MisforMimi

I've learned that EVERYONE, I MEAN EVERYONE wants to loose weight, even naturally skinny people. The normies, I call them, the ones who can happily eat plain lettuce with lemon slices and 3 ounces of dried up chicken breast for every meal. My brother is one. I do think there is an element of jealously involved like nobody can get a break on losing of maintaining weight if they didn't. And yes they think WLS is a break! A co-worker of mine is bipolar and she's having electroshock treatment and ppl are like great whatever works! The fear and hatred of the obese is so insidious and subversive in our culture it's unreal.

You are so right! It takes a lot of energy to raise small children and it only requires more as they age if you want to fully engaged in their lives. Your husband has some legitimate fears and concerns, but at the end of the day they are HIS fears and concerns and HE needs to deal with them. Sounds like his loss and having not fully grieving is taking center stage and he may need therapy to deal with his past or just a counselor or someone to talk to. Your family and relatives may need emergency and elective surgery. It happens to most people over the course of a lifetime. Your kids might break a bone, he might get in a car accident and break a bone a require surgery. I still have fears of anesthesia even though I lived through my father's amputation, my mother's pacemaker and my 3 year old daughters tonsillectomy oh and I work in an orthopedic surgery clinic. I have faith you all will figure this out. You owe getting healthy to yourself and then to your family and kids. With or without his blessing, move in the direction of health. You know if you could stay on a 1200 cal diet of your own will, yes, you would loose weight but if you are like any of us (pre-surgery) my guess is that you would gain it back and 40 pounds extra and would be on the roller coaster again. And research shows us the yo-yo dieting is bad as staying fat!!

Getting your insurance company to pay for protein supplements, powders and RTD drinks??? I have Regence

I've not had surgery yet but my bet is that the success of this group is due to the fact that the ppl on here are getting extra support!! Which we all need. They are asking questions, starting connected, using resources, getting inspiration, going to follow up etc etc

Tell her all the WLS patients you know ARE exercising and watching their diets very carefully!!

Are you serious? That lump on my neck will go away???????!!!! I'm all in now!

You got this, boo!

I think I can use the flex spending account as well if I don't max out with my out of pocket expenses for the surgery

Try not to eat after midnight or shall I say at all...LOL...since you're on 48 hour prep, but if you slip closer to the actual surgery it/can will be cancelled.....its not related to anesthesia dosing per se, but more labout choking on food as your body relaxes with anesthesia....

@@Jersrose43 Wow, how brave!! I curious to know what were your responses like? You have some good points. I think we all own the decision to some degree or we wouldn't be here. Even if some choose to use the medical and scientific community to support our decisions, which I'm sure you did as well, with all the research required to get here....I guess I don't care to hear ppls opinions....I already know that most people think this is taking the easy way out and loosing it on your own is best yadda yadda yadda and some ppl stuggle to keep their opinions to themselves. I have some relationships that I value for other intrinsic reasons besides what their views are on weight loss surgery....

@@Algae Sounds like your "friend" needs that other spiritual 12-step program called Al-Anon!! I hope told her to mind her business! Dang. That's rough.

I'm in the process of getting an HR certification and I'm learning a bit about the process. Technically, being obese with chronic health conditions and having surgery qualifies as disability, given you 9 months off and protected status. None of us really need that. FMLA gives you 12 weeks off if you qualify and places your position in a protected status. Both options require that you have medical certification from a physician. Your doctor could be vague saying you have a x health condition requiring inpatient surgically intervention and you can return to work in x weeks with x modifications. That paperwork is submitted to HR who is mandated to keep it private. If you work in a small office and your manager is your HR professional, then you run the risk of letting cat out of the bag before you may have wanted to. You could also choose to simply take vacation time and keep it totally private BUT what happens if at the end of 1, 2 or 3 weeks of vacation and you're not cleared by your surgeon to go back to work or you simply feel like you may need more time off or god forbid you have a complication? Now you would have to complete FMLA paperwork anyway. Your work team would / could be highly suspicious by you not coming back from "vacation" and HR will make you claim the previous period of time as FMLA. If you want to maintain privacy, you can take the FMLA, be truthful on the forms to HR, but simply tell your co-workers you are taking medical leave to have surgery. If you're old enough everyone will think you're having a hysterectomy! But not coming back from medical leave when expected is more understandable than vacation. Also every company has policies regarding leave, as stated above I would advise you read up on it. I was describing federal law above so what ever policy your company has had to be more generous to the employee or they would be in violation of federal law which is usually not the case.

So, I've finished/passed my 6-month physician monitored weight loss. Yay! I've had my initial consult. Yay! I'm scheduled for my 1st NUT appointment and psych eval (Nov 10 & Nov 11 respectively). Yay! I'm looking for a surgery date of early 2015. Yay. NOW WHAT????!! I don't have the "pressure" to loose weight for my insurance company, I'm not gaining weight but I'm not as careful as I was before. I'm a little terrified of the holidays coming and my 2 week liquid diet would start for another 2 months. The only reason I'm waiting for the start of the year is so that my flex-spending can pick up my out of pocket costs which would be about 15% and since my spouse is not working, we don't have that kind of cash laying around right now. And taking 3 weeks off during the holidays would be not so kind to my team (at work). I don't want to start the liquid diet too early and burn out...... Thoughts? What did you do during this time???? Its 11 weeks till the new year. The anticipation is killing me!!!

You could make a complaint to the practice manager and if its affliated with a hospital, I would talk to someone in patient relations. Specifically, from the practice manager I would want to know what the standard of turn-around time you should expect from her (the mean paper-pusher). And report her attitude. You are a paying customer and there are other places that would happily compete for your dollars!! You could go to patient relations. Ask how are they prepared to offer you something in the way of service recovery for being inconvenienced and disrespected? Free parking, a private room (one can always hope)....etc etc... And most importantly let the surgeon know about your experience... Your surgeon pays her salary and would be highly displeased to get a complaint. You can decide how far you want to take it and what its worth to you but all those are reasonable options. I do the job of the woman you referenced at another facility and state and when a person calls on something I was supposed to do, I am all about the apology, explanations and their paperwork moves to the top of the pile. Healthcare is changing, the place where you are going ain't the only show in town....

@@Jonathan Blue Dude congratulations! You're a friggin rock star! You are so right, I need to keep going but allow myself a few cheat meals....I have a few restaurants I need to show out at but I don't want to loose my gains or gain my losses LOL... I'm hoping to get on this Crossfit train when I'm cleared after surgery...for now I need to up my walking....LOL...I'm excited to check out your blog

@@MBM1Forever, Congratulations on the 14lbs! maybe we can be buddies then since we have around the same size and having the same procedure around the same time.....

By any means.......but that was funny

@@Lauriep, I hear what you are saying. I had my initial consult and I had several things go through my mind. I had my heart set on the sleeve because the thought of having my insides rewired was scary. I was only choosing between the sleeve and the bypass oh and NOT HAVING SURGERY AT ALL!! And I do take ibuprofen for occasional pain from degenerative arthritis. The thing that got to me was IF I'm going under a general anesthetic to loose weight and halt some chronic disease processes, I want the procedure with the highest percentage of average weight loss. The thing about the pain, well at least the arthritic pain, it's an inflammatory process. So, there is a high chance that joint pain would significantly improve with improved diet, exercise and less weight. I've loss a considerable amount of weight before and maintained it for many years (on my own) and then I lost that control. And I'm here thinking that I could do it on my own but my ability to maintain weight loss is virtually impossible. Some weight loss, especially by big people can be easy (barred serious metabolic issues) but we all have the history of "gaining it all back and then some" that is a common thread in our story. There is gravity in the decision, but just remember to keep it real and be seethingly honest with yourself. Only you can decide. I don't know what you have gone through for your insurance co., you would definitely have to do all that again down the line.

Yes. Call your insurance company...

Oooh, Imma try that! Drink more water and walk around that park!! No really, I am! And have the gastric bypass!!

@@CowgirlJane, Thanks! I was going to hit you you for sure about this. We are looking into the cafe but on a non football Sunday mid afternoon. We can come to consensus on time eventually.

Your six months will fly by!! Don't get complacent! I found myself having to huff and puff by the end..... lol

There is a meet up in Bothell, being planned for next month as we speak.....er...type! Hang on! Details coming soon!

@@RxtineVsg Hey, I hope you get answers as well. What a quandary! I am co-hosting a WA state BP local chapter in November. I can PM for more details.......

Have you ever lost 12 pounds in 3 weeks previously? Is it the TOM? Are you, could you be retaining water? Could you call the NUT for some perspective? I would also think for this that have had many attempts, I would say the body/metabolism needs time to catch up and that you've entered dreaded 3 week stall. Everybody had it, or so I've read here. There is actually a physiological reason for it.