Steve J.
August 3, 2005
Aug 02, 2005
There have been a lot of new posters on the
Cali
board lately. That's so cool!!! It wasn't long ago that I found OH and then found my way to the
Cali
board. That was quite a discovery for me! I just read and read and read and learned and learned and learned. It took a bit for me to start posting as I still felt like an outsider not understanding the ropes and relationships. When I did finally start to post folks here jumped right in and welcomed me with open arms. Only then did I come to understand that the dynamics here are fluid and when you jump in you make your own ripples that cross some folks paths, bypass others and no matter what there are people that will make sure you don't sink and will help you keep your head above water. Quite amazing actually. People post about many things but it always comes down to the support, IMHO. Sharing their experiences helps others get a bigger picture of this WLS journey. Sharing your experiences helps one to understand your own journey as you travel the path. So many people, so many stories. So many calling out for help, understanding, advice. So many willing to offer all that and more. We run the gamut, we
Cali
Board Peeps. All for one and one for all seems an appropriate quote. From you my awesome angel, strong, loving and supportive like a Mama Bear, to the profound writings of that other desert goddess, my Sistermoon, Jeannie, who never fails to shake us up, push us to expand our awareness, stake her claim in this crazy world, leaving many speechless and some quite confused too I suspect! LOL All the way to the warm fuzzies and cheerleading of my buddy Mary Ann and Jodi W. You find everything and anything here... be thankful that this place exists people. Just remember that when you get pissed about something here. OH is quite the resource and, like us, not perfect, but boy oh boy wouldn't the WLS world be lacking without it? It's all good to be sure!
August 2, 2005
Aug 01, 2005
Right now I am SO focused on figuring out the insurance situation. I contacted my buddy at my corp office in
Atlanta
July 24, 2005
Jul 24, 2005
Things I am thankful for:
1. My partner Darrell
2. My loving and supportive, and totally crazy, family!
3. My Angel, Janine
4. Hope in the possibilities of WLS
5. obesityhelp.com
AMOS is the greatest resource for the obese person. The people here, by and large, are the kindest, most helpful, caring and inspiring people I have ever had the good fortune to come to know. Daily I am amazed at the journeys, the profiles, and the helpful and supportive posts here on the
Cali
board as well as other boards. Sometimes, IMHO, a little more decorum, diplomacy and good manners might help ease some of the flaming and hurt feelings that seem to occur here but, hey, it's a diverse world, thank God!! People have many facets, differing perspectives, feelings, opinions and this is an open forum. So head butting is going to happen. Just try to have more empathy and realize your truth is not THE truth. I try to always keep that in mind and in my life it seems to have helped my heart, mind and soul to always learn and expand and find new horizons to aim for. People are awesome, each and every one of you. A dear woman I knew years ago introduced me to one of my favorite quotes when I told her I had been running into hostility when people found out I was gay: She gave me a big hug, looked me in the eye and said, just remember Steve, God don't make no junk. So the way I see it everyone has positive and negative aspects to their personality, has done wonderful things and not so kind things to others and themselves, has been loved and loved others, has been disliked, hated and been looked down on and disliked, hated and looked down on others, has had horrible sorrow, and fear, and been confused. Many times we lash out at others when feeling trapped in bad feelings. Many times we don't understand why others disrespect us or don't seem to understand us. Many times we don't want to take responsibility for our words, behavior or actions. But what is, is. What's done is done. The past cannot be changed. Taking responsibility for our words, actions and life is the only sure way to self respect; again IMHO. Deep down we all wish to be respected, cared about, held and comforted. Yet I feel many of us here don't grant ourselves the respect, self care and personal comfort we deserve as living, breathing human beings. So peeps please know ALL of you here at OH are beautiful, deserving humans that are awesome to know as I watch you put one foot in front of the other, day after day in the journey we call life! Thank you all so much for being here and being involved. I have learned so much from everyone here in the last 5 months. I cannot begin to thank you all enough for the words of wisdom, recipes, support, laughs, hugs, compassion, advice, and friendships.
1. My partner Darrell
2. My loving and supportive, and totally crazy, family!
3. My Angel, Janine
4. Hope in the possibilities of WLS
5. obesityhelp.com
AMOS is the greatest resource for the obese person. The people here, by and large, are the kindest, most helpful, caring and inspiring people I have ever had the good fortune to come to know. Daily I am amazed at the journeys, the profiles, and the helpful and supportive posts here on the
July 22, 2005
Jul 22, 2005
Man, sometimes it is HARD. Responses to my post were to call and go see the surgeon, don’t be so hard on yourself and obesity is a disease. All true and I did feel better getting those perspectives. So lesson learned here dear reader? If you have a struggle going on be sure to post and seek advice, words of wisdom and directions from those that know the path!I called Mark @ WB Thursday morning and was told than Sandee, the bariatric nurse, was still working on my file and it had not been sent to the insurance company yet. I was surprised at this. My thoughts were they had everything ready to go and as soon as they got that last letter, BAM, off the request went. As you can tell I really am still getting to know how all this stuff works. It is not quite the efficient, well oiled machine I am used to from working in the private sector business world. So I figure I’ll call again on Thursday the 28th and check the status. No biggie. I have been getting used to the flow of this, and I have to say some of the stories of the hoops others here need to jump thru to get to the Losers Bench make me feel like a spoiled brat! When I asked about an appointment with Dr. Krahn Mark told me no, not now. The routine would be at this point (and I think it all depends on WHO you talk in the office to as to what the procedure is at any given time by the way):>submit to insurance;>approval would likely be given within two weeks;>then I need to schedule a 4 hour orientation class;>after the class we would schedule surgery, right now a six to eight week window. If everything were to happen quickly and smoothly it looks like surgery around the middle of October. We’ll look back here and see how accurate that guess is!! LOL
July 21, 2005
Jul 21, 2005
I was up last night from about 1:30 - 3:30. Could have been the bag of cookies and large chocolate bar I ate watching TV before I went to sleep. Earlier I was e-mailing with Barb McGraw (we have the same surgeon) as I canceled my appt with my surgeon that I was to go to this afternoon. Why you ask? Because I haven't lost any weight. Gained a few pounds as a matter of fact. This appointment was a check up for weight loss. So here I am, feeling like a failure again, and as usual I turn to stuffing my face to try to feel better. But I woke up sick to my stomach, feeling guilty and freaked out in the middle of the night. Sorry my Angel.... not my usual morning rise and shine post but I am not happy with myself and am feeling out of control just as things are progressing for my WLS. Two days ago I was happy then I crashed. Can't figure it out. I am too close to the subject (myself) to be objective. Well, enough of that. It will be OK in the long run and this will pass. Please send some positive thoughts my way that I find the strength to deal with my emotions and get some weight off before surgery!!!
July 20, 2005
Jul 19, 2005
Well, finally, I received the Psych eval letter giving the OK for WLS Monday the 18th. Tuesday morning I called Mark @ WB and faxed the letter then verified he had received it. So they have everything they wanted to submit for insurance approval.
July 16, 2005
Jul 15, 2005
Oh My God! One REALLY needs to follow up on their own when it comes to health care I guess. Although I have read over and over about needing to be the squeaky wheel I seem to operate in the “out of sight, out of mind” mode! Father forgive me. It is almost a month since my last posting. LOL Man o man, I gotta tell you to keep calling and calling to be sure things are where they need to be. Both my PCP and Psych had not sent off the letters of clearance. It’s OK because I KNOW and understand they are busy and you need to be proactive. So since I take too much for granted, and maybe am dragging my feet a bit as well, I haven’t been keeping on top of things as much as I probably need to. The Psych thing was SO screwed up I don’t know if I can explain it! Seems when I last went to see him and asked Western Bariatrics to fax over what they needed there was a big mis-understanding. What was faxed was a letter of clearance of some OTHER patient with the name and patient info whited out. NO COVER LETTER OF EXPLAINATION! So when I was in with the Psych he had this on the top of my chart and told me I’d be fine with the surgery. So I figured he was writing the letter. WRONG!! They were thinking it was MY letter they had and that they didn’t need to do anything except tell me yeah, you’re OK. It took a couple weeks and three people at the Psychs office after a dozen phone calls back and forth to get the drift. In my opinion all because Western Bariatrics (WB from now on) didn’t fax a cover letter explaining this was an example of what they needed from Dr. Kohut for me. Sheese. This last conversation was on Friday 07/01. Deb at the Psych’s office told me she had talked to the Dr. and since he was working over the holiday weekend he would dictate the letter to be transcribed and sent. Cool. I checked back with her on Tuesday morning and she let me know that he had done so and the gal that does the transcribing would be in that afternoon and hopefully it would be in the mail that day. If not then the next day. Imagine my surprise when I called Mark @ WB on Wednesday 07/14 to make sure they had everything to find out they never got the letter from the Psych. So-o-o-o I call and had to leave a message for Deb as they were closed. I called her at lunch yesterday and she found the dictated letter had not been transcribed yet. She PROMISED that she would make sure it was done and sent to ME at home that day. We’ll see. (UPDATE: As I was typing this Dr. Kohut’s office called (on a Saturday???) to make sure where she was to send the letter. So maybe I will see it in a couple of days after all.) So, as for my PCP there was a blood test I had done the morning I had my Upper GI (06/16) that they never had received the results of. (I called his office on 7/7 to check on the letter). They got the results sent to them and he got the letter written and faxed to Western Bariatrics last Wednesday (07/13). I know this because, as I mentioned in the previous paragraph, I called Mark @ WB and he had this letter but not the Psych eval. Well, guess we will be submitting to insurance this coming week, fingers crossed. It’s odd; I keep thinking of life AFTER surgery and it is almost euphoric to think of living without the fat suit. BUT there is the other side of the coin that washes in almost at the same time…. SURGERY….. NO FOOD FOR COMFORT OR STRESS RELIEF… NO FAT SUIT TO MAKE ME INVISABLE… DUMPING…. PAIN…. ETC…Hey, that’s life, and if I want to stick around for a good many more years I truly believe I need to have this done and get the weight off. And I do want to stick around a while. So there you have it. On the upside, last weekend was my first get together with OH folks. We had a gathering in
Las Vegas
and it was great. I’m so glad Mary Ann and Celest put this out there. It was wonderful to visit and ask questions of the post-ops and listen to their experiences. Looking forward to seeing these folks again and meeting those I haven’t met!
July 12, 2005
Jul 11, 2005
Vegas Weekend
07/8 - 07/11/2005 -
Treasure
Mirage and
Kahunaville Dinner @
FRONT ROW, left to right:
Josie, Janine, Gary and Mary Ann.
SECOND ROW:
Celest, Sylvia, Liz, Robyn, Lucy and David.
BACK ROW:
Lynette, Sheryl, Nancy, Dani C, Mary and Susan.
The Tall Guy in the Back? Me, Steve! LOL
Check out my PictureTrail for all the pictures:
http://www.picturetrail.com/gallery/view?p=999&gid=7890758&uid=3424164
June 23, 2005
Jun 23, 2005
Here it is Thursday morning, and summer has arrived. Nice and hot the last two days here in the
June 18, 2005
Jun 18, 2005
Found this reading Mary Ann's
(POTW right now, you go gurl!!)
profile and liked it!
|
You Are a Prophet Soul |
|
You are a gentle soul, with good intentions toward everyone.Selfless and kind, you have great faith in people.Sometimes this faith can lead to disappoinment in the long run.No matter what, you deal with everything in a calm and balanced way. You are a good interpreter, very sensitive, intuitive, caring, and gentle.Concerned about the world, you are good at predicting people's feelings.A seeker of wisdom, you are a life long learner looking for purpose and meaning.You are a great thinker and communicator, but not necessarily a doer. Souls you are most compatible with: Bright Star Soul and Dreaming Soul |
About Me
Inland Empire, CA
Location
25.0
BMI
Surgery
12/01/2006
Surgery Date
Surgeon
Mar 06, 2005
Member Since
