Anna D.

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I talked to my surgeon's office and they have all of my information and she said that she would be submitting it to insurance within the next hour!!

I have Medica Health Partners so they've said that it usually takes about 2 weeks.  I'm hoping I heard by the end of this week but I will try my hardest to be patient!!!!

Ugh, big mistake today.  I've eatten too many carbs and salt today.  Now I feel sick and horrible.  Part of it was that I was wearing an old bra that had a really tight band and it was hurting.  I bought new bras a few months ago and that solved that problem.  I'm all over the place with my brain today.  Yesterday I was at a purse party at my in-laws' house and they had snacks there (chips, crackers, those little eclairs you can buy at Sam's Club, and then also had guacamole with chips at home. Of course my insides are no where close to being able to handle something like this.  I need to detox - bad.  I have that nasty taste in my mouth and my jaw hurts from chewing gum yesterday.

I received a voice mail around 10am this morning.  It was the receptionist (she told me her name, bwahaha!) and she said that in a few seconds she would be faxing my eval to Dr. Drew at Abbott Northwestern!!  Oh whew it's about time.  I can finally stop worrying that I'm missing something.  I can be much more patient with the insurance and Abbott now that everything is in.

I also got my D vitamins today.  I'm so happy that they're crushable and somewhat small!!!

Not to mention it's BEAUTIFUL out today besides it being slightly windy.

Yesterday I called the therapist's office to get a "real time" answer for when they would fax my eval information over to my surgeon's office.  I left a message in the morning around 8:25am.  She never called me back.  I called again around 3:30 in the afternoon and the receptionist (different one) told me that the typist (they only have one??) was out until Thursday so it probably wouldn't get out until Friday.

*sigh*

Today I called again to verify that information.  The receptionist (the one I always leave messages with but never calls me back) verified that my therapist promised her that he would have it done and submitted to be faxed to my surgeon's office tomorrow, Thursday April 23, 2009.  Oh boy I was happy to hear that!  You can bet your pants that I'll be calling them tomorrow afternoon to verify that it was done!!!

I am so tired of waiting at this point.  Each day that goes by makes a little voice in the back of my mind talk louder and louder about not being approved. Argh.

I could say I'm pissed off but it's more along the lines of being frustrated and disappointed.  Oh, and impatient.  I'm incredibly impatient.

I had my psych eval and MMPI test on Wednesday March 25th.  I have been waiting for my therapist to get my stuff done and sent to by surgeon's office at Abbott Northwestern.

I called on Wednesday morning and the receptionist would say she'd ask my therapist and give me a call back.  I even gave her my number.  I called again this morning because I hadn't heard from her yet.

She calls back in an hour and leaves a message.  Apparently SHE was the hold up because she was supposed to send the MMPI results off for dictation or something but it never happened.  So now they're sending it off on Monday and they probably won't get it back until Wednesday of last week.  Had I known it would take this long I would have done the eval back in February!  Damnit!  I should have asked her to put a rush on it.  Seriously, OVER 3 WEEKS?!  It's been almost a month now!  I swear, of everything, this is the most time consuming part of it all.

Now I definitely won't have a date until probably May and my surgery date probably won't be until June or, hell, July maybe.

My surgeon called me today and left a voicemail to let me know he got my blood work.  He said everything looks normal except my Vitamin D was low.  So now he wants me on 2000 units of Vitamin D daily pretty much for the rest of my life.  I can't get anything until Friday anyway since we have $8 in our checking account. Okay, allow me to adjust that. $6.54 because my husband ate at Taco Bell for lunch today.  HEAVEN FORBID he pack a lunch to bring with him or something. Gosh.

Work has been stressful.  Waiting for surgery approval is stressful and frustrating.  Money being tight is frustrating and stressful and very irritating.  I haven't been eating as well lately because we just don't have it in the house because we don't have money to go grocery shopping because my husband doesn't know how to pay the bills in a smart time frame.  I'm so angry with him right now.  I put some cash in the bank so we had something in there (the $8) and then he goes and stops at TB for lunch!? What?!  *sigh*

Anyway... I realized I haven't made a YouTube update in a long, long while.  I should do that tonight I guess.

I know they have my bloodwork because I got my copy.  I called my therapist's office this morning to see if he had sent my eval over or not.  I'm kind of irritated that it's 3 weeks so far and he STILL doesn't have it in.  Argh.

I'm antsy and anxious and being stressed out at work.  I just want answers.  This blows and it's causing me to make poor food choices (not TOO poor but you know).  Then my husband is a financial moron and we have $8 until Friday.  *sigh*  Please make time go faster.

I'm obviously anxious about all of this surgery stuff.

This morning I stopped at my clinic to get my blood tests done. I went before work to get it done. I didn't have to wait for long and I wasn't nervous going into it. She pulled 6 vials of blood from me and, by the time she was done filling the last one, I started feeling light headed and woozy. I felt the same way the last time I gave blood. They gave me a small glass of water to sip on and I sat there for a while.

I stayed home from work because I felt just horrible and my head was swimmy. I fell asleep on the couch for about an hour without realizing it until Ben startled me awake. I feel bad for having stayed home from work. I know how much it sucks to feel screwed when coworkers aren't at work.

On a side note, Ben and I started watching "Weeds". Wow, what a snappy modern show!

Well, today Ben and I went up to Minneapolis to Abbott Northwestern Hospital for my meeting with the Nutritionist and for my surgeon consultation.

First off, we were up at 6am and arrived with only 3 minutes to spare. Traffic was somewhat congested on 35W North so it took a little patience. We checked in and then went up to the 3rd floor. The Nutritionist, Liz, was ready for us right away. She went over a lot of different things nutritionally (dur) and vitamins. I will need to go shopping for vitamins this weekend or at least very soon to get a head start on that. I was weighed at 271 pounds which is 9 pounds down from what I weighed at my dietitian appointment back on February 18. My height is 5’ 2 ¼” tall. Haha I’m growing! They actually measured and weighed me twice because it didn’t cross my mind to tell the nurse that I had already been weighed and measured! Oops. They also took some “Pre-Op” photos.

We waited in the consult room for an hour before Dr. Drew made it to the room. It was somewhat boring and I really really wished I had brought a bottle of water. After 60 minutes of waiting he arrived and we went through the horse-and-pony show of questions. I answered ‘no’ to more questions than ‘yes’ and he said that [aside from my morbid obesity] I’m pretty healthy. He did the physical exam and said that I’m a good candidate for laparoscopic RNY. He explained how they used to do the procedure, how they do it now. He was very thorough in explaining risks and complications of the surgery whether it’s laparoscopic or open procedure.

So what is there left to do? I need to get my labs done which I’m doing tomorrow morning – nothing but water after 8:30pm tonight! I also need my therapist to get his psych eval submitted. I called the office and she found out that he’s just waiting to get the test results back from dictation. Hopefully they are submitted this week. I double checked the fax number they had and Eeek they had the wrong fax number! In fact, they had the phone number instead. Whoops!

So hopefully in a week my paperwork can be submitted for insurance approval and then hopefully at least 2 weeks after that I’ll have a date. I’d at least like to have a surgery date scheduled by the end of April. That’s where I’m at right now.

Well, it's the Sunday before my surgeon consultation.  Our house has minimal choices for good food right now; we drastically need to go shopping.  I'm starting to hate shopping less and less the past few months.  I have anxiety about making decisions and being away from home.  It's gotten a LOT better over the past few years.  We even go up to Minneapolis to go out with a few friends of ours over the past few months and I've really enjoyed it!

Letting go of control is one thing I find difficult to do. In the past, if we've been traveling or going somewhere, I needed to know when we would get there, how long we would be there, and when we could go home.  I had a very difficult time enjoying myself because I was obsessing about what comes next.  I've been working on this with my therapist for the past 2 years and I feel that I've gotten a lot better.  I've been enjoying myself quite a bit more.  In fact, the last time we were at his parents' house (Friday evening) my husband was the one that decided it was time to leave instead of me acting all anxious. It was wonderful!

This brings me to my appointment this week.  I am going to have to be in supreme control of my eating behaviours shortly before and forever after surgery.  We went out with our friends last night in Minneapolis.  One of our friends had RNY about 5 years ago.  Granted, she hasn't felt good lately in general and she's been super stressed out about a lot of things lately but she drank 2 glasses of wine and was incredibly trashed.  Trashed to the point where she was falling asleep. 

Now, I'm not a big drinker.  I'm not really even an occasional drinker.  I get horrible hangovers ever since I started drinking in high school so I learned quite early how much is too much.  I don't see alcohol being a problem for me.  It made me a little frightened to see my friend so inebriated and sick.

I've been looking at a lot of Before/After pictures.  I can't wrap my head around being smaller.  I've been overweight for my whole adolescent and adult life.  I'm afraid of how to deal with losing so much weight.  I'm afraid of being one of those people who, no matter how well I follow the rules, doesn't lose the weight like I should.  I know this is incorrect because back in 2003 when we went to Las Vegas, I was so incredibly anxious that I hardly ate and with that and all the walking we did, by the time we came home in 4 days I had lost 10 pounds.  I know it's possible but I can't seem to understand it or believe it.

As you can tell my brain is all over the place.  I'm excited like you wouldn't believe.  I want to be healthier and skinnier.  I want to know what I look like not fat.  Not overweight.  Not morbidly obese.  Waiting is frustrating.  Looking back, I've come a long way since January when I started making appointments.