blizair09

This surgeon wouldn't win any popularity contests! Walk, yes, but no gas medicine? That is harsh.

Great job!

It will get better every day!

Best wishes for a good day tomorrow! The next few days will be rough, but it gets better quickly.

I am 8 days post-op and I can't have cottage cheese until October 20 and I can't have scrambled eggs until October 27. I'm not even to full liquids yet. (That starts on Saturday.) Every plan is different though. I'd listen to your body and decide how to proceed from there (outside of the obvious of following your surgeon's plan...) Good luck!

Yay! Great progress. (I must say, though, your makeup is pretty flawless in the picture on the right. Beautiful!)

I had a similar experience my only pain was when i first woke up i had to wait like 15mins for them to put the drugs into my IV then for them to register but other than that i never had pain except slight gas discomfort, never took the painkillers they sent me home with, nurses were pretty surprised. i hope you can say the same for the next weeks You are a better man than me. I felt like absolute hell the night after the surgery and the two days after. On the third day post-op, I started to turn a corner and every day since, I have gotten better and better. Thank God for the pain pills!!

I lost 99 pounds pre-op -- and that was six-months leading up to my sleeve on September 28. I have lost 111 pounds total as of today (October 6).

@@ginabee38 I think it is all about mindset. For me, the surgery itself is one part of a much bigger journey. I changed my relationship with food before the surgery; I started tracking my intake on March 21 and my surgery was September 28. That being said, I had never been successful in tracking my intake before I started this journey last spring. For me, it was seeing 400 pounds on the scale and knowing that I HAD to make a change. I, too, wanted to make the most of this opportunity, but my goal was to lose as much pre-op as possible and then continue that momentum post-op. I have never depended solely on the surgery. The journaling has been key to that strategy.

Yay! Congratulations!

I have been writing down everything that I put in my body since I began my six-month insurance-required diet in March. I have continued that since my surgery last Wednesday. I write down the food (with amount), the calories, the carbs, and the Protein. Pre-op, when I cooked at home (which was most of the time), I weighed everything. When we ate out (mostly when I was traveling for work and dinner on the nights I arrived back home), we would choose places with their nutritional information posted online or I would estimate on the high end. Right now, it doesn't matter as much. At Day 8 post-op, I am still on Clear liquids and Protein powder. I haven't even cracked 200 calories yet. But, as I progress through these stages, the calories and protein will slowly climb and I am going to keep my carbs under 20. Journaling will be key in keeping everything straight. I have shared my food journal with the nutritionist several times, but that's about it (though I am not opposed to anyone looking at it). I also record my weight on it on Monday's (and occasionally other days when I hit one of the milestones I set for myself). Journaling has really kept me accountable and has been key to 111 pound weight loss (so far!). Good luck!

@@#BirdDog Congratulations! The booth thing is a HUGE deal! I got there about a month or so ago it is was a happy, happy moment (second only to the no seatbelt extender moment -- a few weeks before that -- since I fly all the time for work). Keep up the great work!

Congratulations! Feel great, doesn't it?!?

I applaud you for getting a handle on it now. I have always been overweight/obese, but I kept it under control for most of my 20s. (And by under control, I mean I was always on a "diet" and I lost 100 pounds three different times.) After about 33 or so, it all went to pot and I ended up 400 pounds six months ago. I basically wasted most of my 30s, and not doing that in my 40s was a big motivator for me. You aren't too young, but you do HAVE to internalize and accept the LIFELONG change with your relationship with food that this journey requires. If you can do that, you are golden. Good luck!

The day/night of surgery and the following 2 days were pretty awful for me. Then the third day out, everything rapidly started getting better. Take your pain pills regularly during those first few days. I couldn't have gotten through it without them. (And I took them every 4 hours religiously those days.) Now, at 8 days post-op, I am feeling pretty good. I get tired very easily, and I have to remember that my body is still in a fragile state (especially when I want to pick something up or bend over). Good luck and feel better!

KristenLe nailed it. Put pizza, and everything else, aside for a while and focus on changing your relationship with food. If you can do that while the weight is "forced" to come off, you'll be much more equipped to continue to lose and maintain when your body normalizes and good choices become the primary driver of your weight and health. (And this is coming from someone who singlehandedly kept Papa John's stock price up for YEARS.)

You're doing awesome! Keep up the good work!

I was sleeved last Wednesday afternoon. Wednesday night, Thursday, and Friday were awful. But on Saturday, things started to improve and have steadily gotten better every day. Now, at Day 8 post-op, I am feeling pretty good. I have to remember that my body is still in a fragile state and that I can't overdo things (or pick up things -- that is the one that is killing me), but overall, I am comfortable. Just keep powering through this bad part. Good things and good times are on the horizon.

You brought up a lot of really great points in your post. I had to do six months of pre-op diet/nutrition as an insurance requirement. Since I had to do it, I took it very seriously. I followed a low carb/high protein/high healthy fat diet, wrote down EVERYTHING that went into my body for those six months, and lost 99 pounds pre-op (from 397 pounds to 298 pounds on the day of surgery). I completely re-established my relationship with food and THAT EXPERIENCE is what prepared me the most for the sleeve, the second half of my weight loss journey, and the lifetime maintenance that will come after. You are right. It won't take you long to read posts in these forums where people (both self-funded and insurance-funded) just have this surgery and only make minimal changes. They eat around the sleeve; they never really stop eating things they are not supposed to eat; they focus on how to have foods/drinks they shouldn't have instead of changing habits that were problematic in the past. (And they don't do anything to prepare for the experience, going from eating whatever/whenever to a tough liquid diet to the surgery to the post-op life. Find any number of the posts about "cheating.") I got sleeved a week ago. I have lost another 11 pounds since then, and I know I am on the right path. I'm going to follow the doctor's plan and I am going to take off the other half of my excess weight and then spend the rest of my life trying to stay at a healthy weight. I, too, had okay labs before I started all of this. But another two years would have likely brought diabetes, and medication for cholesterol, among other things. I looked at this as God giving me one last chance to fix things. And I took that chance. I hope you do, too. You definitely sound like you are in the right frame of mind. All my best to you!

I had a very different experience from Loopylulu. I spent the night, and I can't imagine what going home would have been like. I was on a constant IV all night and the nurse came in every hour to adjust the IV, take blood, and many other things. I felt awful that night and the two days following before everything starting to rebound. (Once it rebounded, though, it rebounded quickly.) I can't imagine not having had that IV for the first night after surgery. To each his/her own on this one...

We have to take the Bariatric Advantage Vitamins that the doctor's office sells. They are gigantic capsules and you have to take one capsule 3 times per day. I just started on those today (Day 7).

I am one week post-op today, and mine aren't giving me any more issues. In fact, they told me to take off the strips today and I went to the tanning bed. I just have 2 little cut-looking marks on my chest and 1 on the inside of my belly button.

On my plan, that's Week 4. (Week 1: Clear liquids, Week 2: Full Liquids, Week 3: Purees) Did your surgeon give you a week-by-week plan? I'm one week post-op today, and food is the last thing on my mind. I get my 40 grams of Protein in through 2 powder/water shakes (1 sweet and 1 savory) and I just sip Water and Powerade the rest of the day. I guess I am just really lucky. (But it takes me 2 hours to drink the sweet protein and 1 hour to drink the savory one. And the sipping water/powerade is an all day thing. All of that effort might have psychologically made me scared of food or something. Haha.)

Best wishes!