Introduction and thanks

Hi everyone, I recently came across this site while doing WLS research online. I was originally scheduled to have the Lap Band on 6/30, but am having the sleeve instead. The band just didn't seem to be for me, even after 2+ months of preparation.

I'm 24 and live near Washington, DC. I've been heavy my entire life, but last year, I hurt myself cleaning the apartment (now I have the best excuse not to clean!) and was taken to the hospital in extreme pain. Turned out that I had two severely herniated discs. After about 10 months of different treatments and physical therapy, my doctor told me I had two options: back surgery or WLS. Since back surgery would mean a long and painful recovery, especially due to my extra weight, I decided to go with WLS and hope that once I lose the weight, my pain will be gone. During the mandatory abdominal ultrasound, they found several gallstones. I started exhibiting severe symptoms shortly thereafter and they removed my gallbladder immediately. I'm finally back on track to get my surgery on 6/30. I'm a firm believer that things happen for a reason. If I never would have hurt my back, I wouldn't have found my gallbladder problem so soon and I never would have decided to FINALLY go through with the operation. I always thought I could just lose the weight on my own if I tried hard enough.

I wanted to thank you all. As a newbie looking at this site, there is an overwhelming amount of support from people at the beginning stages of the process all the way to those who have long achieved their weight loss goals. Your words are so incredibly encouraging. I think this journey is one that you don't fully understand unless you've been through it yourself. I look forward to coming online at the end of the day and reading all of your success stories. Best of luck to all of you in this journey. We can do it!

Cat

P.S. if someone could tell me how you all get those trackers in your signatures, I'd appreciate it. I can't figure it out for the life of me, though I know it's under "Resources".

Go to settings under your user name, click on health tracker,input your weight etc,save, then click on health tracker  again in the upper rt hand corner, click on create a new ticker, choose your ticker & widget & click for it to be shown on your signature/message posts & save it. You have to enable your signature for the ticker to be shown, that is under message board from the settings page. Good luck!

Perfect, thank you! I think I didn't have my signature enabled. This shouldn't have been so hard, but hey, it's Friday. Long week lol

Welcome!  I'm also in the DC area - I had surgery at Virginia Hospital Center.  

Another plus side of things is that if you do still need back surgery, your recovery will be infinitely better after you lose weight!  (But hopefully you won't need it at all.)  

Welcome! I had a coworker who had the surgery primarily to ease her back pain- her doctor basically gave her the same option- and now her back doesn't hurt nearly as much. I think you made a great choice! Good luck and I look forward to reading about how it went!

Wow, thank you for sharing! Hearing those stories help me remember I'm making the right decision.

No problem! I hope it turns out the same for you! It is also good to see another 20-something here... I am 25

Hi welcome and much success to you on your upcoming surgery. I have mines July 10th!

Hopefully the weight loss will resolve the back problem but if it doesn't contact me and I can tell you about having a spinal stimulator put in my back that has completely resolved my pain. It's much easier to do than regular spinal surgery.