Hello All I'm Home!

I got home on the 20th, and boy was it good to lay in my own bed. Those beds at the Krankenhaus should be in a torture museum. I don't sleep very well at night as I just can't seem to get comfortable no matter what position I'm in. I have lost 13 lbs since surgery and can already see physical differences. I'm already sick of this liquid diet and have a HUGE craving for scrambled eggs. But I must be patient, something I have never mastered well. My nurses were WONDERFUL! The only bad experience I had was in ICU. The day nurses were all young and I thought I was in a dormatory, as they were chasing each other down the hall, yelling, screaming, laughing so loud like it was a party. They kept running in and out of my room being very noisy from just playing around. At one point I opened my eyes and saw 3 nurses snapping rubber gloves at each other right at the foot of my bed. I could not believe the unprofessionalism and lack of concern for all the patients in the ICU. I just kept hitting my pain med button so I could go to sleep and not keep hearing the ruckus. But other than that everything else was great. The nurses on the Ward were so caring and sweet.

I'm just kidding, but are you sure the nurses playing around wasn't just a side effect of the pain meds . I am glad all of your nurses were good. I did not share your positive experience. The nurses I had after surgery were awful and didn't give a rip that I was puking every time I had to take a sip of water. I had a very mad pouch after surgery and it was swollen so much nothing could pass. And they refused to give me IV fluids so I eventually got really dehydrated from the lack of fluids and vomiting. Had to check myself out of Sachsenhausen and get to a local hospital up here and make them give me fluids. Needless to say I spent an additional 14 days in Eschenbach in the hospital being rehydrated. Glad to hear you are doing well. Eventually the pain will subside and you will be comfortable in your bed once again, Take care... Daisy

Congradulations Tammy I found your information about the Krankenhaus helpful. Tomorrow I will be 2wks out from my surgery ( 2 May 08). Today my fear went out the window... if I could hop on the table right now I would ! 2 weeks! Can you provide me some information about your experience: did you experience much pain, any problems with gas, what items do you recommend I bring with me to the hospital (towel for me) (a dart gun for the kinder nurses ) and did you have access to the WWW while in the hospital? Did you have any tubes? What the temp in the hospital? Something I haven't heard anyone speak about ...What are the visiting hours? What were you pre labs like? did you experience much discomfort? Were any of you (readers) required to do a post diet? Dr.Weiner recommended it but stated it wasn't required. How does this help? Sondra

Congrats on getting your surgery date. I know you are excited, nervous, happy, scared.....I had them all too. I remember when I got the dates and final approval, I started crying because it meant a new life for me. I am 2 months post surgery and I don't feel like I ever had surgery. Now keep in mind that everyone is different and reacts differently to this surgery. I really didn't have a tremendous amount of pain afterward. The think I remember right after surgery was my stomach muscles contracting alot. It was more annoying and a discomfort than actual pain. I was pretty drugged up so I didn't really experience much pain. I think I was on my pain pump the next day but told them to take me off of it by day 3. I don't like that drugged up feeling and since I wasn't in alot of pain there was no need to keep it going. I wanted to get up and walk. Walking is the best thing for you and you need to walk to get rid of that gas. I did have bad shoulder pain after the surgery for about a week. I'm sure it was from the gas. I had one drainage tube that was removed the day before I left. It did not hurt at all, nor did it hurt when they removed it. I recommend taking your own pillow, a laptop, if you have one.....just for movies, they have no internet service. Take baby wipes, your bum will appreciate them. Take your own comfy clothes, a book, magazines. It gets boring at times. But you will probably meet some really nice people there too. As far as the temp in the hospital, it was Feb when I was there and the heaters were still on. It wasn't really all that cold outside so it was warm in the room. Thank goodness I had roommates that liked to have the window open because it was too stuffy. I have no idea what the actual visiting hours are but I think it might be around 8 or 9 am to 8 or 9 pm. There was one patient who's husband seemed to be there from sun up to sun down, and I think it was almost 9pm or a little after when he would leave. The nurses are great. There wasn't a nurse that I didn't like, they were all so very nice. The post diet.....I stuck to the liquid post diet for the most part for a week, except for a couple of cheats. I had a potato one night and I caved 2 nights before and had BK. But the reason for the diet is to flush out your liver. You most likely have a fatty liver and it's easier for them to do the surgery when your liver isn't so fatty. You'll be on a liquid diet for 4 weeks after surgery. However, I did not follow the liquid diet to the letter because I felt like I was starving at week 2. I started eating scrambled eggs, potatoes, soft foods. I had no problems with my new pouch. I have never thrown up, but I do feel sick if I eat too much. I think the most discomfort was the first 2 weeks of drinking water. That subsided after I healed more. Keep us posted on your surgery and how you are doing. Feel free to ask as many questions as you want. I wish you the best of luck!

Hi,

I live near San Francisco, Ca and my mom lives near Frankfurt in Heusenstamm.  Anyway, I was wondering how much weight loss surgery in Germany is compared to the US?  I am considering a VSG (sleeve) and it costs $17,000 in San Fran and $10,000 in Mexico.  If you could provide any info I would appreciate it.

Thank you