Surprise Sleeve

Hi everyone,

I am from Ontario, Canada, and up here, RNY is the go-to surgery. DS is almost never done, and VSG is pretty rare (maybe 10%). So, I was expecting RNY. Most of the pre-op classes and appointments focused on RNY. When I woke up from surgery, I found out they performed the sleeve on me. Apparently there was an access issue. So, now I feel like I need to do a bunch more reading.

What info do you think is most important for me to know? My surgery was just on Monday, so at this point I'm just focusing on water, protein shakes and my vitamins. I'm not tolerating anything very well (intense pressure feeling with small sips) but it's getting a little better each day.

Normally, I have a really high pain tolerance, but the pain in my left side is brutal. It didn't help that I got run over by a large metal racking cart on my way out of the hospital (she couldn't stop it and I couldn't get out of the way.) I think I guarded my side with my arm pretty well, but that still may be contributing to the pain. How long does the side pain normally last?

I'm sorry for your surprise! VSG is a great surgery, just like the RNY. Really, I don't see a difference other than from a medical stand point. We can all eat the same, live the same, etc. I do think RNY people absorb less than we do and need more vitamins overall, but we all need vitamins for life, so please take them!

For me, I only had pain the first day out of the hospital. In the hospital, it was bad, but that was in my back more than anything from laying on the surgery table. I was up and doing semi-normal things (slowly and easily) in a few days. Though, it took maybe 3 weeks before I could sleep on my side, which was horrible since I'm a side sleeper.

I think the best advice for you right now would be to take things slow! If something hurts, don't pu**** You're swollen from a major surgery, so take care of your new sleeve :)

Thank you, it looks like you have had great success with it, which was one of my fears. It is possible to get there, and that's good to know.

I grew up taking a whole whack of vitamins, so it's just same old same old for me. The only change will be scheduling them appropriately.

Wow, that must be a bit disconcerting! That said, I believe that most of your food rules will be the same. You still eat small portions either way, though your stomach was revised differently. For the VSG, they removed the fundus of your stomach to make a banana shaped sleeve. The fundus is where a lot of your hunger hormones are secreted. Some people say they never really feel hungry again and have to eat by the clock, some (like me) experience a return of hunger, but it is duller and easier to make go away with even a small bit of food.

For me, it was my right incision that hurt the most and the longest. It was the incision through the rectus muscle, so that makes sense. I was slower to recover than many. While I was back at work within 2 weeks, I was sore on my right for some time after. However, I did not experience that serious fatigue that some do. My body would get sore, but if activity was light, I was as wakeful as normal.

Almost everything will be the same between the two surgeries. The recovery is the same. Short and long term, the way you eat and drink should be exactly the same.

You might need fewer vitamins long term. But you might not. The biggest difference will likely be the prospect for gerd. VSG end up with reflux pretty often, and may need to be on a PPI .

At least for those in my surgeons practice, we pretty much go through the same experiences. We have the same water goals, transition to food the same way and take the same vitamins. It appears that the biggest difference for some people is the pace of weight loss (though I lost pretty fast), and the possible future issues. GERD would be the main possible future complication for VSG, where there are other issues for Post-RNY (better described by someone with an RNY but a few of the ones which OH people seem to mention are ulcers, reactive hypoglycemia, dumping, or malabsorption related).