ELPMax

That was an amazing group of pictures. Good Job! :-)

Good Luck on the Surgery Chad. At least he was willing to show the concern for your well being. I have noticed the same from my girlfriend some of the insecurity she has. I have addressed it no different then you did. Just keep reminding your boyfriend that he is what is important to you. :-)

I used Bariatric Advantage. I got two packages of it so I didn't get grossed out from one. I got a vanilla and a banana cream. They were both were ok but I found that I liked the vanilla with real banana in the blender. I was allowed to add fruit to mix if I only used Water instead of skim milk. Made the shakes far easier for me do for the two weeks.

I thankfully have taken short term disability from work. Thankfully I was given 4 weeks off. However, I could have gone back to work a week after surgery as far as energy and pain management go. The only hard part I have found personally has been keeping to eating at set times. I use a lot of alarms on my phone to remind me to stop drinking and preparing for lunch / dinner and meds. At my job (IT Tech) I would be both seated for long periods of time and then have to move. Moving computers and so forth will be off my table until weight restrictions are removed. Right now at home I am cleaning things and working on personal projects. My only advice would be do not push it. My plan is at my follow up appointment I plan on asking to be allowed to return to work order (required by short term disability and work).. That would keep me out from June 30 - July 21 and that would be 3 weeks off. Like I said I could have gone back to work this week and been fine.

My insurance only required 3 Months of supervised diet. Though I had to journal everything (my co-workers would tattle on me if I didn't), I ended up loosing 21 pounds my last appointment before they scheduled my surgery. I was told by the surgeon that I would have to loose at least 15 pounds before he would even consider doing the surgery. Staff advised that I shouldn't gain any weight. Every 30 days I was in the office with my food journal and was told what things to modify. I have never been told not to loose a certain amount of weight prior to surgery. But I started out at 424 pounds too. This may be a requirement for your insurance. Have you questioned the staff on this any? I am sure you would have no problems getting an answer from them.

I didn't think about the PT part. Which given the fact that my fiancee is an OT (Occupational Therapist) getting some PT help isn't going to be a problem. I have access to them at work and getting an order for PT/OT isn't a challenge for me given that I work in a hospital along with my fiancee. We have access to a center with work out equipment as well. I just figured on working out with a personal trainer would be the best given I can do it away from work and in a gym setting. I like the ideas about increasing my walking distance. I kind of park pretty far due to company policy requiring us to park our cars as far as possible. In my work area I support about 10 buildings that are within a mile of each other. In the winter I liked to walk to most of the building but with it being summer and getting up to a 108 sometimes I will take our shuttle/car to the locations instead. Thank you again for all the good ideas. I do appreciate everyone's thoughts.

Hello Everyone! My name is Max and I have gone through some big challenges here the last few days. My family came in from out of town to help me the next few weeks. I am used to being by myself or having my fiancee come by (she is doing a diet that requires her to do Protein shakes) and not having any smell of food. My family has been very making food and the smell is just well like heaven some times. I get the feeling to eat and I usually go get a SF Popsicle. However I have been looking towards the future. I have a question/request for advice... I know I need to start working out and given that I am 373 pounds currently. What is opinion of doing work outs? I was thinking of trying to find a personal trainer that has some experience with someone my size. What has the general experience of most been when it comes to working out? I know I am on weight restrictions so weight lifting is out.