JennyBoBenny
I want to live
Feb 17, 2009
I am two weeks post op. My story is a lil confusing...and I feel the need to get it out..Two years ago I started this journey when I ventured up to 450lbs. I signed myself up for the gastric bypass but told myself that I wasn't going to need it cos I was gonna work my ass off prior to such a journey.
I was laid off work so I took the year on EI and started training myself. I started with aquatics and sometimes swam twice a day. After 3 months of swimming and feeling a bit more flexible and comfortable I incorporated doing some time in the gym as well as swimming. I was doing this 4-5x a week, if not more. I actually ended up training myself to 45mins on the elliptical. It's truly amazing what we can do when we put our minds to it. A year of working out I managed to get to 373lbs and was invited to go to Israel before my year of not working was up. At the same time my surgeon's office called me it was my turn. I was flabbergasted..I wasn't ready to do it and I didn't want to miss my first out of country trip. I've always wanted to travel and took the trip. I asked them during the trip if I could postpone the surgery for a year. She said yes but after that I'd have to start all over.
During the trip I lost my routine but I would have had to adjust it anyhow cos I was going to go back to work. A few months after my return I ended up with Cellulitis and was hospitalized. I was way past the point of working and financially I was becoming stressed out which wasn't helping me to heal myself..I took the first job that was offered to me while I was sick. They waited almost 3months for me..So now I had to get used to working again and feel healthy after having the Cellulitis. (btw was my second infection of cellulitis but I was never hospitalized the first time)
While, same shit story...Working a part time job, with full time hours, and no car..it was too difficult to incorporate swimming close to me. My gym and pool was downtown. Sigh..So I kept working like crazy. Come January the surgeon's office calls me and tells me my surgery date is January 27th and my Pre Op is Jan. 8th. Now remember, I did all the required appointments to get on the gastric bypass list and even paid for it out of my own pocket so things went faster...but now we're coming upon two years. The surgeon's office tells me to bring $200 for the liquid diet and to be at the Hospital first to do all the required testing and then to come visit them. I catch the bus to Toronto. I do everything that is required of me and go to the surgeon as the last step and the surgeon is baffled and who I am. He says no one ever defers the surgery and now he's not sure what I've completed and if I need to do anything over. I was shocked. I came prepared and eager..and why wouldn't he be sure who I am it should all be in my folder and I could barely afford to get there this time. I had a list of questions for him and his common answer was one week and told me he was putting me on the liquid diet for 3 weeks. I get to his front desk and they ask for $300. I told them I don't have that and THEY decide to put me on the diet for two weeks..and take my money. There was confusion about doing some gastric bypass class..Which I did but two years prior they didn't call it the gastric bypass class. They called it a nutritional class which it was really nothing about nutrition. It was all about how they rearrange your insides. I leave there a lil confused but in a rush to catch my bus home..they bring out four boxes of powdered stuff. Where am I to put there? They didn't even offer me a bag to put it in..nor could I choose what flavour I wanted more of. I shoved it in my bag and took off..having a meal at Burger King which I had not ate at in years. It was the closest food joint. Totally aware of what I was doing.. Of course distracting myself so that I could cope with the unorganized incompetency. Do I still let the surgeon go ahead?
I go home..I'm not even home a day and they call to reschedule my surgery cos the surgeon did not book properly. Now my surgery date is Feb. 2nd.
A few days later I receive a phone call from a dietitian in Toronto saying why wasn't I in her class.. I called her back and she told me I was scheduled for her class and an appointment with a social worker at the hospital a few days later. I told her I had no idea and no one informed me. I plead my story and all the confusion and receive a call from the dietitian saying that I HAVE to do their class. I explain to them, via answering machine, that I can't afford to come there two more times prior my surgery and that I HAVE done their class. She said even though the surgery is the same and the diet, it's been two years since I did the class. What a crock of shit. lol After some more pleading I am given Jan 30th (my birthday) has a date to do the class and they waived the social worker visit. I am still on schedule but totally baffled but determined..I want to be healthy.
So I catch the bus on the 30th..make the class, late..I'm on the liquid diet at this point, almost two weeks..no cheating.. I was very determined..It didn't bother me to watch people eat but I was more aware of my own eating habits and what I needed to change after the surgery..then I wouldn't really have a choice. My friends girls baked me a cake and everyone feels bad eating around me..I explain this is my choice..
This is where I get a lil teary eyed.. cos.. I was soo focused and determined to do THIS now.. I had concluded that I could do more physical damage to myself trying to lose it on my own and this would give me a jump start.. I go in for the surgery..on my own..no family or friends.. I come out of surgery and I can't breath. It hurts so much.
I have hospital acquired pneumonia and the surgeon, on his short visits barely doing his job, says, at one point in time he thought he lost a staple..and then said he wasn't sure if they sealed the exit. Meaning I had no exit. So, no matter what I swallowed it would come back up. So, originally, I was supposed to have the surgery Monday and get released Wednesday..I was there till Saturday and begging to go home. Thursday my pouch swelling went down and I had an exit. He checked for a leak and supposed there wasn't one it was just swollen shut..I was soo happy when I could swallow water on Thursday but I still had the pneumonia and I don't ever remember having such a thing. I could barely breath, not slept in days, and I was supposed to walk while in pain and do some breathing exercises. It was more than difficult for me to do. Come the Saturday the surgeon released me telling me I had a 'little' pneumonia and that it would go away with breathing and walking..Off I went..barely able to talk but glad to be going home. My friend in the area drove me home. She didn't want to and thought I should stay in the hospital. I got home late Saturday night.. Sunday she left to go back..and by Monday I was off to emergency here to check and see if there was any blood clots in my lungs. Of course, low and behold its easier to find a blood clot then to prove there isn't. And my surgeon never sent me home with any antibiotics for the pneumonia or pain meds..since the whole time I was in the hospital only the morphine gave me release to sleep for an hour and breath without excruciating pain. We called him and made him send some Demerol. Left the hospital Monday night and they gave lovenox and pneumonia meds. Tuesday we went back to emerg here to do CT scans and a doppler ..recommended us to a specialist who gave me a prescription for pneumonia and said to do the exercises..by this point in time I haven't really slept in almost a week and a half..and I did the wrong thing. I rested for two days going thru the stages and fever of pneumonia..my friend taking care of me was scared and took me back Friday to the hospital when my fever when as high as 39.4 degrees Celsius. They said the pneumonia got worse in the two days and they were keeping me over night to administer some meds thru IV in case there was mal absorption issues and the next day I'd see another specialists. The next day he told me straight up. You HAVE to walk..and do the breathing apparatus a few times an hour to build yourself back up and that the oral meds I was given should do the trick. So, I cried..went home..and worked my ass off for the next two days.. walking every hours and a few times an hour doing the breathing apparatus. I could feel a change in my breathing and the high grade fevers were broken..
So here I am.. Afraid to sleep..second guessing my decision but regaining my determination. I haven't been able to have a good cry since it all started cos it hurt me took much and I truly don't have the air...It's such a life test to push one's limits and capabilities when ya feel like an extreme bag of shit.
I'm still going thru the pneumonia stages, but not as extreme, and dealing with the recovery of the surgery which is supposed to be fine but is damn tender, more than it was after the surgery, or in the last two weeks.
I still feel a bit lost but wanted to get this off my chest lol maybe it'll help me breath better. Now I better go walk some in my apartment hallway. I've been sitting here far too long.
Peace
1 Comment
About Me
Ottawa, XX
Location
28.1
BMI
Surgery
02/02/2009
Surgery Date
Jan 13, 2009
Member Since
