G33kg1rl

Good luck, HanSolo1977! By the way, I love your nick. I'm a huge Star Wars fan.

Ypsilanti, Michigan, next town over from Ann Arbor, about 40 minutes from Detroit.

Hello, everybody. I'm in Ypsilanti. If I get approved for sleeve surgery, I will be working with Dr. Hawasli of St. Clair Shores. I realize that's quite a hike, but I have some medical issues that Dr. H. is willing to work with, and some other doctors aren't. It's great to meet you all!

Oh, man, that is annoying . . . I can relate. I made it all the way through one hospital's program, with all classes, approvals, etc., only to be told on the day of surgery that the doctor was worried about complications and wouldn't do the surgery on me. I had to go to a second hospital and jump through all the hoops again. Then they denied me too. This is my third try . . . hopefully this time it will actually happen!

It's interesting to see what different people are and aren't allowed to eat. I thought my own diet was pretty strict, but I've learned it's not as strict as some! I feel relatively lucky. A question, though . . . someone on this thread said that you shouldn't eat onions as part of your liver-shrink diet. Why is this? I don't think of onions as being high in carbohydrates at all.

Sewing from scratch is much easier than doing alterations, and it can be fun, although OutsideMatchInside is right that sewing your own clothes can be at least as expensive as buying ready-made outfits. Still, if you sew your own things, you get to pick the exact pattern and fabric you want, instead of settling for whatever the store has available. It's also really exciting to watch the new garments take shape!

So I went in for surgery today and all went as planned until the surgeon came in. As I was lying there on the gurney with an IV in my arm, he told me that he's too worried about my liver and that I should have the surgery done at another hospital. I followed his pre-surgery directions to a T and literally the first thing I told him back in October was that I have liver problems. Why wait until the freaking morning of surgery to tell me that I'm not a candidate for his facility?! Anyway, I'm so bitterly disappointed and feeling somewhat depressed. I had myself emotionally ready for this surgery and the letdown is terrible.

Thanks, everybody, for your support. For the record, the surgeon cancelled at the last minute because he was worried about my liver, and suggested I go to the University of Michigan hospital. I'd be fine with that if he hadn't told me this literally minutes before I was scheduled to be put under. I came to his facility in October of last year, and literally the first thing I told them was that I had liver problems. (My liver specialist was the one who recommended the surgery.) They've had all my medical documentation for months. I suspect the surgeon only just bothered to read what was in my chart that morning. I have no problems with a doctor saying I need more extensive care than his facility can provide--it DOES really bother me that I was strung along until the day of surgery, though. I'm starting over again at U of M, waiting to get into one of their informational presentations. I asked how long the whole process to the day of surgery would take, and the lady at U of M wasn't sure. Ugh. What a mess!

Well . . . I'm a geek. I have a Master Replicas lightsaber sitting on top of my bookshelf (Anakin Skywalker's, if you're curious), and a Weta copy of Bilbo's map to Erebor, among other things. I know all the lyrics to Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog. I have dressed up as a Jedi when it was not Halloween. I've been out of the role playing scene for ages, but I have a friend who's trying to get me back in. I'll probably let him. And since most geeks seem to be guys, I added the "girl" to the end to make it clear. I can't really explain the fake 1337-speak . . . (using numbers for letters), it just seemed like a good idea at the time.

I'm having surgery on the 9th. I think it would be great to have April buddies too, although I have no idea how the friending system works here.

Wow, you look terrific! Congratulations!!

I haven't gotten my sleeve yet (I'm having surgery on Wednesday too), but I've had other surgeries. You don't dream under general anesthesia. It's like time skips--one minute you're getting something put in your IV, and bang! The next minute you're in the recovery room. You don't feel anything during the procedure. You may feel pretty groggy when you come to--like you may be able to hear people talking around you, but be too sleepy to respond. That's about it for weirdness, though. It's not like sleep paralysis or anything disturbing like that. In my experience, catheters don't hurt going in or out. They feel a little strange during the in and out procedure, like pressure where there's normally no pressure, but other than that you don't notice them. General anesthesia really isn't so bad. You may be surprised at how easy it goes.

Thank you so much! I appreciate it.

I'm not too sure if anyone reads these blogs, so I'm mostly writing this for my future self. I want something to look back on so that I can see progress and feel like I made the best decision for myself. Life at almost 200 pounds overweight is not so hot. Everything hurts, all the time, especially my back and my legs. Climbing stairs is a minor torture, and picking things up off the floor is almost beyond me. It's hard to put on my socks. It's hard to clip my toenails. I can't rush out to the store and buy a last-minute outfit for some unexpected event, because even the "fat lady stores" don't stock my size. I have to order things off the internet. Putting on seat belts is hard. Clipping my toenails is hard. I have high cholesterol, fatty liver disease, severe sleep apnea, and borderline diabetes. Walking anywhere is so painful that I've thought about zipping around stores in one of those electric carts, but I'm not yet ready to be "the fat lady on the cart" that people snap pictures of on their cell phones and send to their friends. I've only been this heavy for maybe 7-8 years, and it's already wreaking havoc on my body. God only knows how I'd feel in 10 or 20 years if I didn't do something drastic now. If I'd even be alive in 10-20 years. I realize surgery is going to hurt. It might hurt a lot, and there's a chance that it'll hurt for a long time. I've read some pretty hair-raising stories on these forums. But being really, really fat hurts too. If I start to regret the surgery in the future, I hope I look back on this entry and remember.

Has your surgeon given you any guidelines about lifting? I had some lifting restrictions after I had my gall bladder out, although it was so long ago that I no longer remember what they were. A 36 pack of beer sounds pretty heavy to be lifting right after surgery, but I'm not your dr. I'd ask him. Also, for what it's worth, I was down for 10 days after gall bladder surgery, but I understand many people are back on their feet faster. I was silly and pushed myself at first, and then was feeling ill and in a lot of pain. I might have gotten better faster if I'd taken it easy those first few days.

It seems like everybody on this site has been told to go through a rigorous pre-operation diet but me. I have to ingest nothing but fluids for the last 24 hours before surgery, and that's it. Nothing about shrinking the liver or anything like that. I'm going to the Barix clinic in Ypsilanti, MI, where bariatric surgery is all they do, so I assume they know what they're doing. Still, I feel a little nervous that my instructions were so different from others'.

Thank you so much for your replies! I feel somewhat better now.

It seems like everybody on this site has been told to go through a rigorous pre-operation diet but me. I have to ingest nothing but fluids for the last 24 hours before surgery, and that's it. Nothing about shrinking the liver or anything like that. I'm going to the Barix clinic in Ypsilanti, MI, where bariatric surgery is all they do, so I assume they know what they're doing. Still, I feel a little nervous that my instructions were so different from others'.

I have just over a week to go and I am totally freaking out. Too nauseated to eat much, too jittery to sleep. I don't know how I'm going to put up with another week of this. I don't know what my problem is--I don't even have a strict pre-op diet to follow. The surgeon's office told me to just stick to clear liquids for 24 hours before surgery. Other than that, I can still eat what I want. Well, okay, I could eat what I wanted if I weren't sick from nerves. I'm an avowed coward, and I keep worrying that I'm going to be in terrible pain. For complicated reasons, I can't take Tylenol, and NSAIDs will be off-limits post-surgery. My hepatologist's office seems to think I'm just going to "tough it out." AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA ::deep, rattling wheeeeze:: . . . ha. I get my whole mouth numbed up just to have my teeth cleaned. If they're going to kick me out of the hospital without pain meds, I'll just insist on staying in the hospital an extra day or two, nursing my drip. From what I hear, I should be okay after the first few days. I just don't want to be lying there feeling like someone stuck a knife into my belly 5 times. (They will actually have stuck a knife in my belly 5 times--I just don't want to feel like it.) I also have a collection of rampant What-Ifs running around my brain. What if I feel so sick afterward that I can't eat or drink? What if I make a wrong move and pop my stitches? What if I have a leak? What if my currently-supportive family gets annoyed with taking care of me before I'm able to do things on my own? After all, I'm not supposed to lift more than 5 pounds for 6 weeks. That's a lot of fetching and schlepping to delegate to the relatives. What if I have disastrous complications and just keel over and die? I know that some of these things are not terribly likely, and that in my case the risks of the surgery are less than the risks of doing nothing. But damn, I am a nervous, twitching wreck.

Wow, there's a surprising number of people going on cruises! That's great. My surgery date is 4/9/14 and I'll be leaving for a cruise on July 1. It'll be my first one. I'm glad to hear that people have done trips like this fairly soon after surgery and still managed to have a good time. I've been sort of worried that I'll be stuck feeling lousy during this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. It's good to know that I'll probably be feeling fine.

Well, in my case it was news from my liver doctor. She said I'm likely to need a transplant 8-10 years from now, and if I'm this heavy they won't put me on a transplant list. I wasn't aware that if you're fat enough, they just give up on you and let you die. :/ She wants me to lose 100 pounds ASAP. Also she said she didn't know how long I'd remain healthy enough for WLS, so that I'd better be quick about it.

Hello, I'm Melissa, a 41-year-old former special education teacher, currently on disability due to major depression. Unfortunately, throughout my adult life I've turned to food as a method of dealing with anxiety, loneliness, and boredom. I now have life-threatening medical conditions due to my weight, and my doctor essentially told me that I need to get my BMI below 35 at the very least or I'll die within 10 years. At her suggestion, I started looking into bariatric surgery. I've only just started on this journey, and am busy gathering information. I've enjoyed what I've read on this site so far--it's been very informative and helpful. I look forward to participating and meeting you all!