Update:: 11/10/11
My surgery is in nov not sure of the date yet but very excited!!!

I have been exercizing more to loose as much tummy and thigh fat tissue as possible before then.  Pole dancing exercise  class is fun i suggest everyone try it at least once.  I also am doing chair dancing exercise classes btw very tough on legs and thighs...and belly dancing too.  wonderful.   i also go dancing at night clubs with friends thurs fri and sat 10-2 4 hours of non stop cardio.    i'm down 178lbs now and feel great!!
 

 Lots of insurance companies do cover plastics after weight loss surgery. They must be medically necessary so have your pcp write a referral to a surgeon, Have your pcp document any issues related to the loose skin...rashes (keep receipts for creams too) or neck and back pain, etc. photos of the rashes are very helpful in getting approvals. Do not refer to it as plastics or cosmetic surgery, it is body contouring after massive weight loss. 

I went to a plastic surgeon Thursday and now waiting for pre-authorization from my insurance co for plastics. Passing along the cpt codes... you can call your ins co and ask if the codes are covered...if you ask about the procedures the operators always say no cause they don't know any better. Mastoplexy (breast lift) "cpt code 19316", Brachioplasty (arm lift) "cpt code 15836", Thigh lift "cpt code 15823", Panniculectomy (tummy tuck w/no muscle reconstruction) "cpt code 15830".  Again don't call there and ask "is plastic surgery covered" the operators are not the ones who know...they simply are call center operators that can relay info from your file or their computer and can change pcp, address, etc info in your account. They are not experts they use a intranet to search for the answers to your questions. A middle man so to speak. They do not make the decisions they can pretty much only change your pcp or give you info based on what is in your file. Pretty much all you do is call get a rep and say "i am interested in finding out if some procedures are covered, i have the CPT codes" They will be more than happy to give you the answers because you have done half the work by having the CPT codes ready for them. Let me know how it goes. Be sure to ask the % covered some are 80/20 mine is 100% with a $250 co pay after my high deductible is met which it is my daughters are having their tonsils removed this year.

I am pursuing brachioplasty and mastoplexy and my surgeon is going to zig zag the scar in my armpit so he can pull the bra back skin into it and make it one long scar from my inner elbow into my armpit and down under my breast and up to center so it's back breast and arm all at one time. One procedure one long scar on either side which i am fine with. better than 3 different procedures.


Once i have that surgery I will get approval for the others.  one at a time...

 Please like my page

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Loquacious-Laura/119810894764414

  I am no longer pre diabetic, no longer have sleep apnea, my depression is in remission so Dr's call it.   I think overall the quality of life has improved for me and my family,  i now want to do things for my kids rather than HAVE to do things for the,.  When they use to ask something of me like needing a drink I would think "i cant wait till you can get yourself a drink"  I feel terrible that I was rushing them to grow up because doing everything was more effort than someone not obese.  So I missed out on enjoying them at the ages they were prior to my weight loss.  
My obesity is a result of many things but the major reason why I believe I got that far is becuase I developed breast very young I was a DDD cup size in the 5th grade.  With that said in PE I would get teased, as early as the 2nd grade I was being teased in PE by the other students.  I had negative feelings associated with exercise and in school refused to participate because I was being publicly humiliated.  I was not exercising and was gaining weight, I was then being teased for being obese, I went from the biggest kid in class to the biggest kid in my grade, eventually the biggest kid in school.  So I was not exercising to avoid being bullied and teased and gained weight which caused me to be bullied and teased.  I developed depression and anxiety disorders and by high school felt like going to school was torture,  I hated it, I tried in private to loose the weight, in highschool I needed a PE grade to get the credit so instead of PE I took weight training which I loved cause there was no cardio jumping around but outside of school had no intertest.  School was unbarable but I had to go and couldn't wait to graduate for it all to be OVER.  My grades were slipping, and I was lucky to graduate with my class.  It was finally over!  Or so I thought.  I searched for employment and finally settled in an office position as a customer service rep. where a relative worked and honestly she got me the job.  Every new employee that was hired was thin and pretty and did 1/2 the work I did but got treated twice as well.   I felt like I did not fit in and sought out approval in them which backfired,  I was teased at work, every day.  I had a daughter at this point so I felt as if I had no choice but to stay and deal with it and go in to work knowing that I was going to be teased and tortured by my co workers.  I can count a dozen times that I ended up in my bosses office crying because I just wanted it to stop.  From cruel jokes to threats it didn't stop.  I started reading self help books and improved my confidence.  I realized that I am better than that and I wasn't going to let them hurt me anymore.  However they tried even harder to upset me, testing the new me trying to make me break character as if it was a game.   A few months later I found another job and quit.   So my thinking that the bullying would stop because I was grown was false.  
So here I am with new found confidence, feeling great!  I was now proud of my size and considered myself a BBW or Big Beautiful Woman.  It was great!  Then after my 2nd daughter my health started to take a dive.  My back had not healed from a previous work accident in 1999 and suffered with chronic back pain.  I was always in pain, it would get worse,  and when I would take meds that worse pain would go back to the normal pain but i was always in pain.  I did not like taking meds and the cloudy feeling it gave me. I don't even like to drink alcohol.  So I just suffered.  Adding to the depression and the chronic back pain,  I had sleep apnea, and high blood pressure but when I was told I was pre diabetic I knew I had to do something.  In 5 years what are my current medical conditions going to be like and what additional medical conditions would I have.   
I pursued weight loss surgery because the many attempts since middle school to get the weight off failed.  From liquid diets, to weight loss medications, to intense exercise, as soon as I stopped or eased off on the intensity of treatment the weight would come right back.     I found the Bariatric Institute at Franklin Square Hospital Center.  They got me educated on all of the weight loss surgery options and the lifestyle change in all aspects not just physically but mentally as well.   I felt confident having my surgery and knowing it would work.   When I heard about weight loss surgery I assumed that you get the surgery and when your recovered and cleared to go back to work you go back to normal but loose the weight.  I had no clue how much work is involved.     Ok so if your obese and reading this, what I just wrote is giving you a negative thought right?  Yeah my throat still tenses up when I talk about how hard things are or how much work is involved.  It is because every day life for an obese person takes effort.  A lot more effort than someone a normal or even over weight.   So when you say work, everyday living is WORK so to an obese person WORK means hard labor.   Trust me it does.     In classes at Franklin Square learned about fitness too.  "I was thinking in my head, how the hell can i do a hour of cardio a day.  I'm beat just walking up the stairs."  But they encouraged walking to the mailbox and parking further from the grocery store.    Adding a little bit more and more each day.  They talked about fitness after weight loss surgery and talked about cardio 1 hour a day.  I was thinking in my head "yeah right"  I was thinking that as a 355lb woman with health issues related to obesity. The thought of anything being effortless never crossed my mind.  I knew I would loose weight after having weight loss surgery but the thinking that I had was not that of a person with normal weight or even overweight.     So NOW with that said after loosing 163lbs in the 1st year following weight loss surgery (VSG).   My everyday life is now effortless and in fact doing WORK feels effortless cause it is actually not as hard as regular life WAS when I was obese.  
An interesting comparison:   My day to day life and the activities I currently do day to day feels like less effort to me now than the same amount of activity done by someone a normal weight who has always been a normal weight.  I have people who have always been a normal weight asking me how I am able to do so much in one day.  

I know that this is probably temporary while I settle into my new life.  However I am taking advantage of this while I can setting up opportunities for myself for my future.  Interesting concept.  Future...I dont feel like "this is my life it is what it is" like I have all my life.  I now think "this is my life it is what I'm going to make it", I think about every thing I do and how it will directly effect my future, maybe not for 10 to 15 years but I am considering running in the county election to be a councilwoman.  Again maybe not for 10-15 years but I have to think about my persona and what it has been in the past and what I want it to be in the future.  I am also thinking how my pursuit of becoming a councilwoman could benefit weight loss surgery and how I could use that to really make positive changes in not only support of community but also have a platform to stand on when fighting childhood obesity.  

to be cont...    yes there is more ha ha ha 

I can tell you about my story, I had sleep apnea, high blood pressure, depression, and was prediabetic and was afraid of what my quality of life would be in 5 years and my children's quality of life would be too.   I have 2 daughters I was a good mom before loosing the weight but felt like i couldn't wait for them to be able to do it their selfs,  get a drink feed them selfs ....everything. I took very good care of my kids It wasn't that i dont love my kids either, it was just very hard and took more effort than I had being morbidly obese at 355lbs more effort than someone that's just overweight.   So really I was missing out on their lives.  
I want to talk about the medical side of it too from a patient's perspective.  I had a newer bariatric surgery that rarely makes the news it's only been done for 7 years so still considered investigational,  and will until there is 10 years of research.  When you think of bariatric surgery or weight loss surgery and you think of the RNY or gastric bypass like what my sister had in PA by Dr Monk in 2007 or the lapband but I had the VSG or Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy performed by Dr Christopher You at Franklin Square Hospital Center here in Baltimore. He staples your stomach in the shape of a tube or sleeve and disposes the rest of the stomach.  Dr You also required patients attend an educational program for 3 or 6 months prior to surgery.  He's passionate about making sure his patients are educated about all of the suegery options so his patients can make a educated decision on what they really want and also information on your life changes physicaly and psych.  You don't just get surgery and that's it,  the Bariatric Institute at Franklin Square follows you forever following weight loss surgery.  If you need more or less support they are always there and passionate and will help you directly or will give you the resources, so you don't gain the weight back over time like we tend to hear about. 
Patient perspective: People also assume that having surgeries like this you will have a large scar but my sister and I had our surgeries done laparoscopicly meaning we have only a few tiny scars some smaller than a pencil eraser.  Some are afraid of loose or hanging skin and can not afford plastic surgery this is actually mine and my sister's case so we have become very creative in clothes shopping. You also have to when you are changing sizes so often.   I wear body shapers every day they are like very high waisted hose and are available in panty style or shorts style and to hide my arms a shrug if i want to wear something sleeveless.  I am very fashionable and people who don't know me or that I was obese compliment me on my clothes all the time, they cant tell i was obese, they can't tell i have loose or sagging skin following massive weight loss.  Unless you tell them they would never notice it.  Would we like to have the reconstructive surgeries? sure but were financially not in any position to do so and even if we were we both would like to have more children so not for several years anyway.  Fact is we are happy, medical conditions that we had related to obesity are gone or what we call in remission.  Our famalies are happy.  Things that we always dreamed of doing, we are doing now.  I got to ride a horse at hawks hallow farm for my surgiversary (surgery anniversary) see pics.  I feel like I have been in a coma my entire life having nightmares of what my life is like being limited in everything from sports to friends, teased and picked on as a child, not fitting in not just socially but in chairs too,  but also having dreams (skinny fantasies) of what I want my life to be like, and just finally woke up to live it.   Mine was always to be not just popular but as a kid I dreamed of being a perfect wife and mother, thinking of TV moms like Donna Reed.  Now I really am doing that, learning how to cook for my family and playing with my kids opposed to watching them play.  Kids remember the things they do and the people they do things with,  they wont remember mom sitting on the bench at the park watching them play because she cant cause she's 355lbs  but they will remember me going down the slide with them and playing mother may i and red light green light.  It's amazing!  I thank Dr You and give him credit for this and he reminds me that it was me who did it.  I made the decision, I made it happen for myself.  Dr's wont say we have to operate on you NOW or your going to die,  they say you need to loose weight here are your options. It's not like having your gall bladder out tho it has the same mortality rate .3%  it's not like you have an attack and they HAVE to do surgery on you. You have to agree to do it, have to have a support system, be determined to do it, get educated on it, follow a plan, and have the courage to do it for yourself, and all this forever.   It is not easy a lot of people that can not relate assume that you get it done and after recovery when your all healed and go back to work that you go back to normal and that the fat just goes away on it's own. Not the case at all but some of us make it look easy because it's much much less effort doing everything you need to do when your not obese so I can personally say in my own opinion the hardest part was getting the surgery but the hard work doesn't start until after you get it and tho the work is harder more intense it is easier because your not 355lbs exercising a hour a day your loosing and the more you lose the less it feels like your putting effort into it.  So in classes again 355lbs they are talking about exercising 30 mins to 1 hour every day and I actually had anxiety associated with that.  How do you expect me to do that?  I have back pain, my knees hurt, i dont have time.  Well I was still in the mine set that i would be 355lbs doing that.  I had never been a normal weight not even overweight i had been obese since kindergarten. How could I do that.  Well I am happy to say that my back pain has improved, my knees don't hurt anymore, and I am faster moving now so I get everything done in half the time I did before loosing the weight and actually have a lot more time to exercise and spend my kids. So all of the stuff that I thought was unrealistic was only unrealistic because I had the morbidly obese thinking. It is realistic!  And my kids,  I'm also no longer rushing them to grow up, I'm growing up with them and by that I mean I'm doing things with them that I wanted to do as a kid but physically couldn't or was embarrassed or afraid to do because I was obese like riding a horse last week.  
Also wanted to say as a kid I was always picked last to play a game,  now I am picking the game.

I now am aspiring to be a motivational speaker to help others struggling with the same thing.  I want to be an inspiration, It feels so good when you help someone else. Please leave me feedback and comments.  It motivates me to keep writing knowing that my blogs are not all done in vain.