CarolynK

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Well, how things change with time and perspective.  I once said I would not test my limits with sugars and things and at the time I truely meant it.  But this weekend I pushed a bit.  We had my annual family campout at my Sis's this weekend and that means food food and more food.  

I did pretty good with things.  I had made sure I had enough fluids and if protein was lacking I had a few protein bars with me.  So that was good.
Then I was looking at the different things offered and then weighed my choices and reasons for what I was going to do or not do.   I am at the point I think where I need to start making smart choices on my own and not just follow only what is on allowable food list.   

Actually everything is on allowable but just not in the same order.  I had brought along some Soy Crisps to help me avoid the crunchy munchies and it worked very well.  

After thinking I should feel guilty then decided NOT,  I made the decision to have 1/4 cup of my Macaroni salad.  It has more egg and meat in it then mac.  But I stopped at that, where I used to be able and sit and eat it all day.

I also allowed myself 1/4 slice of homemade Banana Nut Bread.  And that was something else I could never stop until loaf was gone.  But that was enough to give me a taste without setting off a binge.  I was pleased.

Now today I am back at following things very closely and I am not feeling guilty about this weekend.  I did not over indulge, I made a deliberate and thoughtful decision and stuck to it.  There will come a time when I need to stop losing weight ( I hope)   And I need to be able to handle real life situations...realistically. 

Other then that i had a great weekend.  My wound is getting better every day.  I can't wait for it to finish healing.  Will talk more later!

It really did bother me that my weight loss slowed down!  Not tragic or anything but disappointment.  Even though I knew it would happen.  But this week joy of joys I am down 4.8 lbs!   Yipeeeee  Gee what little things to make a girl happy!    I am now down 92.5 lbs!    That brings me down to  239.8!   6 # to go for 100 from surgical weight and  I am now 120 lbs from my highest!  

Happy Happy Joy Joy!

Well here we are, closing in on 6 months out and my wound is still not fully healed   I just need skin!   I really do not want skin grafts now...I really don't!  Because of Babbette my weight loss has slowed way way down but it hasn't stopped thank goodness...it is still about 1lb a week but I can live with that.

My mood and general attitude has been a bit better since Dr gave me another anti'depressant to take at bedtime.   But I still have my days which tells me I am not over medicated!   Yesterday was one of them,  I tried really hard not to let Chet know how I was feeling but he could tell anyway and was concerned.

I can not tell him how much it irrates me to have him talk about his 7 week vacation that I should have been going on too.  He's going to do this and that and the other thing but I don't have money around to do squat!   It is not fair!  but when was life ever.

I want him to go...we had this trip planned for over a year and we have money down and points from time-share ect ect that we would lose if he didn't go!  But dang....lets not talk about it 24/7!

I have taught him how to use digital camera and how to download it to lap-top so he can share with me.....when he gets home and he has promised that we can go back to a couple of the areas in a couple of years.   I have always wanted to see the River Walk in San Antoine!

Oh well....I get to clean out the house while he is gone....hehehehehe.....some things he hasn't used or seen in years will disappear completely!

Not that I will get rid of stuff with sentimental value but junk!

See I have my up days and my down days and then I get completely split and have both in the same day!  Poor guy doesn't always know what hit him!  I try to thank him for helping and putting up and let him know that I love him even when it might not seem like it and I will make up for it as soon as I can.

He is still so proud of me for going through this and surviving the evisceration.   He is still planning on how to do ps when the time comes without going into debt.  And when I mentioned I wanted bare necessities he said lets see what it will cost for Total Body lift....you will have deserved it by then!   Who could ask for more?

Well enough rambling for today....I will be back in a couple of weeks with new pics...I hope.

Hi all,   

Just thought I would download some new pics to show off what I have done in 5 months.   And to introduce you to Babbette my new companion and Hernia.  She will be with me for approx 8 months as long as I behave myself.  The Dr will repair it and remove excess stomach skin at the same time.  But because of the evisceration they do not want to do it now.  My body and intestines need this time to finish healing and resting.

I am not to do anything strenuous or lift anything over 5 lbs.  Makes it hard to exercise.  I can not even get in the pool because my wound is still open!  (sigh)

It makes me wonder sometimes!   I really am having no problems with my RNY.....it is my body that betrayed me.  Osteo Mylitis is not something I expected to jump up and bite me in the backside!    But anyway...here I am and I would do it over again but hopefully I would know ahead of time about the infection so we could have avoided this mess.

Thank you all for being here.

 Ok folks,  I have been a tropper through all of this I think.  But this last couple of weeks have really gotten to me!  I have about had it with this stupid complications and I am tired of being Miss Mary Sunshine!

I know there are folks a lot worse of then I am but at the moment....well I am upset about me!

My new skin does not want to heal.  It grows and then tears.  We are trying different dressings ect to see what works best.

The infection in my spine has stabilized, which means it won't be going away but I will always have it.   Just occasionally something will make it flare up and I will need more meds.   This has nothing to do with the surgery, I apparently had it before hand but nothing had made it flare up. 
Where did I get it..I have no idea.  Now it is the cause of the incision/wound problem.

Ok now I have been losing but slowly and the more I lose the more it looks like I am either 10 months pregnant or swallowed a basketball!  
I knew I had a hernia and thought it was the small lump on top left of basketball.  Well I was right and I was wrong.....the basketball is the large (very large) hernia and the little lump is baby hernia.  

It is so large because of the envisceration!  These are my intestines that are poking up here!   They do not want to fix it until they are sure that all the repairs that they had to do in my 2nd surgery are healed completely and if they can wait until I am about 12-18 months out they will remove excess stomach skin at the same time!

But the thing is I will be walking around with this basketball and I HAVE to wear the belly band.   The muscles are not working in that area.  argggggggghhhhhhhh

Needless to say this last 2 weeks I have been so far down I need a ladder to tie my shoes.  I went to Dr and we have rearranged my anti-deprresants and we will see how that works.  

But at this very moment if you were to ask would I do it again.....I would say NO!    But I wouldn't really mean it.  It is just such a long road.  I have missed spring and now summer and I will not be able to do strenuous exercise until next year!   I am missing the honeymoon where exercise really helps but what can I do about it?

I am just so danged disgusted with it all.   I don't miss the food I don't mind the eating routine....I am missing life!

Hopefully the new meds will work and next time I will be more myself.
Thanks for reading.

Things have gone fairly good since I have been off bedrest.  I have been able to get out and about more.  Mostly grocery shopping and my nephews wedding, but hey better then bedrest right!   The weight is still coming off, slowly but coming off non the less.  I still can not exercise like I should until my wound is completely healed.

Now as for the wound, there is no depth to it anymore...Yipeeee... but I still need some skin.  New skin is growing but this past week some of my new skin is disappearing!   I am having more drainage and wherever there is drainage that gets to the new skin...it eats it away!   The nurse is trying different dressings to see what will help more and I see the surgeon on the 8th.  

I also see infectious disease Dr on the 6th and see if I can finally get off the anti's.  I can only hope.

I have been hanging in here pretty good but I have to tell you this past week as been hell!   I am already on Paxil 30mg a day but it sure doesn't seem to be helping right now.  I will see PCP on the 9th and see if we can change that.  I missed spring completely with hospitalization and bedrest.  Now I am missing summer and the pool exercises I could be doing with this stupid wound.   My weight loss is no where near what others who can exercise is experiencing and yes I know don't compare myself to others but right now I can't stop comparing!   

I don't care if I get my food or protein in at all, but I am doing so because I am not that danged low yet!   All I want to do is sleep but I can't sleep!   My back is still killing me and I am tired of taking pain meds!  Back has been a problem for a long time....I have arthritis in lower spine then that danged infection in the same area!   Drs are working on both!

Look at me!  I am a wreck!  I got lucky at the beginning and was no where near a scale to see the gain and stalls from surgery!   I didn't feel the emotional pull since I was all drugged up with pain meds from my evisceration and 2nd surgery.    I was put on paxil because I just wasn't handling things well, but who would in my position!

I am tired of being Mary Sunshine.   I am tired of putting on a good face to my family and friends....I am just plan tired!

I can't even go to my copd support group with any of this....I am part of management and it upsets them too much to have management not feeling good.  It reminds them that we are human.

I know there are so many out there with much worse problems then I have but right now ....I don't care!   This has been growing for some time now and if I don't let it out I will do something stupid like sabatoge my diet and pouch.    Been there done that and won't go there again!

Cripes I haven't even updated my profile background ect since Easter!  I have new pics to download....new avater to put up but I just don't care right now.  This is long I know but this is the only place I can unload right now.  Again I know there is so much good that has happened to me in the last few months but right now the bad is overwhelming.   I am just plain tired.

I am going to stop for now and thanks for reading. 

Ok, I went to surgeon this morning.  I am off bed rest ....Yipeeee!!!!!!!!

They said my wound was healing nicely and should scab over within a couple of weeks and as for my weight loss I am right on target which is a miracle since I have been in bed for most of the last 3 months!

Wow moments are grand!

Well it has been awhile again.   But I have been on bedrest since I last wrote and I was not allowed up for very long every day.

My wound is healing good, there is no depth to it now just need the skin to close up.  That is progressing at a fairly good rate but will probably take the rest of the summer to completely close.  No pool exercise for me this summer.  

I continue to lose weight but at a slower rate which is fine as long as I continue to see inches fall away.   I have had a bunch of wow moments and some of them might be TMI.  But I can now clean myself from head to toe with out assistance from anything!   I can wear my wedding ring...Yipeeeeee
I did not have to use the seatbelt extender in my car the other day!   I actually was able to buy a bra in a real store and not online!  I have gone down from a 56C to a 48C and I don't mind it in the least, other then the fact that the girls hang about as low as my knees!   I have also gone from a 3-4X to a 2X with a couple of 3's depending on brand.

There are several more but these are the biggies!  I have lost a total of 73.6 lbs according to my scale.  I weigh every Tues morning.   Of course I am now down 102 lbs from my highest weight, last July!

But I saw some of my sis's, aunts, and cousins this past weekend and I was very upset to see how most of them have put on the extra lbs.  The sis after me has been doing Nutri System and is doing good on it so far but like me she will gain it back,  she always does but I wish her well with her endevor.   We are a large family in more ways then one.   There are 7 siblings and I truely believe that all of the others would qualify for WLS but unfortunately after my complications, they will not try.

I am going to the Surgeons this morning for a check up and hoping that he takes me off bed rest,  bed rest is way over rated but it is also a necessary evil!  I hope he is pleased with my progress so far,  I am so afraid of not doing things right and messing up.  I haven't so far but temptation is there.  Oh I will confess a couple of times I needed something more to eat at the end of the day but I chose things like 1 oz of cheese...or 1 oz of deli turkey and that has only been a couple of times.

I hope to upload some more pics later today but I need to get ready to leave now.  Talk later

Well it has been awhile, and I didn't mean to be gone this long but things got out of hand.    I will try to make this short, but probably won't be.

I went to my brothers wedding on March 31,  there was no music or dancing or anything and I stayed in my chair and let folks come to me. No problem there, I thought I did real good.

On April 1'st sometime during the afternoon I got real nauseated and had lots of pain in my open incision and neither one of these things were normal for me.   I contacted the Bariatric PA at the hospital and he made a couple of suggestions and wanted me to call back if things didn't get better.

So about 10pm I called and he wanted me to come in.  DH was spazzing and I told him to slow down it wasn't an emergency.......welllll was I wrong!   I proceded to cough hard,  I thought pre runner to nausea again.   But I had a lot of pain with it and then I looked down and there was blood all over my nightie.  I had eviscerated myself!   I actually coughed my guts out!  They are hanging there as pretty as you please!   Needless to say I told DH yes we need to hurry it is emergency after all.

We left the house without my glasses purse or cell phone....thank goodness hubby had his!   Called my daughter to meet us at hospital on the way.Needless to say I was in emergency surgery by 2am on the 2nd.

When I woke up my incision was like twice the size that it had been and all kinds of strange stiches were visible.  I was on several different IV antibiotics and I figured I would be there a week....wrong

I ended up there for one full month.   I was discharged on May2.   I was on bed rest with bathroom privelages the whole time and they re-opened the incision because of infections.

Speaking of infections they have decided that the infection they found in the bone of my lower spine is what caused things not to heal in the first place.   It was just laying low.  

Once they found the source of the infection, and decided on treatment they were able to send me home, where DH is giving me daily IV antibiotics.    I have one nurse that comes in 3x's a week to take care of the Wound Vac.   This is a neat machine that they hook up to my wound with what looks like foam and saran wrap.   Hook it to the machine with a tube and the machine sucks things closed and pulls the excess fluids off.  In the 2 weeks that I have used it I can see a major difference in its size, for the good of course.

I have a different nurse to come in once a week to check my Groshon Line which is similiar to a Pic Line or the Lines they use for chemotherapy.  It is in front of my right shoulder, near the arm pit and above the breast.   While they are hear they also draw the weekly labs for the Nuerosurgeon and Infectious Disease Dr.   The Nuerosurgeon is monitoring to be sure nothing breaks through to the spinal cord itself.

Then I have an aide 2x a week to help with showers.  The area around the Groshen Line and the dressing around the wound can NOT get wet and it is too hard for me to do on my own and hubby is all thumbs.   But he is doing everything else needed around the house so I can not and will not complain!

As for DH,  he is doing laundry, running dishwasher, taking care of his own meals, doing all the shopping and waiting on me hand and well at least half a foot    He hovers over me like a mother hen.
I have been doing a lot of sneezing this last couple of days and that scares both of us but it scared him so bad he called my daughter, whom I assured I was taking my nasonex and they convinced me to try one of the Benedryl strips.   The Nasonex should kick in any day! I do have nightmares about coughing or sneezing to hard and messing up the innards again.   I think it will be a long time be I cough of sneeze without fear, especially since that one coughing spell almost killed me.  Yes they told me it is a wonder I made it to surgery.

My one daughter comes in every couple of weeks and does a complete housecleaning, dusting mopping, vacumning ect.  Another one can only make it on Saturday and she does little things for me.  My middle daughter doesn't have much time but she has been up to visit twice.  I have it so much better then many that I am grateful despite all of this.

I asked for and am now taking Paxil 30 mg 1 x a day and potassium supplements, for some unknown reason my potassium is not staying up and I am not taking steroids or diuretics.  I of course have my previcid and vitamins along with my inhalers.    I am still taking the Loritab but it is more for my back pain then the wound.   The wound benefits but I don't think I would take the full amount if it were just for my wound.

Now for the good news.   All of the Drs say I am doing excellent and healing faster then they would have expected.   I am doing better then most considering everything that I have been through.

The bariatric part of all of this is doing great!   I am now past the 6 weeks and can have 2oz of protein and 1 oz of either fruit or veggie or some of the few bread choices I have at one meal.    I still supplement my protein with 2 shakes a day giving me beween 60 and 85 grams of protein a day.

I do have trouble getting the fluids in.   I do better on days that I am up more but while laying in bed it is not easy to remember to sip sip sip!

I have only had mild dumping when I ate too fast (overly tired both times) and it was dry heaves.    I have tolerated everything I have tried so far, but I am going slow with adding new things.  Right now it is hard to fix anything other then very very simple things like egg salad or tuna fish  So I haven't experimented yet,  it will come eventurally but I need time to heal.

Now for the really good part.....I have lost 61 pounds since March 13.....Laying in bed!!!   How awesome!   The only problem with that is without moving around or exercising I didn't tighten much up and it isn't easy to see where I lost it!   But again that too shall come.   But 61 pounds   YAHOOOOOOOOOOOO

Well I need to get back to bed....Will write more in a couple of days.

Yesterday started out great.  I woke up with energy that I tried to conserve but remained active on the computer.  I wrote 2 new topic's chats for another group that I belong to, read, putzed around the house a bit and had a good day all in all until late afternoon dressing change.

Boy Jeckyl and Hyde look out!   The pain came back with vengence and I was miserable.   My poor DH is taking this like a trooper most of the time even while he says...I sure hope you get to feeling better reallllll soon. 

I went back to the clinic to have last 4 staples removed and incision check.  They say it is still looking good and that I am doing everything right for it and my overall bariatric plans.  It will take it approx 4-6 weeks to heal

At 2 weeks and 1 day I am down 23.4 lbs!  It is so very hard to believe!  I know it won't continue like this but this is amazing!  My breathing has improved and I am not so SOB when showering or simple things.   

My O2 levels are still jumping between 92 and 96 at rest but that is normal for me and even if SOB is aleveated  my lungs are still damaged.   I can just hope to optimize what I do have going for me.

I don't go back to the clinic now until April 25th but I have my 2-4 week meal plan and my 4-6 week meal plan.  I know I will get tired of it but it will pass.

I am going to weigh myself every Tues morning.  Surgery was on a Tues and then write here.   I do not want to become a slave to my scale but I want to keep track.

Later