AlliP
My Story
Oct 18, 2006
8/20/06~~ Well this is my first entry and my surgery is tomorrow. Where to start. Well I am 31 years old, 5'8" tall and am tipping the scales at about 330 these days. That puts my BMI right around 50. I have been researching this surgery for years, but finally made the choice to go ahead with the surgery!
Why now? Wll, I have been fighting my weight for about 20 years and decided this was as good a time as any to go forward. I gave birth to a beautiful baby boy named Vincent on March 28, 2006.
Seven days later he passed away due to a couple of heart complications that could not be fixed. It was the best seven days of my life!! Now I will have my little angel looking down on me as I go forward with my journey.
I started this journey in June 2006 by going to one of Dr. Snyder's seminars. My husband, Jared and myself attended this seminar already knowing I was going to have the RNY surgery. The next day I called and scheduled an appointment with Dr. Snyder. I knew my insurance had a exclusion to the surgery. So from the get go I knew I was going to be self pay. I was actually surprised at all of the pre op tests I had to complete. I was happy to do them , but just surprised.
So I completed all of the tests (so I thought) and contacted Dolly at Dr. Snyder's office to schedule a date. Dolly informed me that she had not received any of the clearence that I would need. I had to see a pulmanary doctor, hemotoligist, get a ton of lab work done, get a CT scan and all that jazz.
Side note: I did not find Dr. Snyder's office to be very nice. I have read about how wonderful they are. I thought they were fine, not any nicer or meaner than any other place. I have issues with Dolly but that is a whole nother Oprah.
Finally on 8/15/06 Dolly called me and told me she had received everything and could schedule a date for me. She asked me what date I preferred, and I told her "tomorrow." She chuckled and asked what my second date would be. I told her I would take her first avalible date. Dolly then told me she had an opening on 8/21/2006. I could not believe it and asked her to repeat herself. I knew my work would be okay because I have been talking to them about this for a couple months. I was in shock and called everyone I knew and let them know. The only delema was that a good friend of mine was getting married on 8/26/2006, and I knew if I took that date I would not be able to attend her wedding. She ended up being just as excited as I was about the whole thing!
I think my husband is pretty excited! He is so supportive and awesome! Thank God we have gone to all of the concerts we had planned already. I guess this means I will not be seeing the Almand Brothers Band at Red Rocks over Labor Day weekend, but that is okay. We are planning a road trip to Omaha to see Widespread Panic in October!! I can't wait!
So I am starving and can not wait to go to bed. It is 6:30pm and I have been on the clear liquid diet for two days. I know once I go to bed I will wake up and it will be the day of surgery. I have finished packing, except to put a few more CD's onto my IPOD. That is key, as music is a mental way of healing for me. I never knew that until Vince died. How weird.
Well, I will write when I am on the losing side. I have been waiting so long to say that!!! Wish me luck and send good vibes my way!
8/21/2006 ~ Surgery date (or so I thought)
I arrived at the hospital at about noon. I weighed in at 323 (I lost 7 pounds in the past two days). I got my iv started, had a shot to help prevent blood clots, was changed into a gown and booties. Then I waited for two hours and Dr. Snyder came in and told me he has to postpone my surgery till tomorrow. He stated he just finished a 5 hour surgery and could not physically perform another today. So here I am at home with a bruise on my arm (from iv) starving, and waiting.......
I was actually proud of him for having the sense to cancel the surgery knowing he could not do it today! I have no problem coming back tomorrow and starting again. So I will hopefully have surgery tomorrow!!
8/25/2006~~ Well I am now home from the hospital and adjusting to home. The surgery went well, so I was told. I woke up in recovery with five people talking to me and me not knowing where I was. Kind of crazy. Had a room to myself in the hospital which is nice. The first night in the hospital the staff was not very nice, but I talked to management about that and had no problems after that night. I just find there is not enough time in the day to get my liquids in. I do not have a problem drinking them, just not enought time to drink all of them. I was in A LOT of pain mainly from the gas. I am still dealing with that. But the pain meds worked well. The hardest thing, again, is the gas! I don't know why but I have had a hard time getting it out. Now that was never an issue before surgery :). So today the pain has been okay. My Dad is in town and has been a huge help to me! My house is two stories and Dad and Jared have been awesome Accommodating my needs. Tired now, will post more later.
8/31/2006 ~~ Yesterday was my one week nut. appointment and doctor appointment. I have lost 14 pounds!!! I am so excited to have lost so much! Now getting the drain out, that is a different story. I didn't hurt, but felt really weird! Since I had it pulled I have had severe pain! The pain is on my left upper side. I hope this goes away soon. I was doing so well, walking over a milie a day, getting in most of the protien and then WAM he takes the drain out and I am at page one again. I have been using a heating pad to help and went on a little walk this morning. Oh well. Other than that I am doing well. I have not had any side effects yet. I am able to drink all of my water and get over 50 grams of protien a day. Yesterday I was able to eat pudding, yum. I had a rough day on the 28th as my son would have been five months old. My husband is the best and got me through that. Hopefully I will keep up with this journel.
9/9/2006~~ Well I went to the gym for the first time today. I weighed myself and was down to 307, which means I have lost 24 pounds since 8/22. I walked for 25 min. and feel great! I am feeling better every day and have not one regret. I am able to go out to dinner with my husband and watch him eat whatever. I love the smell of food, but know I can not have it! I am never hungry anyway. My intake consists of Protica in the morning, and one bottle of Isopure (fruit drink) a day. The rest is water, pudding or popsicles. I get about 65 grams of protein a day and try to get about 50-65 oz. of water in a day. I have not had any complications as of yet!! I will post after my three week appointment with Dr. Snyder on Friday!
9/23/2006~~ First things first. I am down to 299. 32 pound loss in one month. Well so much for not having any complications. On 9/11 I ended up in the emergency room with a stricture. The doctor took care of that, not much pain involved. Then on 9/13 I started eating pureed food. On 9/16 the cronic diarea started and has not stopped since. I stopped eating and went back to liqud's on 9/17. That did not seem to help. I went to the doctor on 9/20 and had some labs done, and was put on antibiotics. I got a call on Thursday 9/21 saying that all my labs were perfect. So now I am at a point where it is still happening and I have no idea what is causing it. Doctor said if it does not go away over this weekend I will have to come back in and see the GI doctor. All I can think of is money, since I am a self pay client. I don't think my insurance will pay for any of my GI visits. I have a follow up from the stricture on this Friday. Maybe he can throw that in for free, a little pro bono!! The diarea has definatley slowed down a bunch and the cramping is not there. So yesterday I ate some yogert and it did not get any worse. I guess it is hard for me to tell if my body is not agreeing with something or if it is just diarea. Maybe it is just a virius or something. I don't know, but if I don't feel normal soon I'm gonna cry! Well, I am going to try to go on a walk today. I have been so weak I have not been going to the gym at all. Lets see how the day goes....
10/4/2006~~~ Well, as of today I am down 42 pounds and feel great. I woke up on 10/2 and all of my side pain was gone!! I can not wait to begin working out again. Of course I can not have all good news. Yesterday, on my birhtday, I had another stricture sneek up on me. So I went in today and had that taken care of. It is so painless!! After that I went to my 6 week nutrition class and got the okay to switch from pureed food to all food. This shall be interesting! Thats all for now, I am tired from the procedure today.
10/18/2006~~ I feel like it has been forever since I have posted. I am still only down 42 pounds, but now that I have begun working out regularly I am hoping that will change soon. I think I was eating to much. I thought I could eat a few ounces every few hours, but at support group I was told no. I am only to stick with one once of food every three hours. I usually have no problem getting in my water, its the stupid protein that kills me. I eat one ounce every three hours. That comes nowhere close to 65 grams of protein a day. so I take my shot of protica daily which adds 25 grams of protein. Then I am supposed to be getting in some carbs, but who knows where that is supposed to fit in!! Anyway, I feel great and have absolutley no regrets. I have gone from a 26/28 to a 22/24 in eight weeks! I can definatley tell the difference!!
11/11/2006~~ Well no update, I'm busy but last I checked I am down about 58lbs or so. Will update soon.
12/15/2006~~ Well time to update! As of this month I am down about 70 lbs. It is amazing!!!! I have gone from a tight 28 to a size 20. I am rarely hungry, but try my best to feed my body every three hours or so. I have a glass of red wine several times of week, and have had no adverse affects yet. I have never dumped, but do feel full after about 4oz. of food. It is crazy. I forget that I have surgery sometimes. I also try to go to support groups once a week or every other week. It is so helpful to go to those groups and I highly recommend it to anyone!! Starting to have a little saggy skin, but I really don't care about that right now. I have had a hard time forcing myself to go to the gym. It is so weird because I used to love to go to the gym daily and now I have to fight myself to get there! I will try to post some new pictures soon. Probally after the holidays. I can not wait to fly and not have to ask for a seat belt expander!!! Happy holidays to all!
1/15/2007~~ The New Year is here, and I could not be any happier!! As of today I have lost 80 pounds. That is amazing to me. I am now in a size 18, sometimes 20. Things have been going well. I just started going back to the gym to day. I noticed how much easier it is to work out with out the extra 80 pounds! Food wise I think I have been doing well. I have great days and I have okay days. The only thing I can not tollerate is eggs still. I have to watch what I put in my mouth. I feel like I could easliy fall back into old habbits. I just feel awesome though!!! Nothing else right now. I really need to measure myself again. I will try to do that this week.
Photos
Why now? Wll, I have been fighting my weight for about 20 years and decided this was as good a time as any to go forward. I gave birth to a beautiful baby boy named Vincent on March 28, 2006.
Seven days later he passed away due to a couple of heart complications that could not be fixed. It was the best seven days of my life!! Now I will have my little angel looking down on me as I go forward with my journey.
I started this journey in June 2006 by going to one of Dr. Snyder's seminars. My husband, Jared and myself attended this seminar already knowing I was going to have the RNY surgery. The next day I called and scheduled an appointment with Dr. Snyder. I knew my insurance had a exclusion to the surgery. So from the get go I knew I was going to be self pay. I was actually surprised at all of the pre op tests I had to complete. I was happy to do them , but just surprised.
So I completed all of the tests (so I thought) and contacted Dolly at Dr. Snyder's office to schedule a date. Dolly informed me that she had not received any of the clearence that I would need. I had to see a pulmanary doctor, hemotoligist, get a ton of lab work done, get a CT scan and all that jazz.
Side note: I did not find Dr. Snyder's office to be very nice. I have read about how wonderful they are. I thought they were fine, not any nicer or meaner than any other place. I have issues with Dolly but that is a whole nother Oprah.
Finally on 8/15/06 Dolly called me and told me she had received everything and could schedule a date for me. She asked me what date I preferred, and I told her "tomorrow." She chuckled and asked what my second date would be. I told her I would take her first avalible date. Dolly then told me she had an opening on 8/21/2006. I could not believe it and asked her to repeat herself. I knew my work would be okay because I have been talking to them about this for a couple months. I was in shock and called everyone I knew and let them know. The only delema was that a good friend of mine was getting married on 8/26/2006, and I knew if I took that date I would not be able to attend her wedding. She ended up being just as excited as I was about the whole thing!
I think my husband is pretty excited! He is so supportive and awesome! Thank God we have gone to all of the concerts we had planned already. I guess this means I will not be seeing the Almand Brothers Band at Red Rocks over Labor Day weekend, but that is okay. We are planning a road trip to Omaha to see Widespread Panic in October!! I can't wait!
So I am starving and can not wait to go to bed. It is 6:30pm and I have been on the clear liquid diet for two days. I know once I go to bed I will wake up and it will be the day of surgery. I have finished packing, except to put a few more CD's onto my IPOD. That is key, as music is a mental way of healing for me. I never knew that until Vince died. How weird.
Well, I will write when I am on the losing side. I have been waiting so long to say that!!! Wish me luck and send good vibes my way!
8/21/2006 ~ Surgery date (or so I thought)
I arrived at the hospital at about noon. I weighed in at 323 (I lost 7 pounds in the past two days). I got my iv started, had a shot to help prevent blood clots, was changed into a gown and booties. Then I waited for two hours and Dr. Snyder came in and told me he has to postpone my surgery till tomorrow. He stated he just finished a 5 hour surgery and could not physically perform another today. So here I am at home with a bruise on my arm (from iv) starving, and waiting.......
I was actually proud of him for having the sense to cancel the surgery knowing he could not do it today! I have no problem coming back tomorrow and starting again. So I will hopefully have surgery tomorrow!!
8/25/2006~~ Well I am now home from the hospital and adjusting to home. The surgery went well, so I was told. I woke up in recovery with five people talking to me and me not knowing where I was. Kind of crazy. Had a room to myself in the hospital which is nice. The first night in the hospital the staff was not very nice, but I talked to management about that and had no problems after that night. I just find there is not enough time in the day to get my liquids in. I do not have a problem drinking them, just not enought time to drink all of them. I was in A LOT of pain mainly from the gas. I am still dealing with that. But the pain meds worked well. The hardest thing, again, is the gas! I don't know why but I have had a hard time getting it out. Now that was never an issue before surgery :). So today the pain has been okay. My Dad is in town and has been a huge help to me! My house is two stories and Dad and Jared have been awesome Accommodating my needs. Tired now, will post more later.
8/31/2006 ~~ Yesterday was my one week nut. appointment and doctor appointment. I have lost 14 pounds!!! I am so excited to have lost so much! Now getting the drain out, that is a different story. I didn't hurt, but felt really weird! Since I had it pulled I have had severe pain! The pain is on my left upper side. I hope this goes away soon. I was doing so well, walking over a milie a day, getting in most of the protien and then WAM he takes the drain out and I am at page one again. I have been using a heating pad to help and went on a little walk this morning. Oh well. Other than that I am doing well. I have not had any side effects yet. I am able to drink all of my water and get over 50 grams of protien a day. Yesterday I was able to eat pudding, yum. I had a rough day on the 28th as my son would have been five months old. My husband is the best and got me through that. Hopefully I will keep up with this journel.
9/9/2006~~ Well I went to the gym for the first time today. I weighed myself and was down to 307, which means I have lost 24 pounds since 8/22. I walked for 25 min. and feel great! I am feeling better every day and have not one regret. I am able to go out to dinner with my husband and watch him eat whatever. I love the smell of food, but know I can not have it! I am never hungry anyway. My intake consists of Protica in the morning, and one bottle of Isopure (fruit drink) a day. The rest is water, pudding or popsicles. I get about 65 grams of protein a day and try to get about 50-65 oz. of water in a day. I have not had any complications as of yet!! I will post after my three week appointment with Dr. Snyder on Friday!
9/23/2006~~ First things first. I am down to 299. 32 pound loss in one month. Well so much for not having any complications. On 9/11 I ended up in the emergency room with a stricture. The doctor took care of that, not much pain involved. Then on 9/13 I started eating pureed food. On 9/16 the cronic diarea started and has not stopped since. I stopped eating and went back to liqud's on 9/17. That did not seem to help. I went to the doctor on 9/20 and had some labs done, and was put on antibiotics. I got a call on Thursday 9/21 saying that all my labs were perfect. So now I am at a point where it is still happening and I have no idea what is causing it. Doctor said if it does not go away over this weekend I will have to come back in and see the GI doctor. All I can think of is money, since I am a self pay client. I don't think my insurance will pay for any of my GI visits. I have a follow up from the stricture on this Friday. Maybe he can throw that in for free, a little pro bono!! The diarea has definatley slowed down a bunch and the cramping is not there. So yesterday I ate some yogert and it did not get any worse. I guess it is hard for me to tell if my body is not agreeing with something or if it is just diarea. Maybe it is just a virius or something. I don't know, but if I don't feel normal soon I'm gonna cry! Well, I am going to try to go on a walk today. I have been so weak I have not been going to the gym at all. Lets see how the day goes....
10/4/2006~~~ Well, as of today I am down 42 pounds and feel great. I woke up on 10/2 and all of my side pain was gone!! I can not wait to begin working out again. Of course I can not have all good news. Yesterday, on my birhtday, I had another stricture sneek up on me. So I went in today and had that taken care of. It is so painless!! After that I went to my 6 week nutrition class and got the okay to switch from pureed food to all food. This shall be interesting! Thats all for now, I am tired from the procedure today.
10/18/2006~~ I feel like it has been forever since I have posted. I am still only down 42 pounds, but now that I have begun working out regularly I am hoping that will change soon. I think I was eating to much. I thought I could eat a few ounces every few hours, but at support group I was told no. I am only to stick with one once of food every three hours. I usually have no problem getting in my water, its the stupid protein that kills me. I eat one ounce every three hours. That comes nowhere close to 65 grams of protein a day. so I take my shot of protica daily which adds 25 grams of protein. Then I am supposed to be getting in some carbs, but who knows where that is supposed to fit in!! Anyway, I feel great and have absolutley no regrets. I have gone from a 26/28 to a 22/24 in eight weeks! I can definatley tell the difference!!
11/11/2006~~ Well no update, I'm busy but last I checked I am down about 58lbs or so. Will update soon.
12/15/2006~~ Well time to update! As of this month I am down about 70 lbs. It is amazing!!!! I have gone from a tight 28 to a size 20. I am rarely hungry, but try my best to feed my body every three hours or so. I have a glass of red wine several times of week, and have had no adverse affects yet. I have never dumped, but do feel full after about 4oz. of food. It is crazy. I forget that I have surgery sometimes. I also try to go to support groups once a week or every other week. It is so helpful to go to those groups and I highly recommend it to anyone!! Starting to have a little saggy skin, but I really don't care about that right now. I have had a hard time forcing myself to go to the gym. It is so weird because I used to love to go to the gym daily and now I have to fight myself to get there! I will try to post some new pictures soon. Probally after the holidays. I can not wait to fly and not have to ask for a seat belt expander!!! Happy holidays to all!
1/15/2007~~ The New Year is here, and I could not be any happier!! As of today I have lost 80 pounds. That is amazing to me. I am now in a size 18, sometimes 20. Things have been going well. I just started going back to the gym to day. I noticed how much easier it is to work out with out the extra 80 pounds! Food wise I think I have been doing well. I have great days and I have okay days. The only thing I can not tollerate is eggs still. I have to watch what I put in my mouth. I feel like I could easliy fall back into old habbits. I just feel awesome though!!! Nothing else right now. I really need to measure myself again. I will try to do that this week.
Photos
 330 Vacation 4/2006~ Lake Powell |
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