Joe F.

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kylakae 22 years, 6 months ago

<font color="CC0066"><b> <center><IMG SRC="http://www.dwarfworks.com/kyla/pictures/bdplaneanim.gif"><br></center> Happy re-Birthday, Joe! Its been one year since your WLS. Congratulations on your awesome weight loss! I hope this anniversary finds you feeling happy and healthy. Please stop by and update your profile so we'll know how you are doing one year post-op! </font></b>

Jackie E. 22 years, 10 months ago

Dear Joe, Thank you and bless you for your response to my e-mail. Your honesty is so appreciated. May our Lord bless you and your wife with all that is going in your life. Best wishes, Jackie

Joe F. 22 years, 10 months ago

Sharon: Thank you so much for your kind words. Yes, Joy and I are praying daily for Donna's rapid and complication free recovery. If anyone deserves it she does. She is one of the good people. Not many of us left. An update on my condition. I have developed a rather severe protein deficiency. The symptoms are severe edema in my ankles and feet. I have developed oozing blistered sores on both ankles. I am having compression bandages placed on my feet and ankles twice a week. I need to have my 10" hernia repaired but can't have it done until the sores are healed and the protein levels are normal. I am eating 130 grams of protein a day and taking Creon at every meal which temporarily defeats the DS. I'm gaining weight but don't know what the protein levels are yet. Other than that I'm doing great. Joy is scheduled for a revision. The surgeon made her common channel 100 cm and it should have been 60 to 70 cm. Doesn't sound like a huge difference but it is 30 to 40% shorter. So that will be coming up soon as hopefully will my hernia repair. Regards. Joe Frost, old gentleman, not old fart San Antonio, Tx., 60 years old Surgery 11/29/00 by Dr. Kenneth Welker Lateral Gastrectomy with Duodenal Switch 340 Starting Weight, currently 225 http://www.duodenalswitch.com/Patients/Joe/joe.html http://groups.yahoo.com/group/WLS-12StepRecovery

Sharon B. 22 years, 10 months ago

Dear Joe, I am a DSer too. Your survival story chokes me up and I am so happy to know that the prayers of the righteous do really avail much! I found your site through a dear friend Donna Powers who had her surgery on last thursday. i was reading her profile comments page and came across your name and dropped in to say hi. Read your story in amazement. You have been through so much. I do hope that all is well for you now, and that you are enjoying the fruits of your wls labors. God continue to bless and keep you and your family.

Debbie B. 23 years, 3 months ago

So HAPPY to hear you are home and on you way to a full recovery. This might take a bit of time but you know you can do it. You have been in my thoughts and prayers every day. I am now addicted to the message board. Even though we have never met, I feel like we are all part of a special family and I have to check up on every one and say a special prayer for those in need. Good luck to Joy on Monday. WELCOME BACK!!!! Debbie

jane W. 23 years, 3 months ago

Joe, you are an inspiration to us all.......a true WLS angel!! I am so very happy that you are in our lives, even if it is through a computer! Thanks for sharing your ordeal with us... Hugs to you and to Joy! She truly is blessed to have you as a loving mate, as you are to have her. What a wonderful success story you two are :) God Bless you both!

RDSunshyne 23 years, 3 months ago

Joe...I am do glad to hear that you are finally home. I want to thank you for sharing your story with us. You are an incredible man. I know, as you do that the power of prayer is real. I thank God, that he pulled you through this, and I pray that your recovery will be complete. I share you wife's surgery date of Feb.5, 2001, and I will send up a special prayer for her. I know that you must be scared for her, but I am sure that everything will turn out just fine. Thanks again Joe for sharing.. Rhonda :o)

Joe F. 23 years, 3 months ago

Hi folks. I'm out of the hospital(s). I spend 6-1/2 weeks in OHSSU having my surgery and six additional surgeries to correct problems. I almost died twice. My family was called in to say their goodbyes. But through your prayers and a brilliant surgeon I survived. And throgh your prayers and the love of my wife I retained the will to live. Thank you. Following is my story of my complications. If it makes anyone uncomfortable to read about problems I won't be offended if you don't. My Story Joe Frost I’m writing this on 1/30/01. I have a hard time writing “01” because I missed December. I don’t remember Christmas or New Year’s. For me it never happened. My daughter had to tell me what I bought my grandchildren for Christmas so I would understand when they thanked me. This has turned out to be a lot longer and a lot more detail than many will want to read, so fair warning. I went in the hospital on Wednesday 11/29/00 for the gastric bypass with duodenal switch to be done laproscopically. Everything went fine. I had an epidural which they removed Friday. That night I had some pain but it wasn’t that serious and I didn’t think much about it. The next afternoon I was released. We went by Fred Meyers to pick up some groceries and assorted items. I waited in the car while Joy went in to shop. I was in some pain which increased as I waited. When we started back to the hotel I was in a lot of pain. I got up to the room I parked myself on the sofa and the pain continued to get worse. I found out what they meant by a 10 level of pain. About 1-1/2 hours later we called the EMS and I was taken to the OHSU emergency room. Dr. Welker had left town and had to be called and he told them what x-rays to take. Dr. Welker returned to town and I was re-admitted. He told me that I had a leak in my stomach wall, away from any suture line. Just in the middle of my stomach. He didn’t believe that it was a place that he had even touched during the operation though he wasn’t sure. He was going to have to open me up and patch the hole and clean out my gut. So much for the neat laproscopic puncture holes. From there on I don’t remember much and can tell you very little other than what I have been told. I vaguely recall several different ICUs and recovery rooms. I was welcomed by a number of anesthesiologists. I was told over and over that there was going to have to be “one more surgery.” Later I recall being told that I was going to be transferred to 6CVA, the wing where post-op DS patients generally stay. From there on I remember lots of what went on but not everything. I had been in a drug induced coma for something like 3 ½ weeks. And while the effects of the drugs wore off it didn’t happen immediately. I do remember a number of hallucinations that seem as real as anything I’ve ever experienced. I understand that while repairing my first patch they found massive peritonitis. After that surgery the stomach contents ate back through into the stomach from the gut in two places. There was another surgery. At some point I went into septic shock and suffered abdominal compartment syndrome and fluid in the gut which was shutting down my organs, one by one. They drained it before it damaged my heart. At some point my spleen was removed. On Christmas day I was developing a fever and sinking. Dr. Welker was out of town with his family for the holidays. Knowing that he read his e-mail when out of town, Joy wrote him an e-mail telling him that my condition was deteriorating and he cut short his Christmas vacation to come back and try to drain infection around my left lung. It wouldn’t drain. He did a thorocotomy where they spread the ribs and sucked the infection out from the various sites around the lung which was partially collapsed. The other surgery sites are somewhat healed but that one still HURTS. At some point my family, two daughters and son, were called to come to Portland to say their good-byes. I was moments from dying at least twice during the ordeal. Joy told me about the candlelight vigils praying for my recovery by the DS group. I can’t think about all of that without choking up. I’m tearing up right now. I believe that prayer and the love of my wife allowed me to live. Without either I don’t think I would have made it. While I was in the ICU I told them that I intended to use the toilet located about ten feet from my bed. They told me that I really needed to use the bed pan. I insisted. They surrounded me by three men and I stepped out of bed and was heading for the floor when they grabbed me, put me back in bed and brought the bed pan. I couldn’t stand, much less walk. That was perhaps my worst day. I was told that a month flat on my back would do that but I had no idea. I worked with the Physical and Occupational Therapists at OHSU daily to try to learn to walk again. It was decided to transfer me to Providence Portland Hospital Rehab unit for work there. I spent ten days there working very hard. Thanks to some wonderful therapists I can now walk with the aid of a cane. I can go up and down stairs. I can get on and off a toilet with something to grab on to. Stamina is a serious problem. That will simply take time. Knowing what I do now, would I do it over again? Of course not. I’m not stupid! But knowing the odds that what happened to me or even worse was a real possibility, would I do it over again? Yes. I am aware how rare my complications are. But they do happen and they did to me. I’m losing weight rapidly. 65 pounds to date. But I have to say that I know the weight will come off. That is now of very little concern to me. My concern is getting back in the shape I was in before I went in. With some trepidation I will say that my wife is going to have the same surgery on February the 16th. I have to admit that I’m nervous about that. But I feel that the odds are very much with her as they were with me. In the first place I can’t and won’t try to tell her what to do with her life. But I agree with her that this surgery is perhaps her only way out. So, by the grace of God, the talent of a brilliant surgeon and the love of my wife I am alive and recovering. ============= Those of you who are still with me, thank you for your prayers and support. They mean everything to me. I'd ask you to pray for my wife Joy whose surgery was scheduled for 2/16 but which has been moved up to 2/5, next Monday due to some severe gall bladder problems. Regards. Joe Frost

Joe F. 23 years, 3 months ago

Debbie B. 23 years, 4 months ago

Hi Joe and Joy I am so glad to hear things are going better. Joe you've got to hang in there. Better days are just around the corner. Every day I check the message board to see how You are doing and It makes my day when there is an update. You are an inspiration to me as I am pre-op and a little scared but with all you have been though I know you are a fighter and the road to recovery may be rocky but worth it. You have so many people who care about you and you are in our thought and prayers. Continue to get better and I am waitng for the day that you post saying I HAVE ARRIVED!!! ((((HUGS)))) Debbie B