Scared and uncertain vsg'er

Hello all!

I am considering having a vsg. I have met with the surgeon and had a consultation with the psychologist. My next step is pre op testing. Before meeting with the psychologist I was very confident about having this surgery....now for some reason I am having a lot of doubts. I have A lot of back problems and know if I loose this weight I will feel so much better. I have pain everyday from the back issues but for some reason I am scared of the pain from surgery and I think it might go back to when I had a hysterectomy years ago. It was Themistocles horrible experience I've ever had. 20 staples in your stomach is not fun. I'm hoping it's nothing like that. Mind you I've had two spinal operations and they weren't hard to deal with. Also I worry about is this really going to help me control my appetite. I know you have todo the work but does it help quite a bit? Thank you all in advance and I look forward to hearing from you.

For me, surgery and recovery was a breeze. Really. It's laproscopic surgery now, they don't "open you up". I was discharged the next afternoon, went home with some pain meds that I didn't need. Rested for a few days and was fine. Had to be sure to keep moving, and I had no problems getting fluids down. My biggest fear pre-op was anesthesia....but I think that's a fear everyone has, and the risk is so minimal, it wasn't worth the worry when you think about it.

VSG was the best thing I ever did for myself...no regrets whatsoever. There will always be "friends and family" who will tell you horror stories. Take them with a grain of salt. Do some more reading here and you will learn so much and your mind will be eased.

Best of luck.

Thank you for your reply. I will definitely keep reading about others experiences. Thanks you again.

It's ok to have doubts & be a little scared. I think you're anticipating the pain from surgery & comparing it to your other surgeries. I think its hard to compare past surgeries to figure out how this one will feel like. You might be making it more than it is in your head than something that it'll actually be.

For me the pain from surgery is temporary & after the first couple of days I felt much better. Surgery has helped as far as physical hunger. Head hunger though, an unending battle it feels like. Hunger for me post op is so much more different than it was pre op.

My hunger signals are not as strong, even now & I'm 3 years out. There's been days where I wasn't hungry all day, but part of this is because of what I was eating also. I noticed that whenever I upped my carbs, especially simple carbs, my hunger signals were a lot stronger than if I had more dense protein & less carbs.

Good luck in whatever you choose to do.

Everyone is different, but for me I had no pain after leaving the hospital. The worst experience for me was honestly getting the IV put in because I hate needles. I was up the day after I got home doing light house work, playing video games, feeding my dogs. Not going to lie though, when I woke up from surgery there was a good deal of pain at first. Most of it came from discomfort in bed and having weighed 477 lbs. I dont regret it for a second even with that bit of pain.

I had so little pain from my VSG that it was almost as if nothing was even done to me. The nurses had to beg me to take the painkillers... I never needed them.

So - a little long, but --

Two C-Sections, 3 knee arthroscopies, one ankle rebuild, 1/2 of thyroid removed, ovary removed. VSG.

VSG was a walk in the park. I went into the hospital on Tuesday morning and was discharged on Wednesday around noon. I used one dose of nausea meds after getting home (the car ride made me a little sick to my stomach) and took on pain pill on the first day home.

On Monday after surgery, I was back at the office.

This isn't going to control your appetite, but it will limit the amount of food you can consume before you feel ill.

What I can tell you is that since I've lost about 94 pounds, my bone on bone knees hurt a lot less. I'll be able to put off replacements for another 5-7 years. Before VSG, I was using 1 Vicodin a day for knee pain. I haven't taken a narcotic for knee pain since about a month after surgery when I really started working out hard.

I can tell you that I can do things now that I haven't done in 20 years. That I fence (as in en garde) 4 hours a week and am in the gym for another 2. In about a week, I'm going to start riding my bike to work one day a week (6 miles each way).

I was scared before surgery too. And that's natural. Surgery is scary. But I can tell you that after the first month or so, I never felt the staples in my stomach. Today, I went to brunch with extended family and ate about 1/4 of what was on my plate. But no one noticed because we were talking and laughing. This was one of the best decisions I've ever made.

Best of luck on your journey.

Thank you so very much for all of your useful information. Makes me feel a lot better. ?

The surgery is a tool that can help you reach your goals. It took me a while before I was ready to accept that the things I was trying to lose weight were not going to get me the results I wanted, and NEEDED.

I think that it is normal to have some concerns. If someone made a list of "Things That Might Hurt", surgery would certainly be on that list.

I've had 2 c-sections, my appendix out, and 2 hernia repairs. I was pleasantly surprised that my VSG was less painful than any of those previous surgeries.

I did have some pain/tightness at the upper part of the new stomach. The surgeon drew me a quick sketch to show what it looked like now, and I understood why. I think it would've been helpful to use his diagram in the pre-op class, rather than the less accurate one from the medical supply company.

For me, once the nerves healed, I'm able to feel "full". Also, if I overeat? It feels like hell, so I don't.

although people are all across the board when it comes to pain after surgery, most of us seem to have little to no pain..