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PLEASE SHARE THIS INFORMATION WITH YOUR FAMILY MEMBER FRIENDS WHO ARE READY TO GO FOR THE NEXT STEP I JUST LEAVE THIS INFORMATION HERE WHY SHE IS PROMOTING HER SELF IF SHE IS NOT GOING TO BE ABLE TO DO THE SURGERY FOR YOU THEY ARE USING THE FACE OF HER BECAUSE DR ALMANZA IS GOING TO BE PERFORMING THE SURGERY HE HAVE VERY BADLY AND DANGER DOCTOR IS AT KILLER 80% OF THE PATIENTS HAVE BEEN INTERVIEWED FOR A SURGERY IN THE USA BECAUSE SO MANY COMPLICATIONS SHE IS NOT AT SURGEON Psic. Carmen Payán BAJA HOSPITAL & MEDICAL CENTER, DIRECTORA Psicólogo clínico especialista en pacientes bariátricos 411D4D42-A340-47B6-B2D1-F6368127E9F3.MOV

If you aren't 100% sure I recommend waiting until you are. You can always revisit the option later. You don't want to regret anything, or not stick with it because you really didn't want to do it. With that being said, it is probably just normal surgery jitters. If you had to go through any kind of pre-op process that usually take 4-6 months. You had plenty of time to think about it and talk yourself out of doing it. This is why I said that you are probably having normal jitters. I can say, I have been reading this forum and 2 others plus in 2 FB groups for WLS. I rarely see people say they regret it, or the only regret is not doing it sooner. The people that I do read about regrets are rare and 100% of the time due to some VERY unlikely/low risk complications. I wish you the best, always make the decision that is best for you and your needs!

because I like to over share sometimes (lol) and just give people a window into a true reality of a very large persons journey struggling with bad habits, eating disorder, anxiety depression etc….… I have decided to show a general weight progression for my weight loss journey so far….it has been far from drops all the time, even when I was doing the right thing! My high weight was July 2021 when I tipped the scales at 456. I am starting the rest of my story in January 2022. I was taking Ryselbus for a bit and was back down to 440. It was at this time that I doubled down to start doing the mental work on my stress eating, emotional eating, binge eating and other disordered eating which had gotten me pretty immobile and huge. During feb, march and April I avoided the scale, focusing on my relationship with food, the triggers contained in my relationship with other people who had made me turn to binging and life in general. Also in some changes in portion size and being able to stop when full (which was hard for me) but April 24th I stepped on the scale and was 426. I felt like I had made progress on me for the first time in a long time. May 8th I was gradually down to 421, then my body did the first drop on may 9th (which I have learned is normal pattern for me) to 414.6 I went up about two pounds and down about two pounds for another couple weeks until finally dropping so to 405.6 May 27th. June I really worked hard on dealing with fast food addiction and some very deep emotional hurts along with work stress and financial stress. My weight varied from 412.6 down (yep, gained!) to 403 at the end of the month. I was gaining, I was loosing, I was struggling to eat better and not loose my head to anxiety and other emotions. Sometimes I won, sometimes I lost. The whole month tracks up and down and up and down until I started to find my way towards the end of the month and the struggle became easier. June 30th saw my surgeon for first consult. I was 403.2 that morning on my scale July 4th I celebrated my own independence by leaving 400s with 399.6… I had started doing a lot of portion control and making healthier choices. Had nearly eliminated fast food. You would think I would be on a better path, but no, my body was still going to frustrate me. Even though I was eating a consistent diet, my weight decided to go on a joy ride and spiked back past 400 to 411.8. I was devastated and disheartened. How could I gain when my calories were in control and I was not eating much junk??? Emotionally I struggled and dug deeper into my past, my present and what I wanted for my future. I made some emotional breakthroughs and slowly the scale slid down, leaving the month at 396.4 Then August 3rd, 399.9 lbs, my nutritionist appt where I got my surgical guidelines and it threw me for a loop. I was told three weeks of either 1) 4 protein shakes a day and a light meal of lean protein and steamed veggies or 2) 50 total carbs a day….. that morning I had what I thought of a healthy smoothie breakfast with split pea (protein/fiber), berries and a banana with ice… I did the math on the carbs. It was 108 for my breakfast… could I do this?? with my struggles with disordered eating I knew I needed baby steps to get used to anything. Carb counting seemed to give me more variety and feeling of control. I started tracking all foods and reducing my cab count throughout Aug….. a miracle happened to my body as my mind relaxed with the guidelines given to me. The weight fluctuated, but trended truly down. I ended august at 376.3 by September I was (mostly) living with 50 carbs a day.. reading all labels and looking up food, paying attention to portion. Funny thing is my calories only dropped about 200 from my pre carb counting diet, but I was even more stringent with what I would consume… I was ready for my surgery when my surgeon was finally able to schedule ! By making my new habits my new normal, I was down to 365.6 at the end of September. A few hiccups delayed my surgery scheduling (mostly an uncommon complicated insurance issue ) but I kept moving with my new normal… I finally got my date of Nov 3rd, so October was go time. The time to double down and follow things to a T so I could be in the best shape for surgery. My body wasn’t as cooperative even with me doing right as I hoped, but with perseverance I dropped more weight. During the last week in October with changing nothing I went from 362 to 353. My body just finally released the weight… surgery day 351.4 ! Will do a post op so far in a bit…

I am wondering if i will have to continue on the Ozempic once weekly shot or if the oral diabetic meds will be suffiecient or if I might be able to get off all the meds and manage with diet. Diabetes is such a complicated disease. My brother died from complications of diabetes by not taking care of himself, I do not want the same fate!

The first couple of months were terrible I had the bypass last Dec 2nd and had some complications so it took me longer to heal but by February I was feeling good. Was throwing up and in pain for what felt like firever. Now I'm doing great I hit my goal weight my surgeon gave me Halloween and my bmi went from 47 to now it's a 25 Sent from my SM-A716U using BariatricPal mobile app

Hi everyone I had my sleeve last week on Thu 3rd nov and everything has been great with no complications and no side effects until 1 week post op I developed a red itchy rash on my stomach area only no where else on my body. I put the itching down to incision healing but it has gotten worse over night by already across my entire stomach and has kept me up itching like hell!! I have contacted my doctor for advice but wondered if anyone else has experienced this? I still have my sutures and bandages on, they come off on day 10.

They’re stumped. No anemia. I have never had any medical issues, never taken any medication. I thankfully decided to make the decision to have WLS as soon as I became “approvable” and hadn’t developed major health complications. We shall see what they say. it was very very nice to see and compare blood work though. My cholesterol is now normal whereas it was very high before. My glucose levels stabilized - I was prediabetic surgery time and now they’re normal. Seeing this reinforced that I made the right decision for my current and future health, I just have to keep at the water thing and hope that it solves this God awful fatigue. hope everyone is doing well!

Thank you! I get why people leave. After a while there’s not much more to say (unless you have a complication) but I stick around to keep myself honest. I update my weight every single time it fluctuates.

I am 7 week post op. And consume 900-1000 cal. But my nutritionist said I was ok to go up to 1200 because I was feeling woozy or tired. I have not had any complications and am down 17 BLS. Did stall for three weeks but started to drop weight again this past few days again. Remember the calories you consume today compared to what you consumed in the past. For me it is about a third . So it is good. It is a marathon not a sprint. Wishing you good health on your weight loss journey.

I think that it partly depends upon how soon after surgery you are travelling, and then your individual experience with healing and recovery. Our surgeon had us stay in town for ten days, in order to have the first post op follow up visit in person, and then head home. That, and also just the basic conservatism of being local for the first few days as that is the time of greatest likelihood of complications needing rehospitalization (and with a DS, he doesn't want anyone else fooling around with your insides if something does need to be done, as uncommon as that may be.) On bathroom issues, most any of us are subject to problems early on as our systems get used to the changes that were made (you may have run into some of them with your sleeve - constipation being the most common, but it can go the other way too...... As you aren't eating much then, there is proportionately less coming out the other end, but again, the diet is different and your system may object, no matter which surgery you have. The DS is known for bathroom issues, but it overall isn't greatly different than what many RNY folks go through - it's just that many surgeons will emphasize it with the DS when they are trying to sell you on something else that they know how to do. The malabsorption will change things, and early on things may be more inconvenient or urgent until your diet gets squared away and you figure out what does and doesn't work for you. Up until Covid hit, we had a regular group support meeting that was primarily vets 10-20 years out that was a restaurant dinner event, and you wouldn't know that it was a group of primarily DSers in there (other than on average being more normal weight.)

I am a 2x revision patient, starting with LapBand in 2011, followed by VSG in 2019 due to severe Lapband complications, and finally GBP in 2021 after even more complications with the VSG. I have been fighting the good fight for ELEVEN YEARS now, and trust me when I say I was so ready to give up many times during the process, but I am so glad that I never did! I am officially down 152 lbs, and have been maintaining within 3-4 lbs since Feb 2022. I am to the point that I am ready to start looking into plastics. After so many years of fighting to get to where I am, I love the way I look and feel.... when I'm fully dressed. But seeing all the loose skin is a hard mental hit every single time. All the work, tears, pain, determination.... it all feels like it's for nothing when I see the destruction it all left behind. After a lot of research on various options, I am heavily leaning towards the Beltline procedure due to the amount of work that will need to be done. Does anyone have any experience with this? I would love to hear all about it! Pros, cons, horror stories, success stories... I want it all!

Lucky you. It will be harder when you have no restriction. It's essential that you use this period to learn how to eat differently and continue to hold the line. I lost half of my weight-loss prior to surgery. Because of complications, after my RNY>RNY revision surgery I had three endoscopy procedures which stretched my pouch and anastomosis. After a few weeks I had very little physical restriction. I've had to work very hard to eat differently and continue to lose weight. My post surgical loss is now equal to what I lost prior to surgery, and I struggle every day with cravings. I need to keep my calorie count in the area of 1000-1200 per day. I eat almost no sugar, flour, white potatoes, rice, or processed foods. But--it's worked and I will continue to do this for life, recording every morsel in my (Baritastic). app I know that as soon as I start to return to old eating habits I will regain what I have lost. It's hard work, but so worth it. Hang in there!

I just wanted to give an update on my experience with ESG after having a VSG 8 years ago. I lost 120 pounds on the VSG and regained 60 pounds. The surgeons I talked to were hesitant to do a surgical revision due to potential complications. I did an ESG revision 5 weeks ago. Since then I lost 10% of my body weight, which is over half of what I had regained. I was very pleaded with the ESG procedure itself, I had it done on a Wednesday and was back to work on Monday. I had lost 4 weeks of work with the VSG. My program at the University of Michigan does a full 6 week liquid diet which I contribute to most of the success. I think the ESG success needs to be talked about more. It's lower risk with a speedy recovery.

You can ask your clinic for advice, but it's probably going to be up to you to figure out, mainly because you have to work it around your schedule. It can seem complicated at first, but you get used to it. I take a multivitamin with iron plus an additional iron supplement, calcium 3x/day, B12, biotin, and D3. Calcium and iron are supposed to be at least 2 hours apart, and I also take a prescription thyroid medication that's supposed to be 4 hours apart from calcium and iron. I use a free app called Medisafe to track my medications and remind me. It's really useful because you can track what time you took everything, and it also tracks how many of each you have left and reminds you to refill. You can set reminders at whatever time you want. I set reminders as follows, but I usually stay ahead of schedule. 6:00 am - Thyroid prescription 10:30 am - Multivitamin with iron, B12, Biotin, D3 1:00 pm - 1st calcium 3:30 pm - iron 6:00 pm - 2nd calcium 8:30 pm - 3rd calcium I also recommend getting a pill organizer with 3 or 4 compartments for each day, where each day has its own removable box (the one I have looks like this one: https://smile.amazon.com/Organizer-Compartments-Moisture-Proof-Medication-Supplements/dp/B07Q9JSHMP). I distribute my pills in that once per week, and then I can just grab the box for the day.

First of all congratulations!! You say you’ve read stories of complications do you mean just because you are post sleeve?? I think you are far enough out now that you can eat plenty to nourish you both. I have heard of several people on here who have become pregnant even sooner post surgery and they have all had good updates as far as I have seen. I’m sure you will be considered higher risk but that just means they watch you even closer (and more chances to see the baby) so not necessarily a bad thing. I do suggest a nutritionist be part of your plan to help keep you on track to meet both of your needs without too much regain. Maybe even a phone call to your team to see if they have any advice or suggestions. And of course you will want to see the OB asap. If you haven’t already, try a search of pregnancy on here. I’m pretty sure there are a couple women who are pregnant right now. I’m sure they will have some of the best advice.

OMG! I got sleeved April 18 of this year and this past Friday October 28th I found out I’m 6 weeks pregnant😳🙌🏾🥰🥲 Guys, I’ve been with my husband for 12 years, married for 8. We have been trying to conceive for 7 years now. I was diagnosed with PCOS from a very early age and never had regular periods. We started fertility treatments in 2016, got pregnant via IUI 2017 and miscarried 1 month later. I was devastated and waited 3 years later to try again. Unfortunately I had to get uterine polyps removed that year and had to wait. Fast forward to 2021 where we started again and was told both tubes are blocked and we would have to do IVF but had to lose a significant amount of weight to be below the max BMI to do it. That is when I decided to get sleeved. It’s now Jan 2022, I started researching Dr’s, found one in February and we started the entire process. Surgery was a success, lost 86lbs reached my goal weight about 3 weeks ago and then BOOM this. Guys I’m so scared! I’ve read horrow stories of complications and etc. I do want to be excited for this miracle but I also feel like what if? Please share your stories with me, share any encouraging words, anything guys. I have waited what seems like a lifetime for this moment, for this blessing, for this miracle and I want to enjoy every single moment of it!

Thank you so much for the reply. Just trying to follow the current advice and wait it out to see if that is indeed whats going on. Question, if you dont mind, with your Synthroid have you ever been told to not take the Multivitamin within 4 hours of it due to causing the Synthroid to be less effective? I am trying to schedule my meds accordingly, and this was never told to me previously when I had my surgery, and all the medication timing do's/do not's is getting a little complicated. Just wondering if this was a widely stated thing. Sent from my SM-G975U using BariatricPal mobile app

I don't have kids, so no c-section but I have my experience with surgeries. My bypass was by far the least painful and easiest recovery. It was also my only "internal" surgery. I don't know if that makes a difference for recovery. Through them all I am an easy patient, never complications, always healing up good, etc. I had ACL repair A leg osteotomy (google it, they cut my leg in half and realigned my bones) Surgery to pull impacted wisdom teeth -5 of them.. yes I had 5 I have extra wisdom! haha (yes, actual surgery under general anesthesia and 1 night in the hospital, it was a big ordeal) Surgery on my abdomen to clear out an severely poisonous brown recluse spider bite that was eating me from the inside out... PS also why I am TERRIFIED of spiders -legit arachnophobic here although I don't feel my fear is "irrational" This also happened in Elementary school, so I was super young! And lastly skin removal surgery. I had lost about 170 lbs years ago through basic starvation and had 17 lbs of skin removed. This was BY FAR the most painful surgery I ever had. The ONLY surgery I regularly took pain meds for. I am ANTI pain meds if I can help it! Too much addiction in my family and this world. If I can suffer through the pain, I will before taking pain meds.

Hi all, I am writing this for the >1% of gastric bypass patients who have the unusual complications that I had and, like me, couldn't find any information about it online to ease your mind. I had my gastric bypass surgery on September 7, 2022. I chose gastric bypass over the gastric sleeve specifically after months of research because of the higher rate of successful weight loss, particularly in women. My first week post-op went great, but after day 8 or 9 when I tried progressing my food intake from full-liquids to pureed foods I began vomiting and feeling really nauseous at every meal. I let my surgeon and dietitian know immediately and stepped my food intake back down to full-liquids. Pretty soon, I couldn't even take in full-liquids and was limited to hydrating fluids and chicken broth. I could keep down hydrating fluids and broth about 80% of the time, full-liquids 50% of the time, and everything else came back up. My surgeon was very responsive and had me get an endoscopy. Under general anesthesia, the endoscopy explored my new stomach pouch and roux limb connections that make up my new tummy system. Typically, gastric bypasses can result in constriction of the connection between the stomach pouch and roux limb, and my gastroenterologist was prepared to use a balloon to inflate the area to ease that restriction. In my case, however, that area looked fine, but further down the roux limb there was a stricture that was almost impassable for the narrow scope. This is what was causing my problem. I had an external compression on my roux limb that was making it impossible for anything more viscous than water to pass through. My layman's understanding of what had happened is that my surgeon brought my small intestine / roux limb up to meet my new stomach pouch through the transverse mesocolon. This involved cutting a hole through the transverse mesocolon to put the roux limb through and then stitching it up a little on either side to make sure nothing else will slip through the hole and cause a hernia. Apparently, this is typically sufficient and there is space enough in the hole in the mesocolon for scar tissue to form but still allow the roux limb to operate appropriately. Not in my case! xD My body and over-active immune system saw a hole and decided that hole must. be. fixed! The scar tissue that formed to close the hole closed tight enough on the roux limb and it was tight enough that barely anything could get through. I had a second laparoscopic surgery on October 12, 2022 to remove the scar tissue and loosen the compression on the roux limb. My surgeon decided to remove the small stitches on either side of the hole in the transverse mesocolon to reduce the chance that any new scar tissue will close the hole up as completely again. Immediately after this second laparoscopic surgery, I felt tons better! I stayed overnight in the hospital and was put straight on full-liquids, which I was barely tolerating before! The reason I am writing all of this out is because, in the month-long interim between surgeries, I couldn't find anything in my online research to figure out what was wrong, or what I could try, or what the next steps looked like, or how long, or why this was happening. I went for more than a month on little to no substantial nutrition, and I found so little information on what to expect or how long I would have to live like this. I even looked in these forums to see if anyone had asked about symptoms that are similar to mine and I didn't find very much information. So, I'm writing about my experience and using as many of the keywords I can think of that I've been searching for over the past two months! So! If you had gastric bypass and you start experiencing nausea and vomiting after what seems like typical food progression, please speak to your surgeon. It could be an internal stricture of the roux limb or the connecting bits, or in my case an external compression of some sort. From the very few resources I could find online, my type of external compression of transverse mesocolon on the roux limb seemed to occur in 0.9% of gastric bypass patients and it seems to happen within the first month. My surgeon pretty much immediately knew what was wrong, and her PA said she had seen it before, but not often, and it was new for my insurance caseworker. The inability to eat made it very difficult to complete normal daily tasks like my job, housework, walking the dog, etc. I wasn't in pain, I just couldn't get enough energy to do anything! My doctors moved quickly to get me back in for surgery, but it still took 4-5 weeks from starting to vomit at each meal to waking up from my second surgery feeling much better. I am so thankful that my surgeon was able to fix what was wrong with the scar tissue compressing around the roux limb; it made a world of difference! I'm not out of the woods quite yet, however. Six days after the surgery to repair the hole in the transverse mesocolon, I had a bad food day and nothing stayed down. I immediately reached out to my surgeon's office and today went in for an upper GI in which I intake contrast dye while a doctor observes how it flows through my new gastrointestinal system with an X-ray. That doctor said it looks like the connection between my stomach pouch and roux limb looks stenosed now. I am grateful that they found something and that there is an explanation for why everything I put in my mouth makes me nauseous and that there's a reason why I don't want to eat anything. I will be having another endoscopy in the following couple of weeks and, as ever, I am hopeful that this will be the last surgery that I need for my gastric bypass.

Other people have articulated very well. I think there are different parts of the "fat movement" that get balled up into the acceptance piece. I like that there are more bigger bodies out there doing "regular things" like yoga, cooking, running, kayaking, dancing, living... and it's not as shocking as it may have been years before. I think that's important, especially for those people whose body is happier at a larger weight. Not everyone wants surgery or wants to starve themselves to a calorie deficit to be "thinner" when they feel good at the weight they are at. And some of them are at 200+ pounds. I think that's important to recognize. I'm not sure any human, unless super tall can be truly "healthy" at 400 pounds, though. But they shouldn't be barred or shunned from life because they are that weight. But, they should not be lied to by a doctor. I'll be honest, though, sometimes I question the amount of medical complications blamed on obesity as a whole just because it's easier to assign blame to. I've been relatively healthy as a bigger girl (especially when I was younger). I'm still able to do cartwheels at almost 50 and close to 300 pounds. I can understand how some people are happy with more padding - or don't care. But my weight is catching up to me, and I want more freedom in my own body.

Had Surgery on June 21. Lost a total of 88 lbs since pre-op (61 since surgery). It's been so much easier than I feared. No complications whatsoever. Everything is going great. But I've hit a plateau. I am at the same weight now that I was 3 weeks ago. Really the first plateau I've had. I've read enough to know they happen and it's not a reason to panic. I did have a 10 day vacation in there when I didn't track at all though I'm confident I ate well. But other than that and another short vacation, I've tracked every single day since surgery. So I'm not panicking. I know I'm eating right and the weight loss will return. And I'll be very happy when it does. Until then, I'm not panicking ... really, I'm not. Really. 😂

Congratulations on your journey so far. You will soon become the person you always wanted to be. Many of us, me included, only tell our nearest and dearest because of this. Many people think they know the ins and outs of this surgery but may have only read of one bad instance. This is a very safe surgery and complications a few and far between. Some nay sayers are just jealous or don't want you to change because of their own insecurities. Ask anything you want, somebody on here will have had the same problem

I understand what you are going through. My original surgery date was Aug 1st. I was on the table and they cancelled it because they were afraid of a med complication. They changed it to Sept. 8th and then right before changed it again to the 12th. I had to change meds and let the other ones out of my system. They were worried about C-diff. Even after my surgery, I was scared based on the things they told me. It was hard at the time, but I am glad it finally happened. Your situation is so unique. Kind of cool. I know it probably doesn't feel that way. I cried for a while after I got home. The pain meds didn't help. Everything is good now. I figure better safe than sorry. (((hugs)))

I can relate to this on so many levels. I went to the ER with a blinding headache once and was told once that I was not going to be given the drugs I was looking for. Fortunately the neurologist I saw at the time was on call came down and saved the nurse from my temper. I could only see out of one eye and she wanted to send me out the door with a Tylenol. The neurologist snorted at that and loaded me up with with the rescue protocol for my pain. My surgeon who did my gastric bypass insists the issues I've run into are all anxiety. I had to push for testing because I know something was wrong...yeah, I have a staple line ulcer and a slightly twisted ulcer. She wouldn't answer my questions. Atleast my GI doctor did. By far though was when I was pregnant. This damn near killed both me and my daughter. Because I could stop vomiting, I was losing a lot of weight quickly. Yet the chief of the residents clinic insisted that I didn't need nutritional support. At one point I started having pain and my skin took on a yellow tone...that was gallstones. The surgeon was furious that I was essentially being starved, called the residents clinic and made it known how unacceptable it was. I was admitted and 5 days later had a feeding tube in my chest. I went into labor early and labor/delivery insisted I didn't need to be seen because I wasn't in pain. Thankfully a medical assistant wasn't having any of it and pushed for an exam. Yes, I was in labor and they had to rush me because my fluid levels were low and my daughter was very breached. The OB/GYN said had I not gotten in as soon as I did, my daughter would have died and I might have too from further complications.

Programs will vary all over the place depending upon their experiences, convenience and tolerance for potential minor complications. Our program, for example, allowed us most everything liquid, mushy or soft for the first month, and we could switch between them and experiment depending upon our personal tolerances - if something didn't settle quite right, go back to what did and try that food again in a week or two. Some programs may prefer to keep their patients all on one track based on the most problematic patients (lowest common denominator) to avoid hassles and calls to their staff.