Cliffnotes

Hellooooooooooo. I'm Jacquie. I'm getting a gastric sleeve on the 21st. I've been cautiously researching stuff. Quick sidebar-I had a double mastectomy a few years ago thanks to a cancer scare, and I didn't know about the "drains" until a week before I got the surgery. Had I known earlier, there's no way I would have gone through with it and I probably wouldn't be here today. Anyway , in the interest of not scaring myself out of this, I'm wondering if someone could explain the "restriction" thing, bearing in mind that if it's too gross I will have nightmares. Thanks!

I'm going in the day after tomorrow and if not for these forums, I would have cancelled. I have been so depressed the last couple of days. I'm finding it hard to motivate.

I just heated up a Premier choc/peanut butter shake and it is pretty good.

That is, trust me, NEVER a fun date starter. BUT, it's worse if you neglect to mention it and you head out with this guy and a couple of his friends to see a band in the City, and because you're nervous, you have an insulin reaction/low blood sugar crash in the Lincoln Tunnel. Because THEN it becomes a nightmare with you unconscious on the sidewalk in Times Square and some people you just met. Then your date hails a policeman, and he he's so freaked out, he doesn't remember your last name, which looks very sketchy to the policeman. Honesty is usually better. Just sayin'.

Oh my friend, I can imagine what you're going through. I recently became single again and the thought of going through that process is a little intimidating. And I'll also have a double mastectomy to throw into the oh-by-the-ways. Whenever I get particularly stressed out about these types of questions I tell myself that outing oneself may not be necessary at first, but at some point, if the dude ends up being someone worthwhile, I'll want to come clean. I believe I have one of those bodies that hangs onto every calorie it ever consumed in case there is a sudden famine. I'm a survivor, right? Fortunately, there is no famine, and no real need to store fat the way I store fat, but my body does what it does because it has wanted to just be prepared in case. LOL.

I imagine not. (rueful laugh)

Thank you. That video was very informative. One week till surgery, and I'm nervous but ultimately very excited.

Well, I'll be getting one drain that will just be in overnight. It'll be unplugged the following morning. To prevent, my surgeon joked, my having to "slosh around,"

Yes, I heard. Actually the idea of the drain was worse than they actually were when I had my mastectomy. More than anything I was concerned that "restriction" was something like non-stop bowel distress or vomiting.

Yeah. I asked my nutritionist about your diet; evidently that IS pretty hard core. My doc has me on a high, simple protein diet which includes shakes but is not necessarily liquids. I've thrown some skinless (sauceless) chicken into the mix, along with some scrambled egg whites. Two days before is nothing but clear liquid. I plan to sleep a lot. : )

Thank you all for the thoughtful responses. (And the nice words about my beating cancer, @kcuster83 . I tend to forget that experience as time goes by. I need to remind myself that it was kind of a big deal and gather more strength from it. :)) Based on your responses, my takeaway is that getting to the restriction point is your body's way of saying that the sleeve is full, and anything el se you try to stuff in there is going to remain in your esophagus. I'm going to posit that THAT is the source of the discomfort. I have a friend who has an abnormally narrow esophagus. He'll eat, the food won't go down and he'll have to vomit. At that point he can't even sip water...he immediately gets sick. This can happen with any type of food that gets lodged in there and doesn't easily break down with stomach acids, which I guess also start backing up into the esophagus. He has gotten a procedure to dilate the esophagus every few years because over time, the space narrows again. Restriction sounds like a version of this, milder and able to be controlled, but ultimately resulting from stuff being stuck in the esophagus. Does that sound close?

Ok. So it's not necessarily eating one bite too much and projectile vomiting for an hour. Thank you. Sounds a bit more mellow than I imagined.

Hello. Jacquie here. Newbie. December 21 is my surgery date. Tomorrow I'm going full-on pre-surgical diet although I've only had Protein Bars for the past several days. I ordered a bunch of Protein Shakes and Vitamins that will be here tomorrow. Unfortunately mine has not been the best of all possible experiences to date. My surgeon -- I really like him. Unfortunately, he has been in the process of splitting his practice with another surgeon, and he's also had some office turnover, so the brunt of scheduling all the labs and various medical clearance appointments...making sure my prescriptions have been dealt with...I feel like it's been a very D.I.Y. process, unfortunately. And subsequently I'm probably more afraid than I need to be.

Hello. Jacquie here. Newbie. December 21 is my surgery date. Tomorrow I'm going full-on pre-surgical diet although I've only had protein bars for the past several days. I ordered a bunch of protein shakes and vitamins that will be here tomorrow. Unfortunately mine has not been the best of all possible experiences to date. My surgeon -- I really like him. Unfortunately, he has been in the process of splitting his practice with another surgeon, and he's also had some office turnover, so the brunt of scheduling all the labs and various medical clearance appointments...making sure my prescriptions have been dealt with...I feel like it's been a very D.I.Y. process, unfortunately. And subsequently I'm probably more afraid than I need to be.