Frustrated and need to vent
My labs are off too. Low Vit A, low potassium and I think I am now low on vit K...I have been bruising really easy. I take my vitamins everyday like I should.
I have been wondering if DS was right for me.........God I hope I am just having a bad couple of days!!!
FRUSTRATED!!!!!
Thank for listening.
It is almost time for your 3 month labs so you can adjust your vites as you need to after that. You are going to loose the weight, I PROMISE you, so I hope you can relax about that.
You won't be able to see the loss. You just won't. Our heads can't keep up. But your clothes will start falling off and you'll have to get new clothes whether you can "see" it or not! lol.
The relationship thing I can REALLY relate to. I am now 14 months post-op and still dealing with the fall-out from relationship problems. It sucks.
After re-reading your post I wonder if you have had labs recently? If so please post them so we can advise you on that.
It's a wild ride. Some days are bad. And you are probably also having a huge hormone dump right about now that just makes you feel like crap. But pretty soon you are going to have a whole lot more good days.
is Jewels. Love her very much!
My labs were taking 3 weeks ago....Vit A level was 22.4(taking 23,000 iu)....Potassium level was 3.1(they told me to eat high potassium foods). My PCP said she wanted to redo labs in 6 months...does that seem like I long time to you?? I have my 3 month post op next week. All other labs I was told were normal BUT she didn't take a Vit K level. I am getting frustrated with my PCP seems like she doesn't know to much about DS so I think she goes by what she knows by RNY. I like my PCP I have had her for years and she was very supportive of me having DS. I just don't know how to talk to her about DS. Any suggestions??
Just a couple of things:
1. Your pcp probably doesn't KNOW jack **** about the DS - you are going to have to educate her. If she won't or can't learn about then it is time for a new pcp. If she is going to be helping you with RNY ideas and rules - that won't work out that well for you b/c our needs are different. I made an entire DS notebook (printed off every single page of www.dsfacts.com) for my pcp and left it with her so that she would have all the info she needed to help me...if it comes to that. You need to sit her down and say "here's the deal - my WLS is different than what you are used to. Here is what I need you to do - read this notebook I've made for you, run the labs I ask you to run when I ask you to run them, and write the rx's I need when the time comes, and learn about my new anatomy just in case something serious ever happens to me. Explain the way we have to eat differently and the reasons behind it. Explain the vites/supplements you take and the reasons behind that. You are in charge and it is time for you to take charge and get what you need from your pcp.
2. In my first year I had labs run - pre-op, 3 months, 6 months, 9 months, and 1 year. After the 1st year I am having them run every 6 months unless there is something that is very far off then I will have that retested. You are in charge of your health care, as long as your insurance will allow it - have your labs run when you want. If you think waiting 6 months is too long in your first year out of surgery then tell your pcp you want them run every 3 months. My pcp ran whatever I wanted when I wanted it. I did get a little flack for her nurse but dealt with it.
3. It seems that the list of labs that surgeons/pcp want to run is NOT nearly as complete as it should be, based on your malabsorbtion. So I would recommend running the full list that Vitalady recommends. It is extensive and will be about 15 (I think) vials of blood.
4. Do NOT depend on your pcp for telling you what labs look good or bad. They don't really care until something is out of range. Once it gets out of range you are ****** for a while b/c you have to work really, really hard to bring it back up. ALWAYS request a copy of your labs and look them over yourself and post them here, if you wish, for ideas/help. MajorMom and Vitalady are more than willing to help peeps with their labs. And as you are going along try to learn as much as you can about what Gina or Michelle is telling you so that you can look over your own labs and decide what you need to tweak. There are lots of peeps that heard "you're fine" and then all of sudden a lot of their labs were in the toilet. If they had been looking them over each time and putting them into a spreadsheet they would have been able to see what was trending down and started supplementing to bring it back up before it tanked.
5. What is your vites/sup regimen? How much are you taking of what and how often? You will always have to look at that when you get your labs back so that you can decide what to increase or decrease. You will change your vites/supps based on your labs...it is a constantly changing thing.
Start a new thread and post ALL of your lab results including the reference ranges and EXACTLY what you are taking. And if you had pre-op labs please post those as well so we can tell if your "normal" labs are trending the wrong way.
Then folks can advise as to whether you can wait until 6 months for your next labs or if you've missed enough that you need an immediate lab for what was missed.
You need a script for potassium. My surgeon told me to eat more potassium too but luckily my pcp wrote me a script. You can't get it by food this early out.
I hope you will take this advice as this is what we have all our newbies do so we can best advise you. I am NOT a lab expert and will not be the one advising you. But we'll get the experts looking at your labs!!!
Okay?
You'll lose the weight, even if you're eating, because you're eating the right things. Sometimes it takes awhile for our mind to catch up to our bodies. Hang in there and when you hit the 1 year mark, you'll be amazed.
