a little update!

Good Morning everyone! *sigh* That hospital is still giving me a hard time in giving me a copy of my upper GI. I called over to the surgeon to play tattle tale on them and he told me to come and take his copy but I have to give it back soon. So I went over to his office(I feel so terrible b/c I always seem to just barge in) and he gave me his copy which I am planning on making copies onto DVD of. He had to go out to his car to get the tape(this tape is becoming the holy grail it seems.) He is too funny. He seemed like he had a cold(which he always seems to) and I said to him, "What is with you, why are you always sick?" He said, "look who is talking." wwwwahhhhhhhhh j/k I told him about the date in august being way too late and I want it to be on a tuesday b/c the last place you want to be is in the hospital over the weekend. He said he will see what he can do. He has to check b/c he has to make sure he and his partners schedules are both free and no one is on vacation. Doctors seem to take a lot of vacations, dont they? I want to go on vacation!!! It was too funny, when I put the tape into my VCR to watch the VCR started to make a funny noise. I was like "nooooo!", and pressed "eject" before it ate the tape or did something horrific to it. So I haven't even watch it yet, ha. I guess I will wait until I see the copies next week. All I have to say is thank goodness for my surgeon. He is like a living angel. On the other hand, I went to two different surgeon even when he advised me not to. They all seem to triple booked their appointments,to be in the office one day a week and make you wait three hours to see the assistant not even them. Oh please. I turned my little skinny butt and left. I was so upset I had my surgeon paged to call me on my cell phone right after that happened. I am told him I am beyond these stupid people. He was so sweet but kind of said, "I told you so!". Oh well. Anyway, I am going next week to see this other surgeon (the one he recommended and the one I saw last time) in the city who is done this test/seen this problem(or at least something similar) before. Let's see what he says. My surgeon said he will call over to him to talk about moi and let him know what has been going on. I do not want this to sound rude,( but I to understand it is hard to get a sense how how something is meant to sound when it is just type not said verbally.) but please do not send me emails asking me "what is wrong w/me", "why dont I sue the surgeon" "if I have an eating disorder" "why dont I force myself to eat" etc. I am getting a little tired of answering these. Most of you who send me these emails do not know my whole story or seem to be alittle slow in understanding when I explain it. I am not going to "call anyone out" b/c that would make me obnoxious, which I am not, but you know who you are. They mostly seem to be coming from people who do not post much if not at all, so oh well. I do understand that I post my "stuff" publicly(which I do not mind at all) but if you are going to ask me personally about myself/my situation, you can at least be humane about it. I really do not mind talking about situation but I refuse to answer to rudeness. I am a real person who is really go through everything I write about on here. Not only am I affected, I have a very caring/protective husband and a young son. We take it day by day over here. I am not in the mood for rude/annoying emails implying I am whining/complaining/bitter etc. I think that is the last way I have ever been. Walk a day in my shoes and see how you will be acting/feeling. I am not going to be polite anymore and answer those emails. So if you want to know "what is wrong with me."...just ask someone else. I mean look at me, I am going on my sixth surgery and I am calling my surgeon "an angel", does that sound like a bitter angry woman! Geez. Anyway, I am feeling ok. Nothing really has changed. I havent had to put myself back in the hospital, which is good. I am pretty sure what he wants to do is going to make it go all away. His tried revising it to make it work so now what is left is to just take it out and reconstructing a new one. Ouch ouch and another ouch. Oh well, I have to do what I have to do! I am actually looking forward to this b/c I am almost 100% sure it will resolve after this. Yipeee!! Have a great day everyone!

Good Lord Tavia For anyone to even consider you a whiner after all you have been through, I mean really!!!!! I always you for being such a strong person. Nothing but here. I know you have to be okay after all this. Keep the faith

Faith is pretty much what I am going on! Thanks so much!!!!

I don't know how anyone could say that you're a whiner or complainer. Most of the time I wonder how you manage to stay so positive. I only went through a quarter of what you've been through and I was ready to scream. Did you see the post here about the Weigh2Win contest? I entered and question # 6 reads as follows: What ObesityHelp member would you like to see featured in OH Magazine? Tell us about that person! Well guess who I named.... YES YOU!!!! I can't think of anyone who has been through was you've been through and manages to stay so upbeat and positive. If you get e-mails from insensitive people who can only criticize, then just delete the darn things. They are not worth your time. We love you... Joanne

By the way the next time you see Larry, tell him I miss him and ask him when he's going to start accepting Oxford again. Joanne

Thanks for telling them about me. If they contact me I will be sure to let you know! Of course I will tell dr gellegell your message. I will speak to him next week but will see him the following week and I will tell him. I know for a fact he will blush b/c he get so bashful over everything I say that isnt about my guts. Nevermind hugging the man, lord have mercy he tears up and doesnt let go. Too cute.

Tavia, I am not sure what to say but know that you are ALWAYS in my thoughts and prayers for a recovery from this!!! You are awesome in the fact that you can remain so positive. You are a true, honest strong women and I admire that! Thanks for the update hun, as always keep us posted......If you ever need anything please feel free to let me know. ~Hugs~ Debra P oh yeah and another 2 just for YOU!

Thank you so so much, deb! you are one of the greatest around here!! thanks for the dancing skinnies, they are funny! Take care.

hi tavia! i don't post too much, mostly because i just started coming to the ny board a couple months ago. seems a lot of friendships have already been formed, feel kinda like an outsider, etc... BUT i would NEVER think to email you (or anyone) an email like you have described above. how intrusive! (ok, if thats really a word). to be honest, i had asked someone else about you, but with all you are going thru and have gone thru.... anyways, i don't really know you, but i think of you often and hope you get well little by little, day by day. and i agree with joanne 100%. i would love to see a story on you in OH magazine. maybe then i would read it! hugs and well wishes, mary jo

Hi Mary Jo, The thing is I do not mind talking about what has happpened/happening to me, that truly doesn't bother me. I just dont like annoying comments back like "you should sue your surgeon" or "maybe it is in your head" or "that I must have a eating disorder" and I can go on. What can you do! This summed up what happened to me initially, I am leaving out alot but you get the sense: Two days after my initial surgery I developed a really bad bowel obstruction, which can happen and just happened to me so soon. It caused my bypass part of my stomach to swell up to the point where it almost exploded, pneumonia to the point one of my lungs collapsed and the other one turned into a pancake and most of my small bowel collapsed as well. Most of this happened overnight and by the next day, I was back in the OR for another turn. B/C I was so sick going into the operating room it was a huge risk to take to operate on me in that state but I probably would have been dead in a day or two staying like that w/out an operation. During the second operation, I went into respiratory and cardiac arrest. I was brought to the surgicial ICU, they didnt think I was going to make it overnight, but I did. Then I was brought into the normal ICU of the hospital and went into cardiac arrest again, twice. Again they didnt think I was going to last, but I did. I am still here! I pretty much was being kept alive on a respirator for all of these ICU trips. I remember hearing voices and conversations people were having around me/to me but dont remember seeing them. I do remember hearing my PCP and surgeon tell me things and I will never forget what they said. They know this b/c I told them I heard them and quoted them word for word...and you see why they say I humble them. I did wake up a few times on the machine and it hurting like the devil. I do remember when I was taking off the machine and could focus on people and the look on their faces is something I will never forget. My poor husband, I am suprised he didnt have a heart attack himself! Slowly but surely I got better, left the ICU and went to regular surgical room. From the day I checked in to have the bypass, through all of this, I was initially in the hospital for close to two months. I have been back and forth to the hospital for various reasons(mostly just due to fair to poor overall health) Then there is part two to my saga! I always felt I would never eat well. I get sick to my stomach(nauseous, pains, feeling like food gets stuck) when I would try anything remotely solid. No one could figure out what was wrong with me. I actually had one doctor tell me I had "post-traumatic stress" which was causing me to "think" I could not eat. Right I say to that. The surgeon never thought "it was in my head" and tried everything he could do to figure out what was wrong. I had a million and one CT-Scans, million and one upper GIs, blood work, urine, nuclear tests and even two exploratory surgeries which all really didnt show any form of a problem. Nothing, nothing and nothing. Looooong story short, my problem was found when I did an upper GI where I ate some food. He saw that food was not passing my Y-connection for some reason. They (both surgeons, a couple of GI doctors, radiologist) all said they do not see anything mechanically stopping the food. He has ruled out it being 100% mechanical(my last surgery showed I formed a bubble around that connection but I still have similiar symptoms still.). He feels that my roux limb-Y connection never really learned to function well (if at all), so the food just sits in me instead of passing. Why *****ally knows? Most likely my body went through too much in the beginning and my bypass never learned to function or maybe just the way to moon and the stars are aligned, who knows. It has been a year and a half since my inital surgery and "give it some time" theory has been exhausted. He tried to revising it to make it work, which seemed like it helped 15% but that still is no way to live. He feels reconstructing it will force the bypass to work as best as it can be b/c he will just take out the whole connection and make a new one. It make sense to me b/c I will be getting fresh new parts so to speak. One has to understand you have to do the least drastic thing first. He tried revising but now he will reconstruct. Ouch. Nothing has been a surgicial error and I have never blamed my surgeon for anything. If it wasn't for him, I probably would have been dead for one reason or another. He is been nothing but compassionate and honest with me. That is all I can ask for. No surgeon has really seen the problem before, let alone done this test except for this one surgeon in the city. He has reported two finding of something similar to my situation and has done this eating test before. My surgeon just wants me to go show the tape to him and ask him for his opinion on my situation. Most of my problem can be found given clinical findings(aka what the patient says) versus a diagnostic test(say a Ct-Scan) This eating upper GI just gave my surgeon the diagnostic piece he needed to figure out the "where why and how". So that is where I am now. What fun! I guess being so close to death makes you look so much differently at life and how staying positive really does help. I know that sounds really cliche but it is just so true. What doesnt kill you makes you stronger, no? Literally in my case! Anyway, thanks for your offer of support, it does mean a lot! You are looking fabulous by the way! You must get the "eating disorder" comments more than I do! Ha. Wow that was a lot to write and now I need a nap! Take care. tavia