OKCPirate

@@SlimJill - talk to your doctor about this: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3697760/ Naltesone seems to help with compulsive behaviors. If you use it for a season to get on stable ground, when you get off of it, try to add in some positive things like sex, exercise etc. I also suggest this book: https://www.amazon.com/Emotional-First-Aid-Kit-Practical/dp/0976852659/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1481661627&sr=8-1&keywords=the+emotional+first+aid. I worked through it before my surgery, but it still works on the other side. The danger is without a positive alternative, it is easy to transfer addictions to something negative. (drugs, alcohol, gambling) I'm not suggesting the struggle is easy, but the battle is one you can win.

As a male who is single and dated heavy and more normal weight I will tell you it is much easier when you are a healthy size. Take time to heal, get your mental and physical health back. In a year or so, poke around the relationship pool again. You will go at it with a new confidence. Your "crazy" detector will be better this time. All I can say is "trust me" because I've been there and have several t-shirts to prove it.

If you were not nervous I'd be worried about you. You are permanently altering your body. But it was the most important alteration I have made it my life. It not only made me healthier, but it has created more positive changes than I can count. I was up and walking within minutes of waking up. Pain? More like mild discomfort. But it depends on what you put in on the front end. I suspect you will look back in a few weeks and go, "why in the heck did I freak myself out?" But that's OK, we all do. Good luck tomorrow.

Heart stress test? Are they worried about anesthesia? Um yes that would be something to be worried about and I'd get that fixed before, God forbid, an emergency surgery happens (as opposed to elective WLS).

This last weekend two guy friends of mine asked me about my surgery and what they could expect because they are ready to take the plunge. I'm taking this as a great NSV. I don't post on FaceBook "I HAD WLS" but when a big buddy comes up to me and asks "how did you do it," well I'll tell them. I think they have been watching me for the last couple of years and they see the changes in my life. Now that they have tried WW and other things and it's just not working for them they are coming to the same conclusion I did over two 1/2 years ago. Thanks to this site I can share with them a wealth of experiences, share knowledge and insights. But ultimately I think it is the "life style" evangelism of renewed health and energy which pushed them over the top.. Am I the only one, or has anyone else had this type of experience?

Congrats, great job

Hey if massage helps, I'll volunteer, and I'm sure I can find some friends on the board to join in.

@@cyndi990 - I am too, no problems with that feeling at all @@LipstickLady - pfft, isn't it fun NOT to have to sit at the end of the table? Or even take a middle seat on a plane (oh wait that is never fun, but at least it is tolerable).

@@vcalvillo90 - #1 pick your parents well (genetics, HUGE component), #2 realize skin is your bodies largest organ, so treat it right with Water, Protein and quality food, #3 stay out of tanning beds, the sun and hot tubs #4 lupe warm showers #5 exercise, muscle underneath your skin helps. Follow these and I can't give you a guarantee, but it's the best shot you have.

Many of us are familiar with the real danger of alcohol addiction following surgery. Why this is the case is matter of debate. Reasons suggested are: Transference of food for self soothing, to alcohol Change in stomach structure which seems to change absorption depending on the form of WLS In another discussion board someone suggested the Sinclair Method as an alternative to AA. This had me really intrigued. My sister and several friends are in recovery and help other alcoholics. Dr. Sinclair did his work in Finland where he showed that 70%+ of problem drinkers were able to stop or greatly reduce their alcohol consumption by taking Naltrexone one hour before drinking. This drug was initially used to treat addiction to heroin. It blocks the release of endorphin's taking away the high, which lead to people being able to quit. (See this summary from a neutral source: http://www.centersite.net/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=11132&cn=14). What has me intrigued is the language we naturally use in our discussion of addictions be it food or alcohol..."Relationship." Many of us used to think of food as "our friend." And I know people who use the same word to describe their past relationship with drugs and alcohol. But we use the the term "friendship" in the past tense because when you are in the grip of addiction you don't realize the relationship. You just know panic if you thought it was going away. I think this is a point of reference most of us can understand when we look back, but we couldn't see it before surgery. Now I'm going to go from what I know, to speculation, and I'm hoping someone may be able to point me in the right direction. I think the transference starts because some WLS people who start drinking start feeling the same soothing they used to get from food from alcohol. The gaba receptors receive endorphin's which gives a warm feeling akin to sex or a close relationship. It's artificial, but to the brain it feels the same. The problem is with alcohol it takes more and more to get that feeling we all naturally want. For those of you who are familiar with Bill W and the AA model, this is what they refer to the disease of alcoholism. At the time of AA's founding there were no MRI or PET scans to show how the brain reacts to certain chemicals, but now we can see exactly what parts of the brain react. And from what I've seen as a lay person is the you can give someone a drink or an orgasm and the same gaba receptor parts are going to light up. (This is not to say these are equivalent, just in that section of the brain). The nation of India's Health Department recently suggested that Neltrexone be given to people before they have an alcohol problem which is interesting. Alcoholism is so bad there that they think this inexpensive drug might prevent people from becoming alcoholics. This is where I think there is an intriguing question, "Can we prevent WLS patients from developing a problem with alcohol by giving them Neltrexone if they decide they want to drink after the requisite few months post surgery? Now I'm sure there are those who will say "well you shouldn't drink anyway." Yes and teens shouldn't have sex before marriage, bla bla bla. I don't care. People will drink and are free to do so if they are over 21 in the US. What I'm thinking about is harm reduction and alcoholism prevention. Alcoholism is a real and expensive problem, and if it can be prevented, it is worth it. So if anyone knows about this or any research in this area please post. If anyone has fears that they have or are becoming alcohol dependent, but are scared to think about stopping drinking, Google The Sinclair Method. This isn't new. Neltrexone has been approved by the FDA for alcohol treatment since 1994. The science backing it up is solid. You just have not heard of it because most of the people who do treatment are abstinence only and they have a strong bias in that direction. Neltrexone is not a licence to drink, but may be one of the best tools to stop someone from hitting rock bottom helping them get control and I think a possible preventive medication but the idea of it as preventative is speculation on my part. I know this is kind of deep, but we have people here with a great deal of education and experience and I'm curious.

Alcohol absorbtion changes post surgery in bi-pass and sleeve, but not so with the band... The authors concluded that alcohol absorption was considerably modified after sleeve gastrectomy with higher and longer blood alcohol values for equivalent amounts of alcohol. Hagedorn et al. compared 17 controls and 19 postgastric bypass patients after consuming 5 oz of red wine to assess the change in alcohol metabolism [15]. Alcohol breath analysis was performed every 5 minutes. They found peak alcohol breath level of .08% in the bypass patients and .05% in the control group (P = .004). The gastric bypass group needed 108 minutes to reach alcohol breath level of 0 versus 72 minutes in the control group (P = .001). However, the gastric bypass patients didn’t experience more symptoms than the control group. A prospective crossover study of 19 gastric bypass patients found that postbypass patients have significantly higher peak breath alcohol content after ingesting alcohol (5 oz. red wine) at both 3 months (.059%; P = .0003) and 6 months (.088%; P = .0008) postoperatively than matched preoperative controls (.024%) [16]. Patients also took considerably more time to return to sober at 3 months (61 minutes) and 6 months (88 minutes; P = .01) than preoperatively (49 minutes). https://asmbs.org/resources/alcohol-use-before-and-after-bariatric-surgery If you read this study you will see there is a very real need to be vary wary of alcohol use post surgery, and it might be even more dangerous if people in your family have alcohol problems. But I'm more and more convinced that IF you are going to drink, look up the Sinclair Method http://www.cthreefoundation.org/, , http://www.the-sinclair-method.com/the-sinclair-method-guide/step-5-the-golden-step-staying-cured/.

Here are a couple of items of note: 1. In 1990, Blum found a correlation between alcoholism and a genetic deficiency in dopamine-binding receptors in the brain, called D2 receptors. People with compromised D2 receptors seek higher thrills to satisfy their reward cravings than people with normal D2 receptors, Blum believes. He predicts that gastric bypass patients with a D2 deficiency turn to other high-reward activities, such as drinking alcohol, because they can’t binge eat with a constricted stomach. 2. There’s little evidence of higher alcoholism rates after a different common bariatric surgery: gastric banding. Also known as lap banding, this surgery installs an inflatable belt around the stomach to constrict it. Unlike gastric bypass, banding does not permanently alter the stomach’s architecture. The difference between the two surgeries suggests that alcohol abuse is related to structural changes from gastric bypass, said Alexis Conason, a New York City psychologist and researcher. In 2012, Conason published a study in JAMA Surgery that found a significant increase in alcohol use for patients after gastric bypass, but not gastric banding. The study also found no significant increase in patients’ use of other drugs, including cigarettes, or compulsive behaviors such as gambling. “If it were addiction transfer, we’d be seeing it across the board,” Conason said. Researchers have proposed a few physiological explanations for increased alcoholism specifically after gastric bypass. Some believe it’s due to changes in alcohol metabolism, since alcohol enters the bloodstream more quickly in a smaller stomach. A 2011 study from surgeons at Stanford University found that six months after surgery, gastric bypass patients reached higher blood alcohol levels more quickly than they did before surgery. This type of fast and high peak often characterizes addictive drugs, said North Dakota’s Mitchell. Cocaine and heroin, for example, both produce brief, intense rushes that leave users wanting more. But it’s also possible that increased alcohol dependence has nothing to do with alcohol absorption in the stomach. Recently, a team of researchers led by neuroscientists at the Pennsylvania State University College of Medicine found that rats that had been given gastric bypasses developed a higher dependence on alcohol. Here’s the twist: the effect held even when the rats were given alcohol intravenously instead of orally. The authors concluded that alcohol abuse after gastric bypass could very well occur independently of how quickly alcohol passes from the gut to the bloodstream. Instead, anatomical changes to the stomach might impact patients’ dopamine response, the Penn State researchers suggested. Some scientists have found that gastric bypass surgery can alter the signaling of D2 receptors. The mechanism for this is unclear, although preliminary research has identified altered patterns of gene expression in areas of the brain that process dopamine. Other researchers suggest that appetite-mediating gut hormones play a role, particularly those that affect dopamine signaling, such as insulin, leptin and grehlin. Scientists have shown that leptin and grehlin levels change after gastric bypass surgery, and both hormones are known to modulate alcohol consumption. http://scienceline.org/2015/01/alcoholism-after-gastric-bypass-is-it-in-your-mind-or-gut/

I had an online chat with Roy Eskapa, PhD who was Dr. Sinclair's associate about this... Now here is my question, has anyone looked into using Nax before they develop an alcohol problem? For instance, if someone has had WLS, hit's their goal weight and then wants to drink, can they take it as they start to keep the gaba receptors from beginning the cycle of dependence? The Indian Department of Health seems to be close recommending as a prophylactic: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2899995/. I don't know if anyone has studied this, or if you have. HAS NO EFFECT WE KNOW OF ON GABA BUT BLOCKS THE OPIOID SYSTEM. (WE RAN A SMALL TRIAL IN INDIA -- AMONG RURAL POOR -- WHEN THE MEDICATION RAN OUT OF FUNDS THOSE WHO SAMPLED ALCOHOL SOON RETURNED THE HEAVY DANGEROUS DRINKING SINCLAIR PROVED IN THE LAB ANIMALS THAT EVEN IF THEY CARRIED THE GENETIC PREDISPOSITION FOR ALCOHOL IF THEY WERE GIVEN NALOXONE OR NALMEFENE OR NALTREXONE THEY COULD NOT LEARN THE DRINKING RESPONSE ... SO HIS (Dr. Sinclair's) BIG THING BEFORE HE PASSED AWAY WE DISCUSSED IN HIS CABIN IN MARCH 2015 THAT EVENTUALLY FOLKS WOULD BE ABLE TO TEST IF THE GENES FOR MUTATION ON MU OPIOID RECEPTORS COULD BE RELIABLY TESTED THEN PARENTS COULD WARN CHILDREN ABOUT DRINKING AND YES IF THEY DID DRINK THEY SHOULD TAKE THE MEDICATION 1 HOUR BEFORE. IF THERE IS NO TEST YET CONFIRMED AS VALID AND RELIABLE THEN IF THERE IS A BLOOD RELATIVE WITH AN ADDICTION MEDIATED THROUGH THE OPIOID SYSTEM THEN IT IS WISE TO USE THE MEDICATION AS OUTLINED IN THE BOOK THE CURE FOR ALCOHOLISM

@@bananashake - I found it online for about $11 a month. Before you say "that's dangerous," the Indian pharmaceutical companies produce most generics in the US. I was surprised when I did a stint at the Justice Department that Big Pharma did not want us to investigate the quality of what was being sent to the US. I found out later that it was because the quality was so good. An online Viagra is the same as you would get at CVS. I was actually shocked there was more of a counterfeiting problem in US drug stores than online from over seas. The reason why is actually interesting...online overseas pharmacies don't want to lose their credit card processing services. When people get bad product, they return it, and too many charge-backs result in being disconnected.

@@diana89131 - Now what? Celebrate and live your life with new found enthusiasm and be thankful. You look hot and you should be proud of yourself. You women are just too dang hard on yourselves (hint: for 3 months, don't read any women's magazines, and you may lose the disomorphic body image issue). You are in the 9 category in my book, so do you want to spend $10,000+ and spend weeks in pain oozing in compression garments to get to 10? I don't think you need it all, unless there is excess skill that is causing a problem health wise. (NOTE: I'm single, I get the embarrassment when you get frisky with someone the first time and I take off my compression shirt and there is excess skin, but no one has yelled "ick" and run out of the room screaming either).

@@OutsideMatchInside - Damn good point. I just didn't think about that because I have stayed in touch with my therapist who I was seeing about other issues way before WLS. He liked my results so much, he decided to have it himself. (Kind of weird to warn your shrink about hormone dumps, but at least his wife enjoyed it).

@@Malin - Because unlike Chantix, it's cheap. I hate to sound conspiratorial, but if there isn't any money in it, no one is going to pay to advertise it. And it is just so counter to what we think we should do..."oh you have an alcohol problem, take this and in an hour pour yourself a drink." But it only works if you drink. But from what I have read, God help you if you use it for a while and then quit. You will relapse much harder and faster than when you began because the brain increases the number of receptors to make up for the blocking mechanism of Nalterxone. That's the trade off.

The most dangerous part of the trip will be to and from the airports. Sip Water (you can bring empty bottles with you. Clear flavored protean powders make sense to me which will keep you energy level up. Wear support socks to prevent blood pooling...https://www.amazon.com/Travelsox-Patented-Graduated-Compression-Performance/dp/B000UQZB94/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1481310462&sr=8-1&keywords=travelsox+compression+socks The statistics say two things: 1) It's going to suck (I hate airports, TSA and most airlines) and 2) you won't die of this. I would suggest you use your layover time to walk. By the way keep your bag under 20 pounds when you leave so you can pick it up with out causing strain. See you on the other side.

@@CStoned - this was my favorite forum for finding inspiration in the journey

@@cassandramarie93 - "my class coordinator mentioned I needed to be off of nicotine and thc for a month before my date" One more reason why I am glad I did mine in Mexico. I have been tobacco free for years, but I vaped in the hospital in Mexico. Nicotine doesn't irritate the stomach. That said, hope you stayed off tobacco. I dated a closet smoker, it took me a week to get that taste out of my mouth. Ick.

@@LittleBill - Yep, whole bunch of libertarian stoners in the state, but remember Focus in the Family is based in CO Springs, Heck, there are a bunch of conservatives and libertarians I work with in PA. We even keep a few liberals (mostly to make fun of)here in Oklahoma.

@@BubblesOhSoSleeved - No, some test for nicotine. Mostly because tobacco irritates the stomach so much that it can make it hard for your stomach to heal. That said, the edibles and smoking will be out of the question for a while after your surgery. If you live in a state where weed is legal, many safer ways to enjoy (vaping, and liquid). I enjoyed last year in CO trying it out after 30+ years. @@LittleBill - actually not. One of the odd things that has happened with the medical pot experiment that has been going on in a number of states is they have found many strains which don't give you the munchies. It is really fascinating to see what has happened now that pot has passed from the stoners to big business. In CO, they can tell you where it was grown, who grew it, what the level of THC is and the strain...some make you high, some make you hungry, some make you paranoid/euphoric. It is a very new world. I work with conservative lawmakers there, and the whole new "green" economy is worth looking at. If you are in CO, go see a "bud tender" and they can tell you all about it.

@@kimiko80 - Are you using the public health service, or self pay? Not trying to discourage you if you are using the government system, well there were some people with some problems using it who have posted here. It can pay to shop around for alternatives. That said, I'm in the US, always glad to meet someone who I feel separated from by our common language.

Your experience may vary, but mine was I had a very rough time getting to the point of inebriation. Seems to zip right through my sleeve. I would suggest you wait until goal before you start and then proceed carefully. Don't drive the first time you try (better at home with friends). Some women seem to get snockered very quickly and that can be dangerous at a club. To help prevent "transference" addiction, look up The Sinclair Method. Dr. Sinclair discovered that the use of the drug Naltreone seems to block the endorphin rush you get when you drink. It is usually prescribed for people with opiate and alcohol addiction, but I don't know why it can be used as a prophylactic to prevent developing a physiological dependency. (see: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2899995/) PS - Let me add LISTEN to your friends. If they suggest you have a problem...YOU HAVE A PROBLEM. They may be polite, but it takes a great deal for most people to bring up such a sensitive situation. Probably enough said there.

I'm thankful for the medical professionals who came up with this life changing surgery, and the pioneers who took the arrows to make this happen. I was up this morning, went for a run, back to do a body weight workout using my TRX system and 10 minutes with the kettle ball. What a change. The family feast is cooking. (I grew an herb garden this year with my daughter, and the sage and basil are really aromatic). The house smells like Thanksgiving. And I will savor the small portion. But the joy is the preparation, the family, my health...not figuring out how to cram a ton of food down my body. It is funny watching my kids stare while I have ONE greenbean bundle and measure 3 ounces of turkey