Forsythia

I had a two week stall. It sucked. Immediately after the surgery all the fluids come off and it is magic. But then the body is all "OMG WTF just happened to me? Hold up!" It takes a bit of time to figure things out!

Awesomesauce!

Stopped all my pills at my one week post op visit. My sugars are between 90 and 115 consistently.

This is true. It does come off slower if your bmi is lower. But stalls happen. You can try adding another snack if you think you need more calories. You can ease back into working out by walking as tolerated as your foot heals. Be vigilant about logging your food. Maybe you just need to try lower carbs or something.

I think I'm just going to have to deal with loose skin there. Fitted tops have always been tight in my arms even when loose in the chest and tummy. It's just odd where the fat chooses to deposit itself. My legs have always toned up well and have much less fat and excess skin. My lower legs are downright slim.

I got two separate EOBs. The hospital charges, then the cost of the sleeve itself. I live in Chicago and went to a hospital in Chicago and the charges were $48,000 for the hospital stuff. The VSG was billed for another $7000 on top of that. My total out of pocket expense was right around $1800 (I had met my deductible but still had part of my out of pocket maximum to meet). The fascinating thing is to see how much the insurance will just write off. The hospital can charge what it wants but BCBS or Cigna or Aetna are only going to pay a predetermined amount.

I think I am having sympathy pains for you. Like, I felt my stomach clench when I read this! Take it easy and feel better!!

I have a lot of curly fine hair. I'm black, and my hair is natural (I've been told I have good hair, but I don't know what that means because the curl is a beast). I stopped relaxing it in 2012 after my stylist told me she wouldn't give me highlights if I kept relaxing it. I'm almost 10 weeks post op. I'm crossing my fingers that I don't lose too much. I've been taking a pre-natal Vitamin with Biotin, Vitamin D and Vitamin B12. But If I lose hair I can always buy a wig. My mom lost all of her hair when she had chemo.. it grew back. All things are temporary!

I'm creeping closer to the 250s. Woot. My next goal is 256, which is 50 lbs down from the weight I came home from the hospital at, and half of 100 lbs. I've been making good gains with my strength training. I have been using a 30lb barbell for dead lifts and bench press. But I think I am ready to try the 40 lb bar for both of those exercises. I also think I can go up to 15 lbs dumbbells on squats. Normally I am sore but lately I am not sore after all of the lifting. So it is time to heavy up, as it were. In some ways, it is nice not to be sore. Being sore makes sitting down to pee a challenge. But I also know that if I am not sore, my muscles are used to it and need more of a challenge. So time to suck it up, buttercup. No one said working out was supposed to be easy. LOL. My wedding band and and engagement rings barely stay on my finger. I suppose I could move it to my right hand since ones dominant hand is usually bigger than their non-dominant hand, but I figure all of the busybodies out there would question my marriage if my rings are not on my left hand. Funnily enough, my husband has lost not one, but two rings and has not worn a wedding band for at least a year and no one says a word to him. He lives a nice busybody free lifestyle. I bought swim goggles and a swim cap. A lycra spandex one, not a rubber/silicon one. I don't need those things snapping my hair off. It's not like swim caps keep your hair dry anyhow. Mainly it just keeps it out of the way and keeps your goggles from tangling up in your hair (also snapping it off). I am determined to use the lap pool at my gym, but not without some kind of basic protections for my hair and eyes.

What exercises are you doing for them? Chest Press and Pec Fly work the triceps, along with actual triceps exercises like triceps dips, triceps kickback and skull crushers. Also push ups are a total upper body workout. My triceps are my nemesis. I feel like fat went to that area much more than other body parts. Ugh!

I have been off my diabetes meds since my sleeve. Typically my sugars run between 90 and 115, post sleeve. I was on metformin and glipizide before.

Captivity! LOL. I'm down one band size and one cup size from a 44D to a 42C. But only only a little over two months out.

I took seven days off of work. Really I could have gone back to work five days after my surgery but I just didn't want to go back to my job. LOL.

I started lifting as soon as my six week clearance was over with. Sometimes I think that building muscle might be slowing the downward trajectory of my weight loss, but I would rather be stronger and have more muscle definition than be thinner but flabbier. In the end I know that that is only temporary as muscle burns more calories and since I am not overeating the weight will come off in fits and spurts as it is wont to do.

You'll be happy to know that Nina and Louise FINALLY buried the hatchet and VS is back together.

I have a weird relationship with pictures and mirrors. I have to make sure my hair is just so and make up is on and I am stating a certain way.. but I don't hate pictures. I don't mind a selfie either. I can usually make my face look skinny enough. I will post all of my professionally done wedding pictures for anyone to look at because I looked cute. LOL! I don't allow anyone at work to take any candids of me. Those are always unflattering. Nope. I'm really vain though. I'm always looking in the mirror at my face and pores and wondering if I am starting to get wrinkles and crows feet. Sometimes I will look in a mirror and be all like "Hey girl, you look good" and sometimes I'll look in that same mirror and be all like "No, Andrea, no.. put something else on!"

There was a questionnaire that I had to fill out. And the psychologist had a med student with him. As if that wasn't extra intimidating. Darn teaching hospitals. I was sweating. To be fair it was hot that day but I never stopped even after sitting in the air conditioned waiting room. After all that he was like, well, you're fine. No diagnosable issues. LOL.

*shakes fist at sky* This is one of those times I regret never getting my license! Oh well!

I go to the gym at the end of the day. I like to have a snack before hand lest I get really really crabby. I am also in the gym for almost two hours. So I am tired, and my muscles are complaining, but I don't feel like I can't stop in the store and pick up a pack of Protein shakes or run an errand afterward.

I was really ready to come home the second day, but my hospital's bariatric program requires three. I never touched the television, but I did get quite a lot of uninterrupted reading done The nurse was a lot less intrusive than the kids' "Hey mom!" every five minutes. If it weren't for the freaking shots and the IV, it would have been a nice mini-vacation. Well, it was nice not to have the cat pouncing on my tummy and meowing at me at 4am. But the nurses and staff came in all the time taking my blood sugar and whatnot!

I was sleeved on Cinco de Mayo. Down 43lbs. I've not had any issues or side effects. I've been going to the gym a lot. Almost 2 hours four days a week. I try to get between 800 and 1200 calories a day. I have the worst time remembering to drink my water! I try to remind myself and have a Water bottle in my face but sometimes I just forget.

People are judgey. And being yelled at by random strangers on the street for being too fat or being told you'd just be so pretty if only you'd lose weight does make us sensitive. But either way, you do not need to justify your choices to anyone other than yourself. No one has been in your shoes - not even those of us who have had our surgeries. Your decision is personal and you do not owe it to anyone else to justify why you have made it.

Everyone stayed at least two nights at my hospital regardless of surgery, period. Those were just per Northwestern Memorial's Bariatric Center guidelines. I felt fine. I stopped using the pain meds the same day of the surgery. I basically spent two days watching Bones and Castle reruns on TNT.

I have a 25 oz Water bottle which I fill as soon as I get to work. My goal is to have it finished off by noon (since my lunch is scheduled at 12:30). I add different flavors of crystal light like margarita so I can pretend I'm having an adult beverage instead of water. Whatever works, right? I fill the bottle a second time and make sure I am done with it by 8pm. I usually tack on my Protein shakes and am over the 64 oz requirement. On days I go to the gym I usually suck down more water.