Surgery Results

[azqueen 0]

Stonersmom & 7thangel - Me too!! 8/16. Too weird. It is finally here. Did you do the pre-op diet hell? So tired of Protein Shakes. BMI 38 so I was border line on doing pre-op diet. Dr. said it would'nt hurt and would be better for surgery outcome due to liver shrinking. Went to Diamondbacks game yesterday and no hotdog and beer also went to movies this weekend and no popcorn or soda. I am proud of myself for that! So what are you planning for your post-op diets? I have heard clear liqueds. Okay, so that is broth...what else, any ideas. Emotions high too. Have you noticed just how many resturant commercials are on TV?? 3 days and counting..Yahoo.

[7thangel 0]

Hi azqueen! I'm in AZ too. Dr. Hilario Juarez at Bridges at St. Lukes is doing my surgery. I don't have a preop diet, so you must have a different doc. I guess for preop I am just sticking to the Protein Shakes, liquids and the like. I am on only liquids for three weeks, then mushies for two or three after that. I get my first fill 6 weeks out. Yeah, I guess "emotions" is the right word. I think I have run the gamut. I told my DH not to let me back out! I know I'll regret it if I do. keep in touch az queen and stonersmom.

[7thangel 0]

sorry, I meant "for POSTOP I am just sticking to"

[pjanes54 0]

My surgery is tomorrow 8/13 and I am freaking out also! I am having mini funerals for my favorite foods. i guess we all go through this! I'll keep you guys posted

OMG, mini funerals...i love it. i think i'll have a service today for cheesecake...i start my liquid pre-op on Thursday! R.I.P. (piece!!) hey, thanks for that MissNilsa! that was a good haha.

ps: here's praying for a uneventful surgery and speedy recovery for you today!!

[newgirl07 0]

Hey Crazy Ates,

Since I started this thread and promised I'd report in, here's my update.

Surgery (Dr. Ortiz, MX) went exceptionally well, best recovery from a surgical procedure I'd ever had. No tube down the throat, no nausea afterward and killer drugs! Gotta love Mexico. Also, great after care.

I'm feeling 90% today. The remaining 10% is the discomfort I feel when I'm driving and go over bumps and slight restlessness when sleeping.

I've moved from broths to regular pureed type Soups now. I never want broth again! A hint for upcoming bandsters, if you have a Kitchen Kaboodle in your area, they carry broth in small single-use packets (beef, chicken & veg). It's like a Syrup that you mix with a cup of hot Water. I brought some with me to MX and they were a godsend on my way home when my flight was delayed 3 times! All of them are pretty good but I liked the beef & veg best.

I'm having a hard time getting liquids in as I'm really not interested in anything. I did learn some don'ts like don't drink OJ too soon post op and don't drink a frappacino no matter how tempting! Both made me sick, although not to the point of throwing up.

Walk as much as you can. I'm on tylenol only now and I think that's due primarily to the walking I've done. My dog is loving it.

Congrats to all my fellow bandsters and good luck to those upcoming. I'm going to close all my posts the same way...

THIS IS OUR YEAR!

[pronetus 0]

Today is day 5. Off Pain meds as of yesterday. Still a little bloated feeling. Soar diaphram. It still hurts a little to take a deep breath. I have had no gas pains so far. It hurts to burp. I was able to walk 3 miles today, 1.5 in the morning 1.5 in aft. I am glad I decided to take 2 weeks sick leave off. Hang in there guys!

[Alexandra 55]

My surgery was at 9:00 this morning, or thereabouts, and I got home at around 3:00. It would have been earlier but WOW thie hospital was busy today and there was a holdup getting me into radiology for the swallow study. That turned out to be a good thing, I think, because during the 90 minutes I waited my head cleared up enormously. (I hate anaesthesia.)

I'm home, feeling good, and looking forward to just hanging around the house for a couple of days!!

Congratulations to the August Bandsters!!

[pjanes54 0]

My surgery was at 9:00 this morning, or thereabouts, and I got home at around 3:00. It would have been earlier but WOW thie hospital was busy today and there was a holdup getting me into radiology for the swallow study. That turned out to be a good thing, I think, because during the 90 minutes I waited my head cleared up enormously. (I hate anaesthesia.)

I'm home, feeling good, and looking forward to just hanging around the house for a couple of days!!

Congratulations to the August Bandsters!!

GOOD FOR YOU! That was a quick turn around! Everything must have gone VERY smooth. Terrific.

[ATTACH]9513[/ATTACH]

[sweetforlife 0]

Well everyone....I am in the land of the living...I was banded on August 7, 2007. It was so funny as I was watching Big Medicine the night before my surgery and saw a lady that was doing the lap band surgery...I love that show. Listen anyone who has not done this surgery...It is probably the best thing that could have every happened to me. For many years I suffered from an eating disorder and it got out of control. For anyone out there that may feel that binging and purging can make you loose weight (trust me there are people out there that feel that way). You will not you were looking at at a previous bulimic that gained 50 lbs! It's better you do what you have to do and get this band. I know this journey won't be easy but now I am in control of ME and that is the most important thing. Here is the low down:

1. I waited until 1:20 p.m. a lady met with me and brough me to OR I was put in a waiting room.

2. The nurse told me to put on a robe that could finally fit me. You know the hopital gown that you have to put two on or you will be ass out..yeah...that can't happen there! lol. I also got a took to put on.The nurse came in asked a few questions. She weighed me and to my suprise I lost 15 lbs.

3. The anestigolist (mind my spelling) met with me to explain what he would be going and asked what meds I am on and if I am allergic to anything.

4. Then I met with Dr. Cobourn for a while. He answered all my questions. He told me he loved my touqe and not to start without him.lol. I told him I would try not too!

5. I was then taken to OR they strapped me up to the machines and sent me to lala land.

6. I woke up. The post op nurse Francine was amazing. She came me all sorts of cool drugs lol. I got some demerol and codine.

7. Dr. Cobourn met with me breifly and told me that I had a bit of a hernia and he fixed it! HA...I went to Peel for the same problem and they turned me away saying nothing was wrong.

8. I had a lot of gas pain in the shoulders which I think was the worst.

9. Got home and put a hot Water bottle on the shoulders took gas X and went beddie bye.

10. One thing that helps with the gas I found was a nice message. My hubbie gave me a message it helped move around the gas.

11. I slept on the couch for the evening as my couch has a lot of pillow which was very comfortable.

12. Woke up this morning to some gas but now soreness in the tummy. I guess the stiching is making me sore. The gas is starting to come out (gross) and is litterly a byatch to come out lol.

All in all ... everything went well. I am very happy and that each and everyone of your for your support along the way. If it wasn't for you all I would be in the dark as to what to expect. At least by reading your experiences I now know what to expect. You all are amazing!

Thanks again for all your support.

[clorox123 0]

Hi y'all

well well. sitting by computer since sitting is the most comfy position.

All went well thank god and I'm soo happy to be home!

got banded at ab. 10 am.. was up ab. 11:15 and I just remember in recovery waking up.. coughing.. still had tube down my throat.. :girl_hug:. so they took out right away. and all i said was "paiinnn" "paiinnnn" they asked me how much 1-10 i told them a 6 1/2.. got some morphine.. a little while later i said "paiinnn" so they gave me some more.. lol.. at 12:30 i was up in my room already! Got up right away to go to bathroom and put on my pj's.. adn then I slept till around 2 ish..

(funny side note. my sis was banded 2 weeks ago.. when i was telling her my "paaainnn" story in recovery she BURST out laffing. she said that were the first words out of her mouth.. "paiinnn" painnn".. lol - i guess when we're tired we conserve our energy for the impt. stuff)

walked around again w/ my hubby... and had this EXCRUCIATING pain on my right side, next to inscision area.. like a 1inch by 1 inch area taht was burning and stabbing me to my back.. coudln't stand straight. Otherwise everywhere else felt find. Thankfully I really did not have any gas pains.. I've had it from previous surgeries so I am soooo thankful that I didn't have that. So back to this pain. I didn't know what hit me. had a massive anxiety attack. (lovely) husband called nurse and they couldn't figure out why i was having pain in that spot. no'g there. It hurt when the fabric of my t-shirt was rubbing against it!! They gave me Toradol IV.. and that dulled it.. I was able to sleep some

About 1-2 hours later Dr. Ren came and said I had some swelling on my right side of muscle when she did surgery.. ( I did have pain on myright side from a rib that kept on going out of place.. went to chiropracter twice and then figured what the heck.not gonna keep on going once a week to snap back into place. so lived with the discomfort and mild pain)so it seems she cut through some nerves there. and the pain that im' having is nerve endings that were cut. and that pain / discomfort will be there for a few weeks (GEE THANKS! :faint:)..

Other than that and feeling like I had a truck run over my stomach.. which is bearable. i'm really doing well.

i'm sorta hungry. but more in my head.. cuz i can't really drink much.. get full and a little nauseous and start burping :whoo: lol.. life is soo much fun

the nerve pain kills when I walk.. it hurts to lay on couch.. but sitting in a chair is ok. problem is my butt KILLS already..:heh: from all the sitting.

Vicodan does NOT work for me. never has.. and advil that i took ab. 2 hours after 2 vicodan also hasn't worked. called dr. and nothing can do. cuz can't call in a narcotic to pharmacy.. so i'll have to wait until tommorow. great. there goes another night of sleep. helllo late night TV once again!

i wandered the hospital all night. Met some great pple who had the surgery too and it was therapeutic for all of us to talk and share experiences.

still constipated but PETRIFIED to push.. lol. sorry for TMI... have aches under breasts. probably the little gas I have.. and incision sites are ok. a little painful.. i'm coughing up stuff. but taht is probably from tube. which is why my throat is killing me too... nervous ab. the cough but I put a pillow on my stomach. cuz i don't want incisions to bleed/pop.. (sis had that by gall bladder surgery and ended up in hospital all infected)

all in all this is something I would do again if the results happen. which their is no reason it shouldn't!!

I hope all of you are doing ok!!

MissNilsa.. how u feeling? any better than this morning???? Did u get some sleep??

will keep u posted!

Pemy

[robinmtz 0]

Hi folks.....

I can't believe how much easier this has been then I thought. My surgery was at 7:30 AM yesterday and I released before 12 noon the same day, less then 5 hours after surgery.

I did have a lot of pain in my shoulder but it never got higher then a 3 or 4. And the pain killer they sent me home with dealt with it fine and today, the next day, I don't have shoulder pain at all.

I have drank a couple of Protein shakes, about 3 ounces both days so far and have had some V8. But am not really hungry at all.

Getting up out of a chair hurts some, but I try to prop myself up so the bend isn't that bad.

I did have some sudden diarrhea last night, but I had liquid anti-Diarrhea med so that took care of it.

Taking my normal meds this morning was fine. I opened the Nexuim capule and added it to Water, tasted yucky, and my timed released Welbutrin went down fine.

I am really happy so far. I was concerned that since I had a Hianal Hernia repair at the same time that It would be hard on me, but so far. no complaints.

[IHadENuf 0]

Congrats to all August Bandsters and good luck to those of you who are going in soon.

Overall, my experience has been a good one. The reality is, this is abdominal surgery so there is going to be pain and soreness and all that stuff but it really does feel like you did a million crunches and are just sore. Each day gets better. Today I actually drove to the mall and walked around the Gap with my friend who was shopping. After an hour I was exhausted so I went home to rest. I would just tell everyone to walk walk walk. It really does help. The gas I am feeling has been bad but is getting better...... I have been off my pain meds for two days and I have been doing fine without them. Sore still, yes but it is not that bad.

One thing that is really hard is getting the liquid down. I drink 4 oz at a time and I am full. The first two days I could barely get down 35 oz. Today I got down 56oz...whooo hoo. It is important to sip sip sip.

Going on Thursday for my follow up with Dr. Kurian at NYU. Hopefully all will be good- keep you posted!

Banded 8/10/07- Dr. Kurian, NYU

[mbsbike2002 0]

I posted this on the introductions forum, but I'll post again here for folks that are looking specifically in the August Surgey Results thread - so, in short, sorry for the douple-posting...

Thank you to everyone for your well wishes...

I did have my surgery yesterday morning. Arrived at the hospital around 8:15AM, and I was able to go directly into a pre-operative cubicle. The pre-op nurse was great. Although they are only supposed to let 2 people at a time into the cubes, she let all three of my visitors in - my wife and my parents.

Surgery was scheduled for 10:30; however, my anesthesiologist was called away for an emergency in the obstetrics dept, so we were delayed until about 11:00. Dr. Cribbins came in and talked for a few minutes - introduced himself as Joe - not "Dr. Cribbins", which pleased my mom - she is in the medical field as well. Dr. Engles, the anesthesiologist came in, gave me some initial sedative in my IV and wheeled me to the OR. I remember being moved to the operating table, having my arms strapped to some arm rests, and hearing the big lie - "I'm just going to give you a little air to breathe" and the next thing I remember is about 15-20 minutes after arriving in the recovery room. Time from arrival in OR to recovery was about 1 hour, 15 minutes.

In the recovery room, I had trouble keeping my O2 sat levels high enough. I think this was due to sleep apnea (it improved when I tilted my head way back) and the cough that I have had for the past few months. Eventually, they brought up a respiratory therapist who gave me an albuterol treatment to clear and open my lungs a little more. They also asked me to cough a lot to help clear out the anesthesia gas. I ended up spending about 2 hours in the recovery room, which is longer than most will spend. I also had one bout of nausea right as I was waking up - I often get nausea from anesthesia, and the nurse gave me a small amount of phenergan which is a good cure for nausea and consciousness...

I decided that I would prefer not to spend the night in the hospital - Dr. Cribbins is currently about 50% of overnight, 50% for go home - so I went back to a pre-op cubicle for my last few hours in the recovery room. I had the swallow test about 4:00p, and left the hospital about 6:00p.

So far, there has been little pain - more of a dull ache. Dr. Cribbins uses a Q-Pump. which provides a constant, metered dose of local anesthetic into the abdominal cavity. I'll have that in place until Friday morning. Also gave me a prescription for Loritab, which so far, I have only used once - to control pain to get to sleep last night.

Today, I am eating (drinking) chicken broth every hour and walking a lot to get the CO2 out of my abdomen. I don't think I've ever prayed to be able to fart before, but right now that would be downright heavenly...

My best wishes to everyone who will be banded soon.

B

[madfroglady 0]

I'm home. I was in the hospital abuot 30 hours all told. Partially because my surgery was late in the day yesterday, and then I got nauseous and vomitted this morning. (That was even with the anti-nausea mad they put on the path behind you ear.) So they gave me some more anti-nausea drugs in my IV and that did the trick.

Reminder to those who will have to spend the night: bring earplugs. I'm not the lightest sleeper but the strange sounds and noises definitely would have kept me awake without them. Still I had to get up to pee evry few hours thanks to the IV.

Glad that part is over with.

The mad frog.

[hf2havefun 0]

Hi everyone,:phanvan

Well, yesterday I had my gallbladder surgery. I was up at 8 AM and did not sleep well the night before. We left for the hospital just after 9 AM and arrived there around 10:25 AM. I was scheduled for surgery for 12:30 PM, but didn't actually get taken into the OR until 1:30 PM. I was sooooooo hungry and thirsty by that point it wasn't even funny. It's bad enough knowing that after the lap-band I won't be able to have food so why torture me now.

Anyway, surgery went well. Apparently, the gallstone was bigger than my doc thought it was (a little bigger, I guess than an Atomic fireball candy). They removed both the stone and the gallbladder.

At one point in the recovery room (I think the 1st time) I woke up and wanted ice chips or Water since my mouth was now even dryer. They said I couldn't have anything yet because they didn't want me to throw up.

So I solved that problem by going back to sleep. :notagree I woke up again freezing half to death and they came over and put more warm blankets on me and on top of my head. I again fell back to sleep. :notagreeI did this quite a few times apparently. I guess the anesthesia has quite the sleeping effect on me. It's a good thing!

I finally woke up and I think it was almost 5 PM. They gave me some ice chips and sat me up a little more. I tolerated that all right, but was a little dizzy. They were monitoring my vitals and oxygen level and I guess I wasn't breathing deep enough and my oxygen levels kept dipping below 90. I then was able to keep down a piece of wheat toast with a small amount of butter on it and a cup of orange juice. I wasn't nauseous at all. I was just a little light-headed from all of the deep breathing.

It seemed that every time I started dozing off, I stopped breathing as deep and my oxygen levels would drop into the 80's. I guess they like it above 90. They told me it was probably a combination of the anesthesia, my asthma, and my sleep apnea. They gave me a Percocet and said that they wanted to watch me for another 1/2 hour to 45 minutes and as long as I could keep my oxygen level above 90 then I could go home. If they found me getting groggy/dozing and my levels continued to drop I was going to have to stay overnight. No thank you.

I finally got to leave the hospital just after 9 pm. We got stuck in construction traffic for an hour and didn't get home until 11:30 PM. ARGHHH! :cryNot to mention on the way home some of I-95 is not in the best of condition and even with drugs I could still feel the bumps. OUCH!!!!

I didn't sleep all that well last night, and I dozed off and on today. The pain has gotten intense at times and I still have a good amount of gas still trapped. It is starting to subside though. The hardest part is getting up from a sitting or lying down position. I guess it could be worse.

And just think, I get to do this all over again next Tuesday (8/21) when I go to have my lap-band surgery.:clap2:

I'll keep you all posted on how it's going. I think I'm ready to lay down again. The meds are kicking in.