steph_co

OMG, ain't that the truth! I got a little cocky today because I was feeling pretty good this morning about 4am (my sleep schedule is all screwy, now) and the last time I had taken Vicodin was 8pm the night before. So I skipped the Vicodin, only took some Tylenol. Went for the walk two times around the block, then went to the recycle center, Rite-Aid, and Target with DH. OOOOOooooohhhh, did I regret that. I probably would have been fine on Vicodin. All that walking and getting in/out of the vehicle without the strong pain meds, I just about died. LOL I took 2 Vicodin when I got home and passed out for 4 hours! Yeah, it was nice when it HAD lessened. LOL Then I got full of myself. haha I'll be staying ahead of the pain meds if I know I'm going somewhere, or before going to bed!! Thank you, Princess. That makes me feel a bit better. I'm drinking my 3rd 11-oz Slim Fast and aside from that, I've only had sips of juice or Water today.

Yes, you can check blades in your bag. And actually, both times that I worked for TSA, blender blades were not a problem (go figure) in carry-on. As long as you have the whole appliance so it doesn't look fishy. But especially checking it, you'd be fine. The only things not allowed in checked luggage were HAZMAT and undeclared firearms...and of course the things that would be illegal to even posess anyway - like bombs.

I made myself drink a Slim-Fast this morning and then I went for a walk two times around the block. Phew.

I had surgery this past Thursday. So I'm two days past. Ugh...I don't know what it is, but I keep getting this pain like a burp that just can't come out. It's not constant - it's like it comes in waves and just gets stuck. What is that??? It makes me not want to put anything else in there. I know it's bad for me, but all I want to do is just sleep or stay lying down. I went for a walk around the block yesterday (holding my tummy) and that felt okay. I just want to go to sleep and wake up when it's no longer hurting - it's exhausting. How long before the port site stops hurting? That's really the only pain that bothers me - the rest I can deal with.

Congrats on the date, WTW! How exciting. I know I was freaked out beforehand...you'll get through it with us all there by your side. We've all been there (or very shortly will be), so we understand. Hugs.

That's great, Wendy! Good luck to your son!

Glad to hear things went well for your DH... I look forward to hearing how yours goes!

Ugh...I meant SAD about the fatso comment. Not worth it go back and edit. LOL

Oh, my. I think I would have gotten a little strong-armed about the hitting the dogs thing. Letting them know that I wasn't going to let the dogs go with them if they were going to keep hitting them. THEN if grandma got upset over that, I would have asked if she wanted to deal with ME, or animal control/the police. That's animal cruelty. That's really said about the fatso comment. Don't worry, Linda - karma has a way of coming back and biting people. YES, even when they're only 12. It's sad that the adult figures in their lives allow them to think this is okay.

Okay...haven't had Vicodin yet, this morning, so I'm a bit more on the conscious side. Surgery was scheduled for 9:15am yesterday. The night before I was having the most terrible anxiety. Not about the procedure itself - more about the permanence of this procedure to my body. Every other diet/exercise plan I could quit. This isn't something I feel I can quit and I think that scared me. I know I sound like a major commitmentphobe, but I'm seriously not. I'm very happily married for 4 years, together with him for 5, so it doesn't touch other areas of my life. Sitting there talking to DH, I figured out that I'm scared to get skinny. :cool: I built up this wall of fat to protect myself. It made A LOT of sense as to why I couldn't succeed in the past in losing weight. Because when I was fat, I felt okay being rejected by people because I could blame it on the fat. Now once I get skinny and I get rejected, I have to come to terms that it's because of something else. Yes - I plan to go get counseling. I already told myself that was a pre-requisite for me before I told myself for sure I could get banded. I just couldn't believe I was THAT controlled by my weight. It really did surprise me. Another thing I was reading in the binder given to me by my surgeon's office was that some people are afraid to lose their fat because they're afraid they'll lose their identity even if "fat" was not the identity they really wanted, anyway. So, yeah. I know when this obsession with food started and it was right after one of the biggest rejections of my life (at 8 years old). So I get to nip this in the bud so that I can move on and LIVE life. Excuse the long psych session. Onto my surgery story. I was scheduled for 9:15, but they wheeled me in at 9: 47. I remember switching over to the operating table, getting my arms stretched out on those boards, then the anesthesiologist saying he was giving me a sedative and clunk - I was out. LOL He told me as he gave it to me that it would feel like I had had a margarita. I told him, "I don't know - I'm a lightweight!" He kind of chuckled like he didn't believe me and that's seriously the last thing I remember. haha DH said the doc called him about 10:30 to let him know I was out and in recovery and that they'd let him in as soon as I woke up. They figured it would be about half an hour. He didn't mention a hernia to my DH, he just told him that I had behaved well and so did they. LOL I was soooo groggy. I'm not sure what time I woke up, but it was really hard to rouse myself. I told the nurse I had to pee and she laughed and said I'd have to wait a couple minutes (she could tell I was still weak from the drugs AND I was just in my gown). So eventually she wheeled me over to the bathroom because I kept saying I needed to pee. Oh, almost forgot - before that, I woke up moaning in TERRIBLE pain. I don't want to scare anybody - I just want you to be aware (and at least I forgot it until now - so it wasn't traumatizing...LOL). I was moving my head back and forth and moaning. So they gave me a bunch of morphine and when that didn't work, they gave me a bunch of fentanel (sp?). It finally started to kick in, even though I still ached. She helped me get dressed and wheeled my bed to the bathroom. I walked in there, took care of business and then came out and she told me to walk over to this recliner. I walked over there all by myself - she seemed impressed. Finally they called my DH in. I was soooo happy to see him because I had kept asking for him. I think they wanted to wait until I was no longer moaning. LOL Didn't want to scare the guy. That was about 11:30. They had me sit there for a bit to make sure my pain was under control. It was STILL hurting, so she broke a Vicodin in half and had me swallow those. OMG - that was AWFUL. It felt like I swallowed a razor blade when it got to my pouch. So then I was moaning from that. She had me swallow some Water to get it to dissolve quicker. She told me I might have to chew the Vicodin whenever I take it. I have opted, instead, to crushing them and putting them in watery applesauce or watery pudding with a couple scoops of Splenda to try and offset the taste. Ick. We finally got out of there at about 2pm and made the 3-hour drive home. Of course, stopping every hour so that we could get out and walk around. But I made it through and feeling pretty good. I'll add more to the recovery stories thread.

LOL! That SO crossed my mind! haha Basically you'll have to give a "job interview" to whomever you go to. Go with a list of questions. As to if they've ever dealt with somebody that has had bariatric surgery, or simply if they've dealt with somebody with compulsive eating disorder. Any other issues you may want to bring up. You ARE interviewing them in order to possibly "employ" them. Did your surgeon have an in-house social worker or psychologist? If so, they could also give you more questions to ask. If you don't like a particular person, then don't "hire" them. You deserve to be happy with this person, in particular.

Erm. Is it giving you an error message when you try to put it all in there? I'm trying to figure out what the problem could be. I've seen the following problems when I've altered my signature - "no more than 10 lines allowed," "no more than 1,000 characters allowed." Are you getting one of those?

Wendy - I totally get what you're saying and HONESTLY, I have no problem with you not liking it - YOU'RE in the group...you should get a say. But the high school stuff from other people is getting really old. This is not the first time I've seen it. Oh, well. Not much you can do about angry people that aren't happy unless they're being passive-aggressive.

If signatures make you so hormonal and angry, you have the option to not show them. Go to UserCP>Edit Options and uncheck the box for "Show Signatures." Then you don't have to discard a whole person because you find one part of their "persona" annoying. I'm going to guess you do this a lot in life.

I try to stay away from RnR. It can get ugly there. Don't worry about it, Tishbite. Seriously. Just because they've been here longer doesn't mean their opinion is more valid than yours. And I'm fed up with that way of thinking..."I've been on THIS board longer than you, so your opinion doesn't count." WTF is up with that? I've been on message boards since 2003. Just because I haven't been on THIS board doesn't mean I don't have a lick of sense when it comes to board etiquette. I made my pic and my November graphic lettering smaller before anybody said anything to me because I understand how it could bother some people. So, yeah - I get it. But if you have something to say to somebody, why not just say it? I've seen a lot of cattiness in the RnR and it was pretty disheartening before I got the band to see how some of the oldies could tear apart some of the newbies, or less actives of the board. It's very unfortunate that we can't just be nice. Did your momma not teach you any manners? It's like some people think just because they're hiding behind a computer that it's now socially acceptable to gossip and backstab. Give me a break.

Wow, Ghost - look at you! NICE results you got!

Guys just like to fix things. He thinks he's being helpful. Don't take it personal. Sometimes they say things that seem kind of blunt and can seem rude to a woman. Maybe he thought you were complaining about "just" 1-2 lbs/wk. LOL Take it with a grain of salt and ignore him.

Kandi - I think it's great of you to share this - I don't think it's bragging. It's good to know that it IS possible. And you know - even amongst the pain that I HAVE had, I WOULD do this all over again if given the choice! Oh, wow - I just noticed! You and I have almost the exact same stats! I was 233 and I want to be 130.

You can so do this. I was 170 when I met my husband, but ballooned up to 200 when we got married (yes, I gained about 30 lbs in just over a year). He tells me that I have confidence even at times I think he's crazy. But I realized that I DO have a lot more confidence in myself than I did in high school and I WAS skinny in my senior year (Atkins). Oh, to be skinny AND have that confidence? Sha-bam! LOL Do the inside work first and guys will be noticing you long before you hit your "goal." I was not comfortable with my weight at 170 (head issues), but the way I was strutting around that place, I had all kinds of guys wanting to date me. LOL You can do this, Jill. I'm here with you every step of this journey! Best of luck with your surgery! Keep us updated on your progress. That's part of why I decided on the permanent change of the band. DH and I used no birth control whatsoever and it took us 4 1/2 years to get pregnant and then I miscarried. My infertility is not medically explained, but I KNOW it has to do with my weight even if the docs were gun-shy to ever say that to my face (I'm surprised that not a single doctor just came out and said that I should lose weight). Here's to us getting skinny and then pregnant!!! We can do it! :whoo: :girl_hug: Hugs, Deyon. You can do this - and do it for YOU. YOU deserve this. Anybody else being happy for you is just icing on the cake. I'm here for you!

Sunshiny - I'm glad I'm not alone in this fear. I had serious thoughts of backing out, I was so scared. But I kept telling myself I HAD to do this - I didn't want to keep getting bigger. I want to be able to have babies and I want to be able to play with my step-children and then our own children when I have them. I'm glad to hear that you started counseling before the surgery - I think I would have come to terms on some things sooner rather than the night before my surgery. I hope things are going well for you, my sister. You'll be in my thoughts for a speedy recovery.

Glad to hear one of my band-day buddies is doing well! Hope the pain and itching go away soon.

What a great attitude! I feel the same way - not to let bad foods take control again. Have fun at Curves! I can hardly wait to get exercising.

Excellent thread - thank you SO much for asking this question! I did not know about this before this past Monday - I happened to read in the book given to me by my surgeon's office that it may be tax deductible! I had no idea! This is some excellent information! DH and I are self-employed and file jointly. Would that be the AGI of what we make together, then? If that's the case, we'll have to have our accountant compare filing jointly to separately! Oh, this is cool - it makes me feel a whole lot better about all that money.

Tracy - I'm glad to hear things went well!

OK, so I'm 19 hours past my surgery and actually feeling pretty decent. I was not told which side my port is on, but I'm almost positive it's on the left because that's where I can feel pulling when I move. When we got home, I took Vicodin crushed in watery applesauce. Slept a few hours and then took another. I was keeping ahead of the pain and it was working great because I really wasn't feeling that much. Mostly across my diaphragm it hurts and then it radiates up to between my shoulder blades. It's weird - I feel the radiating pain more in my right shoulder than my left and then THAT pain kind of radiates over to the left. Strange. But no major gas pain (niiiiiice). I only used a Gas-X strip on the way home because I was hoping the pain I was feeling WAS gas and that it would help. It didn't really. The pain between my shoulder blades almost just feels like sore muscles. It's nothing unmanageable, thank goodness. I had Vicodin and Tylenol PM last night about 8:30pm and then slept. I woke up around 1am hurting a little. Took some liquid Tylenol and tried to get more sleep. Slept until about 4am. Got up and took some Vicodin in watery applesauce. I'm doing pretty good. If I wasn't hurting (I kind of have to hunch over a bit when I walk to keep from feeling the stretching by my port), I'd probably be able to go take care of some of that dang Christmas shopping sitting in a motorized scooter. I have to chuckle at that sight. But I'll force myself to take it easy here at home. I'm scheduled to go back to work Sunday night at 6pm. We'll see how I feel. Most likely DH will have to go with me (we work for the same company and he's familiar with my job) to support me. I hope I feel a bit better by then. I HATE being laid out in bed. I want to be up and moving about more so than sleeping.