aliekat55

Very unexpected but i have lost so much padding around my butt that now i am getting presure points. it is hard to sit in a chair for any length of time, even with 75 pounds off . I guess that is a victory of sorts. I am feeling bony prominences that i never knew i had and when i lay down they also cause presure points ( shoulder, hip) I hope i adjust to this and dont have to keep shifting my position in chairs and beds constantly.

It is all pracitice for the rest of our lives. not to worry. i would have a small salad and that got me through to surgery. you made good choices.

I agree. I have a hard time reconcilling the clothes i am wearing with my perception of myself. i keep thinking the clothes must have 'relaxed' or streched or something because i cannot see myself as anything but large. However when i was at my heaviest i was like you and saw myself as much smaller than i was. amazing how a picture reveals so much more than a mirror. Right now my I am struggling more with my perception than with food. who would have thought? I feel like my brain is 40 pounds behind reality and cannot catch up. I am at a lower weight than i have been in 30 years, yet dont feel all that much smaller. good luck

have the fit bit one because they were out of the flex. it is awesome, the interface is great, it connects to my iphone without any effort and the website is great. Certainly helps me track with activity and sleep. that said , i hear great things about the Nike and Jawbone, although the nike does not track sleep and the jawbone was a bit more expensive.

My mood is all over the place. I fell like there are five different people inside and they take turns in my brain. So much to deal with, thinking about the surgery, the proces of getting it, then the actual surgery and now learning a new life and relationship with food. Not having food for an emotional crutch. Now the change is body image. its a lot for a normal brain to accept. at least it has been for me. my dear wife has been stellar and so far i dont think she has contacted a lawyer.

I had no problems and actually flew home by myself two days afterwards. having someone in the hospital that first day would have been nice, but i managed.

IF you have not had any urine output you are probably dehydrated, although they should have given you a ton of fluids while you were there. I hope the surgeon calls back soon.

I have fought that nausea feeling off and on for five weeks. for me it was about eating and drinking too fast. Never mind that it was loads slower than ever before, it wasnt slow enough or small sips enough. Now that i am timing my itty bitty bites it is much better. Nevertheless if he doesnt feel better quickly he should get it checked out.

I get a pressure in my lower esophagus, rather uncomfortable. sometimes mixed in with a tiny bit of nausea for good measure. I am a slow learner and constantly surprised how little it takes. I dont feel i have eaten too much at any time but i eat much to fast. When they say take 20 min. i suppose they mean it, not 10 minutes, which by the way is so much slower than normal for the tiny bit of food I eat. but i am getting much better at it since I absolutely hate that full feeling.

Don, what settings do you put into MFP? it recomends 80 gms of protein for me but i exercise alot and and i struggle to get 90 gms in and only with shakes. I know i am only 5 weeks out but i cannot imagine eating the kind of protein you are doing. we are the same height and headed for a very similar goal.

how many calories do you aim for? i think i need more than the 700 a day i eat, because i typically get 400-600 calories from my exercise which is not much and i am womdering if that is why i am sluggish.

I get this feeling when i eat too fast, although not with a popsicle that should melt and move on. the esophagus can spasm if irritated so if you eat the popsicle fast you may want to try to slow it down. No matter how slow i think i am going, it doesnt seem slow enough. i will have to take people's comments here to heart and get a timer so i can wait between bites.

BTW there is a great article on the NYT about a man who went to belgium for a hip replacement and describes top service and great results he paid 20% of what it would cost here. IT was last weeks article and should not be hard to find. if I am as lucky as you and my hard work pays off and need abdominal plasty i expect to look into a trip to europe.

IF you google medical tourism they show many services that are easy to navigate for both mexico and western europe (belgium, netherlands, and recently Poland, czech republic. the prices i have seen appear to be half of what you have found for what appears to be top western style medicine including the trip. Go early and enjoy a mini-vacation.

It takes alot of focus and energy to eat properly. I can eat little bits easily and then one big bite and swallow and i am paying the price. I hope it becomes more automatic wth time.

four weeks out my blood total protein level dropped below the reference range--ouch! I thought i was doing well keeping my daily intake to 74gm daily. I wonder if it reflects that first week after surgery when i could get so little in. I am going to increase the protein to 80+. that could explain my fatigue. part of it could be that i have been exercising everyday and that may be consuming some of the protein. doesnt leave much room for any carbs. I am eating about 750 calories per day and working hard to get that in. i had decreased my protein shakes by half, so I will have to increase that a bit. otherwise my blood levels were good.

definitely count your blessings. i got the other side. no complications mind you, but pain, fatigue, constipation. took a couple of weeks to work it out.

one more thing. if you dont track your food I found that My fitness pal is a lifesaver. really easy to use.

need more info. how much protein are you getting? how much exercise are you doing? are you taking you vitamins?

it is day 27 post op and I am under 100KG (220 for the non metric amongst you). it is significant because although i got close once ten years ago i never made it into double digits. it is the lowest i have been in 30 years. My mind cannot catch up with the reality, i still see myself the old way even while people are shocked at the change. part of it is that it is hard to believe I am here and that it will not go away like it always has. Nevertheless, it is of interest that i am not as small as i was ten years ago when i got close to 100KG, back then i was much fitter and was lifting weights, so for the same weight i was one size smaller (38 pants instead of 40). I guess while i think about it i have already reached another goal which was to get the weight off my bum knee so i can exercise more. I havent had trouble with the knee for weeks. Although i lost much of the weight (43 pounds) pre op, it was all due to the VSG, the education, the preparation, the anticipation. Before i started this path i was on an uphill course. IT has been a very tough road with some difficult days. i am only now getting more energy than i had before.

well the vitamin levels arent back yet and i will discuss all of it with the surgeon next week. in the meantime I am increasing my protein by 10mg a day to 85mg. I did research and the recomended amount in some of the bariatric literature is 1 to 1.5 mg per kg of normal weight. That is a lot! for an 85 kg man that is 85- 127 gms a day!

only three weeks out yet NSV's are all over the place. I need to focus and note them and not take them for granted. I was sitting on a wooden chair at the dinning room table and was uncomfortable, finaly i figure it was because by BFB was so much smaller that the presure on my sitting bones was uncomfortable! go figure. I now have definition over my Quads- never seen that before. Big success was not weighing in for three days now. I find that it plays games with my mind no matter what the number is.

i had heightened ability to smell for a few days. it was amazing for a while. i remember being at the airport and being able to tell you what the food stores were for 100 yards. Still I was not hungry so it did not bother me too much. after a while I just wanted to get away from it. the other thing to look out for is changes in temperature tolerance. i have always been hot, needing cool air to feel comfortable, now i am all over the place, from hot to cold to in between. I have to keep a heavy sweatshirt nearby and it put it on and shed it regularly during the day. You would think i was going through menopause.

love the fitbit. had no trouble at all with the sync and using the app. has helped me tremendously with keeping up my activity and monitoring my sleep efficiency. it syncs with MFP seamlessly.

i was feeling like you, except i could sip ok. but it got much better very quickly at the end of day number two. Not convinced that walking helped but i walked constantly despite the pain.