Hello from a new member

[gunslinger95 9]

I was doing some post-op research and came across this interesting site and decided to register. My surgery was last Monday (10/7) and while I still have very little energy (liquid diet and 8 days out from surgery will do this I understand) I feel great and am heading back to work tomorrow (Boo!)

My wife had the Roux-en-Y bypass performed back in January and has lost 140 pounds in 9 months. She was a HUGE motivator that made me decide to go through with surgery myself. That and wanting to me a more active part in our 5 year old's life. I had been thinking about the surgery for a while but it wasn't until a trip to the amusement park with my in-laws this summer and I was unable to ride most of the "adult" rides due to the seat belts not closing that made me say "enough is enough". Thank god that my employer picked up the bariatric surgery rider to my health insurance last year!

I had to attend a pre-surgery informational brief before I could meet with my doctor. I used the same one my wife used. If you live in Northern Virgina, i HIGHLY recommend Dr. Moazzez - he's FANTASTIC!. That was on August 14th. I scheduled my appointment for August 29th and we decided to go forward with the Sleeve Gastrectomy. I weighed in at his office that day at 328 pounds fully clothed (my scale said closer to 319 naked) and we talked briefly about BMI and target weight.

The BMI calculator says a 6'1" man should weigh no more than 189 pounds. I remember being right about 180 my junior year of HIGH SCHOOL! I told him that number seemed low for someone with my frame (I have very wide shoulders) and he did some calculations and deduced that my "ideal" weight would be 214 pounds. I'd buy that, even though that would be a BMI of 28.2 and would still make me "overweight" - I can live with that as it's a just a label.

The office had received insurance approval within a day or two and my surgery date was set for October 7th. This gave me just about 5 weeks to complete all the prerequisite tests and appointments, so it was a chore getting everything done in time.

The two weeks on Optifast leading up the surgery wasn't great (who would call 960 calories a day great when I was probably consuming 3 or 4 times that amount before) but the physical hunger went away pretty quickly. I lost 15.4 pounds on the Optifast alone.

The surgery went off without a hitch and I spent one night in the hospital. I had a rough time the first two days home in that I was SO nauseous that I just couldn't drink the 64 ounces of fluids that I was supposed to. We made a visit back to the doctor on Friday and I got a prescription for a couple of different nausea medicines and went to the ER briefly to get some IV fluids to prevent dehydration. The new meds worked and by Saturday I was feeling much better and was able to significantly increase my Fluid intake.

I'm still have some issues getting all the my Protein in. I haven't found any of the pre-mixed drinks that I like and the powders mixed with Water (I won't get milk until Friday at the earliest) are tough to take. My wife told me she wasn't hungry post-surgery and I know that sleeve patients are supposed to have decreased appetite over bypass patients anyhow, but I appear to be the exception to the rule - I'm STARVING! I think once I get milk and yogurt, things will be easy from there to the "mushy" stage.

Sorry this turned out to be a little longer than I originally anticipated, but it felt good to be "my story" thus far down in writing. While I'm just starting my journey, I'm very excited about what the future holds and can't help but ask why I took so long to do something about my weight? Thanks for listening...

Edited October 16, 2013 by gunslinger95

[Carlotta 57]

Good to hear from a person on their new journey with t gastric sleeve.

[ohboyherewego! 12]

Welcome and congrats to you and wifey both! I just joined today as well. Hoping for my date to be about first week of November. Keep the stories coming. You will do great!

[peachie86 63]

congratulations on getting sleeved and welcome to the site!