This is really bugging me...a rant

I'm seeing more and more posts here and elsewhere of people asking just a week or so out of surgery why they are so tired.

It seems that because the hospital has deemed you fit to go home, that you don't feel you're entitled to additional recovery time. 

THIS IS NOT TRUE, PEOPLE!!!

Your insurance company doesn't want to spend $20k/day to keep you down in the hospital, but really, you need a few weeks of recovery time.  There are a precious few who are back to work and living in a couple of weeks, but the majority of us need a good one or two months before we're back to our old selves.  You need this time to:

• Relax and heal
• Figure out eating
• Drink that darned 64oz of fluids every day
• Get a vitamin routine that works
• Firgure out a bathroom routine

All before you return to work.  If you MUST return to work earlier than you should, then let your family at home know that you are still recovering, and intend to be an invalid the minute you step into the door, so they'd best be chipping in to keep things in order a little longer.

We talk about wls so casually that people are forgetting how big and serious these procedures really are.

kthanxbye

Very true! I see patients all the time try to rush back to normal life. If you had a surgery, and any WLS is not an outpatient procedure, or you have the flu. Take time to rest and let your body use that energy to heal. Otherwise you are stealing that energy.

Yes!!  I think many people are deceived by the tiny laparoscopic incisions (as opposed to the open incisions that some of us had), and don't really think about all the things that were done inside OR think about the fact that their body is trying to heal with almost ZERO nutrition (when it is used to receiving MORE than enough).  

Eating so little, just in and of itself, will cause fatigue!  Combine that with the trauma of not only having the stomach cut (and, for some, having the intestines rearranged), but also having so many organs "traumatized" by being jostled and pulled out of their usual positions, and it is truly major surgery.

Even if my RNY had not been open, I am sure that I would still have been fatigued for a number of weeks.

Lora

But, I had surgery three days ago, and my vacation starts tomorrow. It's been scheduled for months. I shouldn't feel this tired, should I?

I haven't had surgery yet so I have no idea what to expect BUT I know from any other surgery that I've had three days after surgery I was wiped out. You have to remember they went inside your body & made adjustments to your body which has thrown your whole system off rack. So, yes I would three days after surgery you should feel like crap; take your vacation & relax.

LOL

Good one, Grim...and it may be worthy of another post if anyone wants to actually enjoy a vacation instead of sitting there like a bump on a pickle.  Just because the surgeon's office has an opening doesn't mean one has to take it.  I pushed my surgery out six weeks just so I could tie up loose ends so I could take off 8 weeks without anything falling through the cracks.

I did something similar, pushing mine back a couple of months so everything would be smooth while I recovered. But 99 percent of all posts seem to be from folks who expect surgery tomorrow, and don't want to wait for anything.

Thank you for clearing this up because I was becoming afraid again to decide to go through with this surgery. I had been told there will be times at first I will ask myself why the heck did I do this but that to will pass and the payoff at end will be all worth it. Thanks again.  GenieR

Amen sister