lindy7767

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Yesterday, I had my two week follow up with Dr Barker.  He said that everything is looking and sounding normal.  He did kid me about needing a few more complaint lines on his form.  I just wanted to make sure that everything I was feeling was normal.  It was.  Glad to hear that .  According to his scales, I was down a total of 19 lbs so far.  Yippee!!!    

The office finally gave me my release notice to go back to work.  I was actually very excited...finally!!!  I start back on 2/12.  I am not looking forward to the long days, but I am looking forward to getting back into the routine of my normal life.

He is such a wonderful doctor.  He has definitely been much more personable in the follow up appointments.  I think that before the surgery he just wants to let everyone make up their own mind and he keeps a real business/professional type attitude.  Once you are on the other side, he is definitely very personable and seems very genuine in the success of his patients.  

I love his whole staff.  Every one of them always have a great sunny disposition in their attitudes, even when their offices are jam packed.  You can tell that this comes out of their admiration for working for Dr Barker.  When I watch him talk to his staff thru the windows from the lobby, you can just tell they he is such a down to earth, compassionate person.

Anyone who is considering WLS, or  has family considering weight loss in Dallas should seriously visit with Dr Barker.   I have had my mom, my mother in law, my sister, my niece and my husband all mention how nice Dr Barker is.  All of them have been with me either at an appt, at the hospital, etc. and have visited with Dr Barker.

So far, mostly I have been eating oatmeal, mashed potatoes, sf pudding, sf popsicles, water and protein shakes. 

Yesterday, I was able to tolerate refried beans from Taco Bell.  The small made two meals for me.  I am looking forward to adding some new stuff.

I am not hungry and I am having trouble getting in six small meals and all of my protein and water.  But I am sure trying.  I just have no appetite and desire.  I want to try to drink more water though, because I can tell my skin is feeling really dry.  

I am still loosing 1 lb a day.  I need to get in more excercise, because I know this along with getting more protein and drinking my water in will help me loose more like I need to.

I am going on a plane in March and April, so I am looking forward to being fitting very comfortably in the seats and down the isles and having plenty of energy.

I sure hope this weight loss stays on track.  So far, I have lost  15.4 lbs since I had my second pre-op appointment on December 22, 2006.  Since surgery, I have lost about 12 lbs.  Loving it.  Just can't wait til the engery is back, the pain is completely gone and I can start Stage 3 foods.

I got my staples out and just have the tape on now for a week.  My doctor's office wants me to stay at home for at least another week.  I am glad, because I haven't had the level of energy that I think would be needed to be back at work full time.  I sure hope to get more walking in, so I can have the endurance to go back to work and set at my desk all day.  I know food intake and walking is the big key.  My husband is going to tak me to a mall to get some indoor walking. 

This is my first post since I have been home from surgery.  Today is the first day that I have felt like even turning the computer on.  

The surgery went well as can be expected.  I had two surgeries in one, so I guess that explains why my recovery has been a little longer than expected at this point.

When I came out of surgery, I was freezing and in a lot of pain. The nurse advised me that I had already been given as much pain RX as they could give, but the doctor had ordered a patient controlled device.  She said that the pain I was experiencing is from the gas.  I know anytime they do a Lap type surgery, they have to use gas to get you blown up enough to get in there and work.  I have had to lap surgeries before, but nothing prepared me for this pain.  I guess because they had to do two surgeries at once, more gas was needed. 

After I got to the room, they discovered that my IV had blown my vein, so they had to move it to my hand.  Meanwhile, forgetting to take out the old IV, leaving it there hanging until my mother in law prompted them to take action and get it out.  (Always a good reason to have someone accertive in the hospital room with you after surgery.)  I am actually allergic to Morphine,so the medicine I was receiving was Demoral.  Apparently I am allergic to it as well, because every time I pushed the control button, my hand and arm shivered with pain and then my body itched all over, it took me about 10 - 15 minutes to get settled down.  In all, I had to go thru 2 medicine pump vials in the short time I was there.  I think I got up to 150CC's on Wednesday and a 130CC's on Thursday.  

Thursday, I was release about 2:30PM, I went home feeling pretty good.  Friday morning, I was feeling pretty good, following my instructions as directed, took my shower and took the On Q Pump pain medicine out as directed.  Quite an experience.  In all, feeling pretty good.  

Friday night and all day Saturday were extremely rough for me.  I had immense gas/bloating/pain along with diarrhea.  I stopped taking the Lortab, because it supposedly gives you gas.  I started taking the liquid Tylenol.  By Saturday morning, the liquid tylenol was making me sick too even drink.  I know TMI, but I want to remember the suffering that I have gone thru in this process, so when I get to my goal, I will know the road wasn't easy, but worth it...or at least I hope.  

Sunday, another day of gas/bloating and pain.  I slept and mostly just drank water.  I could barely get down a protein drink.  Late into the night, I was feeling rather sorry for myself, thinking what have I done and hoping that things would really start getting better soon. I hate to just lie around.  It's been long enough now.

Monday, I am starting to feel a bit better.  I am really tired of having to sleep on my back.   I am a side and stomach sleeper, so this is really getting old.  Hopefully it's just a few more days.  I think I am about to start my cycle, so I am not looking forward to the immense pain this brings with it.  The nurse warned me that it would probably be around the corner.

Well...I can say that I am definitely loosing weight, because I have not felt like eating/drinking anything but water.  So my calorie intake has dropped immensely.  I can't wait until my follow up appointment Thursday morning @ 10AM with Dr Barker to get the official results of how much I have lost since I started this process.

Thanks to everyone for their love and prayers...I have definitely felt them.

Love,
Lindy

Hello All,
This is Cindy posting to let everyone know that Lindy came out of surgery approximately 1pm yesterday and the Doctor said everything went well and while they were performing the surgery noticed she had a hiyatal (sp?) hernia that they also repaired. They will keep her until around 1pm today assuming all goes well.  She just called me (8:15 a.m.) and she seemed to be in really good spirts and was at a 2-3 pain level.  Last night when I was visiting her she said she was at a 7 and mentioned if she knew it was going to be that much pain she might not have had the surgery.   Some of the pain she was having was with the iv being in the same hand as the morphine injection and when she would push the morphine button it was hurting really bad so they moved the iv.  Later she said she didn't think it was even given her meds but I'm sure it was.  I was glad to hear she was much more alert and her pain has lowered today.  If I have time and/or if there are any updates, I'll post more later.  Thank you in advance for your continued prayers for Lindy during this time.  She still has a long road ahead of her in the success of this weight loss battle.

Well, I am on my fifth day of the liquid diet.   According to my scales here at the house, I now weight 226.6. The doctor's office, with clothes on is 234.   So, I am not really sure if I have lost what I need to loose before the surgery or not.   I think the big thing is geting mentally ready to embark on this journey.  I have been researching different protein smoothie drinks on the internet, since I am not real crazy about the plain old vanilla/chocolate ones.  They aren't too bad, but adding fruit sure does hide the aftertase of the protein.

I am really getting excited, but nervous at the same time.  My nephew Matthew came down today to help my husband Steve put the Christmas stuff back up in the attic...that was a relief.  Now after I get past the pain/fatigue from surgery, I can get with getting my house neatly organized, so we can start the adoption process and home study.  I have always been a very neat/organized person...however the last 3-5 years, I just haven't had any energy to do much at all.  I keep the common area pretty well picked up and neat, but I haven't done the usual spring cleaning of the closets/cabinets and the extra rooms, where things tend to get pushed into when we have company, etc.

I am really looking forward to having more energy and not wanting to sleep for hours upon end.  Sometimes I just don't ever want to get up on the weekends.  My husband has to beg me to get up to go out of the house.  It's even worse during the cold months.  

I am also really ready for us to get things settled with the Pool company.  We never finished the construction phase, although our pool company, Platinum Pools would like to think they completed their good faith workmanship like manner of the contract.  They decided to allow the contractor do dirt birms with drainage by the deck instead of putting in a retainer wall. So, when it rained heavily for the first time, the pool deck raised severely.  This was after the coping and mortar were cracking severely.  They replaced the coping/mortar, but are stating the decking problem is not part of construction, but now they are saying it's not even warranty work.  Fortunately, we have the bank's legal department on our side and they are refusing to allow release of funds as well.  In addition to all of this, we advised them at gunite a problem in our spa.  They didn't fix it right away, the plaster people came in and didn't fix it correctly, then the section that was bad had to be redone, it was redone with the wrong color of plaster, so it had to be redone again.. Now, the plaster is a different color and there is about a 1' by 2' area in the spa that looks discolored.  We have had significant pump and filter problems.  They replaced the filters, but they didn't dig out giant pieces of plaster they left in the pipes.  We had to pay a contractor $85 dollars to come fix this.  My husband had to drain the spa and he took about 3 cups of large chunks of plaster out of the bottom.  The whole pool construction process has been very stressful.  I just hope that we do not get cheated in the long run.  We picked a very reputable company, but the owner sent a letter to the bank and feels they are owed their money.  Once they receive, then in good faith they will fix the issues.  Yeah right!  We will pay promptly as soon as they just fix what they have messed up or not done properly to begin with.  Oh well.... a very good life lesson is what I chalk this up to.  I know if I could withstand this pool process for over 10 months. We signed the pool contract in late April 2006, excavation was on June 19th.  We only got to swim last season about 3-5 days.  Platinum Pools customer service sucks for us.  Their commercials on TV are a joke.

Okay, enough ranting about the pool...it's obviously just on my mind.  It's a good thing that it is too cold to go out and swim, or I would have to look at the unsightly problem daily and be reminded of their lack of care for customer appreciation.

Well...I better get a few things done around the house, laundry/organizing, etc.  So I can come home to a nice clean house after surgery...Not sure it will stay that way, but at least I can hope.

I had my EGD yesterday @ Doctor's Hospital.  The weather was not good at all.  I woke up to snow/wintery mix.  My mother in law was driving me.  Neither she or I really care to drive in icy weather...but we drove 25-30 miles the whole time and avoided the crazy people who were traveling in the left hand lane.  We saw a few people who had slid off the road into the ditch, but fortunately, we didn't see any major wrecks.  

The hospital was running a little short staffed because of the weather delaying the workers, but most of the worker's at least were not working on a short fuse.  BJ was the nurse who did all of my pre-op work, blood, and IV stick. She did such a great job.  Instead of putting it in the vein on my wrist, she put it under the forearm, it went in like a charm and very little to no pain.  I was highly impressed.  I have had at least 5 sedations before in my life, and that usually has been one of my greatest fears, because it just plain hurts and then the pain lasts for weeks afterwards.  I am not feeling a thing now.  My only complaint was how cold it was in the area where I was being prepped.

When I went up to the surgery waiting area, I met the anesthesiologist, Monica and the nurse Jo.  Both were very friendly in comforting me and explaining what to expect.  I was very impressed with how genuinely happy and friendly the staff was.  Dr Barker came by to say hi, in between procedures.    

After coming home, I felt extremely exhausted and even had a hard time waking up the next day for work.

I have been on my liquids for 2 days now.  I have done really well, except I think I might have been having a caffeine headache earlier today.  I had some Crystal Lite Energy that has a small amount of caffeine and it went away.  

I am really getting excited about my surgery on 1/24/2006.

Ok, I have loaded the only two pictures that I have electronically on this computer.  I couldn't load the more recent picture to my avatar, because it was too big. So for now, at least you somewhat have an idea of what I look like/use to look like.  More to come... when I get my flash drive out, I will put some pictures of me and my wonderful, supportive husband, family, friends.  My twin is really up on this internet blogging and creating neat website pages...so maybe I will get her to help me out too. 

It's only a few days until I go in for my EGD. My date is January 17th.   start my liquid diet this day as well.  My husband is going to try the liquid diet with me, even though he is not having the surgery. Then he is going to get strict and follow Weight Watchers.  He has been successful before on Weight Watchers, so I am sure he will do well.

I am anxious about the surgery and ready to get started with weight loss.  I have found that I have been very motivated and in really good spirits the last few weeks.  I have had a very positive disposition, which I think really helps mentally when it comes to surgery.  

I am looking forward to being off of work, because the last year at work has been really stressful.  We built a pool last summer and that has ended up being somewhat stressful as well, because the builder didn't finish on time and we had alot of problems along the way. We still haven't settled construction related issues and are hoping we don't have to go into a legal battle.  The good thing is that when the weather gets nice again, I can go swimming.  I have alot of feet problems and just about any excercise that involves putting pressure on my feet simply puts me in a state of pain. My podiatrist says to ride a bicycle and swim.  So that's going to be my main work out strategy.  I am still going to try to walk 30 minutes a day too and take Yoga at least 1 day a week.  I love Yoga because it helps me reduce my stress levels.

Well, I hope I can keep up with posting at least once a week. I am not big on sharing my life story, but I have found reading others really helps me know what this Weight loss journey is like, so I know that by sharing, this is what helps people make serious life decisions that are helpful to their success.

Best of luck to all of those having surgery this week. 

Hello. I am new to the site and just learning to get around.  I have not been on a blog website before, so it may take a while for me to learn how to get around.

I look forward to meeting other people who have gone thru WLS and/or who are considering it.

Sincerely,
Lindy