catwoman7

P.S. I agree with the others that I wouldn't start the liquid diet now. For one thing, you usually just do that for a week or two before your surgery. For another, it's pretty awful - I wouldn't do that until/unless I had to! And third, not all surgeons even require it - some just have you do a 24-hour fast before your surgery, which is kind of standard with other types of surgeries. Oh - and even the liquid diets, when required, can vary a lot. Some people are allowed to eat SOME food, like a sensible, low calorie dinner (but protein shakes the rest of the day). And some of us (me included) had to have just shakes plus no (or very low) calorie fluids the whole two weeks. So yea - I'd wait until the time comes.

there's quite a bit of variation between surgeons for food plans, so there aren't any standards. Some clinics have their patients on low carb plans, or ultra low carb plans, and some just have you follow a balanced diet. Your clinic will give you their guidelines sometime before surgery. For vitamins, I'll attach the ASBMS (American Society of Bariatric and Metabolic Surgery) list of requirements. You have to scroll down a little to see them - but they do have them listed for each type of surgery. Most clinics pretty much follow these, so these tend to be more standard across clinics than the food plans are. But here it is in case you're curious: ASMBS-Nutritional-Guidelines-2016-Update.pdf

yes - that does sound like it could be dumping - although it also sounds like you're very dehydrated. That can get very dangerous quickly, so if you're not able to handle fluids very well, call your clinic or go to the hospital. They may need to put you on IV fluids to get you hydrated again. dark urine is definitely a symptom of dehydration - and the feeling of being unwell is, too.

go back to your clinic and don't be embarrassed. Regain is unfortunately very common, so they're used to dealing with that. They can help you get back on track - and they may even put you on meds or something to help you get back on track. Better to deal with it now and not risk it starting to spiral out of control. I can guarantee that you're not the only patient they've seen for help with regain, because I've known several of them (me included!)

I went with bypass for the exact same reasons you're thinking of. I had GERD prior to surgery, and I didn't want to take the risk of it getting worse (sleeve doesn't ALWAYS make it worse, and for some people, it actually gets better, but the risk of it getting worse was too high for my comfort, so I went with bypass). Also, I had my surgery almost eight years ago, and at that point, standalone sleeve surgery was still kind of a new thing, and I was afraid it might turn out to be "Lapband 2". It's been around long enough at this point that I wouldn't have that particular fear anymore, but if I had to decide today, i'd still go with bypass because of my previous GERD issues. your surgeon may recommend bypass anyway since you have GERD. Bypass usually improves if not outright cures GERD. My surgeon said he'd do either one, but he wanted me to at least strongly consider bypass because of the GERD issue. It didn't take much to convince me to go in that direction. I've been very happy with my bypass and am glad I decided to go with it.

that's a super fast lost! We started out at about the same weight, and it took me almost a year to lose 100 lbs (I lost 200 altogether, but it took me 20 months to lose the whole 200+ lbs)

are you sure it was dumping? Dumping usually means dizziness, heart palpitations, chills or sweating, cramps, and diarrhea. it you were vomiting and generally can't keep food down, that could be that your stomach isn't quite ready to move to the next food progression - in which case going back to the week 1 plan for a few days before trying week 2 again is the usual solution. Or it could be some kind of food intolerance. That's not uncommon after surgery and is usually temporary. Lactose and artificial sweeteners are the usual culprits for that. a third possibility is a stricture, although those usually appear between weeks 4 and 12, so it's a little early - and I'm not sure if they occur with mini bypasses or not (they do with traditional gastric bypasses - about 5% of bypass patients get those). I'd call your clinic and let them know what's going on. They might want you to come in for testing. Plus Tomo is right - not being able to keep food down for a few days is one thing, but not being able to keep fluids down can be dangerous.

Asheville's great! I haven't been there in probably 40 years, but from what I hear, it's gotten even better since then! (it seemed pretty wonderful even back then...). I lived in Watauga and Avery counties - so about 1.5 hours from Asheville. We were about 10 miles from Tennessee and maybe 30 from Virginia - so up in the top corner. P.S. if you're not familiar with that area - it was the Boone/Blowing Rock/Linville/Banner Elk area. Very protty - but I was in my 20s then and there really wasn't much there for young single people unless you were into skiing or hiking. i think I would have been much happier living in Asheville.

I wouldn't start a liquid diet until they tell you to. The thing is a PITA - the worst part of the whole ordeal, I think. And some surgeons don't even require one (some just have you do water only for 24 hours before surgery). So I'd wait and see what they say. Like someone else said, you could work on lowering your carbs and calories and trying to eat more nutritiously - kind of like you'll be eating once you're a couple months out of surgery and all healed up. That's what my dietitian had me doing, so my change to the "new" eating style didn't seem as radical.

if you want to know for sure, I'd call them and ask, but I kind of doubt something like that would delay your surgery

you do have to comply with your clinic's program or you'll eventually regain weight (although a 10-20 lb gain once you hit your lowest weight is very common - and almost expected. I planned for that when I set my goal and went a bit under goal to compensate) that said, I'd never been able to lose weight and keep it off. I was over 200 lbs overweight, and I lost 50 or 60 lbs God knows how many times, only to gain it all back. I got the surgery (in my case, bypass) because if I couldn't even keep off 50 lbs for more than a couple of months, I knew there was no way I could lose and keep off 200 lbs. BUT...this actually worked. I did actually lose all that weight - over 200 lbs. Your stomach will be a lot smaller so you can't take in a ton of food AT ONE SITTING - plus, most people lose their sense of hunger for a few months (up to a year) after the surgery. Having no hunger makes it much easier to lose weight. Once the hunger comes back, though, which is does for most of us, it'll be more of a challenge. You're still not going to be able to eat a ton of food at one sitting, but you might start grazing or eating mindlessly if you're not watching yourself. So that's when you have to really make sure you're continuing to comply with the program. people gain weight back because they stop being compliant and old habits start creeping back in. As before, you still won't be able to eat as much as can now AT ONE SITTING, but if you're snacking all day, yep - you'll be able to take in a lot of calories. The examples I always use is that before I had surgery, I could eat half a large pizza for dinner. No way could I do that now. It would be physically painful. All I can manage is 1-2 pieces. BUT...if I ate 1-2 pieces at 5:00 pm, and another 1-2 pieces at 7:00 pm, and 1-2 pieces 9:00 pm, (which would be easy to do), I'd end up eating half the large pizza. So THAT'S what you need to watch out for. the surgery in and of itself shouldn't exaggerate depression. If you're feeling depressed, though, it'd probably be helpful to work with a therapist. A lot of us do - both for that or to deal with eating issues (unfortunately, as they say, the surgery is on our stomachs, not on our brains). where are you living in NC? I lived there for 10 years. I went to high school in Raleigh and when to college up in the mountains. My brother still lives in NC, so I still get down there occasionally...

here are the 17,501 previous posts on the 'three week stall" (and no, I am NOT kidding). Happens to almost all of us. I wish bariatric clinics would tell their patients about this, because we get at least one post every day from someone worrying because they're only a couple of weeks out, and their weight loss has stalled. It is normal and it happens to the vast majority of us. https://www.bariatricpal.com/search/?q=three week stall

the infamous three-week stall (doesn't always happen the third week, but sometime during the first month, almost all of us experience our first major stall). Here are past posts on it that I just did a search for: https://www.bariatricpal.com/search/?q=three week stall 17,501 posts!

I took three weeks off but could have gone back in two. Other than being tired, I was fine. I have known people who have gone back after a week - although two seems pretty standard. P.S. my surgery was awhile ago - and it was bypass, not sleeve - but I don't know that that makes much difference as far as recovery goes.

yes - ulcers will usually resolve medically. Those sound like the standard meds for it...

you can probably find before/after pictures (with private parts covered) if you look at the Web sites of plastic surgeons

this didn't apply to me since i was post-menopausal when I had my surgery, but I remember them telling us in the classes to use two forms of birth control for the first few months (they didn't mention malabsorption, but this makes sense. Plus people tend to be a lot more fertile after surgery)

I've never shared my photos of what the skin actually looked like, but I can tell you that most of us can easily hide the loose skin in clothes. I've had extensive plastic surgery (three of them, to be exact), but this is what I looked like BEFORE I had plastic surgery. See any loose skin? I promise you that it's there - this was after losing over 200 lbs, so I had a TON of it. But as you can see, it's not noticeable at all in clothes. I just tucked the stomach skin into jeans or "tummy control" leggings and wore slightly oversized, long-ish tops. Plus 3/4 length or longer sleeves to cover my batwing arms. No one could see my excess skin (except for my husband and doctor, of course...)

that's a really great idea - and since I'm retired, very "do-able", too!

I think night time hunger is really common. My worst time is late afternoon. It's a constant battle. Sometimes I swap around dinner with my afternoon snack (so dinner around 3:00 or 4:00, snack around 6:00 or 7:00), sometimes I'll eat things like baby carrots dipped in hummus or ranch yogurt (ranch dressing mix with plain Greek yogurt) (carrots usually irritate my stomach after awhile, so I rarely eat much of this), other times sugar free Jello or sugar free popsicles. Anything to keep me from blowing it. You'll probably have to do the same - if you can't take your mind off it somehow, figure out how you can swap things around to make it easier - or stock up on "safe" things (some people chew SF gum or drink hot tea...). Or get out of the house (easier said then done at night - easier for me in the afternoon!)

if you mean common as there are sometimes absorption issues with meds and therefore the dosage needs to be adjusted or you'll need to be switched over to another med - then yes, common. If you mean common in that WLS amplifies anxiety issues or causes heart issues, then no.

I'm pretty sure you need to have a passport now to travel to Mexico and back. I can't remember when they passed that law - maybe five or ten years ago? Before that you didn't have to have one.

OK - that makes sense now.

I was honest with other obese people. With non-obese people, unless they were a close friend, I just told them I'd been working with a dietitian and exercising like a fiend (which technically was true - I just omitted the surgery part). Skinny people usually believe that schlock.

if you mean pain as in physical pain, you may or may not have that. I didn't have any - in fact, I wondered if they even did the surgery! Pain is all across the board - some have it, some don't - but most of us seem to have little to no pain with these surgeries. But if you're one who does, they'll send you home with pain meds. Just try to keep ahead of it and you should be fine. It'll last a few days at most.