My Case Worker is discouraging!

Aren't you suppose to feel good every time you talk to your case worker? Everytime I talk to mine, she makes me feel discouraged. She's been guiding me through the process, and checking in with me during my 6 month weigh-ins. All she ever has to say is, YOU ARE 23 YEARS OLD and this is a BIG decision. Really think about, you can't take this back, try considering to do it on your own. Believe me, she is almost pushing the opinion of not getting it. I have 1 month before everything gets submitted for approval. She said, "once i give everything to the board of directors, they will consider age as a factor". But she makes it sound like I'm too young to need this. I told her today that she make me feel discourage that I'll even get approved. She says, "I know, I'm here to be your devils advocate." She also says that my BMI is the only thing qualifying me (it was 53 and now it's 47). My main Insurance is Cigna, and Hill Physicians is my group. Hills physician will ultimately render the decision. If I get denied, the appeal then goes to Cigna to chose. What are my chances being 23 years old with a high BMI, but no real co-morbidities? My case worker said that i've been really proactive and doing everything right.

Ughh help me with some opinions. Anyone with my insurance in Cali?

For most insurance, if your BMI is over 40, you don't need co-morbidities.  All you can do is your best, and then see what happens.

As far as your caseworker is concerned, she's doing her job.  This is a life-altering procedure, losing most of a major organ.  And you have a lot more years to live with it than, say, I did having the surgery at age 52.  It's never a bad idea to think about it, and then think about it again.  But if it's what you want in the end, you go for it!

I'm in CA, but I have Kaiser. Something to consider is that most people your age and at your very high BMI have a long, if not lifetime, history of obesity. That will be taken into account. Whether you have comorbities now, or not, you are headed on a path to be pretty ill by the time you are 30.
I completely understand your frustration. You might explain to the case worker, too, that it's not like you just woke up one day at 23 and decided you didn't want to be fat anymore. Let her know how hard you worked as a teen, because every overweight teen I know -including myself- did some pretty crazy things to get and stay slim. I have met very few people who have entered into WLS without a lot of thought and past experience trying to lose the weight. Go toot your horn. You've worked really hard for this and deserve the opportunity to change your life for the better now BEFORE YOU GET SICK!

Just my two cents....

That's interesting you say that. When I first looked into it at 23-24 I wasn't ready for it and part of the reason was because, despite the fact that I was 340 pounds, I felt like I was very attractive and I didn't have any comorbidities (that I knew of) so I figured I was healthy. If I'm cute and healthy, why the hell would I have surgery besides as a get out of jail free card? THENNNN all within a few months I found out about PCOS, sleep apnea, insulin resistance... that still didn't really wake me up though because I had a boyfriend and he didn't mind Darth Vader (my CPAP mask) or any of the PCOS symptoms. I even started losing a lot of weight once I got on meds for the PCOS and insulin resistance. I gained it back on purpose though (long story). It wasn't until I was 380 pounds, kids were calling me out in public about being huge, I couldn't fit into booths or public seating, I could barelly breathe while I was resting and talking, I got winded walking to my car, I couldn't wear anything that didn't remotely resemble a tent or a mumu and I stopped being able to make myself the cute fat girl and i officially became the sloppy, stared at, i'm gonna need a scooter in a year if I don't stop this **** fat girl. Oh, and I became borderline diabetic and my depression got to the point that I was pretty much going to not be on the earth anymore. THAT made me mentally ready for surgery. Rock bottom...

So yeah, within a few short years I went from "healthy" and "cute" to my body being so ****** up and my brain being pretty much beyond repair when it comes to depression. Save yourself the hassle IF you are truly ready to make the commitment. And it's ok to not be ready at this moment. You have time. It doesn't HAVE to be done now. But if you're ready, I wouldn't wait like I did because mentally I'm suffering and dealing with things I never would have had to if I would have done this years ago.

What a journey you took getting here! I really think most of u**** some kind of "rock bottom" before we were ready to resort to surgery. It's like there is a point of desparation needed before we will take such an extreme leap...everyone has a differend line that gets crossed. I figure I started throwing around the idea of WL surgery about a year ago when my therapist brought up the Lap Band. She has a friend who's daughter got a Lap Band and lost a bunch of weight. She saw how that changed her life for the better and since so many of my issues are directly tied to my obesity, she wanted that for me. It wasn't until March when I had gained another 12 lbs in the matter of a month after changing a medication dosage that I hit that rock bottom and decided I needed to give the idea real thought and start taking some action.

I have felt my blood pressure going up and I know I am not sleeping right. Even with a CPAP I don't always get the right sleep...in fact I'm sure I don't get the right sleep. The CPAP keeps me from being oxygen deprived so I don't die in my sleep, but I wake up a lot at night and don't get the sound sleep I did once. All of that starts to make dying of some obesity related issue something real like never before.

I can't imagine being obese as a teenager and young adult. That must be so hard. Kids are mean and teens are even more brutal. I was normal weight until I was in my late 20's with obesity setting in somewhere in my mid 30s. But even at 46, I get the same question asks that you guys are getting at 23..."This is permanent and extreme. Are you sure you are ready? Have you thought this thru?" None of these people have been inside your head for the last however many years that you have dealt with obesity. They don't know what it is like to be you trapped in an obese body.

I actually think it's good that she's making you second guess your decision because it's probably made you think about it more. I've been on this board since August or September (other name) and I've seen quite a few people, young and old, jump in without giving it a second thought and come out the other end not knowing which way is up and then they are mad at the world for their decision. "This wasn't what I signed up for..."

You are young... this is true. Some people your age can't grasp the concept of "forever." I had my surgery at 28. I started looking into it when I was between 24 and 25. At that point in time I wasn't ready for it. I could have done it if I wanted to (which I did WANT to) but I knew I wasn't ready for the commitment, the real FOREVER of it. I just thought it was going to be a get out of jail free card. A lot of people have the surgery thinking that. Now, some younger people say they're ready and are successful thus far and others aren't. That being said, I see a whole lot of older people coming on here even more clueless than the younger ones. Maybe it's because there are more older people than younger people so the volume of clueless ones seems to be higher, I don't know. No one can tell you if you're ready or not, but forever IS a long time. It's not like marriage where it's pretend forever and then you can get a divorce when the going gets tough. Sometimes I even sit here and think "holy **** I don't have a stomach. I won't have a stomach when I'm 40... or 80. I'm going to be eating like this FOREVER." Eww just writing that made me feel uncomfortable. Forever is just a hard concept to grasp. And yes, I know I have a stomach, but I always walk around saying I don't have one.

Also, this is a last chance for a lot of us. Like, this. is, it. If this doesn't work, we're ******

I think those are the things she's trying to get across to you. Basically "Do you understand the reality of what you are about to do and all the positive and negative consequences that may arise as a result of your decision?" That's a deep ass question. More so than any of us can truly understand until we are experiencing each consequence.

Just food for thought.

I got surgery 4 months ago and I am 23 and my BMI was 49 with no co-morbidities. I think you will be fine.

 Ok, while I am happy she is making you think and maybe research more, it annoys me that she is using your age as a factor to do it. Recent studies have shown that when a child is obese they have like a 80% chance of becoming a morbidly obese adult and that heart disease, liver disease and other life long damage STARTS at a very early age. So if you have been obese for a long time, and you continue to be obese you are doing more damage to your body, so if you "try it on your own" and fail (as most people do, statistics are just against them, it's that simple) you are spending more years doing damage to your body that could have been avoided. I don't understand the "wait until you are sick and damaged" mentality that some health care providers have, it makes me kind of crazy. 

I don't think that's what she's saying though. It came off to me as it being a permanent thing and is she sure she wants to, and is ready to, make the commitment. I think people of all ages really need to do a lot of soul searching to be able to answer that question honestly. Like I said, I've seen a lot of old ass mofos that still weren't mentally prepared. I think that's all she was trying to do. I also think that with age and life experience does come maturity and the ability to view the world differently and more logically and, for some, it may take more years for them to be able to grasp the true commitment of "forever." 23 year olds do come in so many different maturity levels though. Some are working 3 jobs and in college and others sit at their parents house and smoke weed all day.... but that's the same for 40 year olds too.

Also, someone who may be jumping in without giving any second thoughts may actually do more harm to their body in the long run as well in sooo many different ways, including gaining all of the weight back and then some, vitamin and other deficiencies, not caring for themselves and causing a leak, etc.

I think I'm mostly saying this stuff, not for the OP, but for other preops that may be reading this.

I don't disagree with you, it's just a pet peeve of mine on the age thing really, there are morons of every age who do things without thinking and without research, but I have heard SO many people say "oh you are young, don't do something so drastic" when the truth is the younger you are when you get the excess weight off the lower your risk of a million different health issues. I just find it especially ignorant when studies are coming out now that our obese children have the same heart disease indicators as people twice their age, and that the list of very young people in need of liver transplants has skyrocketed because of obesity related complications. 

Ah, it seems like we are on the same page, we just read the OP's post differently.