Overdue update

Oct 04, 2009

Wow...Just realized it's been a little under 3 months since my last blog entry! I've never been good at these things. :)

In short, I had the Lap Band surgery on September 16, 2009.

When I finally got the referral from my insurance company in July, I contacted Virginia Mason in Federal Way. They set me up with an appointment...on October 1. I hung up the phone after making the appt and almost cried. 3 months?!? In the past 6 months alone, my health problems seem to be compounding so what would 3 more months do to my body?

I called the insurance case manager who said they just added a 5th provider, but they were out of Olympia. They were getting people in fairly quickly. Traveling from Kent to Olympia would be a challenge but it would be worth it. Plus my best friend lives 5 blocks from their office. I got the referral to Pacific Weight Loss Surgery (www.pacsurgical.com) setup a consult with them August 6.

On August 6, I took the hour drive to PWLS and met with Michelle, the coordinator. She was real sweet and informative, having gone through LBS herself. I met with Dr. William Neal, the surgeon. I had a ton of questions and he was very patient in answering them all.
(I should note I did things backwards. Ideally, I should've gone to a seminar first then to a consult. I thought I had all the answers but once I compiled my list of questions for the surgeon, I realized I know it all. I ended up going to the seminar on August 22nd with my husband Ian, who also learned a lot.)
After meeting with Dr. Neal, Michelle and I setup some follow-up appts: psychological evaluation (as required by my insurance company) and nutritionist visit. Both were scheduled on August 20th.

I was thrilled - things finally started to move!  I must confess, however, I was incredibly nervous about the psych eval.  I had been dealing with depression for almost 10 years and my maternal grandmother was bipolar. Both my immediate family and extended maternal family deal with depression too. It was overwhelming to think something that I had been accustomed to living with would prevent me from getting LBS. Before the eval, I had my regular counseling session with my therapist (this was recommended to deal with food issues but I found out I needed a bit more help). She is incredibly knowledgeable on the area of WLS, having had a few dozen patients over the years go through it. She doubted the eval would come out negative as they search for serious conditions. That made me feel better but still....she wasn't the one doing the eval :)

August 20th came and I met with the nutritionist, Biena, at Dr. Neal's office. She is the nurse there. She also had LBS so she was not only speaking from an educational perspective but a personal one as well. She gave me all the info I would need - what to eat the first several weeks after the surgery and the nutritional requirements I would need. After that, I had the psych eval down the street with Dr. Meyer (both he and PWLS work together often). It lasted about an hour and at the end he said he saw nothing wrong that would prevent me from having the surgery, at least from his standpoint - yay!! I asked what he looks for and he said those who are schizophrenic or have multiple personality disorders usually are not good candidates.

The next step would be for Dr. Meyer to submit the eval back to PWLS who would then submit the paperwork to my insurance company for final approval. I waited with my breath held. On August 31st, I got the call from my case manager - I was approved!!

On September 1, I contacted PWLS and Michelle was able to accommodate my schedule - I wanted to have the surgery before Ian started school so he wouldn't have to take any time off. She called me later and they fit me in September 16th! Wow...things were moving soooo fast! That night, I had my last meal at the Olive Garden. I wanted to pig out, but in the end, I didn't eat much. Imagine that!

Starting September 2, I had to go on a diet called Medifast for the 2 weeks before the surgery to reduce the size of my liver, making the LBS easier. It's similar to Slimfast. You can have 5 items of either a Medifast oatmeal, pudding, shake, chicken noodle soup or meal bars a day plus a "lean and green" meal once a day, consisting of a green vegetable and a meat. The food was horrible! The only thing I could stomach was the bars and I quickly ran out of those and they're expensive to replace - over $30 for 7 of them!! I cried a lot during this time because the food was horrible, but mainly because I was grieving my relationship with food. It would change forever.

On the eve before my surgery, Ian and I stayed at the Little Creek Casino near Shelton; my surgery would take place at Mason General Hospital in Shelton. (If you're a non-smoker - stay away from this place! Our floor was non-smoking but I could barely breathe! Smoke was everywhere.)   We stayed overnight because we had to check in at 6am. We got to the hospital just before 6 and I was fairly calm. The night before I was a nervous wreck but a long, warm shower helped clear my mind and calm my nerves. By 7:30, I was wheeled into the OR. I think I was back in my room before 10 (I don't remember and neither did my sleepy husband). By 12, I was cleared to go home -- but I had to pee first. Simple task that was impossible for me to do! I had to go, I could feel it and I was taking liquids every 10-15 minutes but when I'd sit down, my bladder would tease me! For over 3 hours, I tried every trick in the book: putting my hand in warm water, turning the faucet on, dreaming of peeing, even the nurse gave me this water bottle to squirt warm water down there but nothing. At 3:15, they said it wouldn't hold me up anymore but if I was still not peeing by midnight, I'd have to go to the ER. Thankfully, my bladder woke up at 9:30.

I don't remember much about the drive home. I was good to go on painkillers but didn't sleep, though I barely remember the drive. I slept for 3 hours when I got home. After my mom got off work, she came and visited me. As a thank you from me, she took Ian out to eat at his favorite BBQ place.

For the next week, I was on liquids which made me have regular diarrhea. Ugh. By the 23rd, I moved onto pudding-consistency foods where I remain. On Tuesday, I can gradually move onto regular foods.

Now for the weight loss: I weighed in on Sept 14th and was at 358 lbs. When I went for a checkup with Dr. Neal on the 23rd, I was at 343, a weight loss of 15 lbs! My highest ever was at the beginning of this process in January - 371.1. When I found out I lost 15 lbs in just over a week, I panicked - with all the weight loss programs I had been on over the years, I've learned 1-2 lbs a week is ideal and healthy, but 15?!? Dr. Neal assured me that was a great weight loss, one I'd likely never see again in that amount of time, but it was expected given my starting weight and being on a liquid diet.

I don't know how much I've lost since then. I have a digital Weight Watchers scale that says I'm at 354 lbs, which I know isn't right. I have my first fill on October 15th so I'll get weighed then. We'll see how it all goes!

(Ok, that's a lot of typing, haven't done that much since college!) 

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