

Wow, you look beautiful. Way to go, you are amazing Holly! Good luck on the rest of journey, you will achieve your goals!

I just got my sheet for what I am suppose to take and I was prescribed Optisource Vitamin and Minseral Supplement. They are chewable and I'm to take one 4x's a day. She said if I take this, I don't need to take a variety of pills, I will only need this one. I need to take Flaxseed every day for my eyes, and I'll find out soon what I'm going to have to do about that one.

I don't tolerate most medications, and nothing seemed to work, even cervical and occipital nerve blocks. I have a small brain tumor located on my trigeminal root and I couldn't tolerate the medication they gave me for that, so I just deal with the facial pain. I started Botox injections last June, every 90 days. The shots are not comfortable, and I hurt the next day even more and it takes about a week and 1/2 until everything starts to paralyze the muscles in my head and neck. Life since getting Botox for migraines made the bariatric possible. When I was getting daily migraines that would last for months, I couldn't do much of anything. I'm grateful I have a good team of doctors now.

Sending prayers . I had a pre-op appointment today, and found out that my EKG on April 1 was abnormal (this was after I got the cardiologist release). Next Thursday I meet with the surgeon and we are setting the date probably last week in May so now I have to get this taken care of. Will keep you in my prayers, that it's nothing but a shadow and keep us posted.

Good Luck Dixie. I actually had a huge post I was going to post here and realized, this is the anticipation of denial section and I didn't want to keep hijacking it with what is happening, so I just tried to figure out the blog thing and posted there about my first meeting today and what happened. It was quite a long day. I had a meeting after receiving all my injections I receive in my head for migraines. I get botox in my scalp and in my neck for headaches, I received over 31 shots today and I forgot about this appointment when they scheduled the pre-op appointments. Dixie, all mom's are psychic in some ways, my son says there you go being psycho again...every time I am right. Yeah, he calls my psycho instead of psychic. I hope you hear soon, please keep us posted.

Dixie, hurray!!! I'm sure if you followed everything your doctor said to do to this point, it will be approved.

I can't wait to be where you are and I'm so happy for you. Congrats, and I bet it won't be too long before you can shout" I took step and I ROCKED IT."

Now we have to wait for Dixie to get approved I would love to hear when my surgery date is, I would love for it to be in May and not June. I'd like to get to swim on 4th of July lol.

Congrats BoBann! Yay, when I found out I was approved, I immediately called my surgeon's office told them and they got the ball rolling on my next step, which is the class tomorrow. I'll update you tomorrow when I find out exactly what that entails. Dixie & Irish, waiting on good news about your approvals!!!

I haven't had the sleeve yet, but I have gone from 330lbs. to 128 and kept it off for five years and regained it due to surgery, depression, sickness which caused me to quit working out, which caused more and more weight gain back to over 300 again. I now am waiting for the sleeve and have been working hard for over six months waiting for the day I get the sleeve. You gained 20 lbs. not 30, 40 or 50 or more. Just a mere 20. Try adding some Protein shakes in your day, one or two, then high protein dinner, low carb (don't drink for 30 minutes after eating). Go back to the beginning. Park your car a little further at the grocery store, take the stairs at work, instead of sitting and watching TV, stand and walk in place. We all know what it is like to gain 10-20 lbs back after dieting. If we can stop it then, we won't have to look back when it's 50 or 60 or 100 and it seems nearly impossible again. I wish you the best of luck and it's great to hear from someone that has been through it and what life is like down the road.

Not sure if you can eat almonds, but I would do something to put back the electrolytes, protein shake or bar, or teaspoon of peanut butter, which is my go-to food.

Botox injections would be pretty much every 90 days to get rid of the 11's. I don't see anything wrong with it, if you worked so hard to get your weight down, why not get rid of the worry 11's. If it's going to make you feel better, why not do it.

Amie, while the six month doctor monitored diet seems like forever...I actually joined once and quit within a month to join a year later, it is worth it. I lost over 60 pounds since I started the pre-op diet and I got approved yesterday, I have my first pre-op class (going over meds, what pre-op testing I might need) tomorrow and next wed. then I willf ind out surgery date and start the pre-op) liquid diet. The closer I get to the date, the more I'm getting nervous, excited, wondering if I am doing the right thing when I read stories of the pains, leaks, etc. the doubt of how I will handle two week liquid diet, how will I handle the recovery, but in the end, I go back to I need to do this, I can't go back to the way I was. Good Luck to you and I hope the six months then approval period go as quick for you as it did me. If I can make it through Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, Easter while on a high Protein, low carb diet, I can make it through Memorial Day and 4th of July on liquids!

Another suggestion if you drink coffee, quit before surgery. It's better to have caffeine withdrawal before surgery than after surgery.

With the lap band there could be issues with slippage. I have had several surgeries in the past, hysterectomy, c-section, laparascopies, and I have issues with adhesions. There are many people that need surgeries to get the lap band off and then end up getting the sleeve. I myself had a heart monitor and it was just under the skin and it always bugged me. With the lap band, you have a port right under the skin. I would hate to have to have fluid inserted or taken out, that sounds painful to me. I also have Lupus and my surgeon will not give me lap band with lupus. With Gastric Bypass, since I have had several issues in the past, including a bowel resection due to having adhesions that wrapped around my intestines and caused sepsis, I do not want any more of my intestines compromised. I have had diverticulitis and polyps in the past too. I heard about dumping and hair loss and nutrition issues with Gastric Bypass and that seems too difficult to me. The sleeve allows for normal digestion of the food and seems all around safer for me than any other surgery.

Wow, 30 day pre-op liquid diet? Did you have to follow a diet previous to this (like 6 months of writing down all your foods and following high protein - low carb) or is this the whole pre-op diet? Good for you 13 days down good luck. Haven't tried Chikes, I will have to look into it.

Good luck to you. Sounds like you were put through a huge process. I hope you hear by the 7th. I'm hoping they will schedule surgery before the end of May. Swimming is my treat. If I had a choice of cake or swimming, I would always chose swimming. I was told I won't be able to swim from 4 - 6 weeks after surgery and I really wanted to be able to swim by 4th of July. Like you though, I'm scared, excited, nervous and yes, scared again. It looks like we'll be doing this very close together and that's a good thing, we can be scared together!

If you can't ride the bike, maybe you can find a pool and walk, run in the pool. It's good for the joints, it's good for your body and you burn more calories walking & running in the pool than you do jogging, walking around a track. Low impact and it feels good! Many hospitals now have an affiliation with gyms that do therapy and they have therapy pools which are at a warmer temperature for people with joint issues.

If you are doing this for a specific period, for let's say 2 - 6 months for a special diet prior to getting your authorization, you can always check out Myfitnesspal.com . Try to stay about 80gm protein, and 40-60 gms of carbs a day during this 800-1100 calories and you will lose weight during this. Try to eat lean meats, chicken, ground turkey, eggs, tuna, fish, etc. for dessert, peanut butter on a spoon worked for me, extra protein, lower carbs than other desserts.

Another good shake idea, something I have had once a day for 6 months is Pure Protein 100% whey in Frosty chocolate. I mix with skim milk and a few ice cubes in my awesome Magic Bullet and it's really good. It has 25gm of Protein. http://www.pureprote...aspx?sku=050449 I know they sell it at Target.

Piercedphoenix, I read that you are having surgery May 7th, so that's a 16 day pre-op liquid diet? I heard some people have 3 days, I was told two weeks, so I am not sure if that is 10 days or 14 days, hopefully I'll find out more this week. Good luck to you and 16 pounds is a good amount of weight! Good for you and good luck!

Congrats Mrs. KC, I hope you are doing well and I hope the next few weeks go great!