A challenge for the "Newbie"

TRACY-okay, girl-now that you are POSTING-no more LURKING allowed!!

CONGRATS on your upcoming WLS, and for taking control of your future and your HEALTH!

I am impressed that you are a VSGer - what kind of foods do you eat? I am getting ready to start soft foods. And do heavy weights (I am BMI 57) ever lose all their weight with a sleeve?

Hi,

Yes, I lost all the weight I wanted to lose with the sleeve.  I lost 105 pounds and have maintained my weight loss now for 3 1/2 years.

What kind of food do I eat?  When I was losing weight I only ate about 800 calories a day, and no more than 25 carbs per day. And I also exercise 5 days a week too.  Now that I have lost the weight I make sure I eat my protein first, I have at least 70 grams of protein each day--for me I still drink a protein drink every morning for breakfast and that is about all I have for breakfast.

Lunch I start out with protein--I eat a lot of chicken, turkey and fish.  I do not eat much red meat--I used to be a red meat eater all the time.  Then I have some veggies--sometimes a salad or a 1/2 of sandwich made with whole grain bread.  I put lots of veggies and some protein on my sandwich.  Dinner is more protein, fresh veggies and fruit.  I never feel deprived.  I do have some desert now and then--just not every day.  I also have learned to make deserts with splenda. I have a book that I love and it is about low carb cooking.  My husband eats all the same foods that I eat.  I eat small amounts of things.

I learned that sometimes just having the taste was all I needed, I didn't need a large amounts of the food, just a few bites.  Everythig in moderations, because you will have a new small stomach.  It is your new tool and you have to learn to work with it. 

For me carbs were my down fall and I had to start to learn to read all kinds of labels and figure out how to eat without having a lot of carbs. There are good carbs and bad carbs.  NO white flour things or sugar only whole grain when ever you can.  NOT whole wheat, but whole grain.

If you have more questions, please feel free to ask any thing you want.

Hugs,
Suzanne

Hi I'm a Newbie and I accept your challenge!  I'm off the fence and ready to make a change in my life!
Your post is very  inspiring!

Thank you!

P DIVA-love the name! When OH had their first national convention, in Tx, in 2004, we all had "Diva names". I still use mine, in our local group (Nurse Diva)...I even still have my tee shirt (somewhere!)..There's a Diva in all of us, isn't there? Or at least there SHOULD be!!

WELCOME !! I hope you post often, and start feeling comfortable to start telling us about yourself

On March 9, 2012 at 10:34 PM Pacific Time, phatdivabbw wrote: Hi I'm a Newbie and I accept your challenge!  I'm off the fence and ready to make a change in my life!
Your post is very  inspiring!

Thank you! Hi,

Yeah!!!! you have taken the first step and it is a BIG step.  You will never regret this.  I have a couple of things that I have written before and I am going to post them for you.  First of all I highly recommend having a weight loss surgery and my choices was a "Sleeve"  It is easy and it makes life 500% better.  I also recommend Dr. Aceves.  I have no idea what you are considering or you want.  So we have to start some place.  Read the things I am send you.  It is long so print it out.  After reading this, start asking me questions.

Hugs,
Suzanne

This information is about my experience with Dr. Aceves and have weight loss surgery for a "Sleeve"

Volume # 1

Hi Everyone, I decided that I would make a list of things for new people who are thinking about having WLS that might be helpful to them. This is long so please PRINT THIS OUT TO READ if you don’t want to read it all at one time.  

1.  First thing is to start asking people on the board you are on all kinds of questions—make of list of things you want to ask and keep coming back and ask more questions as time goes on. The more questions that ask the more you educate yourself about WLS and the process and what doctor they liked. Don’t rely on just one source of information. It is really normal to have all kind of feeling and emotions when trying to decide if you want to have Weight Loss Surgery. I must have talked myself in and out of doing this at least 50 times during my 6 months of research. My only regret is that I didn’t do it sooner. This is a big step. But if diet and exercise worked for us then we still wouldn’t be fat and would have lost the weight a long time ago and never regained it. It takes a lot of courage to have Weight Loss Surgery. I am very proud of you for looking into this. Don’t give any more days of your life being overweight, and your body hurting along with being unhealthy. WLS really is your answer.

 

2. How do you select your surgeon? First of all this is NOT a time to price shop for the cheapest doctor to do your WLS—that is just the wrong way to go at this. There are a lot of doctors who advertise on the Internet doing sleeve surgery for a lot less than some other doctors. I found one posting from a person who had the following concerns after having surgery in Tijuana, Mexico. (a) They put NO name band on her to be able to ID her when giving medications or anything else. (b) NO one asked if she had any allergies to foods or medications—thank goodness this person didn’t have any. (b) The lab did NOT label tubes of blood with the person’s name on it—very dangerous. (c) Day after surgery they gave this person ice chips, tea and apple juice. The next day (day 2) they gave this person NOTHING so this person asked why and the nurse said this person wasn’t allowed to eat anything. Well, this person then said I had clear liquids the day before and they wanted to know WHO gave it to this person?? (d) This person was told that they would get a copy of the operative report on their discharge to take home with them—This person has not received it yet and that was about 2 weeks ago. So make sure have positive feedback about the Surgeon and Staff and Hospital that you choose. My choice after 6 months of research was Dr. Aceves in Mexicali, Mexico. What I can tell you in my opinion is that he is the very best you will ever find to do your surgery. I can only speak about my experience and my research that I did before I made him my choice for a surgeon.

 

3. Pack lightly for your WLS. So many of us have gone to Mexico, so you want a small suitcase with wheels, a laptop & a cell phone. The clothing that you wear to Mexico are the same ones you can wear home—slip on shoes work great too. Make sure that the clothing is loose fitting. Something just comfortable for your ride home. While in Mexico—that is if you go to Mexico for WLS make sure you take GAS-X. They have nothing in Mexico that they give your for gas, and the use gas in your abdominal area during surgery. It is painful after the surgery, so GAS-X STRIPS are easy to use by just placing them on your tongue. Take a couple of boxes with you—you will be glad you did. If you are going to use a credit card make sure you tell your credit card company and your Bank if you use your debit card or credit card. Sometimes if you DO NOT let these companies know you are outside of the US they block your charges. Use a credit card or debit card vs ca**** is much easier to use. Take small amounts of cash for tips—I took $45.00 in 1’s for tip money for various things. If you go to any hospital anywhere leave ALL jewelry at home –just a watch and no rings or other jewelry. I never had any problems at all leaving my purse and computer& cell phone in my room while I was in surgery, but they recommend that you leave all jewelry at home.  If you are a lady please remove all nail polish—they need it removed to see your nail beds during surgery.

 

4. The first month you do after surgery is the HARDEST month you will ever have to do. You do 10 days of nothing but clear liquids to start with—that means you have to be able to see through the liquid. Do not panic if you can not get the protein they want you to have the 1^st 10 days—I couldn’t find anything I liked that was clear during the 1^st 10 days. They want you to try to drink 64 oz each day, and I don’t think I could ever get that much water drank—just do the best you can. Your new stomach has just had major surgery and it is swollen and will only hold something about the size of your thumb. The next 10 days gets much better—you are now on creamy liquids for these 10 days. You can now have some creamy soups, yogurt, and pudding—sugar free and find a protein drink that you like. For me it is Premier Protein Drink and I get mine at Costco. When looking for a protein drink, make sure they are low in calories, high in Protein—Premier has 30 grams of protein in each drink box and make sure you have low carbs too. I know there are a lot of other protein drinks out there that people like. When it comes to carbs I tried to keep mine at no more than 20 carbs per day. Ask others what kind of Protein drinks they liked and where they get them. The last 10 days are mushy foods. So this is a bit of a challenge. How many foods can I make mushy? I even considered using some baby foods. Start thinking about what will work as mushy foods for you.

 

5. Starting the 2^nd month is quite an adventure. You can eat regular food. Here is where the relearning process takes place. You now will take tiny BABY BITES of food and chew each bit about 30 times or until it is like a liquid. From here on out you will need to take small bites of food and chew and chew and chew. I found out that chicken and fish were a lot easier to chew up. I don’t eat much red meat—your tastes will change and things you didn’t like a lot might taste good and something that you used to love don’t taste that great anymore. Keep track of what you are eating and keep your calories at about 800 calories per day and no more than 20 carbs per day—whole grain carbs are the best to have—NO white or refined carbs. I highly suggest that you keep track by writing them down or using some of the Internet sites that offers you this. I suggest this site it works great there are other sites to use this is just a suggestion. http://www.livestrong.com/thedailyplate/  It really is good to write down and track everything you put in your mouth to start with—that is how you know that you have not had more than 800 calories per day.

 

6. I want you to understand weight loss surgery is just a tool. The fat does not just melt off of you—they is NO miracle cure. Now you have to put a lot of effort into eating healthy and starting to exercise. Everyone has some kind of exercise that works for them. I love walking and try to walk about 5 days a week.

 

7. For many of us we started to lose some of our hair 3 or 4 months after having WLS. I would find a lot of hair in the shower after washing my hair. That is pretty normal for a lot of us—this does not happen to everyone. There is no magical cure for hair loss—some people use different shampoo’s or take Biotin. It happens and you live with it. YES, it will grow back. For me I had pencil straight hair and mine grew back natural curly and I love it now.  I already had thin hair so for me, I got some cute wigs and wore them for about 9 months until my hair looked a lot better. It was worth the hair loss to lose 105 pounds.

 

8. Because we eat a lot of protein we suffer from constipation. You need to have at least 70 grams of protein EACH day. So I mix my protein drink each morning with MIRALAX. It is NOT habit forming and is tasteless and it is just a good way to start off the day. I put the protein and a cap full of Miralax in the blender with about 5 small ice cubes and that is my breakfast. 3 years later I still have this for breakfast and nothing else, it just works for me.

 

9. You may have periods where you have what we call STALLS. You may be doing everything right and eating and exercising and you have NO weight loss for a week or more. This is normal—mine lasted 9 days. Don’t panic the weight loss will start up again, just keep doing what you are doing.

 

10. Our heads play games with us sometimes it is ugly what our brain tried to convince us of—We call these “Head Games" and they really are tough times to work though, but you can do it. Your head is still thinking with your old brain and way of thinking that you have been doing for most of your life. You now are eating VERY small amount of food, but your head is used to you eating LARGE amounts of food and that is what your brain wants—so it tries to tell you the you should be eating more—NOT true at all. So you need to have a talk with yourself. Do I just WAN T to eat or do I really NEED to eat?

 

11. You are not on a diet, but you are making a LIFESTYLE change and that is good because you can do this for the rest of your life. You will NEVER be able to eat like you used to. That is good because that is how we got fat. You will morn the loss of food—you will look around and see others inhaling all this food and you think to yourself—I used to eat like that.  You will notice how fast people eat and inhale their food and talk and hardly chew what they are eating. That is pretty normal feeling to have—because you are now eating such small amounts of food and chewing and chewing. You will never be able to guzzle a bottle of water again—that is OK too. These are all good things. In time you will look at all the food people are eating and thinking to yourself oh my gosh I could never eat that much again—it is way too much food.

 

12. When you have issues or problems come back to the board and ask others who have already done this. We are here to help and support you.

 

13. Give or exchange all your fat clothes away. You will never need them again after they become too big for you. This weight loss is something you will be able to maintain for the rest of your life. You have earned the right to have new clothes.

 

14. Make sure you have the VERY best doctor that has had a lot of experience with sleeve surgery and check his success rates out. Check the doctor for HIGH patient reviews from the people who have gone to him or her. I can NOT STRESSS this enough. Make sure that your surgery is being done in a hospital NOT a Clinic. One clue that it is a clinic is if they send you to a hotel room to recover—that is why they cost less, this is also dangerous too. YOU are worth the extra money that it cost to have this WLS in a Hospital and by the best Doctor you can have. You want to have a happy and GREAT life and having the RIGHT Doctor and Hospital are the key to this.

  Sorry if this is long, but it is intended to have as a reference and answer a lot of your questions that you might have. For some of you, you are very lucky because your health insurance is now starting to pay for Weight Loss Surgery. For many of this, we did not have your luck, so we are self pay patients. 

There are companies that loan money for this surgery—be aware that their interest rate is high.  Once you pick your doctor ask them about these companies that give loans for surgery if you are a self pay patient.     You know we never think twice about making car payments. If you have to borrow the money for this surgery just look at this as “body payment." It will be the best money you have ever borrowed.   Please PRINT this out to read later. If you have any questions for me please feel free to contact me. I had surgery almost 3 years ago, so I do have quite a bit of experience. I really am here to help you along your journey. It took me 14 months to lose this weight and I was 63 when I had the surgery, so it is NEVER too late in life to do this.

Volume # 2

Here are some more things I want you to know about if you are thinking about having WLS and you are having the “Sleeve."  

1.      We have talked a little or a lot about “slimming or phlegming" In case you missed it, when you first start eating regular food you have to re-learn how to eat again and chew. With your new stomach you will need to take small tiny bites and chew until the food in your mouth is almost liquid like. This is nothing like what you had been doing your entire life. In the past you eat and talk and put big bite in your mouth along with a few chews and then swallowing—this will NO LONGER WORK FOR YOU. This is a very difficult thing to change. So with your new stomach and just having surgery you may experience slimming or Fleming. First you will feel like the food is stuck, then it comes back up in a clear liquid –your saliva. It isn’t vomit, so that is why it is called slimming or Fleming. It’s a wakeup call to slow down you eating and chew, and chew and chew some more. Just go to the bathroom or have a napkin ready for the slimming or Fleming if you are eating out. If you try to overeat—which is bad you may experience this too sometimes. For me it was always about not chewing enough.   

2.    What are some signs that you are full? At first I wasn’t sure, but sometimes I just got tired of all the chewing, so I stopped eating. I now get the hiccups or my noise will start to run when I am full. I know that other people have said they experienced this too.  

3.    It does take some time to retain yourself on how to eating and I know that the first month it is such a process just trying to get all the food in that you need to get in because of your new restrictions.  In time it does get a lot easier. Some people actually mourn the loss of food, because you will NEVER EAT the quantity of food that we used to eat---YEAH that is how we are going to lose the fat and maintain that goal weight that we want to have for the rest of our lives.  

4.    If you think you are hungry and you are positive that you are having physical symptoms of hunger this is YOUR OLD thinking brain playing those tricks we have talked about. You now have to start learning to educate this OLD brain into being your NEW thinking brain. Ask yourself do you just "want to eat" or do you really "need to eat" because it has been 3 or 4 hours since you have eaten anything. It is amazing what our brains can and will do to sabotage our way of thinking. You may be challenged by this OLD brains way of thinking for many years. For me I just have to have some self-talks with myself. We have an addiction to food. There is no way around avoiding food, so we need to find the set of skills that will allow us to change our lifestyle. I eat to live, I NO LONGER live to eat! Food is not my main focus in life.  

5.    I have seen so many times where people are going along and doing great with their weight loss. Then all of a sudden they are NOT losing anything—they panic—I did when it happened to me. We call these “Stalls." We have stalled and are not losing anything. Most of the time you are eating all the same and correct things that you have in the past when you were losing weight. Our body just does this naturally--stalls. Mine lasted 9 days one time. This is really normal. I have a few suggestions. Use this site or something like it to track everything you are putting in your mouth.http://www.livestrong.com/thedailyplate/  You might be surprised at what you are eating—that is why I say track it. Remember keep your total calories at 800 per day—if you exercise then you can eat more. This site will help you figure that out how much more you can it by what kind of exercise you did. You also need to make sure that you are not eating more than 20 carbs per day. No white or refined carbs. They should ONLY be   whole grain carbs—not whole wheat, BUT Whole Grain carbs—do the best you can when it comes to carbs. If you are having problems with the weight loss you can kick up the amount of exercise you are doing too. The weight loss will start back up again, so don’t panic.  

6.    We all stumble and fall along the way, don’t beat yourself up over it. Move on and have a better day the next day.  

7.    Be aware that your friends and family may not be supportive of you having WLS. For your family, first they really may NOT understand it and they are scared for you. This is pretty normal. You have been on the Internet, and been educating yourself and doing a lot of reading—you know much more than they do about weight loss surgery and your choice is the sleeve. They have only heard the horror stories that the media puts out there or one of their uneducated family or friends have told them. Your friends are scared they may lose you as a friend because you are going to lose the weight and they will remain fat—yes I call it fat. I know there are a lot of politically correct terms to use, but if I can say I was fat you will one day too. Some of your friends will be jealous. My suggestion is that you can try to educate them some, but take your time and effort right now and use it for yourself. After you have had WLS and they see you are becoming healthy and you are alive and well they may come around. I want you to put yourself FIRST, for the very first time. If they are truly your friends they will be there when you are skinny.  

8.    The first month will be the hardest month you will have to do. You are changing everything about how you eat. I want you to keep saying to yourself that it is ONLY 30 days and I can do ANYTHING for 30 days. Once you start the 2^nd month and can have regular food, it gets easier.  

9.    What do you do about getting smaller clothes? One of my adventures used to be to go to Resale clothing places and sell or trade my larger clothing to them, and then finding some smaller sizes. Just buy what you need to get by for a while until you need a smaller size. It was like a treasure hunt or an adventure for me. I found some places like Goodwill that had brand name label NEW clothing that the local stores gave them. I found some great deals at these places. So consider doing something like this or getting together with some of your friends and trading clothing. I also donated a lot of mine for a tax deduction to nonprofit organizations that give tax receipts—it is really great when it is tax time rolls around and I had all these deductions. I would make a list of everything I was going to donate and how much weight I had lost. I kept that all together in case the IRS asked why I gave away 20 some dress and 10 pair of pants, and 30 tops!  

10.Make sure that you go see your Primary Care Doctor when you have had WLS if you have gone outside of the US for your surgery. I went to see my PCP before I went to let her know what I was doing—I wanted a doctor who would support me in my efforts. I had to do a bit of education and after she had time to read all of the information I left her, she was behind me all the way. She said come back in to see her after being home for 2 weeks and she would check me over and run a blood panel to see how I was doing. She did this every month for a while and started taking me of meds that I no longer needed. I did need to start taking potassium—mine was low after having WLS and I knew this when I left Dr. Aceves—they had run a blood panel after I had my “Sleeve surgery." I loved the fact that my PCP took me off 4 of my other medications within 3months of me having WLS.   

11. Exercise is important for you in a lot of ways. Walking and swimming are the ones that work best for me. I know that there have been a few people who said they did nothing. Walking helped me lose a little faster and was good cardio too. I try to walk at least 4 or 5 times a week. When I can I try to swim on the days I don’t walk. I know at first it is difficult to start to exercise, but walk around your home then, down the block a little. When the weather is bad—I live in Oregon and we have a lot of rain, we walk inside the Mall during those times. They open up the Mall at 6:00 am where I live, so you can start early. Buy a used treadmill and see if you like walking on it.

My last words of wisdom are the following

1.     Saying yes means you will do something new, meet someone new most likely and make a difference in your life.

2.    Be true to yourself. It is you, your authentic self, the one you were in the first grade, before you leaned to massage your personality into a form that would suit others.

3.    Sometimes it is hard to hear the message because of all the external voices and they are so loud.

4.    Voices that are loud are always meant to bully. DO NOT BE BULLIED.

5.    So carry your courage in an easily accessible place. Be your OWN authentic person when it comes to Weight Loss Surgery. This is ALL about you and NO one else.

6.    Last you don’t need the approval of the Bully. You know what is right for you, follow your heart and go for it.  

I am always here if you want to ask me more questions, or I didn’t cover something that you are thinking about. I read my E-mail daily.   I know it is a BIG step to take and there are a lot of things to think about, you can and will be success. 

Suzanne

Hi,

What a big step you have made.  Wow, all those feeling are quite normal and we all had the very same one.  Excited and scared all at the same time.  Wanted to have the surgery right away and get started and scared to have the surgery.  So I know exactly how you feel.  Start reading some of the posts and see what people are saying.  Ask me a million questions and I will answer them.  If you want to make a list of questions I will call and talk with you too if you need it.  I am here to support and help walk you through your journey to be healthy and watch you lose the weight. 

Hugs,
Suzanne

What is this book on low-carb cooking? I would love to have one . . . Is it available on Amazon?

Hi,

I am sure you can get it at Amazon.  I got it on QVC because the author was on one of their shows.  He has been on the Food Network too, but I don't think he is on there any more.
Here is the information about the book.
Author:  George Stella
Title:  Still Living Low Carb
Price $24.95
ISBN: 978-0-9846682-0-5

Some really GREAT things to eat and easy to fix

Hugs,
Suzanne

 Starting to think about surgery. I'm afraid that it means eating less, and if I could "just eat less" then I probably wouldn't be sitting here thinking about the surgery. Any and all suggestions, ideas for support, etc. are appreciated.