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Truthfully ! I didn't want to die. I couldn't even lie down without coughing, and then I would go and Pee. The more that came out the better of a chance of sleeping. Plus the Water was even coming threw the pores of my skin. Make it short. I saw a surgeon at the U of M, and he made it clear, that if I didn't do something,,, I was going to drowned in my own fluids. I said i know, he said "OF COURSE YOU DO, OR YOU WOULDN'T BE HERE" Right, so let's do something about it. WHOA! not my field Bariatrics. Go to Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit. They have the Monopoly on this. He took me off the steroids,and in a couple of days I started to go to the Bathroom,all water ! I lost 30lbs. in 30 days. The surgeon was aware of the condition called pockets "THEY DON'T EVEN HAVE A NAME FOR IT YET !" He agreed, surgery was a must to live, so I chose the band, because I didn't want to have everything cut out, and thrown away. I lost over 120 lbs. regained it when they said it was blown, but now I had it fixed, and a fill, and I feel G R E A T ! So I'm on my way again. That's my story. Shirley

hi all. i've been posting for a few weeks on here now, but not under the AZ posts. i am a 24 years old female who has been overweight for about 24 years now! =) i am going through scottsdale bariatric with dr. balckstone. i am almost done with my 6 month program and am getting very nervous. i know it will be hard post op, but it cant be harder than not being able to fit in clothes, or sleeping with a CPAP, or...........i can go on and on. well, hope to talk to all of you at some point.

Hi Folks, So glad I found this forum ! I have less than 2 weeks to go and I am feeling very scared. I have one of the best surgeon's in the country. He has done more than 5,000 bariatric surgeries (both band and gastric) but I am still coming up with every bad thing I can think of in my mind ... I wish i could just let it go. I have no fear of the pain, I just do not like going under anesthesia. I have been overweight for the last 20 years and have lost and gained probably a couple hundred pounds in between. Now I am getting close to border-line diabetic, as well as mild sleep apnea, High BP, and knee pain. It's time ... I have to do something. All of my friends and family keep telling me how great things will be in the long run but I still can't get this fear out of my mind. I feel like I should get a grip. I am so glad to hear I'm not the only one feeling this way.

Hi everyone, I just wanted to give you guys an update. I was sleeved on 6/18 and my weight was 246. My average before that was 255. First few days where very hard! By the end of the week was feeling great. Second week my head hunger was getting the best of me. I even cheated and ate 4 fries. I felt no restrictions and it did not make me sick. I was more ashamed of losing control than anything else. I have started WLS Group and I am hoping to start therapy to help with my food addiction. My incisions are hardly visible! They don't even have scabs on them anymore :s I never got nausea or vomited and have been able to eat whatever I put in my mouth. Well, 3 oz of it at least. Now am on pureed foods and that is going great. My favorite thing to eat is chicken breast from a can pureed with my husbands awesome salsa. For the 4th my family made me ribs in a crock pot so that the meat was tender. That was so good and satisfying. I continue to take all my Vitamins (Calcium 1500 mg a day, a multi, Iron, and b12 sub (all from Bariatric Advantage)) every day. I also take Carafate 4xs a day. I drink between 50-70 oz of Water every day. I know I am not dehydrated because my pee is light. Oh I also take something for acid reflex but not sure the name. I have no symptoms of acid rflx. I do not drink Protein drinks because my nut/case manger/surgeon said that it is not necessary but I am thinking I want to try some.. I have read a lot about Premier from costco, I think I will try those. SV (or scale victory): I now weigh 225 lbs NSV: I had to retire one ring finger because it fell off. My clothes are fitting too big My face is thinner and I no longer get sun glass imprints on my cheeks I don't think about food all day a lot energy My hubby cannot keep his hands off me... hehe! No longer take meds for diabetes, high blood pressure and cholesterol I can cross my legs when I sit My knees don't hurt when I sit down to use the bathroom (btw bm's are normal) My fears: tearing my sleeve not being successful at weight loss my food addiction What I am looking forward to: riding my bike... I want to do this so bad but I have not been cleared yet a new wardrobe running a marathon living longer going on a cruise and wearing short shorts! What I do to feel normal: I go to mc donalds every morning and order a decaf coffee I got to restaurants and stick to Soups If you guys have any questions, please ask! Thanks for reading. Veronica

Love the undies idea...but here they make you take everything off oh well. Renew good luck tomorrow! I will be thinking about you all day! Karen less then a week to go! 2 weeks for me We are almost there! I like the idea of preop pictures my DR doesn't do that. I did take my measurements back in Aug. when I started this journey. I will take them again the day before my surgery. Best to all!

My paperwork has not been submitted...I am just starting out on this long journey. Cigna has been good to us in the past, but I downloaded the 35 page guide to getting approved for bariatric surgery and read thru the entire thing. I am planning on having to wait the 30 days and if it does happen sooner YEA! Did they make you do a 6 month diet?? My GP wrote to them stating that I have done several supervised diets with him over the past 3 years...I am hoping that appeases them and I don't have to do a 6 month diet...If I do then I am willing to accept this...what's another 6 months..lol. I hope you hear from them soon...no news is good news...What is your BMI? Is there any reason you think you may be denied?? My prayers are with you! Kimberly

At Renew Bariatrics they do bypass and gastric and some ball one...🤔 and the band. Most ppl get gastric (they even have mini gastric) or sleeve. Renew is right across the boarder too. Literally a 7 min drive once through the boarder. I was anti Mexico but omg these guys are AMAZING! Can't express that enough. Best decision ever. Anyway. Gotta go weigh myself 🥳🙏

Fall into the savings with our bariatric price specials. If you have been thinking about having a bariatric procedure now is the time Dr. Ponce and his team are running a fall special book your procedure between september and November and you will receive a $300 credit toward the surgery price; you will also receive a gift basket, and a 30 day supply of Protein powder. Do not delay if you are considering Bariatric surgery and have questions call or email Trish we are happy to serve you and be a part of your weight loss journey I would be happy to get you her info if you need it. This is a great deal! Sarah

I am 4 weeks post op. I renewed my gym pass. Before surgery I was taking phentermine 37.5 (appetite suppressant, energy booster) so I'd be able to work out for hours. On phentermine I would push hard and burn lots of calories. I loved what the pill did for me. But my doctor no longer wants me on it because of the long term risk. Going to the gym without my energy booster is awful. I can barely do 10-15 min on the elliptical at a low resistants. And the treadmill is just a joke. I can barely get to 5 min. Can someone please help me... Is there something out there that will help me in the gym? Get me going.

So who is buying the soda? Stop buying it. You are playing head games with yourself. This happens. Get back on the horse. One meal at a time, cut the carbs out. It's not that you fell off the wagon, it's that you get back on the wagon. Go get some sugar free popsicles or something to replace the binge sweets. You can do this one meal at a time. After 3 days the cravings will subside once you stop ingesting all those carbs. Add some good fats like avocado, coconut oil to help you feel sarisfied. Up your protein to 100grams. Get your bariatric materials out and reread them. Journal. Journal your food. Journal your gratitude.

I started with a BMI over 60, and nobody even brought up DS as an option for me. To be honest, I thought DS was an outdated surgery that's not really being done anymore because of all the risks. I didn't realize it's still popular for high-BMI patients. The surgeon who did my RNY doesn't do DS. He recommended RNY to me rather than sleeve because of my high BMI, since RNY patients statistically lose a bit more than sleeve patients. My understanding is that the sleeve is basically the first step in DS, and that's how the procedure was developed -- surgeons would do the DS in two separate surgeries for high-risk patients, and a lot of them didn't even need the second surgery because they lost enough weight with the sleeve alone. So, that is one option: get the sleeve first and have it revised to DS if necessary. You could also have a sleeve revised to RNY. I remember seeing a bariatric surgeon on YouTube say that he recommends the sleeve to all patients because you can always get it revised, but to me, that's crazy because I don't want to have more than one surgery!

I had mine done in Philadelphia but go to Dr Peter Leport in Fountain Valley, they have a bunch of doctors in the office. I know there is a Bariatric doctor at the hospital in the Hillcrest area which is where my sister had her bypass. Worst case my doc for cash pay charges 250 for a fill and then the office visit of 35.00.. My insurance is paying for my fills now. Which is far better than one of the doctors locally here that required me to pay 3,700.00 just to get an appt with him, then pay for the fill, then pay for an office visit. Even if insurance was to have paid they would make you cough up cash up front just to see this ROCKSTAR!! lol.. I don't think so

I had a great surgeon in Knoxville, TN and I am sure they work with you being out of town to do as much as possible in as few visits as they can. His name is Dr Stephen Boyce @ New Life center for Bariatric Surgery, and they are a Quality Center. 2/7/11 pre-op - 254 2/22/11 surgery - 243 Today 3/6/11 - 228 down 26 lbs

I don't think it is based on "safeguarding" the public's health. It's based on risk/benefit analysis, which is why it seems so way off for banding. The years of RNY and other bariatric surgeries are the body of experience they use to calculate such things. It will be several MORE years and MANY more banding patients will have to be studied before any changes are made. IMO, there should be a huge divide between RNY qualifications and those for banding. The current guidelines don't take into account the exponential difference in risk level. Someday, we can hope, they will.

I had the same problem, United Health care called and they told me excluded but as long as employer said ok to cover it and medically necessary and outpatient they would cover. THen started with surgeon to find out "excluded" and no way will they pay. One person at insurance company just said real rudely "we don't pay for obesity". THank you very much. Our company insurance agent told me even if I waited until September when my employer renews insurance it could not be added even if employer said ok because we have less than 3000 employees. Said that most companies will not add until company of that size. I am not sure if that correct or not. I own my house so I borrowed $17,000 to do self pay. Ouch. good luck to you. If self pay not a option really check your new jobs insurance plan out.

Sades, It's not as easy to get a second opinion for bariatric. Once you are someone else's patient and have had the surgery, other Docs aren't really interested in the problems you might have that are caused by another Dr. I am going to get a copy of my x-ray though and if I am not happy with the answers I get on Thurs. I will decide from there on how to proceed. You were lucky your Dr. was honest with you. Mine MIGHT be telling me the truth but until I can alleviate any doubts, I need to keep asking questions until I understand this whole mess. Sounds like you're doing fairly well, all things considered. I'm glad you're not having a terrible time of it and hope once my turn comes, it's easier the second time around. Thanks for checking in with me. Judy

Hello Sunset21May, It took about 6 weeks after my PCP refered me to the surgeon, after I did get to talk to the MD, he refered me to the Nutritionist and the Psychololgist for an eval and counceling. After that, it actually went pretty quick. I was already for my primary care at Kings Daughters, Temple and they also just started with the Lap-band. You also have a choice of going to Scott and White for bariatric surgery. I am very comfortable with Dr S. and his staff. For me it was the best thing ever! If you have any questions just ask ! Greetings Lulu66

Sorry I'm not sure how to reply to a particular thread...I'm new to this. I have been talking with alighterme and they gave me one price for Dr. Ortiz, but when I told them I wanted Dr. Lopez they told me $750 more (I'm not letting money make my decision especially not worth my life over $750 dollars). I then read on here that Dr. Lopez was not with alighterme anymore so I tried contacting Dr. Lopez direct which lead me to Mexico Bariatric Center where she told me that alighterme is lying to me about Dr. Lopez working for them. In the meantime I have a friend that used alighterme a year ago (Dr. Ortiz assisted Dr. Lopez with her surgery). She contacted alighterme & they told her he was with them until the end of the year. I'm so CONFUSED & overwhelmed with making a decision. Talking to both of these companies has now made me very skeptical of using either one. I'm not sure who to believe and not sure if I want to put my trust in them for my surgery.

My mother and went down to TJ in Feb. and we used Drs. Valenzuela and Cabrera and they were fantastic to us. We made sure that they are both certified bariatric surgeons with over 2000+ bariatric surgeries done with no leaks!!. We booked thru Mexico Bariatric Center and I have to say that they were wonderful also to us.

If your band was placed by Dr Aceves originally your price for revision to sleeve is $10,500. If you are going there for revision after lapband surgery elsewhere it's $12,500. VSG as a "first" bariatric surgery is, I believe, $9500. Tracy

No, a tree hugger is an environmentalist who understands the delicate balance of nature and the ecosystems. They understand that when you affect one small part of it, it affects the larger part, too. They understand that we get 1/2 of our medicines from the rain forests, which are being destroyed at an alarming rate. And they understand that we are the stewards of this earth and are entrusted to care for it, because everything isn't renewable. Extinct is extinct. I applaud them for their efforts. Now I know that they are the butt of jokes about some bug or species that they are trying to protect, but that comes from people being woefully uninformed about so many things, not the least of which is our environment. And it speaks volumes about the person making fun of them.

You can also buy it from the Bariatric Pal store. You get points for posting in the forum, so it can lead to a substantial discount

Hello, When I started back to solids, I still ate all the soft foods and introduced one solid food at a time so I knew exactly what I couldn't tolerate if it came up. I wasn't allowed grilled chicken until solids, at the soft food stage we were told to cook chicken in the slow cooker so it was fall apart tender and more juicy. So, I actually started with a baked chicken breast. Then went on to cooking chicken all kinds of ways, included grilled. I then went to turkey burgers, still kinda soft but more solid than ground up meat. All that was going well so I just tried everything one at a time and always at home in case I got sick. Baked pork chops, pork tenderloin, turkey and regular Italian sausages. We were told to try steak last because it tends to be the hardest to digest. So I actually didn't try steak until about 3 months post op, and it was sliced steak for kinda what you get on a cheese steak sub. But, lean steak we sliced and made at home. I tolerated that fine, twice so just yesterday (4 months post op) I ate some New York strip steak from the grill which also went fine. I think at this point I have tried and tolerate all the meats just fine but I can't eat COLD chicken, makes me sick every time. I think it probably is too dry when cold. I am not low carb per my bariatric Dietician. He stresses a balanced diet of everything while focusing on protein. Always eat the protein first. I typically fill up so my normal is about 40-60g carbs a day but there are some days I have more. I bring this up, because pizza. I have made my own at home, protein packed and did well. Also had take out pizza and ate the topping first and only a few bites of the crust before being full. I can't seem to eat "soft" breads, they don't make me sick but hit me like a bolder in my stomach and gives me a stomach ache. I can eat it toasted, or crackers, wraps. Anything but the normal soft breads. I eat all the veggies! I love salad and tolerate it fine. Again, started with eating 1 veggie at a time rather than a bowl of mixed veggies in a salad. To know where the issue was if I had any. I did not, and EAT ALL THE VEGGIES! I have always been a huge veggie person, moreso than fruits. Never a big fruit person, strawberries, watermelon are my go to but I have actually only had watermelon since surgery. I went kinda deep but I hope this helps.

Hey all, my wife is looking into the gastric sleeve surgery, of course I am the one with all the questions about it. Hoping maybe someone could help with any anecdotal evidence at least. I'm trying to reduce the "I wish we knew x before doing this" ... Anyway, for obvious reasons we are looking at Mexico. The first one she sent me was Elias Ortiz out of Tijuana. So I looked into him more, and read about some very poor (in my opinion) things about him, I think mostly when he was with ALM (or whatever it's called). Of course the first surgeon we look at giving me the eebie geebies is not a great start. He's not officially out of running, but we have looked into the following now. Odd that there didn't seem to be lists of them. Haven't looking into everything equally, our spoken to the coordinator on prices or anything, but these are probably in order of what we like. Endobariatric in Piedras Negras with Guillermo Alvarez LIMARC in Tijuana with Liza María Pompa González Obesity Control Center in Tijuana with Ariel Ortiz Elias Ortiz & Co in Tijuana VIDA Bariatrics in Tijuana with Gabriela Rodriguez Ruiz So I guess the questions are the following. If anyone could answer whatever question you may be able to add to, that would be great. Thanks!! 1) After deciding on Mexico, what was the overriding determinant in picking a surgeon, was it only price? 2 Did you get to pick the bougie size? I read a study (odd that I only found one) about bougie sizes - apparently 32 fr and 40 fr are the 2 commonest sizes? Anyway the study said that there was no materially significant weight loss difference between the two sizes, but there were less complications with the 40 fr size. Also in her situation, she's 5'10", and her general body type is such that her most healthy weight is going to be more than others her height, so I fear something too restrictive could come with problems of their own. 3 I've read about issues where people's Drs don't support post op care for out of country surgeries. This was old info though. Have people found this to still be the case? Is it only for the primary doctors, or only bariatric doctors? Or both, or is that not really a thing anymore? 4 What about complications during surgery. I have to imagine they send you to an ER in the states. I understand at that point our insurance will cover the emergency internationally, but not sure the MX hospital would be adequately staffed, and may have to send us to a place in the US. Any issues with transportation delays having to cross border? 5 Complications after you return home... I assume no, but are there any that, if we are about to make it back out, would fix the problem for like no cost or reduced fee? 6 Post op care. Like weeks/months/years... Is there a type of support you wish you had but was not provided? Nutritionist, or type of PT or psychologist/psychotherapist that focuses on mental issues that may arise after the big life change, to avoid body dysmorphia from moving to a different body part... I know the OCC place mentioned 5 years worth of support. Not sure if that is worth it, or if it's just something out there for fluff because it seems like something that would be useful for patients, but actually patients after the fact realize it's not helpful. 7 anything you know now, but would've been really helpful to know beforehand? Whether generally, or issues that would be specific to MX vs going to a place in US? 8 wondering the success of people with situation like her... In my opinion her problem isn't with overeating/the size of her stomach. She doesn't eat because she's hungry, so I'm not sure the impact this has on ghrelin will be a huge help. She invites an environment where she keeps low metabolism, skips meals, snacks on crap, drinks artificial sweeteners, takes medication that has been shown to lower metabolism. I tell her she needs to eat more protein, fiber, and 'eat like a diabetic' and when she works out (which she doesn't even do anymore), it's more of a benefit to go shorter sessions, but with more intensity, as that is best for your metabolism ... She says "Believe it or not, I actually learned this in college (for her nursing degree) and I know what I need to do" but yet does not do at all what she needs to do - and yet also simultaneously complains that she's tried everything to lose weight, even though that's not the case, particularly in last few years when she's out on anywhere from 20-40 pounds (guess). Looking at all the pre and post op diets, it looks like there's a focus on protein (as one would expect). So she's like, addicted to the dopamine I guess that she gets. She eats because she knows it's there. So while I am sure she will lose a bunch of weight offer the first 6-12 months, I tell her I'm more worried about being back where she is now 5 years after the fact, due to her behaviors that have put us in this situation in the beginning. There have been a handful of things that she's done (each successive thing being more expensive), where she's like "if I get x then it will force me to do y" and that's basically her 'argument' here. 9 related to above, how does one stay hydrated while exercising, esp in heat? Or even being sick? Is it recommended to drink warm water, due to the quicker absorption than cold?

I don't have a surgeon yet....about the only thing I've done is pass the verbal pre-screening to join the program and schedule my first call with the bariatric nurse. I DO have high bad cholesterol and low good (I forget which is which), and sleep apnea. I know this isn't a comorbidity, but found out today I will be having a knee surgery April 3....and I know that it is partially due to my weight....so I gotta lose it so I don't need the other done. Hopefully that will be a contributing factor for approval.