Hello Bariatric Buddies!

My Name is Arianne!  I am a 37 year old mother of seven kids( 2 biological; 4 step; one adopted) ranging in ages from 15,15,15, 13,13, 8 and 6!  (Wow, just typing that made me tired! haha)  I am also a registered nurse that works in the NICU here in Portland, Oregon. 

I am scheduled for my RNY on May 31st, 2011 and am anxiously counting down the days!  I am trying to be prepared both mentally, emotionally, spiritually and logistically, so if there are any gems of advice you can give me I will gladly snatch them up!

I am looking forward to making lifelong connections and friendships as we support eachother and encourage eachother to be healthy!

Good luck with your surgery, I just had mine on 4/30/11. It was the best thing I could of did for myself and I would do it again. You will be fine, stay positive!

Welcome to the group.  I have found a lot of support here and I'm sure you will too.  Good luck with your surgery!

Colleen

Welcome! I am an LPN and currently beginning the coursework to get my RN under my belt. Not sure if that makes me crazy or smart to do this..lol. Wow... 3 15 year olds... I don't envy you. That is a tough age.. bless your heart. Ask any questions you may have. I look forward to traveling this journey with you.
As far as gems... i will share with you, what i shared with Rubensgranny in a reply to her. (I am copying and pasting in here to save my fingers some work).

Best advice I can give you is: don't allow yourself to get away from the walking, nor following all of the basic wls rules, because once you get away from it, it can be very difficult to get back on top of things. Make good use of these early weeks and months to establish all of your healthy new lifestyle habits so that once you are 2 years + out, you don't have to fight regain and try to figure out how to get things where they need to be to stay successful in this journey. You are in the perfect place to really get established easily in your new way of life.

I am almost 3 years out. (July 21st will be 3 yrs). I started back to college this past semester and was so busy and distracted, I let myself get sidetracked a little, and gained 10 lbs over the 4 months. I have gotten 5 of the 10 back off now, but it is harder than ever to do now. I KNEW better! But alas I am as human as anyone....support group leader or not. LESSON LEARNED! Don't let yourself learn it the hard way.

Busy life indeed Arianne. Great to see your posts. The end of May is just days away. Keeping you in my thoughts. Hugs