Newbie from Minnesota

Hi - I'm a newbie, too.  I will post here and on a couple of other forums.  My BMI is 62 and I'm 57 years old.  I am meeting with my surgeon tomorrow and I'm very nervous.  I've done many of the steps, but have lots of fears and concerns.  One is that my husband (BMI 51) is doing it with me, and I worry one or the other of us will have complications at our age.  We are both 57.   But, I think we are both determined to make this life change.

Welcome to the board. I am pretty new myself. I hope you have a great appt tomorrow.

Suzy

Welcome, Mary!  Who is your surgeon?  I'm also in MN. 

My mom had a high BMI and had DS with Dr. Henry Buchwald last fall.  She was 65 at the time and had a very good recovery.  She had awful co-morbidities (sleep apnea, diabetes, cholesterol, BP) and they are all gone now!  Older people can do very well with bariatric surgery.  And Mom and I live together - it's wonderful to have the support of a close family member going through the same thing.  My husband is great but he's naturally an average BMI and just didn't understand the need for surgery.  So having my mom go through it with me was a huge blessing.

I had a BMI of 61 at surgery time and I am at 44 now.  Hoping to get under 30 eventually.  Best of luck to you!

Hi--

I don't post often but I had my lap rny 1 year ago today and my BMI was 64 and I was 53 at the time I had surgery.  There is a WLS for those of us over 50 board which I look at a lot and there are a lot of good people who post on it.

I was nervous when I met with my surgeon on 1/31/08 for the first time.  If you are comfortable with the surgeon, he or she will discuss all of your options with you. 

I had to go thru the 6 month process where I had stress tests, pulmonary tests, blood tests, group nutrition meeting, info seminar, psych eval, etc.  During that process, I found out I had asthma (which I didn't know), sleep apnea (which I suspected but not to the degree it was--I gave up the CPAP 2 months ago), high chloresterol, bad readings for chloresterol, anemia, degenerative disc disease, back pain, knee pain, constant fatigue and a few other things I don't think I can remember. 

I had no really bad issues except for a fever the day I was to be discharged and they couldn't figure out why and it took a little longer to regulate my breathing.

In one year, I went from a BMI of 64 to a BMI of 37, am 180 pounds lighter than my heaviest weight and 160 from surgery, have gone from a Roamans 5X that was starting to get tight to between a 20 and 22 depending on the cut, I don't have to have my seat in my car all the way to the back.  I do not regret this for a minute though at first you have doubts--now the only one I have is that I couldn't have done it sooner in my life.  But even though I hit 1 year, my journey still goes on with the hard part-maintenance.  This will be the first time in my life that I have the tool to help me with that.

Many people our age have had successful surgery.  Check out the WLS over 50 board.  Don't let age be a barrier. 

Best of luck to you.
Sylvia

Oops... I sent one before I wrote anything!  LOL

Just wanted to thank those of you *****sponded.  It is really hard and at my age, thinking about possibly having to have platic surgery doesn't help. 

Anyway, I am moving forward on this journey.  Thanks.

Plastics is something I thnk about but that is a decision further down the road.  It may be that or a lot of Spanx-lol

I am glad you are moving forward.  There may be some bumps but it will be an interesting ride.

Sylvia