saw the surgeon!!

Mar 06, 2012

 so another trip to edmonton, another ton of cash! lol, oh well, its sssooooo gonna be worth it! well we left on wed feb 29, we went straight to the weight wise clinic to see my case manager sue. she changed around my appts so i would see my dietician suneet right after her that a.m.. well all went well with them, suneet gave a pamphlet called my guide to healthy eating after bariatric surgery, actually sue had mailed me an intro to bariatric surgery pamphlet aswell. getting closer i can feel it! lol suneet said if i get a surg date to call her and she will give me my 2 week liquid preop diet of ensure high protein. both of them wouldnt say whether or not i would get to see dr karmali the next day or not. i was left hangin, and was told its all up to dr modi( who i adore!!) to put me thru to the surgeon. so that afternoon we went to another module, called craving change. it is a 3 part class, which we attended part 1. i met some nice people at this module, steph, jim, and geri. hope to keep in touch with them all. craving change was interesting, i found it helpful and look forward to reading thru the booklet. this is definatly one of my weaknesses, i see a comercial on tv, then i want that yummy ooey gooey looking chocolate bar! at least weve learned not to keep junk food in the house, so i dont do the impulse thing anymore, but sometimes that commercial lingers and when we go shopping, standing in line, those chocolaters call my name, and i have to be really strong and fight the dam urge to buy 2 of them. so back to my trip, before we went to the module we went for lunch at the hotel and saw our favorite waitress tara. we were lucky we got to see her this trip cause she was in on her day off, then left for the bahamas on thurs a.m. she gives us hugs and great vibes whenever we see her. one of the reasons we love staying at that hotel. the people there remember us and treat us great! 
 so thursday i go to my apt with dr modi. she is so fantastic! i hope i get to see more of her, shes so uplifting, positive, and encouraging. my hubby james came in with me and he got a kick out of her to. she shook my hand 3 times saying goodbye, i thnk she likes me.lol she always tells me how awesome i am because of the weight i managed to lose. that and she loved my openess about my psych history. so needless to say, that went well. so onto dr karmali!!! well 1st thing is he brought in 4 of us to the room, aswell as 2 of us brought our hubbys, and he just went over the 3 types of surgery they do there. then i went to my o.t. apt. which went ok, nothing really happened with her, just kinda checked in on my activity level. then i went back to see dr. karmalli one on one. we talked about the rny, and he agreed that would be the best surgery for me, he told me my bypass will be 100 cm long and my stoma will be 25mm wide. he said not to expect much pain, cause if theres alot of pain that means theres something wrong. i will have to do a 2 week liquid diet of ensure, and a colon cleanse the night before surg. its just a pill i take, but apparently it cleans me out. i wioll fast the night before surgery, then the day of surg, then overnight until the next day when they check me for leaks, then i can have fluids. boy am i gonna be parched! hopefully ill be to groggy to care. they also chech for leaks while im on the table but likes to check a 2nd time aswell. if i have a hiatus hernia, he will repair it aswell during surg. i will have a jp drain, which should be removed before i leave the hospital, if not then definatly removed before we come back to winnipeg. surg will be on a tues or wed ( i think) and we can fly home the following monday. at my one of my early post op visits if they find i am losing quickly they will give me meds for gallstone prevention.he will send me home with an anti-nauseant. i should be able to wear plastic earings to keep my piercings in tact, but they wil tell me for sure at my pre-op admission apt. which will be the day before surg so we dont have to fly twice. they use stockings and heparin injections after surg to prevent blood clots. and last but not least he requires me to come in for a scope before surg, he checks for polyps, and h. pylori bacteria and does biopsys.  he likes to do the scope himself so i need to come back to edmonton for it. i asked him how soon surg would be, he said about 2 months, he said i could have the scope in 2 weeks. so i left there pretty excited, went to the front counter to book the scope and the 3 hour class i need to attend before surg called preparing for bariatric surgery. the girl at the front said they dont book the scopes there so i had to down the end of this other hall and book it with nicole, dr karmallis secratary. so we go see nicole, and she tells us she can book me for june 28th!!!! um, excuse me?  what happened to 2 weeks? now its 4 months till scope? then another 6 weeks or so till surg? i dam near hit the floor! im sure my jaw did. well i was upset after that, felt very discouraged. we went back to the front and booked my phone follow ups and my class. while there we saw dr karmalis nurse anna. told her our situation, that we were hoping surg would be early may because thats when james is done exams and before he starts his co-op term. she said she would put a note on my file and see what could be done. well, by then it was too late to get to our module for the afternoon, and to be honest i really didnt feel up to it. so we went back to the hotel, and napped. i tell ya, it was a good nap, i was feeling emotionally drained, so many ups and downs in one day. so we had a nice quiet night in. i wont discuss the crappy supper we had that i had to send back 3 times and eventually didnt even eat. im sure it wouldnt have happened if tara was there. but on the plus side our server ended up being her brother. so we got to meet him, and hes just as huggy as tara! lol, very lovable family.  so friday i had to do some tests for dr modi. i was fasting since that absent supper the night before. so we went to the royal alex hospital to do blood work and a urine test. then we had to haul all our luggage to hys centre for a ecg, then back to the weight wise clinic for my apt with donna the physiotherapist. it all went well, but i sure logged some mileage on my pedometer. after my apt with donna, we went to see dr karmalis secratary nicole to apologize for my curtness the day before. i wasnt rude, just obviously disappointed. so we are saying sorry to her, and she tells me that i wasnt the only one who was upset, apparently dr karmalli misquoted all 4 of us that he saw the day before. she said she was working on getting another day of scoping in april, and the 1st people she will be moving up are us 4 that he misquoted. so i am to await her call on monday or tuesday. 
 update!!!
nicole phoned me today, and yes she moved my scope up, to march 29th!!!!! horray!

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